Page 22 of Highland Fire

Caitlin said nothing, and Daroch went on more desperately, “I am not responsible for spreading these rumors. Mollie belongs in my past. I haven’t gone out of my way to look her up in almost a year.”

When she still said nothing, Daroch ground his teeth. “You need not take that attitude with me. I am not betrothed to Fiona, nor am I like to be.”

“Now that is the best news I have heard in many a long day.” At the harsh, uncompromising tone, such a look crossed his face that Caitlin was momentarily thrown off stride.

She opened her mouth to administer the tongue-lashing he so richly deserved, but something moved her to say instead, “You should not be surprised. Your reputation is scandalous. Do you wonder that I am not in favor of a match between you and my cousin?” Gentling her tone, she went on.

“Fiona is very young, very innocent. Quite frankly, Daroch, it surprises me that you are taken with her.”

His eyes flashed. “And what might you mean by that?”

Caitlin sat back in her chair and regarded him in a puzzled way. Before she could find the words to answer him, he burst out, “I thought, I hoped, that you of all people would put no stock in idle gossip. It seems that I was wrong.”

“What else am I to think?”

His reply was fierce. “Is it too much to ask that you judge me on what you have observed of my character? You think I am inconstant. You believe me to be a profligate. What makes you think so? Rumor and conjecture that have no basis in fact.”

She blinked while her brain assimilated his words. It was true that rumor played a part in her assessment of Daroch’s character, but there was a lot more to it than that. Indignantly, she exclaimed, “When you discovered I was not a lad but a female, you tried to have your way with me!”

A smile twitched his lips, and his eyes danced.

“True, but at that time Fiona made no impression on me, and I was laboring under a misapprehension about you. A woman who dresses up as a boy and goes gallivanting around the countryside leaves herself open to that sort of insult. Yes, and this same specimen, who gets herself embroiled in an altercation in a common bawdy house, has no one to blame but herself if a gentleman assumes that she is any man’s for the taking. ”

Caitlin sucked in an infuriated breath. “That’s not fair!”

“Who said anything about ‘fair’? I am merely trying to demonstrate that appearances can be misleading. I know you, so I put no credence in such things.”

His words chastened her. Now that he had got her thinking about it, she was willing to admit he had a point.

Her opinion of his character was largely based on the rumors which circulated.

If she had to judge him solely on what she had observed, she would have been more than happy to encourage his attentions to Fiona.

She frowned, recalling that there was also the matter of his family’s history.

All the Gordons of Daroch are tarred with the same brush .

It was almost a creed on Deeside. Daroch’s father and uncle were notorious rakes in their own day.

If she had not known her own mother better, Caitlin might have been persuaded that one of these gentlemen was her father.

But she did know her mother, and Morag Randal would never have succumbed to the blandishments of a rake.

For the first time, she began to question her prejudices respecting the Gordons of Daroch.

A moment’s reflection steadied her. In her uncle’s bookroom, there was a tome containing evidence enough to convict the former lairds of Daroch of every vice ever invented.

About the present laird, however, there was not a scrap.

She let out a long sigh and looked up at Daroch with an appealingly frank expression.

“If you did not go to Aboyne to visit Mollie Fletcher, why did you go? It is not idle curiosity that prompts my question, Daroch. I care about Fiona. I don’t wish to see her hurt.

There is a mystery here, and it is in your interest to clear it up.

You are absent for long stretches at a time.

Where do you go? What do you get up to?”

His lips were tightly compressed, and a muscle flexed in his jaw. Lowering his eyes, shaking his head, he said, “I cannot tell you, so don’t ask. Suffice it to say that it is not a woman.”

After a lull in the conversation, Daroch said, “I had not meant to change the subject. Mind what I told you. There will be no more smuggling jaunts for you as long as the Randal is in residence. It’s too dangerous. MacGregor says he’ll be satisfied with nothing less than your head.”

Caitlin could well believe it. “I should not have thrown my dirk at him,” she said.

“What was in your mind? Were you trying to murder him?”

“Of course not! I aimed for the bedpost. How was I to know he was going to leap out of bed and get in the way?”

Daroch’s unexpected laughter brought her brows winging together. “Oh, Caitlin,” he choked out, “a common bawdy house! I wish I had been there to see it! How do you manage to get into these scrapes?”

Caitlin’s cheeks were burning. She had to force down the impulse to reveal MacGregor’s part in the whole sorry debacle. MacGregor had meant well. But oh, she ached to box the young Highlander’s ears.

Her train of thought was interrupted when Bocain’s huge muzzle came off her forepaws.

The hound cocked her head and pricked up her ears, then whined almost at the same moment they heard the whinny of a horse outside and the click of the garden gate.

Setting down her cup and saucer, Caitlin went to investigate.

When she opened the door, she fell back a step. The Randal stood on the threshold. Every detail of the scene in The Fair Maid’s upstairs bedchamber flashed into her head with mortifying clarity. He advanced, she retreated, one hand clutched to her heart.

“Good dog,” said Rand, and obligingly scratched Bocain behind the ears. “No, you may not jump up on me. Down! Down, I say! Now stay!”

Having settled the hound, Rand’s eyes moved to the young man who was staring at the deerhound with open-mouthed astonishment.

Rand’s first thought was amusing. Lord Byron in tartan!

The young man, who had risen to his feet, might have stepped out of the pages of a Walter Scott novel.

He was darkly good-looking in a romantically brooding way, and his immaculate English get-up of beige pantaloons and snug-fitting blue superfine was adorned by a voluminous Gordon plaid which was draped casually over one shoulder.

Rand’s subsequent thoughts were not so amusing.

He was aware of a strange stillness in the atmosphere, as though the pair, suddenly exchanging eloquent, unspoken messages with their eyes, had just been caught out in something improper.

It was improper, Rand decided, as bile rose in his throat. In England, this kind of conduct would never be tolerated. Unattached males and females did not meet without a chaperone present.

When Caitlin made the introductions, he had the presence of mind to smile and offer a few pleasantries, but all the while his mind was functioning on another level, taking everything in.

The cottage was as neat as a new pin. The furnishings were rustic.

The only claim to elegance he could detect was the silver tea service and the fine porcelain set on the table.

Caitlin and her guest had evidently shared a pot of tea.

He wondered what else they had shared, and allowed his eyes to roam.

The door to the bedchamber stood ajar, affording him a glimpse of the made-up bed.

The plain gray frock Caitlin was wearing was buttoned to her chin.

Daroch’s neckcloth could only have been tied with the aid of a valet.

Rand understood about such things. He judged the young laird to be approximately the same age as Caitlin and far too young to be considered a serious suitor for the girl.

By the time Rand accepted the chair Caitlin had indicated, his expression was considerably more agreeable.

Looking at Daroch, he said, “I’ve been trying to track you down for days.”

“Oh?”

Rand smiled at the exaggerated show of unconcern. “Fiona suggested that I might find you here.”

At the familiarity of his using Fiona’s Christian name, Daroch bristled, but before he could respond, Caitlin flashed him a warning look and quickly interposed, “May I offer you tea, Lord Randal?”

Rand inclined his head and forebore to grin when she bustled about, slamming doors and rattling drawers as she fetched him a cup and saucer and a silver tea spoon.

So she knew about The Fair Maid, he thought.

No doubt, she had heard about Nellie too.

It had long ceased to amaze him that nice girls had their own methods of picking up all the salacious gossip going about. His own sisters were a case in point.

Caitlin’s wrath did not unnerve him but rather amused him. It was a good sign.

“Mr. Gordon,” he said finally, “I am anxious to trace a young relative of yours. Dirk Gordon is his name. Where may I find him?”

Daroch had been expecting the question. He was able to say easily, “Oh, Dirk never keeps me informed about his doings. He comes and goes as he pleases, that one.”

“When did you last see him?”

“Before I left for Aboyne. Caitlin, did he say anything to you?”

Caitlin was studying the pattern on the rim of her teacup. The eyes she raised to Rand’s were as clear a crystal prisms. “He said something about removing to his Gordon relatives in Fochabers.” Fochabers was in the far north of Scotland, and miles away from Deeside.

“Ah,” said Rand. “How convenient.”

“Beg pardon?”

“I meant, of course, how inconvenient.”

Caitlin slanted a sidelong look at Daroch.

Hastening to answer that unspoken plea, Daroch said, “See here, Lord Randal, if this has anything to do with the altercation that took place the other night in the change-house, I shall gladly pay for any damages that were incurred by my young cousin.”

“What altercation?” asked Caitlin, trying to look innocent. Neither man spared her a glance.

Rand waved a hand negligently. “You misunderstand. I’m not asking for compensation.

Why should I? No damage was done. No, I merely wish to assure myself that the young cub is unharmed.

He’s how old? Fourteen? Fifteen? I could not be easy in my conscience if I thought the lad was hiding out in the hills like some escaped convict.

” His winsome smile conveyed a hint of apology.

“The other night I lost my temper. I put a price on his head. I’ve since gained a little perspective. After all, I myself was once a boy.”

Into the silence, he said, “Miss Randal, this shortbread is delicious. My compliments to the cook.”

Having achieved what he set out to do, namely to allay any fears that he was bent on revenging himself on young Gordon, Rand allowed the conversation to meander.

He was waiting for the opportunity to be alone with Caitlin.

When he realized that Daroch was suspicious and meant to frustrate his purpose, he resorted to subterfuge.

Exclaiming at the lateness of the hour, he made his excuses and left. Ten minutes later he was back. There was no sign of either Daroch or his horse.