Page 57 of Somewhere Along The Way (Mackinnon #3)

Chapter Seventeen

Annabella had never felt so exhilarated. She had never felt so pleased with herself. She had thrown a fit. She had expressed her anger. She had broken free.

Yesterday she had taken a giant leap and jumped free of the restrictions in her life.

Today she was still traveling on the momentum of that leap.

She was something she could never remember being before.

She was wonderfully and thoroughly happy with herself.

And that, she discovered, was a far cry from being happy with one’s surroundings or one’s set of circumstances.

Nothing had ever fortified her like the knowledge that she had honestly faced a situation and taken a risk to be herself without pretending to be something she was not.

Living within that tight little perimeter of existence permitted to her was not really living.

She could see that now. Life was either giving up false beliefs and taking a chance to free yourself or a self-inflicted prison.

The desire to jump free had always been there, but Annabella had been taught always to look before she leaped, to think things through.

And yet whenever she thought things through, weighed the good against the bad, and recognized the dangers, she always retreated into the security of what was familiar to her: the security of obedience.

For once in her life, she had taken over, pushing everything else aside.

For once she had reacted, not according to the codes of the times, not according to the teachings of the church, and not according to the instruction and expectations of her parents.

She had been herself and done something she wanted to do. And that felt good.

There seemed to be no reason for Annabella and Ailie to continue their stay in the fishing cottage once Ross had discovered they were there, other than the fact that the girls had grown quite fond of the quaint little cottage and heaped all the blame for their having to leave upon Ross Mackinnon’s back.

For the next two or three days, things settled in quite nicely, with the sound of Barra Mackenzie’s baritone laughter flooding the castle at periodic intervals.

Barra, it seemed to everyone, had formed a fast friendship with Ross and Percy, and the three men along with Allan were together constantly, whether they were hunting, fishing, golfing, or sitting around the fire with a glass of whisky or Drambuie telling stories.

Soon the few days Ross and Percy had originally decided to stay turned into a week.

“Your uncle has invited them to stay on for a while,” Una said to Annabella one afternoon.

Una was sitting before a large weaving loom. Annabella, sitting beside her, watched her aunt’s nimble fingers roll thread around the warp beam and secure it with a weight. Bella helped stretch the warp to the cloth beam, silently wondering just what her uncle was up to by this latest move of his.

She had been spending an hour or so each day with her aunt here, in the weaving room, learning the loom and readying herself to try her hand at weaving soon.

Una pressed the pedals and the heddle raised and lowered the alternating threads.

As the weft was guided through the gaps, Annabella let her mind go back to what her aunt had just said about Ross and Percy’s extending their visit.

“Uncle must be enjoying their company,” she said. “Is that why he’s invited them to stay?”

“That and a few other reasons, I suppose. You know how men love to talk. They spent the entire morning in Barra’s study going over farm journals and discussing farm animals, of all things.

Now I ask you, how could anyone talk about cows and pigs for four hours?

We’ve always run a fine herd of Ayrshire cows, but now Barra is talking of buying Jersey and Guernsey cows.

I said, ‘Our Ayrshire cows give us enough rich milk. Why do we need different ones?’ But I doubt my opinion will stop progress.

I have a feeling that come next spring, we’ll be seeing a few of those Jersey and Guernsey cows dotting the pastures, up to their udders in buttercups. ”

A strong slice of rich afternoon sun cut across the loom and flooded Bella’s face.

Una laughed. “By fall that shaft of sunlight willna be hitting you in the face, lass. When the sun drops lower in the sky, it’ll be giving me an eyeful.

” She paused a moment and looked outside.

“The fog has lifted and it’s turned out to be a fine, fine day.

Why don’t you find Ailie and the two of you go outside to get some sunshine?

You’re much too pale, Bella. The sun will put a little color on your cheeks. ”

“Mother said a lady should never get sun on her face.”

“Oh, pooh! A little sunshine never hurt anyone.” Una looked thoughtful.

“I wonder where your mother got all those ideas she’s filled your head with?

She surely didn’t have them as a child. Why, there wasn’t a more tangle-haired, mud-splattered lass in the Highlands.

” She sighed. “Well, never mind all that. You run along now and get your hour in the sun.” She turned toward Annabella, taking her hand in hers.

“You’re young for such a short while, Bella.

Make the most of it. Don’t waste your youth trying to be old.

You’ll be there soon enough. Live each day as if it were your last. Make no excuses for yesterday, no promises for tomorrow.

Tomorrow belongs to God. As they say in Turkey, ‘today’s egg is better than tomorrow’s hen’. ”

Annabella laughed and hugged her aunt. “Have you ever been to Turkey?”

“No, but I’ve been in love. I ken what you’re going through, lass.”

Annabella looked at her aunt, hoping to discover something in her countenance that would clue her to what she was about, but her aunt’s features were closed.

Una Mackenzie was very much like Bella’s mother in looks.

Her posture was straight and regal, yet approachable; her eyes were a softer gray than Anne’s and full of more understanding.

It was as if her mother had been remade into a softer, gentler, more compassionate woman who looked every inch a mother.

Annabella guessed that was what it was about her mother that seemed to put distance between them.

The duchess did not look like a mother. She looked like a beautiful doll one would display on a bed but was never allowed to play with, while Aunt Una was the doll being pulled down the stairs— bumpety, bumpety, bump —by its one good arm, the other having been lost in a tug-of-war.

At one time this doll had been as beautiful and finely made as the other, but time and use had given it a patina that comes only from loving hands.

Looking at her aunt, Annabella could see how living life to its fullest had plumped out Una’s figure somewhat and put the lines of laughter upon her face.

And work such as cheese making and lace tatting and weaving and a hundred other chores Una lovingly performed had coarsened her hands.

Bella almost smiled, remembering the first few days she had been here, and how her mother had said, “Una! Faith, I cannot understand why you persist with these menial chores when you have so many servants about. No gentlewoman does her own milking and washes her own linen. Why do you persist?”

“Because I enjoy it. It fulfills me.”

“Fulfills you?” the duchess had said. “Dear, dear, Una. There is something dreadfully wrong with a woman who must raise blisters on her hands in order to feel fulfilled.”

Una had simply laughed. “What else would I do? I can drink only so much tea.”

Annabella was still smiling when Una stretched and kneaded her back, her eyes still on the window.

“If I didn’t know it was closer to fall, I’d swear it was springtime.

Just look at that sun. Why, it’s as golden and mellow as a round of cheese.

Now, go on with you. You’ll have plenty of other opportunities to learn weaving.

Next week, I’ll show you how to make lace. ”

As she went downstairs, Bella was thinking of how different her life was now. She would even go so far as to call herself happy, if it weren’t for the dark cloud of uncertainty about her future that always hovered over her head. She pushed all unpleasant thoughts away.

“Afternoon, miss.”

“Good afternoon to you,” she said, waving at the old butler. She was remembering how he used to speak to her only when she spoke to him first. A lot of things had changed since she had first come here. And no one was more astonished than she.

Within days of her coming, the spirit of self-sufficiency she saw in everyone here at Seaforth had spread to Bella.

She had never known so many tasks were required to run a household, or that you had to be fit as a trout to do them. Housekeeping was hard work. Laundry day, for instance. That was something that required strength and stamina.

Before Annabella had been at Seaforth very long, Ailie had coaxed her into the laundry—on a Monday, of course.

“Laundry is always done on Monday,” Ailie said.

“Why?” asked Bella.

“Mama says it’s because we always cook a great joint of venison on Sunday, and there’s enough left over for Monday. That way, Cook can spend less time in the kitchen and help with the laundry.”

Annabella looked around the great room that was reserved for laundry.

Apparently there was a lot of work to do on washday, for there were several women already at work.

Wicker baskets of carefully sorted clothes were everywhere.

Bride, the laundress, was boiling the dirtier clothes in a copper, while Dorcas, her helper, was washing the finer things in a dolly tub.

To Annabella’s horror, linen was bleached by the disgusting practice of soaking it in urine, which contained ammonia—or so she was told.