“Seems a mite odd that Lady Marjory did not come with him in the old days when he stayed here,” Thaddeus said, setting the boots aside for cleaning. “Our Mistress Janet should ha’ had a lady here to show her how to go on.”
“Aye, she should have, but Lady Marjory had daughters of her own to raise. I think, too, that she enjoyed life in London more than she would have here.”
“Odd that she did not stay in London, then,” Thaddeus said, taking Hugh’s jack and breeches from him and handing him a clean shirt.
“Aye,” Hugh agreed. He slipped the shirt on and reached for his hose. As he pulled them on, he said no more, not wanting to discuss his aunt further. Thaddeus had served him since boyhood and tended to take liberties in private. Although he had sense enough to show proper respect whenever anyone else was about, Hugh was not eager to make him a gift of his feelings about Lady Marjory.
Thaddeus had turned to the washstand, but as he poured water from the ewer into a basin, the little man shot a look at Hugh from under his bristling eyebrows.
“What?” Hugh said.
“I were just thinking, is all. Now Mistress Janet be away in Scotland, ye might be glad of a lady in the house again.”
“She fusses,” Hugh said.
“Aye, well, she’s kind, is all, and while ’tis true enough that Mistress Janet were not one to fuss, I trow ye’ll no dare to shout at Lady Marjory the way ye did at Mistress Janet.”
“I did not shout at her.”
“Aye, well, have it your way, but ’tis been sorely quiet since she left.”
Hugh could not deny that. He remembered days not long past when maidservants sang and laughed while they went about their work, when the castle had gleamed from the cellars to the ramparts. But the maidservants had departed soon after his sister had gone. Even the ones who only came in daily had stayed away, commanded to do so by husbands or fathers who believed it was unsuitable for them to work in what had perforce become an all-male household.
He had suffered from their departure for only a few weeks, however, before Jock’s Meggie had arrived to take over the cooking and supervise the housekeeping.
Meggie, a widow with five small children, had moved her family into the kitchen quarters at Brackengill rather than go to her own people when Hugh had installed his captain, Ned Rowan, to look after her late husband’s tenant farm. Rowan had a fond eye for Meggie, and Hugh had hoped they might marry, but Meggie had refused.
Hugh was under no illusions about Meggie’s loyalty to him, either. He knew that, having refused to marry Rowan or to go to her parents, and with five children to rear, Meggie had chosen life at Brackengill as her least objectionable alternative. If she was loyal to anyone, it was to his sister, Janet. The only one at Brackengill more loyal to Janet than Meggie was Meggie’s nine-year-old son, Andrew.
With her children underfoot all day, Meggie was not as efficient as Janet had been, but at least she knew her place, and Hugh did not miss his frequent battles with his sister. Growing up alongside him at Brackengill, Janet had shared his lessons simply by demanding of his mild-mannered tutor that she be allowed to do so. Despite the combined efforts of the tutor and Hugh’s uncle Brampton, during his annual visits, to teach her to submit to Hugh’s authority, neither they nor Hugh had succeeded to any extent that he could discern.
Because Janet had taken control of the household when she was little older than Meggie’s Nancy was now, she had come in time to wield her authority as housekeeper as if it were equal to her brother’s authority as master of Brackengill. Her temper was certainly equal to Hugh’s, and their battles had been loud.
It occurred to him that Lady Marjory might well return things to the more comfortable way they had been before, and without the quarreling. She might even prove to be a better housekeeper than Janet.
Perhaps Thaddeus was right and he was judging his aunt too hastily. She was clearly a kind and considerate woman. He could do worse than to let her have the run of Brackengill.
Logic told him that such a city-loving woman would not long be content in Border country, but as long as she wanted to stay, he would be churlish not to welcome her.
Having made this decision, he decided that what had first seemed a penance would soon prove a boon. Then, in a much better mood, he finished dressing and went downstairs, prepared to enjoy his supper and be polite to his new housekeeper.
False Sir John a wooing came
To a maid of beauty fair…
I
T WAS CUSTOMARY ON
evenings when Sir William’s family dined without company, for his daughters to retire soon after supper, so that they could be up and about their duties early each morning. It was not dark yet, however, nor would it be for two more hours, and despite her busy day, Laurie was not the least bit sleepy.
The maidservant Bridget served all three daughters of the household. Since Blanche would keep her occupied for a short time, and since Bridget favored May over Sir William’s other daughters, Laurie knew she might well have a full hour to herself before the maid would come to her.
There was no fire in her fireplace, because Blanche did not approve of wasting wood during the summer months when she believed that fires were not necessary to warm bedchambers other than her own. Laurie’s bed curtains were plain blue damask, decorated only with simple embroidery that she had worked herself at the age of thirteen. The chamber was bleak, but she was used to it.
For a time, she busied herself by taking off her cap and brushing her hair while she gazed out her window and enjoyed the soft breeze that wafted gently in.
The tall, narrow window provided no barrier to the elements, other than the thickness of the wall surrounding it, unless she closed its shutter, and she did that only on those rare occasions when a storm raged outside with such ferocity that it blew rain into the room.
She liked to gaze at the view, which was far more interesting than her bedchamber even when the landscape began to turn golden brown toward the end of summer. The oak trees retained their dark green leaves into the autumn, and now the grass was still green and wildflowers spattered the land with vibrant colors.
Her window faced west, so she could rest her elbows on the stone sill and watch the sun go down, and she was high enough to ignore activity in the bailey below. She would have liked to have a larger window with a cushioned seat like the one in the ladies’ parlor, but since that one faced south, the evening view from it was never as spectacular as hers could be.
Lingering clouds began to turn color before the sun touched the horizon, and soon vivid hues of orange, red, pink, and purple streaked the sky. Dusk would linger after the sun departed, but sunrise would come early, and the dawn’s light always woke her. Therefore, when Bridget came at last to help her undress, Laurie did so quickly. And when Bridget had gone, she climbed into bed, leaving the bed curtains open as she always did, except in the dead of winter when leaving them open meant the risk of waking up to find oneself frozen into an icicle.
She was soon asleep and had been sleeping for some time when a small hand touched her bare arm and startled her awake. Moonlight through the window cast a faint halo around Isabel’s slight figure and gilded her long hair where it fanned out from her little nightcap.
Laurie sat up. “Isabel, what is it?”
Bursting into tears, Isabel flung herself into Laurie’s arms. “Oh, Laurie, I don’t know what I should do!”
“Hush now,” Laurie said, shifting a little and helping the child climb into her bed. Plumping pillows, she drew the coverlet over them both. “Here,” she said, “snuggle close and tell me what’s wrong. Did you have a bad dream?”
“Nay, I have not slept at all.” Sniffling, she wiped her eyes with the sleeve of her bedgown. “Mama will be so angry!”
“She will not be angry with you, love,” Laurie said, giving her a squeeze. “Come now, what can you have done that is so terrible?”
“May is gone, and I did not tell.”
“What?” Laurie sat up straighter. “You must be mistaken. May would not go anywhere after dark. She would be too frightened.”
“Nay, but she did, and Bridget went with her. Mama told Bridget she could not go to her family till her usual day out, and she was crying and crying. Then May told her she could go to them if she would help May go out, too.”
“But, why? May has no reason to slip out. Not only is it dangerous, but she usually takes more care to avoid trouble with your mother. Why would she go?”
“Because she is in love,” Isabel said, heaving a deep sigh.
“Don’t be daft, Isabel. May does not know any gentlemen other than our father’s friends and acquaintances. Where would she find one to fall in love with?”
“She found him in Tarras Wood,” Isabel said. “His name is Sir John. I do not recall his surname, if she told me. She met him about a fortnight ago, and she has been able to think of nothing and no one else since.”
“But how did she meet him?”
“She was trying to follow you one day, to see where you went. It was all my fault,” Isabel added guiltily. “I told her that I thought you were brave to ride out alone as you do, and she said she was just as brave as you are. To prove it, she ordered her pony saddled and rode straight out the gate. No one stopped her. I think she must have done it other times, too.”
“But did your mama not find out May left?”
“Nay, for the servants did not tell her, and that day she had ridden with our father to Broadhaugh. He wanted to talk to Sir Quinton, and she went along to cultivate Lady Scott’s acquaintance, she said.”
“Godamercy, child, you hear a good deal, do you not?”
“Aye, for no one pays me much heed unless it is to correct my grammar or tell me that I should be minding my lessons. But Mama gives us our lessons, and she had explained to me why she would not be doing so that day. I told May, and that was when she decided to ride out.”
“What else do you know?”
“Well, Sir John is a man of wealth, for he has two castles in England—”
“England!”
“Aye, and in England a man can marry a maid without her father’s permission, May said. He need only persuade a parson to perform the ceremony. And if a maid has a proper dowry, Sir John said, the thing is arranged in a trice.”
“But May has no dowry. At least, she will have none if she runs away to England,” Laurie pointed out.
“But she said she is taking her dowry with her!”
“What can you mean, child? She has nothing to take.”
“Nay, but our father has much in his coffers, does he not? And Mama has jewelry that she said she will give to May when she marries. So May is taking some jewelry and what gold Sir John said would be suitable from our father’s coffers.”
Stunned to speechless dismay by Isabel’s artless revelation, Laurie sought for something sensible to say, and failed.
In a voice even smaller than before, Isabel said, “Are you dreadfully vexed, Laurie? I know that it was wrong not to tell Mama at once, but May made me promise that I would not tell her at all.”
Weakly, and not expecting any answer, Laurie said, “What demon can have possessed her to do such a thing?”
“Well, May said it was all your fault.”
“Mine?”
“Aye, for she said that she is ripe for marriage, that she has been old enough to marry for nearly two years. Since she can never marry till you do, and since you never will, she said that she had decided to take matters into her own hands.”
“What makes her think that I never will marry?”
“She says that you hate men. Do you hate them, Laurie? I think that some men are rather nice.”
Taking a deep breath, Laurie said, “I do not hate men, Isabel. I do not even dislike them. I just have never met one with whom I can imagine spending the rest of my life. If I ever do meet such a man—one to whom I can talk the way I talk to our father or to Davy Elliot—perhaps it will be different. But most of the marriageable men I have met behave as if they think they are grander than God.”
“Laurie, that is blasphemy!”
“I know, but they do act so. I’ll tell you a secret, though. I would like to meet Rabbie Redcloak. I believe I would like him very well.”
“But he is a made-up man, Mama says.”
“Aye, I know she does. Look, Isabel, are you certain that May has already left Aylewood?”
“She crept out of our bedchamber a long while ago. I do not know when, exactly, but I have been lying there so long that I thought the sun must be coming up soon. I was afraid to face Mama, so I came to find you.”
“It is hard to tell the hour when the moon is bright, but let me look.”
Laurie got out of bed and went to the window. “I don’t believe it is as late as you think it is,” she said, peering out. “The stars move during the night, you see, and although they move slowly, they seem scarcely to have moved at all since I went to bed. It may be close to midnight, but I doubt it is later than that. Are you truly certain that May and Bridget have left the castle?”
“I think so.”
“Surely someone would stop them,” Laurie said.
“All I know is that May said she had it all fixed. I think that she must have planned this carefully, Laurie. She told Bridget that she would help her because it meant that she would have company at least as far as Tarras Moss.”
“Godamercy, has she actually arranged to meet this man, then?”
“Aye, she has. He promised to wait for her tonight, and he told her not to fear our father because he would take her far beyond his reach—and beyond Mama’s reach, too.”
“Did May say where she is to meet him?”
“Nay, but she must have been planning to ride toward Tarras Moss. She said that Bridget could ride with her that far if only she would say—if anyone dared to challenge them—that May was her sister, come to fetch her home. I don’t know who would believe that, though, because everyone here knows May.”
“She must have disguised herself somehow,” Laurie said. She thought swiftly. “Perhaps I can still find them before it’s too late. If May meant to collect her dowry, surely she also took time to pack some clothing, and she will not be able to move fast. She is not an intrepid rider, and she will have Bridget up with her.”