Page 13 of Highland Fire

Unbidden, there came to Caitlin’s mind the memory of Fiona’s tenth birthday.

In those days, Caitlin saw very little of her cousin.

Fiona’s mother was a lowlander, from Edinburgh, where the family had taken up residence.

From time to time, they came into Deeside for extended holidays.

This had been one of those times. Since Caitlin rarely went near the big house, and Fiona was not allowed to roam the estate, the two girls knew each other only from a distance.

There was to be a party in honor of Fiona’s birthday.

Glenshiel, himself, came to the shieling to deliver the invitation.

Caitlin was loath to go. In the first place, she was fifteen years old and considered her cousin a mere child.

In the second place, she truly was envious.

It seemed to her that Fiona, as the trueborn granddaughter, had everything.

When she came into Deeside, she lived at the big house.

She had so many pretty frocks in her clothes press it would have taken a month of Sundays before she could wear every one of them.

Her looks, even at ten years old, were stunning.

Caitlin arrived at the party expecting to find a spoiled brat who would look down her nose at her “poor relation.” What she found was a timid, solitary child who was terrified of putting a foot wrong.

Charlotte was right in this—from that day forward, Caitlin had adopted the role of guardian to the younger girl, protecting her, as much as she was able, from the pernicious influence of a mother who was always finding fault.

“Caitlin hasna an envious bone in her body,” declared Donald Randal staunchly.

Glenshiel brought the argument to a close by rapping his cane on the floor. “It’s no Fiona we should be thinking about, but Caitlin. Ye are going on for two-and-twenty. A woman must marry. Is there no one in Deeside who has taken your fancy, lass?”

Caitlin stared at her grandfather as though he had just asked her if she would like to become the queen of England.

“Well?”

She closed her mouth. “Like who, for instance?”

“How should I know? The Randal for one.”

“The Randal?” Her laugh owed as much to astonishment as amusement. “What about the ancient feud? Our two families have been at daggers drawn since before I was born.”

“Aye. The feud…Well now, ye have a point there.” Glenshiel’s grin wavered between sheepish and wolfish. “I’m a reasonable man. If the Randal were to marry into our family, I’d be willing tae let bygones be bygones.”

Donald Randal snorted. “Ye mean the Randal has decided tae put his foot down. He wants an end tae the feud, and if ye try and thwart him, he’ll turn every Randal against ye.”

Glenshiel’s jaw jutted, but he said mildly enough, “What do ye say, lass?”

“The Randal and me?” Caitlin’s eyes were brimming with laughter. “Somehow, I just can’t see it.”

“And why not? Ye have a good head on your shoulders. I’ll say one thing for your mammy—she saw to it that ye had a lady’s education.

If ye could only learn to curb that tongue, with the right clothes, ye’d be a taking wee thing.

” Bracing his weight against his cane, he leaned forward as if to emphasize his point.

“Come home, lass. This is where ye belong, not in that bothy ye call home.”

“I’m content with our arrangement.”

“And if I am not?”

“You gave me your word, and I’m holding you to it.”

“My word! My word! And what about your word tae me? Did ye no promise that ye would conduct yerself as a true daughter o’ the house?” When Glenshiel became agitated, he tended to lapse into broad Scots.

Unsure of his meaning, Caitlin simply stared and Glenshiel continued in the same irascible vein, “Where were ye this morning when the Randal asked to be presented to the members of my family? I’ll tell ye where ye were.

Ye were skulkin’ about, like a week timorous mole, terrified to see the light o’ day.

It would not have surprised me tae see ye diggin’ a hole and disappearing down it. ”

Since this described exactly how Caitlin had felt that morning when surprised by the Randal on the church steps, she had no ready answer on the tip of her tongue. She was still humming and hawing when her aunt answered for her.

“Glenshiel, you’re not seriously suggesting that Caitlin should set her cap at Lord Randal?”

“I don’t see why not.”

“No, you wouldn’t!” Caution was thrown to the winds as Charlotte saw her hope of snaring the Randal for her daughter begin to fade. “Lord Randal will look higher than Caitlin for a wife.”

“Now just what do ye mean by that?”

“Really,” interrupted Caitlin, “there’s no need for this. Why are you so obstinate, Grandfather? We all know what Aunt Charlotte is getting at.” When Caitlin was agitated, as at the present moment, she sometimes forgot to address her grandfather as “Glenshiel.”

“Spit it out, woman!”

“Very well. Though I’ve no wish to hurt anyone’s feelings, least of all Caitlin’s, you are forcing me to say what your own principles should tell you. Caitlin is not a true daughter of the house. She is base-born and everyone knows it.”

The silence was profound. Glenshiel looked as though he had been struck by a thunderbolt.

The color rushed out of his face, then rushed in again.

It took a moment or two before he could find his breath, and when he did, his voice came out thin and reedy.

“No one in his right mind would blame the lass for something she couldna help.”

“You yourself abandoned her to that little croft. What else should people think?”

“That was her mother’s doing.”

“But—”

“Woman, hud yer tongue!” Glenshiel laboriously pulled himself to his feet.

His eyebrows were down, clear evidence that his hackles were up.

He glared at each person in turn. “My quarrel was with my daughter. If she had said the word, all would have been forgiven. Whisht, woman, do ye no ken that my own dearling wife, God rest her soul, was born on the wrong side o’ the blanket?

If that shocks ye, all I maun say is that ye’ve led a sheltered existence.

Good God, where do ye suppose all these cadet branches o’ the great clans got their start?

They come frae bastard sons, that’s what. Tell her, Donald.”

“That’s very true,” Donald Randal immediately responded, and rubbing his hands in evident relish, he began on a catalog which left barely one prominent family on the whole of Deeside untouched.

This recital was interrupted by the arrival of Glenshiel’s physician, Dr. Innes, a dapper gentleman in his mid-to-late forties. Gentlemen of this age were always of particular interest to Caitlin, for she judged that her own father, if he lived, would be something over forty.

She had long ceased to wonder about Dr. Innes. He was a single man, whose devotion to his profession precluded, through choice, any interest in the opposite sex. As her grandfather had once put it, crudely if not succinctly, “The only bodies Innes is interested in are ailing and dead ones.”

Glenshiel’s words were borne out by the good doctor’s opening remarks. “They got old Arthur Cameron last Thursday night, aye, and his relatives were in the watch-house keeping guard over him. They stole him from right under their noses.” He spoke with relish.

“Who got Arthur Cameron?” asked Charlotte politely.

“The Resurrectionists, you know, graverobbers.”

The cup and saucer in Charlotte’s hand wobbled alarmingly, as did her voice. “This is sacrilegious! Why don’t the authorities do something? People aren’t safe even in their graves!”

More cautious now, the doctor responded, “They are trying, but our graverobbers are daredevil fellows and always one step ahead of them.”

Glenshiel, seeing that the ladies would likely put a damper on the conversation, diplomatically suggested that a wee toddy might be more to the doctor’s taste, and the three gentlemen quickly decamped for the library.

“Well!” exclaimed Charlotte, looking at the cup of tea she had newly poured out.

Fiona’s thoughts still revolved around the conversation that had taken place before Dr. Innes had arrived.

Looking at Caitlin, she said, “Grandfather said all would have been forgiven if your mother had only given the word. What I wish to know, Caitlin, is what is the word your mother refused to say?”

Two pairs of eyes were turned on Caitlin. “That,” she said, and carefully licked a crumb of shortbread from her finger, “was the name of my father.”

For the next several days, Rand was fully occupied in familiarizing himself with estate business.

The damage to his property on the night of his arrival was only one small annoyance with which he had to contend.

As one day followed another, it became alarmingly obvious that his factor had been lured away from Strathcairn for a purpose.

In Serle’s absence, mischiefmakers had run amok.

Rand slammed down the decanter of amber liquid he had just unstoppered. “Puerile!” he told his companion distastefully.

John Murray’s eye held a merry twinkle. In fifteen years of friendship, he had seldom seen Rand out of countenance. The spectacle tickled his fancy. “It’s not whiskey?” he asked solicitously.

Murray had arrived from Inverey earlier in the day with the baggage and servants Rand had been forced to abandon when he had answered the urgent summons from his factor, a summons which had later proved to be counterfeit.

With the arrival of the baggage, Rand was now attired in his usual sartorial elegance.

Murray’s costume of dark pantaloons and blue superfine coat was almost identical to his friend’s.

“Need you ask?”

“Now this is serious,” said Murray through his laughter.

“I don’t happen to think this is funny,” said Rand. He strode to the bellpull beside the fireplace and yanked on it. “Damn. I forgot. They’ve done something to the bells.”

“They don’t work?”