Page 26 of Hard-Hearted Highlander
Catriona turned her attention to the maid, shaking her head as she helped herself to a seat on the settee. She frowned at the boots, and Miss Holly once again attempted to tuck that tress of hair behind her ear. “What is your age, Miss Holly?” Catriona suddenly asked.
“Pardon?”
“Your age,” Catriona said again. She could be too direct in her speech at times, a trait she’d inherited from Auntie Zelda.
Miss Holly was clearly taken aback. “Ah...nine and twenty,” she said.
Catriona laughed. “An old maid, are you? A spinster, put on the shelf.”
“Cat,” Rabbie said in Gaelic. “At least one of us must mind our manners.”
“I beg your pardon, I shouldna have said, aye?” she said to Miss Holly. “I laugh because we are the same age, we are, and that is what has been said of me,” she reported cheerfully.
“Far worse has been said of me,” Miss Holly admitted, and glanced away from them both. She didn’t sound indignant, but rather seemed to be correcting Catriona’s view of her.
“What do you mean, then?” Catriona asked.
“You’ve said enough, Cat,” Rabbie said in Gaelic. “Leave the woman be. She is not our concern.”
Catriona smiled at Miss Holly. “My brother reminds me that I must learn to speak before I think. So you’ve no’ married, Miss Holly?” she asked, ignoring Rabbie’s advice.
Miss Holly swallowed. “Ah...no.”
It was curious, the way she answered this question. Rabbie couldn’t say if she was embarrassed that she was not married, or if she was perhaps not telling the truth.
“You?” she asked of Catriona.
“Oh, no,” Catriona said, and strolled to the sideboard to have a look at the bottles there.
Rabbie knew, perhaps better than anyone, as he and Catriona had always been rather close, that Catriona’s marital status was a source of anguish for her. She was a strong, independent woman...but she wanted a family. She had learned to hide her disappointment behind bravado.
“I’m like my Auntie Zelda, aye?” Catriona said, as if being unmarried scarcely bothered her at all. “Auntie Zelda never married and all her life, she has come and gone as she pleased.” Catriona glanced up at Bernadette. “I like that I might live as I please. I’ve heard that in England a woman doesna have that freedom.”
“I’m not... I don’t know,” Miss Holly said. She tried to tuck the hair behind her ear again, and again it fell.
“Even if I desired to marry, there is scarcely a lad about, is there?” Catriona continued. She turned from the sideboard and said, “All of them scattered now, are they no’?”
“Scattered?” Miss Holly repeated curiously.
Catriona’s attention snapped to the maid. “Aye, scattered,” she said. A wee bit of bitterness had crept into her voice. “Surely you know this.”
“Know what?”
“She doesna know,” Rabbie said impatiently. It was astounding to him that what had been done to the Highlands of Scotland could remain unknown to anyone. “Leave it be, Cat. She will no’ care.”
“Sheoughtto know,” Catriona said to him in Gaelic. “Every one of them ought to know what they did.” She turned back to Miss Holly and said, in English, “You’ve heard of the slaughter at Culloden Moor, have you no’? The English forces slaughtered Stuart rebels and pillaged the hills.”
“Pillaged!” Miss Holly seemed surprised by Catriona’s choice of words.
“Aye, pillaged. Hamlets emptied, people gone missing.”
“I didn’t...” Miss Holly hesitated, frowning. “I had heard of the fighting, naturally, but I wasn’t aware—”
“Good afternoon.”
Miss Kent had arrived and stepped tentatively into the salon. She was dressed in a green riding habit and matching green hat.
“Aye, good afternoon, Miss Kent,” said Catriona.
