Elaine Coffman - [Mackinnons 06] (35 page)

Quietly, she slipped her hands behind her and stepped a few
feet away.

After the scribe finished his work and left, Fletcher turned
to Father Sebastian. “If I could rely upon your kindness for one more request…”

“I would be happy to help in any way I can.”

“The contents of those books are very important to me. There
are those who would give anything to destroy the evidence we found here. I
would like to say it is my concern for this old relic that prompts my actions,
but my motives are selfish ones, I’m afraid.”

Father Sebastian smiled. “I will hide them in a safe place,
monsieur. Have no worry.”

“Thank you,” Fletcher said, handing the priest an envelope.
“I would like to make this contribution as a way of expressing my gratitude.”

Father Sebastian nodded. “Contributions for the needy are
always appreciated. Bless you.”

Fletcher nodded, then took Cathleen by the arm. “We have
what we came for,” he said, “and I find I am anxious to take the news back to
Scotland, post haste.”

She looked up at him. “Will we go to Edinburgh first?”

“No. I want to take you to Caithness, where you’ll be safe.
Then
I’ll
go to Edinburgh. Alone.”

He did not miss the knowing smile she gave him. “Thank you
for your concern, but I have a suspicion that the real reason is that you first
want to share the good news with your aunt.”

Fletcher grinned. “I am never so transparent as when I think
I am hiding something.”

“Aye, I think that sometimes I have a grasp of what you are
thinking before you do.”

“Talk like that makes a man feel downright transparent.”

“Dinna fret. I am certain you will think of some way to
muddy the waters.”

He puffed up. “Good at that, am I?”

“No, but you’re getting better,” she said, laughing.

“You’re a long way from home, lass. Keep talking like that
and I might be tempted to leave you here.”

She gave him a confident smile. “You might be tempted, but
you canna leave me here.”

“And why is that?”

“Because once a woman has given you her heart, it is
impossible to get rid of the rest of her.”

Father Sebastian looked at Fletcher and laughed.
“Thunderbolts and fires come as fate requires,” he said.

Fletcher looked from him to Cathleen and back again, then he
said, “Pray for me, Father.”

Father Sebastian laughed again. “I have been, my child. I
have been.”

Returning to their hired carriage, Fletcher tried to explain
to the driver that they wanted to go to Le Havre, using sign language to
emphasize his words. He must have suspected he wasn’t doing a very good job of
it when he saw the bewildered look on the driver’s face, for he said, “Okay,
you tell him.”

She spoke to the driver in his native tongue. He helped her
into the carriage, then climbed in beside her and closed the door. The driver
shouted and cracked the whip, and the carriage lurched forward.

Cathleen looked down at his hand resting on his knee. For a
moment she was distracted by the sight of the crested signet ring, the expensive
fabric of his coat, the fine cotton of his shirt.

A beam of sunlight slanted through the window, catching the
gold of the ring and sending a flash of light into her eyes, blinding her for a
moment. She closed her eyes against its glare.

When she opened them a moment later, she saw Fletcher make a
face. “I can’t believe it,” he said.

She stared at him curiously. “You can’t believe what?”

“That same wretched smell,” he said. “It’s here, in the
carriage. I can’t imagine where it is coming from.”

“Oh. Neither can I,” she said, slipping her hands beneath
her skirts.

The carriage clattered on down the road, and Fletcher leaned
back and closed his eyes, hoping to fall asleep, but the smell was so strong it
made sleep impossible. He kept thinking about that smell. Then suddenly he
remembered the way Cathleen had looked when she met him at the scribe’s.

He opened one eye and glanced at her. There she sat beside
him, the picture of innocence. Yet, the more he thought about it, the more he
remembered the way she had rounded her mouth as she said the word
Oh
.

It seemed more than a bit suspicious to him, and on top of
that, there were her eyes. Big as pumpkins they were, and the expression in
them was guilty. “Want to tell me about it?” he asked, crossing his arms and
doing his best to look sagacious, but feeling that he looked more like Father
Christmas with a merry twinkle in his eye.

She sighed. “How did you know?” She laughed then. “Aside
from the smell, I mean.”

“Cathleen, you had better stick to telling the truth,
because you can’t lie worth a damn. The truth is written all over your face.
Now, tell me what happened.”

She settled herself back into the carriage and told him
about her bit of adventure. When she got to the part about the net and the
bucket, he said, “My God! I should be horsewhipped for letting you go alone. I
would never forgive myself if something happened to you. Never.”

“I wanted to go…”

“I won’t allow you to do something like that again.”

She laughed. “Go, saith the King. Hold, saith the wind.”

He couldn’t help smiling at her, despite the fact that his
guts were churning at the thought of those two slimy bastards chasing her. Then
look turned serious. “I’m sorry for what happened. I know you must have been
terrified.”

“Aye, I was frightened,” she said, “but,
‘he that fleeth
from fear shall fall into the pit.’
Jeremiah.”

For a stunned moment, Fletcher simply stared at her, then he
laughed heartily. For the life of him, he could not get out of his mind the
picture of her jumping up to toss a net over one man and bashing a bucket down
over the other one’s head. “That’s my lass,” he said, drawing her into his arms
and giving her a quick kiss.

A second later, and gasping for breath, he released her.
“Bad idea,” he said, and moved to sit on the seat across from her, opening the
window.

“Is it that bad?”

“Love, you are as rank as a pole cat.”

She looked down at her soiled dress and sniffed. “I don’t
smell a thing.”

“Count that a blessing,” he said, turning his head for a
blast of fresh air coming through the window.

The harbor of Le Havre lay before them, glittering in the
sunlight, half a dozen boats and ships riding the gentle waves that splashed
against the wharves.

Once they docked, they went straight to an inn, Fletcher
ordering “the best-smelling bath money can buy” the moment they were shown to
their room.

The landlord looked Cathleen over good and proper, then
agreed to have it sent up immediately, and left as if he could not get out of
the room fast enough.

“You stay here and don’t open this door for anyone except
the landlord bringing your bath. Is that understood?”

“Aye. Where are you going?”

“To arrange passage back to Scotland for us. I won’t be gone
long.”

“Just long enough for me to smell better?”

“Definitely that long,” he said, laughing and dodging her
shoe as she tossed it at him.

Not long after he left, Cathleen went to the window and
stood watching the street below, waiting for a glimpse of him. The sun they had
enjoyed earlier was gone, replaced by a slow, steady drizzle that drenched the
city and kept the smoky smell of fires and cooked food huddling close to the
houses that lined the cobbled streets.

Catching sight of him as he crossed the street, she watched
until he turned the corner and disappeared from sight, then she closed the window.

The chambermaid brought buckets of steaming water to fill
the copper tub. Once she was alone, Cathleen scrubbed herself and washed her
hair twice before leaning back and closing her eyes.

The joy she had felt earlier was leaving her. She felt it as
if it were a physical thing, as if someone had turned a spigot inside her and
let all the happiness flow away. She glanced at the window, where a bleak
half-light crept timidly into the room.

How foreign this place was. Everywhere she looked, the world
seemed forlorn and forbidding, lonely and withdrawn.

She rose and stepped from the bath, finding no pleasure now
in its warm, fragrant depths. Drying quickly, she dressed in fresh clothes,
then towel-dried her hair before twisting it into a quick braid and coiling it
at her nape.

Suddenly feeling tired, she lay down on the bed. A dark gray
mist seemed to settle over her, and she felt its liquid heaviness upon her
face. She wiped away her tears, feeling their saltiness burn the scrapes on her
hands, as she thought back over the months since Fletcher had come into her
life.

She loved him, and she knew he loved her, too. But she also
knew it was not to be. They were too different, their worlds too different,
their futures too far apart. She remembered the way his hand had looked with
the signet ring, remembered too the way the sunlight had flashed off it,
blinding her. It occurred to her that that was exactly what she had been,
blind. Blind to the reasons why things would never work out between them. Blind
to the things that ring stood for. Blind to who he was and to her own station
in life.

She was the heather, dancing in the wind on the hillside,
rooted there until she died, living and enjoying each day to the fullest, but
never losing sight of the fact that she was heather.

Fletcher knew no such bounds.

He was the sunlight that passed over her, bringing warmth
and light into her world, but only temporarily. Soon, darkness would come to
cover her, and he would go on, spreading warmth and light to others he met
along the way.

She was earth.

He was wind.

She was bound by what she was, always to be solid, immobile.

He knew no bounds, nor was it in his nature to stay.

He had taught her love. It would have to be enough. She
would have to end it soon.

It would be better that way, but it would also bring her
pain.

When Fletcher returned two hours later, she was asleep on
the bed. For a while he stood over her, looking at her, seeing her beauty,
feeling her sadness.

He sat down beside her, leaning over to kiss her cheek. She stirred
but did not awaken. He did not let that deter him, but went on to kiss each
soft hollow, every sleepy and warm place. He smoothed his palm over the petal
softness of her skin, feeling the loyalty and devotion of the muscles below. He
spanned the narrowness of her waist and cupped the fullness of her soft
breasts.

Every place he touched she was lovely.

And she was his.

He rolled her over to her back and began to unbutton her
dress, pulling the bodice apart until her loveliness was bared to him. Kissing
her throat, her neck, her breasts, he tasted the residue of herbal soap, then
easing her skirts up, he moved her legs apart, touching the warm dampness
there, between her thighs. Hearing her moan, he looked up and saw her eyes
open.

“I love you,” she said.

“And I you. You are so beautiful,” he said, “inside and out.
I will never tire of seeing you like this, of being with you this way. If I
live to be a hundred, each day with you will be like the first.”

He saw a flash of pain in her eyes and thought to ask her
about it, but at that moment she unfastened his trousers and took him in her
hand. He was hard and stiff with wanting her, needing her, desiring her…

When he could stand it no longer, he removed the rest of his
clothes and hers, taking her as a ship comes to its mooring, moving hard
against her, feeling her response, pressing, wanting, each needing the other so
desperately that they seemed to fear that moment of complete intimacy, that
utmost connection that would take them beyond what they could comprehend, as if
somehow they both sensed that their time together was fleeting.

Again and again he brought her to the edge of the summit,
then held himself back, feeling the twisting need, the shuddering gasp that
threatened to overwhelm him.

On and on it came, until she writhed beneath him and cried
out his name, and dug her hands into his hair and held him to her, refusing to
let him go. She arched against him. “Now,” she whispered. “Come with me. Love
me. Now. Give me this memory.”

He groaned, yielding to her, and the power of it drew her
with him, his whispered words of encouragement and her panting cries of
pleasure blending for a moment into one, as two raindrops come together on a
windowpane.

They lay together until the heat of their passion cooled and
the perspiration of their bodies dried in the twilight chill of the room, yet
they stayed as they were, until he felt himself grow smaller and slip from the
mingled wetness of her desire and his seed. And even then they remained as they
had been, solid and together, filled with love and life, as if by staying this
way they could hold at bay what was to come.

Knowing that she was worried about what lay ahead, and
understanding that her frightening encounter had caused this fear, he gathered
her close and rolled over, cradling her in his arms, holding her against him,
wanting her to feel the security and protection he offered. “It is almost
over,” he said, trying to assure her.

“Aye. It won’t be long now.”

Her melancholy touched him.

“Don’t worry, angel mine. I’ve waited too long and gotten
too close to let anything happen to either of us. We will see this thing done
and we will see it through together. We have been through much, each of us
suffering our losses.”

“Aye
. ‘A man of sorrows, and acquainted with grief.
’”

His heart felt weighted down. She failed to mention where
that quote was found, and he knew it had been intentional.