The Marriage Contract

by Cathy Maxwell

  “Why?”

  She stumbled for words and then quickly gasped, “I hope to learn something.”

  He didn’t believe her but with a grunt let her know she could do as she pleased, provided she didn’t interfere with him. He proceeded to chop the rabbit meat into pieces, which he tossed into the bubbling stew pot.

  Anne grew anxious. They were going to need help serving to so many guests. “Is Norval available?”

  Roy had laid down his butcher knife and now wielded a wooden spoon like a scepter. He used it to point to a corner.

  Anne followed his direction and discovered Norval asleep on some meal sacks. The old man was passed out cold. She tried to wake him with a hard shake, but to no avail. She slapped his cheeks. No response. She even pulled open an eyelid. He didn’t wake.

  “Is he dead?” she asked Roy.

  In answer, Roy picked up a bowl containing water and tossed it on Norval, splashing some onto Anne at the same time.

  “What? What? What?” the old servant sputtered.

  Deciding to turn the other cheek and handle Roy’s insolence with tolerance, she said quietly but firmly to Norval, “We have guests, and you are needed to serve them.”

  The old man had to crawl to a stool for help rising. His knees cracked loudly, and Anne worried for him. “What do you need done?” he asked, his eyes still half closed. He was obviously under the weather from overimbibing the night before.

  “We need to wash bowls and spoons,” she said. “You must fetch water.”

  “You don’t need to wash those,” Roy countermanded her, nodding to the stack of dirty dishes. “There’s a sand box over there. The food on them is dry. Rub a little sand on the plates and they’ll be clean enough.”

  Anne had never heard of such a thing, but Norval had. This was obviously the standard practice. He shuffled over and began preparing bowls for stew. She decided she didn’t think much of Roy’s method as she watched Norval clean bowl after bowl with the same sand.

  Her appetite for breakfast vanished, especially as Roy used his spoon to take a slurping taste of the soup.

  She directed her attention away from Roy and poked around a bit. She knew what a kitchen needed. Before her Uncle Robert and Aunt Maeve, she’d lived with a distant cousin who had considered her little more than a servant. What little cooking skills her mother had taught her were refined in Cousin Gen’s kitchen. She knew how to bake bread and that the loaves should be started in the morning…although she didn’t see any.

  “Are you baking bread today?” she asked Roy.

  He ignored her. Norval began setting bowls out on a huge wooden tray.

  Roy’s insolence miffed Anne. She also knew she couldn’t continue to let it go unchallenged, especially in front of another servant. She walked over to the chopping block where he was cutting off turnip heads.

  “I asked if you were baking bread today?”

  The cook’s lip curled in derision. “No need. The laird won’t be here.”

  “But I will be. Furthermore, he’ll be back this evening and expect something to eat.”

  “He won’t want bread,” Roy answered. “He drinks his dinner. Ale gives him everything he needs.” He turned his back on her.

  Anne stared at him, wishing she could make him vanish with a blink of her eyes. But that wasn’t going to happen. She came around to his side of the chopping block. “Roy, I want you to bake bread.”

  Norval had stopped his chore to watch the exchange. Both Anne and Roy were conscious of their audience. A well-trained servant would have acquiesced to her request.

  Roy was not well trained.

  His pig eyes traveled the length of her person with such insolence that Anne felt the color rise to her cheeks.

  And then, he made a gargling sound in his throat and spat into the stew.

  Anne stared in shock. She pulled her gaze from the distasteful spittle congealing in the middle of the stew to the cook’s face. He was grinning at her. “Would you like for me to do it again?” he said almost pleasantly.

  A red haze descended over Anne’s mind. “You are the most disgusting person I have ever met,” she announced.

  Her words didn’t have any impact on Roy until she picked up the butcher knife. What? Did he think he was the only one who knew how to handle a cleaver?

  “Get out of my kitchen,” she said, in a voice she could barely recognize as her own.

  Roy wasn’t laughing now. “Come along, my lady. You’d best put the knife down.”

  She sliced the air with it, inches from his belly. “Not until you leave.” She brought the cleaver down with a resounding “thwack” on the chopping block, neatly splitting a turnip in half.

  By the time she turned to threaten him again, Roy was off and heading toward the door. Anne followed. “And don’t come back until you have a little respect,” she told him, slamming the door in his wake for emphasis.

  She’d seen him run in the direction of the great hall. She knew his type. He was probably going to whine to Aidan and weasel himself into looking like the abused party.

  She faced Norval. “Dish up that stew.”

  The old man was practically shaking. She had to lay down the cleaver before he could take a step, but she’d never seen him move so fast or efficiently. He had thirteen bowls of piping hot stew ladled out in a wink. He picked up the tray with more strength than she would have credited him.

  “Come along,” Anne said, and led the way to the great hall.

  Everything was as she’d expected. The men were sitting, impatiently waiting for breakfast while Roy held center stage accusing her of being out of her wits. His knees still shook.

  It pleased her to make an entrance looking like the very soul of civility. “Are you ready for your breakfast?” she asked sweetly. Without waiting for an answer, she nodded to Norval to start serving.

  “Roy has been telling us a fascinating story, my lady,” Aidan said.

  Anne glanced at the cook, who blanched. She smiled at her husband. “Oh, really? Is it believable?” Out of the corner of her eye, she noticed Deacon had already dug into his stew with gusto.

  Nothing could have pleased her more.

  Aidan leaned forward, his eyes bright with curiosity. “He said you threatened his life with his own meat cleaver.”

  “I did.” Fang and his sons were now gobbling the stew. Everyone had touched it but Aidan. Drat. She could postpone the coup de grâce no longer. “Did he tell you why?”

  “He said you were a madwoman.”

  “I was absolutely furious,” she admitted. “Especially after he spat into the soup you are all eating.”

  She looked right at Deacon when she said those words, and the satisfaction of seeing his jaw drop with a spoonful of soup in his mouth made her want to do a jig!

  Spoons hit the table. Fang’s sons spat the contents of their mouths back into their bowls. The dogs, who were begging under the table, went wild with the commotion.

  Fang stood. “Is that true?” he demanded of Roy.

  Roy appeared ready to collapse. He shot a pleading glance to Norval, who quickly side-stepped away, lest he also be accused.

  “I meant nothing by it,” Roy said, a tremor in his voice. “All cooks do it.”

  The men at the table stared in dumbfounded silence a minute, a few a bit green in the gills. Then Fang’s oldest son stood and yelled, “I don’t think we should let him off easy, lads. I say, he deserves a dunk in the privy!”

  His words were met by a roar of approval, and before Anne realized what was happening, the Mowat boys jumped over the table to descend upon Roy, who took off running. He headed for the kitchen door, but Deacon tackled him and the hapless cook was hoisted high and carried out the front door.

  Anne watched the mob of boys, men, and barking, excited dogs in a state of shock. It had all happened so quickly.

  She turned to the dais. The table had been knocked over. Bowls and stew were everywhere. Several of the dogs had stayed behind to
lap up the bounty on the floor.

  And there was Aidan. He sat in his chair exactly as he had before chaos had over taken his great hall. He was watching her.

  “Happy?”

  “I didn’t expect such a reaction,” she allowed.

  He rose and stepped down from the dais. With a catlike grace, he approached. “Well done, lady wife,” he said in a voice as smooth as silk. “You flipped the tables neatly, no pun intended.”

  She didn’t answer. She was wary of him now, waiting for the next game he wanted to play.

  He stopped, so close she could make out the weave in his shirt. She caught a whiff of sandalwood and orange oil and intimately knew from where it had come.

  She was also becoming familiar in a way only a wife could with other things—like the muscles of his chest, or the size and breadth of his hands.

  He tilted her chin up to look at him. He had a lovely mouth. She had not noticed it before. Now, she couldn’t take her eyes off it.

  He spoke, “Touché, Anne. You’ve been very clever.”

  “Do you think Roy will be back?”

  “I doubt it. And you have dinner to prepare…”

  He said the last with mock sadness. She knew he was certain the task would overwhelm her.

  It almost did. She hid behind her pride, refusing to be intimidated. “Are you having guests for supper tonight?”

  He pretended to consider a moment. “No. Just Hugh, Deacon, and me.”

  “Deacon should be more careful whenever he sits at my table.”

  Aidan’s eyes sparkled and he laughed with genuine amusement. “I think he learned a lesson this morning.”

  She nodded mutely. When he smiled and looked at her with admiration and a hint of something else, something she couldn’t quite define, it was difficult for her to breathe, let alone think.

  “Have a good day, wife,” he said, and left to join the others. As he opened the front door in the alcove, Anne heard Fang’s sons yelling outside. “…three…four—!” The door closed behind Aidan.

  She started to have a little sympathy for Roy.

  Looking around, she searched for Norval. They had a lot of work to do, but the servant had disappeared. Frowning, she hunted for him in the kitchen. He wasn’t there.

  He was either taking a nap…or could he have bolted?

  Anne stood in the center of the filthy kitchen and realized she was defeated. She couldn’t clean this room in a week, let alone in a day. And then there were the great hall, the bedrooms, the laundry, the candles, and those ridiculous rushes.

  It was enough to make her want to return to London.

  And that was what he wanted, wasn’t it?

  The door opened. “Excuse me, my lady?” a woman’s soft voice said.

  Anne turned. A group of women crowded in holding buckets, mops, and brooms. She pushed a stray lock of her hair back. “May I help you?”

  A rosy-cheeked woman stepped forward. Her eyes were the blue of the sky on a sunny day, her hair the red of a rusty nail. She bobbed a curtsey. “My lady, we don’t mean to intrude, but we’ve come to welcome you to Kelwin. I’m Bonnie Mowat. I’m the mother of that brood of boys you fed this morning.”

  Anne was surprised such a tiny woman could birth such strapping sons. In her bitter frustration she couldn’t help saying, “Welcome me? Do you mean you don’t mind that I am English?”

  Mrs. Mowat laughed. “We despaired of the laird ever getting married. There isn’t a lad in the parish, including mine, who feels his obligation to settle down and raise a family, because they all want to ape the ways of the bold and heroic Laird Tiebauld. Oh, don’t mistake my meaning. The laird is a great, generous man. There’s none like him…but he’s been needing a wife. You’ve done us a favor, my lady. A great favor.”

  It was on the tip of Anne’s tongue to tell them she’d be sent back to London posthaste after today, but she didn’t. She wasn’t ready to admit defeat—yet. “Thank you, Mrs. Mowat. I appreciate your welcome.”

  A tall, silver-haired woman pushed forward. “I’m Kathleen Keith. You know my son, Hugh?”

  “Yes, I’ve met him,” Anne said.

  Kathleen smiled with a mother’s pride. “I’d like to see him married too. He’s a fine lad, but the time has come he made me a grandmother.” She turned to the women close to her. “This is Mary MacEwan and her daughter Fenella.” Mary looked almost as young as her daughter, who was a lovely strawberry blonde.

  Suddenly, Kathleen changed the subject. “I understand Roy is gone.”

  Anne didn’t know how to answer. Were they his friends? Would they blame her for his fate? “Well…he—”

  “You don’t need to explain,” Kathleen said in her forthright manner. “It’s good riddance to him and to his lazy wife, too. I hope they run all the way to Edinburgh. But you’ll be needing a cook, and Mary and Fenella are the best in the village.”

  Anne hesitated. Aidan hadn’t said anything about household accounts or hiring servants.

  Bonnie read her mind. “If Laird Tiebauld can spend what he does on sheep, then he can spare a few coins for a good meal every night at his table.” She lowered her voice to confide, “Mary’s husband died last month. The laird slipped her a bit then. I know he has been worrying about her. He’ll be pleased if you hire her.”

  Anne gestured to encompass the kitchen. “I don’t know if it is a position you would want,” she told Mary. “The place is—” She broke off with a shake of her head. There were no words adequate enough to describe the mess.

  “It will be fine,” Mary assured her. “Nothing is wrong here that good hard work and soap won’t clean.”

  “Oh, yes,” Anne agreed. “But I don’t know if there is enough soap to meet all the needs of Kelwin.”

  “That’s why we’re here,” Mrs. Keith said proudly. “We’ve come to welcome you, and to offer our help. I’ve been itching to get my fingers on that mush of stems and leaves the laird takes such pride in on the floor of his hall.”

  “I’d like to see it gone, too,” Anne agreed.

  A sly smile lifted the corners of Mrs. Keith’s mouth. “Then let’s see it gone together…before he comes home.”

  “I can’t expect you to help—” Anne started to protest but Mrs. Mowat shushed her.

  “It’s a housewarming we are giving you, my lady. If we’d known you were coming, we would have forced our way in before your arrival.”

  “Yes,” Mrs. Keith agreed. “We would have barricaded those bachelors—and their dogs, too!—out of the castle, and scoured the place with boiling water.”

  “It needs it,” Anne said. “But it is almost too big a job, even for us.”

  “Och,” Mrs. Mowat said, taking Anne’s arm and leading her forward. “It’s not just us. Come along, my lady, and meet the rest of the women in the village. They are outside waiting.”

  Mrs. Keith swooped in to take her other arm. “And they are armed with buckets, brooms, and mops.”

  “And enough soap to scrub every brick in this drafty place,” Mrs. Mowat added.

  As Anne stepped outside, the sun came out from behind a bank of clouds and she caught her breath. What they’d said was true. There were close to fifteen women and their children of all ages waiting to pay their respects. Their names ran together during those initial introductions in her mind, but she would never forget their welcoming smiles. Each of them was unique and special.

  “I can’t believe you are all so generous,” Anne told them. “This isn’t going to be easy.”

  Mrs. Mowat gave her arm a squeeze. “We don’t mind. We do this because you are one of us now. You are the laird’s wife. The Lady of Kelwin.”

  For a moment, Anne couldn’t speak. Their open-armed acceptance swept her away. Nothing like this had ever happened to her before.

  She was one of them.

  Mrs. Keith took charge. “Let’s clean,” she cried out like a commander leading the troops into battle, and the women sallied forth.

  C
hapter 7

  The trip to McKenzie’s to buy sheep was a hard one for Aidan. He usually took pleasure in the company of Fang’s sons, although this time only the eldest four rode along. Their good-natured rivalry and bantering tended to make him laugh. Plus it was a good day for traveling. He should have enjoyed himself.

  But he didn’t.

  In the past, the eldest boys, Thomas and Douglas, rode with him. Now, they stayed close to Deacon—and the others followed their brothers. There was a new sense of manliness about the lads, a determined set to their jaws, an unspoken purpose that Aidan hadn’t seen before, and he feared the source.

  Deacon had recruited them. When the time came, they would march against the English.

  On the return trip, he nudged Beaumains closer to Fang’s horse. Ahead of them, Hugh, Deacon and the boys were making outrageous wagers and laughing whenever someone lost.

  “Are you really going to let your sons go with Robbie and Deacon Gunn?” he asked Fang.

  The old man’s eyes hardened and then softened on a weary sigh. “Do I have a choice? Thomas and Douglas are men full grown. William and Andrew are old enough to make their own decisions, too.”

  Aidan rode in silence for a moment, then said, “I have known your sons since the youngest was a toddler. I don’t want to see them go to war.”

  “Strange words from the descendant of Fighting Donner Black. Especially since Deacon told me you were in.”

  “He did?” Aidan frowned. “He goes too far. I have yet to commit myself.”

  “But you are smuggling in the gunpowder.”

  A trap seemed to close in around Aidan. “Aye.”

  “Then you are in, Laird.”

  Aidan rubbed the polished leather of Beaumains, reins between his gloved fingers. “I hope to avoid it. My family knows first-hand war is never a solution. My grandfather taught me the lesson.”

  Fang shook his head in sad agreement. “Aye, but sometimes, Laird, a man must make his own decisions—even if it has dangerous consequences. I canna stop my sons from being the men they must be. They are young and full of spirit. If there is a war, they will go.”