Page 41 of Wild Wicked Scot
She bent down and picked up a pair of stained buckskins. If she was going to keep near to him, she would not abide this field of debris.
CHAPTER ELEVEN
ONTHEWAYto his chambers, Arran was intercepted by Sweeney, who informed him that MacLeary and his men were at the gates.
“Now?” Arran asked. He wasn’t expecting them.
“Aye, milord. Donald Thane has put them in the barbican with a flagon of whisky.”
The old barbican had once been used for defense of the castle, but Arran’s father had refurbished the rooms to host travelers for the night. It wasn’t unusual that persons who had arrived in Scotland by sea would find their way to Balhaire. “Find Jock and send him to me,” Arran said, and reversed course, headed for the barbican.
MacLeary was a large man with a shock of white hair that made him look a wee bit like a snowcapped mountain. He had meaty jowls and hands, and when he greeted Arran, he clapped him so hard on the back that Arran might have gone sprawling had he not been prepared for it. MacLeary had come in the company of two men; the three were passing the flagon of whisky between them.
“Arran Mackenzie, look at ye, lad,” MacLeary boomed. “There is no’ a bonnier man in all of Scotland, is there? Were I no’ married these thirty years, I’d ask for yer hand.”
His men laughed heartily.
“I must remember to send round thanks to your wife and pray for her continued good health,” Arran drawled. “What brings you to Balhaire, then?”
“We’re bound for Coigeach and a meeting there,” he said, referring to another MacLeary holding north of Balhaire. “You’ll want to attend as well, Mackenzie. I’ve news for you.”
The door opened behind Arran; Jock walked into the room. Arran waited for the men to exchange greetings and Jock to settle onto a bench.
“What news, then?” Arran asked MacLeary.
“Tom Dunn has come round,” MacLeary said.
Arran hadn’t heard that name in several years. Tom Dunn was a controversial figure in these parts. Some regarded him as a loyal patriot of Scotland and the Highlands. Others considered him a traitor to Scotland. Dunn had been friend to the Mackenzies for as long as Arran could remember, but in recent years, he’d heard some unsettling things about the man.
It had begun after the official union of Scotland and England. Dunn had settled in London to capitalize on the new connections. Or spy for the English, depending on whom one believed. “Lined his pockets with English gold,” Arran had heard one man say. There was no proof of it, but since the union, rumors about everyone flowed like a burning river through these hills.
“What of him?” Arran asked.
“I’ve no’ spoken to the man, but I’ve heard something interesting from Marley Buchanan.” MacLeary paused to pour whisky into a glass. “Dunn told Buchanan that your Norwood has been...what’s the word, then, lads...mi-onorach,” he said with a swirl of his hand.
There was not an exact translation for the word, but Arran understood MacLeary—he meant Margot’s father was involved in something dishonest.
“In what way?”
“They say he’s making bedfellows of the French in the war against England to keep his pockets full, aye? But when suspicion was cast at him, he blamed it on you. Said he had no knowledge of any dealings with the French but had heard thatyouare plotting with them.”
Arran was stunned. “I trade with the French openly and honestly. And lawfully by the Acts of Union.”
“It’s no’ your trade he impugns, lad. He insinuates that you mean to bring French troops to Balhaire and, together with your Highland men, support the effort to put James Stuart on the throne.”
Arran stared at MacLeary. James Stuart was the surviving son of King James II, who had been displaced from the throne before Arran was born. James Stuart lived in the French courts and practiced Catholicism. His half sister and reigning queen of England, Queen Anne, had been raised as a Protestant. The queen had no surviving children, and her health was not good. It had been decreed by the Acts of Succession that when she died, her successor would likewise be a Protestant. Therefore, her brother, James Stuart, would have no claim to the throne. It would go to the queen’s nearest living Protestant relative, George Hanover.
There were many in Scotland, and even a few in England, who believed that the rightful heir to the throne was the queen’s half brother and son of King James II. Moreover, there were many who would prefer to see that line of Stuarts restored to the throne sooner rather than later. Those who actively sought that end were known as Jacobites.
It was impossible to believe that Norwood would be involved in such deadly politics. And to be involved to such an extent that he would label Arran a Jacobite sympathizer seemed out of character for him. After all, Norwood was the one who had proposed that Arran marry his only daughter to expand both their holdings. Why would he want to tear apart what he’d worked so hard to put together?
“I’m no’ a Jacobite. There’s no’ a man in the Highlands who believes I am. I donna believe it,” Arran said flatly. “Norwood helped design the union. He staked his reputation on it, and he is loyal to the queen. Why would he seek to harm that?”
“Ach, the queen,” MacLeary said with a beefy wave of his hand. “She’s no’ right in the head, that one. She sleeps with her maid and wars with the Duchess of Marlborough over jewels or some such nonsense. She’s no’ meant to lead nations, and word from London is that she’s no’ long for this world, aye? Donna close your eyes and ears, man. Men are aligning themselves with whomever they believe will prevail. And ye know as well as I do that ye canna trust aSassenachas long as a day.”
Arran didn’t disagree with that, but still, it seemed too risky for Norwood. “It doesna make sense,” he insisted, holding up a hand. “If I were accused of treason and made to stand trial, that would mean that my lands—hisdaughter’slands—would be forfeited to the crown.”
“Or...perhaps yer lands would be forfeited and given as reward to whoever exposed the treason,” MacLeary suggested. “It’s a gamble a man might find worth taking.”
