Taming the Heiress (8 page)

"Here, Mother," Thora said, handing the cup to her.

Meg placed the breakfast plates on the table and sat down while Thora poured tea into mugs and added sugar and cream for herself and Elga, leaving Meg's plain as she preferred.

Anna took the spoon and tried to feed herself, while the older women talked. Meg glanced over her shoulder to the small room beyond the main area, where Iain still lay asleep in his box bed. Norrie and Fergus had already gone down to the beach to start the day's fishing, and Fergus had mentioned that he might join Stewart's work crew to earn some extra money.

None of them needed the money; Norrie and Fergus need not work at all. Meg had offered repeatedly to take care of all of their needs. While they accepted some things from her for the sake of the little ones and the old women, the men would not allow her to provide for all of them.

They had even refused to move into the great house, with its roomy comfort. Their little croft house had ample room, they insisted, and Norrie and Fergus had pointed out that it was closer to the harbor. The croft house, which had grown over generations, consisted of three spacious buildings attached under one roof, used separately for living, cooking, and sleeping quarters, with a byre for cows, goats, and chickens. They said it was more than enough for them.

Meg had at least insisted that the smaller house be refurbished and she had sent them new furnishings and had purchased Norrie a new boat and fishing nets. She wanted her kin, and all her tenants, to have whatever they needed. But the islanders rarely asked anything from her.

"Did you tell Mr. Stewart that you wanted him to leave Caransay?" Thora asked.

"I did. But he will stay nonetheless, and his crew with him," Meg answered.

"Ach,"
Elga said. "Water horses, the lot of them." She nibbled on bacon. "Especially that Stewart. A prince of the sea. He prances about in the waves by night."

"I saw him outside just now. He was not prancing," Meg said.

"Why do you think he wants to build his tower on the great rock? It has belonged to the water horses since the time of the mists, when the first
each-uisge
came out of the sea and took the form of a beautiful man and then fought Fhionn MacCumhaill. He made a bargain with Fhionn that he would keep the rock and let the people have the island, but he must have a bride from Caransay every one hundred years."

"Stories," Meg said. "Just stories."

"Easy to say, now that you are a fine lady with riches, a castle, and servants," Elga said. "Years ago, when your heart was pure and your life was simple, you knew the truth."

"Does this Stewart know you? Who you are?" Thora asked.

"His bride? Of course," Elga insisted.

"He recognized her," Thora said. "I was at the harbor yesterday—I saw it in his eyes when he looked at Margaret."

Meg felt her cheeks grow hot. "He knows nothing."

"He has come for his son," Elga said.

"Hush!" Meg glanced at the door of the sleeping room, where Iain dozed. "He knows nothing of my son. He does not even know that I am Lady Strathlin."

"Good," Thora said. "Keep that from him for now."

"I intend to tell him," Meg said stiffly. "When the time is right, I will tell him."

"I looked into the fire and I knew he is the one," Elga said.

"That he is the kelpie? Or the engineer who has made my life miserable?" Meg asked bitterly.

"The one who is meant for you," Elga replied.

Meg took a sip of tea and did not answer.

"Uisht,
Mother," Thora said. "It is bad luck to talk so much of the kelpie. You must not say it so often."

"Why? He's come back for his bride," Elga insisted. "He's part of our family now."

"Oh, do stop," Meg said, and groaned.

"A prince of the deep, building a tower on his rock for his bride, but guised as a working man," Elga intoned, nodding.

Meg sighed and leaned her chin on her fist. Through the window, the early sky lightened to blue.

Since childhood, she had loved and respected her great-grandmother, and had listened to Elga's endless stories of ancient heroes, gods, and goddesses, and had given credence to Elga's divinations. The island's oldest inhabitant, Elga was also its mystic and its bard, respected by all—and perhaps indulged, Meg thought, as she became more eccentric and stubborn with age. Elga clung to the old ways, the old legends and superstitions, and she still practiced spells and charms as she had always done.

Mother Elga lived in a medieval world, with a medieval mind. The rest of the world had moved on, yet she was content in her ways and certain they were right.

Yet Meg felt removed from the world of her childhood at times. Years on the mainland had changed her—she had a practical, more modern bent, and knowing both the mainland world and the older island ways, she understood both, saw the benefits of both. Time rolled slow in the Hebrides, and on Caransay, tradition, routine, and simplicity ruled.

Meg had acquired Caransay's lease and had done all that she could for the islanders, but she knew that Elga would always live by the old ways, and so would Thora. Norrie's wife was kind but meek, and Mother Elga dominated the family with her old-fashioned beliefs.

Meg had not only outgrown the old ways, she had been deeply hurt by complying with them.

"Mark me, he is the one," Elga said. "You made a bargain and a binding promise with the kelpie, girl, and bore his child. Now you must pay your agreement."

"I have paid more than anyone can know," Meg said quietly. She turned away, caught her breath against tears.

"It was our bargain as much as hers," Thora said. "What she did, Margaret did for us, and everyone on this island. Our homes and our livelihoods are safe. We have all that we could ever want, thanks to her generosity."

"That fortune of gold and riches came to her through the kelpie," Elga said. "Just as much as that sweet child did."

"It came to me through my maternal grandfather's will."

"And never would have come to you at all if his first two heirs had lived," Elga said. "The old man died and left his fortune to his only granddaughter, an island girl. No one expected it. All of it happened within a few weeks of your marriage to the kelpie. He made that magic happen."

"No water-horse could have arranged that," Meg said, letting her impatience slip for a moment. "There is no magic. And he is not my husband!"

"You did not resist him that night, girl," Elga said.

Feeling herself blush, Meg sipped her tea and set down the cup with a chinking sound.

"Once a woman is loved by the kelpie, he will haunt her heart forever," Elga said.

"Mr. Stewart is not my husband," Meg insisted.

"One night with him made you his bride," Thora said. "You had his child. Such marriages are still made in Scotland. It is an old custom but still followed. And rightly so—he should marry you if he gave you a child."

"Go to him," Elga said. "Riches and happiness await. I've seen it in the fire and in the water. Your marriage will—"

"Enough!" Meg burst out. She could not bear the thought of a marriage to the low cad who had tricked her that night. "Enough of this talk of kelpies. He is just a man, and not one we want in this family. Leave it be!" She would spare her grandmothers the truth of what he had done. "I'm going up to the Great House," she said, standing. "I have correspondence to review with Mrs. Berry. Send Iain up to the house after he has had his breakfast. He is to have lessons with Mrs. Berry in reading and mathematics today. And tell him that if the weather holds, we will take him to the beach to play."

"We will come, too," Thora said. "Mrs. Berry is a nice woman. And small Anna loves to play in the sand."

"Small Anna likes to eat sand," Mother Elga grumbled.

"Good, come to the beach later," Meg said. She grabbed her shawl and went to the door.

"We must have a great ceilidh to celebrate when she finally accepts the truth," Elga said, leaning toward Thora.

"He's so handsome," Thora said. "What woman could resist a man like Stewart?"

Sighing, Meg left. Out on the machair, she saw that Dougal Stewart had gone, and the sun was bright over the sea.

* * *

His shelter was snug and cozy, the walls plastered thick to cut the wind and muffle the sound of rain. Barely ten paces side to side, the single room was warmed on cool nights by a coal brazier, and cozy during the days when the sun beat on the thick thatch roof. The small windows let in sea breezes—and sometimes rain and blown sand if Dougal forgot to close the shutters tight.

The best luxury of his little hut was that he had it to himself. He had a canvas hammock, a small cupboard, a wooden chair, and a table large enough to hold maps, charts, and a lamentable amount of correspondence. It was enough. As for the letters, he disliked dealing with those, but he always saw to his duty. As resident engineer, he was also required to keep a daily progress log, crammed with figures and his observations. The Stevenson firm and the lighthouse commissioners expected to be kept informed of all events, problems, and successes in correspondence and, if they requested it, the progress log.

The wind howled, and the night was heavy with rain. Dougal was weary and sore from another long day out on Sgeir Caran. He and his men had been drilling through solid rock in the beating sunshine that was relieved only by sea spray from waves reaching high enough to splash the workers.

Out there, Dougal had paused now and then to watch seals cavorting on the rocks, and a few dolphins had made the men laugh with their antics in the waves. Returning to Caransay later, the men had eaten supper and gone off to their huts to rest, but Dougal was up late, working at the notes, the reports, the maps and drawings. He knew that Alan Clarke and Evan Mackenzie would be doing the same. There was a great deal of detail work to make sure that the project was closely supervised and the resulting structure safe and solid and built to last the ages.

Finishing his report for the commissioners, he then wrote a note to David Stevenson, the brilliant engineer who had recommended him for the job on Sgeir Caran after Dougal had assisted him in completing the nearly impossible task of building a lighthouse on Muckle Flugga, a challenging and inhospitable environment. On Sgeir Caran, Dougal was encountering some of the same issues of design and safety.

But he had a worthy and experienced crew that he could fully trust, and he knew that together they could build a fine lighthouse on Sgeir Caran, one that would serve many.

Sealing the envelope, he reached into a small wooden box where he stored his correspondence and removed a recent letter from Lady Strathlin—or more correctly, her Edinburgh solicitors.

Be assured that you shall not build on Caransay without Lady Strathlin's permission, Mr. Stewart. Despite your parliamentary order, we will stop this enterprise. Your structures will come down, if not by Nature, then by legal writ.

Dougal frowned as he considered the threat. The new barracks were ten stout houses along Innish Harbor, protected by the high headlands. They would not blow out to sea, like the houses his men had constructed on Guga, the small isle beside Caransay had done. Nature indeed. These new huts would stand in high winds.

The letter, like the others, was written in the tight script of some anonymous clerk or secretary. Regardless of their protests, Dougal intended to remain and see that lighthouse complete. Somehow he must convince the baroness and her lawyers of the worth of this project.

Turning the page over, he read the curious postscript there, which had puzzled him earlier. This had been written by the baroness herself—the first direct contact he'd had from her.

Mr. Stewart, the birds who frequent Sgeir Caran may desert the rock if a lighthouse is placed there. A magnificent pair of golden eagles makes their home there each year. At any time of year there are gannets, puffins, and shearwaters—even the little storm petrels that are rarely seen and that make their homes on the undersides of rocky protrusions. The gannets in particular are hunted cruelly in other places. They are bludgeoned to death in a ritual called "the hunting of the Guga." But on Sgeir Caran, they are safe and protected by ancient tradition. The golden eagles are, of course, most beautiful, most spectacular, and to be revered and protected.

For the sake of all these birds, I ask you recommend to the commission another location for the lighthouse. I understand the urgent need for a light to aid seafarers, and I applaud the courage of the men who would build it.

I beg you, sir, to erect your tower elsewhere.

Yours most sincerely, Lady Strathlin at Strathlin Castle

Birds! Intrigued by this new action in their little war of words, Dougal sighed. Each letter had been a move or a countermove, as if they played chess. He never quite knew what might come next, and he had begun to enjoy the correspondence, wondering what the baroness and her lawyers would do next.

But birds—here was an unexpected challenge. He had heard of the lady's acts of charity and generosity, and knew she preferred privacy. He knew little else about her.

Sometimes he imagined her as a formidable older woman. At other times, he wondered if she could be some magnificent, mysterious creature. Whoever she was, he was sure she took some pleasure in their little game of wills. At times she surprised and secretly delighted him—witty, commanding, haughty, plaintive at times, all through her lawyers, but for the new message about the birds. He had a grudging respect and a growing curiosity about the baroness. He did not care for her lawyers at all.