Enlightened (11 page)

“Probably not,” Murdo agreed merrily, adding, “Did you enjoy your bath? You look as though you did. You’re all pink-cheeked and shiny.”

“The bath was wonderful,” David assured him gravely. “I stayed in so long my fingers were like prunes when I got out.”

“Me too.” Murdo grinned. “And I have high hopes for dinner. The food doesn’t smell half-bad.”

As though he’d heard them—and perhaps he had—Foster chose that moment to enter, bearing a basket of new-baked bread in one hand and a dish of butter in the other.

“Good evening, my lord,” he said with a deep bow to Murdo. He looked odd, bowing like that with the basket and butter dish still in his hands. He turned to offer a smaller bow to David. “Sir.”

David nodded and murmured a “good evening” of his own, but it was lost as Murdo bit out angrily, “I thought you said this was a
private
parlour?”

The innkeeper blanched, freezing in the midst of straightening from his bow. “I beg your pardon, my lord?”

“You damn well ought to!” Murdo continued. “Haven’t you heard of knocking before you enter a private room?”

David swallowed, suddenly mortified. Could Murdo make it any more obvious that they craved privacy? Then he dismissed his own thoughts impatiently. Murdo was right. It
was
meant to be a private parlour, and Foster wouldn’t necessarily assume that, just because his male guests wanted privacy, they wanted one another. They could simply be discussing private business.

“Well?” Murdo snapped.

“Please accept my apologies, my lord,” Foster stammered. “I forgot myself for a moment. It won’t happen again.”

It didn’t. Foster stayed away after that, and the nervous young serving maid he sent in his place nearly knocked the door down each time she brought a new dish, her hands shaking as she laid the rattling crockery down. Murdo was polite to her, though. Gentle even.

There was a bit of a disaster when she brought the gravy. She was balancing too many things, and the sauce boat overturned, upsetting its contents all over the white tablecloth.

“Oh no!” she gasped. “Mr. Foster’ll have me guts for garters!”

Flushing scarlet, she began trying to wipe up the mess with her apron.

Murdo put a hand on her arm to still her. “What’s your name, girl?”

“Peggy, m’lor’,” she said, looking at him obediently, though her anxious gaze flitted back to the table.

“Right then, Peggy,” Murdo said firmly. “Go back to the kitchen and tell Mr. Foster that His Lordship overturned the gravy boat, and now he wants a fresh tablecloth brought and this one burned. And the cost is to be added to my bill, if you please.” He said it all in his most supercilious tone, giving the girl the right words to parrot to her master, then he smiled his most coaxing smile. “Do you have that?”

She stared at him, eyes wide, and repeated what he said. Twice through, at Murdo’s insistence. When he was satisfied, he released her, and she scurried away.

Once she was gone, Murdo turned to David. “What?” he said. “Why are you looking at me like that?”

“That was kind,” David said simply, then he chuckled. “And not a little devious.”

“Devious?” Murdo’s tone was outraged, but his expression was amused, the winsome dimple that David loved making a rare appearance.

“I wouldn’t have approached it like that. I’d have spoken to Foster on her behalf instead.” David paused, then admitted, “I’d probably have made it worse for her.”

Murdo chuckled. “Honest to a fault, that’s you.”

David chuckled too, ruefully. “That’s what my mother’s always said about me.”

“You’re direct,” Murdo said. “Uncompromising.”

“You think me inflexible,” David accused without heat.

Murdo inclined his head. “At times. Sometimes I hesitate to tell you things because—” He stopped, his gaze suddenly troubled.

“Because what?”

“You’re very black-and-white about everything. I’ve never met anyone who has such a strong sense of right and wrong.”

David considered that echo of Chalmers’s words from a few days before. “I’m not sure that’s true,” he said, frowning. “I struggle more than anyone I know with what’s right and wrong.”

“That’s just it, though,” Murdo said. “Most people don’t worry about it all that much. Most people are adept at convincing themselves that what they want—what suits them—is right. Or at least, that it isn’t really wrong.” He smiled. “
I’m
adept at that.”

David sipped his ale. “I really don’t think I’m as principled as you imagine,” he said at last. “Over the last year or two, my views on certain things have altered significantly—in ways that have suited me very well.”

Murdo’s gaze gentled. “If you’re talking about us, I know you didn’t alter your view without a struggle. In fact, I know you still struggle with it, still question yourself.” He paused, then added, “I know that, even now, when you give yourself to me, you hold a part of yourself back.”

David’s heart clenched at that, and at that bleak look in the other man’s eyes. What Murdo said was true, but he hadn’t realised Murdo knew it.

“I feel as though—” Murdo began, then stopped, seeming to debate with himself whether to continue. When he started up again, his tone was careful. “I feel as though we’re fighting over that part of you. I want you to give it up, give it to me. But you’re still not convinced that what we have together is—right. And I don’t know what I can do to convince you.”

“Murdo—”

The knock at the door was different this time, harder, with a flourishing rhythm at the end,
tat-tat-te-tat-tat
.

They glanced at one another, both frustrated by the interruption. “Come in,” Murdo called out.

It was Foster this time, with Peggy trailing behind him, a clean tablecloth over her arm and a miserable expression on her plump face.

“Your Lordship requested a clean tablecloth?” Foster said with unctuous smile.

Murdo gave the little man a long look, before he confirmed. “I did,” he said. “And that you proceed to burn this one, if you please.” He flicked a disdainful finger at the stained one.

“Of course,” Foster assured him, and began to remove the silverware from the table before adding casually, “I must apologise for Peggy’s clumsiness.”

He had guessed it was the girl, David realised, and had come to prod out the truth.

He had made a grave error.

“I
beg
your pardon?” Murdo’s incredulous voice was pure ice.

Foster stilled in what he was doing and looked up. Seeing the expression on Murdo’s face, he swallowed hard.

“What
exactly
do you mean by that comment?” Murdo demanded.

“I was merely apologising, my lord,” Foster said, licking his lips nervously. “I’ve no doubt the girl caused you to spill the gravy, and I wanted to assure you—”

“What did she tell you?” Murdo demanded.

It was plain that Foster took Murdo’s swift question as evidence that his suspicions were warranted—his eyes gleamed with triumph. “Merely that, my lord. That you spilled the gravy and wanted a new tablecloth.”

“And to add the cost of the ruined one to my bill?”

“Yes.”

“Then why are you bothering me?”
Murdo roared at him, eyes flashing and nostrils flaring with temper.

Foster quaked in the face of Murdo’s impressive anger, while Peggy, who stood behind the innkeeper, looked at the floor, biting her lip against a tiny smile.

“Perhaps,” Murdo went on, “you think to chide
me
for my clumsiness? Is that it? Are these apologies a backhanded way of giving me a scold?”

“No! No, my lord! I would not presume to criticise!” the innkeeper babbled.

“I’ve already said I’ll pay for a new tablecloth. Is that not enough for you?”

“My lord, it is most
generous
,” Foster went on, his expression growing more horrified by the second. “I did not intend to suggest that your spilling gravy was in any way careless.”

Murdo waved him away impatiently. “Enough of this. Pray, leave us.” He gestured to Peggy. “And you, girl, attend to the table, if you please.” Then, entirely ignoring Foster, he turned to David and began to talk about, of all things, horses.

Foster slunk away, while Peggy began to clear the remaining dishes to the sideboard. Once the door had closed behind Foster and a minute or two had passed, Murdo turned to the girl again.

“He didn’t believe you, I take it?”

She shook her head miserably. “I’m always in trouble with ’im. Always getting me wages docked.”

“You should find yourself a new position.”

“I’m saving to get married. Just another year and I’ll be away.”

“Is that so?”

Murdo dug into his pocket and brought out a leather purse, beckoning the girl over. Peggy approached apprehensively.

“Put out your hand,” he said.

She opened her hand, and he counted five guineas out into her plump palm.

The girl stared at the gold in her hand, and her other hand crept up to cover her mouth. Tears welled in her eyes. “Oh, sir,” she whispered. Then she looked up, horrified. “I mean, my lord!”

“Put it safely away, somewhere that odious little man won’t find it. We don’t want him to accuse you of stealing, do we? And here—” He drew out one of his cards and handed it to her. “That has my name and direction on it, just in case you have any more difficulties with him before you leave.”

“Thank you,” she whispered, still staring, awestruck, at the coins.

“You’d better get this lot cleared up before he comes back looking for you.” Murdo smiled.

She did as he bid her, wisely slipping the coins into the toe of her shoe first.

Once she was gone, David said, “That was quite a little scene you acted out with Foster. I don’t think I’ve ever seen you being quite so
aristocratic
before.”

“Like that, did you?”

“I wouldn’t say I
liked
it—I wouldn’t like you to act that way with me, at any rate—but it was very effective, I must say.”

“It’s effective with some people,” Murdo admitted. “Rest assured, I wouldn’t even bother trying it with an egalitarian like you.” He grinned at that, his black eyes gleaming with humour, and David was swamped, quite suddenly, by a wave of helpless love and affection. Love for this complex, sometimes difficult man who was, nevertheless, capable of great kindness.

This man who’d once said to David,
“Don’t try to find a virtue in me, Lauriston. You won’t.”

David reached across the white tablecloth and took hold of Murdo’s hand, lifting it up to his mouth to graze a kiss across the knuckles, loving the warmth of the skin his lips brushed, and the strength in the long fingers that curved about his own.

Murdo looked briefly puzzled by David’s affectionate behaviour, but when David went to draw away, he tightened his hold on David’s hand, and they stayed like that for a long while, finishing their ale and watching the fire burn down to nothing but ash.

Chapter Nine

The clattering of horses and carriages in the inn’s courtyard began before the clock struck five the next morning. Groaning, David pulled a pillow over his face to shut out the noise, but it was no good. Soon enough, there were maidservants going up and down stairs and guests moving around, and David gave up all hope of any further rest.

He wished he at least had Murdo with him. They could have spent an hour or two together in bed. As it was, David found himself indulging in something he’d had no need to resort to for some time, bringing himself to a perfunctory climax with his own hand.

He got up straight after, washing and dressing without so much as looking in the mirror, tucking his overlong hair behind his ears and tying his cravat in its usual slapdash knot.

Murdo was in the breakfast parlour when he got downstairs, looking as tired and grumpy as David felt, albeit ten times as elegant. He grunted at David over his plate of kippers and suggested they make an earlier start than planned, given they were up, a suggestion David was only too happy to agree to.

The final leg of their journey was actually quite pleasant. They were only a few hours from London, and after a hearty breakfast and near enough a pot of coffee each, they were well fed and alert—for the time being, anyway, till tiredness caught up with them. By shortly after noon, Murdo’s carriage was pulling up outside Murdo’s London townhouse on Curzon Street.

David climbed out of the carriage, using his cane to avoid putting too much strain on his bad leg, ignoring Murdo’s approving smile. Once he stood on the pavement, he gazed around, fascinated. The townhouses that lined the street were remarkably similar to those at home, with the same classical facades, but here they varied in height, some of them a full storey or more higher than their neighbours.

The colour palette of these buildings varied too, brown brick and bright-white stucco. Very different from the ubiquitous sandstone which gave Edinburgh its characteristically gloomy beauty. It struck David, as he looked about him, that the sober townhouses of his home city were more elegant than this—collectively, at least. The unified lines of Edinburgh’s New Town, the sweeping crescents and classical perfection, were incomparable. Yet these houses, too high, too grand, spoke of something different, something entirely less collective. No New Town here. Here, they built what they wanted, where they wanted it, setting down their lofty houses in the middle of the city, right on top of whatever had been there before. A statement of individual pride and wealth.