“Puget, you will address me as Murdoch or Your Grace, lest you insult me.”
Colin, whose presence prevented last minute attacks of cowardice from inspiring Puget to retreat, aimed a spectacular glower at the people gathered at the foot of the steps.
“Murdoch,” Puget said. “I beg your pardon.”
“Pardon denied,” Hamish said, resuming their progress up the steps. “It’s not me you’ve wronged, though not for lack of trying.”
Puget had disclosed the whole scheme, and had—like the dutiful scribe he was—kept track of every party who’d been fleeced by a forged IOU. Fortunately for Puget, Megan was the only lady whose letters had been copied and Hamish was the only person to whom a forged merchant’s bill had been sent.
Unfortunately for Megan, Puget confirmed that he’d made meticulous forgeries of each letter, with special attention given to rendering a perfect replica of the lady’s signature.
“If you knew it was wrong,” Hamish asked as they reached the minstrel’s gallery, “why did you do it?”
Puget was disheveled, exhausted, and facing the social equivalent of a firing squad. Hamish had intended the question as an opportunity for the condemned to unburden himself.
“It wasn’t wrong, at first,” Puget said. “Sir Fletcher asked me to make exact copies, works of art to safeguard the sentiments of his intended. Traveling across Spain, the originals had become creased and tattered. He told me he wanted only to preserve the correspondence.”
The gallery was less crowded than the ballroom, but all eyes turned to Hamish when he reached the top of the steps. Moreland was near the railing, looking every inch the duke—the displeased duke, flanked by no less than three family members.
His Grace aimed an unimpressed glance at Hamish, then turned back to Westhaven.
“So you made copies,” Hamish pressed, “not realizing they’d be used for blackmail?”
“I would never—of course I hadn’t realized what Sir Fletcher contemplated. One doesn’t, until it’s too late. He mentioned over a drink late one evening that somebody might get the wrong idea, given how exactly I had copied the lady’s hand. He never used the word forgery, but the threat was strongly implied. I was a complete dupe who’d taken artistic pride in—why am I explaining this?”
Hamish took him by one arm, Colin took him by the other.
“You’re rehearsing the story you’re about to tell the Duke of Moreland,” Hamish said, “and it had better exactly match the tale you told us at Angelo’s.”
“Exactly,” Colin said. “Word for word, not a detail out of place. Artistic pride and all that.”
Westhaven looked resplendent in his evening attire, Rosecroft was intimidating, while Keswick’s expression was unreadable.
Too damned bad.
“If I might interrupt, Your Grace?” Hamish said.
Moreland turned slowly, as if reluctant to acknowledge an unfortunate connection. “Murdoch. One does not attend a ball in less than one’s best finery. Go home and change. Better still, go home and stay there. You are creating a spectacle at my daughter’s ball.”
“I will make a worse spectacle yet if you do not afford me a few minutes of your time, sir. Deny me Miss Megan’s hand if you must, but you will hear what Puget has to say. In private would be best.”
Moreland arched an eyebrow that probably set half the House of Lords atremble when His Grace was displeased.
“You have presumed on my patience for the last time, Murdoch. Be gone.”
Perhaps this was where Megan got her determination. What marvelously stubborn children she and Hamish would have, assuming Moreland didn’t see his prospective nephew-in-law drawn and quartered.
“I will leave,” Hamish said, “once you’ve heard what Puget has to say.”
Westhaven scanned the ballroom, his profile much like his papa’s. “I’d like to hear this tale. One grows bored of waltzing, sipping punch, and chatting over cards.”
“In other words,” Moreland snapped, “we’ve already drawn the notice of every gossip in Mayfair, so I’m to appear graciously entertained rather than outraged by this folly.”
Rosecroft aimed a look at Puget. “You were the regimental scribe in Sir Fletcher’s unit, if I recall correctly. What brings you here?”
Moreland let the question stand, suggesting His Grace had been testing Hamish’s resolve, probably not for the first time.
Puget tugged down his waistcoat. “I was the scribe, but I became the regimental forger. And then I became simply a forger, and worse than that, a fool.”
“Which fate apparently still afflicts you,” Moreland said. “Spare me the dramatics, and get on with the rest of your tale. I have every suspicion it does not end happily.”
“That was the point, Your Grace,” Puget said. “As far as Sir Fletcher was concerned, the only acceptable conclusion to the story was marriage to Miss Megan Windham. The young lady apparently divined that her happiness would be forfeit in that case, and Sir Fletcher used my skills to ensure she was coerced to the altar.”
Moreland appeared to be studying the crowd below, but he’d gone ominously still. “My Megan, coerced?”
Puget’s upper lip was beaded with sweat, his complexion as pale as the duke’s cravat.
“Blackmailed,” Hamish said. “By Sir Fletcher, using letters Megan desperately regrets sending him when he served in Spain. I did not expect you to take my word for it, but Puget has no reason to dissemble.”
“Go on,” the duke said softly. “Leave no detail out, and be very sure of your facts.”
Puget’s tale was simple and sordid, and he’d reached the part about forging a bill for boots when Colin touched Hamish on the arm.
“Megan needs you,” Colin said. “I’ll tend to matters here.”
Puget fell silent as the duke joined Hamish at the rail. “That scoundrel,” Moreland said, gaze focused on Sir Fletcher halfway across the ballroom. “I’ll make him rue the day he stood up with my niece.”
One floor below, with a hundred gossips and tattlers looking on, Sir Fletcher bowed over Megan’s hand. He stood too close to her, he kept hold of her hand, and everything about Megan’s posture confirmed that she loathed his touch.
“Excuse me, Your Grace,” Hamish said as the noise in the ballroom faded. “I have a knight of the realm to call out.”
A circle had formed around Megan and Sir Fletcher, as if a bare-knuckle match were about to start.
Megan broke free of Sir Fletcher’s grasp, by the simple expedient of withdrawing her hand from her evening glove. Sir Fletcher was left holding a length of white kid, while Megan backed up two steps.
“You will leave me alone,” she shouted. “You will leave me alone, and you will leave every decent young woman alone, do you hear me?” She snatched the glove from Sir Fletcher’s grasp, smacked him across the face with it, and tossed it at his slippered feet.
“She’s a Windham,” His Grace said. “By God, she’s every inch a Windham.”
“Your Grace, Megan’s nearly blind in close quarters,” Hamish retorted. “She can’t see that Sir Fletcher’s enjoying her outburst.” Worse, Pilkington walked around Megan in a slow circle, clearly calculating how to use her behavior for his own benefit.
Hamish knew what it was to be without allies, at the end of his resources, with nothing to lose. He could not bear to see Megan in the same position. He turned for the stairs, but Moreland stopped him.
“Wait,” the duke said. “Megan is not finished with Pilkington, and I am not finished with you.”
Megan could not see who all was standing by, eagerly watching this altercation with Sir Fletcher. Her family was among the crowd, likely scandalized by her actions.
If I’m to be ruined, let it be on my terms.
“Megan, dearest,” Sir Fletcher purred. “You are overset. Perhaps a surfeit of her ladyship’s excellent punch is to blame, or perhaps your nerves have grown delicate waiting for me to offer for you.”
He c
ircled Megan, as if she were some inanimate sculpture, helpless even to move.
“No offer from you will meet with my acceptance, Sir Fletcher, unless it’s an offer for you to leave the country permanently. You are a disgrace to your gender.”
Sir Fletcher came close enough to whisper. “At least I didn’t pen my torrid sentiments in lurid detail, madam. It’s time for you to drop into a convincing swoon.”
“Get away from me.” Megan drew her foot back, which should have been undetectable beneath her skirts. Sir Fletcher, though, like most predators, had sufficiently sound instincts that he stepped away.
“Are you throwing me over for that kilted barbarian?” he asked—loudly. “I could tell you tales about the Duke of Murder, Miss Megan, that would give you nightmares.”
Such scorn dripped from Sir Fletcher’s words that Megan gave up her last hope that this encounter could be blamed on nerves, fatigue, female hysteria, or—society’s favorite explanation for dramatic scenes—a misunderstanding.
“If Murdoch will have me,” she said, raising her voice for all to hear, “I will gladly become his duchess.”
Sir Fletcher guffawed. “You’d marry that, that beast in plaid? He disgraced his command by disobeying orders, got captured by the French, barely knows how to waltz—”
Megan could not see the expressions of Sir Fletcher’s audience—for this was skilled performance—but she didn’t need to see who believed Sir Fletcher to know the truth.
“Waltzing would not have saved Lord Colin MacHugh’s life, when you told him there were fresh horses to be purchased five miles north of camp in the Spanish hills. There were no horses, but there were French patrols.”
“You know nothing about it,” Sir Fletcher retorted. “French patrols were a fact of life. We were at war with the French, hence, French patrols. We traded them bread for brandy between battles. Would you expect to find Egyptian patrols, for God’s sake?”
Somebody tittered, then fell silent.
“When Lord Colin didn’t return to camp,” Megan went on, “Hamish MacHugh went after him, and because Hamish had left camp without permission, he went out of uniform. His men were excessively loyal, so a dozen of them went searching for Lord Colin with him.”
The story had upset Megan when Colin had relayed it in the park, and it upset her now. “Your directions were the merest fancy,” she went on, “the sort of practical joke with which you amused yourself when not avoiding actual combat. So you left a dozen good soldiers stumbling about under the noses of the French, and the French found them.”
The silence in the ballroom was absolute, and Megan made sure her voice carried to every corner.
“Such is war,” she said, “that soldiers captured out of uniform are subject to torture. Fortunately for Hamish MacHugh’s men, they found Colin. Unfortunately for Hamish MacHugh, so did the French. There was a battle, and there was a bridge.”
She had to fight for her composure, but in this, she would not fail Hamish.
“On one side of the bridge, we have the soldiers you sent on a goose chase in time of war,” Megan said. “On the other, the French, who realize exactly what treasure they’ve come across, courtesy of your dubious sense of honor. A dozen British soldiers out of uniform, exhausted, on maneuvers against orders, and ripe for capture. The man you malign so easily, the man you call a barbarian, ordered everybody else to retreat and get back to camp.
“Hamish MacHugh held that bridge,” Megan said, hurling her words at Sir Fletcher. “He fought against impossible odds, knowing his fate would be death or worse. He forbid his men to admit they’d disobeyed orders with him, lest they be court-martialed. Lord Colin and the others reached safety, while Murdoch was taken prisoner by the most notorious interrogator in the French army.”
Megan turned to the faceless crowd surrounding her and Sir Fletcher. “Who is the barbarian? The officer who nearly gave his life for his brother and his men, or the scoundrel whose carelessness precipitated the danger? Or maybe”—she swallowed past a lump the size of a fist—“the worst barbarism is perpetrated by ladies and gentlemen who spread gossip and spite for their own entertainment. Who think because a man is handsome and charming and looks like them, he must be good, but if he’s different, then he must be a stranger to honor.”
Sir Fletcher backed away from her, his footsteps on the chalked dance floor the only sound. He tripped over Megan’s glove, turned, and scuttled away. The crowd parted as if even touching his sleeve would have resulted in a dreadful contamination.
Megan swiped at her cheek with the one glove she still wore. The silence grew until movement on the steps to the minstrel’s gallery caught her eye. The crowd turned as three men descended. One of them—a tall auburn-haired man—wore a kilt.
Hamish. Megan knew his bearing, knew his step, knew him—and he’d heard her every word. He stopped at that distance where Megan could make out his features clearly. Keswick and Rosecroft were at his sides, and his expression was thunderous.
Hamish was such a private man, and Megan had turned his worst nightmare into grist for the gossip mill.
“Don’t be angry,” Megan said. “Please, Hamish, don’t be angry.”
He propped his fists on his hips. “That is the most skillful ambush I have ever seen, Meggie Windham. And you lot”—he glowered at polite society—“don’t you know it’s rude to stare? Where are your manners?”
He held his arms wide, and Megan flew to him as if she’d been shot forth from Cupid’s bow. Applause started from the minstrel’s gallery and became a deafening thunder as Hamish whirled her off her feet and scooped her into his arms.
“You routed the varlet, Meggie mine,” he growled. “Sent him packing with his tail between his legs. You are magnificent.”
“You’re here. I was so worried, and you were here all along.”
“I am here,” Hamish said, setting her on her feet, “with you, exactly as I always hope to be, but unless I want a certain duke—or a certain duchess—to skewer me where I stand, I have a bit of an ambush of my own to conduct.”
“Don’t kill Sir Fletcher, Hamish. I know he’s a disgrace, but he’s not worth—”
“Hush now. I had Puget pen a passionate letter in Sir Fletcher’s hand to a certain lovely viscountess. Alas, the letter will be delivered to her jealous husband by mistake. By sundown tomorrow, Sir Fletcher will be on a packet to Calais.”
“That was brilliant,” Megan said, going up on tiptoe to kiss her beloved. “Noon would be better, though, or at first light. How early does the first packet leave?”
Rather than answer her question, Hamish went down on one knee, right in the middle of the ballroom. He bowed his head as if he were a knight in some medieval ceremony, and just like that, the ballroom was silent again.
“Hamish, what are you doing?” All the joy Megan had felt in his arms became muted with bewilderment.
He took her bare hand in his. “I’m ambushing you, more or less, which is only fair, because you ambushed me first. Miss Megan Windham, you have not known me long, but you know my heart and have made that heart whole. I love you. I will always love you. Will you … Will you please marry me?”
“For God’s sake, say yes!” somebody—who sounded suspiciously like Uncle Percy—bellowed. The rest of the gathering took up the chant, and resumed clapping and stomping, but none of that mattered.
What mattered was that Hamish was hers, and Megan was his.
“I’ll marry you,” Megan said, drawing him to his feet and bundling close. “Gladly, joyously, of course I’ll marry you. I love you, and you have made my heart whole too. We’ll have red-haired babies, and sing the lovely old songs, and on cold nights, we’ll have a wee dram to ward off the chill. They’ll call us duke and duchess of marital bliss.”
“We’ll have each other to ward off the chill, Meggie. Make no mistake about that.”
As it happened, they were both right—except that often, they had more than a single wee dram, and some of the songs
they sang were on the bawdy side of lovely—but Megan and Hamish MacHugh were, indeed, known as the duke and duchess of marital bliss.
To my dear readers,
To once again write stories for the Windham family, and to visit with some of my favorite characters, was an absolute joy. I’d been missing Westhaven, Lord Valentine, and St. Just, especially, as well as Their Graces.
In my mind’s eye, Hamish bears a close resemblance to Jamie Fraser of Outlander fame, and his home is in the part of Perthshire where I’ve spent a lot of happy vacation/writing time. I’ve put some pictures up on my website (graceburrowes.com) on the Scotland with Grace page.
The Windham Brides series will continue with Anwen and Colin’s story, and I am hearing rumors about a certain Welsh duke crossing paths with Elizabeth Windham in the story after that. If you’d like to keep up to date on all my releases, book signings, travels, and other adventures, please do visit the graceburrowes.com website to sign up for my newsletter.
I hope you enjoyed Megan and Hamish’s tale, but now that they’re off honeymooning in the north, how about a sneak peek at Anwen and Colin’s story?
Happy reading!
Grace Burrowes
Keep reading for a peek at Colin and Anwen’s story in:
Too Scot to Handle
Book Two of the Windham Brides Series Coming in Summer 2017
Chapter One
Mr. Wilbur Hitchings heaved up a sigh of such theatrical proportions, Anwen Windham suspected he’d rehearsed it.
“A lady of your breeding and refinement shouldn’t be bothered with financial matters,” he said, shuffling papers on the lectern before him, “though the general conclusion is simple enough: Charities need benefactors. Your good intentions are helpful, madam, and commendable, et cetera and so forth. Good intentions do not pay the coal man or keep growing boys in boots and breeches.”
Anwen refused to sit quietly and be condescended to like a recalcitrant scholar. She set about straightening the rows of desks and chairs before Hitching’s podium because he apparently wasn’t interested in restoring order to the empty classroom.
The Trouble With Dukes Page 28
