Courting an Angel (5 page)

A powdery light blanket of snow, the first of the season, muffled the sounds of their footsteps on that December afternoon. Several starlings gathered in the hackberry elms and dined on its few remaining berries while wrens, so secretive during the summer nesting season, flaunted themselves boldly on the barren branches of a birch tree. Wood smoke scented the Strand’s crisp, crystalline air.

“Aunt Keely says ’tis a Welsh custom to kiss beneath the Yule mistletoe,” Rob old her friend. “I’ve decided to allow Henry one kiss.”

“Your aunt is a bit of a pagan, isn’t she?” Isabelle said with a fond smile. “By the way, your uncle seems in especially good spirits for a man who’s just fathered his sixth daughter.”

“Aunt Keely assures Uncle Richard that the next one will be a boy,” Rob replied. “’Tis why they’ve named the new babe Hope.”

“How can she possibly know what her next child will be?”

Rob shrugged. “She hasn’t been wrong yet . . . Ouch!”

“Owww,” Isabelle cried.

Something struck their backs, and the two women whirled around as a second barrage of snowballs sailed through the air toward them. The telltale giggling of little girls reached their ears.

“We got you good,” ten-year-old Blythe called, materializing from behind a hedgerow.

Eight-year-old Bliss, trailed by her three younger sisters, stepped from behind the hedgerow and asked, “Will you play with us?”

“Please?” three-year-old Summer and Autumn chimed together.

“Pretty please with sugar on it,” added six-year-old Aurora.

“I thought I felt pryin’ eyes watchin’ my back,” Rob said. “Come along then.”

Beside her, Isabelle chuckled as the five Devereux girls dashed toward them. “I too felt someone watching us,” she said.

“I still do.” Rob glanced around but could detect no one watching them. Yet, the uncomfortable feeling persisted.

“Grandmama Talbot’s birthday party is tonight,” Aurora announced when she reached them.

“Mama said we may attend,” Blythe added. “If we nap today.”

“We can eat all the pudding we want,” Bliss told them.

“Apples and nuts,” Summer and Autumn shouted with childish glee, making all of them laugh.

“Do ye think anyone will invite me to dance?” Blythe asked, hope and fear warring upon her pretty face.

Rob noted her cousin’s anxious expression. “Do ye wish to dance?”

Blythe nodded and blushed, admitting, “With Roger Debrett.”

“He’s an old man,” Bliss said.

“Is not,” Blythe countered, rounding on her sister.

“He is —”

“— Not!”

“At twenty-two years, Roger Debrett scarcely qualifies as aged,” Rob informed Bliss. She smiled at Blythe, adding, “I’m certain sure he’ll be invitin’ you to dance.”

“Shall we try to make a snowman?” Isabelle asked, hiding a smile.

“There isn’t enough snow,” Bliss complained.

“Watch this,” Rob ordered her cousins, starting toward the rear of the garden where the snow was virgin, untouched by their footprints.

Rob removed her left hand from her pocket, tightened her cloak around herself, and then lay on her back in the snow. She brushed her arms upward in the snow toward her head and down again. Finally, Rob stood and stepped away from the spot, then beckoned the five little girls to her side.

“What is it?” Aurora asked, inspecting the impression in the snow.

Rob opened her mouth to reply but then frowned as an uncanny feeling of being watched overwhelmed her senses.

“Are you going to tell us or no?” Bliss demanded, drawing her attention.

“What d’ye think it is?” Rob asked, suppressing the overpowering urge to look over her shoulder and catch whoever was watching them.

“’Tis an angel,” Blythe answered.

Rob grinned. “Correct.”

“Me make angel,” Summer demanded.

“Me too,” Autumn said.

“Isabelle and I will show ye how ’tis done,” Rob agreed. “Come here where the snow is still unblemished and wrap yer cloaks tightly around yerselves . . .”

* * *

False Solomon’s-seal with its blackberry clusters and an arum plant bearing bright red fruit nodded just above the snow-dusted lawns next to the stone wall of Devereux House. A pair of piercing gray eyes peered out of the high-styled windows of the Earl of Basildon’s study and watched the two young women surrounded by five little girls in the garden.

Gordon Campbell fixed his gaze on the petite, ebony-haired woman — his wife. At this distance, he was unable to see her features clearly but distinctly recalled a pair of disarming emerald-green eyes that had stared up at him from the pretty face of an angelic eight-year-old. Had the promise of her beauty been fulfilled?

From somewhere behind him, Gordon heard Mungo say to the Earl of Basildon, “I’m verra honored to make yer acquaintance, my lord. Yer fame has even reached the Highlands of Scotland.”

Gordon smiled inwardly. Mungo always failed to look beyond a man’s possessions to see the true worth that lay beneath. A poor man’s flaw, but utter folly.

Sensing someone beside him, Gordon glanced to his left and saw Dubh MacArthur silently offering him a glass of whiskey. Accepting it, Gordon took a healthy swig and then coughed as the potent liquid burned a path to his stomach.

“Fine spirits,” Gordon managed to say finally.

“A gift from Dubh’s father,” Earl Richard said with an easy smile. “You know, I never understood how Iain enjoyed this particular poison until I met my illogical wife.”

The three younger men smiled. Apparently, Englishwomen could be as troublesome as their northern counterparts.

Dubh gestured toward the window, asking, “Who’s the blonde?”

“Isabelle Debrett, a cousin of one of my business associates,” Earl Richard answered. He stood on Gordon’s right side and gazed out the window. “Rob and Isabelle have become fast friends.”

“Strange,” Dubh murmured.

Gordon turned his head to look at his brother-in-law and asked, “What’s strange?”

“I canna remember Rob havin’ a friend,” Dubh answered absently, his interested gaze riveted on the blond beauty walking beside his sister. “Whenever I picture her in my mind, I see her strollin’ aboot the garden with our mother.”

“Everyone has friends,” Gordon scoffed, gazing out the window again.

“I dinna recall any.”

“Who are those little girls?” Gordon asked.

“My daughters,” the earl answered.

Gordon turned a horrified expression on him and echoed, “Ye’ve five daughters?”

“Six.” Earl Richard grinned. “Baby Hope is barely ten days old and much too young for romping in the garden with her sisters.”

“If ye want a son, do it with yer boots on,” Gordon advised, casting the earl a pitying look.

Dubh and Mungo nodded in agreement. Earl Richard smiled and would have replied, but the door opened, drawing his attention.

“My lord, the barge is ready for travel,” Jennings, the earl’s majordomo, informed him.

“My barge will carry you upriver to Hampton Court,” Earl Richard told Mungo. “’Tis the fastest route. Of course, my bargemen will remain there at your pleasure.”

“Thank ye, my lord.” Mungo turned to Dubh, asking, “Are ye accompanyin’ me upriver?”

Dubh flicked a glance out the window at his sister’s friend and then shook his head, answering, “The English rose in the garden interests me. I believe I’ll be stayin’ here a few days.”

“Why take a chance with one pretty flower?” Mungo argued. “There’ll be dozens of beauties at court to pluck.”

Gordon snapped his head around and cast his friend a puzzled look. Along the road to England, he would have bet the Campbell fortune that Mungo disliked Dubh. Now it appeared that Mungo could hardly bear to part with the man.

“I’ll take my chances,” Dubh said with a smile. “If I’m disappointed, I’ll meet ye at court in a few days.”

“As ye wish.” Mungo followed Jennings out of the study.

“Shall I send for Rob?” Earl Richard asked Gordon.

“Their playin’ in the snow makes such a fetchin’ picture,” he said, refusing, his gaze returning to his wife. “’Tis certain she’ll balk when I order her to pack her belongin’s.”

“Ye’ve plenty of time for arguin’,” Dubh said. He looked at his uncle, adding, “We’ll be stayin’ next door at the Dowager House.”

“The countess and I are hosting a party tonight to honor my mother-in-law’s birthday,” Earl Richard told them. “Of course, both of you are welcome. Gordon can begin wooing Rob tonight.”

“Court my own wife?” His suggestion surprised Gordon. “Ye must be jokin’?”

“Rob wishes to remain in England. She and my young brother-in-law —” Earl Richard broke off, leaving unspoken whatever he’d intended to say. Instead, the earl smiled and added, “Heed my advice. Your married life will enjoy peace if you seduce my niece to your will.”

Gordon said nothing. He stared out the window at his wife and considered the earl’s advice. He never intended to hurry back to Scotland, as traveling at this time of year could be treacherous, especially in the Highlands. Where was the harm in seducing his bride to do his bidding? Getting her home to Argyll would be easier if she developed a fondness for him. After all, arguing with a reluctant bride across the long length of England and Scotland was a less than appealing notion.

Beside him, Dubh MacArthur asked, “Will the Debrett lass be attendin’ yer party?”

“Isabelle is Rob’s guest until after the first of the year,” the earl answered.

“Will ye do me a favor?” Gordon asked the earl. “Dinna tell Rob of my arrival. I’d much prefer meetin’ her again before she’s aware of who I am.”

“As you wish.”

“What are they doin’ now?” Gordon asked, a puzzled smile on his lips.

Earl Richard’s gaze followed the young marquess’s, and then he smiled too. “Making angels in the snow.”

* * *

“Great Bruce’s ghost,” Rob muttered in frustration, inspecting herself in the pier glass. She wore an exquisite garnet and gold brocaded gown with a squared neckline and long, tight-fitting sleeves that ended in a point at her wrists. Though she’d never looked more beautiful, Rob only saw the despised devil’s flower staining the back of her left hand.

Why me? Rob wondered. Couldn’t the Lord have bestowed this particular disfigurement upon some other woman? Or even one of her own brothers?

Rob sighed with instant remorse. Wishing her shame on another was a terrible sin. She didn’t mind being flawed and could have managed to live happily with an overly long nose or a rotund body. After all, nobody shunned a fat lady. Or made a protective sign of the cross when a fat woman passed by. Why couldn’t this particular flaw have been located elsewhere on her body, a place that wasn’t so visible?

Watching her movements in the pier glass, Rob practiced hiding her left hand within the folds of her gown. Too bad, the damned skirt had no pockets. Well, dancing was definitely out of the question. Unless Henry stood beside her, she couldn’t chance flaunting her shame beneath the noses of London’s elite.

Rob whirled around when the door swung open. Music from the great hall drifted into her chamber, the sound wafting through the air like the delicate song of the nightingale.

“Isabelle said she’ll meet you in the hall,” Blythe announced, walking into the chamber with Bliss.

Rob smiled at the pretty picture they presented in identical gowns of pink velvet. “Ye do remind me of rosebuds aboot to bloom,” she said.

“You look pretty too,” Blythe returned the compliment.

“Too bad Uncle Henry isn’t here to admire the sight,” Bliss added. “You’ll probably never look that good again. I mean —”

“We know what you mean,” Blythe interrupted.

“I look like a changelin’-witch,” Rob said miserably, frustrated tears welling up in her eyes. “This gown doesna hide Old Clootie’s touch.”

“Who’s Old Clootie?” Bliss asked.

“Satan himself,” Rob answered in a hushed tone of voice as if speaking his name could summon him into their presence. She held her left hand out for their inspection. “Most in the Highlands believe ’tis Old Clootie’s mark upon me.”

“What stupid people,” Bliss blurted out. “No offense to your kinsmen, Cousin Rob.”

“None taken.”

“Satan does not exist,” Blythe informed her. “Mama said so, and she knows absolutely everything.”

“’Tis so,” Bliss agreed, bobbing her head.

“Whether Old Clootie actually exists or not doesna matter,” Rob told them. “He lives if people believe he does, and I’m a changelin’-witch if they think so.”

Blythe shook her head. “’Tis true only if you think it.”

Rob stared in surprise at her younger cousin and wondered at the wisdom in the ten-year-old’s words. Finally, she smiled and said, “How verra perceptive of ye, Blythe.”

“At the moment of your creation, the great mother goddess touched you with her blessed hand,” Blythe told her. “I wish I wore her flower.”