Page 81 of The Devil of Clan Sinclair
“No, your ladyship. He isn’t ill. He doesn’t have smallpox.”
“Thank God,” she said, settling back against the pillow.
Hannah shocked her by bursting into tears.
“It’s my fault, your ladyship. It’s all my fault. Oh, your ladyship, I’m so sorry. I didn’t know he didn’t know.”
“I don’t understand,” she said, wanting to scream at the girl to explain. “What has happened?”
“Mr. Sinclair, your ladyship. He took Elliot.”
Chapter 21
On the way to Drumvagen, Scotland
July, 1870
On the journey back to Drumvagen, Macrath was grateful he’d amassed a fortune. He hired a private train car so his son wouldn’t be exposed to strangers, and arranged for meals and beverages to be stocked.
He estimated Elliot weighed less than one of the handles on his ice machine, which made the situation all the more amazing. Besides costing his father a fortune, he had three adults at his beck and call.
By the time they got to the border between Scotland and England, Macrath had gained a hearty respect for the young girl who tended to his son. She didn’t get flustered when the baby started to scream. She merely placed Elliot on her shoulder, patted his well-diapered bottom, and commanded him to “Hush, right now, just hush.”
She rocked back and forth on the seat so much, Macrath was almost seasick, but it was a movement evidently pleasing his son because every time she did it, Elliot fell asleep.
The wet nurse, not to be outdone in her care of his son, appeared triumphant when she unbuttoned her dress and put Elliot—what kind of name was that?—to her breast. His son immediately stopped fussing and started to gurgle appreciatively.
Wise beyond his months.
The eleventh Earl of Barrett, my ass.
He was not going to surrender his son to anyone, not even to the nobility of England. If Virginia thought the world would be fooled, all they had to do was look at the two of them together.
She had lied to him. Or, if she were only guilty of the sin of omission, it was a pretty damn big omission.
How could she not have told him about their child?
He settled back against the seat, surveying his companions.
Agatha, the wet nurse, had a round face with cheeks as red as her rosebud mouth. She smelled of warmth and his son, a fact that might be linked to her plenteous bosom, about which she seemed unduly proud. Her breasts preceded her out of a room and into one, a fact for which he was grateful, since Agatha was the source of his son’s nourishment.
If Agatha had any worries, they didn’t appear to concern her. She thought everything was amusing, her smile showing several missing teeth.
“Is he all right?” he asked a few hours later. Elliot had spent half the night in sleep, only to awaken with a cry that clawed its way up Macrath’s spine to settle at the base of his neck.
“Oh, yes sir,” the wet nurse had said, hauling out her breasts again. “He’s just a growing boy and he’s hungry.”
“Is it normal for him to cry like that?” Whenever Elliot screwed up his face, it was a warning. In a moment the ungodly, bansheelike shriek would fill the car.
“Oh, yes sir,” the wet nurse said again, this time giving him a pitying look. Did she save the look for all males, or just him?
Even Mary, a serious little birdlike child, smiled, the same expression she’d no doubt give a half-wit.
The private car allowed him to be intimate with his son’s needs. The first time Mary changed his diaper, he stared out the window and focused on the passing scenery, the shape of the clouds, the gorse blowing stiff-necked in the breeze, anything but the odor now filling the space.
How could anything as small produce something that foul?
The next time Mary changed his diaper, he’d only been wet, and Macrath had taken the opportunity to inspect his son surreptitiously. Yes, Elliot was definitely his offspring.
