Joan Wolf Read online

  “Excellent, Douglas.” Ian put down his glass of wine and asked cautiously, “How much?”

  The price was surprisingly reasonable. “I know Sir Horace rather well,” explained Douglas. He frowned. “Are you strapped for money, Ian?”

  “Somewhat. The problem is that I need rather a lot of capital. I’m going into the sheep-farming business.”

  “What!”

  “Don’t look at me like that, Douglas. It is not what you think. I’m not going to evict anyone. But I do want to break up the maze of small crofts that covers Lochaber. They hardly provide subsistence living for the tenants. Sheep, on the other hand, have proved to be profitable. What I would like to do is fall back on the old clan tradition of cooperative labor and create sheep farms to be run by groups of crofters. Everyone would contribute something to the capital and labor required to run them, and all would share mutually in the profits.”

  Douglas was looking at his cousin, an odd expression on his face. “And what would your role be?”

  “Well, since the land belongs to me, the crofters would have to pay me rent. I foresee that in the future I will make rather a decent profit.”

  “And for the present?”

  Ian smiled crookedly. “For the present I pay. As there will be no wealthy Lowlander to bring in his sheep and pay me high rents for emptying Lochaber, I shall have to foot the bill myself.” “For buying the sheep you mean?”

  “Yes. And to support the crofters for a little bit. And pay for transport to the market. It will take more capital than I’ve got.”

  “What are you going to do?” Douglas was blunt.

  So was Ian. “Ask the Duke of Argyll to cosign a bank loan with me.”

  There was a stunned silence. “Argyll?” said Douglas.

  “Argyll. He is no friend to the clearances. He has the money and the prestige to stand behind me. There is no other Highland chief who can do it; the rest of them are even poorer than I am. So I am going to ask the duke. That, my dear cousin, is the reason I came to London.”

  “Sweet Jesus.” Douglas blinked several times rapidly. “The world must be coming to an end.”

  Ian looked grimly amused. “I can’t say it is a popular idea with my family but, as I said to Frances, I learned in South American that the nation who refuses to mend its own internal disputes in the face of a common threat is a nation on the verge of destruction.”

  “Yes,” Douglas said slowly, “I see your point.” He looked at Ian and for the first time said her name, “How does Frances feel about all this?”

  “Oh, she agrees with me.” Ian grinned ruefully. “Frances has never been a very good hater. My mother and sister, now, they have the true Macdonald spirit when it comes to the Campbells. They are very disturbed about this. But they are realists as well. They had no other suggestion to put forward so they have screwed their courage to the sticking point and reluctantly agreed. I’m sure they both secretly hope Mac Caileinmhor will spit in my face so they can go back to hating him with impunity.”

  Douglas threw back his head and laughed. “You are probably right.” He sobered suddenly and said with uncharacteristic intensity. “I hope it all goes well, Ian.”

  “So do I,” Ian replied just as soberly. “So do I.”

  * * * *

  The house in Mount Street proved to be just what Frances had had in mind. The nursery was not furnished but Nell settled quite happily into a bedroom not far removed from her mother’s. Once she had gotten organized Frances sat down to write a few notes. One was to her aunt. Lady Mary Grahan, whom she believed to be in residence in Hanover Square. The other was to the Earl and Countess of Aysgarth in Kent, telling them that she was in London with Nell.

  The next thing Frances did was take her sister-in-law shopping. “This is my treat,” she said firmly to Margaret’s protestations. “If I am going to take you to parties and introduce you to people you must be properly dressed. As a matter of fact I had better buy some clothes myself. Edinburgh fashions are always a year behind London’s.”

  Lady Mary came to visit, delighted to see Frances and full of plans for introducing Margaret to as many eligible men as possible. Margaret tended to be rather wary of all these plans. She was not anxious to marry some “mincing Sassenach,” as she said to Frances.

  “You don’t have to marry anybody,” Frances replied calmly. “Just have a good time. There is the theater and the opera and concerts—all kinds of entertainment that I know you will enjoy. I imagine Ian will want to be home for Christmas so we may as well see and do as much as we can in the few months we have. Winter in the Highlands must be rather quiet.”

  Frances’s words made sense to Margaret. She had the Macdonald zest for living and determined to enjoy her stay in London to the utmost. As she also had the Macdonald scorn for the English she pushed the idea of marriage right out of her mind. When Margaret married it would be to one of her own kind.

  One of their first visitors in Mount Street was Douglas. He had found himself reluctant to go but could discover no excuse for staying away. Margaret greeted him in the drawing room. “You look marvelous, Margaret,” he told her, surveying with approval her tall slender figure clad in a walking dress of dusty rose.

  “Thank you, Douglas. Frances’s doing, of course. The only problem is that I have to make most of my appearances with her by my side. It doesn’t seem to have occurred to her that her presence is a distinct disadvantage to her precious scheme of making me the toast of London.” Margaret’s dark eyes were full of affectionate laughter. Despite her words the prospect of making her debut under Frances’s aegis did not appear to be disturbing her at all.

  “Nonsense. You will complement each other. And dark beauties are all the fashion at the moment, I might add.”

  There was a sound in the hall and Douglas turned to see Frances coming in the door. He would know her light step anywhere, he thought. He stood holding her hand and thinking, I had forgotten she could look this way.

  The fire within her that had gone out five years ago when Ian left was lit again. He had never even realized that what they all had been seeing in the interim was simply the glow of the embers. She smiled her unbelievable smile. “Thank you so much, Douglas, for finding us this house. Perhaps if you weren’t so utterly efficient we all wouldn’t rely on you so outrageously.”

  His kind face was surprisingly stem. “I was happy to be able to help.”

  Frances gestured him to a chair, seated herself and Margaret, and rang for tea. He was still sitting there half an hour later when Ian came in. Frances looked at her husband, and her eyes were indescribably beautiful. “You look as if you’ve had good news,” she said to him.

  His own eyes glinted and he came across the room to where she sat. Douglas watched the arrogant, lazy grace of that big body as it bent over Frances briefly. For a moment his lips tightened, then he heard what Ian was saying. “You were successful?” he asked incredulously.

  “Yes. I just spent two hours with Mac Caileinmhor. He has agreed to stand behind me.”

  “I never had any fears he would not,” said Frances with serene radiance.

  Ian’s hand went out very briefly to touch her knee. “You’re prejudiced.”

  “Well I’m glad you are all happy,” Margaret said bitterly. “I find it a bit more difficult to be beholden to the Campbells.”

  “Pride is a dangerous luxury, Maggie,” Ian said gravely. At this his sister, his wife, and his cousin all turned to stare in astonishment. He was serious. They looked in silence at his dark face with its brilliant eyes, high cheekbones, strong nose, and proud mouth. Then, in unison, they began to laugh. “May I ask what you find so amusing?” Ian inquired.

  “You. Preaching humility!” Margaret recovered her breath first.

  After a moment Ian grinned, taking in the still-convulsed faces of his wife and cousin. “I see what you mean. But all the same, Maggie, I mean it. I’m not asking you to love the Campbells. Even I would find that an impossibility. Bu
t we can be civil and cooperative with each other. The duke is going to Ireland for a month, so he has delegated his nephew Ardkinglas to work out the arrangements with me. He seems a decent sort of chap.”

  “For a Campbell,” said Margaret.

  “For a Campbell,” he agreed. “You don’t have to see much of him, Maggie, but if you are rude to him I’ll murder you.”

  Margaret’s mouth set and Frances said gently, “Of course we will be pleasant to Mr. Campbell. Won’t we, Margaret?”

  Margaret looked at her sister-in-law and sighed. “Oh, all right. I’ll be nice to Mr. Bloody Campbell. If it kills me.”

  “It won’t kill you, Maggie love,” said Ian. “I’m sure of it.”

  Chapter Nineteen

  And fair Marg’ret, and rare Marg’ret,

  And Marg’ret o’ veritie,

  Gin ere ye love another man

  N’er love him as ye did me.

  —ANONYMOUS

  The Macdonalds’ arrival in London created a considerable stir among the ton. Frances, of course, had a number of friends whom she had seen regularly during the years of her widowhood. She also had an impressive number of disappointed suitors who flocked to bemoan their fate and see if she really seemed to be happy with Lochaber. “She married him after all,” was the consensus of those who remembered that summer five years ago, when Frances and Ian had been the chief gossip tidbits at everyone’s dinner table.

  Frances was used to the ways of London and paid scant attention to the curiosity watchers whose eyes were constantly on her. In truth, she had been something of a celebrity for so long that she really was oblivious to the stir her presence invariably caused.

  Ian, on the contrary, was startled to find himself the center of as much attention as he was accorded. In Scotland he expected to be deferred to; in England he was an unknown. The Lochabers did not even sit in the House of Lords.

  What had happened was that society was now filled with the young men who had been at school with him. Ian found himself somewhat cynically amused to be suddenly famous because he had been the terror of Eton and Cambridge. He was far from regarding his schooldays with the wistful nostalgia that seemed to afflict so many of his peers. He had been champing at the bit to leave the whole time he was there, and he cherished no desire to return to the playing fields of his boyhood glory.

  To add to his past legend, however, he now had the glamorous distinction of his years in South America. And the publication of Waverly had raised to fever pitch the English interest in the romantic Scottish Highlands. London was in the mood to appreciate a Highland chieftain from an intensely Jacobite family who looked, as one young lady said soulfully, “Just like Conrad in Lord Byron’s Corsair.”

  Ian, however, was engaged in far more mundane affairs than Byron’s heroes ever sullied their hands with. He and James Campbell spent a great deal of time working out the details of the arrangement that was to exist between Lochaber and Argyll. Ian also spent time with the secretary of the Venezuelan legation, Andres Bello, and he had several conversations with the foreign secretary, Lord Castlereagh, about the war in South America.

  Margaret was unaffectedly enjoying herself and the reflected glory of her brother and sister-in-law. She went to balls and danced, she went to dinners and talked, she went to concerts and plays and listened. Her path, however, never crossed that of James Campbell of Ardkinglas until a few weeks after their arrival in London.

  Campbell had called in Mount Street to keep an appointment with Ian. As Ian had not come in yet, Frances had told the butler to bring Mr. Campbell to her in the morning parlor. They had met on one previous occasion and Frances was inclined to like the slender, well-bred Scotsman with the steady blue eyes. They were chatting comfortably when the door opened and Margaret came in. “Oh, I beg your pardon, Frances,” she said in her slow voice that in phrasing was so like her brother’s. “I didn’t realize you had company.”

  “Come in, Margaret,” Frances replied, “and let me introduce Mr. James Campbell of Ardkinglas to you.” Frances cast a hasty glance at the man who had risen immediately upon Margaret’s entrance and what she saw on his face shook her profoundly. She looked back quickly at Margaret, who was standing a few paces into the room. Her tall, slim figure was still as a statue, her brown eyes under the dark, finely arched brows were staring directly into the eyes of James Campbell. She looked spellbound.

  Holy Mother, thought Frances, this can’t be happening.

  For a breathless moment no one spoke, then faint color stained Margaret’s clear olive skin. “What did you say?” she asked Frances with palpable effort.

  “I said I should like to introduce Mr. James Campbell.”

  The beautiful color drained from Margaret’s face. She stared at Frances with appalled eyes. “Did you say Campbell?”

  “Yes.”

  “I—see. How do you do, Mr. Campbell,” she said to the intense blue eyes of the man staring at her as if he had seen a vision. “I just looked in to see if you want something from the lending library, Frances,” she added hastily.

  “No, thank you anyway,” Frances returned.

  “Very well. I’m off, then,” said Margaret, and retreated swiftly from the room.

  Frances turned slowly to face James Campbell of Ardkinglas. He had flushed darkly red. “Who was that?” he asked Frances in a taut voice.

  “Good heavens,” said Frances, really shaken now. “Didn’t I say? That was my sister-in-law, Margaret Macdonald.”

  “Lochaber’s sister?”

  “Yes.”

  “Oh.” There was a pause, then he said flatly, “She doesn’t much care for the Campbells, I take it.”

  Frances’s eyes dropped to her hands, which were slowly folding a piece of embroidery over and over. “She is a Macdonald of Lochaber and Glencoe. It is a clan that has a long memory,”

  “Yes, I know.” There was a moment of strained silence and then the door opened and Ian came in. He sensed the unease, took in the somber look on Campbell’s face, the tenseness of Frances’s body, and frowned. “Is anything wrong?”

  “Of course not,” Frances said too quickly and Campbell seconded her eagerly. By unspoken mutual consent neither said anything about Margaret. In a few minutes Ian led Ardkinglas away to the library and Frances was left alone in the morning parlor.

  She knew what it was she had just seen. Frances was a firm believer in love at first sight. It had happened to her when she was a great deal younger than Margaret. But like her sister-in-law, she was appalled at who were the parties involved. Ian wouldn’t like it. Of that she was positive. Even Frances found her mind shying away from the thought of marriage to a Campbell. And what, for the love of heaven, must Margaret be thinking?

  ****

  A second confrontation occurred that week to disturb the accord of the Lochaber household. The Earl and Countess of Aysgarth came to town and Frances took Nell to see them. She had been slightly apprehensive about their reaction to her marriage, but they seemed to be genuinely pleased for her. “After all,” as Lady Aysgarth had said to her husband when they first received the news, “it has been two years since Robert’s death. One could hardly expect a beautiful young woman like Frances to remain a widow forever.’’ The only fear that the Aysgarths had was that they would lose touch with Nell.

  “Of course you will continue to see her,” Frances had said warmly when she divined this concern. “Why you know how Nell loves her Grandmama and Grandpapa.” And when Lady Aysgarth asked if Nell could return with them to Kent for two weeks, Frances had not been able to say no. She was acutely aware that from Ian’s point of view it was not the time to bring in the Sedburghs, but he would have to accept their relationship to Nell one day. So she said yes, to Nell’s delight; her grandparents spoiled her shamefully and she reveled in it.

  Frances and Margaret were going to the theater with a party that evening and Ian was engaged with some South American friends, so he was not going to accompany them. He came into Fra
nces’s dressing room before he left to say goodbye, and she dismissed her maid and said, “I have something to tell you, Ian, and I’d better do it before you hear it from Nell.”

  He sat down in a fragile chair and Frances offered a silent prayer that it wouldn’t break under him. “What is happening?” he asked.

  “I went to see the Aysgarths today,” she said quietly. “They arrived in London this week.”

  At the name Aysgarth Ian’s face had hardened. “Oh?” he said only.

  “Yes. I took Nell.” He said nothing and after a moment she went on, conscious that her heart was beating uncomfortably fast. “They wanted to take Nell to Aysgarth with them for two weeks and I said she could go.”

  Ian’s mouth looked like it was set in iron. “No,” he said.

  Frances had promised herself never to quarrel with Ian again, but on this subject she knew she could not give in. “Why not?” she asked steadily. “Surely you are not so small-minded that you can’t share Nell with two old people who love her?”

  It was not Nell that Ian found it impossible to share, but he could hardly say that to Frances. How could he explain the fact that he was jealous of a dead man? The shadow of Robert Sedburgh had been hovering over him ever since they arrived in London. “After all, Ian,” he heard Frances say, “they are her grandparents.”

  He rose to his feet, intimidatingly large in that delicate, woman’s room. “They are not her grandparents,” he said with harsh emphasis.

  She stared at him, her face taking on that remote look it wore when she was angry. “They don’t know that.”

  He suddenly took a step toward her. “How did they know you were in town?” he asked grimly.