Chapter Eighteen
THE CHAIR AT Robert’s desk rocked back as he stood up.
He strode across the bare wooden floor of the estate office and stood looking out across the rough pasture to the sea.
This had been the factor’s office from time immemorial, and when he had stepped into it a week before, it felt as though he had never left: the same battered desk, the same view of the south harbor, the same windows coated in salt carried inland on the sea spray, the same smell of damp books and damper boots.
The familiarity was comforting, but it disturbed him, as well.
He and Gregor had stored their fishing rods in a corner of the office.
They had sat together in the window, bored and restless when the weather was bad; they had run out with high spirits down to the beach when the rain had cleared.
He could almost hear Gregor’s voice carried on the wind:
“Come on, Rob! We’ll miss the tide!”
Pulling the little boat into the water and taking the oars together, lying in the springy grass to watch the peregrine falcons hunting above the cliffs, slipping away secretly to join the free traders on their smuggling expeditions.
.. For a moment his chest hurt and he caught his breath.
There were ghosts here on Golden Isle and he was still not comfortable with them.
He knew that he had bitten Lucy’s head off the previous week when she tried to get him to talk about how he felt.
He was ashamed of it. The truth was he had lost the two things most precious to him on Golden Isle, the brother who was his best friend, and the only life he had known.
He had rebuilt his life, but he could never replace the brother he had lost, and being on Golden Isle only exacerbated the ache of loss.
It constantly reminded him of the past. He wanted to emulate his younger self and take the first boat leaving the harbor, but this time he had to stay and do his duty.
So he buried himself in his work day after day to drive away the memories, and the one thing he certainly was not going to do was to rake over old feelings by talking about how he felt.
Robert’s factor was watching him, his pale eyes keen in his narrow face.
The factor was a man perpetually on edge with nervous tension; he had almost fainted when Robert arrived unannounced at his house on his first night on Golden Isle.
McTavish had muttered something about tidying the place up for the laird and had kept Robert standing on the doorstep while he hurried off like a frightened rabbit.
Following him in uninvited, Robert had seen him putting various papers on the fire, apparently because he had no kindling.
Mindful of McCall’s accusations that the factor was in Cardross’s pay, Robert had taken him page by page through the accounts for the last seven years.
They made grim reading. As Robert had suspected, the crops had suffered from successive poor summers so that the island could no longer produce sufficient food to support the population, let alone sell the surplus to passing ships.
The war had affected trade badly and the press-gangs had taken almost all the able-bodied men.
There was hardly anyone but the women and the children left to work in the fields. It was a dire situation.
Robert was well aware that he had neglected Golden Isle shamefully, but the more he scoured the accounts, the less he could see McTavish doing any useful work to protect the estate even though he was being paid good money to do so.
In fact, the reverse was true. McTavish had repeatedly sold island produce at less than its market value.
He had failed to import vital raw materials.
He had, in fact, allowed the islanders’ condition to deteriorate slowly but inevitably.
It made Robert question where his factor’s interests really lay.
It seemed that McCall and the other elders’ suspicions of him were indeed correct.
“My lord?” the factor said, clearing his throat nervously.
“I will be taking some of the men and repairing the beacons this afternoon,” Robert said. He turned back to the room in time to see an expression of alarm crossing McTavish’s face.
“The beacons, my lord?” the factor repeated faintly.
“Yes,” Robert snapped. “The beacons that are supposed to be used as a warning of danger in times of war. The beacons that you have allowed to fall into disrepair.”
The factor paled. “There is no one to do the work, my lord—”
“There is me,” Robert said, “and the handful of men whom the press-gang have not yet taken. We will also restore the watchtower on the headland.” He reached for quill and ink and drew a sheet of paper toward him. “I am writing to my cousin to send more men from Methven—”
“M-Methven men, my lord?” McTavish’s voice was shaking now. “There is surely no need.”
“There is every need,” Robert said. He sat back and fixed the factor with a narrow gaze. “You have just said yourself that we are short of hands here. If I bring in Methven men we will soon have the island defenses back in place.”
He could see that the idea did not appeal to McTavish, and the reason was not far to seek. The factor did not wish the island to be defended, quite the reverse, in fact. His attitude reeked of guilt.
“I have heard reports of a French privateer that has been sighted in the waters near here,” Robert continued.
“I suspect a raid and in these times of war we need to be vigilant. I am summoning half my clansmen so that we may trap and capture the pirate.” He wrote swiftly, his pen scratching across the paper, dusted the letter with sand, folded it and handed it to the factor.
“Take this to the mainland, McTavish, and from there arrange for its safe delivery to Methven.”
He watched, smiling grimly, as McTavish hurried out of the estate office and down the path to the south harbor, the tails of his coat flapping in the wind.
He was certain that the factor would either arrange for the letter to be taken directly to Wilfred Cardross or read it and send Cardross word of the contents.
It would take the best part of a week for Cardross to hear the news, longer if he had moved south to Edinburgh, but when he did find out, he would come to Golden Isle as fast as a cat with its tail on fire.
Cardross could not afford for his French ally to be captured because the pirate would surely sing like a canary to save his own skin and in the process give away Cardross’s treason.
He returned to the desk and wrote a second letter, this one addressed to Jack at Findon.
Start sending the men over as soon as you receive this. I have poked the hornet’s nest and want us to be ready and waiting. He added a few more lines, signed and sealed it. Stuart McCall could take it to the mainland once McTavish was on his way.
Robert threw himself down in his chair. All they had to do now was wait.
* * *
“EVERYONE SAYS THAT Lord Methven hates Golden Isle,” Sheena commented the following morning, as she helped Lucy to dress.
“After his brother’s death he never set foot here again and neither did his grandsire.
Everyone says that they left the place to rot.
It is as though he blames the island for his brother’s death and the people suffer for it. ”
Lucy sighed. Sheena had only been on Golden Isle for a week and already she was gathering gossip like a magpie gathering shiny dross.
Each morning she repeated to Lucy what she had learned the previous day, and each morning Lucy struggled not to feel cast down by her maid’s words.
It was clear to her that Sheena was right.
Yet she knew Robert was hurting. She could feel it in him, but he was not willing to share his feelings in order to lessen the pain.
She could not fault Robert’s devotion to the estate since their arrival.
He spent the best part of each day with McTavish going over the accounts and discussing payment for this year’s yield of crops, fish and feathers, or walking the island to talk to all the crofters, from the peat cutters on the northern hills to the men who worked the mills on the burn, to the fishermen in the south harbor.
Over breakfast he would discuss with Lucy his plans for the day, but he never invited her to join him.
Over dinner he would tell her about his work on the estate.
Afterward they would sit in the parlor and share a malt whisky, and Lucy would play on the ancient piano.
It was pleasant and domesticated, but at the same time Lucy felt excluded.
In contrast the nights were so different, bright with intimacy and hot, wicked addictive pleasure.
Step by delicious step Robert was leading her to the ultimate consummation, and a part of her longed for it.
Yet at the same time Lucy was finding the gulf between the days and the nights increasingly difficult to deal with, as though she were wed to two very different men, the one silent and withdrawn and the other a man she trusted with her body and would trust with her life.
“Mrs. Stewart is quite a talker,” Sheena said.
“She tells me everything. She’s lonely, poor lady.
She used to be housekeeper at Methven but fell out with the old laird and he sent her here.
I’d run mad being marooned on a place like this.
” She looked toward the window, where the mist pressed close as a shroud.
“Golden Isle? Gloomy Isle is more fitting.”
“I’ve seen the sun,” Lucy said. “It came out once last week and the island looked beautiful. I think the mist will lift today.”
Sheena snorted in disbelief. She finished threading the ribbon through Lucy’s hair and stood back to admire her work. “There. That looks pretty. Let’s hope Lord Methven notices. He does not strike me as a noticing man, not where it matters.”