Temptation

  At that Temperance got to her feet. Would he toss the woman down the side of the mountain? It was one thing to throw someone out the window into the rain, but it was another to throw a person down a mountain.

  “Mr. McCairn wants children,” Temperance said loudly as she physically put herself between James and the woman. “I think that perhaps you’re a little old to—”

  “I’m twenty-seven,” the woman snapped, looking hard at Temperance. “It is you who are too old to bear children.”

  “Twenty-seven?” Temperance whispered, then gave a little prayer of thanks that she’d never climbed mountains or did whatever this woman had done to so age her. But, then again, maybe she was lying about her age.

  “Would you like to see the size of my arm?” the woman said to James.

  “I don’t want to see anything you have,” he said through clenched teeth. “I want you off McCairn land this moment.”

  “But I was told that you wanted a wife,” she said. “A strong wife who could lift sheep and work beside you all day. I thought I had found a man, a true man, but here I see you sitting with this . . . this . . .” She looked Temperance up and down. “She doesn’t have a muscle on her body. I can tell that she’s soft.”

  When James took a step toward the woman, Temperance grabbed her upper arm. Maybe it was fear that gave Temperance extra strength, but, whatever it was, the woman gave a yelp of pain when Temperance clamped down on her. “I think you’d better leave now.”

  “I’ve dealt with women like you,” Penelope said. “You’re jealous of— Ow! You pinched me. I don’t think that’s fair. You—”

  “If you don’t leave now, he’s going to pick you up and throw you down that mountain,” Temperance hissed into her ear.

  But the woman didn’t seem to take this as a warning. “Oh?” she said, and there was interest in her voice as she tried to pull away from Temperance and return to James.

  But Temperance squeezed the woman’s arm again, then shoved her toward the path by the tree. “Go up there, take a right, and get out of here,” she whispered to the woman. “Didn’t they tell you that he’s insane? I’m his nurse. I have to keep him sedated. If I didn’t, he’d . . . Well, I can’t tell you what he’s done to women in the past. If you married him, you’d be his eighth wife.”

  “Really?” the woman said, her face full of interest as she looked over Temperance’s shoulder at James, who was still standing by the entrance to the cave. “But I was told—”

  “Let me guess. You met a woman, a nice, plump little woman, and she told you of this man’s need for a wife. Did she have reddish gold hair and a little mole to the left of her right eye?”

  “Yes! Have you met her?”

  “Oh, yes,” Temperance said as she visualized her mother for a moment before returning to her elaborate lie. “She recruits women for him. He . . .” Temperance couldn’t think of another lie quick enough because her head was full of thinking of ways to murder her mother. What in the world had Melanie O’Neil been thinking when she chose this dreadful woman? Temperance had seen specimens in bottles that were better preserved than this creature.

  “What does he do to them? To all those wives, I mean?” Penelope asked, eyes wide, obviously still interested.

  “You don’t want to know, but it’s horrible. Now go. I’ll try to hold him off as long as possible.”

  But the woman was not frightened and she hesitated.

  Temperance gave a sigh of disgust. “He’s broke,” she said flatly. “Not a penny to his name. He won’t be able to fund any of your expeditions to any mountains anywhere.”

  At that the woman scurried up the side of the cliff. “I’ll tell that woman, Mrs. McCairn,” she said over her shoulder as she began to run down the path. “I won’t let her send any more unsuspecting girls up here.”

  Temperance looked at her long enough to snort, “Girls!” Then she went back toward the cave and James. “There,” she said, “that’s done.”

  Turning away, James looked out over the village; his fists were clenched at his side. “I’m going to kill my uncle,” he said softly. “What would make him think to send me a . . . a . . . something like that?”

  “Maybe someone told him you wanted help with the sheep and he just assumed . . .”

  “That I wanted a bull?” He turned back to her. “What has happened that he’s sent these last two? First there was the narcissist girl, then this Amazon. What has put these ideas into his head?”

  Temperance looked down at her nails. They really did need a trim. “I can’t imagine,” she said, but knew she couldn’t look at him, for she had been the one to tell her mother to send her someone brainless. Then she’d told her mother to send her an “athletic” sort. On the other hand, did her mother have to take her so very literally?

  When Temperance looked back up at him, he seemed to be expecting an answer from her, but she didn’t dare open her mouth to try to explain for fear that she’d reveal her part in all this.

  “I’ll, uh . . . Maybe I’ll write your uncle a letter and try to explain,” she said at last.

  “And what do you plan to explain?” he asked, looking at her with one eyebrow lifted.

  “That you don’t want him to send you any more idiots?” she asked, smiling.

  He didn’t smile back. Instead, he stepped closer to her and reached out a big hand to touch her hair. “He did well in choosing a housekeeper for me,” James said softly.

  For all of Temperance’s thoughts of maybe giving in to the man, now, when he touched her, she drew back. The truth was she was beginning to like James McCairn. And since she was only here temporarily, maybe it would be better if she didn’t get too involved with him.

  Stepping back, she gave him a devil-may-care grin. “Shall I tell your uncle that you’ve fallen in love with the housekeeper he sent? Maybe he’ll shorten my sentence and I can go back to civilization, where people don’t live in grass-roofed huts.”

  She’d meant to make him smile, but instead, he stepped back abruptly and his face lost all expression.

  “I forgot how horrible we are to outsiders,” he said coldly, “so go now and count your days until you can get away from us.”

  “I didn’t mean—” she began, but stopped. “You’re right. I can’t wait until I get out of here. So I’ll be going now,” she said, then turned toward the path that led up. But when he said nothing, she stopped walking, looked back, and said louder, “I have things to do at the house, so I must get back there.” He still didn’t say anything, so she turned back around and again started walking. But it was as though weights were strapped to her feet. All that awaited her at the house was cleaning. And helping with the cooking and—

  “Do you think you can count?” he said from behind her.

  She turned around quickly. “What?” He was still scowling, but now she saw a twinkle in his eye.

  “Do you think you can count sheep? Old Fergus falls asleep and—”

  “Yes!” she said with too much enthusiasm.

  His expression didn’t change. “But maybe you should go down. I talked to Hamish about you, and he was thinking of asking you to teach a Bible class on Sundays, so he said he was going to call on you this afternoon to discuss the matter.”

  Temperance cast a fearful glance toward the village below them. “Why does he think I can teach a Bible class?”

  “You rescue doomed maidens, don’t you? At least that’s what I told him. And isn’t it true? I needed to tell him a great deal about your good works to make him overlook your more obvious sinful ways.” He glanced down at her skirt that exposed her ankles. “I was telling the truth, wasn’t I?”

  “Well . . .” Temperance said, smiling at him. He was teasing her and she found that she liked it. In her life men had told her she was “formidable.”

  “Beautiful but formidable,” is what they’d said. So being teased was not something that had happened to Temperance very often.

  Suddenly, she looked up
at him in speculation. “You were a diplomat, weren’t you? You smoothed out what could have become a war between that man and me, didn’t you?”

  At that James gave a tiny smile. “We’re a small community, and it’s better if people get along.”

  “Hmmm,” she said. “If that’s so, why don’t you go to church?”

  James grinned broader. “I’ll work myself to death to support them, but I don’t have to listen to them.”

  “But that’s—” Temperance began, frowning.

  “You want to stay and help count, or do you want to go meet with Hamish?”

  “Do I have to use a quill pen?”

  “Big rock. Big chisel.”

  “Just so I don’t have to write with a feather,” she said, smiling. “So bring on the sheep.”

  Dearest Mother,

  Temperance bit on the end of her pen, trying to think how to phrase what she wanted to write. How could she tell her mother that she was doing an abysmal job of finding James a wife without offending her mother? Could she say, Let’s put it this way, if you were employed by me, I’d have fired you a week ago? No, that wasn’t the way.

  I am sure the misunderstanding is all my fault, but the two prospective brides you have sent, so far, have not been women I or James would consider. Perhaps if I tell you some about him you could help me better.

  Even though he is the laird of a clan and it might be assumed that he lives in luxury and comfort, nothing could be further from the truth. Actually, he is little more than a sheepherder—and a farmer and a fisherman. Whatever he is, he is certainly a worker! I rarely see him because he is always overseeing the village he owns. Whereas another man might just collect rents, James lives and works with his people.

  For example,

  Temperance again put the pen into her mouth and thought about this afternoon up on the mountain. The process of counting sheep had been a long one, so she’d had plenty of time to observe. She hadn’t met many of the villagers, but today there were six children on the mountain, all running after the sheep and helping the men with the counting.

  She remembered once looking up and seeing James grab two children, one under each arm and swing them about; their laughter split the air. It was a lovely sight.

  At one point Temperance asked a little girl why they weren’t in school today.

  “The master let us off,” the child said before she went scampering off.

  “And who is ‘the master’?” Temperance shot at James the first time he came near her, to grab a sheepskin of water and tip it up. But she didn’t give him time to answer. “It’s that man, Hamish, isn’t it?”

  “Yes, he’s also the schoolmaster, if that’s what you mean,” James said. “And before you start on him again, unless you want to find yourself with the job of teaching seventeen children, you’d better stay out of it.” There was warning and truth in his voice, so Temperance clamped her lips shut and wrote down the numbers that one of the men shouted at her.

  But her silence didn’t last long. “If you had a wife . . .” she said softly.

  “But I don’t have a wife, do I? I just have a snoop of a housekeeper who sticks her nose into everyone’s business. If you want to help the brats, why don’t you teach them something on Sunday afternoons?”

  “Bible studies aren’t really my area of expertise. I mean, I know a few stories, but—”

  She broke off because he was looking down at her with one eyebrow raised. Clearly she was missing some point. He was trying to tell her something that was just between the two of them, but he couldn’t say it outright because there were four men and three children near them.

  Finally, it dawned on her. This was her chance to bring the twentieth century to McCairn. “Yes, I see. Maybe we could have Bible classes inside your house. Just me and the children.”

  “I think that could be arranged,” James said softly; then, as he raised the flask to his mouth again, he winked at her, and she had to duck her head to hide her red face—and her smile, for that wink had made her feel quite good.

  For the rest of the afternoon, Temperance recorded numbers, but she thought of what she’d like to teach the children when she got them alone. That women were entitled to the right to vote? That little girls shouldn’t let little boys seduce and abandon them? Not quite.

  But no matter how hard she thought, she still hadn’t come up with an appropriate topic for this Sunday’s private lesson with all the children of the village. Children she’d never even met.

  Now, she looked back at her mother’s letter.

  For example, he loves the children and he plays with them. From what I can see, between Sunday morning lectures and school days spent with a man who is a throwback to Cotton Mather, it may be the only play they ever have in their lives.

  For a moment Temperance stopped and thought about how different her own childhood had been, with rides in the park with her parents, ice-skating, and—

  “Skating!” she said aloud, then looked down at the paper again.

  Mother! You must send me twenty-one pairs of roller skates, as I have found the perfect skating rink. And send them in a crate marked as something else so no adult here will know what’s inside. Oh, yes, and send me seventeen white Bibles, each marked in gold with an angel, if possible. It looks like I’m going to start teaching Sunday school.

  Temperance sat back, looked at the letter, and smiled. She’d send it off with Ramsey first thing in the morning, she thought as she slipped the letter into the drawer of the old desk in her bedroom.

  It wasn’t until late the next day that Temperance got to finish the letter to her mother, and by then she had a great deal to add, for Grace’s daughter had a secret to show Temperance.

  “What is it?” Temperance asked when the little girl whispered that she had something wonderful to show her.

  Alys put her finger to her lips to signal silence, then started up the stairs, pausing once for Temperance to follow her. The child led Temperance to the bedroom she shared with her mother.

  Temperance had not been inside the room since Grace had taken it over, and now she frowned, feeling as though she were invading the woman’s privacy. But Alys pulled on Temperance’s skirt and led her inside.

  It was amazing what Grace had done to the room; it was clean and patched as well as possible. A person could actually see the room’s former splendor.

  Even though they were alone in the room, the child tiptoed over to a wardrobe that stood opposite the bed, then carefully opened the doors. She jumped once when the door creaked, and looked around, as though she expected her mother to jump out from behind the curtains.

  The girl leaned into the wardrobe, bent, and then when she straightened and stepped from behind the door, she held in her hands a beautiful hat. Carrying it as though it were the Royal Jewels, the girl held it out to Temperance.

  “Where did you get this?” Temperance asked, looking at the handmade flowers that circled the brim. She’d never seen anything like them. There were tiny rosebuds, lilacs, and sweet peas on the brim, but what made the flowers unique was that the colors were like nothing she’d ever seen before. Actually, the flowers weren’t colored so much as they were tinted, as though they were from a distant time and place. The hat looked as though it had been taken from a romantic painting of a hundred years earlier.

  “Did you find this somewhere?” Temperance asked as she took the hat from the girl. She couldn’t resist putting it on and wasn’t surprised to see that it fit her perfectly. There was an old stand mirror in the room, and she looked at herself in it. The hat, with its gentle flowers, the bit of veiling that softened the edges, made her look like . . .

  “A romantic heroine,” she breathed, then made herself stop being so silly. Reluctantly, she took the hat off. “We have to put this back,” she said to the girl. “This belongs to some woman from long ago, and—”

  “It’s your hat,” the girl said, obviously frustrated that Temperance wasn’t understanding.

>   “But you can’t give me something that doesn’t belong to you.”

  The child looked at Temperance as though she were stupid. “You gave it to me, and Mother fixed it.”

  “Fixed . . . ?” Temperance said, then abruptly turned the hat over. Inside was the label of her hatmaker in New York. It took her a few moments to digest the fact that the gorgeous creation she held was the same as that muddy, sodden old hat that she’d handed to Grace just the day before.

  “How?” was all she could say to the girl. Now that the child had found her voice, she certainly seemed articulate enough.

  “Mother took the backs off the curtains you wanted thrown out and made the flowers. She used to make flowers for the orphanage where she grew up. Do you like it?”

  “Yes. Very much. It’s beautiful,” Temperance said, looking at the hat in wonder. The flowers looked old because the silk used to make them was many years old.

  She looked around at the bedroom she was standing in. There wasn’t a piece of fabric in the house that wasn’t in danger of falling apart. There were curtains and bed hangings and upholstery. But Temperance knew that in every piece there was some good fabric, fabric that could be saved to make trimmings for hats.

  “Alys, are you in here?” came a voice as the door opened and Grace entered; then her eyes widened as she saw that Temperance was holding the hat she’d refurbished.

  “Alys shouldn’t have bothered you with that,” Grace said. “I apologize for taking your time,” she said as she reached out to take the hat from Temperance.

  But Temperance drew her hand and the hat back. “This is the most beautiful hat I’ve ever seen,” she said softly. “The truth is that I’ve never seen anything like it. And, trust me, I’m an expert on hats. If you were in New York, and making these, they would sell . . .”

  At that thought Temperance looked up, wide-eyed, at Grace.

  “What is it?” Grace said, for even though she didn’t know Temperance very well, she could see that she was thinking hard about something.

  “We need a label, something big that can be seen. Is there anyone in the village who can embroider? I need someone who can do really fine work.”