Page 16 of The Scottish Duke
She nodded. “For my arthritis. She refused to take any payment, saying that she’d gathered the herbs on Blackhall land and used our equipment.” She smiled. “I quite liked her.”
He felt compelled to say something to defend himself, but how did he prove a negative?
His neck was getting warmer.
“You can’t honestly believe such a thing of me?”
“It’s been three years since Ruth died. I had hoped you would find someone to love, that you would be able to trust enough to do so. But I certainly understand that you’re a man and that men have needs.”
“Not enough to swive the maids, Mother.”
Her cheeks were pink. Was she as embarrassed about this conversation as he? He’d never thought to discuss his sex life—or lack of one—with his mother.
He’d only been with one woman in the last year, and was so desperate to have her that he’d almost caused a scandal.
He stared down at the letter, not seeing it. Instead, he sawherwith her hair down around her shoulders, her face wet with rain. He would have taken her there, outside, only feet from the ballroom. He’d never felt what he had that night. Never come close to it, and it wasn’t the whiskey.
The woman of the storm had disappeared.
He’d been unable to find anyone by the name of Marie. Nor had his careful questions to various people resulted in the whereabouts or the identity of a ginger-haired enchantress. Hell, he didn’t even know if the mole near her eye was real or painted on. Maybe the entire episode had been induced by the amount of whiskey he’d imbibed.
No, she’d been real enough, a fiercely voiced shadow, saying words that he hadn’t forgotten in all the months since that stormy night. No one else had been able to imbue as much disgust into her insults as she had. Or pinned his ears so effectively to the wall.
Damn her, whenever a Highland storm passed over the mountains, heading toward Blackhall, he wondered if she’d appear again.
“...do, Alex?”
He realized he hadn’t been paying attention.
“Do?” he asked, handing her back the letter. He hoped to God she burned it. Knowing his mother, however, he knew she wouldn’t. If he didn’t handle the situation, it would only continue to concern her.
“I’ll go and see her,” he said, the decision only seconds old. “When I go to Inverness in a few days.”
“Do you think that wise? Wouldn’t it be better to send Edmonds?” she asked, referring to the Russells’ solicitor.
“And have Edmonds give me that superior stare? I think not.”
He bent and kissed her on the cheek, and left before she could say anything further.
After Nan left, Lorna retrieved her father’s book from beneath the sagging mattress.A Manual of Botany of Scotland: Being an Introduction to the Study of the Structure, Physiology, and Classification of Scottish Herbal Plants and Related Treatmentswas the product of a decade of her father’s study.
She’d nearly finished the remaining illustrations and had written to several of her father’s friends, men who initially expressed enthusiasm about the idea of the completed manuscript. Unfortunately, of the three men she’d written, only one had responded, and his letter was three pages of complaints about his ill health. Only one sentence referred to her inquiry. All he’d written was, “Due to the nature of my health, my dear, I am unable to assist you in soliciting a publisher.”
She supposed she could write the other two men again, but she didn’t have as much hope as when she began the project. Had she misinterpreted everything? Had those comments his peers made at her father’s funeral only been words of kindness? Had they no faith in his work?
She’d been told that her father was a great botanist. She knew he’d spent most of his life studying the flora of Scotland. He’d trudged through marshes and bogs, over glens and mountain crags. After her mother died, she’d followed him from one desolate outcropping to another, learning at his side. She’d sat, patiently, as he spoke to wise women and old men smoking a pipe in front of crowded shops. He’d written down recipes, learned how to concoct various remedies, and painstakingly reformulated them in the hopes of keeping such traditions alive.
“Once upon a time, Lorna,” he told her, “we had no physicians or hospitals. We trusted in those who were attuned to nature and the earth. It’s knowledge we’re losing each day.”
She would faithfully copy down each recipe, watch as he prepared them, and then transcribe his notes beside her pictures of each herb.
If, on his expeditions, he occasionally forgot she was there, she didn’t mind. She understood his preoccupation and occupied herself with her drawings.
When he died, suddenly and unexpectedly, one April morning after they’d just arrived in Inverness, she was shocked at how few coins stood between her and poverty. The innkeeper’s wife, knowing her predicament and feeling some compassion, had recommended her to Mrs.McDermott, the housekeeper at Blackhall.
If she’d known then what she knew now, she would have gladly entered the poorhouse instead. At least she wouldn’t be pregnant and she would never have met the Duke of Kinross.
Chapter 6
