Susan Johnson (13 page)

“Maybe not the first, darling, but the most fortunate of men, I assure you,” he drawled. “I’ll be back shortly. Do call your counselors. I don’t wish any further delays.”

She sat in stunned silence for a moment after he left and then, rising from the table, went to the windows and slipped back the draperies enough to look out onto the courtyard. He was serious. At least a troop stood at attention before her house. When she surveyed the other directions from a variety of windows she took note of the ring of soldiers surrounding her home.

He was indeed determined, she realized.

Which meant she didn’t have much time.

Returning to her bedchamber, she dismissed her maid, telling her she had a headache and wished to lie down. She felt a small guilt lying to Geillis, who had been with her so long, but in these troubled times, excessive caution was required.

Quickly sliding her small pack from under the bed, she pulled out the clothes she’d taken earlier from her son’s room. James was a big boy at twelve, and the riding pants and shirt would do nicely. Swiftly discarding her gown and petticoats, she dressed the way she had as a child in the country, when comfort was more important than decorum. In moments she was attired, her riding boots and a servant’s jacket she’d plucked from the kitchen hall completing her ensemble.

Turning before the cheval glass, she decided her
disguise looked adequate provided the night was sufficiently dark, for although she’d bound her breasts, a side view still wouldn’t pass muster at close range. Her hair of course would have to go, she realized with faint misgivings; the heavy mane of curls was too difficult to hide.

She reached for her small gold scissors, and minutes later, her shorn tresses lay in silken heaps on the floor. Her remaining red curls were clubbed together at the nape of her neck, a tartan tarn pulled low over her forehead. A stable lad gazed back at her from the mirror. With no moon, she thought, and a little luck …

Glancing at the clock on the mantel, she noted the time with dismay. A quarter of her hour of reprieve was already gone. But not wishing to leave evidence of her disguise, she took the time to clean up her hair from the carpet and stuff it into her rucksack.

Her jewelry had already been stowed inside, including Robbie’s new necklace; she had money as well, and enough food to last her a day or so. Her main objective was simply to escape Edinburgh tonight. After that, she’d see if the route to Edgarhope Wood lay open to a stable lad taking his master’s horse home.

With the pack on her shoulder, she surveyed herself one last time in the mirror, searching for any discrepancies that might give her away. Adding a scarf around her neck, she hid a bit more of her pale skin and a portion of her chin. At the last, she rubbed her fingertips in the ashes of the grate and smeared a light gray film over her face.

Better, she thought. Stable lads as a rule didn’t have a freshly bathed appearance.

And now, she nervously reflected, glancing once more at the clock, to get past the circle of guards surrounding her house.

A
RGYLL WAS MOVING AT AN EQUALLY SWIFT PACE
, his subordinates assembled to perform the tasks necessary for his expeditious return to Kilmarnock House. Sitting at his desk, he delivered orders in a brisk staccato to functionaries standing at attention before him. “Have the lawyers brought round. I need my schedule rearranged for the morning—no appointments until noon. Where are those gifts I had Lawson buy? And have some champagne sent over to Kilmarnock House from my cellar. Agnes Erskine is gone from the city? Her departure monitored? Good,” he pronounced with a nod to the young captain who answered in the affirmative. “Send a note to Queensberry—where’s my clerk?” he queried, raising his voice, his impatience obvious. “Ah.” He noted the man running through the doorway, papers in hand. “Tell Queensberry he is being formally apprised of the return of the Carre properties to their owners
and
of the revocation of the treason charges against them. I’ll sign it before I go. Deliver it to him.” Assured of his conquest of the beautiful Countess Kilmarnock with his troops in place around her house, he considered Queensberry’s notification a courtesy to her. He would arrive at her home with that duty discharged.

A conciliatory gesture along with his gifts.

A peace offering.

H
OLMES ENTERED ROBBIE’S ROOM OUT OF BREATH
, his swift journey through the streets of Edinburgh and his racing ascent of the stairs leaving him gasping for air.

At the sound of running feet on the stairs, Robbie had risen from his chair, and he met his man with pistol drawn.

“Argyll’s troops … have Kilmarnock House … barricaded,” Holmes breathlessly announced.

“How many?” Robbie was already slipping his jack on.

“Three corps.”

His scowl deepened. “Is he there with her?”

“He was … but he’s back at headquarters now … with clerks and lieutenants scurrying as if a battle was about to begin.”

“You’re right there,” Robbie curtly muttered, fastening the last buckle on his jack. “How many men do we have in town?”

“Sixty since morning.”

“And there’s a watch at Kilmarnock House?”

“Front and back … plus the garden wall. You knew he’d do it,” Holmes asserted, the discussion of Argyll’s motives and agenda much debated during the afternoon and evening.

“I didn’t think he’d be so clumsy.” Robbie’s brows rose in derision as he slipped his sword baldric over his head. “He could have waited a day or so to woo her.” The thought brought a grimace to his face. “Double our surveillance,” he ordered, pulling his sword from its scabbard, lunging in a feint to test his pain levels and stability. “I have to know where she is, where Argyll is,” he added, teeth clenched against the torment, a thin beading of sweat breaking out on his forehead.
“Send Mrs. Beattie inside.” Geillis was a relative, the ranks of Edinburgh servants close-knit by blood ties. “Hurry. And tell the men I’ll meet them at our appointed rendezvous in ten minutes.”

R
OXANE HAD TRAVERSED THE UPSTAIRS HALLWAY
undetected and traveled down the servants’ staircase without meeting anyone, but the kitchen was bustling with staff, some cleaning up the remains of dinner, others gathered round the fire with pints and pipes in hand, their normal duties lightened with the house empty of Agnes and the children.

She waited in the shadows of the pantry, but quickly realized that passing through the room without being seen was impossible. She decided to leave through the garden door, although the route required she cross a long open stretch of yard.

Moving back up the stairs, she carefully made her way through the reception rooms, on the lookout for servants, but she reached the library unseen. The glass-paned doors to the garden gleamed in the moonlight as she entered the room, as though beckoning her to freedom. Or luring her to disaster, she uneasily thought. The crushed rock of the garden paths shone pale under the moon. One of these paths led to the stable yard.

Her hands were shaking as she grasped the door latch and pulled it open, the metal hinges squeaking faintly in protest. Freezing at the sound, she waited, heart pounding. But the garden walls were high and thick, and after several tense moments, she realized the guards hadn’t heard.

Taking a step outside, she held her breath while she closed the door again, not wanting to leave an open door behind her. And she endured once again that fearful interval while the sound of grating hinges died away in the night.

She could hear the horses in the stables, their soft nickers and movements reassuring. But in the quiet garden the voices of Argyll’s guards were audible as well, their words drifting over the wall in bits and pieces, a word, a phrase, a guffaw of laughter.

Campbell swordsmen—so close and waiting for her.

A church bell began tolling the hour. She silently counted to ten.

Which left her only thirty minutes before Argyll’s return.

She wished for a moment, the way she might have in childhood, that she could fly over the garden wall and drift away like the wispy clouds above and find herself safe in Edgarhope Wood, where her mother’s family had left her a small cottage.

But the fleeting whimsy passed. Steeling herself against daunting reality, she forced herself to move, because standing in fear at her library door would bring sure disaster. She didn’t want to sleep with Argyll—not tonight, not ever.

She moved one terrified step at a time, and in a disjointed and shrinking way she progressed across the cultivated gardens over soft dirt under her boots, to the wooden gate that divided the garden from the stable yard.

Neither garden fragrances nor beauty struck her senses during her passage, her mind’s eye focused only
on reaching the gate. When she did, she pressed her face against the rough wood and waited for the fierce pounding of her heart to subside.

But she didn’t allow herself much respite with time so urgent, and moments later, she eased the gate open a fraction so she could view the stable yard.

Her heart stopped.

Three Campbell swordsmen were lounging against the stable door, passing around a small earthenware decanter.

She had to walk through them to get to her horse.

It took a moment to gather her terrified wits into a modicum of calm, and a moment more to remind herself she had nothing to lose. If she stayed, she became Argyll’s paramour for certain. If she could bluff her way past the guards, she had a chance at freedom.

Boldly pushing the door open, she stepped into the stable yard.

Three pairs of eyes immediately swung her way.

“D’ye ken how many o’ these are in yon cellar?” Roxane called out in as deep a tone as she could muster, holding up a bottle of whiskey she’d brought along for possible bribery.

“And how did ye come by that?” one of the troopers gruffly queried.

“The mistress is alone, ye ken … an’ who’s to notice in a big manse if a bottle or two flies away.”

“Na then, lad, ha’ye more wi’ye?” another man inquired, clearly interested in the extent of her cache.

“Mayhap I do.” She pulled out a second from her pack. “But the cellar isna’ so far ye couldna’ fill your rucksack and no one the wiser.”

Such temptation brought all three men from their lounging pose, and as she approached, their focus was not on her but on the two bottles she held.

The whiskey was swiftly grabbed away and lifted to their mouths while she stood hoping they’d move aside enough so she could enter the stable.

“Weel, that’s mighty fine,” one man murmured, taking a breath between gulps.

“What d’ye say ye show us yon cellar, lad, and ye can fill yer rucksack, too,” a trooper declared, waving his bottle toward the garden gate.

“I couldna’ leave my work right noo. But ye ken that door?” She pointed at the gate. “Through there and yell see the glass doors, wi’ no one home but the countess upstairs waitin’ for Argyll hisself.”

“Och, ay, an’ Big Red John will show the leddy a right fine time tonight,” a trooper said, chuckling. “But show us yon cellar, lad, seein’ ye ken the way.”

The church bells tolled the quarter hour, and for a second she considered making a break for the street and running.

“Ay, lad, come wi’ us.” The soldier’s tone had taken on a harsh rasp.

“The commissioner needs the lad,” her stable-master brusquely said, coming out from the stables, leading a horse. “He says he wants this mount to be brought to him at half past the hour, and ye best hurry, laddie, or hisself will ha’ your skin.”

“Ay,” Roxane croaked, her nerves stretched so taut her stablemaster had to wrap the reins around her hands and give her a push. “Now don’t ye dawdle, laddie, or I’ll see ye get the whip when ye come back. Hisself said half past, and half past he means.”

Forcing her feet to move faster, she passed through the gate into the street, offering up a thousand prayers for Alec’s nervy inspiration. She needed her horse tonight, she’d told him earlier, but no more; he’d improvised with panache.

Obliged to walk past the entire line of troops guarding the front of her house, she stayed in the shadow of the huge roan, running the gauntlet with a wildly beating heart. But Holyrood Palace was up the hill, and up the hill she must go.

Until, finally out of sight, she leaped into the saddle and galloped away.