“You mean your mother planned to kill Mary Rose?” Sinjun was staring down at the man, revolted, but yet not wanting to believe such evil existed.
Erickson only shrugged, which was a difficult movement since every bit of him hurt, even his knee he’d hit when he went to the floor with the damned vicar. He said, furious, “That is bloody lunacy. My mother wouldn’t kill anyone. I don’t know what she planned to do, but she wouldn’t kill anyone.”
Sinjun lifted her nightgown, baring her leg to the knee, and sent her foot into Erickson’s ribs. He moaned, clutching himself. “You’re lying, you paltry—I can’t think of anything strong enough to call you that would fit. Believe me, in the stables at Vere Castle I have heard many singularly wonderful terms for paltry men. It’s obvious that your mother would kill Mary Rose, or you would, and after Mary Rose was dead, then you would have her money and Donnatella. Bloody hell, you are an evil man. As for your mother, she should be taken out and shot. Immediately.”
Mary Rose said against Tysen’s chest, “I can’t believe it. I’m rich then? Why didn’t my mother ever tell me? Why did she make me believe that we were the poor relations, completely dependent upon her sister and Uncle Lyon?”
“Perhaps your mother didn’t think you would believe her,” Tysen said. “Would you have?”
“No, probably not. But she should have tried.” Mary Rose felt pain flow through her. She simply didn’t understand her mother, never had. She said, “But how does Uncle Lyon even know about the money?”
Erickson said, holding his head, not looking at any of them, knowing the rest of it didn’t matter, so why not tell them, “Your uncle told me that he threatened to have both you and your mother kicked out of Vallance Manor. I think he wanted to bed your mother and she refused him. I don’t blame her for refusing him. He’s an old man and his breath is nasty. I guess your mother had to tell him about the money. She assured him there were buckets of it because your father was very rich. She promised she would give him some if he didn’t kick you out and if he left her alone. He came up with this plan after, of course, he went to Edinburgh to make sure she was telling him the truth.” Erickson turned over on his side and very slowly began to pull himself upright, using the wall for support.
“Wait,” Mary Rose said. “If all this talk about an inheritance comes from my mother, then perhaps it doesn’t really exist. My mother has been mad, on and off, for a very long time. Maybe she asked this man in Edinburgh to lie for her.”
Erickson shook his head. “No, she didn’t. Your uncle found and confronted the man who holds the trust for you. He wouldn’t tell your uncle who your father is, but he confirmed that there is a trust in your name, confirmed that it was a lot of money.”
Mary Rose just stared at him, still trying to take it in. She was no longer a poor relation. She had worth.
Colin said, “But you had to marry her before she turned twenty-five or you wouldn’t get a dime?”
Erickson nodded, on his hands and knees now, breathing hard, trying to get hold of himself.
“That’s right,” Sinjun said slowly. “If Mary Rose were twenty-five, then she would get her dowry and she and her mother could go anywhere they pleased, do anything they wished to do.”
“It’s still so hard to believe,” Mary Rose said. “I never knew, never guessed. Perhaps my father loved me, since he left me so much money. I never considered that even possible.”
Tysen wanted to tell her not to consider it now, but he didn’t. He raised his head and looked at Erickson’s neck, his fingers clenching at the remembered feel of choking him. No, he shouldn’t remember that with fondness. He was shaking his head at himself when he looked Erickson right in the eye. “I’m going to wed with Mary Rose, didn’t you hear? She will be my wife. You have lost. It is all over.”
Erickson nodded. “Yes, Mrs. MacFardle has told everyone that you’re marrying the Bastard, and she doesn’t understand it except that she’s saying that Mary Rose planned it all. She wet herself down in the stream, rolled about in some briars, and came here with the purpose of gaining your pity and then seducing you. And because you’re a bloody vicar—you have all this honor and nobility—you’d feel yourself forced to marry her.”
To his own surprise, Tysen threw back his head and laughed. He hugged Mary Rose very close and laughed harder. He said finally to Erickson, “Can you even begin to imagine Mary Rose seducing anyone?”
Erickson was forced to shake his head. His belly was starting to roil and ache. His ribs pulled and poked against the inside of his skin. He held himself perfectly silent. He wasn’t going to bear the humiliation of vomiting on the corridor floor of Kildrummy Castle. He moaned and rolled back, hitting the wall, his eyes tightly shut. “That’s why I had to act quickly. If Mary Rose were to marry you very soon, then all would be lost.”
“I see,” Tysen said. “Or you could have tried to kill me too.”
“No, I’m not a murderer.”
“I’m rich,” Mary Rose said, wonder in her voice. “Now,” she said, not loosening her hold around Tysen’s back, perhaps squeezing him even more tightly, “now you don’t have to marry me.” Slowly, she leaned back against his arms and looked up at him. “I release you, sir. You are free of me now.”
“Actually,” Tysen said, “no, I’m not.”
Erickson was holding his belly, lying on his side. He felt a small surge of hope. “That’s right, Mary Rose, you don’t have to marry him now. Now you can think more clearly about this. You’ve only known the vicar for a week. You’ve known me all your life. I’ve always been kind to you, never baited you about being a bastard. You swam with the porpoises, and I taught you, remember? Listen to me—a vicar doesn’t need money. A vicar needs only to have a roomful of captive people for him to exhort about their endless string of sins. That’s why there are churches. Once they file in, they close those huge doors. No one can get out. Then the vicar yells at them, makes them feel guiltier than dirt. Once they fill the collection plate, he pats them on the head and they feel all right again, and he feels superior.”
“I cannot believe that you and your mother have survived this long without someone trying to murder the both of you,” Colin said.
“My mother means no one harm. She just wants me to be happy. However, she wants herself to be happy as well. She wants to attend balls and routs in Edinburgh, rub elbows with Society. Mary Rose, listen to me, the vicar doesn’t need you, not like I do. He’s a man of God, and even though he nearly killed me—something he’ll roast in hell for doing—he isn’t really a man, as in a man a woman would find pleasure with and—” He stopped cold, shook his head at the possible further pain his words just might bring down upon his body, and said, desperation bubbling very close to the surface, “Please, marry me, not him. Be free of him, don’t let him talk you out of it. I’ll only force you if I have to, only if you refuse me and—”
Sinjun kicked him again.
19
THE FOLLOWING MORNING at the breakfast table, Miles MacNeily told everyone about his adventure escorting Erickson MacPhail back home, there to be dealt with by his fond mother. “He didn’t even have a chance to explain,” Miles said. “She started yelling at him from an upper window. If I hadn’t wanted to pound him into the ground some more, I would have felt sorry for him.” Miles shook his head and looked at his eggs, which had been cooked so long they looked like clumps of yellow rocks. “The woman’s a terror. I heard her call him an idiot, loose-mouthed, a rotten seed of her womb. I left as quickly as I could. It’s strange. Erickson has the reputation of being very strong, very determined. But, evidently not with his mother.” He eyed the eggs again and forked down a bite, choked, and grabbed for a glass of water.
Mary Rose winced as she watched him. No one else had as yet touched the eggs. She said, “I’m sorry, Miles. I’ve never made eggs before. I suppose that I did fry them a bit too long.”
“Perhaps just the slightest bit, Mary Rose. Don’t worry about it. You tried,??
? Miles said, but he smiled at her, and it was a very sweet smile, Tysen saw. He felt something vaguely like jealousy rolling around in his gut, and it shocked him. Shocked him so much he just stared down at his dirty boots. Miles MacNeily was old enough to be her father.
Tysen said finally, “Miles is right. Don’t worry about the eggs. We are all grateful.”
Sinjun said suddenly, “I didn’t know you were in the kitchen, Mary Rose. Are you certain you feel well enough to be up and working like this?”
“I feel fine, Sinjun.”
“Nonetheless, until we can find a cook, I will see to the meals. Colin, please assure everyone that I am a splendid cook.”
Colin choked on his coffee. It really wasn’t his wife’s claim that bowed him over, but rather the rancid odor and taste of the coffee. He couldn’t seem to stop coughing until Meggie smacked him hard on the back.
Once Colin was upright again, a glass of water in his hand, his eye on that coffee in his cup, Meggie said, “I heard Pouder talking to MacNee about a new cook. Pouder said Mrs. Golden from the village needs money to take care of her grandchildren. He was of the opinion that she would be ready to come to Kildrummy today, so you don’t have to cook us any meals, Aunt Sinjun. He also said that she would make a splendid housekeeper as well.”
There was a moment of stunned, very grateful silence before Tysen said, “Meggie, despite all the arguments you put up to me, despite all your endless complaining, I was right to force you to come with me to Kildrummy Castle. You have been of invaluable assistance to me, and I thank you.”
Meggie didn’t even blink. “Thank you, Papa. I live to serve you.”
The table shook with all the laughter. As for Meggie, she sat back, her arms folded across her chest, the little queen who had brought down the house.
Three hours later Mrs. Golden was happily humming and baking bread in the Kildrummy kitchen. The smells floated through the castle.
But there was no more laughter.
Tysen, standing on the top steps of the castle, was yelling at the top of his lungs. “You will not leave, Mary Rose! Where did that carriage come from? You will remain here and you will marry me. I don’t want you to free me. I have kissed you—perhaps even more than kissed you, at least in my imagination. You have been compromised. You have seen my bare chest, hugged me. You have breathed against my bare shoulder. That’s beyond being compromised. Now, come back into the castle this minute or it will be the worse for you.”
But Mary Rose kept walking to the waiting hired carriage, carrying a valise that Miles MacNeily had reluctantly loaned to her.
“Oh, Papa, no, she can’t do this,” Meggie said, coming to a skittering halt beside her father. “I had no idea what she was planning. It’s her honor, Papa, she said that it was choking her. I didn’t know what she meant then. Oh, goodness, I think Mr. MacNeily helped her, and that’s because Mary Rose talked him into it. I think he’s hiding because he doesn’t want you to thrash him like you did Erickson MacPhail. You can’t let her go, Papa. You have to stop her.”
Tysen wondered in that instant if the world hadn’t tipped onto its side and put him in danger of falling off. Here he was, standing on the top steps of the castle, his hands on his hips, his face red, and he was yelling like a madman. He could actually feel the hot blood roaring through his veins. This was utterly ridiculous.
Meggie was tugging at his hand. “Please, Papa, you have to stop her. Mary Rose means to do the right thing—it’s just that she sometimes doesn’t realize that what she believes is the right thing is stupid.”
“Yes, I will stop her, and yes, this is an incredibly stupid thing she’s doing.” He ran down the long, curving stairs into the inner courtyard. “You will stay put, Mary Rose!”
She was about to let the coachman assist her into the carriage when Tysen grabbed the man by his collar and simply flung him away, sending him skittering on his backside into the dirt. “Now, as for you—”
“Tysen, you shouldn’t be here. You were supposed to be in the village.”
“I was and now I’m back, thank the good Lord. Meggie is right, this is one of the stupidest things you’ve done to date, Mary Rose. Now come along.”
She kept pulling and tugging. “You must see reason here. It is good reason, solid reason. I can see it. It’s not stupid. Why can’t you see that it is the right thing to do? You don’t want me as your wife. I’m a bastard, you can’t change that. Your brother—the earl—would rip off his wig and stomp it into the ground in rage, if it were the last century and he wore one. No, you can’t have a bastard in your family, it would be a travesty, you—”
Tysen heard the geese, Willie leading the way, honking so loud he could no longer hear his own furious heartbeat. He heard Meggie yell, “Papa, I’ve got her valise. No, no, Willie, don’t nip at my arm. I’ll get bread for you, but you must be patient.”
He briefly saw Meggie from the corner of his eye tugging at Mary Rose’s valise, slowly pulling it back toward the castle, the geese stampeding madly after her.
“No more,” he said, looking down at Mary Rose. “No more.” He grabbed her and hauled her over his shoulder.
“Tysen, oh, goodness, this isn’t what a vicar should do. Put me down. This is ridiculous. I’m doing what is best. Listen to me. Mr. MacNeily went to a lot of trouble to get this carriage here for me—”
To Tysen’s utter surprise, he smacked her bottom. “You are going nowhere.” To his further utter surprise, his palm lay on her bottom for a good second longer than necessary to deliver the hit. He raised his hand as if scalded, then stared straight ahead, determination freezing his face, and walked back to the castle.
Still, she reared up, but it did her no good. She could kick, she could pound him with her fists, but because she didn’t want to take the chance of hurting him, she was, effectively, not going anywhere.
Mary Rose saw Meggie tugging with all her might at the valise, the geese honking louder and louder, Willie pecking at Meggie’s feet. Dust flew up and Mary Rose thought, I must plant trees and shrubs here. There is too much bare earth and black dirt. Then she shook her head, tried to relax as her stomach bounced up and down on Tysen’s shoulder.
The coachman picked himself up, brushed off his trousers, and stared after the man—a vicar!—who was carrying the lady over his shoulder, followed by a little girl dragging the dratted valise with geese nearly on her heels, making more racket than his own dear wife in her finest moments.
Miles MacNeily stood just inside the castle door, in the entrance hall. Pouder, standing next to him, looked mildly interested. When Tysen came through the door, Miles said, “I’m sorry, my lord, but Mary Rose, she is very special and she didn’t want you to feel responsible for—”
“Miles,” Tysen said, not looking toward his steward as he strode through the entrance hall, “you’re fired.”
“But, my lord, I’m already leaving, in but two weeks now.”
Meggie managed to pull the valise into the hallway. Willie was honking loudly outside on the steps. Pouder was waving his gnarly old hands at the goose, yelling, “Begone, ye miserable white-feathered sot! Ye’ll nae bite the lass’s heel!”
Willie’s beak came around the side of the wide front door. He honked, then retreated. Tysen couldn’t help it, he started laughing. The woman over his shoulder had tried to leave him, and yet he was laughing. He felt her belly on his shoulder, knew that if he pulled her just a bit closer, his face would be touching her hip. He was hugging her thighs. The feel of her, it made him shake.
What was happening to him?
He saw Meggie, his precious girl, pulling that ridiculous valise past Pouder, who was just staring down at her. Miles MacNeily leaned down and scooped it up.
He heard Meggie said, “Thank you, Mr. Miles. You shouldn’t have let Mary Rose talk you into that carriage. She is promised to my father, and I have already written to my brothers telling them that we will have a new mother.”
“Er, would you like
me to post your letter, Meggie?”
“Yes, sir, that would be very kind of you. Oh, goodness, Mary Rose, what is in that valise? It weighs more than I do.”
“I gave her my two prized candlesticks,” Miles said, “for her to pawn in Edinburgh. Since I haven’t yet come into my inheritance, I don’t have any money. Perhaps I should give them to your father as restitution.”
Meggie, a practical girl, who was racing after her father and Mary Rose, turned briefly and said, “I suppose it is the least you could do for your treachery.”
Where had Meggie learned that excellent word?
And then Tysen thought, two blasted candlesticks! It was too much. He felt laughter bubbling up again, and seamed his mouth together. He said, “I imagine that you needed the candlesticks to live on until your twenty-fifth birthday?”
Mary Rose nodded.
“I suppose you would have written to your mother for the name of the solicitor.”
She nodded again, not a word out of her mouth.
“And then you would have been up bright and early, ready to camp on the solicitor’s doorstep? Then once you had all your wealth, you would have brought your mother to Edinburgh?”
Another nod.
He walked toward the staircase, paused a moment, and called out over his shoulder—actually, over Mary Rose’s bottom—“You’re not fired, Miles, at least not for another two weeks.”
“Thank you, my lord. I’ll see to the coachman. I’ll take Mary Rose’s valise back to Meggie’s bedchamber.”
“I don’t want your candlesticks,” Tysen said, “just swear to me you’ll keep them hidden from Mary Rose.”
“Yes, I swear, my lord,” Miles said. “I can see now that this is for the best. I won’t listen to her again.”
Mary Rose called out, raising her head from Tysen’s back, “At least you listened to me once, sir.”