Dalziel sighed. “Nothing, I’m afraid. Her name wasn’t in any of the police files. There was a census taken a few years back. I may find something there.”
They went back and forth, Gavin asking questions as they occurred to him, but Dalziel had very little to add to what he’d already told him.
“You’ve done well,” Gavin said, getting up, and was once again arrested by the change in the other man. Dalziel positively glowed.
After leaving Dalziel, Gavin took a turn around the small courtyard at the back of the hotel. The Regent was not what he was used to—its rooms were cramped, the meals were plain Scottish fare, and the courtyard was too small to allow a man to stretch his legs. With the beach only a short walk away, the small courtyard hardly mattered.
Just thinking about the beach had his muscles bunch in knots. His eyes were only off her for a few moments, and when he looked up, she had disappeared. His reaction was hardly rational. It brought Alice forcefully to mind, when she’d jumped overboard and sunk like a stone. The shock, the fear, the desperate attempt to save her had proved futile. He wasn’t going to allow Kate to go the way of Alice.
He winced when he remembered how he’d come at her like an angry bear. One day, he would explain why he’d been so angry. One day, he would tell her about Alice. Meantime, he had a sacred promise to his granny to keep.
Their practice session had gone as he’d expected. Just getting Kate’s compliance was a major undertaking, but she’d finally agreed to participate. Nothing much had happened on the beach, but when she was in the bathtub . . .
Those were her thoughts he’d absorbed. Kate wanted his lips on her, his hands on her, so he had complied, and how like Kate, when she was found out, to put the blame on him.
“My arousal is nothing more than a reaction to the cold.”
Had he said that? It was a lie, of course. His arousal was a reaction to a woman who was fast becoming an obsession with him. Damned if he knew what her attraction was! Another lie!
One corner of his mouth turned up in a crooked smile. His granny had started something with her prophecy, but now his goal had taken a surprising turn.
Whistling under his breath, he entered the hotel.
When he got to their room, Kate was not there, but her maid, Elsie, was unpacking a trunk of clothes and hanging them in the wardrobe.
“Oh, Mr. Hepburn, sir,” she said, dipping him a curtsy, “I was to tell you that Miss Kate has gone downstairs with her cousins for a bite to eat.”
“And when did you get here, Elsie? I thought you went home to Braemar.” If Kate was with her cousins, he had nothing to worry about.
The maid pointed to the trunk. “I arrived an hour or two ago with Miss . . . I mean, Mrs. Hepburn’s things. It was all arranged before the family came up to town. There are a few things I want to press, but I’m finished here. May I go?”
Gavin nodded. “Please do.”
It was only idle curiosity that made him open the wardrobe doors and inspect his wife’s garments. Though every piece of clothing was perfectly tailored, Kate’s choice of colors left him bemused: brown, dark blues, and various shades of gray. These were not the colors he would choose to dress her in. These were not the kind of garments she’d been wearing since the night he’d met her at Juliet’s reception. Everything he’d seen her in was borrowed, and she had shown her borrowed finery off to good effect. The clothes in this wardrobe belonged to a dowd.
The thought turned in his mind as he went downstairs to join her.
Eighteen
The funeral service for Dr. Rankin was solemn and comforting but not personal. Kate did not think that the minister could have known the doctor very well. He spoke of Will’s dedication to his work and his tireless efforts to improve the lives of the working poor, but he made no mention of his treatment of his mentally disturbed patients, and she wondered if the omission was deliberate. By and large, ministers and priests distrusted psychiaters and all they stood for.
The sanctuary was standing room only, but class distinctions were still in evidence. The working poor had chosen to crowd into the back of the sanctuary, while the well-heeled, fashionable mourners sat at the front, close to the communion table. Internment would take place later that week in Braemar, in the family plot.
As she looked around the mourners who sat in the nearest pews, she realized that she knew most of them from Juliet’s wedding reception. Dr. Rankin had no family, and Gavin and Dalziel were his chief mourners, along with Dr. Taggart from the clinic. But Dr. Taggart would not be attending the reception that was to take place at the hotel. His work at the clinic took precedence over everything. As for the working poor, it was the same story. As soon as the service was over, they would go back to work so that their families would not go hungry.
When the mourners left the church and stood outside on the broad stone staircase, waiting for the usual complement of carriages and dark horses with their funeral plumes, Gavin broke the silence that had fallen between them.
“Will wasn’t in that building. Will was an outdoors man. When I think of him, I see him fishing for salmon in the river Feugh.”
She smiled faintly. “I was thinking along the same lines, only I saw him with his sleeves rolled up, checking on every patient in his clinic. What will happen to it now? Money was always a problem, but Dr. Rankin had backers who believed in him personally. With him gone . . .” She shook her head.
“We’ll think of something,” he said.
They were interrupted by Sally Anderson, who still managed to look like a Viking, though she was dressed from head to toe in black. “Kate, Gavin, I don’t believe you’ve met my fiancé, Cedric,” she said. “He read Dr. Rankin’s obituary in the newspapers and came to lend his support.”
“Cedric Hayes,” said the man at her side. “I’m sorry that we’re meeting under such unfortunate circumstances.”
“I’m Gavin Hepburn,” said Gavin, “and this is my wife, Kate, formerly Kate Cameron.”
Kate managed to keep her expression neutral, though she was still shocked when anyone referred to her as Gavin’s wife. Soon, the charade would end, and she wondered what people would call her then.
The conversation had moved to the doctor’s work at the clinic, so she had time to study Cedric at leisure. He wasn’t what she expected. He was attractive enough if one was partial to Greek statues. He was more than handsome, but there was an air of pride about him that marked him out as a man who knew his own worth.
“Stuffy,” was Gavin’s verdict when they climbed into the carriage they shared with Magda and Dalziel. “What does your friend see in him?”
“A marriage made in heaven,” Kate replied. “That’s how Sally describes it. Cedric will bring a title into the family, and she will bring him a fortune. Then they will be free to go their separate ways.”
Magda said darkly, “Sally is a fool if she believes that. A woman is never free to go her own way. Even in these enlightened times, there is some man who has her in leading strings.”
Kate made no reply, but she guessed that Magda had been warned by their father to be on her best behavior. Their father wouldn’t know what to do with leading strings and had certainly never played the heavy-handed role. She slanted a look at Gavin.
He spoke to Magda. “In my experience, it’s the other way round. It’s women who keep their menfolk in leading strings. What do you say, Dalziel?”
Dalziel, however, was too tactful to contradict a lady, and he answered in such a roundabout way that no one knew what he thought.
The gravity of the occasion soon gave way to a livelier atmosphere and, in Kate’s opinion, did not have the feel of a wake at all. There were medical students from Woolmanhill, and their descriptions of Rankin’s caustic remarks when some unfortunate student fainted at the sight of blood had everyone laughing.
Kate, naturally, took a great deal of ribbing from her friends.
“I thought,” said Lorna Dare, “that you would never marry. Not that any of us believed you. But so soon after you’d met! What came over you, Kate? You know the man’s reputation. What were you thinking?”
Kate gave a start when Magda’s voice came from over her shoulder. “Who told you that Kate and Gavin had just met?”
Lorna shrugged. “It’s common knowledge.”
“Then common knowledge is an ass.” The haughty tone of Magda’s rebuke made Lorna’s cheeks burn. Magda went on, “Our family and Gavin’s have known each other for ages,” and with a dismissive sweep of her lashes, she wandered off.
That was one thing Kate liked about her family. They might bicker in private, but they never criticized each other to outsiders.
For the next little while, she was flanked by Hamish and Rory. They hadn’t known Dr. Rankin well, and the gist of their conversation centered on the pretty young women in attendance, those who looked susceptible and those who did not.
“Try to remember,” Kate said between her teeth, “that you are gentlemen, and this is a serious affair.”
“It doesn’t feel serious,” said Hamish. “It feels more like a party.”
It
did
feel like a party, thought Kate, and just the sort of affair that Will Rankin would want to celebrate his life. She looked over at Gavin. He turned his head, and their eyes met. A slow smile curled his lips.
Yes
was the message that came to her.
She was taken aback. Had he read her mind? Had she read his? If she didn’t watch herself, she’d soon be as weird as he.
She was only half aware that her cousins had defected. When she came to herself, she was partnered by Mrs. Cardno. This was intolerable! She wasn’t a little girl in need of a nurse. She knew how to take care of herself. And what harm would come to her surrounded by Will’s friends and coworkers?
She had, however, misjudged Mrs. Cardno. She hadn’t come to watch over her but to invite her to a little séance among friends, who were to meet in Mrs. Cardno’s room in about ten minutes.
“A séance,” Kate stuttered. She was definitely mixing with the wrong crowd. “I’d love to, except that Gavin wants me to act as his hostess.”
Mrs. Cardno patted her hand. “Some other time,” she said. “I would ask Magda, but I don’t want to spoil her budding romance with Mr. Dalziel,” and with that, she collected the ladies from Mrs. Hunter’s guesthouse and trooped off.
Dalziel and Magda? Kate almost laughed. Magda had turned down the best in the valley. She wouldn’t look twice at a plain sobersides like Dalziel. She wished that old biddies like Mrs. Cardno would mind their own business.
Gavin joined her next. “I’m sorry I had to leave you alone,” he said, “but there were so many people who wanted to convey their condolences and talk about Will.”
“That’s understandable. I’m not complaining, really.”
“What did Mrs. Cardno want?”
“She invited me to a séance.”
“She
what
?” He lowered his voice. “You’re not going to tell me that you believe in that mummery?”
“Certainly not, any more than I believe in sorcerers and witches.”
Someone called him by name. “I have to mingle,” he said. “Can I trust you to be on your best behavior, or should I manacle you to my wrist?”
“So Magda was right! You men do want to put us in leading strings!”
“It was only a figure of speech, an exaggeration to drive home my point.”
She rolled her eyes. “Hepburn,” she said, “I’m well able to take care of myself.” She gestured with one hand. “What could anyone do with all these witnesses around? Honestly, Gavin, I don’t need a bodyguard. Go and mingle.”
He relaxed and smiled the smile that never failed to turn her insides to pudding. “Just see that you don’t leave this room, and don’t talk to strangers.”
“Yes, Papa!” she replied. “Now go. You are the chief mourner, after all.”
After that exchange, she helped herself to the scrumptious delicacies that were laid out for the guests. This feast, she reflected, could not possibly have come from the hotel’s kitchens. Since she knew that Gavin was paying the shot, she deduced that he’d sent in his own caterers to do the job.
She found a quiet nook in a corner and savored each bite. She had finished the crispy ginger shrimps and was beginning on the tiny pork fritters when she was joined by Gordon Massey. She couldn’t hide her surprise.
“I had no idea,” she said, “that you knew Dr. Rankin.”
“We were at school together.” He leaned toward her. “Will Rankin spent his early years in Edinburgh, though Aberdonians prefer to forget that fact and claim him as one of their own.”
She smiled as she was meant to. “Are your parents here, too?”
“Ah, no. They’re settled in a snug little cottage in Braemar and are still trying to trace relatives they have lost touch with over the years.” He was gazing down at his plate of appetizers, his fingers hovering over one, then another. He looked up with a smile. “Your father,” he said, “certainly knows his history. The debate between him and Miss Anderson’s fiancé was becoming too hot for my comfort.”