Deirdre was intrigued. “Is he Irish?”
Darragh loosed a guffaw. “Is he a man, you might as well ask!”
“Well, I am asking,” she persisted.
Conall leaned forward, his eyes moving from his brother to his father and back. “I thought we agreed to ask Da first.”
Darragh grinned. “Curse you for a timid soul, Conall. There’s no harm in a visit.”
Lord Fitzgerald put down his fork, his sharp eyes watching Darragh. “Who is it ye invite that yer brother quibbles at the thought?”
Darragh leaned back in his chair and folded his arms across his chest. “What name have the dispatches from Italy been full of lately?”
“Dillon!” Deirdre responded instantly.
“Burke!” Lady Elva offered more slowly.
“Do you read nothing but the generals’ names?” Darragh said disapprovingly. “There’s many a brave man whose memory goes wanting, if that’s true. Think again, what name keeps returning to the roster of battles won and honors received? He’s not a great noble such as Dillon or Burke. Some say he was spawned by the Devil himself. He certainly fights the like. ’Tis not for his piety that some men call him the Avenging Angel.”
“MacShane!” Lord Fitzgerald rose so suddenly that he nearly overset his chair. “Ye’ve invited MacShane here? Without my permission?”
Lady Elva was on her feet instantly, forcing her sons to
rise with her. “My lord, please!” She turned to her stepsons. “What have you done? Who is this man? Och, never mind. You will simply withdraw the invitation.” She looked pleadingly at first one, then the other. “If he’s not due to arrive before the end of the week, there’s time to ride out and meet him. Offer him some excuse that will save him embarrassment. You’ll do that, will you not?”
Darragh crossed his arms, his eyes hard on his father’s face. “’Twas time you told us, Da, why you hold MacShane in such disdain when the soldiers of the Wild Geese consider him the pride of the brigade. What is between you?”
Lord Fitzgerald shook his head. “He’s nae welcome in me home. That’s an end to it.”
“But why, Da?” Deirdre questioned, her curiosity piqued beyond containing. “Did this MacShane insult you?”
A muscle twitched in Lord Fitzgerald’s lower jaw as he looked at his daughter. “This is no business of yers, lass. Go to yer room at once.”
“Da!” Deirdre cried, stung by his reprimand.
“Why do you not tell the lass the story you told Conall and me?” Darragh suggested.
“Aye, I’d like to know why you would deny hospitality to a famous soldier, and an Irishman at that,” Deirdre declared.
Lord Fitzgerald turned a savage look on his daughter. “Ye’d like to know, would ye? And who, I’m wondering, gave ye the right to question yer father?” He reached for his cane and waved it menacingly. “Go to yer room! Go at once, before I send ye back to the Ursulines!”
Conall’s hand closed over Deirdre’s elbow. “Come, lass.”
“Aye, go, Deirdre,” Lady Elva encouraged. “I will send Brigid to you with tea.”
“Ye’ll do no such!” Lord Fitzgerald roared. “As for ye, lass,” he continued, pointing his cane at Deirdre, who stubbornly held her ground, “ye’ll leave my sight this minute or I shall damage more than yer pride!”
Deirdre flinched at his barrage of words but she did not flee. “I will go, Da, but I think you’ve been entirely
unfair!” With an accompanying swish of her skirts, she turned and marched from the room with Conall at her elbow.
Lord Fitzgerald reseated himself when his son and daughter were gone and swallowed his glass of claret, struggling to control his temper. When he looked across at his wife’s white face he knew he had acted badly, but the name MacShane had startled him. He smiled reassuringly at her. “Ye’re much too lenient with the lass. She’s been so long among the arrogant French that she thinks she’s become one of them. A night without a meal will not damage her overly.”
*
Deirdre allowed Conall to steer her up the stairs but she was far from cowed. When they reached the second floor she came to a halt, all but tripping her brother. “Da’s never, ever threatened me before!” She turned to Conall and, blinking back tears of hurt, demanded, “Who is this MacShane?”
Conall scowled and put a finger to his lips. After a brief glance back down the hallway, he beckoned her toward his room.
The doors of his apartment opened onto a magnitude of disarray that appeared to have been weeks in the making but had been achieved in the few hours since his return. Two huge trunks stood open in the center of the room, spilling their contents of clothing and papers over the furnishings and floor.
Ignoring the disorder, Deirdre lifted a map from a suspicious pile and discovered a chair.
Conall hurried over to lift the remainder of the chair’s contents and then waved his sister into the seat.
“Who is this MacShane?” Deirdre demanded impatiently. “And why did you invite him here, knowing Da’s feelings?”
“Patience, lass.” Conall seated himself after unearthing a second chair Instead of speaking, he braced his elbow
on his knee, dropped his chin into his hand,and stared off into space.
In an effort to control her curiosity, Deirdre drove her fingernails deep into the palms of her hands. “MacShane?” she prompted when she could no longer bear Conall’s silence.
Suddenly he smiled and the corners of his eyes crinkled in a pattern exactly like his father’s. “I should have known any hint of mystery would whet your appetite. MacShane always turns the lasses’ heads, though he does not seem to hold them in so high a regard.”
“He does not like women?”
Conall gave her a disapproving glance. “’Tis unladylike of you to inquire, lass. But, as you did ask, he’s a man, as much as any.” A teasing smile lifted his mouth. “Whose business is it, I say, if he chooses to deny himself the more tender pleasures? I suspect ’tis his convent upbringing which formed his character.”
“Convent?” Deirdre replied in surprise.
“Aye, convent.” Conall shrugged nonchalantly but his gaze never left his sister’s face. “Some say he’s the misbegotten child of a nun, but I know for a fact that his mother had simply retired to a French convent before his birth.”
“He’s French?”
“Nae. MacShane’s blood is as Irish as his name. His mother came as a widow to France and birthed her son inside convent walls before taking the veil. The lad was reared in a monastery.” Conall looked away with a sly smile. “A priest, that’s what he was meant to be.”
Deirdre waited five seconds before saying, “Until…?”
“Until that idiot William of Orange invaded Ireland,” Conall finished. “’Twas enough insult to raise dead clansmen from their graves. ’Tis not surprising that righteous anger sprang a courageous lad from the confines of monastery walls to defend his land.”
“A warrior priest,” Deirdre said wondrously.
“A damn fool lad with no schooling in the ways of war and less sense than heart, that’s what Da called him—them.” Conall glanced nervously at his sister. He had
nearly given away more than he intended, but Deirdre seemed not to notice. “There were many green lads running amok in ninety-one,” he added. “They were the first to run into the thick of battle and the first to die. Da said ’twas bad for morale—green lads bleeding their life’s blood at your feet while a man was trying to separate an enemy’s head from his shoulders.”
“Not to mention the strain it put on the poor lads,” Deirdre added, then flushed at the callousness of her statement. She shook her head in bewilderment. “Even if what you say is so, it does not explain Da’s dislike of MacShane now. MacShane is a skillful soldier, if the dispatches are to be believed.”
Conall nodded, satisfied that his sister’s reasoning was as sound as his own. “Da is a man with a long memory. Perhaps you will better understand Da’s feelings when I tell you that MacShane once saved Da from the maw of death.”
“MacShane did that? When?”
“Oh, ’twas little more than a month before a land mine took Da’s leg. Our regiment was caught in a crossfire. Da had ordered the lads to fight their way through when enemy fire cut us off. MacShane’s regiment had been fighting beyond the hill. Suddenly, he was amidst us, and his quick action brought Da down before a cannonball could take his head off. A rare scolding Da gave the lad, too, for the impertinence.”
Deirdre stood up. “I should have known you would not tell me the truth.”
“Sit down, Dee, or I’ll be forced to stand; and, God’s truth, missing me dinner is all the gallantry I’m in a mood to serve you this day.”
Deirdre’s anger dissolved. “Oh, Conall, I forgot about your dinner!”
He caught her by the waist and brought her to sit on his left knee. “I like contrition in you, lass. ’Tis as becoming as your anger.”
Deirdre lifted her chin haughtily but the dimple in her left cheek appeared. “You’re entirely too arrogant, brother, and if you will not tell me the truth, I will seek out Darragh. He will answer my questions.”
“I have not lied to you,” Conall replied. “Da’s dislike of MacShane is as much a mystery to me as it is to you. ’Twas like he’d seen a ghost when MacShane appeared in the thick of battle. If there were words between them, I did not hear them. Da would not discuss it, nor would he thank MacShane for saving his life… Since then, Darragh and I have fought beside MacShane, yet he’s said nothing of the incident. It does make a man curious.”
“’Tis hard to believe that an untrained lad has made so grand a name for himself in the brigade.”
“Well now, lass, MacShane is not a lad any longer,” Conall replied, a new look in his eye. “As for untrained, you’d not think him born for anything else were you to see him in battle. I’ve seen him and he’s a beauteous thing to behold. Fierce and ugly, without mercy and without fear, ’tis a superb fighting animal he is. Och, for the days when men stood shoulder to shoulder in battle with nothing between them and the enemy but the swing of their axes!”
“I should think it rather windy for such immodest display,” Deirdre replied, remembering stories told to her of how their Gaelic ancestors had fought in the nude. “Do not tell me MacShane shames his enemies in like manner?”
Conall’s chuckle rumbled through his chest before it reached his lips. “The lassies would nae mind, would they, Dee?”
Deirdre hid her face in his shoulder, glad that he could not see her blush. “So, the man’s a brute, and ugly as sin. ’Twould seem there’s little to interest me in his visit.”
“Aye, there’s little in MacShane that would interest a convent-reared mademoiselle. He’d frighten you to death. Eyes like flame, he has, twin fires of blue-white light that seem to illuminate a man’s soul. He’s a man more men would measure themselves against if they did nae fear they’d be found wanting.”
Deirdre lifted her head. “You sound as though you admire him.”
Conall nodded. “Aye.”
Deirdre regarded her brother for a moment, reading the
truth of his answer in his eyes. It surprised her. Conall and Darragh held few things in esteem besides their family and their faith. MacShane must be extraordinary to so charm two seasoned soldiers. “So. When may we expect this warrior paragon?”
“Not later than Friday.”
“Then he will be here for Cousin Claude’s soiree,” Deirdre mused. “What will you say to Da? Will he change his mind about MacShane’s visit?”
Conall’s ruddy face became serious. “Da’s ailing. Could be his candle’s burned low. No, hear the truth, Dee,” he counseled as Deirdre opened her mouth to protest.
“It grieves me to see the old man hobbling about like a three-legged dog. Truth, I believe he would rather have died than be left behind each time Darragh and I return to battle. He’s a warrior and should have died as such.”
Conall paused and smiled suddenly. “Yet, the good Lord’s left him here these many months to torment his children, and so we deserve! Still, there comes a time when a man should put his house in order, and so it is with Da. He will see MacShane. And whatever there is between them will be resolved.”
Deirdre did not reply because there was nothing she could add. Her father was ill, his strength ebbing. She knew it as did her brothers. She only hoped that Lady Elva might linger a little longer in happy ignorance of the fact. “’Tis up to us to make him comfortable,” she said mostly to herself.
She rose from her brother’s knee and surveyed the room’s disorder. “Where’s Gildea?”
“Gildea, damn his black heart, has deserted me!”
“Poor Gildea,” Deirdre murmured sympathetically, for she knew her brother’s valet was rarely in the wrong when the two of them had been quarreling. “What has the poor man done this time that made you leave him behind?”
“I? Leave him? Never! Oh, the cunning of the idler. He deserted me, he did, and for a Parisian flirt of doubtful parentage!”
Deirdre’s eyes lit up. “Gildea’s in love?”
“Wedded and bedded!” Conall eyed his sister with a
jaded expression. “Truth, I thought you had him so tightly rolled up in your skirts that the lad would rather slit his throat than look at another colleen.”
Deirdre made a face. “That’s no pretty thing you say about me.”
Conall chuckled. “When you always rise to the bait, how can I resist?” He glanced about the room as though seeing it for the first time, and his gaze was sheepish as he looked up at Deirdre. “Perhaps one of the maids could…”
“Lady Elva will have none of that, not with your reputation with servant girls,” Deirdre answered. “I will send up one of the footmen to look after you.”