A Scandalous Scot (37 page)

Whatever was happening was new and too difficult to reveal. But even the cynical part of him was being won over by a woman’s laugh.

He found himself winding around her at night, as if she were his pillow. When he awoke one night, it was with a curious sense of discomfort. Jean wasn’t beside him in the bed. He listened for a moment, but no sounds came from the bathing chamber.

He sat up, lighting the lamp beside the bed.

Annoyed, he grabbed his robe and made his way into the sitting room, the lamp an impromptu lantern.

She wasn’t there, either.

Had she gone ghost hunting again? What could those damn ghosts give her that he couldn’t?

He put down the lamp and dressed, then made his way to the Long Gallery by the glow of moonlight. When he discovered the chamber empty, he was more worried than annoyed. She’d fainted in the West Tower, which was the second place he visited.

She wasn’t there, either.

As he passed the kitchen, he saw two crying maids, each comforting the other, followed by a young man blinking rapidly.

He reached out, grabbed the lad’s arm and asked, “What is it?”

Please, God, don’t let Jean have been hurt.

The young man belatedly realized who Morgan was and jerked to attention. “Begging your pardon, Your Lordship. It’s Mr. Seath.”

Morgan suddenly knew where Jean was.

A crowd of people surrounded the steward’s door, parting for him as he approached. He stood in the doorway for a moment, then crossed the small sitting room to the bedroom.

William Seath lay on his bed, his emaciated frame propped up on two pillows. His hair had been brushed back from his forehead, his features appearing even sharper in death. An odd glow surrounded him, until Morgan realized it was the lamp beside the bed casting a yellowish hue throughout the room.

Yet the man was smiling, his face serene, without the lines of fatigue and pain that had marred his appearance for so long.

Mrs. MacDonald sat on one side of the bed, Jean on the other. She was speaking softly, and it was a moment before Morgan realized she was praying aloud.

Her hand lay over Mr. Seath’s in a comforting touch.

The windows were open, the better to allow Mr. Seath’s soul to leave Ballindair.

He came to stand beside Jean, reaching out to clasp her shoulder. She didn’t turn or look up at him, only sagged against him as if needing his support.

“He was a good man,” Morgan said, feeling his throat tighten. “A very good man.”

Mrs. MacDonald nodded, tears streaming down her face. She made no effort to hide her grief. Nor would he have asked her to do so. To hell with those damn rules for staff.

“Why didn’t you wake me?” he asked.

“Tom came and got me,” Jean said. She placed her free hand against his where it rested on her shoulder.

If she were another woman, or William Seath another man, or even if he had been the same man he’d been upon returning from London, he would have said something about the impropriety of the Countess of Denbleigh visiting a man—even an ill one—alone in his bedchamber.

But he only smiled, and said, “I’m glad you were with him.” He looked at Mrs. MacDonald. “Have the mirrors covered,” he said, “and the clocks stopped.”

The housekeeper turned surprised eyes to him.

“He was like a member of the family,” Morgan said. “What we do for our own, we should do for him.”

She nodded, and began giving instructions.

“And the bell, sir?”

He gave his assent. A man from the staff would stand before Ballindair and ring the heavy bell signaling a life’s end. Those who heard it would know they’d lost someone of importance at Ballindair. They would be invited to participate in the service to both mourn William Seath and encourage his soul to rest.

“Did he have any family at all?”

“No,” Jean said, looking up at him. “Ballindair was his family.”

He nodded. “Then we’ll act the same,” he said.

When Jean stood, he took her into his arms in full view of the staff remaining at William Seath’s door.

J
ean and her aunt were preparing to sit vigil with William Seath. His body had been washed and then dressed again in his dead clothes. Only then was he laid in his coffin. Because he was so emaciated at the time of his death, only two of them were needed for that task.

If he’d had any family, the task of watching over the body would have fallen to them, but there was no shortage of volunteers for the hours ahead.

Her aunt opened her Bible, preparing to read aloud from it, when Morgan entered the Clan Hall where the bier had been erected.

“I’ll sit with Jean,” he said.

Aunt Mary merely nodded and slipped out of the room without a word.

Morgan moved a chair to sit beside her. Perhaps it would have been more proper for him to be on the other side of the coffin, but she was grateful for his proximity.

“You were very fond of him,” he said.

She nodded, unwilling to tell him not all her tears were for the steward. Instead, she was feeling selfishly melancholy at the moment.

The time had come.

What would he say? Worse, what would he do?

There was every possibility he would simply walk away. Or he might commend her honesty at the same time as he banished her to a different life, one away from him.

Regardless of what he might do, she had to tell him who she was.

“You once asked me how I knew Mr. Seath’s condition was so dire,” she said, speaking softly in deference to the occasion.

He nodded.

“My mother had the same wasting sickness,” she said. She clasped both hands in front of her, squeezing tightly. The pain made her concentrate on the feeling in her hands, and not the mists of the past rising to envelop her. She didn’t want to think of those days. She didn’t, yet she must.

“She became ill very sudden,” she said. “Because my father was a physician, he knew the symptoms well. He told us she hadn’t long to live.”

He placed his hand over hers. She looked down at their hands, wishing she could absorb some of his heat. She was cold, from the inside out.

“The end didn’t come soon enough,” she said. “Each day was agony for her. Then each hour. Even the air against her skin was too much. Sometimes, we could hear her praying to die.”

How many times had she heard her mother weeping? Or those long, agonized moans indicating the morphine wasn’t helping?

On that last morning, her father had come into the kitchen, looking pale and drawn. He’d aged in the intervening weeks, the lines of suffering reminding her of those on her mother’s face.

That morning his eyes had looked haunted, and he simply stood in the middle of the room. When she had gone to him, followed by Catriona, he extended his arms around both of them, lowering his head to whisper, “My girls.”

That was all he’d said.

Looking back, she didn’t think it was a cry for help or a plea for forgiveness. He had simply acknowledged the moment as the last guilt-free one he would have. Then he left them, returning to the bedroom he’d shared with his beloved wife.

What had happened next had never been in any doubt. Her father came downstairs to the sitting room an hour later. He faced both Catriona and her, saying very calmly, “I have ended your mother’s misery.”

An excess of morphine had simply stopped her breathing.

He’d not attempted to escape his crime, but reported himself to the authorities.

“As a physician,” Jean said to Morgan in the Clan Hall, “he’d always attempted to save lives. In that instance, he willfully took one.”

Not once, however, had he ever seemed to regret his act. Instead, a sense of calm and peace had come over her father as he awaited his punishment.

“What happened to him?” Morgan asked.

“They hanged him for what he’d done,” she said.

She’d never said those words aloud. Aunt Mary knew the story, of course, and after her father surrendered to the authorities, everyone in Inverness had known.

Her father had adored her mother, to the extent of destroying his own life to help her.

Her father had never expected either Catriona or her to forgive him. And he’d also been prepared for the authorities. He hadn’t tried to evade them or the consequences of his deed. Instead, he went to the gallows wearing a small smile, the guard had said. The last word on his lips had been their mother’s name.

The power of love was frightening.

Love made people behave in ways that were improvident. Love ruined reason. Love was like a cancer, encompassing everything in its path.

And she’d caught the disease.

Morgan didn’t move, his hand still covering hers.

“I’m sorry, Jean.”

She glanced over at him. In his look was only compassion, not censure. Perhaps she’d be able to recall that expression later, when it was gone.

“It was a very great scandal,” she said. “Both Catriona and I were known as the Murderer’s Girls.”

People had avoided them at the shops and in the street. They’d been shunned by their neighbors, and any friends who’d remained through their mother’s torturous illness.

The greatest kindnesses had come from strangers: a guard at the prison who arranged a place for them to wait where they didn’t have to view their father’s hanging; a woman who asked if they were hungry on the way to Ballindair, then shared her dinner with them.

“I don’t remember any scandal involving the MacDonalds,” he said, frowning.

Here it was. The moment she’d dreaded ever since marrying him.

“My name isn’t MacDonald,” she said. “Nor is Catriona’s.” She took a deep breath, a little difficult given that she could barely breathe. “It’s Cameron. Jean Cameron.”

He nodded. “I remember the case,” he said. “Dr. Cameron. I think they called him something else.”

“A great many names.” She was not going to recite the list of calumnies they’d uttered about her father.

“I’m sorry, Jean.”

In that instant, she realized he still didn’t understand.

She leaned close to him, lay her head against his shoulder and closed her eyes. He smelled of something wonderful: the scent of his soap or simply him? She didn’t want to move, but to stay here forever, in just this place, within his comforting arms.

But to do so would be to cheat him of the truth, and it was something she owed him.

She pulled back, keeping him from reaching for her by the simple act of placing her hand against his chest.

“I’m the one who’s sorry,” she said.

“For what?” His eyes softened. “Do you think I would blame you for your father’s actions, Jean?”

“You came home because of scandal,” she countered.

“I came home because it was time to come home.”

Her smile felt bittersweet; did it look so to him?

“You lectured me on honor, Morgan. It was the reason we married. You wanted to be honorable above all else.”

“And you questioned the meaning of honor, if I recall.”

She forced herself to meet his gaze as she struggled to get her voice under control.

“I’ve brought you shame and dishonor, Morgan. We’re not married. My name is Cameron, not MacDonald, and neither the law nor the kirk will say it’s a true and honorable marriage.”

He didn’t say anything for a moment, but a muscle flexed in his cheek. She wished he would speak all those thoughts burning in his eyes. Let them out and let her deal with them as well as she could.

He sat back as if he couldn’t bear to touch her. She clasped her hands in her lap again, intently staring at her whitened knuckles. She had borne many things in her life; she could endure this, too.

In the silence, she could barely hear herself breathe. She was trembling, freezing, even though the afternoon was temperate and leaning toward warm, the sun a glowing disk in the sky.

Help me
.

Perhaps God judged her wanting at that moment, because Morgan spoke.

“What do you propose we do about the situation?” His voice was cold, as if he’d caught her chill.

“If you were a man like Andrew, I’d suggest this episode would enhance your reputation. You could even claim the entire idea of marrying a maid was just a grand jest.”

He didn’t say anything, and a second later she looked up to find him staring at her. Morgan could be very intimidating when he wished to be.

“You could say I was a partner in your little scheme.” She remembered Aunt Mary’s words. “A strumpet.”

His face tightened. “You were a virgin, Jean. I didn’t imagine that. Would you sacrifice your reputation for the sake of my honor?”

“People don’t care about a maid’s reputation, Morgan.” When he didn’t speak, she continued. “I have no funds. I could always go into service again, I suppose. Will you allow my aunt to give me a recommendation?”

He looked at her as if she was something beneath his shoe. Her fingers danced along the edge of the placket of buttons on her bodice. Should she offer to reimburse him for her clothes?

“What are you talking about?”

“I couldn’t go back to being a maid at Ballindair.” She forced a smile to her face. “Even the ghosts would be scandalized.”

He stared at her.

She looked out over the Clan Hall. “I’ve always been better suited to be a maid than a countess,” she said.

Standing, she placed a hand on Mr. Seath’s coffin, patting it gently.

Wordlessly, she turned and left the Clan Hall,

Jean could only remember one time when she was as miserable, but unlike that time, there would be no sound of a rope being pulled tight, or the muffled echo of a body dropping from a noose.

No, this death wasn’t of the physical form but of the spirit.

Chapter 36

RULES FOR STAFF:
All such holidays and observances followed by the family are to be respected by staff.

A
cloud hung over the castle at the death of William Seath. Ballindair’s steward had been a much respected and beloved personage.

Or perhaps the dour mood was due more to the Earl of Denbleigh’s incessant glower. Or the Countess of Denbleigh’s refusal to see anyone, having retreated to her suite and remaining there, secluded.