The Spitfire

The Spitfire

Bertrice Small

They cast their destinies to the winds of desire
.

The year is 1483. Tavis Stewart, Earl of Dunmore, abducts beautiful Lady Arabella Grey, cousin of King Richard III, as she is about to marry Sir Jasper Keane. Tavis wants revenge for Jasper’s murder of his fiancée. Irresistibly, deliciously, Arabella surrenders to her enemy with fierce abandon--knowing that there may be only one way to get what is rightfully hers.

For my son, Tom

who grows more like my heroes with each passing

year. This one’s for you, Bun, with much

love from your doting mother.

Prologue

Spring 1483

“By the body of Christ crucified!”
swore Tavis Stewart, the black-browed Earl of Dunmor. “
By the body of Christ crucified, and by the tears His blessed mother Mary shed upon the hill of Calvary, I will be avenged!”
He stood amid the smoking ruins of Culcairn House, his nostrils burning with the acrid scent of death. A fine mist of rain had begun to fall, and the damp but sharpened the unpleasant stench.

“She brought it upon herself! Upon us all!” said Robert Hamilton, the young laird of Culcairn. The boy was close to tears. In the last three years he had lost his mother to a childbed fever, and his father to the never-ending border wars. His home had been all he had, and suddenly it was gone. How was he to shelter and to protect his younger sisters and brother now? How could he even seek out a wife without a decent home to which he might bring her? It was gone. And why? Because of his bitch-in-heat of an elder sister! Beautiful Eufemia with her dark red hair and bright blue eyes. Eufemia with her quick laughter and mocking smile.
Eufemia, the whore!
It was time that Tavis Stewart knew the truth. He need seek no vengeance over Eufemia Hamilton, whose honor was long gone, had the earl but known it.

“Robbie, please!”
Eleven-year-old Margaret Hamilton put a gentle hand upon her brother’s arm, sensing his dangerous thoughts, his dark, rising anger. These last few hours had made her older and wiser beyond her years. “Eufemia is dead, and to have died in such a way as she did is too horrible to contemplate any further.” The young girl began to tremble, shaking so hard her teeth chattered. “I…I sh-shall hear her sc-screams until my d-dying d-d-day.”

The laird put a comforting arm about his sister, but his voice was hard and bitter as he spoke. “Eufemia is to blame, Meg, and there is no use in denying it. She brought the English down upon us, and cost us all dearly in her jealous folly. She had no care for any of us. Neither you, nor me, nor Mary or Geordie. We might hae all been killed because of her! Damn her black soul to hell!”

The Earl of Dunmor glowered down at the laird from beneath his thick and bushy eyebrows. His dark green eyes were icy with his anger. He was twenty-seven years old to the boy laird’s fifteen, and though Robert Hamilton stood six feet in height, the earl topped him by a good four inches. “Yer quick, laddie, to make allegations, but slow to gie me the whole truth of this matter,” Tavis Stewart said in a dangerously soft voice. “Ye’ll tell me now, or as God is my witness, I’ll kill ye where ye stand!” His hand went to his jeweled dagger as if for emphasis.

“Noooooo!”
Margaret Hamilton pulled away from her brother. White-faced, she put her slender child’s form between the two, her little hands stretched out as if she might actually prevent them from assaulting one another, for her brother’s hand had gone to his dagger as well. “Has there not been enough killing here?” she sobbed. “Is that all men are good for, my lord? Killing, and looting, and ravishing?” She wiped the hot tears from her cheeks, smudging the soot upon her pretty little face.

About her the kilt-clad borderers looked shamefaced for a brief moment, remembering other raids, other smoking ruins, other women who wept. There wasn’t a man standing within the sound of Margaret Hamilton’s voice who was not moved by the sweet-visaged girl and her poignant words. She looked so vulnerable, but then they always did. She was too young to have suffered so terribly, but then they always were. The Earl of Dunmor’s face, however, was impervious, and he gave no sign of relenting.

“Come, Mistress Meg, come wi’ me, lassie.” An old servant woman finally took the girl by the shoulder and gently led her away. Meg looked back to her brother and the earl. Then, torn, glanced toward her six-year-old sister, Mary, and their three-year-old baby brother, George, who huddled together whimpering in the lap of another servant. Her maternal instinct rose strong, and she immediately decided that Rob and the earl could solve their own problems. The bairns needed her more. She hurried toward them.

“The truth, Rob! I want the truth, and I want it now!” the earl growled at the laird once more.

“Eufemia was a whore, my lord,” began the laird, and then he staggered with the blow that the earl delivered to his jaw. Grim-faced, he continued. “A born whore though she hid it well, or so she thought. Most knew, though none would dare to say it aloud.”

“I did not know,” Tavis Stewart said gruffly.

“Ye cared nothing for my sister,” Robert Hamilton said quietly. “Ye wanted a wife. Eufemia was convenient, for our lands abut, and she was beautiful. ‘Twas all ye cared to know, my lord, and my sister was ambitious. She wanted a good marriage, and would have probably been a faithful wife to ye if ye serviced her with regularity, for her passions were great. She lay wi’ those men who could not for fear of retribution brag on it.” The boy sighed sadly.

“Last year, however, my sister fell in love, God help her. He was English, Sir Jasper Keane, by name. They were well suited to one another, for the Englishman was as rash and as reckless as was Eufemia. They met while out riding the borders. ‘Twas dangerous for my sister to ride alone, but she would have none wi’ her. Even our father could not control her. She was wild for her Englishman. Wild to the point of madness.

“Once she learned he was seeing another lass along the borders, she followed him upon the moor until she had located the wench’s cottage. Eufemia burned that cottage to the ground, my lord. Sir Jasper, I am told, found her behavior most amusing, although he beat her black and blue for it. She showed me her bruises as if they were badges of honor instead of her dishonor. Eufemia believed he cared for her because he beat her.

“My sister thought to be the bastard’s wife,” Robert Hamilton said, shaking his head. “She truly loved Sir Jasper, and she refused to believe him when he told her he would have an heiress of good character to wife, not a red-haired Scots whore wi’ but a small dowry, but Eufemia laughed when she told me his words. She did not believe that the Englishman would wed another. She thought he but said what he said to taunt her and make her jealous.

“At first those words did not fret her, but eventually, I think she began to be afraid Sir Jasper meant them, though she would nae admit it even to me. She began to be jealous of every minute he was nae wi’ her; jealous of his other women, and there were several, I am told, for the Englishman is as randy a borderer as I hae ever heard. Women are drawn to him even as flies to a honey pot.

“Then you came to us, Tavis,” continued the laird, “and ye asked me for Eufemia’s hand in marriage. God knows ye could hae made a better match than my sister, but I understood yer reasons. Ye wanted a wife and an heir, but ye were not of a mind to quibble over the matter, which ye should hae had to wi’ a greater name or fortune. I should hae refused ye, my lord. I knew what my sister was, for she had confided her passion to me from almost the beginning, although I dinna know why. Eufemia always held herself aloof from the rest of us.” The boy’s shoulders slumped with his exhaustion and dejection. For a long moment he was silent and there could only be heard the sound of the wind and the sobbing of the survivors of Culcairn House.

Briefly the earl felt pity for the young laird, but he both needed and wanted to know the entire story of this tragedy which certainly, to a great extent, concerned him as well. “The rest of it, laddie,” he said quietly. “Tell me everything, Rob.”

The laird sighed deeply and then continued. “Eufemia would nae let me refuse ye, my lord. She swore to me that if the match was struck she would be a good wife to ye, but the truth was that she could barely wait to tell her English lover of her
good fortune.
She wanted to make him envious of her
earl,
for he was but a simple knight. How she laughed at being able to repay him in kind. She told him he was welcome to his heiress if he could even find one who would hae him. She would be a
countess,
the wife of the king’s half brother, despite her small dowry. Now that I think on it, I believe my sister gave me her confidences because she was fearful. ‘Twas a dangerous game she played with a dangerous man.

“Sir Jasper told my sister that he would bring her to England and gie her her own house. Eufemia replied that she was tired of being his mistress and would not be publicly shamed. He would either wed wi’ her or she would wed wi’ ye. Several weeks ago she told him she would nae see him again; that she was finished wi’ him, and she would tell the world so. That she preferred being a wife, and if nae his, then yers. She was stubborn, my elder sister, but the break pained her, I know. Her temper was foul these past weeks, and she cried easily.”

Robert Hamilton’s eyes dimmed with his memories. He could once again hear the stamping of hoofbeats outside of his home, the hard jangling of bridles, the menacing rumble of voices that forewarned him of trouble to come. He moved swiftly to the library windows, and saw outside in the light of the smoking torches a large party of men. The burning brands flamed eerily in the rising wind, sending an equal measure of light and shadow over the mounted troop, none of whom, the young laird noted, wore plaids.
English!

“God in his heaven!” he whispered softly to himself, fearing the worst even while hoping for the best. Culcairn House had originally been a hunting lodge, and although added on to over the years until it had become a house, it had never been fortified; although it should have been, considering its precarious location so near the border.

Robert Hamilton heard a mighty hammering upon the door. He ran from the library downstairs to the main level of the house, directing his servants even as he came to seek safety for themselves and the other young Hamiltons. The hall was emptied as if by magic as he, himself, flung open the stout oak door of his home to face a deceptively handsome gentleman who stepped quickly over the threshold, saying as he came, “I am Sir Jasper Keane. I wish to see Mistress Eufemia Hamilton.”

“I am her brother, the laird,” Robert Hamilton answered, “and the hour is late to come calling, my lord.”

“Yet I am here, sir, and you will not, I think, send me away,” came the arrogant reply. “Surely you will permit me to speak with Mistress Eufemia after the long, hard ride my men and I have undertaken this night.”

Robert Hamilton laughed bitterly. “I am nae in a position to refuse ye, my lord, am I? Still I am uncomfortable, for I dinna think much honest business is conducted in such a manner in the deep of night.”

The Englishman flushed, but before he might reply to the laird’s sharp words, Eufemia Hamilton herself appeared at the top of the stairs.

“How dare ye come here!” she hissed at Sir Jasper Keane. “Get ye gone, my lord!” Then turning, she disappeared into the upper reaches of the house.

SirJasper leapt up the stairs after her, but the laird’s voice caused him to stop in his flight.

“
My lord!
I will nae hae this shameful matter between ye and my sister made any more public than ye hae both already made it. Let me escort ye to my library, and I will send for Eufemia to come and join us there. I would bid ye remember that this is
my
home.”

The Englishman nodded, but said, “My men must be allowed entry to the house, sir.”

“There is nae any danger to ye here, Sir Jasper,” the laird replied stiffly. “I will open my door to show my good faith, but yer men will remain outside.”

“Very well,” came the agreement.

Robert Hamilton opened his front door and said to the assembled troop, “Yer master bids ye await him here.” Then turning back to his unwanted guest, he led him upstairs to the second level of the house, into his library. “There is wine, my lord. I bid ye help yerself while I go and fetch my sister.” He hurried from the room and up the staircase to the third story of the house, where the bedchambers were located.

In the upper hall he met with old Una, the children’s nursemaid.

“‘Tis a wicked man that comes courting wi’ a troop of armed rogues at his back,” she noted matter-of-factly.

“Aye,” he concurred. “Take the bairns to safety, and if there be those amongst the servants who have nae hidden themselves, bid them do so before it is too late. We may get out of this alive, old woman, and we may nae. It is too late to seek help from the earl, I fear.”

He continued down the hallway to his eldest sister’s room, entering the chamber without even knocking. There he found Eufemia, flushed, excited, and as anxious as a maid with her first love. He marveled that anyone as willful and selfish as she was could be so beautiful. Her sapphire-blue eyes were almost black with her mood, and he observed she was wearing her very best gown, a dark green silk with pearls embroidered on the bodice.

“He hae come for me, Rob!” she said excitedly. “I knew he would!”

“Dinna be a fool, Eufemia,” the young laird said sharply. “If the Englishman had come to offer marriage to ye, he would hae asked me first, as ‘tis proper. Certainly he knows yer willing, sister.”

Eufemia Hamilton frowned. “Yer right,” she said slowly, as if unwilling to admit to the truth of his words. Her eyes flashed angrily as her mood turned. “Damn him, Rob!” Now she was almost close to tears. “Damn his black soul! Send him away!”

“Tis easier said than done,” Robert Hamilton replied quietly. “Only ye can send him away.”

“I’ll nae see him!” she said petulantly.

The laird gripped his sister’s arm in a bruising grasp, and his voice was so uncharacteristically harsh that Eufemia’s eyes widened in surprise. “I may be yer junior in years, sister mine,” he told her, “but I am the head of this family, and as such,
I will be obeyed!
Ye’ve endangered us all wi’ yer shamelessness, and by God, ye’ll put an end to it this night before the earl hears about it. Do ye understand me, Eufemia?”

“Aye,” she whispered.

“Then come down to meet wi’ yer
lover.
He’s awaiting ye in my library.”

“Ye’ll nae come wi’ me?”

“Nae unless ye want me to, sister.”

She shook her head in the negative.

“Then bind up yer hair and go before his men start stealing the livestock.”