Chapter 15
Ada clutched the sides of her head with furious concentration. Lachlan was also racking his brain, trying to think of the missing link, the piece of the puzzle they needed to put a finger on possible suspects.
“The only way I’m not goin’ to worry about bein’ boiled in oil if I’m caught is if I’m too much of a bampot to realize what I’m doin’ is wrong. What about that? Should we search for a simpleton?”
Lachlan waited to see what Ada thought of his suggestion. She was the daughter of a wise woman, brought up to look at life and people in a different way.
He watched as she sifted his suggestion through her mind.
“Mmm…Calvin, ye make a good point, but on the wrong end of the scale. I think the poisoner believes themselves to be so clever that they will never be caught.”
That was it. The final piece of the puzzle. Reaching over, he gave Ada a quick hug.
“Let’s get started then, shall we?” she said to him, blushing slightly with pleasure.
They were doing this together as equals, and they had not said one angry word to each other for many tolls of the bell. He summarized their understanding of the problem.
“We must find the names of people who were at the dining hall and had access to the alehouse, those who have had a petition denied or turned over in someone else’s favor within the last two years, and who are shrewd and cunning.
They might even have a plan to blame it on someone else if suspicion lights on them too. ”
“Aye!” Ada slammed her hand on the table. “Ye do last year’s ledger, an’ I’ll do this one. Please tear me parchment smaller so it does nae curl under me hand, Calvin.”
They sat together in companionable silence, the only sound the occasional scratching of a quill or a hiss of a finger drawing itself down the parchment.
Not even when the sentry helped Iona bring them a small pot of stew was it enough to break their concentration.
Lachlan grunted his thanks, and Ada ate one-handed, her eyes never leaving the ledger pages.
The cases were fascinating: two fine ladies fighting over which one of them was the owner of a small white dog; the grocer disagreeing over a charge that he cheated his weights; the baker alleging that the blacksmith shoeing his horse in such a way that the shoe was cast off and must be replaced, thus doubling the blacksmith’s money on the deal.
The list of cases went on and on. Every now and again, Lachlan would rise from his chair and go to pour them some of a stimulating cordial Iona had made them.
The sun rose in the sky and then began to sink in the west. Lachlan could hardly see the letters in front of him anymore, his eyes were so tired.
“Come, lass, enough. Show me what ye have.”
It was one of those gorgeous balmy summer evenings that often happen in the Highlands. The smell of heather blew in the window, carried down from the gently sloping hills. A bird trilled in the eaves, rustling its nest as it settled down for the night.
“Very well, Calvin.”
Ada stretched like a tired kitten and then went to lie on the bed. He followed her so they might share their findings together. She snuggled close to his chest, holding out her scrap of parchment so they both could read it.
“Farmer Andrew was accused of stealin’ Farmer Dougal’s milch cow.
He denied it, but in front o’ a host o’ witnesses, he was found to be a liar.
Farmer Dougal was able to show the milch cow in Farmer Andrew’s byre had a mark in its ear that proved it came from the Dougal herd.
The man was fined two gold sovereigns an’ made to pay penance to the kirk, too; the Andrew’s milch cows would sometimes graze on the kirk’s land.
That’s me best bet. Humiliation an’ he is still no’ in good standin’ with the clergyman.
Father Williams still denies the man the use of the kirk’s fields because Farmer Andrew swore an oath on the holy book to be tellin’ the truth, which, as it turns out, he was nae.
Plus, he was in the great hall at the time of the poisonin’, he has access to the alehouse, an’ he regularly brings foraged produce to the kitchen! ”
Lachlan gave her a squeeze. “Ye’re as smart as a whip, Ada.
Now ye’ve made it hard for me to choose which one I rate the most likely…
” He mused for a while and then made up his mind.
“Aye, alright. The man I suspect is Merchant Vallaty. Likewise, he was in the hall and visited the alehouse and kitchen freely. He supplies Cook with all her spices. He petitioned grandfaither to set up his own spice market and was denied. The enterprise was deemed unnecessary because grandfaither has a deal with me own faither to supply the nearby town. If Merchant Vallaty’s request had been granted, it would have cut out the profits the MacNairs make bringing the spices down here from the northern ports.
The records indicated that Vallaty had set up his own connection down in Edinburgh that would provide him with a bigger profit.
He’s a shrewd businessman an’ would nae have taken kindly to bein’ refused.
He went to all that effort of organizing it only to have me grandfaither shoot his plans down. ”
Ada wriggled with expectation. “Ooh, I like that idea of yers very much, Calvin. They are both excellent candidates. After readin’ through some o’ yer grandfaither’s judgments, I’ve come to realize how difficult it is to make a rulin’ that would nae end up sending at least one person into a frenzy of loathing. ”
There was a knock at the door, and when Lachlan went to answer, Oswald, the page, was there.
“Please, sir, the healer sent ye a wee cauldron o’ broth. She bid me to tell ye to check the pastry seal. If it has been broken, then ye must nae eat the broth.”
He told Oswald to bid Iona thanks on his behalf and sent the boy away after checking the seal.
“I want to kick this bothersome poisoner in his backside before they lower him into the oil,” Lachlan fumed. “The ridiculous lengths we must now go to make sure we don’ die.”
Ada giggled. “Ye must be able to kick a man so far with those braw muscular legs o’ yers, Calvin.”
He gave her a wink. “That’s no’ the only thing I can do to great lengths, lass.”
They ate with a ravenous appetite; it had been a long day, and Ada was still recovering from the fetid whiskey. Her stomach rumbled, and she gave a satisfied sigh as she pushed the empty broth bowl away from her.
“Ah, that hit the spot. It was so delicious. Me hunger is comin’ back nicely.”
Lachlan stretched and then yawned. He was also feeling the effects of the bowl of broth.
“I wish I could have gone down an’ helped yer mither slaughter the chicken, but we did good work today with the ledgers. Tomorrow, we must go to Grandfaither together an’ lay our findings before him.”
Ada replied in a sleepy voice, “Aye. Maybe ye should go alone? Make the poisoner think I’m still at death’s door?”
He did not want to take the credit for all the hard work.
“Nay, lass, ye must come with me. It’s time to put this charade to an end.”
Ada shuffled to the bed and fell on top of it.
“If this is goin’ to be our last night together, Cal, please don’ waste yer time sittin’ there at the table.”
She patted the mattress beside her with a tempting smile playing on her face.
Her long lashes fluttered against her cheekbones, a lazy sultriness beckoning in her eyes.
He was mesmerized by her beauty, so struck by how gorgeous she looked with her long red hair spread out on the pillows around her that he found it hard to concentrate.
“Come,” she urged him. “Come lie down with me. I want to show ye how much I want ye, Cal. Don’ deny me this on our last night together…”
He found it hard to form the words. “Deny ye what? Ye must ken I would give ye anything…ye only have to ask.”
She rolled over onto her side, propping herself up on one elbow.
“I want ye to lie naked beside me, Cal, an’ stroke me into ecstasy.
I’ve heard that’s how young people might pleasure one another before the wedding and the beddan.
” Her hand ran over her breasts. “Ye can start here, and then…” Her hands ran over the smooth skin of her stomach and onto her thighs. “An’ then move here and go in here…”
He was transfixed. It was as if he could imagine himself touching her like that.
“Stay right where ye are,” he drawled the words, finding it hard to speak. “I must just finish me ablutions. I’ll be right back.”
Lachlan stumbled to the washroom, found his lemon-tree twig brush, and rubbed inside his mouth a few times. His mind was turning cartwheels inside his head.
Aye, we can satisfy one another without breakin’ faith. All the things I can do to Ada is makin’ it hard to concentrate. Me mind’s in a whirl. The moment I get back there, I’m goin’ to show her the best time o’ her life.
Staggering into the bedchamber, Lachlan flopped onto the mattress, tryin’ to summon up the manly prowess that had throbbed so hard within him that morning.
“Bolt the door, Calvin,” Ada whispered huskily. “I dinnae want us to be disturbed.” He felt her mouth run across his back as she crept closer to him. “Close…I mean, bolt the door.”
Her beauty was so intoxicating that he was finding it hard to think, but by the time he had stumbled to the door, it was already opening.
Thank goodness he had not removed his plaid yet.
A man standing inside his bedchamber wearing only his nightshirt was a dead giveaway that some sculdudrie was planned.
Iona hobbled into the bedchamber, completely untroubled by the sight of her daughter lying on top of the bed in her shift and the laird’s grandson without his boots and stockings. It was clear the couple had been preparing to bed one another.
She propped her staff against the table, perusing the notes they had scrawled out at her leisure.
“Aye, I can see ye put the day to good use,” was all she said.
Lachlan tried to think of an apology. “M-Mistress Iona…dinnae fash about us. We were just goin’ to bed…that is to say, Ada is still ill,” he slurred, the words inexplicably running one into the other.
Iona chuckled. “Of course. I dinnae worry about ye. I put enough marjoram herb into that broth to make a giant droop! I’m a wise woman when it comes to emotions an’ when it comes to desires.
Take yer time to work out which one it is ye feel for each other afore ye start tryin’ to satisfy yer yearnings! ”
She moved to the door, still chuckling. “An’ if ye want to catch the poisoner, ye should be lookin’ for a woman! Men challenge one another to battle or swing at each other with fists. They don’ lurk in the dark like evil spiders. Look at the wives, Lachlan, no’ at the husbands.”
And on those wise words, Iona hobbled out of the door, carrying the stew pot with her. Ada and Lachlan were both asleep before the healer had even shut the door behind her.