Chapter 12
ELEANOR BEGAN TO strip off the shirt and pull down the breeches as soon as Keir closed her door.
She slipped on a nightdress and burrowed under the bed covers.
Her heart hadn’t slowed down.
True to his word, he sneaked her from the stable to her room, told her to feign illness, and promised to have a solution by morning.
She shivered, more from excitement than cold.
The temperature hadn’t yet dropped outside and the fire in the fireplace looked to be recently tended.
She pulled the quilt up to her nose anyway.
A moment later she threw it off and leaped out of bed.
The boys’ clothes were where she left them, on the rug, near the door.
It wouldn’t do to have someone enter in search of her and find them.
She balled them up and stuffed them under the bed.
She still trembled.
She put one knee up on the mattress, then changed her mind.
She scurried barefoot across the room to Hannah’s door.
“Hannah?”
“Oh, thank goodness.
I thought you ran away.
I found the money you left me.”
Hannah embraced Eleanor and hugged her tightly. “Here,”
she said, letting her go, “I have your brooch, too.”
She went to her own bed, lifted the pillow, and brought back the coins and the jewelry.
“He’s going to help me … us.
He … Keir.
He found me in the stable.
I told him everything.”
The weight of her deceit lifted from her spirit.
Hannah’s chocolate brown eyes went wide.
“We don’t have to pretend to be …? But …”
“I know.
It’s a miracle.”
“He knows you really are the princess?”
“He knows.”
Eleanor shifted from one foot to the other and back again, rubbing her arms, and bobbing.
“Hannah, he was so close to me.
He touched my face.
I thought … I thought he was going to … I mean …? he confessed that … oh, I can barely say it, but he confessed that I stir his soul.
He has feelings for me, Hannah.”
“He told you that? To your face?”
“Well, he thought he was speaking man to man.”
She cut her laugh in half.
“But he said the princess stirred his soul.”
“He must have been struck dumb when you told him you are the princess.”
“He laughed.
He didn’t believe it until … oh, Hannah … he looked beneath my shirt.”
Hannah’s hand flew to cover her mouth.
***
FENELLA SAT ON the edge of the bed and stroked Huey’s leg as if he was a lamb sleeping through a storm.
Because storm it was between Hubert and Keir.
Words like quiet thunder.
“If ye cannae believe me, ye can ask yer wife.
She kens the truth.”
Hubert, pacing in front of the fireplace looked from Keir to Fenella.
“’Tis true, husband,”
she stopped petting her son, “they be lasses.
English lasses.
I dinna mean to keep a secret from ye, as I kent ye’d find out on yer own.
But I dinna ken she was the verra center of the … the rebellion.
She was simply a lost lass, lookin’ fer her ma.”
Hubert shook his head.
Keir patted him on the back.
“I found her in the stable, no longer in that fancy gown.
No wig.
Disguised again as a common stable boy, feedin’ the horses.”
Fenella left the bed and joined the men at the fire.
She poked a finger at her brother.
“Tell me, Keir, are ye smitten with the lass? Will ye be helpin’ her out o’ love or duty?”
Keir snorted, picked up a smaller log from the scuttle and tossed it on the fire, though the room was warm enough.
“Pity.
’Tis pity.
And a bit of duty.
I’ve changed me thinkin’ on the nasty politics of it all.
The woman should be free to find her mum.”
Fenella crossed her arms and stared at her brother until he relented.
“Aye, ye see through me, don’t ye? Always have.
I’ll nay call it love, but … the lass … she awakens somethin’ in me.”
He plopped down onto one of the side chairs.
Hubert took another loop around the spacious room, came back to the fire, looked at them both and complained, “I cannae think a single word that will appease me mum or me father if we whirm her off and spoil the plan.
’Tis their hope to find a place at court.”
He took hold of Fenella’s hand.
“And they only this week allowed me bride to visit here.”
Fenella tisked her tongue at him.
“If ye were hopin’ to one day be laird of this castle, I’ll have ye know I’m happy on the farm and want fer nothin’ more.”
Hubert smiled at her.
Keir stood back up.
“We have to deal with the English captain.”
“Luxbury? I can reason with him.”
Fenella dropped her husband’s hand and waved hers in his face.
“Nay, ye cannae do that.
He’ll nay be swayed wi’ words.
Eleanor has captured his heart.
I could see it in his face as he walked her down the stairs.
I suppose ye two only had eyes for the vision she was, floatin’ down the steps like a fairy, but I could see the captain’s expression.
And how he shrank with contempt to release her to the Baron.”
“So I’ll need more than purposeful words and a good argument.”
Hubert glanced at Keir.
Keir dug out his sporran and filled Hubert’s hand with gold coins.
“Will this do?”
***
“YOU DID WHAT?”
Eleanor’s jaw dropped.
“I didn’t think we’d need those clothes again so I threw them in my fireplace.”
Hannah held her hands out in supplication.
“They smelled bad anyway.”
Eleanor glanced around the room.
There was a tray of food on the writing desk, the draperies had been opened by the maid who’d brought the food, and a plain dress was lying over the back of one of the side chairs.
Plain.
Like the one Hannah was wearing.
Then her eye caught a slight motion at the door.
Something was slipping through the crack at the bottom.
A note.
Hannah saw it too and retrieved it, handed it to Eleanor, and sat on the bed with her.
The corners of Eleanor’s lips curled up as she opened it.
Who else but Keir would send her a note? There would be instructions … the solution he promised.
But no.
“Oh, it’s from Bernard.
He says he’ll be joining us in the Beldorneys’ second carriage for the ride to the parish kirk.”
She set the note on her lap.
“Do we have to go?”
“All the guests will be expecting to see you, rested and recovered.
You’ll have to play the part until—”
“I’m not playing a part anymore.
I am who I am.
I accept it now … because Keir McKelvey knows.”
She looked square at her friend.
“I have some power now.
I’m not a pawn in all this intrigue.”
“You’re not the queen either.
At least not yet.”
Hannah picked up the note and ran her fingers over the ink.
“Are you sure that’s what this says? I can’t make out all the letters.”
Eleanor read it again.
Word for word aloud.
“I guess I need to practice more.”
Hannah rose and got the tray of food, brought it back, and together they gorged themselves on the breakfast fare.
They chatted a bit about the previous night and Hannah raved about the two courses of food she’d enjoyed before she was sent to check on Eleanor.
“And there were plenty of desserts left.
I went down to the kitchen after you went to bed.
They treat me like another servant, which I rather like.
There were cakes and sweets I’d never had before.”
Eleanor smiled.
“We won’t be enjoying this rich life if Keir helps us find my mother.
She must be poor or she’d have sent for me long ago.”
“But Keir is rich.
He’ll be laird of Caladh one day.”
“He’s engaged to Anabel MacLeod.
She’s the one who will enjoy the riches.”
Eleanor sighed.
Hannah’s face darkened.
“But he’s seen you, uh, he’s seen your womanliness.
He should have to marry you.”
“He didn’t touch me.
He has nothing to repent of this morning.
It was a simple mistake.
He’s betrothed … but … he doesn’t love Anabel.”
“He loves you.”
“He didn’t say that.
Only that … oh, Hannah, why am I so flustered thinking about the man?”
Their laughter was not in the least full of humor, only confusion.
They left the tray on the bed and Hannah helped Eleanor don the dress.
There came a knock at the door and as Eleanor called out permission to enter, a different maid appeared.
“My ladies, I am here to tell you the carriage awaits.”
She eyed the girls and frowned.
“Your hair, princess … shall I find you a bonnet?”
***
THE RIDE TO the kirk was bumpy and jarring.
Eleanor kept her chin high and avoided Luxbury’s eyes by looking out the carriage window to catch glimpses of the McKelveys at the turns.
The road smoothed somewhat as they came to a low row of bushes lining the last hundred yards to the stone chapel.
The kirk was larger than Eleanor expected and, from the direction they came, was preceded by uneven rows of headstones.
“What a funny cemetery,”
Bernard said.
He’d been commenting on various things along the way—a picturesque loch, a thatched-roof hut, a patch of new heather—trying to draw Eleanor into a conversation, but Hannah was the talkative one.
“It does look odd,”
Hannah nudged Eleanor, “not all the rows are straight like at Ingledew.”
“Mm.”
Eleanor turned her head back to the other window and watched those on horseback trot by.
They had to wait as the Beldorneys’ coach let out the Baron and Baroness along with Hubert, Fenella, and their son.
Then their carriage moved closer to the door, the horses’ hooves scraping on smooth stones, and stopped.
Luxbury stepped out first and held a hand out for the ladies.
Eleanor made her reluctance to have him touch her obvious as she kept both hands on her skirt to lift the hem.
She stepped down unaided, much to Luxbury’s embarrassment.
There was a rather loud snort of amusement from a McKelvey.
Eleanor was sure she knew which McKelvey it was.
She took Hannah’s arm and rudely pushed passed Luxbury, whose red coat made him stand out even more against the backdrop of the grey stone church and a cloudy morning.
The air hinted of impending rain.
At the doors Fenella took Eleanor’s other arm and whispered as they entered.
“Me brother asks that ye find him during prayers.
He’ll be waitin’ behind yer carriage.
I’ll make an excuse to me mother-in-law … say yer delicate constitution be rearin’ its ugly haid ag’in.”
She snickered softly, squeezed her arm, then turned to shush her son as he made loud exclamations over the stained-glass scenes.
Eleanor’s temperature rose.
How could Keir expect to have a clandestine meeting here? And at their coach? Wouldn’t the driver hear?
She followed the Baroness into her pew and sat stiffly, waiting.
There were already several parishioners in attendance and the Beldorneys’ guests were still crowding in.
Eleanor glanced back to see the men who’d ridden horses standing against the back wall along with the carriage drivers.
Oh, that’s good.
But how am I supposed to sneak past them during prayers?
Perspiration began to bead up on her forehead.
She loosened the bonnet’s bow under her chin.
Fenella scooted closer as Hubert took the last spot in their pew.
Now how would she get out? She was trapped amid the entire Beldorney family.
A tiny groan escaped her lips just as an exceptionally old man in a long robe passed up the aisle.
The Baroness cocked her head toward Eleanor.
“My dear,”
she whispered, “you don’t look well.”
She clicked her fingers at her daughter-in-law.
“Could you take her out for some air, Fenella?”
Fenella rose and put an arm around Eleanor to walk her out the side aisle.
Eleanor kept her focus on the slate stones under her feet.
The whispered suspicions of the guests reached her ears.
One in particular made a rude comment about the princess’s health.
She raised her head enough to see the speaker was Anabel MacLeod, sitting in the last pew, directly in front of Keir.
She could think of nothing to say or do in response, but Fenella, a hand on Eleanor’s elbow, hissed at the beauty before directing Eleanor out a side door.
“That woman,”
Fenella growled, “I could spit.
And to think our father has exchanged Keir’s future for that lass and a chunk of land he coveted.”
She herded Eleanor toward the carriage.
“Do ye ken?”
“That Keir is betrothed to Anabel? Yes, I know.”
Fenella growled again.
“Men! And ye, too, supposed to marry the king, and him an old senseless man, his wife not yet dead even.”
“Do you know what Keir wants to talk to me about? He said he’d help me find my mother.”
“Aye, I spoke to him aboot that brooch ye showed me and I told him of the lad I saw.
I suspect he has a plan.
Can ye ride a horse astride? In that dress?”
Eleanor tightened the strings of her bonnet, then touched the front of her dress; she’d fastened the brooch to the inner lining, out of sight.
“I can ride any horse, but …”
“I best get back to Huey.
Me husband is helpless at keepin’ the lad quiet durin’ the service.
I’ll tell them Keir escorted ye back, ridin’ our brother’s mare, to lie down before tonight’s ball.”
She put both hands on Eleanor’s shoulders.
“Ye’ve decisions to make, lass.
I’ll ken what ye’ve decided by whether I see ye tonight … or not.”
Eleanor pulled her shawl tighter across her shoulders once Fenella walked away.
She could see Logan and Keir hold the door for her.
Fenella slipped in and Keir eased himself out.
He took long strides toward Eleanor, his hat in his hand.
The closer he got, the more he scowled.
“Princess, ye look pale.
Are ye ill indeed?”
“I … I may be.
Nerves, perhaps.
Should we be meeting like this?”
She met his gaze, unflinching and waiting.
He put his hat on his head, then placed a hand on her back and directed her to the other side of the carriage, out of sight of the church doors.
They stood inches apart, Keir looking down at her, his compelling eyes searching hers, his hands roaming down her arms to her hands.
He took each in his and held them up to his lips.
“I dinnae ken how to address ye anymore.
I feel both awe and comfort in yer presence.”
“Call me Eleanor.
Or just El if you want.”
“I promised to help ye.
I have two plans and when I explain them to ye, ye’ll either think me mad or genius.”
He looked up at the sky.
“’Twill start to rain soon.
We best head for the vicarage.
We’ll take cover there until the kirk empties out.
Two hours at most.”