Lady of Light (14 page)

Claire sensed it would be the same with Evan. Indeed, it was almost a relief to finally think of him in that way and not feel guilty about it. He was her husband now, after all. And she did want him.

But still the doubts and fears assailed her, whirling about in her mind until she couldn’t make any sense of anything. She knew she wasn’t in a proper frame of mind right now to receive anyone, much less a husband intent on consummating their marriage.

Her glance fell on her clarsach, the one Lainie had given her. It symbolized, in so many ways, the abrupt transition her life had made today. A MacKay family heirloom, the harp was now rightfully hers as a MacKay wife. An exquisitely wrought instrument, it held the promise of music beyond any she had known before. Yet only with its playing would the songs flow forth. Only within her hands, and heart, would it reveal the depths of its beauty—and its secrets.

Claire walked to her clothes chest and picked up the harp. She pulled over the chair, sat, and placed the instrument on her lap. It felt right there, like it had always been meant for her, nestling so naturally in the curve of her shoulder. Lightly, she stroked its strings. The most ethereal notes rose into the air, drenching her in rich bass and bright, high trebles.

She placed her ear on the sound box and plucked the strings again. A wonderful resonance reverberated against her face, filling her head with the most beautiful, vibrant tones. In that moment, it was almost as if the harp spoke to her, became a living being.

A song, a haunting tale of love lost and found, of misty, Highland meadows, of towering, craggy mountains, and icy, rushing burns, began to flow from her fingers. Claire closed her eyes, forgot everything but the music, and played. On and on her nimble fingers plucked and stroked, coaxing out everything the little clarsach possessed. And, as the song finally ended, she felt at peace once more.

“That was so very, very lovely,” Evan said.

With a gasp, Claire’s eyes flew open. He stood there, smiling and so heartbreakingly handsome, in the doorway.

“I-I’m sorry,” she stammered. “I forgot you were waiting.”

“It doesn’t matter. I very much enjoyed listening to you play. In your music, I see so much of you. Your kindness, your courage, the depths of your feelings, and your love.” He leaned against the doorjamb, and shoved his hands in his trouser pockets. “Hearing you play, you inspire me. You make me proud you chose me for your husband.”

Och, but Evan was such a wonderful man, Claire thought. If only he knew that the honor was far more hers than his, in his choosing her to be his wife. She stood, walked to her clothes chest, and carefully laid the clarsach down.

“You can come in, you know,” she murmured then. “This is as much your bedroom now as it is mine.”

Evan straightened, removed his hands from his pockets. “Still, I didn’t want to presume…. “ His voice faded as he suddenly seemed to notice what she was wearing, and how she looked.

Claire’s throat went dry. The nightgown she wore was the same one she wore every night. What with the impending trip to America, there had been no extra money to spare on a new, and perhaps prettier, nightgown for her wedding night. Yet, as Evan continued to stare at her, she felt as if she were dressed in some regal robe—or nothing at all.

“Do you know how beautiful you look?” he said just then, his voice gone low and husky. “It makes me almost afraid to touch you.”

“Och, aye.” Claire managed a shaky laugh. “And me, little more than a poor lass without a penny to her name.”

He moved to stand before her then, and took her into his arms. At his touch, Claire shivered in an odd mix of fear and anticipation.

Evan must have noted her reaction. “Don’t be afraid,” he said, his tone now soothing. “I’ll go slowly, as slow as you want. We’ve got all the time in the world.”

She hid her face on his shoulder, basking in the warmth of his body and the heady scent of him. “I’m sorry,” she whispered. “It isn’t you, but me. It has all gone so verra fast—meeting you, falling in love with you, wedding you. And now, on the morrow, leaving Scotland for another land.”

“I know.” Evan began to stroke her head. “I’m asking so much of you.”

“Nay, you’re asking no more than many husbands would ask. I … I just don’t know if I can be the kind of wife you need.”

Evan laughed then. “And don’t you think I have the same doubts, that I can be the kind of husband you need? All we can do is love each other, try our very best, and trust. Trust in each other, in our love, and in the holy vows we made today before God.” He bent and began feathering soft little kisses across her forehead, down her face, moving ever closer to her mouth. “And that, I think, will get us through everything life can put in our way.”

“Truly, Evan?”

“Yes, sweetheart. Truly.”

With that, he pulled her even closer, his hands caressing her head, his fingers threading through her long hair, his mouth capturing hers. And, like the music Claire had performed just a short while ago on her harp, Evan soon caught her up, body and soul, into that sweet, ardent song played from time immemorial between a husband and a wife.

8

One month later

He that wavereth is like a wave of the sea driven with the wind and tossed.

James 1:6

As the Colorado and Southern Railroad locomotive wound its sinuous way through the hills of the Colorado high plains, its whistle shrilled a series of sharp blasts. At the sound, Claire glanced up from her reading of Mrs. Hannah Cobb’s
Home Cook Book and Family Medical Adviser,
a gift from Evan while they waited in New York City’s Grand Central Station for the first of their many railway adventures. For her efforts, she was rewarded with a fresh dose of soot and ash from the locomotive’s smokestack as it blew in through the open window.

“The train’s signaling Grand View’s depot,” Evan explained to Ian, who stood on the opposite side of the car, gazing out the window. “In a few minutes we’ll top that next hill, and you’ll see the town.”

The assurance they were finally at the end of their journey was music to Claire’s ears. If she never traveled on a train again, it would be too soon. The journey across the Atlantic on that steamship had been difficult enough. She had been seasick nearly the whole time. But the train trip across over half the United States had been even worse.

They hadn’t been able to afford first-class accommodations, and had ridden during the day on stiff-backed seats. They had slept at night on shelves for beds. Her seasickness had also returned, thanks to the car’s incessant rocking. Stops to take on more fuel or water for the steam engine were frequent, and the jerks from the train’s starts and halts were enough to nearly snap Claire’s head from her neck. To add to the misery, the early August weather had been blisteringly hot, far hotter than anything she had ever experienced in Scotland. Thankfully, the train’s speed, once it started moving, blew a cooling breeze into the compartment. But whenever the train stopped for refueling …

The views outside, at least, had been fascinating and frequently even awe-inspiring. Nothing Claire had ever read about America had prepared her for its immense size and geographical diversity. She had stared out the windows for many hours at a stretch, mesmerized by the ever-changing scenes passing before her.

This was her new home, her land now. She wanted to absorb all she could about it as quickly as possible. Besides, the more she kept her mind occupied and her hopes up, the less time Claire had to think about the journey’s discomforts, or about Scotland … and how homesick she was already.

That deep, empty ache would eventually subside. Claire had to believe that. It was all just so new, so foreign, and she felt so out of place. Not that Evan, bless his heart, hadn’t done everything he could to ease her way. He hardly ever left her side, patiently explaining everything as many times as she and Ian needed to hear it. She was so grateful to have such a wonderful husband.

“There, there it is,” he exclaimed at that moment, casting Ian an excited look. “That’s Grand View. We’re home, Ian. Home at last!”

Watching him, his handsome, chiseled face alight with such simple joy, Claire’s love for Evan swelled anew. Och, but he was so proud of his country, and most especially of Colorado. Some of his enthusiasm couldn’t help but rub off on her and Ian. And it was a beautiful land. A beautiful, if so very different, land than what she had always known.

Though the grassy hills were green, they lacked the deep, verdant richness that only frequent, Highland rains could bring. This far east of the Rocky Mountains, which Claire could see looming in the distance, the trees were sparse. Only random, isolated stands of pine trees growing near rocky outcroppings or leaning precariously from towering bluffs dotted the open, hilly land. And where the Highland’s broad glens and craggy mountains had boasted a wealth of rivers and rushing burns, here the watercourses were few and far between. Indeed, many of them, this late in the summer, were dry.

An occasional hawk or falcon soared overhead. Herds of small, brown-and-white deerlike animals with short, jagged horns on their heads—pronghorn antelope, Evan called them—grazed placidly not far from the railroad bed. From time to time they’d “spook” and race off, the rhythmic pounding of their hooves barely audible over the creaking, clanging, and rumbling of the train.

From time to time, they’d also pass a solitary ranch or farm. That kind of isolation Claire understood, for it wasn’t much different from life in the Highlands. The difference in the scarcity of people, though, lay in the fact that Scotland’s rugged lands failed to support very many, while here it was obvious Colorado was still but an essentially unsettled land.

As their speed began to slow, the train’s whistle tooted once more. Claire closed her book, bent, and shoved it into the carpetbag on the floor. Then she pulled out her handbag, extracted a mirror, and examined her face.

Aside from a smudge of soot on her cheek and a few errant, windblown curls, Claire supposed she looked presentable. She had quickly noticed that married women in America wore their hair up, unlike Scotswomen, who marked that life passage by turning to the wearing of the little white, frilled caps called mutches. When she had reached America, she had soon put her mutch away and twisted her hair up onto the back of her head. The sooner she began to look like an American, Claire reasoned, the sooner she’d be accepted and feel like one.

“Look, Claire,” Evan said, joining Ian at the window. “There’s Pa, and Abby, and Beth. They got the wire I sent them from Denver in time, and they’ve come to meet us.”

At mention of Evan’s family, Claire’s stomach clenched. She had dreaded this moment, even as she knew the meeting was the culmination of their long journey. What if they didn’t like her, or were displeased that their son had wed so precipitously and without their approval? She and Ian had come too far to risk being rejected again.

No good was served, though, Claire reminded herself, worrying about what might not ever happen. Besides, Evan had assured her his father and stepmother were good Christians. Even if she hadn’t been his wife, they’d surely welcome her out of Christ’s love.

The train finally lurched to a halt. Claire gathered her rapidly shredding courage, pinned on her little, dark blue sailor hat trimmed with a band of white grosgrain ribbon, and, picking up her two bags, joined Evan. He paused in his waving to shoot her a loving glance.

“Have I told you yet today,” he asked, scanning her from head to toe with a heated look, “how beautiful you are?”

“Only about ten or eleven times so far,” Ian muttered disgustedly beside him. “You’ve been married a month now. Aren’t you ever going to quit cooing at each other like a pair of turtledoves?”

“I certainly hope not,” his brother-in-law said, grinning. He slid his arm about Claire’s waist and pulled her close. “And, for the eleventh or twelfth time today, let me tell you how beautiful you are, Mrs. MacKay.”

His happiness was infectious. In spite of the nervous fluttering in her stomach, Claire smiled. “Thank you, Mr. MacKay. A woman, even one already wed a full month”—she shot her brother a quelling look—“never tires of hearing such sweet words. Now, if only your family finds me even half so appealing …”

As the other train passengers filed from the car, Evan turned her around and guided her down the aisle. “Well, we’re about to find out, aren’t we?”

Though he smiled when he spoke the words, and his eyes shone with a deep conviction that everyone would love Claire, her heart nonetheless began a frantic pounding. Her first glimpse of the MacKays was fuzzy, the bright sunshine outside momentarily blinding her. Then Evan was releasing his hold on her waist, jumping down from the train, and raising his hand to her.

“Come on, Claire. Come and meet my parents.”