Highland Sunset

by Joan Wolf

  Katherine Romney, while skillfully setting Van at ease, was making some close observations of her own.

  Vanessa's black hair was done very simply, in a coronet of braids on top of her head. Katherine would send her own hairdresser to the child in the morning, she decided. That severely simple fashion would not do at all.

  Frances had said the child was not in the usual style, Katherine thought, and she most certainly was not. What Frances had not said was that Vanessa was beautiful. Her skin was dark, and against those eyes... The bone structure of her face was perfect. No wonder Frances had been anxious to get her out of that barbarian wilderness and into some decent society. The child was wearing an evening dress of deep burgundy silk that was beautifully made and showed off her small waist and long, lovely throat. Young girls usually wore pastels, but Frances had been right to dress Vanessa in burgundy. Frances' taste, Katherine remembered, had always been unerring.

  There came a pause in the conversation and Katherine said, "Your mother desired that I choose you a wardrobe, Vanessa, but I don't see how London can better the dress you have on. It is lovely."

  Van's long, narrow hand smoothed her silk lap. "Thank you. Mother had some clothes made for me at home, but she thought it would be easier to buy what I needed in England rather than have to lead a train of packhorses to Edinburgh."

  Katherine arched a finely plucked eyebrow. "Pack-horses?"

  "You couldn't possibly get a carriage into Morar," Van replied unconcernedly.

  "Oh," said Lady Linton, a little blankly. Then, "Tell me about Morar, Vanessa dear. Your mother thinks it beautiful, I know."

  Van's great light eyes glowed and Katherine drew in her breath sharply. Her thoughts went, quite suddenly, to her son. Whatever was Edward going to think of this Scottish cousin of his?

  After Katherine had heard all about the loch and the mountains and the sea, she introduced the subject that was on her mind. "My son the earl, your cousin Edward, was sorry not to be here to greet you, Vanessa. He was called to London unexpectedly, but he will be returning shortly."

  Van smiled politely.

  "And in the meantime"—Lady Linton smiled her lovely, warm smile—"You and I will have a chance to become better acquainted."

  Van's own smile warmed a little in response. It was impossible not to like her mother's Cousin Katherine.

  CHAPTER 4

  Lady Linton's hairdresser descended upon Van the following morning and took her in hand. First her long heavy tresses were washed and then attacked with the curling iron. Van's only stipulation was that she should not be powdered, and Lady Linton, who was present as an interested observer, agreed. "It would make you look sallow, Vanessa dear."

  "That's what my mother said," Van replied.

  The hairdresser went to work and Van sat quietly and allowed her to fuss as she pleased. As she watched in a mirror a series of long curls began to appear. Van stared curiously. "I did not think my hair would ever curl," she murmured. "It's so heavy and straight."

  "Your hair, it is beautiful, Lady Vanessa," the hairdresser said. Then, in French she said to Lady Linton, "Mademoiselle does not look English."

  "I am not English," Van replied in the same language. "I am a Scot."

  The hairdresser looked delighted. "You speak very good French, my lady. You have traveled in France, perhaps?"

  "No. My mother taught me French."

  "Your mother always had a gift for languages," Lady Linton said and Van felt a stab of homesickness.

  Her hair, when it was finished, looked lovely even to Van's critical eyes. It was drawn back off her forehead and fell in a profusion of ebony ringlets on her neck and shoulders. Van had refused the tiny lace-edged cap the hairdresser had tried to pin on her creation. In the Highlands there was an iron-clad rule that unmarried girls did not cover their hair. Both Lady Linton and the hairdresser had acquiesced gracefully to her scruples and her hair was left unadorned save for a simple threading of ribbon.

  After she was dressed in a day gown of fine green merino wool, Lady Linton took Van on a tour of the house. Mrs. Robertson had departed earlier in the Romney coach, full of gratitude and awe, so Katherine was alone with her guest.

  Staplehurst was a much more formally laid-out house than Creag an Fhithich. Everything in the castle at home was come at by narrow spiral stairs or long winding passages. This English house had been added onto also, but the result was much more symmetrical than the rabbit warren of different levels and sizes that Van was used to at home.

  Almost the entire ground floor of Staplehurst was occupied by living rooms. There were a dining room, drawing room and library, several smaller salons, and a great long gallery that was filled with pictures. On the ground floor as well was a state apartment of several bedrooms and dressing rooms, which had been occupied at times by both Queen Elizabeth and King James, Lady Linton told Van. A large conservatory led west from the dining room to the chapel, and concealed the huge service wing from the garden.

  The second floor of the house was given over to bedrooms, with attendant dressing rooms and, in some cases, sitting rooms. The third floor held the nursery and the schoolroom, both still furnished and polished, although they had lain empty for many years.

  "My son is planning an addition to the house," Lady Linton told Van as they finished their tour. "He has engaged William Kent to add a series of state reception rooms to the ground floor and some more bedrooms upstairs. It used to be that only family came to visit but in the past few years it has become more common for large house parties of people to gather at country homes for festivities and—of course—for politics. One needs different kinds of rooms to accommodate them all." Lady Linton smiled affectionately. "And Edward loves to build. The park has become quite famous, you know."

  "It's lovely," Van said absently. Politics, she thought. This looked promising. Evidently that Romneys were still interested in politics.

  "I have a letter for you from my father, Cousin Katherine," she said. "Would it be all right if I gave it to you now?"

  Lady Linton looked surprised but she nodded. "Yes, of course, Vanessa. Go and fetch it and then come to the morning room."

  The morning room was a pretty, very feminine room that the countess used as a combination office and sitting room. It was here that she attended to her correspondence, wrote out her invitations, her menus, and so on. She was sitting on a green silk sofa in front of the fire when Van returned with Lord Morar's letter. Van gave it to her, then went to sit in a high-backed velvet chair of the same green as the sofa.

  There was silence in the room as Lady Linton read her letter. When finally she looked up, Van could not read her expression. "Your father seems to expect a French invasion," Lady Linton said thoughtfully

  "Yes." Van leaned a little forward. "Things look very promising, Cousin Katherine. The prince is most anxious to lead an expedition."

  Lady Linton sighed. "Do you know, I had quite forgotten what a rabid Jacobite Morar is. Frances never speaks of it in her letters."

  There was a startled pause. Then, "I don't think 'rabid' is the correct word," Van said. " 'Committed' is more appropriate."

  "Perhaps." Lady Linton looked down at the letter once more. "Well, if there is a French invasion, Vanessa, be assured that I will see you get home safely." The violet eyes lifted to Van's face. "But I doubt there will be a French invasion, my dear. I doubt it very much."

  Van frowned. It was Lady Linton's tone that warned her more than the words. "My mother thought you also were a Jacobite, Cousin Katherine," she said at last, carefully. "Was she wrong?"

  Katherine Romney continued to look thoughtfully at the young face opposite her. "My father, like your mother's father, had Tory and High Church principles, certainly," she said at last.

  Van was not liking the sound of this at all. "And you?" she asked bluntly. "Do you still hold to the faith of your father, Cousin Katherine? My mother has not forgotten her upbringing."

  A flash of impatience flickered
across Lady Linton's face. "Your mother has remained Jacobite because she is married to your father. I, on the contrary, married a man with very different principles." The violet eyes were faintly ironic. "Women, my dear Vanessa, tend to take on their husbands' politics, you know."

  A fine excuse for betraying your king, Van thought scornfully. But all she said was, "The Earl of Linton is not a Jacobite, then?"

  "The Romneys have been Whigs for generations," Lady Linton said gently. "A Romney accompanied William of Orange when he came from Holland to accept the English throne. My son is a member of Lord Pelham's government. It was on government business that he was called to England."

  Van was appalled. How could this have happened? She forced her voice to remain quiet. "I am quite sure my father did not know this."

  Katherine Romney looked amused. "Considering this letter, I am quite certain also," she agreed. "But your mother did."

  Dhé. Van's eyes opened wide.

  "Oh yes." Lady Linton's eyes were half-humorous, half-rueful. "Frances certainly knew. The Romneys, my dear, are rather famous, you see. There is no question that Frances could be ignorant of their political affiliation."

  Van was dumbfounded. "But why...?"

  "Because she wanted very much for you to have a chance to see something of the world outside your own hills." Lady Linton's voice was gentle. "Vanessa, dear, let us not allow politics to spoil your visit. Obviously your mother did not tell you that the Romneys are Whigs because she knew that if your father found out he would not allow you to come. And she wanted very much for you to come."

  It must be so. Van remembered suddenly her mother's urging that she judge people by their hearts, not by their politics. Almost certainly she had known.

  "Vanessa," Katherine said sympathetically, "it is not important, my dear. Believe me. It is not something we need ever discuss again. And should it happen that the prince lands with a French army, I promise I will send you home." She got up and went over to put a warm hand on Van's shoulder. "You have come all this long way to enjoy yourself, my dear. Don't disappoint your mother."

  Van lifted her long, searching look to Lady Linton's face. What Cousin Katherine did not know, she thought, was that she had another sort of mission from her father that still needed to be carried out. She forced herself to smile. "No," she said. "I shouldn't want to do that. Very well, Cousin Katherine. Between us, we shall consider this subject closed."

  Katherine squeezed her shoulder gently. "Good girl. Now, would you like to play the harpsichord for me?"

  "Of course," said Van courteously, and rose to her feet.

  Lady Linton planned to take Van to London as soon as her wardrobe was extensive enough to allow her to take part in the myriad events of the social season. Consequently, Van found herself spending untold numbers of hours with dressmakers, who pinned and snipped and hemmed like a hive of bees in full activity.

  She was not looking forward to the advent of her cousin the earl. It was one thing to have to accept Lady Linton graciously; after all, Lady Linton was her mother's dear cousin and more a lapsed Jacobite than a full-fledged Whig. But to have to be the guest of a full-blooded Sassenach Whig! That stuck in Van's throat. If it were not for the fact that she might be of use to the cause in London, Van thought she would certainly have gone home.

  He came four days after Van's own arrival at Staplehurst. Van and Lady Linton were sitting in the drawing room waiting for dinner to be announced when the Linton butler, Fenton, came in to say, "His lordship has arrived, my lady. He just drove his horses down to the stable himself. Shall I tell Cook to put back dinner?"

  Lady Linton's lovely face lit like a candle. "Yes, Fenton, do that, please." As the butler left the room she turned to Van. "I have no doubt at all my son will greet all his horses before he puts in an appearance before his mother. I hope you are not too hungry, Vanessa dear."

  It was perfectly plain to Van that even had she been starving she was going to have to wait for the earl. "Of course not," she replied a little austerely, and listened with half an ear to Lady Linton's abstracted chatter. The countess clearly was not interested in Van's responses. All her attention was directed toward the door of the room.

  At last it opened and both women stared at the tall male figure that filled the doorframe.

  "Well, darling," Lady Linton said composedly. "And have you reacquainted yourself with the horses?"

  The voice that replied was deep and clear and tinged with amusement. "You know me too well, Mama," and Edward Philip Henry George Anthony Romney, twenty-seven years old and Earl of Linton for the last five years, began to walk across the room.

  Van had never wondered what he looked like and she felt the oddest tightening in her stomach as she watched him come. He was all Saxon: tall and fair and broad-shouldered. He was bareheaded and the rays of sunlight from the window struck sparks of gold from his neatly tied back hair. It did not take much imagination, Van thought, to picture a Viking's helm on that smoothly shining gilt head. He was the archetypical Sassenach and Van's spine was ramrod straight as she acknowledged Lady Linton's introduction.

  "How do you do, cousin," the deep, beautifully timbred voice said easily. "My mother is so pleased to have a daughter-on-loan."

  Van stared up into the bluest eyes she had ever seen, her face still and reserved. "How do you do, my lord," she answered in a voice she strove to make cool and distant. She removed her hand quickly from his grasp. "I am pleased to be here."

  His eyes, impossibly, got ever bluer. "Did you have a pleasant journey?" he asked.

  "Yes. Thank you." He was so big he blocked out her whole view of the room.

  "Francois is holding dinner for you, darling," Lady Linton said, and he turned from Van to smile at his mother. It was a loving smile, a little amused and full of lazy sunshine.

  "All right, Mama," he said. "I'll go and change."

  Dinner was more than an hour late when the earl finally took his seat at the head of the polished rosewood dining-room table.

  "It's a long trip from Scotland, cousin," he remarked genially to Van as liveried servants placed dishes on the table. "Was it very arduous?"

  "Not arduous. Just tedious." Van forced herself to look at him. His blue gaze was directly on her face. There was no purple in his eyes, as there was in Lady Linton's, nor any gray, as in her mother's. They were completely and absolutely blue.

  Sassenach eyes.

  He raised his golden eyebrows. "And what have you been doing since your arrival?" His voice was perfectly courteous, but Van thought she detected a faint note of amusement in its dark depths. Her back stiffened.

  "Getting fitted for clothes," she said. "Cousin."

  Lady Linton added serenely, "Frances desired me to see to dear Vanessa's wardrobe, Edward. Just fancy, Vanessa says it is impossible to get a carriage in to her home."

  "General Wade's roads don't go as far west as Morar," the earl replied calmly, and Van stared at him. Edward smiled at her, but not with his eyes. "Didn't you expect me to know where Morar is?" he asked.

  "No. That is," Van amended hastily. "I hadn't thought of it."

  "When Vanessa's wardrobe is completed we will leave for London," Lady Linton intervened. There was the faintest of lines between her lovely brows. For some unfathomable reason, her son and her guest did not appear to be getting along. "Did you look into engaging a music teacher, darling?" she asked now. "Frances was particularly anxious for Vanessa to receive some professional instruction while she is with us."

  "Yes, I did, Mama," he replied impeturbably. Then, to Van, "You must play for me after dinner, cousin."

  "Certainly," Van said stiffly. It was going to kill her, she thought, to be beholden to this... this Whig.

  "How was the rest of your London visit?" Lady Linton asked her son. "What was that urgent summons about?"

  He shrugged easily, his big shoulders moving smoothly under the blue velvet of his coat. "There were dispatches from Cumberland," he replied. He took a sip of bur
gundy and turned to Van. "The Duke of Cumberland is commanding a combined British, Dutch, Hanoverian, and Austrian force against the French," he said.

  "I know." She paused and then added deliberately, "In Scotland we hear all the news from France. My brother, in fact, just recently returned from three years at the University of Paris."

  "I see," said Edward, very softly. He looked over to his mother's face and smiled. "And have you planned every moment of Vanessa's visit for her, Mama?" he asked, his smile lazy and sweet, his blue eyes glinting. "Mama is in heaven at the thought of a daughter to take about," he added to Van. "She has been contacting all her old cronies and lining up invitations for months."

  Van looked at Lady Linton, her eyes wide and startled.

  "Edwards exaggerates," Katherine Romney said with dignity. Then, laughing, "But only a very little. My goodness, Vanessa, but this visit of yours is going to be fun!"

  CHAPTER 5

  After dinner Edward insisted that Van play for him. She sat down at the harpsichord reluctantly, but soon the music absorbed her, as it always did. When she had finished she sat for a moment, hands in lap, back to her audience. Then she turned around.

  His eyes were waiting for her. There was no amusement in them now; they were utterly and completely grave. "Herr Schmidt will not do for you at all," he said. "I will engage Martelli."

  "Martelli!" Lady Linton said. "Do you think he would consider Vanessa as a pupil?"

  "Yes," Edward replied matter-of-factly. "If I recommended her." His eyes had never left Van. "Do you know the Brandenburg Concertos?"

  "Some of them," Van replied.

  He nodded. "Play one, please," he said, and Van, automatically responding to his tone, turned back to the instrument.