Page 20 of The Scot Who Loved Me
“Blame me, cousin. It was my idea.” Cecelia could be innocence in white muslin. “You are to play the part of an up-and-coming merchant courting Anne.”
He pinched the front of his coat. “Wearing cast-offs from a rag-n-bone mon? No one will believe it.” He relaxed in the chair. “I thought you needed a strong back. To haul things and such.”
“We need that too, but it must be a well-dressed back.” Cecelia stretched her arm toward an old sea chest, a silent squatter in the room. “Your new wardrobe awaits. You’ll be pink of the fashion. After some alterations, of course.”
The chest’s lid slanted open from clothes crammed to overflowing. Silks and gold embellishments winked in the light, top of the mode by the look.
He’d never worn silk a day in his life.
“The rightful owner left my home in a hurry. The law was on his heels. It turns out he was a bigamist and will not return to London anytimesoon.” Cecelia’s eyes were bright with mischief. “You will be comforted to know, he’s still alive.”
His gaze traveled to Anne. So she told the room about his refusal to wear a dead man’s clothes. He was twitchy about those things.
“I’ll wear whatever you want.” He answered Cecelia, but his eyes were on Anne, the color high in her cheeks.
Anne’s betrothed.The tables had turned in his favor. He sat back, knees wide, fingers loosely linked. The league practically served him Anne on a platter. Could be why she kept her distance, tense and straight.
Her blood-red earrings twinkled darkly. “I’m pleased that you will join us. Now, can we get on with the plans? We’ve dithered too long already.”
The battle cry given, the women took action. Quick voices bounced instructions around him. Tea implements were cleared. The Fletcher sisters collected wooden chairs off the wall. Anne strode to the table, unfolding foolscap. This mirrored meetings in West and Sons Shipping. Mr. West unfolding paper, the men gathering round the diagram to get their orders.
A life of crime never looked so efficient. Or so feminine.
The elder Miss Fletcher touched her sister’s arm. “Please fetch the wax from the kitchen.”
While Miss Margaret Fletcher nipped out, his cousin regarded him with wily eyes. “Are you drowning in this sea of women?”
“It hasna escaped my notice that there’s no men.”
“Our league has none. That is until you. It’sbetter this way. Women are barely noticed,” Cecelia said. “Maids, wives, shopkeepers. We are the cogs of Society.”
“We keep our mouths shut and our ears open,” Mary said wryly. “We excel at it.”
“Our clan chief knows about this?”
“Knows about it?” his cousin said archly. “Once we promised to secure thesgian-dubh—”
“Youpromised to steal the dagger.” Anne was beside him, holding the paper close.
His cousin steeled herself. “Yes, onceImade that promise, our chief practically pushed us out the door.”
He whistled low as Margaret Fletcher scurried back to her seat and set a lump of wax on the table. “The ceremonial Roman dagger, you say?”
“The very same.” Cecelia MacDonald sat taller, quite pleased with herself. “But first we get the gold. Taking back thesgian-dubhcomes later.”
Thesgian-dubh, stolen during the Uprising, or so he’d heard. The tale of its loss was hazy, its beginning, however, was clear. Every lad was told the tale of the ancient iron dagger, pride of Clanranald MacDonald. Lore said a Roman general gifted the knife long ago to a MacDonald warrior chief. Their agreement being,You barbarians stay on your side of the bulwark. We Romans will stay on ours.Clansmen accepted it, cocksure in the knowledge the great invaders feared them.
Like him, the dagger had lost its way.
“I’m surprised our chief gave his blessing,” he said. “He didna support the Uprising.”
“What happened at Moidart and the Isle of Eigg convinced him.” Anne was solemn.A townburned, our herds destroyed, and forty men unjustly taken.The unsaid words were a firebrand in her eyes.
His hand curled to a fist. Her fervor was putting a fire in his belly. It wasn’t enough that Scotland surrendered. The Government had to rub salt in the wounds. “This is why you do it,” he said for his own edification. “To make Clanranald lands home again.”
“Yes. First the gold, then the dagger.” Anne was quiet, the only one standing at the table as if she couldn’t bear to sit down on the job.
The women gathered round the table were a force, their manner confident, their ages unimportant. Brave and beautiful, war had branded them, but loss would not define them. Their courage put a great yearning inside him—to be the hero they needed him to be.
