Page 6 of The Texan Duke
The doors opened as Sam stepped forward, did a pretty little bow in front of the duchess and reached for her hand, holding the tips of her fingers like he was some sort of Spanish grandee.
“Your Grace,” he said, his voice strangely unaccented, “I am Sam Kirby. Thank you for welcoming me to your home.”
Sam could—and had—sounded like a New Yorker, someone from Alabama, and a native Texan. It all depended on what suited him at the moment.
Evidently, it suited him to sound like he was from nowhere now.
Sam had lived in Washington DC once upon a time, which is probably where he’d learned to handle people. He didn’t talk about those days any more than Connor talked about the Civil War.
“Are you a relative, Mr. Kirby?”
The duchess, like the other Scots he’d met, sounded odd, as if the words she was speaking were all crunched together or slid off into nothingness. He could only understand about half of what she was saying. Maybe Sam was faring better.
Connor hadn’t thought he’d need an interpreter in Scotland.
He took the opportunity of Sam’s glad-handing to look around.
In Texas he was used to open spaces, grand prairies that stretched as far as the eye could see. Their houses were modest, places to rest and recuperate from a day of good work.
It seemed to him that the Scots had it backward. They were all for trapping the outside in. A good-sized herd could winter here in the room the duchess called the Laird’s Hall. He guessed this was the place where the leader of the clan called together all the able-bodied men, where elections were held and disputes adjudicated.
He’d learned clan behavior from his father. He just wished Graham had told him about Bealadair.
From what he’d seen of the exterior, it was more than just a castle and definitely more than any other private house he’d ever seen.
The XIV had four major divisions, the ranch split up into manageable areas. Each division had a center of operations with a bunkhouse, various buildings and stables, and a main house for the division manager. All of those houses, plus the one where his mother lived, as well as his own, could be put into Bealadair and probably have plenty of room left over.
Glassey had told him that there were only the five of them. Why would they live in such a huge house? It seemed to him that it would be a waste of effort trying to find somebody or even getting from the bedroom to the kitchen. And all the staff? He’d already seen dozens of women dressed in black dresses with white aprons and caps and men all gussied up in uniforms that looked like they were going to a parade.
“The duke was one of the wealthiest men in Scotland, Your Grace,” Mr. Glassey had said. “Of course, that might not be an important consideration for you, given the size of the XIV Ranch.”
He hadn’t responded to the solicitor’s almost question. He had no intention of telling the man anything about the financial health of the ranch. Nor was he about to mention that the size of his inheritance from his uncle made the future of the ranch more certain.
At least he wouldn’t have to worry about cattle prices. Or buying new stock. He could invest in the railcars he’d thought about, plus other advances throughout all four divisions. He could hire more men, buy more horses, and afford to send his sisters and mother to New York for shopping if that’s what they really wanted.
From his inspection of the Laird’s Hall, he was beginning to think that Glassey hadn’t exaggerated. The brass and crystal fixtures looked fancy enough to have come from France.
The walls were covered in crimson fabric, the same material as the floor-to-ceiling curtains covering the dozens of windows. All the females in his family would have loved the room and been impressed with the furniture groupings, settees, couches, chairs, and tables that looked as if they’d also been made in France. He could always tell from that kind of swooping leg that looked too delicate to support a man’s weight.
He liked leather. Give him a comfortable chair, something he didn’t have to worry about ruining. A chair built to handle a little abuse. It didn’t have to have horns like the last chair his father had had made in Austin, a big, wide, comfortable chair adorned with about ten horns from their cattle mounted on the back. His mother had categorically refused to have it in the main parlor, so Graham had taken it to the house Sam had built on the property.
This Laird’s Hall could do with a few leather chairs and less fancy furniture.
It seemed to suit the duchess and his other relatives just fine, however. They all took their places either on the sofas or the chairs, looking at him expectantly. What was he supposed to do now?
Sam was still doing his diplomat thing, explaining about the train journey from London. The duchess—his aunt, although he had difficulty thinking of the woman in that way—smiled and began introducing him to his cousins.
“Lady Lara Gillespie, Your Grace,” she said. “My oldest daughter.”
He wondered if he should stop her now. He was tired of Glassey calling himYour Grace. Why did he have to have a relative do the same thing? And what was thisLadynonsense? These people sure liked titles.
Was the rest of Scotland like this? Or was it only his heretofore unknown family? Were they truly as odd as they appeared to be? After all, they’d been out in a blizzard—without coats—to welcome him, and other than standing in front of the fire for a few minutes, none of them looked the worse for wear.
He was still bone-deep cold. They’d gotten here by the skin of their teeth before the blizzard got them. Scotland was damned determined to freeze him to death. He removed his hat, because that was just polite, but he kept his coat on as he met his cousins.
Lady Lara was tall, with brown hair and brown eyes, similar to the other two cousins. She had a mole at the corner of her eye and the fastest smile he’d ever seen. If he’d blinked he would have missed it.
Her brown hair, the mass that wasn’t fixed in a bun at the back of her head, was curly, tendrils coming down on either side of her face. Her nose was prominent and her mouth wide. He had a feeling that if she allowed herself, she would have a boisterous laugh.
