Tidings of Great Boys (23 page)

“Lady Lindsay—”

“Gentlemen, I have one thing to say.” The crowd quieted just enough to hear me. “We’re expecting the neighborhood round about
to come tonight for Hogmanay. If I hear of any of you waylaying our guests, getting underfoot, or bringing yourselves to their
attention in any way, I will press charges of harassment. Is that clear?”

“What’s Hogmanay?” said an English voice, clearly lost. The reporters, who seemed to be Scottish with a smattering of other
accents, growled at him.

“Do I have your agreement?” I asked.

“If you’ll give us an exclusive with Shani Hanna.” Oh, she was a tricky one, the woman in the camel coat. Never missed a beat.
She’d be presenting in a nice, warm studio before another year was out, with no more tramping round in the snow after a story.

“I’ll do no such thing. Shani and the prince are no longer seeing each other. That makes her a private citizen and not flash
fodder for the likes of you.”

“Is it true they were engaged? Was the video a ploy to get his attention?”

“Thank you for your cooperation, ladies and gentlemen,” I said cheerfully. “Our guests are arriving at eight o’clock. I expect
you all to be gone by then.”

“Lady Lindsay, who’s the young man with you? Is that your boyfriend?” Gray Parka Guy was back.

“You’ll find the Cairn and Crown a very comfortable place to have a bit of supper and a nice pint,” I said, smiling as though
I really meant it. “A good evening to you, and the best in the new year.”

Some of them actually returned the greeting, though the woman in the camel coat had flushed with frustration. I turned my
back on them all and Alasdair offered me his arm.

So lovely and old-fashioned.

What, you think I would turn down an opportunity to walk half a mile tucked up against his side? I’m not stupid. No, in fact,
being a thoroughly modern girl, I slipped my hand under his elbow and took it like the lady I am.

I
LOVE GETTING ready for a party. I love planning it and talking about it. But most of all I love dressing for it.

Every shower in the house was running at once after tea, which meant some people got their water piping hot and some had to
take the tepid and even cold leftovers where the plumbing couldn’t keep up. When mine ran cold, I realized how soft I’d become
in London and California. I shrieked and rinsed off in double time, instead of being a proper Scot and toughing it out.

I swore to myself that when we became a hotel, the boilers would be the first things on the replacement list.

Showered, lotioned, buffed, and dried, we all assembled in my room to dress. “What did you all bring?” Despite the fact that
Gillian had lugged along enough luggage to go round the world with—twice—I knew it was difficult to pack a proper party dress,
especially one that required boning and petticoats, like mine.

I pulled my
ceilidh
dress out of the closet.

“Is that what you’re wearing?” Carly asked. “There have to be six yards of silk. You’d better hope no one holding a drink
bumps into you.”

“It’s traditional,” I said. “Normally I’m not much on tradition. I’ve even been known to wear Doc Martens to Ascot on Ladies’
Day. But somehow…” I trailed off.

“Tonight seems like a good time for tradition,” Lissa said. “Especially if your dad goes for the hotel thing and this is the
last family party you get to have here.”

The last thing I expected was for my throat to close up. Or for Lissa to be so wise. I nodded, to cover up the fact that (a)
she was right, and (b) I was more emotional about it than I’d admitted even to myself.

The strapless dress had to go on over my head because of my tulle petticoat, and Lissa zipped it up for me. Then I pulled
my
earasaid
from its hanger.

“What is that?” Gillian wanted to know. “I’m thinking plaid shawls don’t go with cream silk, girlfriend.”

“Ah, but this is Scotland, where the plaid goes with everything.” I swung the length of MacPhail dress tartan over my shoulder
and secured it with my great-great-grandmother’s sapphire brooch. The ends hung down nearly to my knees and gave a bit of
swing in the turns of any dance.

Then I turned to the velvet box that had mysteriously appeared on my dressing table while we’d been working in the ballroom.

“Oh, my,” Shani breathed. “Is that—?”

“Yes. Mummy must have brought it up with her. She keeps it in the bank in London.”

“You’re not really going to—”

“I am, indeed,” I said. “The neighbors would stage an uprising if you even suggested there was a class system operating here.
Dad deplores it. He’s the most class-averse man you could hope to meet. But woe betide you if you have Hogmanay at Strathcairn
and the countess and her daughter don’t wear the bling.”

While Gillian laughed in disbelief, Carly sighed with sheer satisfaction as I slipped the Strathcairn ruby tiara into my hair
and secured the heavy little arc with clips. “You think this is bad, you should see Mummy’s.”

“I don’t think it’s bad at all,” Carly said. “I’m just glad I got a chance to see it. How old is it?”

“The original came with Mary Gordon in 1651. It was updated for Queen Victoria’s Jubilee—that’s when these diamonds were put
in.” I touched them. “Mummy’s is from the 1860s, when the family invested in some mines in South Africa.” I looked over at
Shani, who was hovering in indecision over two heaps of shimmering fabric. “You think the Star of the Desert is big. They
had to break up the original Nafisa diamond because the countess couldn’t hold her head up. So now it’s in bits between Mummy’s
tiara, this one, and a necklace.”

“I can’t wait,” Carly said.

“All right, you lot,” I said, “who can I help?”

“Me,” Shani moaned. “I can’t decide.” She held up the two dresses. One was the raspberry 1972 Lanvin she’d worn on a date
with the prince that fall, and the other her Lagerfeld.

“You’re going to be dancing Strip the Willow,” I reminded her. “Will the Lagerfeld stand up to it?”

“You’re right.” Resolutely, she hung it from the top edge of my closet door. “The Lanvin is way more comfortable for dancing.”

“And plus you look totally hot in it,” Lissa said.

“There is that.” Shani smiled. “Mac, you wouldn’t have a chain or anything I could borrow, would you? My jewelry’s all in
the safe deposit box.”

I grinned at her. “Would this do?” I lifted the false bottom out of the tiara box and showed her the ruby necklace that went
with it.

She tried to keep her jaw from dropping. “Oh. Well, um, I suppose I could make do with that.”

“Gee, Mac, I don’t suppose you have a rope of pearls anywhere around here?” Lissa asked in a bored tone as she stepped into
the silver waterfall dress she’d worn last year at the Benefactors’ Day Ball. “I couldn’t fit my diamonds into my carry-on.”

“No, but Grannie does. She’s coming up from Edinburgh. D’you want me to call her and ask if you can borrow it?”

“No!” Lissa practically shrieked. “I was kidding, you loon.”

“That dress would be spoiled if you put jewelry with it, anyway,” Carly told her. “But I would updo your hair and put Alasdair’s
thistle pin in it. It would be a nice compliment.”

With a sly glance at me, Lissa murmured, “Okay. It’s probably safe to do that… now.”

“If you only knew.” I ran the zipper up the back of Carly’s completely stunning gown that had to be her own design. “
Mi’ja
, tell me you didn’t make this in your spare time.”

“I did, actually.” She grinned at my appalling Spanish over her shoulder, then frowned down at her chest. “I’m still not sure
about the draping in the front, though. The crisscrossed bandage look is so last fall.”

“Uh-huh. It reminds the world you have cleavage, girlfriend. Don’t knock it. I’m wearing opera gloves. Do you want my other
pair?”

“Ooh! Yes, please.”

“So what was that supposed to mean, Mac, what you just said?” Lissa asked.

“What, about Carly’s cleavage?”

“No, silly. About Alasdair.” Lissa poured Gillian into a little confection that had to be Tori Wu. Who else could take the
Betsey Johnson mini-prom-dress look and cross it with a
cheongsam
and have it come out quite like that?

“Gillian, that dress is amazing,” I said. “How are you going to do your hair?”

“I’ll tell you as soon as you spill about Alasdair. What’s going on with him?”

“Absolutely nothing.” I handed Carly my second pair of gloves out of the bureau and began pulling on my own. “He doesn’t seem
to get that I want to be more than just friends. Or rather, he gets it. He just has a million reasons why it’s a bad idea.”

“Have you talked about it?” Gillian asked.

“Yes. Which is why I know about the million reasons. Like, I’m rich and he’s poor. Which, as Mummy has told me, is no longer
as true as it used to be. And the age difference. And the fact that he’s Gabe’s guest.”

“Which has what to do with it?” Lissa wondered.

“Blah, blah, blah,” I finished. “I appreciate you lot angling to give us time together. Not that it did a bit of good.”

“It must have done some good, if you’re friends,” Shani put in. “I mean, I know that’s not what you want, but it’s something.”

“Does Rashid consider you a friend now after you turned him down?” I asked her.

“Yes. I mean, it’s not like we’re eating lunches together all the time, but it’s all cool between us. And I know him a lot
better than I did before, since he’s not trying to impress me all the time. He’s just… himself.”

“Careful,” Carly said with a smile. “You might fall for him all over again.”

“I think Danyel would have something to say about that,” Lissa said. “And of the two, I think he’d wear better in the wash,
you know? Hey, do you want help with your hair?”

“Not me.” Shani scooped her hair up and wound it round one hand. “What do you think of the sixties pouf?”

“With your cheekbones, it’d be perfect,” I said.

Hair always takes the longest. Mine was basically done, and as all of us knew, Shani could produce amazing do’s in the dark
with one hand tied behind her back. That left Lissa’s updo, Carly’s curls, and Gillian’s razor-sharp angled bob, which just
needed some sheen and a brush-out.

The clock chimed eight and we looked at one another.

“We are so hot,” Lissa said without a trace of smugness. She was just reporting the truth.

“Smart, too. We can dance Strip the Willow,” Gillian added.

“Come on, girls.” I ushered them out of my room and toward the upstairs balcony. “Let me show you how to make an entrance.”

THIS BEING THE COUNTRY, people had made an effort to arrive on the tick of the dot, which meant the entry hall was a crush
when we appeared at the top of the stairs.

Dad, dressed in full tartan kit, and Mummy, in the diamonds and Emanuel Ungaro couture, stood near the door, greeting people
as they came in. I caught Dad’s eye and raised my eyebrows in a meaningful look.

“Friends, neighbors,” he called over the buzz of the crowd, “please join me in welcoming our daughter, Lindsay, and her friends
Shani Hanna—” I gave Shani a gentle shove in the small of her back to get her moving down the stairs. “—Lissa Mansfield, Gillian
Chang, and Carolina Aragon.”

One by one, as he called their names, my friends floated down the grand circular staircase like the stars they were. I brought
up the end of the procession, and Dad met me at the foot of the stairs with a hug.

“Wasn’t too theatrical, was it?” he whispered anxiously in my ear.

“It was perfect. Saves so much time in introductions later, too.”

I plunged into the crowd to be kissed and exclaimed over, and to have my gloved hand shaken again and again. Even Carrie,
dressed in a purple strapless confection that I swear had come from an eighties consignment shop, managed to remember she
was in polite company, and we air kissed as if we were still friends. My grannie, who was seventy and dressed like me in a
bottle-green
ceilidh
gown and her MacPhail hunting
earasaid
, practically crushed the breath from me with her hug.

“I heard about this hotel plan,” she whispered fiercely.

Oh, dear
. “Gran, I—”

“Dinna fash yerself, lassie. I think it’s a wonderful idea, and our Graham had best get that through his thick skull or lose
the place altogether. I’ll not have it passing out of MacPhail hands. I will
not
.”

“Wow, Grannie.” Not for nothing had the Dowager Countess spent several seasons as a lady-in-waiting at Buckingham Palace.
“Has Mummy been talking to you?”

She made a sound like
whssht
. “I can see through a grinding stone with a hole in it, even if he cannot. You leave my son to me.”

Poor Dad. With all his women rallied against him, he didn’t stand a chance.

I don’t think I’d consciously been praying about the hotel plan or anything. As you can tell, I’m not very good at praying.
But all the same,
someone
had dragged in support from the place I’d least expected it. With a strange feeling of relief, I struck that problem off
my mental to-do list and left it to my formidable grandmother.