A Rebel Without a Rogue (26 page)

Fianna threw her quill down on the table, her groan startlingly loud in the silence of the empty drawing room. “Appeal to your readers’ sensibilities” had sounded simple enough, but whenever she tried to revise her chapter in accordance with Mr. Wooler’s advice, the results proved frustratingly maladroit. This line clumsy, that one maudlin, this last one utterly false—she’d struck through each one with increasing frustration, the ink blotting in ugly smears on the paper.

She raked her hands through the hair at her temples. Her father had used words to inspire the people around him; why couldn’t she?

Perhaps that was the answer—use Father’s own words, rather than her own. Where had she hidden them, those letters her father had written to his sister in 1796 and ’97 when he’d been imprisoned in Dublin’s Kilmainham Gaol? Candlestick in hand, she made her way back to her bedchamber, her eyes scanning the room. Yes, there, under the mattress, where she’d placed them for safekeeping the night she’d first arrived.

Somehow, she’d not been able to bring herself to share them with Kit, even now, when they were well into the project of writing her father’s history. Still clinging to the one thing of Aidan McCracken’s that was all her own?

Setting down the guttering taper on the bedside table, she flipped through the packet of letters.

15 November 1796

It is expensive to live here, plundered by Turnkeys, etc. and still more so when confined with others who cannot support themselves nor yet be left to themselves. I hate money, it makes me melancholy to think about it.

He’d be proud of her, how she’d dealt with those gaolers who’d extorted and stolen from him.

She turned to the next letter, written in an unfamiliar hand. She’d forgotten the packet contained not only letters from her father, but also ones he’d received while at Kilmainham. This one, from his cousin Charles:
 

26 April 1797

I have nothing to tell you of except the barbarities committed on the innocent country people by the yeomen and Orangemen. The practice among them is to hang a man up by the heels with a rope full of twist, by which means the sufferer whirls round like a bird roasting at the fire, during which he is lashed with belts, etc., to make him tell where he has concealed arms. Last week, at a place near Dungannon, a young man being used in this manner called to his father for assistance, who being inflamed at the sight struck one of the part a desperate blow with his turf spade; but, alas! his life paid the forfeit of his rashness; his entrails were torn out and exposed on a thornbush.

Yes, that would be a story to engage a reader’s sentiments. Well used to hearing of the barbarities committed by the Catholics in Ireland, the English were, but not so familiar with the ones inflicted by their own kind.

Had Kit’s uncle ordered his men to participate in such acts? Taken part himself? Or merely stood by and allowed Irish Protestants to deal with those who protested the English oppression his uniform so clearly symbolized?

Fianna frowned. Fanning the flames of outrage toward a dead man would do little to help her tonight, would it? Fianna set the letter to the side, opening one written by Aunt Mary:

2 June 1797

It is a great pity the people do not always keep in mind that they should never do evil that good may come of it. What is morally wrong can never be politically right. Have you not observed that since the assassinations began the cause of the people (which had before been rapidly gaining ground) has gradually declined? When we once deviate from the path of rectitude it is difficult to return.

Fianna shuddered, her aunt’s words an eerie echo of her barely averted argument with Kit. Or, if she were to be truly fanciful, a prophecy of warning sent by a kindly pooka, if a fairy horse could write as well as speak.

Well, she’d always known she’d have to keep the details of her quest to rehabilitate her father’s good name a secret from Aunt Mary if she wished to gain her aunt’s acceptance. Had her father agreed with his sister about what constituted justice? Or had he, like his daughter, believed that a vitally important end might justify a dubious means?

“Writing of Aidan’s, is it, then?”

Fianna shot to her feet, clutching the letter close to her chest. How in hell had Sean O’Hamill entered Kit’s rooms without her hearing him?

 
“Did I startle you,
cailín
? Or did someone walk over your grave, as the English are wont to say?”

“Sean!” Fianna could not quite meet her uncle’s eyes, her body strangely awkward and unsure. Should she offer him a smile? Her hand? An embrace? Would he welcome any such presumptions of intimacy? Or draw away in disgust?
 

Settling on a cautious nod, she folded her hands in her skirts. “But how did you get in?”

“Oh, I have my ways,” he said, taking a step into her chamber. “As you well know, we O’Hamill are a resourceful people.”

“Of course we are. But I didn’t expect to see you again so soon.” Not after she’d written to him telling him of her mistake in believing Major Pennington still alive.

“Of that I’ve little doubt,” he said, glancing about with curiosity. He bent down to pick up a cravat—Kit’s—that had fallen on the floor. With a grimace, he set it down on the dresser. “As your last note made no mention of your current abode.”

“Of course it did not,” she said, her chin tilting high. “After the way you snarled and snapped at Mr. Pennington the last time you met? What, did you expect an invitation to dine? Like a cur in the streets, you were, and I a bone he’d snatched from your jaws.”

“Ashamed of your uncle’s manners, are you, Máire? How little family feeling you have.”

“Family feeling?” Fianna said, shaking her head. “I was simply afraid you’d toss about more insults, or worse yet, start a brawl, and ruin my chances to find out what I needed to know.”

“But why should you care if I brawl with young Pennington, now that you’ve no need of his help?” he replied, stepping closer to her. “I’d think a proper
caílin
would be glad to see a strong Irishman’s fist in the face of the blackguard who stole away her honor.”

“Not every situation calls for a violent response,
Seanuncail.
”

Her uncle’s eyes narrowed. “What, do you seek to unman us, just as the English do? Demand we suppress our pride, our patriotism? Stand idly by and watch while our women are violated as shamefully as is our country? Does not the despoiling of our womenfolk call for a strong fist?”

“You think me despoiled, do you?”

“Have you not been forced to trade your virtue in order to achieve justice? And now, when justice has slipped beyond your grasp, is not that damned Pennington still keeping you here, forcing you to cater to his voluptuous pleasures?”

“No one has forced me to do anything, Sean.” Her fist beat against her chest once, then again. “I chose to make an arrangement with Mr. Pennington, and with Viscount Ingestrie before him, in order to achieve my ends.
I
chose,
Seanuncail
.
I
. A bitter bargain, to be sure, but one that I made of my own free will. And my choice says nothing about you.”

“It may say nothing of the uncle of Fianna Cameron. But it’s O’Hamill blood that runs through your veins, Máire. And a smear on my honor if I allow a daughter of the blood to succumb to the blandishments of a deceiving Englishman.”

He pulled at the valise that poked out from beneath her bed, lifted it to the mattress, and opened it wide. “Come, what reason have you to stay?”

Fianna reached out a hand to pull the valise closed. “What reason? Come, and I’ll show you.”

He followed her to the drawing room, where her papers lay in piles upon the table. She picked up the first few sheets of the manuscript and thrust them into his rough hands.

“We are working on it together, Mr. Pennington and I,” she said as Sean’s eyes quickly scanned the ink-smeared pages. “A history of my father, his life and his beliefs. A book that will tell the truth of Aidan McCracken and will restore his good name. Perhaps not here in England, but in Dublin, and in Belfast. Mayhap through the length of Ireland. A book that will make my grandfather proud.”

Her uncle looked up from the pages, his mouth a grim twist. “But your grandfather has left Ireland behind, Máire, for the wilds of America. And he never learned to read, as well you know.”

“You deliberately misunderstand me, Sean. You know I speak not of Grandfather O’Hamill, but of my father’s father. My McCracken grandfather.”

Sean grimaced. “You think to make dour old McCracken take pride in you?”
 

“You think I cannot? Because I’m a bastard? A whore?” The nails of her fingers burrowed deep into her palms.

He lowered the manuscript sheets down on the table, shaking his head. “The fault lies not in you,
cailín
. It lies in himself. Ah, did I not tell Mairead, when that pinched sister of Aidan’s came with her fancy carriage and fine promises, no McCracken would ever care for you as an O’Hamill would? What matter how many fine frocks or fancy books they could give, if they never welcomed you into their hearts?”

“But I can prove my worth, Sean. I can!” She grabbed up a sheet of the manuscript, shaking it close to his face. “If not by bringing my father’s killer to justice, then by telling his true story and restoring his good name.”

Sean’s expression was grave as he grasped her trembling hands between his. “Máire. What family worthy of the name demands a child prove her merit before granting her its love?”

His words sent a cascade of icy memories tumbling through her brain.
Cold, unsmiling slip of a girl
, the women of Belfast had whispered when she first came to live with her father’s family.
Fae-born,
the more superstitious murmured, hands restlessly tracing the sign of the cross as they jerked their menfolk away from the sight of her strange, uncanny beauty.

Unnatural. Changeling
.

Bastard
.

No one in her father’s family had stood for such ignorant talk, staunch Presbyterians that they were. She’d been so very grateful—frightened, reserved child that she’d been—for the stern, haughty McCracken glances that instantly quelled slander and gossip in Belfast’s streets and kirk.

But had her aunt, her grandfather, any of her McCracken aunts and uncles, had they ever troubled to wonder what might lie beneath the impassive face of the girl they’d plucked from her mother’s side when she was but six years of age? Had they ever told her those whispers were untrue? Ever told her she was worthy of their regard? Of their love?

Fianna shook her head, once, twice, trying to cast off the doubts Sean’s words had raised. But hadn’t Kit said almost the same, suggesting that Aunt Mary had lied to protect herself from her own unkindness, insisting that Mairead agreed it was for the best to leave her child behind?

Had she been wrong all these years, then? Wrong to work so hard, to plan and scheme, to prostitute herself, even, all in the hopes of winning her father’s family’s regard? Should a true family accept all its members, love them all, no matter how unworthy?

Might it not be her, but the McCrackens, who were unworthy?
 

But if she did not, could not, belong to the McCrackens, then what chance did she have of finding a family at all? Fianna pulled out of her uncle’s grasp, turning away from the pity in his eyes.

“Why should you care what the McCrackens think of you, Máire? Does not O’Hamill blood run red through your veins?” A heavy hand came to rest against her shoulder. “Come. More important work lies in store for you,
cailín
,
than wreaking vengeance on a dead man. Devil Pennington may be gone, but London still teems with the enemies of Ireland.”

“And you think to turn enemies into friends?” she asked, turning to face him.

“Friends?” For the first time, a hint of passion shone from his dark green eyes. “Nay, there’d be no redeeming such as they. Say instead, wipe the filthy stench of their tyranny from this island, and from our own.”

“Murder, Sean?”

“Nay, not murder. Justice! And you will be its herald, Hibernia and her harp calling to the sons of Ireland to pull their tyrants down.” Sean grasped her arm, urging her back toward the bed. “Come, I’ll tell you of our plans while you pack your bag.”
 

Fianna took a stumbling step toward Sean, then pulled back against his grip. “But what of Kit—of Mr. Pennington?”

“What of Mr. Pennington, indeed? Or, say rather, what of Mr. O’Hamill?”

Fianna could not see the man who stood behind her. But even when it was hardened by suspicion, there was no mistaking the sound of Kit’s voice.

How was she to explain why she was alone in his rooms with the man he’d once accused of being her lover?
 

CHAPTER EIGHTEEN

“A wise man would remove his hand from Miss Cameron’s person. Are you a wise man, Mr. O’Hamill?”

Kit had never heard such ice in his own words before. But the sight of Sean O’Hamill’s thick, rough hand gripping proprietarily about Fianna’s arm—damnation, he wanted to break each and every finger. Especially after the older man jerked Fianna roughly behind him. As if it were Kit, and not himself, who posed her the greatest threat. Kit stepped farther into the room, waiting for the man’s reply.