Chapter 4 #2
For a moment, they stared at the young woman with the flame-coloured hair but retreated swiftly when faced with the force of those sharp grey eyes. Following her shared confidence, their attention returned to Nathaniel Wells, who, if they had interpreted correctly, was received by the king himself.
‘Is he married? Betrothed or… anything…’ began the marchioness, having reassessed her opinion.
‘I’m not sure. I did hear that he’s betrothed to the daughter of the Dean of Westminster. But it is only a rumour.’
Interest was written all over the dowagers’ ample faces, surmising how much the High Sheriff of Monmouthshire might be worth.
Lochranza whispered into Nathaniel’s ear as she passed, ‘I’ve told everyone you have the ear of the king.’
Nathaniel looked quite astonished, before he laughed. ‘Only his ear?’
‘Look out. They’ll all be foisting their daughters on you.’
Looking bemused and relieved, the black plantation owner said that as he was already married, he would settle for an ear.
Three young spinsters, their mothers perched like fat pigeons on fragile chairs with spindly legs, giggled and whispered, their attention fixed on the imposing sight of Ethan MacKinnon, resplendent in a dark green kilt.
His legs were not spindly – quite the opposite in fact. Lochranza was nothing if not observant.
Whether he felt her eyes on him, she would never know, but by some instinct, he seemed to sense her gaze, turned his head and looked directly at her.
His look was bold, his nod of acknowledgement curt.
Her forthright gaze was just as bold, too direct for the finely bred young lady she was supposed to be.
Their looks held, the corner of his mouth lifting in a weak smile.
Lochranza gave a curt nod.
The attention she received was noticed by others of her age.
‘He smiled at you! He’s sure to ask you to dance,’ exclaimed Rosalinda, a girl with corn-coloured hair and a fresh complexion, her dress sprigged with small blue flowers. Similar flowers and feathers erupted from a host of ringlets falling over the nape of her neck.
Lochranza made a big show of sighing as though deeply disappointed with the man with whom she’d locked eyes. ‘I can’t possibly dance with a man like him.’
All three young ladies stared at her open-mouthed.
‘Why?’
‘Tell us why?’
‘Oh, please do! Is it because he’s wearing a kilt?’
Replying to their girlish enthusiasm necessitated Lochranza facing them, thus the spell that had fixed the gaze between her and Ethan MacKinnon was sharply broken.
Shielding her mouth with her fan, she fed her enraptured friends a fiction that would both amaze and excite them. ‘I do hear he was once married to a Creole woman, but they didn’t get on. One night, she was found at the foot of a cliff.’
‘She threw herself over?’ The young women, as though to amplify their delicate dispositions, squealed like frightened mice.
A smile slowly crept over Lochranza’s plush lips and there was mischief in her eyes. ‘Nobody is quite sure. It might have been an accident, but Lord Ethan MacKinnon was out walking the cliffs that night she was last seen. She was found the following morning.’
It was total fabrication, but she did so enjoy making up stories Those who listened, young and old alike, hung onto every word.
The trio of young ladies, brought up in splendid isolation, looked surprised that death, and more specifically violent death, ever occurred.
Sweeping away from their horrified tittering, Lochranza made her way through the throng of guests, complimenting women on their dresses even when they looked quite hideous, being pleasant to elderly gentlemen and reticent to officers in uniform who asked if she would partner them in a dance.
Such popinjays, she thought but smiled at them anyway whilst telling them that her dance card was quite full.
Not that it was. She quite liked to dance but preferred not to plan her schedule.
Besides, she had other things in mind, things that drew her more determinedly than the prospect of having her toes stepped on by military boots or young men with two left feet!
Ladies were congregating in small groups, their eyes fixed on Ethan MacKinnon as they whispered behind open feather fans.
Lochranza smiled secretively. Her urge to make mischief had not faded away.
The fact was she presented an imposing sight, with her cloud of Titian hair caught up with a green silk streamer. Compliments were paid, for which she gave thanks, but as she moved on, the ballroom, large as it was, seemed to close in on her.
Small talk, general conversation, even laughter should have been entertaining, but instead seemed only superfluous chatter.
Judging by the continual coming together of feminine heads behind feather fans, her story regarding a dead wife was circulating fast. Poor MacKinnon. He must surely have noticed the change in attitude towards him.
All because of me, she thought to herself, and felt guilty. A cliff, a dead woman falling to her death, the possibility of murder. Why did I say that?
An odd feeling grabbed her inside as though a creature was imprisoned there, its tiny nails scratching her soft flesh as it fought to get out.
What was that creature? Where had it come from? And why had her telling the lie about MacKinnon made it suddenly active – as though she knew those cliffs, and someone who had died?
Murdered?
She closed her eyes in exasperation. This was ridiculous. There were no cliffs, no dead woman. She blinked away the unsettling thoughts. They weren’t real. They couldn’t be.
In the meantime, she needed to return to the here and now.
My goodness, I could have ruined the poor man’s reputation forever. I must make amends.
Pasting on a smile and willing the rolling in her stomach to be still, she made her way to where Lord MacKinnon and Nathaniel Wells were engrossed in conversation with a group of other gentlemen. Like a gathering of cattle waiting to drink at a pond.
She was just in time to catch the tail end of their conversations.
There was a shaking of heads. ‘It’ll be the ruin of some and that’s for sure. The man’s opened a jar of worms, don’t you know!’
She heard the name of the abolitionist, Wilberforce, mentioned and the ending of the slave trade eight years before.
‘Most are only fit to be field hands anyway, although there are exceptions, though they have to be house trained – if you know what I mean. Cooks, maids, butlers, nursemaids…’
Determined to swallow her pride and beg forgiveness before Ethan MacKinnon sensed the hostile atmosphere, she waded forward, her silks rustling her bright eyes shining. ‘Gentlemen!’
The conversation stopped abruptly. The group of distinguished gentlemen, some titled and all very rich and powerful, acknowledged her with a slight tilting of their heads, a mix of admiration and benign forbearance in their eyes.
Compliments and the etiquette of good manners flowed copiously in her direction.
Ethan MacKinnon said nothing but looked at her with an odd little half-smile as though just the sight of her amused him. The effect was disarming.
‘We haven’t met, have we? I’m Lochranza Kildare.’ Despite his forthright look, she refused to let herself sound nervous.
‘Where is Lord Kildare? Fancy leaving dear Lady Lochranza to do the honours,’ said a very stately-looking man who she did not know, barging in without her wanting him to.
Ethan MacKinnon did not move. Neither did his smile lessen or increase, the amusement remaining in his eyes.
‘And you are?’
‘MacKinnon. Lord Ethan MacKinnon.’
‘Delighted, I’m sure.’ She offered her hand for him to kiss.
His lips brushed her hand. Her arm tingled.
‘Lochranza?’
He was asking her if he had pronounced her name correctly and she loved the way he said it.
‘Yes.’
His smile widened. ‘On fair Lochranza streamed the early day, thin wreaths of cottage smoke are upward curl’d. From the lone hamlet, which her inland bay and circling mountains sever from the world…’
The words had come tumbling off his tongue. Was he laughing at her? Seeing through her and instantly surmising that she knew nothing of the Scottish village?
‘Lovely words,’ she said at last. Her smile turned quizzical. She frowned. ‘What do they mean?’
He laughed, his eyes sparkling with delight. He shook his head. ‘Your name. It’s from a poem a friend of mine is writing. Do you read much poetry, Lady Kildare?’
‘Ah yes. Occasionally.’ The truth was that poetry bored her. ‘Is this friend of yours published?’
The amusement remained on his tanned face, lips curled, eyes shining.
‘He is indeed. He hasn’t published this particular piece yet, not until he’s sure it’s just right.
His name’s Walter Scott and he’s something of a perfectionist, even though I assured him I thought it a wonderful piece. What do you think?’
‘I like it very much. I didn’t know I was named after a place.’
‘You’ve never been there?’
She shook her head. ‘Never.’ This sudden knowledge intrigued her.
‘I presume your father had a soft spot for both Scotland and that isolated village. It really does appear to be fixed between wild skies and an equally wild sea, hence the beautiful name. Lochranza. Just like you.’
There was gravitas to his voice, the haunting lilt of a Highland accent enriched with that of a colonial. The way he rolled the name around his tongue warmed her through and through – more than a blush – almost as though it were her that he was rolling around on his tongue.
‘I must go there one day,’ she finally said, fanning her face with the silky coolness of her sea green and gold-edged fan. Ordinarily, she would have rebuffed carrying the blessed thing.
Apologising for anything was totally forgotten.
She glanced downwards at his kilt. ‘I presume you know Scotland well.’