by Maura Seger
The sound went through Katlin like an ice-shrouded knife. She put a hand to her throat. "Why?"
The spectral lips moved again. "You mock me."
"No! That is, I certainly don't want to do that. If I've done something wrong or said something— "
"So many years, trying, hoping... Can't speak to any of them. God's name, why? Punishment..."
Katlin swallowed hastily. Thoughts turned over wildly in her mind. "Punishment? You mean you can't appear to any of your own descendants?"
Slowly, the head nodded. "A few women, that's all, and never Wyndhams. Silly chits. Couldn't see or hear me, only feel."
Sarah, Katlin thought suddenly. She had complained of a sudden chill as soon as they entered Innishffarin and she had been frightened by it.
"Now you," the laird said. His mouth curled in disgust. "The worst of the lot."
Katlin straightened her shoulders. It was all very well that he was a ghost, but that didn't relieve him of having to be polite.
"I beg your pardon," she said. "If you don't wish to speak with me, I will be glad to take my leave." So saying, she lifted her skirts and turned away.
Only to find the late Francis Wyndham standing directly in front of her. The man could move, that was for sure.
"Oh, no, you don't," he said more firmly than before. Conflict with her seemed to strengthen him. "I've waited too long to talk to somebody, anybody. You're not just going to walk away."
"I will if you continue to be rude to me," Katlin informed him.
"Damn you, woman! I'm a ghost. You're supposed to be terrified of me, not insisting I behave like some damned courtier!"
In point of fact, she was terrified but she wasn't about to let him see that. Ghost or not, he was a Wyndham. She had her pride.
"Being a ghost is your own fault," she said firmly. "You should have done what Grandfather did."
Francis's eyes fell. "Don't you think I wanted to?" he asked faintly. "It's not that simple."
"I don't see why not. People die all the time. You don't find most of them hanging about."
"This is different! I need to talk to that fellow, my descendant, what's his name...Angus? Damn lack of imagination, that. Do you know how many of us have been called Angus?"
"No, and I don't want to. He doesn't believe in you."
"Damn young pup! What do you mean, he doesn't believe?"
"You saw for yourself. He couldn't communicate with you so he decided you aren't real. He thinks I made you up."
Barely had she said that than Katlin had a sudden thought. Was it remotely possible that Francis Wyndham was some sort of illusion? Or worse yet, delusion? She did seem to accept his presence with unlikely ease. It was almost as though she felt at home with him.
If he was a creature of her own mind, she was on very shaky ground indeed.
He saw or sensed what she was thinking. A rough chuckle came from him. "Don't give yourself so much credit, chit. You aren't capable of dreaming me up."
"But if I did," Katlin said slowly, "I'd probably make you just the way you are."
He scowled suspiciously. "How's that?"
"All bark and no bite."
"No bite? No bite! Sweet heaven, I'm surrounded by imbeciles! My own flesh and blood doesn't think I exist, and this Sinclair wench thinks I'm her tame creation. What did I do to deserve this?"
"Probably a great deal," Katlin said tartly. "Now if there's nothing else, I have things to do."
"Not so fast. I'm thinking."
"You don't need me for that."
"But I do need you to do something for me."
"What?" Katlin asked as discouragingly as she could manage.
"Get Angus back here again."
"Oh, no! Absolutely not. I'm not having anything to do with him."
"Why?" Francis demanded. He peered at her narrowly. "What have you got against him? He's a fine figure of a man and my great-great-grandson to boot. You could do worse."
Katlin pressed her lips together and kept discreetly silent.
Francis snorted impatiently. "Have it your way, stubborn chit. Probably for the best."
"What do you mean 'for the best'?" she demanded, her temper rising. The nerve of the man... spirit... whatever.
"Got you there, did I? Well, I meant it. No sense wishing a weirding woman on my own kin. Although," he added thoughtfully, "God knows it's happened before."
Katlin's mouth dropped open. Despite herself, she asked, "A weirding woman? What is that?"
"Someone with special abilities, such as seeing ghosts," Francis said. "What does it sound like? I suppose I shouldn't be surprised."
"Why not?" Katlin asked as she struggled to come to terms with this.
"Isaiah didn't tell you then?"
"Tell me what?" she demanded with exasperation. What was he talking about?
"Runs in the family. Every few centuries a weirding woman crops up in the Wyndham clan. Some are born into it, some marry, but the strain runs true. Used to be more common in the old days, now it's not. Last one was, let me think, must be four, five hundred years ago."
"What has that got to do with me? I am a Sinclair."
Francis gave her a look of enormous satisfaction. "I knew it, Isaiah didn't tell you. Why do you think your kin were so hot to get hold of Innishffarin? Think they just picked it out by accident?"
"King William awarded it to us," Katlin said stiffly.
"Sure he did, after Desmond Sinclair, curse his black heart, asked him for it. He wanted Innishffarin out of sheer spite. The Sinclairs started out as a Wyndham by-blow four, five hundred years ago with that same weirding woman. Climbed into their own pretty fair but never quite got over thinking they needed to set the scales straight. Innishffarin was the chance to do it."
"By-blow?" Katlin demanded. Her eyes widened. Could this possibly be true? "I doubt that very much. The Sinclairs have always been a thoroughly proper family."
"Not at the beginning, girl," Francis said with conviction. He grinned at her. "You might say we go way back."
"If what you're saying is true, and I still doubt it, it would only strengthen the Sinclair claim to Innishffarin."
"Oh, no, it doesn't. By-blows don't inherit. You get born on the right side of the sheets or you marry in. No exceptions."
"If that's your attitude, no wonder Desmond Sinclair asked for Innishffarin. It's grossly unfair that children should suffer because of the irregularities of their parents."
"Typical Sinclair attitude," Francis scoffed. "But it won't work. You won't have any more luck than the rest of them."
Katlin's brow knit. "I'm not depending on luck. I expect to work very hard. Whatever it takes, I will keep Innishffarin."
Francis shook his disembodied head in disgust. "You don't fool me for a minute, girl. Work hard, indeed. You want what all the others wanted going right back to Desmond."
If she had invented this ghost, Katlin decided, she had made him as batty as she would have to be. What he was saying made no sense at all.
But when she told him as much, Francis materialized a hand and waved it in front of her dismissively. "All alike, the bunch of you. Think you can take the Wyndham treasure, but you can't. It will never be yours. I've guarded it all these years and I'll keep right on doing it until I can pass it where it's supposed to go—to the legitimate Wyndham line. You can try all you like but you won't have any more success than the rest of them."
And with that, the ghostly form began to thin and waver until within seconds it had disappeared entirely.
Katlin was left staring into empty air.
Chapter Sixteen
Katlin prided herself on being a sensible young lady, never mind recent evidence to the contrary. Moreover, she needed money. No one, not even a ghost, could dangle a reference to a treasure in front of her and not expect her to do something about it.
What she did was head straight for the kitchen where she hoped to find—and question—Maggie Fergus. Maggie had lived for years at Innishf
farin. If anyone knew what Francis Wyndham meant, it would be Maggie.
But before she could get there, she discovered that she had a guest. Charles was standing in the center of the hall—a disheveled and annoyed Charles, to be sure, but her former intended all the same. Only he didn't know about the sudden shift their relationship had taken, necessitated by the interlude at the pool, about which Katlin did not care to think just now.
The look he gave her was possessive and angry. Brushing clumps of mud from his breeches, he demanded, "Where did you go?"
Katlin glanced at the previously clean flagstone floor but refrained from making any comment. Instead, she said, "I'm sorry. I don't like hunting very much so I didn't stay."
He stared at her dumbfounded. "What do you mean, you don't like it?"
As she didn't regard her statement as a particularly complicated one, Katlin thought it shouldn't require any explanation; but apparently it did.
Patiently, she said, "I've never liked hunting. I went along today to be polite but as soon as I could, I slipped away." She hesitated a moment before she asked,'' Were you successful?''
Charles made a sound of disgust. "There was no wolf, we were following a bloody drag. Wyndham was sporting with us, that's all."
"Are you sure?"
"Of course I am. Man doesn't give a rip about what others think of him. A bloody savage, that's what he is."
"What did the St. Johns make of it?"
"Them? Fools, the both of them. Said we'd had a good ride and found a decent meal at the end of it. Didn't seem to care about anything else. Can you imagine?"
Charles knocked a bit more mud on her floor. "My throat's parched. Too hot for Scotland this time of year."
Having dropped the hint, he left her no choice but to ask if he would care for a drink. Sarah appeared in response to her ring, took one look at the floor and frowned.
"Yes, miss?" she asked, shifting her gaze to the baron.
"Tea, please, Sarah."
The maid bobbed a curtsy and turned to leave just as Charles said, "Not tea, for God's sake. I'll have a whiskey. Surely, you can manage that."
"If you like," Katlin murmured. "Never mind the tea, Sarah. I'm sorry to have disturbed you."
"You coddle your servants too much," Charles complained as he sat down on one of the couches near the fireplace. "Doesn't do, you know. Gives them ideas above themselves."
"Sarah and I get along fine," Katlin said. "I have no complaints about her work." She opened a large oak wardrobe set against one wall. In it was an arrangement similar to that in her grandfather's bedroom; Isaiah had liked a drop from time to time, she gathered.
She poured a measure and took it to Charles. He knocked it back in a single swallow and held out the glass for more. Reluctantly, she went to get it.
When she returned, he was sprawled on the couch, his legs thrust out and the beginnings of a smile on his face. "Come here," he said, patting the cushion beside him.
She pretended not to see and took a seat on the opposite couch. They needed to talk, she knew that, but she wasn't sure this was the right time. Charles was unnaturally flushed from exertion, anger and now the whiskey.
Katlin cleared her throat. Softly, she said, "I've been doing a great deal of thinking since I arrived here."
She'd also been doing a great deal else, especially in the past hours, but never mind about that.
"Restoring Innishffarin will take many years and absorb the overwhelming portion of my energies. It is likely that I will be in London very little, if at all."
Charles peered at her narrowly. He seemed more interested in the whiskey than in what she had to say. That surprised her since she had never seen him drink to excess before. But then she couldn't remember the last time he had suffered an upset of any kind, as he had over the hunt. His life had the well-ordered smoothness only large amounts of money could achieve. In his own world his every whim was seen to. No source of discomfort or annoyance was allowed to come anywhere near him. But it had now, and he was clearly not enjoying the experience.
"Wha'd'you say?" he asked idly as he held out the empty glass again.
Katlin took it and set it aside on an end table. Before he could object, she said, "I will be remaining at Innishffarin not merely for the six months my grandfather's will requires but possibly a good deal longer. As we have been in one another's company before my coming here, I thought it only right that I make that clear."
She wasn't handling this well, Katlin thought, as she watched comprehension creep slowly over the baron's long, bland features. His eyes narrowed.
"Don't be ridiculous. You're not staying here. Place is a wreck and it's the back of beyond."
Katlin forced down the tart response that sprang to her lips and said, "That is my point. Innishffarin needs a great deal of work. I intend to concentrate on it fully."
Charles laughed, a singularly unpleasant sound. How was it that she had never noticed that about him before?
"You'll have to, considering that you've got no money."
"I'm not totally without resources."
"Like hell. Think me a fool? You've the income Lady Margaret settled on you but that's tied up. You can't get at it unless she says you can, or unless you marry, in which case your husband decides what's done with it." He looked around derisively. "I won't see a penny put into this place. Let Wyndham have it, serve him right. He can pour his fortune down this rat hole." The notion seemed to please him. He sat back with a self-satisfied smile and gestured to the glass.
"Get me another of those. I'm in no hurry."
Katlin stood up but she did not touch the glass. With her hands clasped in front of her, she spoke slowly and evenly. "But I am. I have a great deal to do. Besides, there appears to be a misapprehension between us. We never formally discussed marriage, we were never betrothed, and it is wrong of you to believe that I would accept your suit."
Charles stared at her unblinkingly. Bad enough that she had just dismissed him, but had she also said that she would not accept his proposal when he finally deigned to offer it?
"You're mad," he said.
Possibly, she thought, given her behavior earlier in the day. But if this was madness, she was willing to accept it.
"We have very little in common," she said, "and I am committed to Innishffarin. That being the case, it would be wrong to sail under false colors, as it were."
Slowly, Charles stood. His hands balled into fists at his sides. A dull flush suffused his cheeks. "It's Wyndham, isn't it?"
Katlin's color fled. She did a noble job of concealing her shock but she could not hide it entirely.
Charles's voice rose. "I knew it! I saw how he looked at you at the St. Johns's and again here. Typical Scots bastard, thinks he can have anything he likes."
"He isn't a bastard," Katlin said automatically. On the contrary, if Francis Wyndham was to be believed, the by-blow was on her side.
"Don't you defend him to me," Charles demanded. His lip curled. "I am a Devereux and I damn well don't lose to any Scots savage."
"This isn't a contest," Katlin protested. The thought horrified her. She would not be a pawn for any man. "I have told you, I am committed to Innishffarin. You despise it, that is quite clear. There is no point to discussing it further."
Deliberately, she walked toward the door. Charles wasn't the only one who could drop loud hints.
He followed reluctantly. At the door, he said, "All right, I'll go, but don't think for a moment that I'm giving up. You'll come to your senses."
When he was gone, Katlin sighed with relief. If he wanted to believe she would change her mind in order to assuage his pride, so be it. As far as she was concerned, that was one problem she had managed to deal with expeditiously. But there were a great many left. Apart from the matter of Angus, from which she still firmly shied away, she had yet to find a way to save Innishffarin. Charles was right about her funds from Lady Margaret; they could remain tied up forever. But if Francis was to be believ
ed, there might be a solution.
***
Maggie Fergus was in the kitchen, stirring soup in a kettle over the fire. She looked up and smiled when Katlin came in.
"His lordship gone?"
Katlin nodded. She didn't question how Mrs. Fergus knew of Charles's visit. Servants always knew everything. Undoubtedly, the story of their disagreement would be well circulated before nightfall. She blushed slightly at the thought that others would know she had dismissed Charles as a suitor but there was nothing to be done for it.
Seated at the table, she nibbled on a piece of fresh-baked shortbread and agreed that a cup of tea would be nice. She was very tired and there was a lingering soreness between her thighs that weakened her resolve not to think of Angus. The memory of his touch, his possession, the incandescent pleasure he had brought her to, were too much to comprehend so swiftly. Better to concentrate on other things.
"Mrs. Fergus," she began quietly, "have you ever heard of something called the Wyndham Treasure?"
The housekeeper continued stirring the soup without pause. But it seemed to Katlin that her back stiffened.
"The what, miss?"
"The Wyndham Treasure. Would you know what that is?"
"A story, that's all, no truth to it."
Katlin doubted that. Perhaps ghosts weren't the most reliable of sources of information but Francis had sounded very sure.
"I love stories," she said encouragingly. "How does it go?"
Mrs. Fergus hesitated. Plainly, she did not want to say, but she liked her young mistress and it was very hard to refuse her outright.
"It started during the Crusades," she said finally, "although I'm not sure at all of the details. Supposedly, one of the Wyndhams, whoever was laird then or maybe one of his sons, again I'm not sure, came home with a great treasure won fighting the Saracens."
Katlin leaned her elbow on the table, cupped her chin in her hand and asked, "What happened to it?"
"No one knows, lass. The fact is it probably never existed, but plenty of Wyndhams have thought differently. They've been looking for it ever since. Not a scrap of it's been seen, which leads me to think the whole thing was false to start with."
She probably was right, Katlin thought. Even if the original Wyndham had hidden the treasure, his family had had plenty of time to find it. Francis had said... what exactly? That he'd guarded the treasure for years and wouldn't let it go until he could pass it to a legitimate Wyndham heir. That certainly seemed to indicate that it not only existed but that he knew where it was.
