He carried me up the stairs to bed after that, and we did indeed do it again, several times, until we were both exhausted. Tucked up warm in the little cottage, ignoring the rain outside and the wedding guests at the Manor and the world beyond, it was almost possible to imagine that we were back on Taransay.
But in the morning it was still raining, and there was a footman at the door with a note from Lord Strathconan, informing us that Neil’s commanding officer had sent orders recalling him to Lochinver at once. At once. The Earl had underlined the words, as though he could not bear for us to have any more stolen time alone together.
Before he left Neil kissed me and held me tightly in front of everyone, and told me that he would come back soon. After all that had so recently passed between us it almost broke my heart to let him go.
‘I hate to leave you, Cat,’ he whispered. ‘But I will write every day—’
‘Come on, Sinclair!’ Johnny Methven interrupted—rudely, I thought. He had been recalled as well, and was in a foul temper as he had apparently been anticipating some time in the Edinburgh bawdy houses instead.
Neil released me reluctantly with a final kiss. ‘Wait for me in Edinburgh,’ he said. ‘I’ll come as soon as I can…’
‘Yours is the fate of a Navy wife in wartime,’ Lady Strathconan said to me, trying to console, as we watched Neil ride away down the drive of the Manor. ‘But do not repine. We shall go to Edinburgh and entertain ourselves there. We will have such fun! You will love it, Catriona. Just you see.’
She squeezed my hand and I knew she was trying to be kind; knew, moreover, than in my strange new life she really was my only ally. So for once I bit my tongue, and did not blurt out that the only thing that would make me happy would be to have more time with my husband, and that gown shops and dinners and fashionable diversions were no substitute for his presence.
Then, when they were almost through the gateway, I saw Johnny Methven lean over and clap Neil on the shoulder. Neil grinned in response to something that Methven said, and they kicked their horses to a gallop and were gone without a backward glance. It reminded me of the moment that Neil had left me and gone back to the wardroom that night on the ship. He had been turning back toward something welcome and familiar then. So it was now, for I had seen the expression on his face before he had been lost from my view. He had looked relieved.
Chapter Seventeen
In which I feel monstrously neglected by my husband.
We went to Edinburgh. I hated it.
Please do not misunderstand me. I love Edinburgh, and think it one of the most beautiful cities on earth, but the Edinburgh that I had visited with my father, with its libraries and lectures and learned debates, was a very different one from the city known to Lady Strathconan and Lady Methven. When I had visited with my papa we had stayed in the old town, with the scholars, scientists and philosophers who had been of his circle. The tenements were crowded, the street smells strong and the hospitality was erratic, but the conversation was stimulating enough to help us all forget that we had missed our dinner. There were no formal visiting hours—guests would call late and talk well into the night, arguing philosophical or mathematical concepts over a bottle or two of the finest malt.
In contrast the Earl of Strathconan had a magnificent townhouse in Charlotte Square, newly built and designed by Robert Adam, no less. The new town was beautiful, spacious and elegant, and the smells and vivid life of the old city were banished. We did not visit there. When I suggested that there were friends of my father I would like to call upon I was politely discouraged. When I called upon them anyway, I was roundly condemned for my behaviour by Lady Methven. Her Ladyship kept a separate establishment in Queen’s Street, where she lived with her glacially cold unmarried daughter Anne. Anne Methven had a disconcerting habit of watching me silently with her chilly gaze, and she never made the slightest attempt to befriend me, though we were close in age. No doubt she thought me beneath her touch.
At least the servants were friendly, all except Lady Strathconan’s personal maid, Mackie, a thin-faced, thin-lipped woman who moved silently like a ghost about her mistress’s bidding. My own maid was a cheerful country girl called Jessie, who had as little idea of how to be a lady’s maid as I had of how to be a society lady. We muddled along together. I think all the servants, from the butler to the hall boy, were so surprised that I learned their names and actually spoke to them that they took me to their hearts immediately. I soon realised that Lord and Lady Strathconan never spoke to their staff except through intermediaries. This was entirely proper, of course, but it went against my nature to ignore the very people who made my life so materially comfortable, and Lady Strathconan was always chiding me for chatting to the housemaids.
Lady Strathconan’s days consisted of walking in the Queen’s Square Gardens, or browsing the new shops that were opening in Princes Street, or attending the assembly rooms to gossip and chat before the same people we had met there called upon us to gossip some more. I found it utterly tedious.
Naturally I was something of a novelty, the schoolmaster’s daughter who had caught the heir to the Earl of Strathconan. The word ‘entrapped’ was not used openly, of course, but once again, as with Lady Bennie back in Applecross, I caught the disapproval, the whiff of scandal. Every matron in Edinburgh picked over the on dit of my kidnapping as though it was a particularly tempting cut of meat, and whilst everyone agreed that I had been frightfully brave during my ordeal, I could see the speculation in every eye as all the matrons wondered privately what had happened between Neil and myself when we were marooned alone together. More than one lady allowed her gaze to dwell brazenly on my stomach, to see if I was showing signs of increasing.
As for the gentlemen, they were all that was charming and attentive, offering to take me driving or to escort me for a walk in the gardens, or to dance with me at the balls and assemblies. Chief amongst my admirers was a handsome but rather stupid army officer called Tolly Gulliver. He seemed to have no discernible job, for he spent all his time dancing attendance on me. I tolerated him, because he reminded me of a dog in his anxiety to please. I suppose that I should have been more careful of my good name, but I was miserable that Neil was not there and did not have the heart nor the energy to dismiss Tolly. His attentions meant nothing to me. They did not ease the pain of Neil’s absence. They left me completely cold.
I missed Neil with a sense of loss that made me ache inside and brought the tears pricking the back of my throat. I pined. Naturally I did not stop eating—it takes more than being unhappy in love to make me starve myself—but it felt as though I were moving through a world that lacked colour and vitality, as though each day were in black and white tones and all the brightness had leached away.
After ten days of living Lady Strathconan’s type of existence I was near screaming, especially as I had had no word from Neil, who, it seemed, was particularly bad at letter-writing despite his extravagant promises. After a month, I thought I would run mad.
Christmas came and went with neither sight nor sound of my husband, and not even the Hogmanay celebrations could lift my spirits. The January days were long and dark. By now I knew that I was not increasing, and whilst a part of me was defiantly glad to prove the gossips wrong, another part of me was desperately upset that I was not to have a baby. I had nothing of Neil’s except his relatives, and I did not want them.
Lady Strathconan tried to cheer me, but her words of consolation left me feeling gloomier rather than uplifted.
‘You know what men are,’ she would say brightly, when another day brought no word from Neil. ‘They become immersed in their business for months on end, and so often forget we poor females left behind! I am sure that had he been assigned a ship we should have heard…’ And then, having reminded me how little Neil must care for me, and the ever present danger of my never seeing him again, she would walk away.
Lady Methven was more blunt. ‘A female is nothing more than a fool if she expects a man to
care for her feelings,’ she would say, and Miss Methven would nod her arctic agreement.
It was no wonder she was unmarried. If she had absorbed her mother’s views on men then she could have nothing but contempt for them, and any man would freeze to death anyway if he attempted to climb into her bed.
When I finally did receive a letter, in the third week of January, it was not from Neil but from my cousin Ellen. She was settled in a cottage in the village of Morningside, a mere few miles down the road. The house belonged to Captain Langley’s mother, and they were residing there whilst they awaited his next posting. She asked particularly if I would like to call.
I was vastly relieved. I had wanted more than anything to see Ellen again, but was acutely conscious that I had been the indirect cause of her father’s death. Although it had been Ellen herself who had run away to raise the alarm, I was not sure what her reception of me might be, especially as I now owned Glen Clair, or would do when all the legal niceties were completed. My father, as I had once suspected, had made the property over to Uncle Ebeneezer for his lifetime only, on the understanding that he would hold it in trust for me.
On my marriage, of course, all my meagre fortune had become Neil’s, but Lady Strathconan had told me that Neil and his uncle had argued over Glen Clair, with Neil insisting it should remain mine as it was my dowry and should become my jointure, and his uncle calling him an indulgent fool. I was grateful for Neil’s generosity in this, though sorry to be the cause of further discord with his uncle.
Anyway, I begged the use of the carriage from Lady Strathconan, and planned to visit Ellen the very afternoon that her letter arrived.
‘Would you like to call with me, ma’am?’ I asked. ‘I know that Ellen is sincerely fond of you, and has always spoken of you with the greatest affection.’
Lady Strathconan had turned away from me, and now she shook her head. ‘No, my dear,’ she said, smiling gently at me. ‘I think it would be nice for you to have time alone with your cousin. I will call another time.’
So it was that I met up with Ellen in the pretty little house in Morningside, where Captain Langley’s mother resided. It had emerged from gossip that Captain Langley was very well connected, and as a younger son of a very rich family had been allowed to marry as he pleased. This was fortunate for Ellen, who did not have a feather to fly, and although I had the impression from Mrs Langley that she wished her youngest had chosen an heiress, she was prepared to be indulgent, given Ellen’s extreme prettiness and sweet nature. There was also the matter of Ellen’s connection to the Earl of Strathconan, of course.
I was given a very warm welcome indeed, Mrs Langley’s sharp brown gaze itemising my clothes and my bonnet and my jewels, and registering just the slightest degree of surprise at my appearance, probably because I had not had the patience to sit long enough for Jessie to arrange my hair quite properly. At any rate, she was extremely civil, poured tea for us, and withdrew tactfully after a twenty minutes’ polite chitchat so that Ellen and I might talk properly.
As soon as she had left the room Ellen leaped up and embraced me very affectionately. She was dressed in a most becoming mourning gown of lilac edged with black, and looked pale but otherwise very well. Marriage clearly suited her.
‘Catriona!’ she cried. ‘I have been longing to see you!’
We hugged each other hard, but then she let me go and hung back all of a sudden, the colour rushing into her face. ‘I hope,’ she added with constraint, ‘that you are not angry with me, cousin?’
I was astounded. ‘How could I be angry with you?’ I asked. ‘It was not your fault that your father sought to rob me of my inheritance. And I am truly sorry that he died, Ellen. I would never have wished that upon him, no matter what he did.’
‘You are all generosity, cousin,’ Ellen said, drooping like a cut flower. I thought it was a great pity that her husband was not there to admire how pretty she looked, for he would have fallen more in love with her by the minute. ‘You are more kind than I deserve.’
‘Rubbish,’ I said, fearing she was about to give way to a fit of the vapours. ‘It was none of it your fault.’
‘No, but when Papa hit you and that dreadful sailor came in to the inn parlour and carried you away to the ship I did nothing to save you!’ Ellen said, wringing her hands pitifully. ‘And then there was Neil—I saw them knock him out and carry him off, too! Five to one, the fight was!’
‘Five to one!’ I said. It seemed Neil had not exaggerated after all.
‘I was so shocked that I fainted dead away!’ Ellen continued. ‘When I came round we were in the gig and already jolting down the road back to Glen Clair. When I asked Papa what had happened he only growled at me and threatened to leave me at the side of the road if I persisted in questioning him. I was so distressed that I sat there and did nothing.’
‘You did plenty,’ I said, clasping her anxious hands in mine. She felt cold and tense, and she looked so distraught that I could not find it in my heart to be angry with her. Ellen was not like me. I would have screamed and bitten the kidnapper, and kicked his shins and made so tremendous a fuss that no one could have ignored me. But she was as delicate as Mrs Langley’s bone china, and so fainting dead away had been her only real option.
‘You did plenty to help,’ I said again, comfortingly and only slightly untruthfully. ‘You ran away to Captain Langley as soon as you could, and that was very courageous of you. You told the authorities what your father had done, which cannot have been easy for you either.’
Ellen seemed a little comforted by this, and she drew me down to sit beside her on the chintz sofa. Everything about the drawing room was chintzy and pretty, decorated in bright yellows and whites. It suited her complexion most perfectly.
‘And, speaking of Captain Langley, I must congratulate you on your marriage,’ I said, smiling. ‘You do look very well on it.’
Ellen laughed and thanked me. She glanced at the clock. ‘Robert will be home soon,’ she murmured. ‘We are to go to the ball at the castle tonight.’
‘You move in the highest society,’ I teased. ‘You were wise to choose Captain Langley over Lieutenant Graham…’
‘Oh…’ Ellen smiled and blushed, looking even more pink and animated. ‘There was never anyone for me but my own dear Robert! Lieutenant Graham was charming, but he was not the man to turn to in a crisis. He would never have exerted himself on my behalf as my dearest Robert did.’
I had to congratulate her on her perspicacity. Nine women out of ten would probably have run into Lieutenant Graham’s arms, only to find that they were not strong enough to bear her weight.
‘You are a dark horse, Ellen,’ I said. ‘I had no notion that it was Langley you preferred. And you had only met him twice!’
‘Oh…’ Ellen blushed deliciously. ‘We wrote to one another after he had left Kinlochewe. Mrs Grant carried the letters for me, and posted them in the village. I kept it a secret from you, dearest Catriona—not because I did not trust you, but because I could not believe that anything would come of it. Had Papa found out—’ She broke off. ‘But when I needed help I knew there was nowhere else to turn but to my dearest Robert.’ She bit her lip. ‘Indeed, it was most immodest of me to throw myself on his mercy when we were barely acquainted, but I knew he had something of an admiration for me and might be persuaded to believe my tale. So I left the malt whisky bottle out for Papa one night, and when he was insensible with drink I crept out and up the glen and took the mail coach for Ruthven.’ She shivered artistically. ‘It was utterly terrifying.’
‘I cannot thank you enough,’ I said. ‘You were very brave.’
She gave me a little smile of gratitude. ‘I think I was. Robert says I was. He was horrified at what I had done.’
I could well believe it. Poor, conventional Captain Langley. No wonder he had hurried Ellen into a hasty marriage to formalise their relationship and cover up her lack of discretion. Still, he must love her very much, and it was greatly to his credit
that he appreciated her worth.
‘And your mama?’ I said. ‘How is her health these days?’
‘Oh, Mama is excessively well now that she is away from Glen Clair and living with her sister in Inverness,’ Ellen said. Her eyes twinkled. ‘Of course she is in mourning, and cannot go out into society officially, but she plays cards and entertains the ladies of the town to tea, and they talk of fashion and play the piano, and all is so much better since she is back in society again.’
I laughed. It was good to see Ellen displaying a little backbone. I had been afraid that both she and Aunt Madeline would mourn Uncle Ebeneezer, despite the fact that he had ruled their lives harshly for so many years with his drunkenness and his petty cruelties. But I could see that both Ellen and her mother had been starved of joy for so long that now they had their freedom they were grabbing it with both hands.
Ellen checked the pot and ordered fresh tea.
‘And you are Mrs Sinclair now,’ she teased, ‘one day to be Countess of Strathconan! How is Neil? I hope that you are both enjoying married life.’
I felt a sharp pain, as though I had tried to walk on a broken limb that had not quite healed.
‘Neil is away at Lochinver,’ I said, with constraint. ‘I hope to see him return soon, but I am not certain…’
Ellen stirred the teapot. ‘He seemed flatteringly anxious to marry you,’ she said.
‘Neil did the honourable thing,’ I said lightly. ‘Which was fortunate for me, since I could scarcely have come back from such an adventure with my reputation intact otherwise.’
Ellen lowered the tea strainer into the cup with a tiny chink. She looked at me thoughtfully with her blue, blue eyes. ‘I am sure there is more to his feelings than honour,’ she murmured. ‘Neil always admired you, as I recall.’
The tears prickled my throat. Oh, yes, Neil admired me. It was my tragedy that I wanted so much more from him than his admiration.
Kidnapped: His Innocent Mistress Page 19
