Until You (50 page)

“Is her heart broken?” Logan queried Lord Cambridge.

“Aye, it is. But hearts can be mended, or so I am told,” was the reply.

“I have been given another chance with her,” Logan said softly.

“Perhaps,” Tom answered him. “But go slowly, Logan Hepburn. Do not attempt to overwhelm my cousin this time by being forceful with her. She needs a strong man, but that man must also respect that she is a strong woman. You need not break her spirit to bend her to your will.”

The laird of Claven’s Carn nodded, understanding. “You will tell her of my wife’s demise?”

“I will. But do not come courting until midsummer. She liked Jeannie and would not approve of any disrespect shown towards her. And in the name of all that is holy, Logan Hepburn, do not mention the bairns you desire of her! If you can coax her to the altar, the bairns will come as a natural result of your passions for each other. Now, tell me, what is for dinner, dear boy, for I am absolutely ravenous?”

The laird laughed aloud. He had forgotten how amusing Tom Bolton could be. Laughing felt good. It had been a long time since he had laughed. Hearing a small noise coming from the cradle, he saw his son was awake. Lifting the lad from his bed, he displayed him to his guest. “Is this not a fine lad, Tom Bolton? Do I not have a fine son?”

“Indeed, Logan Hepburn, you do!” Lord Cambridge agreed.

The boy squirmed in his father’s arms, anxious to get down. The laird set him upon the floor, and the little fellow toddled over to one of the great wolfhounds in the hall, climbing upon its back and crowing with delight. The two men laughed as the dog turned its massive head and licked the child’s face lovingly.

“I’ll have him on his first pony come the spring,” the laird boasted. “He’s a braw little laddie, Tom Bolton.”

“Aye,” Tom agreed. “I can see that he is.”
And I can see you are a good and doting father, which will not harm you in my cousin’s eyes.

“You’ll stay the night?” the laird said.

“I will,” Lord Cambridge responded. “Will your brothers be joining us?”

“They were lost at Flodden,” Logan replied.

“Ah, your sorrow is great, my lord. A winter of mourning will ease your heart, I am sure,” came the reply.

 

In the morning Tom returned to Friarsgate, eager to impart all that he knew to Rosamund.

She wept learning of Jeannie and her child. “And the wee laddie she bore last year motherless. Ah, cousin, these are hard times for us all.”

“They are,” he agreed.

Afterwards, when she had gone from the hall, Edmund asked Tom, “Will he come courting, do you think?”

“Perhaps, but I have advised him not to appear until at least midsummer,” Tom replied. “She liked Jeannie.”

“Aye, she did,” Edmund agreed.

“You must tell Maybel to hold her peace,” Tom said.

“Aye,” Edmund agreed. “I will remind my well-meaning spouse that if she natters on at Rosamund about Logan Hepburn being a bachelor once more, it could drive the lass away. Of course, Logan may do that himself if he goes on about bairns,” Edmund chuckled.

“I’ve warned him about that, too,” Tom responded, chuckling himself.

 

They celebrated the festive holidays, which concluded with Twelfth Night in early January. Tom was once again generous with Rosamund’s daughters. She was amazed that he had managed to find gifts for them all under the circumstances.

“Perhaps in the spring,” he told her, “I may travel into Scotland and see about that ship we want to built. It has been a year now since I first suggested it, dear girl.”

“We have lost no time,” she assured him. “The new flocks we bought last summer are doing very well. We’ll have quite a birthing of lambs next month.”

“I have never understood why sheep insist on having their offspring in February,” he said. “The weather is foul, and the wolves are hunting vigorously.”

“No one has ever understood sheep,” Rosamund told him, laughing. “It is their own way, and they will have it, I fear. At least I have the flocks all gathered in now that the snows are covering the grazing on the hillsides.”

The winter had now set in about them. Tom returned to Otterly to husband his own estate and attend to his business affairs. The days were beginning to grow visibly longer again by Candlemas on February second. Father Mata was teaching Rosamund’s daughters six mornings a week. The three girls sat at the high board and studied diligently, for both their mother and their uncles had said it was important, no matter what others might say. All of them could read and write now. The young priest taught them Latin, not simply the church Latin needed for the mass but the Latin that was spoken within the civilized nations. Rosamund taught them French even as their father had taught her when they first met. They already knew their numbers and simple arithmetic. Rosamund and Edmund schooled Philippa in how to keep Friarsgate’s accounts, as the responsibility would one day be hers.

“Great lords have others to do this for them,” Rosamund said, “but a wise woman knows how to manage her monies herself, lest those others attempt to cheat her because she is a woman or make mistakes. It is not easy to manage Friarsgate, but if you would keep it safe you must learn, Philippa. Do you understand me, my child?”

Philippa nodded. “Aye, mama, I do. But when I marry one day, will my husband not take on this task for me?”

“Friarsgate will belong to you, Philippa, not your husband. You are the heiress to Friarsgate, my daughter. It will be yours until you pass it on to your eldest-born son or daughter,” Rosamund explained. “It will never be your husband’s property. I am the last Bolton of Friarsgate. You will be the Meredith of Friarsgate, but your heir, and I do hope it is a son, will be the next lord or lady of this manor. My unfortunate uncle Henry could never live with this knowledge. For him Friarsgate is the Boltons’, but our sons are now all gone.”

“What about Uncle Henry’s son, mama?” Philippa asked innocently.

“He could never be the heir unless your sisters and I were gone from this earth,” she said. “I have not seen him since he was a child. He was an obnoxious little boy, strutting and making pronouncements.”

“They say he is a robber chief now,” Philippa said.

“So I am told,” Rosamund replied. “Who told you that?”

“Maybel did. She said Uncle Henry’s son is even worse than his strumpet mother,” Philippa repeated.

“I suspect Maybel is right,” Rosamund answered her daughter, “but she should not have said it to you, Philippa. Put my wicked uncle and his offspring from your mind. They will have nothing to do with your life.”

“Yes, mama,” the little girl said dutifully.

Rosamund sought out her old nursemaid. “Do not speak to the girls about my uncle’s son. You will frighten them, Maybel.”

“Very little frightens that trio,” Maybel answered pithily.

“That is because they are young and sheltered. They have not lived as I did as a child. I don’t want them to be afraid of the Boltons.”

“You keep them too close, Rosamund,” Maybel said. “Philippa has been to Queen Margaret’s court. I think you should take her to her own king’s court to meet our good queen. She was once your friend. Perhaps she will favor Philippa if she knows her. Philippa will be ten in April. It is time you begin seeking out a worthy husband for her.”

“Not yet,” Rosamund said. “Perhaps when she is twelve.”

“All the good matches will be taken if you wait too long,” Maybel replied, outraged by Rosamund’s attitude.

“Why, you had two husbands by the time you were her age, and a third two years after you were twelve.”

“Which is precisely why I shall wait until Philippa is older. I don’t want her marrying some graybeard. I want her to fall in love and marry a man closer to her in age, who will hopefully be her one and only husband,” Rosamund said.

“Romantic twaddle!” Maybel huffed.

“But she is my child,” Rosamund said, “and I will plan her life, as it is my right to do. I mean to plan wisely for Philippa and her sisters.”

“They may have their own plans,” Maybel said sharply.

 

The hillside now began to grow green with the coming of spring. The ewes proudly shepherded their new offspring into the meadows beneath the warm spring sun. The fields were plowed and the grain sown in those being used this year. The orchards came into full bloom. Rosamund’s second daughter, Banon, celebrated her eighth birthday on the fifteenth day of March. Philippa turned ten at the end of April, and Bessie was six by the end of May. Tom came from Otterly, as he had for the two previous birthday celebrations. He brought Bessie a small terrier pup as a present. She squealed with delight upon opening the basket in which he had placed it, and then she hugged him. The squirming puppy jumped from its basket and scampered across the garden with Bessie in hot pursuit, causing them all to laugh. It was at that moment uninvited guests arrived, ushered into the gardens by a house servant.

“Such gaiety,” Henry Bolton said. He was accompanied by a tall young man whom Rosamund immediately recognized as her cousin Henry the younger.

She arose. “Uncle, this is a surprise, but you are, of course, welcome.” She deliberately ignored her cousin.

“I have brought my son with me today. He has been living with me,” Henry said.

“I had heard he has taken to robbery, uncle,” Rosamund replied.

“Nay, nay, niece. He is a reformed man. Aren’t you, my son?” Henry said.

“Yes, father,” the young man responded. His gaze had fastened upon Philippa. “Is that the heiress to Friarsgate?” he asked his sire.

“You have never been noted for your subtlety, cousin,” Rosamund told him. “But if you think to wed my daughter, put it from your mind. I told your father this in December.” She glared at her relations.

“The little wench has to marry someone, cousin,” the young man replied.

“There are two criteria for her husband. She must love the man she marries, and he must be of a high social station. You fit neither of those standards, cousin. If that is the purpose of your visit, then you have wasted your time.”

“Is this the kind of hospitality you offer me?” Henry demanded, outraged.

“You come into our midst unannounced, uncle, bringing my cousin, who has spent his last years in robbery and mayhem. Your purpose is to make a match between my innocent child and this ruffian, something I previously told you was not possible. And you wonder I do not welcome you with open arms? You have dedicated your life, uncle, to stealing Friarsgate from me. You have failed. Now you hope you may yet gain it through my daughter. It will not happen, I tell you! Now, get out! Take your wicked spawn with you and know that you shall never darken my door again!” Rosamund stood as tall as she could, her index finger pointing out of the garden. About her, her family was very, very quiet. Her daughters had never seen her this angry.

“You were always a difficult girl,” Henry said. His face was red with his outrage. “This is Bolton land, you stupid bitch! It must remain Bolton land! I will kill you before I allow Friarsgate to be given to a stranger!” He lunged at her furiously, but Rosamund was quicker and stepped back.

“Get out!” she told him again in a hard voice.

Henry’s face now turned from red to deep red to purple. “Why could you have not died with your brother and your parents? You have ever been a thorn in my side, you damned bitch! This should all be mine!” He was foaming about his lips, and then with a loud cry, he collapsed at her feet and was very still.

“I think you have finally killed the old devil off,” Henry the younger said as Edmund knelt, seeking a pulse from his half-brother.

Edmund looked up. “He is dead, Rosamund.”

“Good!” she replied vehemently.

Father Mata stepped forward. “Have mercy, lady,” he counseled her gently.

“He had none on me,” Rosamund said softly. Henry Bolton was dead. She could scarce believe it, but it was true. Then she said, “I will give him in death what I would not give him in life, Mata. He may be buried here at Friarsgate.”

The priest nodded approvingly.

“His cottage?” Henry the younger said. “Is it now mine?”

“Nay,” Tom quickly said. “I built it for your father to live out his life in, but it is part of Otterly, and Otterly is mine. I know your father had a will, young Henry, and you are his sole heir. Meet me at Otterly in a week’s time, and we will see what it is you have inherited.”

The young man nodded. Then he turned to Rosamund and bowed. “I will not say it has been pleasurable seeing you again, cousin,” he told her wryly. “And I should far rather wed and bed you than the little wench who is your heiress. I am old enough now by far, and it is said that I am skilled in passion.”

“Get out!” Rosamund said once more. “The sight of you sickens me, and your lack of grief is shameful.”

“I do not grieve for him,” her cousin said. “He was wretched to my mother. I hated him for it. Had I gotten my hands on Friarsgate, I should have exiled him from it even as you did. And I would not have allowed his bones to be interred in its soil.” He bowed to her once more. “Perhaps I shall return, cousin.”

“Do not,” Rosamund said in a hard, cold voice.