Thorn in My Heart

by Liz Curtis Higgs

  Leana wriggled free of Roses grasp, feeling foolish and a more than a bit hurt. “Perhaps my ill luck will rub off on you, Rose.” When her sisters countenance fell, Leana was sorry she'd spoken unkindly. “That is to say, I wish you only good luck, dearie. Though you need no such wishes from me.”

  “Aye, I do.” Rose took her hands and pulled her down onto the pew, ignoring the crowd of well-wishers around them. “It is your blessing that matters most, Leana.” She glanced up at Jamie, who was engrossed in discussions with their neighbors, then turned back to give Leana her full attention. “I know…” Rose groaned and started again. “I know that you've been dreadfully misled and ill used. By Father. By Fergus McDougal. By Jamie, unintentionally.”

  “It's true. I have been.” It pleased Leana to confess it in the kirk, even if only to her sister. “Yet I fear I must bear some responsibility—”

  “Nae.” Rose's tone was adamant, her dark eyes sparking. “You did what your heart told you was right. You said yes to loving Jamie and no to marrying Fergus. Doesn't the Buik say, ‘Let your yea be yea; and your nay, nay? You ken that it does. And that is what you did. God Almighty stts your honest heart.”

  Leana managed a faint smile, but inside she shivered. Her heart was anything but honest. Her love for Jamie still burned there, bright as ever, and her unending hope that he might change his mind before Hogmanay was alive and well too. Neda knew. Jessie guessed. Jamie would never know, not unless he came to her and confessed the same.

  Leana squeezed her sister's hands, grateful for the covering of noise around them. Even so, she lowered her voice. “You've asked for my blessing, Rose, and you shall have it. But only if you can tell me that you love Jamie with every bone in your body.”

  Her sister glanced up at her betrothed, and the corners of her mouth twitched. “I care for the lad, that much I know. But love is a word that scares me, Leana. The only kind of love I've ever known is yours: a sister's love, almost a mothers love.” Her gaze drifted toward Lachlan seated at the other end of the pew, busily chewing on his mutton. “But you'll never convince me that Father loves either of us. Not as Mr. Elliot loves his daughter Susanne.” Rose hung her head. “I'm confused, Leana. Does Jamie love me as you do? Or does Jamie love me the way Father does?”

  Leanas heart sank at the thought of her young sister having to grapple with such weighty matters. “I will pray that Jamie loves you as I do, and more. And I will pray that you love him completely, as you should.”

  Her sister nodded, though she made no promises, then gazed up at Jamie when his hand accidentally brushed against her shoulder. “I enjoy his company. He makes me laugh. And he is the handsomest of men.” A winsome smile decorated her sweet face, as pink and shining as Annies. “The wedding will be fun, wont it? And all the presents? And the dancing at the bridal? But the best part…” She ducked her head beneath the brim of Leanas hat and giggled like a schoolgirl. “The best part will be not having to answer to Father ever again!”

  Thirty-Nine

  O happy is that man an’ blest!

  Nae wonder that it pride him!

  Whase ain dear lass, that he likes best,

  Comes clinkin down beside him!

  ROBERT BURNS

  Seven weeks of hard labor.

  Jamie smiled at the thought of it, filling his shovel and hoisting it toward the dunghill, now covered with frost. Three of those weeks had already passed, yet they seemed more like three days to him, all for the love of Rose. Sweet Rose.

  Unless he was mistaken, she had warmed to him a bit. That morning she'd greeted him at breakfast with a hesitant smile and a gift waiting by his plate. “ ‘Tis December, Jamie.”

  He unwrapped the ribbon and cloth, knowing what waited inside, yet pretending surprise. “A waddin sark! And well stitched it is, Rose.” He held up the fine cambric shirt so the household could admire Rose's needlework, then winked at his betrothed. “Did you do this on your own, lass, or did a certain skilled seamstress under this very roof offer some assistance?”

  A bonny blush tinted her cheeks. “You know very well Leana helped me.” She gazed at her older sister with a respect bordering on reverence. “Without her needle, our bed linens and tablecloths would be a sorry sight indeed.” The bottom drawer of Roses dresser, empty only weeks earlier, could barely be pushed shut for all the linens and sheets, tablecloths and curtains Leana and other women in the parish had carefully stitched and placed in the sacred drawer, which every bride hoped to fill before her wedding day.

  Jamie had nodded his thanks in Leanas direction, not quite meeting her steady gaze. The awkwardness between them had eased but not disappeared. Whenever he was in her presence, the words she'd spoken on Martinmas stretched between them like an unseen silken thread: / love you still. Had he misled her somehow? With all his heart, he hoped he had not. As long as Rose was in his life, Leana would be on hand as well, hovering in the wings, providing support and guidance. He needed her on his side and on Rose's as well. It was a thorny arrangement, like three points of a triangle—stable but sharp edged nonetheless.

  Jamie pushed his worries aside and plunged his shovel into the refuse, making quick work of it. The days grew shorter, yet Duncans list of duties for him grew longer. Mucking out the byre was the worst of them, so he'd tackled it first, even though it meant his clothes reeked for the balance of the day. By four o'clock, when the sun ran its course, he'd be free to scrub himself clean and dress for supper. For Rose.

  Thinking of her made his labors lighter. Over Neda's haggis on Martinmas night, they'd made their formal pledge of betrothal with the entire household serving as witnesses. Moistening their right thumbs, Jamie and Rose pressed them together, hands and hearts joined as one. Then he spoke the traditional vow, and Rose repeated it after him, her voice high and thin:

  Receive it, then, with a kiss and a smile

  There's my thumb, it will ne'er beguile.

  The wedding banns had been cried aloud by the session clerk in Newabbey kirk on the last three Sabbaths in November, with nary a complaint from the congregants, despite Rose's youth and Jamie's recent arrival in the parish. It was clear that Lachlan McBride's consent had sufficiently convinced the townsfolk of his merits as a son-in-law. Though much remained to be done in preparation, Jamie knew Neda and Leana would see to the details. His primary responsibility was to appear at kirk and claim his bride on the last day of the year. December could not pass swiftly enough to suit him.

  The day was well chosen. Among Scots, Hogmanay was the luckiest day of the year to marry. Jamie prayed it might be very fortunate indeed. After spending their bridal week in Dumfries, he would take Rose home to Glentrool and pray she carried his heir in her womb.

  “Well, lad, I see you've pit the brain asteep for a moment.” Duncan ducked his head to enter the stables, where Jamie had paused to warm himself on Walloch's obliging horseflesh.

  “Aye, Im meditating on a certain dark-haired lass,” Jamie confessed. “Give me another minute to thaw my fingers, then I'll be back to my labors.”

  “Och! I've no fear of that, Jamie. Ye're the hardest worker Auchen-gray has seen in mony a day.” Duncan joined him at his task, smoothing a brush over the gelding's back, their tandem strokes falling into the same rhythm. “I venture even now Lachlan McBride is thinkin of how he might convince ye to stay on a bit longer. On through the spring lambin and the summer shearin.”

  Jamie brushed harder, hiding his irritation. “ ‘Twill not be the way of things, Duncan. When Rose is mine, so is my freedom.”

  “Aye.” The overseer's checked bonnet bobbed up and down. “Ye've more than earned the right to both. Though I believe ye were the one to name the price, were ye not? Seven weeks o’ labor without a ha'penny earned, when a bag o’ silver from Glentrool would ve spared ye even one day of it.”

  Jamie frowned at the reminder. “McKie silver was provided once and stolen. I was not about to ask for more.”

  Duncan stopped brushing and looked him in the ey
e, his demeanor more serious than usual. “It's yer pride that's put ye here, doin the work o’ a peasant. Naught but pride. And ye ken what the Buik says: ‘When pride cometh, then cometh shame.’ Ye've let Lachlan McBride get the better o’ ye, and mark me words, lad, he's not finished with ye. The laird kens a bonny bargain when he comes upon it.”

  “But I've made a bargain as well. A bride like Rose is worth seven years of work.”

  “So ye say, lad.” Duncan resumed his brushing. “Me faither would say it's dear-cost honey that's licked off a thorn. Enjoy the sweet taste of it while ye may, Jamie. Mind that yer tongue isn't pricked when ye're not payin attention.”

  Jamie merely nodded, vaguely disturbed by the overseers comments. Were they the idle musings of a man more familiar with a farm steading than a laird's house? Or were Duncans words a warning? “I do appreciate your concern,” Jamie murmured, patting Wallochs withers, then moving toward the midden walk that circled round the dunghill. “For now, I've more stalls to muck and a doocot that needs attending.”

  “Aye. See ye dont get so wrapped up in yer work that ye miss Leanas potato scones.” Duncan followed him out into the frosty forenoon air. “Made them specially for ye, I ken. Neda will have them at the kitchen door aboot one o'clock or whenever yer stomach starts to growlin.” Duncan stamped off across the hardened ground, leaving Jamie to press on with his work and stave off his hunger.

  He was unwelcome at the family hearth covered in filth, and righdy so. Instead, he stopped by the kitchen door at the dinner hour and let Neda feed him something plain and nourishing to hold him until supper. Potato scones with a bit of hard cheese and the hottest mug of tea she could brew would be a cheery sight on a December day.

  He tipped his head back to discover the sky above him had no color at all. Neither blue nor gray nor white, it was naught but a backdrop for the black branches of the orchard trees, stark and bare. The wind was blessedly still and the air cold but not bitterly so. Around him shuffled stable lads lugging saddles that needed cleaning and young shepherds bound for the hills. They greeted him as an equal, and for that he was grateful. To be blethered about behind his back and ignored to his face would be a miserable lot.

  Jamie stamped his feet as he worked to keep the blood going and his mind off the waddin sark safely hanging in the oak clothes press. Four weeks and two days. It was agony to have her sonsie self so near—beneath the same roof, sleeping in the next room, breathing the same air—and know that he must wait to claim her, wait to touch her, wait to kiss her the way he wished. Not the chaste kiss he'd stolen from a shepherdess two months past, but the kiss of a husband ravishing his wife and her relishing it. Aye, that was the image seared across his mind when he lay in bed at night, counting the hours. Four weeks and two days.

  Rose had honored him with the traditional bridegrooms sark. Now it was his turn to provide for his bride, and he'd not disappoint her. His mother—no doubt without saying a word to Alec—had sent a package by post from Monnigaff, a charge which Lachlan had begrudgingly paid when he learned its contents. “Gifts for the bride,” was all Jamie told him, but it was enough to keep the man from insisting he empty the box while the curious household gathered to look, Rose among them.

  The first token of his affection would be placed by her plate at supper that eve: Rowena's silver brooch, bought by Alecs father decades ago at the luckenbooths, a cluster of locked stalls selling jewelry and silver on the High Street in Edinburgh. The tiny pin, no bigger than his thumbnail, boasted two silver hearts intertwined and his mothers initials engraved on the back. R M. for Rowena McKie. Rose might think they were her own initials and be charmed by his cleverness.

  The box also held ribbons and lace for the ladies and silver buttons for the bridegrooms sark. Rowena generously included a pouch with sufficient silver to buy a wedding gown—a tailor in Newabbey village had already taken the measurements—and a weeks lodging in Dumfries. The inn was his mothers idea and a fine one. He would enjoy Roses company in blissful privacy before they bade farewell to Auchengray and braved the January storms en route to Glentrool.

  Not all in the package was fortuitous. Evan was still breathing threats, his mothers letter explained. “Do your best to bring your bride home with a babe in her womb,” she cautioned. “Your foolish brother wouldn't dare threaten the lives of all three of you.” Rowena went on to say that his father was too infirm to travel east for the wedding and unwilling to send her without him, meaning no McKie would witness his marriage. It grieved Jamie to think of standing in the kirk without his family seated behind him beaming their approval. But it could not be helped; he would not fret over things that couldn't be changed. He and Rose would see them soon enough.

  Jamie glanced at the watery sun as he walked toward the back door, guessing the time, then brushed enough soil from his clothes to keep Neda from holding her nose as she fed him his scones and cheese. “Your Uncle Lachlan has a present for Rose too,” the keeper of the house whispered, her eyes bright with the news. “He's promised to let her open it before supper. I've a clean shirt and breeches waiting in your room, lad.” She waved him away, wrinkling her nose after all. “See that you're presentable.”

  By seven that evening any remnant of Jamie's lowly labors had vanished. His face, hands, and hair were gleaming, his chin freshly scraped with a razor, his clothes carefully pressed by one of the maids who'd taken a fancy to him. Lachlan was ringing the tableside bell as Jamie hastened down the stair, the brooch tucked in a velvet pouch in his palm.

  Jamie nodded to the usual assembly round the table, then placed his gift by Rose's plate, brushing her arm as he did so. She giggled and pulled away, batting her braid at him playfully. Much as he loved her, it made him uncomfortable to see her behave so. More like a schoolgirl than a young woman about to be wed. Leana, seated next to her, neither blushed nor simpered but sat gracefully in her chair, the mistress of Auchengray. Perhaps she might teach Rose how to wear the mande of marriage in a more becoming manner.

  His uncle stood, quieting the room at once. “I've two announcements of interest to our future bride. Rose, I've arranged for you to spend the week before your wedding with your Aunt Margaret in Twyneholm. ‘Tis the custom, you know.”

  “Aye.” Rose sighed with a hint of drama, her eyes seeking Jamie for sympathy. “I know.”

  She'd warned him this might happen. Aunt Margaret Halliday— Meg to her two nieces—was her mother's older sister, a maiden who'd seen sixty summers and still lived in the two-room cottage where she and Agness were born. To hear Rose's description, the woman was an eccentric character—keeping bees, distilling spirits, and hiding smuggled salt brought to her door by the free traders of the neighborhood.

  “An unco woman,” Lachlan confessed. “But with a stubborn will and a good heart to match it. ‘Twill be a most interesting week, of that you can be certain. Now, lass, you've noticed two packages by your plate, aye? Open the one from Jamie first if you like, then the larger one, before we ask the Almighty to bless our meal.”

  Rose pulled open the velvet pouch and shook out the brooch with a satisfactory gasp of delight. “Jamie, how bonny!” She held it up for all to see, then pinned it to her gown with trembling fingers. “Jenny Copland has been showing off her luckenbooth brooch for months. Wont she be the quiet one next Sabbath morning!”

  “Now, Rose.” Her father held up a pointed finger. “Mind your manners.”

  She ducked her head, even as she pulled the second package toward her and carefully untied the plain linen wrapper. Both sisters stared at the folds of lace waiting inside, their eyes wide, their mouths hanging agape. “A kell!” Rose lifted up the fine white cambric with its pulled thread work done in an intricate design. “To wear with my gown. Oh, Father, its a treasure. Wherever did you—”

  “Dresden.” Lachlan sat down, clearly pleased with himself. “It just arrived today, courtesy of…ah, Mr. Fergusson.” All at the table knew of Fletcher Fergusson, one of Galloways more renowned smugglers, w
ho'd no doubt charged Lachlan dearly for the headdress, meant to be worn only by young, unmarried women. Like Rose.

  She stood, stepping well back from the table, and tried to drape the delicate fabric over her head without success. “Leana, help me. Somethings gone wrong in the back.” The ever-efficient Leana quickly arranged the lace over Rose's hair and along her shoulders, spreading it out so that it showed off the delicate needlework to best advantage.

  “Roses,” Leana sighed at last, shaking her head. “It's covered with roses. How utterly perfect.”

  Jamie gazed at the beautiful lass beneath the lacy kell, and his concerns evaporated. “Aye,” he whispered. “Perfect indeed.”

  Forty

  The sun that brief December day

  Rose cheerless over hills of gray,

  And, darkly circled, gave at noon

  A sadder light than waning moon.

  JOHN GREENLEAF WHITTIER

  Fit a brides gown on a Friday?” Joseph Armstrong, the tailor from Newabbey village, shook his scissors like a scolding finger. “Whose daft idea was this, I'd like to know?”

  Leana touched Rose's arm to keep her from confessing the truth. “It was mine,” Leana said coolly. “Had I looked at a calendar before I chose the twelfth of December, Mr. Armstrong, I'd have known better than to have my sister fitted on such an unlucky day.”

  “Aye, well,” he grumbled. “ ‘Tis too late now, lass. The gown and I have made the hours journey to Auchengray, so dress the bride we will.” With a noisy huff, the tailor knelt to the floor once more, poked half a dozen straight pins between his teeth, and returned to his hemming. Between mouthfuls, he directed his apprentice to pin the sleeves as well. “Set up the smoothing board first, lad, and be quick about it. See that ye dont drop the goose on Miss McBride's toes, or she'll be limping at her sisters wedding.”