A Year and a Day (39 page)

“V
ery pleasant,”
Mary
responded. A
pparently
she was
not much for talking, or perhaps
she was
a little shy.

“And my brother?” Ewan pressed, a little desperately, “He wasn’t too difficult a travel companion, I presume?”

A flush broke across the lady’s features, and she looked down into the folds of her gown. “No, sir,” she responded. “Not…not at all.” And then quiet descended again.

Muira directed her sister-in-law-to-be to a chair and rang for some tea. No one spoke while they waited. When it finally arrived, Muira took matters into her own hands. “Lady
MacMillan
’s son was very excited to see the stables,” she announced. “He’s very keen for you to take him riding soon. Won’t that be nice?” she asked, and then snorted when she received no response. Giving up on her brother, she turned to her guest, “Lady
MacMillan
, I’m so anxious to see your dress! Did I hear you’d had it sent over from
France
?”

“The fabric,” the Lady answered, looking miserable as she bit into a scone.

Muira sighed heavily and shook her hands, apparently fed up with both of them. “Well, I’ll leave you two alone to get to know each other better,” Muira said, in a tone so frankly sarcastic that Ewan could almost hear the “lovebirds” that she omitted. “I’d like to see my husband before the other guests start to arrive. Call if you need me!” she announced, and then with a swish of her skirts, she swept away.

Ewan endured another hour with Lady
MacMillan
before finally pleading clan business as an excuse to let her go.

He knew, instantly, that h
e had made a terrible mistake. Mary
wasn’t awful. She just wasn’t…

What
? Ewan asked himself, trying to put his finger on the flaw.

Cait
, he answered wearily, sensing that it was the truth.

She just wasn’t Cait. She never would be- but it was too late to back out now.

“What is it? Why are we stopping?” Cait asked, jarring suddenly awake. A light rain had started falling and she’d been permitted inside the carriage with the
Laird
and his wife. However, as it was only the first day of their journey and it was clearly still light outside, she wasn’t expecting to stop so soon.

“Something in the road,” the driver called back into the carriage. “It will only take us a moment to clear it.”

The
Laird
nodded. Isobel started to rise. “I think I’ll take a moment to stretch my legs.”

However, to the surprise of both ladies, the
Laird
blocked her way. “I don’t want you to see this,” he said.

“See what?” Isobel and Cait both asked at the same time.

Of course,
Laird
Frasure ignored Cait, who bit her tongue and flushed for speaking out of turn.  Cait instantly looked out the window, despite his admonition and clapped her hand over her mouth. She recognized where they were- the little village just past Glen Mohr, only….

“This is where the English struck this past spring,” the
Laird
explained gently. “They didn’t leave too much of it standing. Poor Camerons. I hear that the
Laird
even lost family here.”

Cait felt her stomach twist.
Did he mean
Muira and the children? She was about to inquire- but then remembered that she wasn’t meant to know anything about the Cameron clan. She settled down, and continued to stare
anxiously
out the window.

Her thoughts were restless for the rest of the journey- not just with worry about her friends, but also for the clan in general. Everywhere she went, there were signs of the English invasion. She knew that the Camerons had managed to beat them back- but at what cost?

Laird
Frasure
made an off-handed remark
that Ewan’s marriage was a political necessity meant to ensure the Cameron’s continued strength. She didn’t know that it helped or hurt to know that Ewan wasn’t meant to be in love with the woman he was about to marry. On the one hand, a bit of her jealousy died. On the other
,
it only underscored that marriage was all about business to
him
!

Cait had hoped that the two remaining days of the journey would give her time to prepare, but they passed more quickly than she had anticipated. All too soon, she began to recognize the landscape that they were rolling past, and she sat away from the window, huddled over the baby lest one of the Camerons outside the window recognized her face.

Cait began to panic when she realized that she was sure to be recognized back at home. The servants would certainly all remember her, and her former relationship with the
Laird
. She
was frankly relieved when Lady Frasure told her, regretfully, to expect to spend most of her time in the room.

“It really won’t be the place for a baby,” she said, “even one as dear as our little Robert- and I’ll want to have you close at hand.”

Despite that reassurance, Cait was frankly terrified that she was going to be
discovered
. She could barely believe her luck when, upon their arrival just after dusk that evening, they were met by a young kitchen girl she’d never met, directed to rooms on the third floor, and told
Laird and Lady Frasure
that
Laird
Cameron and his fiancé would be happy to meet them down in the dining hall.

Cait remained in the room to unpack while the
Laird
and Lady went down. They didn’t return until late. Then, after helping Lady Frasure undress and tucking Robert down to sleep, she simply went to bed herself.

Cait couldn’t sleep. It felt altogether too odd being in her old home- and no one knowing that she was there.

Cait wondered who was asleep upstairs in her old room. Was it the little kitchen maid who had let them into the house? Was it one of her old friends? Who had taken her place in Ewan’s bed? Was Lady
MacMillan
installed there already? Cait tort
ured herself with the questions. As
the clock in the outside hall
chimed midnight she
found that she was no closer to sleep than she had been back at noon.

The grumbling of her stomach wasn’t making her thoughts any easier to ignore. Deciding that hunger was, at least, one ill that she could repair, she kissed the baby, and then slipped out of the room.

As she had hoped, the castle was silent. She didn’t bother with a candle, treading her way down the servant staircase by memory until she reached the kitchens and slipping inside quickly for a slab of cheese and a hunk of bread. Some leftovers were sitting out from the feast, and she helped herself to a few of these as well, gulping down some fruit tarts and a bit of meat. Feeling pleasantly full, she started back up the stairs, deciding it was faster to go along the front. She instantly regretted her mistake, however. She had only topped the first flight of stairs when she ran almost smack into a familiar face- and then heard a blood-curdling scream!

Cait’s heart clattered to a stop, stunned and frightened by the sound. She stiffened. Then, as the significance of what she was seeing sank in, she did the only thing she could: she ran.

Muira was alive
. Cait took a morsel of comfort from seeing her friend apparently well, but it was small compared to her absolute horror at being seen. Maybe Muira hadn’t recognized her? Maybe she would manage to get away and Muira would think it was merely a trick of the night? She clung to the hopes, even as she ran with all her might, hearing Muira’s pursuing footsteps growing farther behind- until she tripped on a rug at the foot of the stairs.

Cait went sprawling forward, landing heavily on her hands. She thought that she had mildly twisted her ankle as well because, though she tried to scramble to her feet, she couldn’t move with her usual speed. She was only half-way standing when she felt a hand fall heavily on her shoulder and she was forced to turn around.

Ewan’s sister looked just as she had on the day Cait had left, almost a year before. Still wearing her dinner gown, she must have been completing some last-minute hostess duties before retiring to bed. Her eyes were wide as saucers and her face was stamped with disbelief.

“Cait? Thank God! You’re alive!”

Despite the words, Muira was staring at Cait as if she were a ghost- and the former maid and companion wasn’t certain how she was meant to respond. She stared back, hefting her chin, “As you see.”

“We thought…” Muira began, looking as though the memory pained her, “We thought that the English had got you!
The morning after I spoke with you…a messenger came. I took the children and ran. We looked for you, but there wasn’t time! Oh, Cait! I thought you’d been killed…or worse…” The tears brimming at the edge of Lady MacCrae’s lashes gave Cait a pang of guilt. She patted Muira’s shoulder gently, still wondering how much of the truth she ought to reveal. She was also stunned by Muira’s announcement, and wondered if it was true.
Did they really think that she’d been killed instead of running away? Was that why Ewan had never looked for her? Was it possible that he would have wanted her back?
Could it really be that
he didn’t know? Cait’s heart started beating faster as dormant hopes stirred back to life.

“I had…gone for a walk that morning,” she said, deciding upon the selective truth.

“But you didn’t come back?”

“I didn’t think it was safe,” Cait said slowly. “I started into Frasure lands and…Lady Frasure granted me a position at her Castle.”

“But Ewan thought you were dead!” Muira said in an accusing tone. “Cait! Don’t you understand? He’s marrying someone else!”

The reminder of the wedding doused the excitement growing in Cait’s breast. So what if Ewan did think that he’d lost her? If it had mattered at all, it certainly hadn’t affected him deeply or bothered him long!

“Yes, I thought he might be- considering we were called here for a wedding,” Cait shot back, unable to suppress a sarcastic tone.

Muira looked horrified by her blasé attitude
, unable to see that
was merely affected. “Cait! Surely you don’t think that he
wants
to marry someone else?” s
he said, shaking her head slowly from side to side, as if she still didn’t quite believe her ears and eyes.

“Yes. I think he
does
want to marry someone else. Wasn’t that the point of our little conversation before I left?” she said, forgetting to cover up the nature of her departure from Glen Mohr.

If Muira noticed, she didn’t say so. She was too horrified by what else Cait had said, “Oh, Cait! It was wrong of me to say that- so wrong!”

“But Ewan promised the
Laird
that-“

“The old
Laird
is dead!” Muira snapped, “Ewan can do what he wants!”

“What he
wants
is the good of the clan,” Cait said, unwilling to give herself the faintest hope. “You admit that marrying a
MacMillan
is good for the Camerons as a whole?”

“Yes, but-“ Muira said, frowning sharply.

“But there isn’t any ‘but’,” Cait finished for her. “Ewan has gotten on with his life…and I’ve gotten on with mine!”
If I live through the wedding,
Cait thought to herself.

Muira still didn’t look convinced, “Don’t you think that Ewan should be the one to decide that?”

“If I recall correctly, he
did
!” He was the one who went away, after all. Cait tried to remember the pain she had felt in learning his entire visit at Glen Mohr had been part of a lie. “He left Glen Mohr without me.”