Chapter Eleven
Two days later Maura rode a dappled gray mare to the village just south of Gleneden, past the church to the graveyard. She tied the reins to a tree, then glanced around.
Murdoch stepped out from behind a stout oak tree.
Maura ran to him, throwing her arms around him. Murdoch had followed almost directly in her wake. It was part of the plan they had conceived, a way to stay in touch should she find the Circle.
When he was able, he stepped back, searching her features. “Lady Maura! What’s wrong, girl?” His welcoming smile vanished. “It’s the duke, isn’t it, child? I knew he was a blackguard! I swear, if he has mis—”
Maura shook her head, blinking back tears. “No, no, Murdoch! I’m fine. Truly I am. He’s not the sort of man to harm anyone.”
And as soon as she’d said it, she realized that he wasn’t. She knew it instinctively. He had remained polite and charming, but she sensed his distance. She sensed his watchfulness. In turn, she tasked herself to be prudent and cautious, ever vigilant, lest she further arouse his suspicion.
Neither of them allowed it to show on the outside, but Maura knew that Alec was as wary of her as she was of him.
“Have ye learned anything, Lady Maura? Have ye found anything?”
She shook her head. “Not yet. The house is large, each wing built in different centuries.” She hesitated.
“It may take longer than I expected,” she admitted.
“But the Circle is there, Murdoch.” She told him about the portrait of James, the seventh Duke of Gleneden.
As she spoke, a shiver slid down her spine.
“Alec said he endured some sort of family tragedy. And I know why.” Her tone turned bitter.
“The curse?” asked Murdoch.
Maura nodded. “I searched through the family annals—I told Alec I was fascinated by such things. But there was little about him. The date he married, and the date of his son’s birth and death.
” She scowled. “For such a scoundrel, he lived to a ripe old age. Why, he was nearly eighty years old when he died. I wonder when he ceased his pirating days.”
She was silent for a moment. Her eyes grew dark. “Murdoch, the Circle is here. I know it. I can feel it. It is uncanny. I cannot explain why, but somehow I just know it is. I—oh, I know it sounds silly, but it’s just as Papa said. As if I can hear the Circle calling to me. Crying out.”
Murdoch squeezed her shoulder. “Ye need not convince me, child,” he said gently. “I have faith that you will find it.”
Maura smiled at him, then held up a finger.
“Wait,” she said. “Wait.” She went to her mare and untied two small sacks.
Dropping to her knees, she untied one and brought out two large candlestick holders with a flourish.
“Look!” She licked a fingertip and rubbed it against the base.
“Pure silver! I brought this pair and another, a tray and a gilt-edged vase as well. Sell them and take the money home to Nan.”
“Lady Maura!” Murdoch couldn’t hide his distress. “What if the duke discovers they are gone?”
She scowled. “He will not. The Black Scotsman stole from us. And these will never even be missed. I found them in the garret.” Which she had.
Well, the candlesticks, at least, so it wasn’t entirely a lie.
The candlesticks were in the garret. The tray and the vase had come from a bedchamber in the old wing.
Murdoch took the sacks, his expression sober. “I know that look, lass. Take care that ye are not too bold.”
Maura knew what he meant, that she should take no more risk than she dared.
They arranged to meet in the same place two weeks hence. She gave him a hasty peck on the cheek, mounted the mare and rode back to Gleneden.
Outside the stable, she handed the reins to a groom. Whistling a merry little tune, she rounded the corner, only to bump headlong into a form as solid as a granite wall.
Strong heads steadied her. “There you are,” Alec said smoothly. “Where were you?”
“Just out for a bit of a ride.” How lame that sounded!
“Along the road?”
“Through the fields mostly.”
“No wonder I didn’t see you, then. I just came from the village—”
Maura’s heart lurched. Mercy, what if he’d seen her with Murdoch!
“—but once I was home, when I went to find you, no one knew where you were.”
“Why were you looking for me?” She sought to quiet the quick, hard pounding of her heart.
“We’ve spent no time together today, your grace. I thought we might walk down to the loch.”
Your grace. Maura felt her skin grow hot. Must he call her that? It was intentional, she was sure, in order to discomfit her.
Which, of course, it did.
“Have you been there yet, Irish?”
“No. You told me you would show me a path through the woods.”
Alec took her arm. “I did, didn’t I?”
They walked past the north wing toward the forest. They hadn’t gone more than a half mile when Maura stopped short.
“Oh, look!” she cried. “How lovely.” She pointed to a stone bridge that crossed a small brook.
A vine-covered archway led into a small open clearing.
“What is that? A well?” A timbered roof, almost a miniature of the one in the great hall, covered a round stone well.
“Yes. It’s always been known as the wishing well.”
Maura had already started across the bridge. She paused near the well, glancing around. “It’s lovely here, so quiet and tranquil.”
Alec propped a hip on the stony wall of the well.
“A matter of opinion. My mother finds the well charming. It was bricked up for years, even in my grandfather’s time, I believe.
My mother had it opened again when I was a boy.
” He pointed to a stone bench on the other side of the clearing.
“A bit solitary for my taste, but she finds it peaceful and sometimes comes here to read.”
Maura laughed. “I was just about to say that very thing!”
The well was perhaps six feet across, built up to about the level of her hips. She peered far down into the round opening, down the moss-laden sides that ended in shadow. “It’s dry,” she said in disappointment.
“I’m not surprised. I can’t imagine why anyone would want to make a wish here, since one never knows when it will fill with water.” He smiled slightly. “My sister and my cousin Caro used to wish upon stars. I often wondered why they never came here.”
“Perhaps they did,” Maura said.
“Possibly,” Alec said wryly, “but I think perhaps they simply wanted to stay up long into the night and bedevil their nurse or the rest of the household.”
He paused, as if in fond remembrance, Maura suspected.
“When the well does fill with water,” he said, “by the next day it’s completely gone. It’s the oddest thing, but I believe it’s been that way for a number of generations.”
“Well, I find it just as charming as your mother,” Maura announced.
“Do you, now? Why do I have the feeling you merely wish your opinion to be contrary to mine?”
“Your statement, sir, not mine,” she retorted.
And one he chose to ignore. He held out his hand. “Come. The loch isn’t far. Just over the next rise.”
Maura hesitated. She didn’t want to take his hand. She didn’t want to touch him. Her response to him was too unpredictable. She couldn’t control it. The thought sprang wildly into her head that she couldn’t control him.
“Your grace?”
He beckoned with the tips of his fingers. The glint in his eyes was almost a dare.
He knew, damn him. He knew full well what he did to her.
Maura’s chin came up. Almost defiantly she placed her hand in his. Perhaps just as defiantly, his fingers curled hard around hers.
They walked in silence for a time, following a winding pathway through the forest. Sunlight played hide-and-seek through the treetops.
But all was forgotten when she caught her first glimpse of the loch. Wooded hills rose on the opposite shore, their shadows reflected in the brilliant blue of the loch below.
She ran down the grassy hillside, exclaiming in delight.
“A boathouse! Oh, and look at the dock!” She ran out farther, perching her hands on her hips, then pointing across to the hills.
“The trees near the shoreline, the ones with the lovely, arching branches. Are they downy birch? And Scots pine higher on the hills?”
“They are.” Alec seemed pleased that she knew. “I’m glad to see there is something in Scotland that pleases you, Irish. You should see it in the autumn, when all the leaves are brilliant and gold. And in the springtime, with primroses and violets everywhere.”
Ah, but she wouldn’t be here in the autumn. Or the springtime.
Maura ignored the insistent little voice in her head.
Plunking herself down near the end of the dock, she tugged off her slippers, peeled off her hose, hiked up her skirts and dangled her toes in the water.
Feeling like a child again, she was unaware of the way Alec’s gaze alighted on her darned cotton stockings.
He sat down, long legs stretched out before him. Laughing, Maura aimed a splash at him with the bottom of one foot.
He ducked.
“What, your grace! You’re not the sort who wails at getting a bit damp, are you?”
This time he couldn’t evade the spray of water she sent his way.
With a peal of laughter, Maura leaned back on her hands. “Is there a boat in the boathouse?”
“Aye. And you are not to venture out alone in it,” he said sternly.
Maura pulled a face. “And you, your grace, are behaving like a stodgy old man.”
“Am I? Lovely as it is, my sister Anne and my cousin Caro once spent a very frightening night here on the loch when a sudden storm blew in. If you were alone, Irish, and I could not find you, I might think you’d been spirited away by a selkie.”
“By what?”
“A selkie. We Scots have our legends, too, you know. A selkie is a creature of the sea, with a seal-like skin. When he—or she—cast off their skin, they assume human form. A selkie-man is said to be a dashingly handsome creature, with extremely persuasive powers over women.”
“And would you be jealous, your grace, if I were to find myself smitten with a selkie-man?” She dipped her toes in the water, watching it dimple.