Chapter 6
Thane had little experience when it came to women breaking down in tears in front of him, and he had absolutely no idea how to deal with it.
Luckily, Tacita swiftly swooped down and shielded Catriona from the eyes of the men.
As Thane looked at his comrades, he realized that they were no better off, and all of them had in fact already found somewhere, anywhere else to look, distinctly uncomfortable with the sight of feminine distress.
If it had been one of his sisters, he’d have bluntly asked what the hell was wrong and who did he have to speak to in order to set things right.
If it had been a lover…well, Thane couldn’t recall any lover crying in his presence.
That was less because of some magical ability to always make a woman happy, and more due to the fact that Thane rarely kept a lover for very long.
He liked women very much, but he didn’t have a place in his life for one.
And in any case, Catriona Ross fit into neither of those categories, so his previous experience mattered not at all. It was a relief when Tacita helped Catriona from the room.
The moment they left, Kai exhaled in a whoosh, overwhelmed by the sight of a beautiful woman having her heart broken after breakfast.
“Pity the war’s over,” Duncan said. “Rather face a battalion of Prussians than that.”
“It was a lot for her to accept,” said Calan. “But I think she does at last realize the truth. The first time I truly registered that an enemy had shot at me, I nearly pissed myself. Think of how a civilian would feel. She never took the king’s coin.”
Thane nodded. It was one thing for a soldier to experience the violence of an attack. It was expected, and at least there were certain rules in place during war. It was quite another for it to happen far away from the field of battle, to an innocent person.
And not just any person. Brodie’s sister.
Once again, the acute sense of loss tightened Thane’s throat up and made his vision blur.
Without warning, he saw a vision of Brodie on the first day the two had met—still in civilian kit, he’d been wearing a green jacket and made a joke about emulating Robin Hood so that he could perch in a tree to pick off the enemy.
Brodie seemed shockingly young, at a mere sixteen years old.
But then again, Kai was about the same age, and so was a good portion of the company.
They’d had to grow up fast, or not at all.
“We won’t let her get hurt,” he said, past the ache.
“We owe him that.” Thane owed Brodie far more than that, but that was all he could put into words.
He couldn’t explain to the others that the debt he owed Brodie could never ever be repaid, not even if he’d had a hundred lifetimes to do it.
He was the reason Brodie was dead. He sure as hell wasn’t going to have his twin’s death on his account as well.
Duncan walked over to him and put a hand on his shoulder. “We’ll do whatever needs to be done.”
“Aye,” Calan agreed, his usual charm and banter gone, showing the relentless man underneath.
Kai also stood, somehow looking years beyond his chronological age. “For Brodie.” He frowned, adding, “And also, because we shouldn’t just let some madman with a gun run loose on the streets of Edinburgh.”
Thane always admired Kai’s basic decency. A lot of soldiers lost it. Kai never did. None of his friends did.
I do not deserve these men, he thought.
A moment later, Catriona reentered.
Thane blinked, surprised. Now she looked like a queen, dry-eyed and in full command.
“Forgive my outburst, gentlemen,” she said in a cool tone. “I promise it won’t happen again.”
Everyone made the usual noises of Nothing to forgive and Don’t think a thing about it. Catriona sat down on the same chair as before—once again concealing the garish pillow it sported—and looked expectantly at them. “Well, I suppose we should resume the discussion if we are to find a solution.”
Thane might need to revise his opinion of her, if she was that quick to recover from a shock.
Just then, Tacita returned to the room as well, bearing a squat pasteboard box. “It might be helpful to look at these items, gentlemen.”
“What are they?” Thane asked, accepting the box from her.
“Letters, if one can dignify these communications with that name. Both Mrs Ross and now young Catriona have received many nasty notes in response to their views.”
“Aunt!” Cat gasped. “You shouldn’t show anyone those. I didn’t even know you kept them.”
“Dear lass, you know I never throw anything away. And since it was clear the authorities weren’t going to take any action about them, I thought it best to hold on to them so I had proof of people’s aggression.”
While she was talking, Thane had already opened the box on the table and was sorting through the letters, handing them out to the others. “Half of these are signed,” he said, surprised.
“Yes. Some writers were as proud of their own views as they were disdainful of Catriona’s.”
“Um, this is a sight worse than disdain,” Kai said after reading through one letter, his face contorted in alarm and disgust. “This is…” He trailed off.
Thane took a few papers and leafed through them. The first letter was merely rude, suggesting that Catriona was poorly raised and educated, and needed to be set straight by her family who had indulged her foolish whims. Possibly somewhat true, he had to admit.
The second letter, by contrast, was vile.
The writer explained in coarse language how they thought a woman could be put to the best use, and that if Catriona continued to speak and write about the dangerous notion of rights for women, he’d come and show her personally what rights he’d take with her.
Living in army barracks for years, Thane was familiar with the language used.
But he’d rarely heard it employed alongside such intense hate, and never in conjunction with a well-born daughter of society.
In his world, ladies of quality were practically different creatures.
It was one thing to speak of a camp follower or a common prostitute in such terms. To use that language to describe a lady…
Calan put down the letter he’d read. “Some of your correspondents are quite graphic in their description of what punishments you should endure for having an opinion.” His tone was light, but there was a deadly glitter in his eye.
“Yes, I know,” Catriona replied in a low voice. “Stabbing, beating, hanging… I first tried to make a chart with all the possibilities, but I decided not to continue.”
Kai must have read through a particularly nasty one, because he looked sick when he finished. “Miss Ross…I am so sorry. You should not have to be exposed to that.”
“It is not your fault,” she told him. “And in fact, such vitriol only strengthens my resolve to enact reforms. Women, all women, should have the right to live freely and safely, on their own terms and not at the mercy of a man who might believe the same hateful nonsense as these letter writers do.”
Thane could see the hints of her brother’s personality in her words. Brodie had always been ready to jump into action when it came to defending the helpless.
“Have you mentioned these letters to the other women you work with?” Thane asked. “Are such letters common?”
Catriona nodded. “Mrs Roberts, our chairwoman, has received many, and I know other women have been insulted and threatened as well. It’s simply something we must accept if we choose to participate in the process of change, just as someone who goes out walking must accept the risk of rain.”
Except that rain generally isn’t so vindictive, Thane thought. But he said, “Did you ever mention them to Brodie?”
“No, I wouldn’t dream of it,” Catriona said.
“He had too much on his mind already. I wanted to ease his burden, not add to it. And anyway, these letters are just venomous. The people who sent them want to feel superior, and they know that I can do nothing to counter their nastiness. They’re harmless bullies. ”
“The one last night wasn’t harmless. You were lucky you didn’t get hurt. Or worse.”
Cat swallowed, looking chagrined. “I admit that last night’s…incident was disturbing.”
Funny how all of them kept referring to it as an incident, as if they were all trying to avoid the more accurate term of attempted murder.
Meanwhile, Catriona was saying, “But I’m sure that whoever it was is content to have frightened me like that. He’s probably laughing with his cronies about it, and that’s good enough for him.”
“What if it isn’t good enough? What if he tries again?”
To judge by her helpless expression, Catriona had no good answer.
“You’ve thought about this quite a bit since last night, gentlemen,” Tacita said softly. “What do you suggest we do to protect Catriona?”
Thane said, “Considering that she’s done nothing to protect herself so far, anything would be an improvement.”
After shooting him a dark glance, Calan added, “We’ll seek out the writers of these letters who’ve so helpfully named themselves, and perhaps we’ll get an answer that way, and discourage the person from doing it again.
But at least for the next several days, Miss Ross should behave with far more circumspection than she usually does.
Stay at home, avoid being seen, that sort of thing.
And one of us should remain here as well, in the event that the gunman returns. ”
Catriona looked puzzled by what Calan was saying. “What? You mean to have one of you stay here, in the house?”
“Yes.”
“Who?”
Thane glanced at the other men. In fact, the issue had already been discussed and decided among them, and there would be no room for negotiation. Thane looked back to her.
“Oh, no.” She shook her head as if to prevent time from flowing forward. “No, absolutely not. Anyone but you.”
“I’m the only one who can be spared,” Thane said, using a flat tone that permitted no argument. “I will stay in this house, and there’s nothing you can do to stop it.”
Cat spun toward her aunt, appealing to her, “Tell him he cannot be permitted to stay here. It’s against all the bounds of society. We’re in mourning. I’m unmarried. He’s a stranger.”
Tacita just shook her head once. “I’m afraid I can’t agree with you.”
“What?”
“There is nothing to prevent a household in mourning to offer a room to a guest, provided that the visit doesn’t turn into an excuse for frivolity and social entertainment.
Mr MacPhearson is going to stay here with a very serious objective in mind, and so naturally we will not be distracting him by hosting dinners or the like to entertain him,” Tacita said.
“And though he is a new acquaintance to us, he was a trusted friend to Brodie. I can think of no greater recommendation to extend that friendship.”
“But Aunt!”
“And,” Tacita continued, forestalling Catriona’s objections, “I believe it’s what Brodie would have wanted.”
Catriona looked as if she’d been struck. The mention of her twin’s wishes seemed to be the one thing that could silence her. Thane filed that fact away for the future.
“I promise to be a very discreet houseguest,” he told Tacita. “You won’t even know I’m here.”
“I doubt that,” Catriona said, and then spun on her heel and left.
“Excuse me, gentlemen,” Tacita said. “I’d best go after her. She’s had rather a trying morning.”
Thane had no issue with Catriona retreating to her room after losing the battle. If she was in her room, she was safe. And in the meantime, he and the men could get to work solving the problem of who had shot at her.
He turned to them, saying, “So, assuming that the gunman objects to Miss Ross’s social views, we ought to ask around and find out if other people in Edinburgh have had any experiences of a similar nature.”
“I’ll look at the newspapers from the last month or so,” Kai volunteered. “Such an event is probably lurid enough to warrant being written about, if it was public.”
“And I’ll pay a visit to everyone who actually signed their names to a letter sent to Miss Ross.” Calan slapped one letter down on the table in disgust.
Kai shook his head. “Can you even conceive of what Brodie would have done if he’d known about these letters? Thane, you have sisters. Imagine if one of them got a letter like that!”
“I’d hunt the man down,” Thane said, his hands clenching as he envisioned what he’d do after getting the bastard alone.
Duncan stood, stretching as he did so (he claimed that every year of his service in the army gave him another creaking joint).
“I know one of the magistrates in town. I’ll go and speak to him.
It may be that the local authorities are aware of such things happening but the news doesn’t make it all the way to the newspapers or the gossip circuit. ”
“Good. You’ve all got your assignments. I’m going to stop by my rooms and pack a few things before I return here.”
“Pack your pistols,” Calan advised.
“You’re sure you’ll be all right, staying in this house?” Kai asked.
Thane waved off the danger. “It’s one madman, not an army. I’ll be fine.”
“I meant…will you be all right being so close to Miss Ross?”
“You mean will I be tempted to kill her myself? Only time will tell.” Kai offered no response, but Thane didn’t like the way his friends smirked after that statement.