"Why, marriage, of course," Christopher laughed, flashing his sharp white teeth.
"Don't be ridiculous, I couldn't possibly--"
"Come now, you've been a widow for nearly a year. Nothing is to stop us from getting married in few more months. You can move into my house. Then we can clear all the young and old people off the land and start making this place turn an even bigger profit once we get rid of the drain on your resources. You can have some new pretty gowns and grace my drawing room and bedroom, while I take over the running of all this myself. I'll be only too pleased to send that bastard Lochlainn packing, I can tell you. He always was an arrogant young buck!"
Muireann gazed at him in horror. "Surely you aren't serious! You're the last man in the world I would ever consider marrying!"
Christopher's smiles at an end, he leaned forward in a threatening manner, but at least he didn't touch her. "Then I don't even give this place another six months. What do you and Lochlainn know about running an estate?"
"More than you do, apparently," Muireann said with a haughty lift of her chin. "I haven't beggared mine the way you have! I've started out with virtually nothing, and built it up. I didn't squander it and leave people to starve in the road!
"If you aren't able to buy it, I'll just have to find a purchaser elsewhere. One who won't try to turn out every tenant as soon as he gets his hands on the place. That is, assuming I ever do decide to sell. I could just bide my time a bit longer, and wait for the fruits of our labors to come in."
"An admirable notion, my dear," Christopher replied in a tone which belied his words. "But do try to be practical for once, why don't you? No one will want all those old decrepit people and half-starved children! Send them to the workhouse where they belong! Let them go before they drag this place under. You'll never prosper if you don't."
She shook her head. "I can't do that. I gave them my word I would look after them. And I am not interested in prospering, as you call it, at the expense of those who can't look after themselves," Muireann said firmly.
She stared at Christopher as though he were the devil incarnate as he lounged in his chair speaking of the fate of dozens of people in a manner which suggested that their deaths weren't of the least concern to him.
"Well, you still haven't given me your answer, Muireann and this conversation is growing tiresome. Will you marry me?"
Muireann laughed mockingly. "I've told you, there's nothing in the world that would convince me to marry you!"
"Not even to keep Barnakilla?" he countered smoothly.
She gave an arrogant lift of her chin. "What are you talking about? I've told you, I don't have to sell. I have other options to keep it running until the spring, when we can begin planting again."
Christopher twirled his new gold-topped cane casually. "I've heard a lot about this estate ever since I arrived back in Ireland a few weeks ago. I came here to see if the reports were true. Now that I see it's all I've been told and more, I think it's about time I informed you of the real reason for my coming back."
"Real reason?" she asked quietly, her blood beginning to chill once more.
"As the closest blood relative to Augustine Caldwell, I have a legitimate claim to this property. So, if you refuse to marry me, I'll drag you through the law courts, and fight you tooth and nail to make Barnakilla and all its contents my own.
"You may be Augustine's widow, but he didn't leave a will, now did he? That was a small oversight on your part, wasn't it, Muireann? So, given all I've seen here, this place is well worth the having now. Therefore, I shall be claiming title to the place in two days' time. Which means I'm giving you two days to consider my marriage proposal, or else you'll have this place pulled right out from under your feet."
Muireann leapt up and began to pace the floor. "You can't do that! Not after everything I've done to improve it. You might be entitled to the land and property, but it was worth virtually nothing when I first took it over. It was mortgaged up to the hilt, and the bank was about to repossess it. I sold every gown, every jewel I owned, every wedding present I received! I've done nothing but struggle and toil since I arrived here a year ago. Now you're telling me you're going to take it from me?"
He reclined in his chair. "Let's not get hysterical. I've already asked you to marry me. I shall let you carry on pretty much as before, except that I will be in charge from now on. Lochlainn won't be at your beck and call anymore. I can't trust him, so you can start by sacking him. But all other parts of this estate will continue on, and soon we shall have some strapping sons to carry on the Caldwell line."
Muireann looked at him narrowly. "This enmity between you and Lochlainn. It wouldn't by any chance have to do with your seducing his fiancée Tara away from him, would it?"
"I suppose the bastard told you that, did he?" Christopher accused too quickly, thus proclaiming his own guilt.
Muireann answered with a level look, "No, he never said a word against you. But I knew from the moment I met you that you were a dissolute libertine, just as Augustine was. I only made the mistake of thinking you could be used to my benefit just like you seem to use everyone for yours. But now that I have no use for you, Mr. Caldwell, you can get off my land. And I would advise you never to step foot here again."
Christopher's change of color betokened his fury. Determined to do anything to break this woman's spirit, he countered, "I'll give you two days to change your mind. Then I'm going to file the papers. If you say no, Muireann, I'll take Barnakilla apart brick by brick if I have to, until there's nothing left. All your precious peasants will be homeless, instead of only the indigent ones you rescued from the neighboring estates. Is that what you want?"
Muireann opened the door and pointed for him to leave. "You can't frighten me, Mr. Caldwell. This is my home. And I am neither powerless nor friendless, as you'll discover soon enough if you attempt to carry out your threats. It will take more than the likes of a dissolute rake like yourself to make me run scared, or steal my home out from under me."
Christopher smirked as he brushed past her. "Brave words, girl. I'll see you eat them one of these days. You'll regret this. I won't have any qualms about taking it out of your hide, highborn Graham or not. I can't wait until we're married, my dear."
Suddenly he grabbed her around the waist and kissed her on the lips. His mouth swooped down over hers brutally, grinding his teeth into her tender flesh.
Muireann tasted blood. She pushed against his chest futilely, trying to end the torture. But Christopher clung onto her like an octopus, so that Muireann, summoning all her strength and resolution, finally locked one leg around the back of his knees and shoved hard, sending Christopher sprawling on his back into the dirt.
She then wiped her mouth with the back of her hand and spat disgustedly at him as he lay prone on the ground. She stalked off, leaving him cursing as she fled.
A movement out of the corner of her eye caught her attention as she ran to the stables to soothe her frazzled nerves by grooming the horses.
Oh God, that was all she needed, for Lochlainn to have seen Christopher kissing her.
But it wasn't Lochlainn who came into the stables after her. It was Ciara, and she was carrying a pistol.
Ciara raised her arm and pointed it directly at Muireann's head.
Muireann's knees turned to jelly. For a moment she wondered crazily if her nightmares had somehow returned to haunt her during her waking hours. This couldn't be happening again...
"Ciara, what are you doing?" Muireann exclaimed. "Put the pistol down!"
"I can't let you do it! I can't let you!" Ciara shrieked, advancing towards her menacingly.
"Do what, Ciara? I don't understand!"
"You know what I'm talking about!" she insisted, waving the gun perilously close to Muireann's face.
Muireann shuddered as she recalled the last time she had looked directly down the barrel of a gun. She prayed she wouldn't faint. If she did, she was as good as dead.
"No, Ciara, I
don't know what you are talking about!" she said quickly. "Please, put the gun down and explain this to me, step by step."
Ciara stared at Muireann, her emerald eyes rolling wildly in her head.
Lochlainn had warned her that Ciara was unstable. What on earth could have made her turn like this? Why did she suddenly get the strangest feeling that it had something to do with Christopher Caldwell?
She cast her mind back to the other times Ciara had behaved oddly. Christopher was the only common link. His name, her job, the dog, the pictures, the pistol. . .
Muireann begged, "Please, Ciara, talk to me! Whatever has been troubling you for so long has everyone terribly worried. Lochlainn is sick at heart not knowing what's changed you since he was last home at Barnakilla. If I can help you, please let me. But killing me won't solve anyone's problems here on the estate. If I die, God knows what will happen to this place."
"Christopher Caldwell wants this place. I'll kill him and then myself before I'll ever let him step across the threshold of Barnakilla again!" Ciara hissed, her hand trembling.
Muireann's eyes widened in fear. Ciara might not mean to shoot her, but she was shaking so much she might well fire the weapon anyway.
"Why do you hate Christopher Caldwell so much?"
Ciara blinked, and Muireann saw her chance.
She stepped forward as fast as lightning and shoved Ciara's clenched hand upwards. The pistol went off as it sailed out of Ciara's hand into a nearby bale of hay.
Ciara tried to attack her with her fists, but within seconds, Lochlainn and some of the other men came running in and separated the two.
Lochlainn dragged his frenzied sister off of Muireann. "What the hell is going on around here! Are you all right?" he asked Muireann as he noticed her ashen color.
"I'm fine. Ciara and I were having a small discussion, that's all," Muireann replied with as much calm as she could muster.
"A discussion about what, for Heaven's sake! I heard a shot!" Lochlainn roared, touching her hair and shoulder intimately despite the presence of so many other people.
"Just leave us alone together, will you please, Lochlainn?"
Lochlainn stared at her in utter disbelief. "I won't leave! I want to know what's going on here!"
"And I told you to leave us alone, Mr. Roche. You will do as you're told or look for a post elsewhere!" she fired back.
She immediately regretted becoming so heavy-handed with Lochlainn when she saw the appalled look on his face. He looked as though he had been slapped.
She longed to reach out to him, but the damage was done. "Very well, Mrs. Caldwell, I'll obey your commands," Lochlainn replied stiffly.
He shot her a mutinous look which warned Muireann that she would have to deal with him later, and their interview certainly would not be a pleasant one.
Then he and the other men withdrew, leaving her alone with Lochlainn's sister.
Muireann approached Ciara tentatively, and stretched out a hand. "Come to my room now, please, and tell me what's wrong. What ever has happened to you, it must be a terrible burden to have to carry alone by yourself all the time."
Ciara crumpled to the floor of the stables and began to weep. "I was trying to save you and Barnakilla! If you marry Christopher, you'll be making the most horrible mistake of your life!"
Muireann knelt down and cradled Ciara against her shoulder. "I already did that when I married Augustine, remember? Fortune hunter that he was."
Ciara's sobs subsided then, but she trembled so violently that Muireann began to fear she was really physically ill.
"What is it? What did I say?" Muireann asked desperately, trying to get to the bottom of this mystery at last.
"I have to tell someone. But you must promise me you'll never say a word to Lochlainn, not one word, do you hear me?"
"I swear, Ciara, I would never break your confidence. But surely it can't be so bad..."
"It is worse than you can possibly imagine, Muireann. I beg you, don't marry Christopher," she pleaded.
"What would ever make you think that I would?" she said, shaking her head.
"I heard him propose to you through the window here. I know what he's like. He's evil, and evil begets evil. And Augustine, he was even worse. How you must have suffered, being married to him."
"What makes you say that?" Muireann asked, suddenly feeling very uneasy.
"Because I know what he was like, the real man underneath the surface. I know. I know. And Christopher is no better, though he prefers women instead of young boys. He only wants you for your money and the estate. He's committed all sorts of perversions on his female tenants over the years.
"He'll do it to you. He'll do it to Barnakilla. He'll come here to do the same thing. He must be stopped. You can't let him!" she warned, with a wild look in her eyes. She clung to Muireann's shoulders and shook her.
Muireann's mouth went dry, and she had to swallow hard past the lump in her throat. Suddenly the barn seemed too confined and stifling.
She rose to her feet and urged, "Please, Ciara, we can't stay here. Someone might be listening outside, or come in at any moment. Let's go for a walk. It will calm you down, and we can discuss this further."
Ciara assented tearfully. Muireann supported her as she rose from the ground.
Keeping one arm around her waist, she escorted Lochlainn's sister outside. Ciara continued to shiver, so that Muireann draped her own shawl around her. They began to walk away from the avenue towards the turf bog, certain no one would interrupt them there.
"I suppose I had better start at the beginning," Ciara sighed at length.
"It would help."
"I was the housekeeper here for several years before Lochlainn went away to Australia. It was during this time Christopher and I first became er, acquainted. It's the age-old story of master seducing servant, though I went along with it willingly enough at first, much to my shame. Christopher flattered me, seemed to be kind, bought me small presents. He made me all sorts of promises he never had any intention of fulfilling.
"I wasn't the only one, though I was too blind to see it at the time. He had dozens of women, some willing, some not so obliging. He took them indiscriminately.
"I ignored it because I had been foolish enough to fall in love with the worthless philanderer. He used me, the way he used all the other women, for gratification of his every whim, no matter how perverse or disgusting," Ciara revealed, her voice quavering with emotion.
"If he was so awful, why didn't you stop the affair?"
Ciara confessed, "I have one serious character flaw, as Lochlainn does, and that's pride. Well, as they say in the old proverb, pride comes before a fall. Everyone said I was Mr. Douglas Caldwell's illegitimate daughter. Christopher used my own pride to get into my bed. He promised me that I would get all the Caldwell fortune indirectly once I married him. Cousins married all the time, he said. He dragged the affair out for years, always playing upon my hope and pride whenever I tried to deny him and break it off."
Muireann was stunned. Ciara was the lord's illegitimate daughter? How had that chain of events come to pass? But she didn't want to stop Ciara mid-story to ask questions, so she let her press on.
Ciara paced up and down as she spoke, like a caged animal aching to be set free. "And I did try to stop the affair, believe me I did. I wasn't totally lost to honor and decency. But he would come to me with his winning ways. Because I loved him even though I knew him to be unworthy, I gave in nearly every time. Those times I refused to give in, he took me anyway, and called me a whore for having accepted him back into my bed."
"It was terrible, Muireann. He seemed to be driven by some sort of need to punish, hurt, corrupt, debauch. Women are different from men, they must be. There was excitement, danger, but never any real pleasure for me. I put up with his attentions because I thought he loved me. I thought I could change him. More fool me." She shook her head sadly.
"Not foolish, but a woman in love."
"Aye, even though
I knew what he was, I prayed I could redeem him. I waited for the day he would set the date of our nuptials. But he never intended to marry me, I know that now. And all the while he enjoyed the degradation he put me through. Revelled in the fact that I was so in love with him I would literally do just about anything for him. Anything." She shivered, and wrapped the shawl more tightly around her.
Muireann sighed. "I can imagine what it must have been like, though I thank God it's not within my own personal experience," Muireann said with a shudder at what the poor woman must have endured.
"Count yourself lucky then. Lochlainn loves you, doesn't he? He would never . . ."
Muireann raised her eyebrows in surprise, and was about to deny their relationship was of that sort. Then she shook her head. "No, not Lochlainn, but many men would, wouldn't they?" She shivered again, recalling her terrible trip to Dublin.
Call Home the Heart Page 30
