Amanda Scott (29 page)

“It would, ma’am,” he said.

Watching him closely, Diana could not tell from his expression what he was thinking, but at least he did not immediately order her mother’s arrest.

“Your father was first cousin to Argyll, then,” Lady Maclean said. “That does not recommend him to me, sir. What business brings you to Glen Drumin?”

“He has come to try our whisky,” MacDrumin said cheerfully. Then, to a maidservant who was putting food on the table, he added, “Bring out a half dozen chopins and a good large jug, lass.”

“Aye, laird, they are here,” she said, gesturing to a tray already on the table.

“Good lass. Here, Calder, I’ll pour the first one for you myself.” He poured a generous amount into a large mug and held it out. “Try that, will you?”

Calder sipped cautiously, then sipped again. “Excellent stuff,” he said.

“Aye, it is,” MacDrumin said with a grin. “Ye’ll no find better anywhere.”

“I don’t doubt you, sir, although I think I have tasted it once before, on a ridge top in Appin country. All the same—”

“Dugald gave some to Bardie,” Diana said hastily. “May I try some?”

“To be sure, lass,” MacDrumin said, pouring a mug for her.

“Take care, Diana,” Lady Maclean warned. “The world has a tendency to tip after a few swallows of that brew, and it feels like fire going down. Won’t you all sit down? Kate and I tired of waiting for Andrew, so we’ve eaten, but we’ll sit and talk with you. Tell us about your journey. You must have got wet, I should think.”

“We nearly didn’t get here at all,” Neil blurted. “Oh, don’t look at me like that, Diana. We’ll be telling them soon enough, and if Calder don’t want to hear it, he can just shut his ears. It was Black Duncan, Mam! He stopped us just this side of Spean Bridge, and he looked as grim as death. If it hadn’t been for his lordship here intervening, we’d be there yet, or dead from being flung into Spean Gorge.”

“Most likely in prison,” Diana said. “Duncan thinks Neil took part in a cattle raid at Balcardane a sennight ago, Mam, and although he’s got no proof, he wants to hail him before a magistrate.”

MacDrumin regarded Neil with more interest than he had hitherto shown in him, and said, “Did you now, lad? A cattle raid. ’Tis an ancient and noble pastime, that. Good sport, too.”

“Dangerous sport,” Lady Maclean said, grimly eyeing her son.

“Och, you take too dim a view,” MacDrumin said. “God put cattle on this earth, not man, and they take their food from land on which man has done no labor. Therefore, they belong to all of us in common. If we steal our neighbors’ cattle today, they’ll steal ours tomorrow, which makes us quits, as I see the matter.”

Calder said evenly, “I should still call it theft, myself.”

“You sound like a Sassennach,” MacDrumin protested. “Them in the Lowlands forget that their land once belonged to our forefathers. They refuse to understand Highland men who take their prey where they find it. But, as I see it, it’s up to them to try to prevent us from succeeding if they do not like our ways.”

“Or pay blackmail,” Calder said evenly.

“Aye, ’tis a time-honored way to protect themselves,” MacDrumin said, grinning. “Why, I can recall a time when men expected the heir to any Highland chiefship to have led at least one cattle raid before his succession.”

“So you have led raids yourself, I expect.”

Laying a finger alongside his nose, MacDrumin said, “Now, that would be telling. And considering your position on the matter, I think I’ll hold my tongue.”

After a pause, Lady Maclean said, “I don’t want to talk about Black Duncan Campbell or about foolish cattle raids. Are all our people well, my dears?”

Rushing, and avoiding his mother’s gimlet eye, Neil turned his attention to the mug MacDrumin had filled for him, but Diana said, “They are, Mam. I’ve taken care to visit as many as I can each week, just as you would. They all ask after you, and Granny Jameson pounded her stick on the floor when I told her I couldn’t say where you were. James of the Glen sent oatmeal to some of the folks on the island, saying it was what Ardsheal would want him to do. I doubt that’s so, but it was kind of James all the same, especially in view of how busy he has been.”

“It was indeed thoughtful of him,” Lady Maclean agreed. “He is always busy, however, so I do not think you need refine upon that.”

Diana exchanged a look with Calder.

“That mug of yours is empty,” MacDrumin said to Calder. “Let me fill it for you. Here, everyone, bring your stools and benches to the table. The food’s going to grow cold. Dugald, when you’ve finished eating, go along and speak to the lads, will you? There’s work to be done yet before Rothwell and Maggie arrive.”

Diana glanced again at Calder. Seeing the speculative gleam in his eyes, she knew he had guessed as easily as she had that MacDrumin intended to move more whisky, possibly the kegs in the cave below the Corriearrack road.

“Mam,” she said, “Lord Calder may well have saved our lives today, or Neil’s, at least. He does not realize, I think, what danger he was in. I am fast coming to believe that Duncan is as much our enemy as Red Colin of Glen Ure.”

“We can talk of that later, darling. Eat your supper now.”

“Try some of this lamb, Diana,” Kate said, passing a platter to her.

Diana thanked her, helped herself to a slice of lamb, then passed the platter to Neil. Having taken note of the size of the house, she had expected a host of servants, but the service was much the same as it was at Maclean House. She wondered if that state of affairs would change when the earl arrived.

“Mam, if Rothwell is expected, surely we must make arrangements for you to go elsewhere before he arrives.”

Lady Maclean glanced at Calder, then at her daughter, before saying cautiously, “Andrew assures me that I have nothing to fear from Rothwell.”

“Nor do you, madam,” MacDrumin said. “That lad has better sense than to interfere with a woman of your stature over a few silly trees.”

“There’s a bit more to it than that, Andrew, as you know full well.”

“Calder knows, too, Mam,” Diana said. “I … I met him in Edinburgh.”

Feeling all eyes on her, she realized suddenly that she did not want the whole history of that episode to come out in this company. Although MacDrumin’s reputation for mischief was legendary and she had heard similar tales about Kate’s adventures, it was hard to imagine either of them helping a Crown prisoner escape.

Lady Maclean eyed her narrowly. “What do you mean, you met him in Edinburgh?” Turning to Calder, she said, “Were you at the castle when I was, sir?”

“Aye, ma’am, I was. I had the honor to meet your daughter the day you left.”

“I see.” She was silent for a moment, then grinned at the openly curious MacDrumin. “I think Diana means to say that she met him in prison, Andrew, and I doubt very much that he was a prisoner.”

MacDrumin chuckled. “Have some more whisky, lad.”

Calder put a hand over his mug. “Thank you, sir, but I’ll wait till I’ve got a bit more food in me if it’s all the same to you. In point of fact, Lady Maclean, my purpose in visiting the castle was to meet you. I had some reservations about your imprisonment. But as it chanced, I arrived a few hours too late.”

Now she chuckled, too. “I don’t believe I’ll apologize for that, sir. I was glad to get away, I promise you.”

“I daresay you were, ma’am, but there are some few details still to be sorted out, you know.” He spoke calmly, but every eye turned his way now.

Kate said, “I thought Diana’s plan was clever. What made you suspect she was not all she claimed to be?”

“Mere chance, ma’am,” Calder said. “I encountered her unexpectedly just after another prison escape.”

Kate clapped her hands. “Another one! We hadn’t heard. Who was it?”

There had been a note in Calder’s voice that made Diana bite her lip and avoid his gaze, so it was Neil who said, “We got Allan Breck out of Castle Stalker. Diana slipped him a message, and he put her scarf out the window, so Bardie—”

Jerked from her reverie, Diana said hastily, “Button up, Neil. You must never name names or speak so openly of such things. Will you never learn?”

Looking cross, Neil turned his attention back to his food.

Calder said thoughtfully, “So Bardie did help. I wondered if he had, but I never suspected he might have done more than help with the planning.”

“Who’s Bardie?” MacDrumin demanded. “No, wait. We’ll have a bit more whisky, and then I’ll send the wench away, so we can talk plainly.”

Having arranged matters thus to his satisfaction, and having sent Dugald out to attend to unspecified other matters, he demanded details.

Neil revived as a result of MacDrumin’s enthusiasm, and when Lady Maclean only shrugged in response to Diana’s mute look of appeal, he launched into a frank description of Allan Breck’s escape from Castle Stalker.

At hearing of Calder’s undignified departure from his saddle, and the reason for it, MacDrumin roared with laughter, clapping him on the shoulder and offering mock commiseration. Then he collapsed in gales of new laughter.

“To think of a man your size unhorsed by a dwarf!”

Calder was not amused. His lips pressed together in a thin, straight line, and a muscle jumped in his cheek. But his irritation was no match for MacDrumin’s infectious laughter. Before long, the hard lines in his face softened. When he looked at Diana and smiled wryly, warmth surged through her, and she smiled back.

Relaxed by the whisky, she found that she no longer objected to her brother’s candid account of the incident at Stalker, but the telling revived other memories.

Calder’s gaze glinted like kindled tinder, and she knew he was remembering, too. He stirred uneasily, as if he were too hot, but she knew instinctively that the heat disturbing him did not come from the nearby fire. Sensing a power she had not known she had, she let her smile widen, feeling sensuously warmed all through.

“I will not allow you to tease him, sir,” she said to MacDrumin while still looking directly into Calder’s eyes. “No man could have stayed in his saddle under such circumstances. Bardie is very powerful, and he never saw him coming.”

“The way Neil tells it, he never saw him leaving either,” MacDrumin said, lapsing into another fit of laughter. “I think I could make good use of your Bardie.”

“He is something of a rogue, sir,” Calder said, “not unlike yourself.”

MacDrumin chuckled.

Abruptly Lady Maclean said, “Surely, the pair of you did not come all this way to talk of Bardie Gillonie, or to tell me about your encounter with Black Duncan Campbell, which would not have occurred if you had not left Appin. And since you did not know Rothwell and Maggie are on their way until you met Andrew …” She paused, her eyes narrowing. “Why
did
you come?”

Neil, who had drunk a good deal more than Diana, said just as bluntly, “Red Colin in going to evict us, Mam.”

“What?”

Taking turns, with both sometimes talking at once, Neil and Diana explained.

“That scurvy devil,” Lady Maclean exclaimed when they finished. Glaring at Calder, she added, “I know Colin is related to you, but I won’t apologize. If I were a violent woman, I’d cheerfully run him through with my sword, if I had a sword.”

“It’s not so bad as it might be, Mam,” Neil said. “James got a paper to stop him, and Diana and Mary went with some others to present it. I’d like to have seen Red Colin’s face when he read it, I can tell you.”

Lady Maclean nodded approvingly. “Excellent,” she said. “I am very pleased with James, and so I shall tell him.”

“Aye, Mam, but there’s a rub,” Diana said. “You’ve got to take the oath.”

Lady Maclean stiffened ominously. “I’ve got to do
what?”

“I made no promises,” Diana hastened to reassure her. “I thought I might have to speak on your behalf, and I was certain you would not refuse if I said you would not. But Colin never asked me. He was too stunned by the papers saying he could not evict us, I think, to note the condition. But he will have read the whole thing carefully by now. Moreover, Term Day is less than a fortnight away. As tenant, you must take the oath before then if he is not to make more difficulties.”

Lady Maclean made a visible effort to control herself, but her expression did not lead anyone to think she intended to cooperate, difficulties or no difficulties.

Calder said gently, “Perhaps you ought to explain, mistress, that Glenure does not mean you to starve. You will be glad to know, my lady, that he has already arranged for you, your daughter, and your niece to take positions as servants to the new tenants. He thinks he has been most thoughtful and compassionate, ma’am.”

“Does he, indeed?” She sighed, grimacing ruefully, then said, “I see he leaves me no choice. I have no one else to turn to who would not suffer for helping us, sir, and I won’t see my daughter and niece turned into drudges to sustain my pride. What must I do, Diana?”

“Why, I don’t know exactly,” Diana admitted. “I expect you have to take the oath before a magistrate, or some other person of law.”

“I can witness any oath she takes,” Calder said easily, “although I would advise you to wait until Rothwell arrives, ma’am. No one will question any oath witnessed by the pair of us, I promise you.”

Diana smiled at him and said, “If you swear the oath, Mam, Calder thinks you can safely return home. He believes he can prevent your arrest.”

“Is that so, sir?”

“Yes, ma’am. I have certain authority because of my position, you see.”

“He is close kin to Argyll and has access to the duke’s ear, Mam.”

Again Lady Maclean looked rueful. “I doubt that his grace will support my cause, sir. He and I have not generally seen eye-to-eye on matters.”

“No, ma’am. I have heard as much,” Calder said with a twinkle.

Neil said enthusiastically, “It will be grand to have you home, Mam. We’ve missed you, and Red Colin won’t be so quick to plague us with you there.”

“There will be no more cattle raids, young man.”

Neil shook his head, grinning, but MacDrumin said, “Now, now, don’t be too hard on the lad, Annie. Showed mettle, that did. Showed he’s a man. Have a drink, lad. You, too, Calder. I say, sir, do you play golf?”