The Lass Wore Black (27 page)

She had never considered such a thing.

Dina smiled. “You will have to discover who you are without your outward appearance. Who is Catriona Cameron?”

The person she’d been the past six months was a martyr, a hermit, an angry, bitter woman. Is that the identity she wanted for herself? Is that who she wanted to be until she died?

The bottle of laudanum sat in her vanity drawer, ready for her to end her life. Did she want to do that? Her mind veered from that thought so suddenly that she was certain she didn’t. But if she lived, what kind of life would she have?

“You don’t have to decide tonight,” Dina said, as if privy to her chaotic thoughts. “You have the rest of your life to become the woman you wish to be.”

“I don’t want it to take that long,” she said.

Dina smiled.

“I’ve often thought that the best way to help myself is to help others,” Dina said, handing her another bundle of clothes.

She turned to look at her. “Am I very selfish?” she asked, and waited for the truth. Dina had always given her the truth, pleasant or not.

The older woman sighed. “Yes, my dear, you are. For a time, it was a good thing, because you needed to heal. Being so concerned about yourself was necessary. Your selfishness was like having a good coat in winter. Now, it’s like wearing that same coat in the midst of summer, cumbersome and uncomfortable.”

She gathered up her courage to ask another question. “Is it easy to live alone?”

Dina looked surprised.

“You’ve been a widow for some time,” Catriona continued. “Is it bearable after a while not to have a man in your life?”

“Marriage isn’t the only relationship, my dear. There is friendship as well.”

Dina’s cheeks were pink, and growing pinker. Did she have a friend or a lover? Could a lover be a friend? The questions were so fascinating that she studied the other woman for a long moment.

“Mark has left,” she said, when it was obvious that Dina wasn’t going to reveal any secrets.

“Yes, he has. A fine man, Dr. Thorburn. Too many times, people complain about the poor and do nothing to assist them. Dr. Thorburn puts his efforts into doing what he can, especially treating the children who most need his help.”

“You like him.”

“I do. I admire him as well.”

Several minutes passed in companionable silence.

“Did he say anything to you about me?”

“A great many things,” Dina said, smiling. “I’m to insist on fresh air and sunshine for you. I’m not to take any posturing from you. I’m to be my own woman and not allow you to run my household. I’m not,” she said with a twinkling look, “to be afraid of you.”

“Afraid of me?”

Dina nodded.

“Why would he say something like that?”

“I have no idea,” Dina said.

“Annoying man,” she said. “I can’t imagine why you thought he’d do me any good.”

Dina continued to smile.

A
ndrew sat in the parlor, empty but for one chair, a table, and a lamp that gave off a faint yellowish glow. He’d built a fire earlier but the room was still chilled.

He was feeling maudlin this afternoon, in a way that disturbed him. He’d not been himself since traveling to this godforsaken country a year ago. Once his mission was done, he’d turn his back on Scotland and never set foot across the border again.

As the fire spat and hissed, memories occupied him. All of his life, his enjoyable life, seemed compressed into a few short weeks. Before he met Catriona he’d felt asleep. Had he ever known pleasure until then, or even joy? He’d most certainly never known the insecurity that had blossomed in her presence.

He’d toyed with the idea of divorcing his wife in order to marry her. He’d made declarations of love to her, when he’d never said those words to another woman. He’d been willing to beggar himself for her, and she’d only laughed when she left him.

Her death would set him free, as nothing else would. Once Catriona was in her grave, he’d be released. He would no longer feel this damnable yearning, the pain that resided, not in his heart, but in his chest or perhaps in the whole of him.

At the knock on the door, he stood, consulted his pocket watch, and walked into the kitchen.

“You’re late,” he said as he opened the door for Artis.

“I couldn’t get away. Mrs. MacTavish is watching my every move. Afraid I might make life miserable for her two little lambs, she is.”

He waved his hand in the air, as if brushing away her words. He didn’t have the patience or the time for her constant complaints.

She removed her cloak. He hadn’t given her leave to do so, or to pull out the chair at the kitchen table. Short of banishing her, there was nothing he could do. She didn’t look the type to listen to a lesson on deportment.

He hooked a chair leg with one boot, pulled it out, and sat opposite her.

“Miss Cameron? How is she?”

“Why you’re so interested in the likes of her, I don’t know, sir. She’s an odd one, taking to going with Mrs. MacTavish on errands to Old Town in the last few days. They take their basket of clothes and food and dole them out to their particular friends.”

“Does she?”

Artis nodded. “Mrs. MacTavish normally likes to take the minister with her, and a few other ladies. When Miss Cameron goes, however, it’s just the two of them and Johnstone. Not safe enough, I’d think.”

“Does the footman not accompany them?”

She shook her head. “Now him, that’s the strangest story. After the fire, he stopped coming to work. When I asked Mrs. MacTavish, she told me it was none of my concern.”

He felt a frisson of alarm. She could ruin everything with her talking.

“It’s important that you not call attention to yourself,” he said.

“I’ve done nothing wrong,” she said, placing both elbows on the table. “Merely talked with a proper gentleman.”

He couldn’t wait until his task was done. If he had to deal with Artis much longer, he’d shoot her first.

M
ark hadn’t allowed his father to interfere with his love of medicine. He certainly wasn’t going to allow a woman to do so.

Yet Catriona was occupying his thoughts. He woke thinking of her. When he traveled in his carriage, instead of having to concentrate on the passing scenery to tolerate the closeness, he thought of her. She’d cooked for him, and whenever he ate, he remembered that night. She’d made him smile, and he recalled those moments in quiet times. She’d wept in his arms, and at night he recalled the feel of her, loving her, and holding her before sleep claimed him.

His entire life seemed built around recollections of her, even when he deliberately tried to banish her from his thoughts.

Even Sarah was conspiring against him. She lost no opportunity to ask questions about Catriona.

“Is she scarred?”

“I never saw her face,” he said. He didn’t tell her that he had an idea how extensive the damage was, however.

“What did you talk about?”

“How annoying I was, for the most part,” he said, which won him a laugh from Sarah.

“What does she do all day?”

Sits and mulls over the unfairness of life, an occupation that will only make her bitter. That, too, he hadn’t said aloud.

When Sarah wasn’t being curious about Catriona, she was taking great pains to ridicule his days as a footman.

“You forget I employ you,” he said one morning. For a quarter hour she’d indulged in a running dialogue with an imaginary servant, a footman of all things, with sidelong glances at him to ensure he was paying attention.

“I can fire you.”

“You wouldn’t,” Sarah said. “No one else would do for you as well as I do.”

She was right.

“Plus, who else would want to put up with you, all dour as you’ve been all week? Not to mention those medicines of yours. Scare a body to death.”

“I’m sure I can find someone who would be overjoyed to work with a young, handsome doctor with an admirable disposition.”

“Who is he? Will you introduce me to him, sir?” she asked cheekily.

He raised one eyebrow and stared at her over his cup.

“You might employ Edeen,” she said. “But then, I dare you to stop the gossips. I’m your mother’s age, so no one thinks anything is amiss with me.”

“You never used to be so verbal, Sarah.”

“You never used to be so foolish, Dr. Thorburn.”

He frowned at her.

“I’ll wager you think about the lass in black all the time.”

He set the cup down on the saucer with too much force. “Where did you come up with that name?”

“Isn’t that what she is? Don’t you?”

“Are you divining my thoughts now, Sarah?”

“I know the signs. You’ve been grumbling around here for days. You aren’t eating properly, and you’ve not been sleeping well. I’m the one who makes your bed, Doctor. I see those sheets every morning. It’s like you’ve fought a war in your bed.”

“Very well, I haven’t been sleeping all that much,” he admitted.

But that was all.

“I could have Anne on my mind,” he said.

She folded her arms and shook her head.

“No, you would have shown the signs earlier. It’s her, the lass in black.”

“Don’t call her that.”

She smiled.

Perhaps his conscience was warring with him. He remembered every cutting word he’d said to Catriona. She’d just sat there, absorbing his criticism, making no effort to protect herself.

Had he taken her to Old Town on purpose, to show her the other half of the world in which she resided? That question bit too close. Who was he to think he had that right? He healed the body, not the soul. Who was he to examine character?

He should look to himself first.

Perhaps Catriona was so much on his mind because of Johnstone’s words.

After the visit to Old Town, he’d made his farewells to Mrs. MacTavish, informing her that Catriona now knew his true identity.

“Is she terribly unhappy?” she’d asked.

The truth won out. “Yes,” he said, “but I doubt if it’s at you as much as me.”

She sighed, then perked up immediately. “I suppose it’s worth it, if she’s beginning to live again.”

As he was leaving, Johnstone had motioned to him from the alley. He followed the man back to the charred ruin of the carriage house.

“The paraffin oil barrel was knocked over,” the man said. Johnstone leaned against the door frame, pointing to the corner. “Someone knocked over the barrel. I’ve four horses in the stable there,” he said. “They could have died.”

The driver turned to look at him. Even though the man didn’t speak, Mark could imagine what he was thinking.

Two accidents too many.

He glanced up at Catriona’s window.

He depended on facts and the evidence before his eyes. The carriage fire might well be an accident and unconnected to what had happened in London.

A wise man observes.
A comment Dr. Cameron had once made to him. He was going to do just that, and while he was at it, he was going to take other precautions.

Now, he stood and looked at Sarah. She knew him better than anyone and didn’t hesitate to either lecture him or keep his occasional confidences. He gave her another one, not looking away from her steady regard.

“I shouldn’t have deceived her.”

She nodded. “No, you shouldn’t have. The poor thing has been through enough. You added hurt to the mix.”

How did he fix it? He couldn’t bandage it, apply a compress, or give her an analgesic.

Absence would accomplish what he wanted, but it was the one solution against which he rebelled. Was he never to see her again? Was he never to talk to her? As a physician, he was concerned about her.

He was also a man who’d become surprisingly adept at lying to himself.

Chapter 25

M
rs. McPhee looked even more harried on this visit than she had on the last.

Catriona stood on a riser in front of the seamstress and her apprentice, enduring the final fitting for her new dresses with hard-won patience.

Aunt Dina had encouraged her to use the drawing room, where there was more daylight. Since only one male was attached to their household, and Johnstone was occupied with directing the rebuilding of the carriage house, she was not adverse to the idea.

Nothing, however, seemed to please Mrs. McPhee.

The woman was a whirlwind in the parlor, bustling around her, giving orders to the apprentice, consulting her brooch watch more than once, and nodding her head incessantly.

When Aunt Dina once again indicated a desire to have the woman make a few more garments, she thought Mrs. McPhee would cry.

“As I have mentioned before, Mrs. MacTavish, I’ve enough to do. I’ve no idea how I can take on more. There’s the Moffat wedding, and the dresses for all the Drummond girls. Not to mention the Farquharsons.” She twisted her hands together. “I don’t know when I’ll have time for the rest of it.”

“Why do you not hire additional staff, Mrs. McPhee?” Dina said. “If your business is so good, I’d think that would be an option.”

“I’ve no time!” The woman threw her hands up in the air. “How am I to judge a girl’s talent when I don’t even have time to sew on a button myself?”