Catherine Coulter the Sherbrooke Series Novels 6-10 (9781101562123) Read online

  Old Angus came out of the house, looking older than the Castle, his homespuns bagging at his knees, his white hair blown all over his head, and a big smile on his seamed face. “Och, ye be Master Tysen, her ladyship’s brother, nae doubt.”

  “Aye,” Tysen said, savoring that lilting word on his tongue, and dismounted from Big Blue’s back.

  “Well, now, ye hae yer man just come wi’ me and we’ll see to them nice horses ye got. Aye, who’s the little pullet riding up behind?”

  “My tiger. His name is Pride.”

  “Aye?”

  Then Sinjun was there, throwing her arms around him, hugging him until he was kissing her hair and hugging her back, and then holding her loosely in his arms, he said, “You are looking quite fit, Sinjun. And it isn’t raining, thank the good Lord.”

  “And you, Tysen, are as handsome as ever. Oh, goodness, I had no idea you were coming. And just look—why ever would you do this? It is surely the most unexpected thing you’ve ever done. But why is she riding on the back of your carriage? She looks fit to drop. What have you done? Oh, I see, she demanded to do it, and you allowed it. You spoil her, Tysen.”

  It took Tysen only a moment of sorting his way through his sister’s words before he had the most awful foreboding. He turned slowly to stare at his tiger, Pride.

  “Well, Meggie,” Sinjun said, “come down from there and give me a hug. I’m sure I will come to understand why you’ve become your father’s tiger. Was it a wager? No, naturally, your father never wagers. I’m not certain if that is because he believes wagering to be a sin or whether he believes he doesn’t have the Sherbrooke luck and doesn’t want to lose his fortune.”

  Tysen looked at his daughter, who had just pulled off her disreputable woolen hat. Her once beautiful hair was matted and oily.

  He closed his eyes, looked heavenward, and without another word, turned on his heel and walked into Sinjun’s house. Luckily, the front door was wide open. Standing right inside was Agnes, Old Angus’s wife, and she was wearing a huge apron wrapped around her large middle.

  “And jest who be ye?” she demanded and crossed her massive arms over her equally massive bosom.

  “I,” Tysen said, “am a man of God who is desperately trying to keep firm control of himself.”

  “That’s right. Ye’re the reverend,” Agnes said and gave him a big smile from a mouth that held only three teeth.

  There was no yelling to the ceiling, no foul curses, no bodily threats. No, Tysen merely regarded his filthy daughter, standing very close to her aunt Sinjun in the drawing room, and said finally, his voice low, controlled, very cold, “I am severely disappointed in you, Meggie.” Without pause he turned to his sister. “I have inherited the Barony of Barthwick from Great Uncle Tyronne and am now Baron Barthwick of Kildrummy Castle. My new castle and holding lie some seven miles south of Stonehaven. I am here in Scotland to see to my lands, determine what it is I will do, and spend some time with you and Colin. Also, I believe the Barthwick solicitor, a Mr. MacCray, is here in Edinburgh. I will need to speak with him.”

  “Yes, Donald MacCray is here. He is very popular, particularly with the ladies.” Sinjun then just gave her head a slight shake and went down on her knees in front of Meggie. “You are a mess, dear heart. Why don’t you come with me upstairs and we will get you bathed and changed. Did you manage to bring clothes? No? It isn’t a problem. Dahling is quite the young lady now—all of fourteen—but surely she must have some older clothes still in her drawers.”

  Meggie, looking over her shoulder at her father, who hadn’t moved from the same spot and who was giving her a very stern, emotionless look, dropped her shoulders and said just above a whisper, “I’m sorry, Papa, truly. But I had to come with you, to protect you, to take care of you.”

  “Go with your aunt, Meggie,” Tysen said, and walked over to one of the lovely bow windows in the drawing room. He heard a sniffle, heard her leave the room with Sinjun. He closed his eyes, appalled at what she had done. For five and a half days, his little girl had ridden on the back of his carriage. Where had she slept at night? In the stables of the inns, naturally. He started shaking, just thinking of what could have happened to her. He prayed now, thanking God for keeping her safe, since he, her father, hadn’t done so. All that blasted rain—what if she became ill? What if she died in Scotland because he never gave his borrowed tiger a second glance? Sinjun had known it was her immediately. He was her father, and he was blind.

  It was devastating.

  Tysen was still utterly white when Sinjun came back into the drawing room. It had been on the tip of her tongue to remonstrate with him for his coldness, despite the fact that Meggie’s outrageous deception had nearly curled her own toes, but at the sight of him, all white about the gills, all she could think of doing was hugging him until he regained some of his color, which is what she did. “It’s all right, Tysen,” she said over and over against his cheek, holding him tightly against her. “It’s all right. Meggie is fine. Mary is with her, helping her bathe. She is all right, no bad aftereffects. Stop worrying.”

  He heaved a very big breath, then slowly pulled away from her. “I never even noticed her, Sinjun, yet you knew it was her right away. So did Old Angus. But not her father. Bloody hell, what kind of a man am I?”

  He’d said “bloody hell,” the favorite Sherbrooke curse. Sinjun just couldn’t believe it. She gave her brother a dazzling smile. “Parents see what they expect to see, it’s that simple. Stop feeling guilty. It doesn’t become you. Yes, that’s better, you’ve finally got some color. Now, what are you going to do?”

  Tysen said slowly, “I would like to thrash my daughter for her appalling behavior, but I don’t think I’ll be able to bring myself to do it. I spanked her once last year, and the guilt nearly laid me low for a week. What do you suggest, Sinjun?”

  “It’s difficult,” she said at last, after worrying her lower lip. “Let’s ask Colin, all right? He and Dahling and Phillip should be back shortly for luncheon.”

  Tysen nodded. “May we stay with you for a couple of days, Sinjun? Then we will go to Kildrummy Castle and see what’s what.”

  “I think that is a lovely idea. I could have Old Angus ride to Kinross and fetch Fletcher or Jocelyn. Would you like to see them?”

  At the mention of his young niece and nephew, Tysen said, “Meggie said they were just babies and didn’t have much interest, but I disagree. I should like that, Sinjun.”

  “Well, Jocelyn is only a little mite, just turned a year old. However, little Fletcher is three and won’t shut his mouth. Do you know he talks to horses? He listens to horses, and I swear to you that they communicate. He even changed two of their names, claimed they weren’t happy with the ones they had.”

  “What were the names?”

  “They were named Olmar and Grindel. Fletcher listened to them, nodded, and then changed them to Fireball and Thor. I swear to you their steps are higher now, they fling their manes and flick their tails just like they’re colts again, and they stamp their hooves whenever someone calls them by their new names. It’s amazing.”

  Tysen gave her a small smile, but it still showed his very white Sherbrooke teeth. “I should like to introduce Fletcher to my horse. I wish him to see if Big Blue is satisfied with his name.”

  Sinjun laughed merrily and took his hand. “Come and tell me all about this inheritance of yours. I remember about Great Uncle Tyronne, but goodness, weren’t there a good dozen boys to inherit before you?”

  “Very nearly,” Tysen said. “It’s sad. They’re all dead. Ian, the last of the heirs and Old Tyronne’s last grandson, fell off a cliff into the North Sea not above six months ago. Then, I suppose, Great Uncle Tyronne just gave up. Although, as Douglas pointed out, the old man was eighty-seven years old. That left only the Englishman—namely, me. I doubt anyone is very happy about that.”

  “But who is there to be unhappy?”

  Tysen just shook his head. “Actually, I have no idea who is livi
ng at Kildrummy at the present time or if there are any relatives remaining. I will see Donald MacCray on the morrow. He will provide me with all the information I need. Now, Sinjun, before I face my daughter I should like to fortify myself with a cup of tea.”

  4

  August 24, 1815

  THREE-YEAR-OLD FLETCHER KINROSS told his uncle Tysen that Big Blue was displeased with his name.

  Tysen stared at the precocious little boy in his father’s arms and asked, “What is the name he would prefer, Fletcher?”

  Fletcher put his thumb in his mouth, leaned toward Big Blue, who was looking back intently—actually looking at the little boy—Tysen was sure of it. “Papa, you must let me down,” Fletcher said. When released, he walked right up to the big gelding, and to Tysen’s surprise but no one else’s, the soon-to-be–former Big Blue lowered his head and lipped Fletcher’s hand, blew on it, and stomped his left front hoof several times.

  “Don’t worry,” Sinjun said. “No animal would ever hurt him. Isn’t it amazing? Ah, yes, I believe Big Blue has spoken.”

  Fletcher patted the horse’s neck, then turned back to his uncle Tysen and said in his clear child’s voice, “He tells me he is not blue. He tells me he doesn’t even like colors. He wants to be named Big Fellow.” The thumb went back in the mouth, then his small arms went up for his father to pick him up again, which he did. Colin Kinross said, “Well, Tysen, what do you think—can you bring yourself to call him Big Fellow?”

  Meggie started laughing. “Oh, Aunt Sinjun, it is marvelous. Big Fellow—I like it.”

  “If that’s what he wants,” Tysen said, and he sounded utterly bewildered.

  Phillip Kinross, sixteen and quite a handsome young man with his father’s dark hair and wicked smile, just shook his head and said, “It isn’t bad, Uncle Tysen. Fletcher was mad at me when he renamed my horse. I can tell you I was worried with what he could come up with, but his name is now Edwin, which, actually, suits him just fine, and me as well.”

  “What was his name before?”

  Fletcher grinned at his very serious uncle, who’d always been very kind to him.

  “It was Claymore,” Phillip said. “Fletcher said my horse was peace-loving and thus the name Claymore made him very nervous.”

  And so the following morning, Big Fellow, with Tysen astride, rode beside the carriage that held one lone passenger—his ten-year-old daughter, who had been wise enough not to argue with her father about her displacement as his tiger. It was a beautiful day. Fleecy white clouds in wondrous shapes filled the sky, a slight breeze moved in from the sea to dry the sweat on Tysen’s brow, and the scent of wildflowers filled his nostrils. He saw clumps of heather ranging from deepest purple to snowy white, in the most unlikely places—poking out of crevices in black rocks, pushing through low-lying stone fences.

  A day and a half of beautiful summer weather brought them to Kildrummy Castle. Tysen saw the ten or so chimney stacks rising high into the air, the round turrets curving outward on each corner of the huge square manor. It wasn’t at all like the older castles he’d seen—soaring stone buildings with slitted windows high above the ground, cold and stark against the Scottish skies. No, Kildrummy was newer, with its slate roof and light gray stone walls.

  “What do you think, Meggie?” he asked, pulling Big Fellow next to where she was leaning out the carriage window to see.

  “It’s sitting up on that barren stretch right over the sea like a big bird of prey,” Meggie said. “There’s that huge forest just off there to the left, but nothing close to the castle. Goodness, it’s all bare land and it looks like there are deep ditches all through it. We should fill in all those ditches. We should plant trees. It is too stark, too forbidding.” She licked her lips and frowned just a bit. “It’s scary,” she added. “And lonely. But the forest just beyond is lovely.”

  Tysen, whose memory of Kildrummy was that of a ten-year-old boy, had agreed with Meggie. That stretch from the castle to the forest was an ugly piece of land. It was stark, and barren, what with all those strewn rocks and boulders. Those jagged ditches, or whatever they were, were dangerous. Walking or riding through that land would require a good deal of attention.

  Now, as a man, however, he believed it magnificent. He wouldn’t have changed a thing. He would have made his way carefully through all the boulders and crevices and admired it. But if Meggie wanted trees, she would have them. If she wanted all those crevices filled in, so be it. He said, “I will inquire what trees would best survive here. We’ll have to examine all those ditches and see where we would get enough dirt to fill them. You, my girl, can find out about the flowers outside the castle walls.”

  She beamed at him and he frowned. Oh, dear, she saw that he was still upset with her. She said in a very small voice, “I wonder if any of the round turrets are bedcham-bers. I would really like that.”

  “We will see,” Tysen said, realizing he shouldn’t say yes to her immediately. He was still infinitely upset with her. He still awoke in the middle of the night, his belly cramping at the thought of his ten-year-old daughter hugging the back of the carriage, splattered with mud and rain, sleeping in the stables. He drew a deep breath. Had Douglas or Ryder been her father, he didn’t doubt for a moment that they would have thrashed her.

  Sinjun had come up with no proper punishment by the time they’d left, and Tysen was still stymied.

  Kildrummy Castle. It was his now. He was Lord Barthwick.

  Late that night after the sun had finally dropped behind the hillocks in the west and the air was clear with just a touch of light left, Meggie sat on her narrow bed in the south turret that looked over the barren stretch to the forest—lush and green and covered with pine trees and the occasional sheep. She mentally began her planting, staring at the closed-in inner courtyard of the castle. But every time she thought of something colorful to plant she thought also of her father’s anger at her. Not that he ever acted angry. No, he acted disappointed, just looking at her, all aloof, with distress in his eyes, and that was much worse. Meggie sighed and slid deeper under the fat quilt that was older than her father, maybe even her grandfather.

  At dinner her father had been polite, just as he’d been since Edinburgh, nothing more—surely no outward show of anger. She remembered the one time he’d actually raised his voice and spanked her. That had been when she’d tied the bells to the goat and he’d played a rather clever tune, if one attended to it carefully.

  She wished he would yell again, maybe even thrash her. At least it might make him forgive her more quickly. She remembered once when Uncle Douglas had yelled at one of the twins—Jason—and smacked his bottom three times. Then Uncle Douglas had picked him up, scoured his head with his knuckles, told him he was an idiot, tucked him under his arm, and carried him to the stables. Uncle Douglas had probably let Jason be his tiger that day.

  She had disobeyed her father, who was closer to God than anyone. Regardless, she had not been wrong to come. She knew, knew all the way to her bones, that her father would need her.

  Mrs. MacFardle, in Meggie’s immediate estimation, hadn’t appeared at all pleased to have the new English lord here at Kildrummy Castle. Dark looks, she’d given Papa, beetled black eyebrows drawn nearly together over her forehead every time she had looked at Meggie.

  Finally, she’d shown them about and reluctantly served them dinner. Meggie wished Mrs. MacFardle were more like that ancient old woman at the inn where they’d stopped for lunch in Clackmanshire, who’d patted Meggie on the head, her voice singsong and very soft, murmuring Scottish words that Meggie thought were endearments, like “a wee gowan,” which she was told later by dear Pouder meant “a little daisy.” As for her father, he was braw, and that, Pouder said, meant he was a handsome fellow. Meggie didn’t think that Mrs. MacFardle thought her papa was braw at all, not even after he’d said a very eloquent grace over their dinner, which, Meggie believed with all her heart, didn’t deserve any grace at all. The pile in the middle of her plate was call
ed haggis, Mrs. MacFardle told them, a sneer in her voice. Every Scot, she said, ate haggis and thanked the good Lord for providing such a splendid edible. Meggie took one look at that sheep’s stomach with its runny brown ingredients stuffed inside, fastened her eyes on the dark blue carpet that covered the dining room floor, and ate four slices of rich rye bread smeared with thick yellow butter.

  Her father took one bite, spoke quickly to Mrs. MacFardle of the huge luncheon he and Meggie had eaten at the Wild Goose Inn, then took one more small taste which meant that as an adult, it was his duty to be polite. There was no one more polite than her father. Even surrounded by sinners, he was polite. Even driven from his own parlor by ladies who pursued him shamelessly, he was polite. He needed her, badly, particularly here in this foreign land, and he would realize it, sooner or later.

  It was at dinner that they learned that Mrs. MacFardle was also the cook. Just thinking about it made Meggie hungry. And now her stomach was growling, but she had no idea where to find the kitchen in this huge, rambling place that seemed older than Northcliffe Hall, even though it wasn’t.

  She snuggled down, aware that the stone walls of her bedchamber were thicker than her leg. That was comfort-ing, because a storm was blowing in off the sea. It wasn’t too long before she heard the wind, swirling off the water, battering against the windowpanes. Then the rain came, hard and fast, striking the glass with a great deal of force. She wished she wasn’t alone. She wished she wasn’t so cold deep down inside where the thick warm quilt couldn’t reach. At three o’clock in the morning—she knew it was that late because a tremendous slash of white lightning lit up her turret bedchamber and she could read the old clock that leaned against the mantelpiece—she just couldn’t stand it. She was so cold and so scared that she knew her heart was going to burst out of her chest. She grabbed a blanket off the bed, wrapped it around herself, and left the bedchamber. She began the trek to the laird’s massive bedchamber that overlooked the angry sea.