The Witch Of Clan Sinclair (13 page)

Tears brined her throat and made it raw. She wanted to lay her head against his chest, breathe in the scent of him and forget the rest. He made her sound much more noble than she was.

“I have to leave,” she said.

“I know.”

She started to place the cup and saucer back on the tray, but the act of moving in a certain way made her gasp. He took the cup from her and put it on the table.

She looked up to find him peering down at her, his green eyes direct and focused.

“You put something in my tea,” she said, the effort of speaking almost beyond her.

“I did,” he said. “I’ll not lie to you, Mairi. It will ease your headache.”

“How do you know I have a headache?”

“Your eyes,” he said, placing his palm gently on her forehead.

She liked the touch of his fingers through her hair and closed her eyes to savor the sensation. A moment later she was drifting off to sleep.

Minutes, or hours, later she awoke to feel his arms around her.

“Shh,” he said, when she would have roused. “Go back to sleep, Mairi. I’ll care for you.”

What a lovely promise. How wonderful to feel so cosseted.

That thought alone should have sent her scrambling for home.

F
enella made it back to the house with only seconds to spare, noting the strange carriage as Allan kissed her good-bye.

She entered the house but didn’t immediately close the door. She stood in the darkness at the bottom of the steps, her hand on the latch.

The carriage didn’t move away. Instead, the door opened and a man emerged. A second later she gasped, because she recognized the Lord Provost in the light of the gas lamp.

She also knew the woman in his arms.

Fenella flew out the door and down the walk.

“What happened?” she asked, reaching Mairi’s side. She reached out and touched Mairi’s arm, her cousin’s wince making her jerk her hand back.

“She was injured,” the Lord Provost said.

“I’m fine,” Mairi said faintly.

“You’re hardly fine,” Fenella said.

“Right now she needs to get comfortable.”

She nodded, racing ahead of Harrison, opening the door and leading the way to the parlor.

“Oh, Mairi,” she said, shocked at the sight of her cousin.

The Lord Provost placed Mairi on the settee and would have spoken, but Mairi shook her head, a gesture that, from her tight-lipped look, caused her pain.

Fenella sank to her knees in front of the settee.

The hair at Mairi’s temple was matted and one of the white cuffs of her dress was spotted with blood. She suspected the other dark stains were blood as well but it was difficult to tell with the brown fabric.

“Someone took offense to my words,” Mairi said slowly.

“They struck you?”

The provost told the rest of the story, leaving Fenella suffused by guilt. If she’d been there, if she’d attended the lecture, Mairi wouldn’t have been alone and attacked. Instead, she’d been with Allan, luxuriating over her own downfall.

What kind of terrible person was she?

The provost still stood beside the settee. He looked rather like a dragon, if a dragon had been transformed to a human dressed in a black greatcoat. His eyes were green, so intent they looked like they could shoot fire.

She wondered if the men who’d attacked Mairi knew that they’d acquired an enemy.

He pulled a bottle out of his pocket and handed it to her.

“It’s laudanum. She won’t want to take it but a little will dull the edge of the pain.”

She nodded, wondering how he knew Mairi so well. Even as a girl she hated to admit she didn’t feel well.

“She’s not to exert herself. Or climb stairs,” he added. “She’s to rest.”

He turned that dragon stare on Mairi, who calmly met it with her own look. Fenella had the distinct impression that the two of them had acquired the ability to converse without speaking. Right at the moment, they were fussing at each other.

“I’ll send word to Allan,” Fenella said. She’d tell him about the events of this evening. Their own plans would have to wait until Mairi was well.

“I will take a day or two, that’s all,” Mairi said, her gaze not veering from the provost.

He only shook his head, gave Fenella a few more instructions, and glanced at Mairi once more. Again, that unspoken communication, one that made Fenella feel as if she were invisible and most certainly unnoticed.

Standing, she walked the provost to the door, thanking him for his kindness.

“I’ll call on her in a few days,” he said, looking back at Mairi. “Don’t let her do too much.”

She bit back her smile. She wasn’t capable of stopping Mairi from doing anything she wished. Her cousin was a wild wind against which she was only a sapling.

But she nodded, closed the door after him, and set about caring for Mairi.

Chapter 14

“W
ould you like another cup of tea, Mairi?” Fenella asked, tucking in the throw around Mairi’s feet.

“I’m sloshing in tea,” she said.

She really should have remained in her room, but she was tired of her own company. The parlor had seemed a likely place to sit and read.

Fenella, however, was surfeiting her with kindness.

“What about some scones? Cook has just taken them from the stove.”

“Perhaps in a bit,” Mairi said.

“I could build up the fire.”

Mairi wrapped her arms around her waist, forced a smile to her face, and looked up at her cousin.

“I’m fine, Fenella, truly. Go do what you would do if I weren’t home.”

Being home during the day was such a unique event that they both had difficulty adjusting to it over the last week.

The men who’d attacked her had never been found, but she discovered them every night in her dreams. Her imagination had furnished them with shadowed faces, taloned fingers, and tall, hunched bodies. They screamed obscenities at her as they threw boulders, and she collapsed bleeding and in agony at their feet.

Each night she awoke sweaty and trembling. For the first time in her life she was afraid, and it enraged her. She wanted to be able to direct her anger toward a person or a tangible object. There was no one, except for the men who’d escaped detection. They could be anyone, even one of her sources. She could know them, do business with them, even talk to them from day to day.

She hated that idea. She couldn’t look at the world with constant suspicion.

For days after the attack she’d hurt all over. Raising her arms over her head had been excruciating. So, too, turning in a certain way. Gradually, however, her pain had eased. As soon as the bruising faded she’d return to the paper and forget about the whole horrible night.

She doubted if she’d be able to forget Logan’s tenderness, but memories like that were more troublesome than helpful.

So much so that she was almost grateful when Robert opened the sliding door, interrupting her thoughts. Her gratitude lasted only long enough for her to see the sheaf of papers in his hand.

He stared at her and she sighed, knowing they were about to have another one of his conversations. At least Robert didn’t treat her as if she were fragile.

“Are the ether supplies depleted? Must you buy the most expensive ink, Mairi? And the parts for the press. Are they entirely necessary?”

“Yes,” she said. “If the press is to run. It’s old, Robert, and it needs to be repaired often. If we could buy another press we wouldn’t have to spend so much in repairs.”

His eyes narrowed at that suggestion.

“You spend money like it’s air,” he said, a comment she heard often enough she could repeat it along with him.

If he could give her a suggestion that was worthwhile, she wouldn’t hate their encounters so much. But the newsprint she used was common enough, neither the worst grade nor the best. Ether was required to clean the type. Otherwise, the ink accumulated until the print was smudged. The ink was perhaps a little pricier than most, but it worked better with the old press. The parts were necessary, although she would admit they’d had to replace too many gears lately.

“Your father was a frugal man.”

She’d heard that statement before, too.

“You could rent out parts of the building.”

That was a new suggestion. She eyed him with interest.

“And charge your pressman rent for his room.”

She frowned at Robert. “His room is part of his salary.”

“You pay him too much.”

Her elderly cousin was lamentably out of touch with the cost of wages lately. He was still budgeting for thirty years ago.

“The income of the paper has suffered in the last week.”

“That’s because I haven’t been working,” she said. “As soon as I go back to reporting the news and writing broadsides, our income will increase.”

When he finally left the room, she sighed in relief. When Fenella appeared again, intent on hovering over her, she stood, the motion making her bite back the gasp a pain.

Fenella was instantly at her side.

She needed to get away. She needed to get out. She needed, most of all, to be alone.

“I’m going to the garden.”

“It’s much too cold,” Fenella said. “There’s snow on the ground.”

“I won’t be gone long,” she said, gathering up the blankets on the settee. “Just a few minutes of fresh air.”

“Shall I come with you?” Fenella asked.

“No,” Mairi said. “I’ll be fine. Truly. Just a few minutes of fresh air.” And solitude.

“Are you very certain?”

“Very certain.”

She escaped from the parlor before Fenella could say another word. Or worse, insist on accompanying her.

F
enella stared after Mairi.

Nothing she did seemed to make any difference. Mairi was still too quiet, too reserved, in a way she’d never been.

If Fenella had been set upon and attacked, she knew she would no doubt have acted the same. Still, it wasn’t like Mairi to be so reclusive.

She had remained at home for nearly a week, refusing to see anyone, even Allan. She’d relayed what information needed to be shared through Fenella. One of the women from the SLNA called on her, and Mairi asked Fenella to tell the woman she was not at home.

“I’m not up to seeing anyone, Fenella,” she said in a curiously flat voice.

“I’m sure she’s here to console you, Mairi. Don’t you think that’s worth a few moments of your time?”

Mairi hadn’t answered, only stared out the window of her bedroom.

At least she’d come down to the parlor in the last few days. That was a step in the right direction.

She turned as Abigail appeared at the door.

“There’s a man here, miss,” the maid said, bobbing a curtsy. “I think it’s the Lord Provost. He wants to see Miss Sinclair.”

A few minutes later Fenella smiled at their visitor, inviting him into the parlor.

When Harrison entered, he dwarfed the room. She did wish he would sit and stop looking so fierce.

She would have taken his hat but he wasn’t wearing one. Before she could offer to hang up his coat, he spoke.

“I’ve come to see Miss Sinclair,” he said, his smile lighting his face.

What a handsome man he was. The thought pinched, feeling disloyal to Allan. Shouldn’t she consider him the most handsome man in the world?

“She isn’t seeing anyone,” she said, wondering if she should offer him tea or coffee.

How on earth did she entertain the Lord Provost?

“I must insist,” he said, his tone cooling.

If it were up to her, she’d take him to Mairi right this moment.

“She’s refusing to see anyone,” she said. “Even her pressman.”

One of his eyebrows ascended upward.

“How is she?”

“She’s healing,” she said. “Today is better than yesterday and so much better than last week.”

“But she isn’t seeing anyone.”

“No.”

“Is she taking the laudanum?”

She suspected, before she shook her head, that he knew her answer.

“Is she sleeping?”

Now that was a question she hadn’t expected.

“I don’t think she is,” she said, surprising herself by answering him. Was she violating Mairi’s privacy in doing so? She hoped not, but something was wrong and maybe Harrison could help her cousin.

“I want to see her.”

She didn’t know how to convince Mairi. She eyed him. Just how stubborn was the Lord Provost?

“Mairi’s in the garden,” she said. “But she would never forgive me if I took you there myself.”

He nodded. “I understand.”

Thankfully, it seemed as if he did. She watched as he turned and left, grateful that he was as stubborn as her cousin.

O
f course the latch to the garden gate was frozen solid, defying Logan’s attempts to open it.

The garden wall, however, didn’t look that high. He followed it midway to the front of the house. Here the bushes weren’t as deep. He wedged himself next to the wall, found a foothold, and lifted himself to the top.

Thankfully, the Sinclairs hadn’t reinforced their wall with spikes or wrought iron. He threw his leg over, feeling the rough surface tear at his trousers. If his constituents could see him now they’d label him a loon. Worse, a man not in complete control of his faculties.

Had he been quite sane since meeting Mairi Sinclair?

He eyed the expanse of lawn beneath him. The garden was larger than he thought, and his quarry nowhere in sight. Had he climbed the wall at the same time she decided to return to the warmth of the house?

The flower beds looked as if they had been piled high with mulch before the snow obscured them. He was surprised at the number of plantings as well as the careful paths between what must be a spectacular garden in the spring and summer. He was startled to see a large fountain not far away, but blessedly not beneath him. He was willing to climb a garden wall but not break his fool neck.

He was losing his mind.

He made the jump with only a slight jar to his pride as he caught his coat on an ice-encrusted rosebush.

He could just imagine the headlines from her paper: Lord Provost Offends Citizen’s Privacy. She’d probably write a poem about him crawling over the wall like a spider with clawed hands, bulging eyes, and a mouth filled with rotting teeth.

If that didn’t frighten the children of Edinburgh, nothing would.

“There is, I take it, a reason you’re invading my garden.”

He turned to see her sitting there in a puddle of fading light. She was bundled against the chill with a cloak and two striped blankets but still looked miserable, like one of the children in Old Town huddled against a wall.

Her face was drawn and too pale, making the blue and yellow bruise on her cheek even more shocking.

He remained in place only because of years of training at standing on stages, behind podiums, answering questions and being shouted down. Otherwise, he would have gone to her, picked her up and sat down again with her on his lap. Only then would he have gathered her in his arms.

Did she understand that there were times when she needed to be protected and perhaps pampered a little, too?

“It’s too cold for you to be sitting in the garden,” he said.

“Thank you for the information. Is that why you jumped over the wall? I don’t need a guardian. Too many other people are more than willing to put themselves in that role.”

He bit back his smile. She was testy. That was a good sign. At least she wasn’t quiet and hurting.

“You’re still not well,” he said.

“I haven’t been sick. I was injured, not bedridden. What are you doing in my garden?”

“Coming to see you.”

“I don’t want to see you.”

“That’s what I heard.”

“But you jumped over my wall and now you’re here despite my wishes.”

He hadn’t exactly jumped, but he didn’t tell her that. He only smiled. Even bruised and battered, she was indefatigable.

“You’re an impossible man,” she said, narrowing her eyes at him. “Are you that way with everyone or is it only me?”

He regarded her for a moment and then gave her the truth.

“I think it’s mostly you,” he said. “Something about you makes me want to get nose-to-nose with you. I enjoy arguing with you although I can’t say it’s a normal preference. In fact, I don’t feel that way around most women. With any other woman.”

“How fortunate I am,” she said.

“Why don’t you want to see me?”

“Vanity,” she said so quickly he knew it was a lie. She lined up her excuses like toy soldiers, always at the ready, self-protection at its finest. “I’m not looking my best.”

“You don’t give a flying farthing about your appearance,” he said, marching up to her.

Her eyes widened as he bent down and placed both hands on either arm of her chair.

He wanted to smile when he should have offered comfort, but he never acted the way he should around her.

Up close, her bruising was worse. He wanted to soothe her in some way, take away the pink in her eyes that spoke of too little sleep.

“I could shout and someone would come running,” she said. “They’d escort you out of my garden.”

“I’ll be leaving soon in any case. I came to see how you were faring. Once you tell me, I’ll take myself off. Are you still in pain?”

“I’m not going to tell you. You’ll drug me again.”

“Which means you are. Where?”

She didn’t answer but she also didn’t protest when he repositioned the scarf closer around her throat. She was going to take a chill if she sat out here much longer.

He should be about his work. He had the voluminous paperwork of the Edinburgh and Leith Sewerage Act to study. The river was in bad condition, worse than it had been before the passing of the act. He’d been petitioned to bring the matter before the Government Commissioners on the Pollution of Rivers who were due to visit Edinburgh this week.

He had a full schedule, subject to last minute appearances by constituents, royal appointees, or commissions whose sole mission in life was to clog council meetings with their own personal projects.