When the Laird Returns (12 page)

The carriage began to descend toward the house, taking a road paved in glittering white stone. Just as suddenly as it had begun, the rain eased.

“It seems as if we’re being greeted,” Alisdair said as the carriage halted in the circular drive before the wide front door.

At the top of the steps was an ancient-looking butler, hair coiffed in an impressive white wig. Speaking to a footman standing beside him, he pointed toward the carriage before turning and walking back to the door in a shuffling gait. The footman went quickly down the stairs, throwing open the door and bowing.

Alisdair left the vehicle and held his hand out for her.

Climbing those steps would make one feel a penitent, Iseabal thought, as if entering a great and noble cathedral. The very last thing she wished to do was to set foot inside that imposing-looking structure. But she forced her lips into a faint smile and descended from the carriage.

T
he majordomo stood stiffly inside the door, an ancient sentinel for Brandidge Hall. Alisdair wondered if the old man had known his father, but before he could ask that question or give him his name, the other man turned, leading them through the massive foyer and into a hallway.

His grandfather, he’d been told, had been a collector of sorts and Brandidge Hall mirrored his interests. Outside one door was a statue of a slender black dog, sitting with paws outstretched, muzzle erect, eyes blindly staring in eternal watchfulness. Egyptian, if Alisdair wasn’t mistaken. Along one wall was a tansu, filled with dozens of tiny drawers, the key to each festooned with a golden tassel.

“It looks like the one in your cabin,” Iseabal said.

“A Japanese tansu,” he said, agreeing.

On an ivory pedestal stood a chest, a work of art intricately carved and lacquered in a brilliant crimson. Noting the
dragons and the number of claws on each toe, Alisdair realized that the chest wasn’t Japanese, but Chinese.

The majordomo stopped, glancing behind him with an impatient look. Alisdair knew he’d just been wordlessly chastised for dawdling.

Stopping in front of a large, heavily patterned door, the old man motioned to one of the two footmen standing guard on either side. The servant bowed, opening the door silently, and the older man shuffled in, announcing their presence in a voice that cracked with age.

“Your grandson, my lady,” he said, standing aside. After Alisdair and Iseabal entered, he abruptly vanished, leaving Alisdair staring at the closing door.

“How did he know?” he asked, and heard a tinkling laugh.

“You’re the image of your father,” a woman said. “With your grandmother’s eyes.”

Patricia Landers, Countess of Sherbourne, was nothing like he had pictured her, Alisdair thought, glancing down at the diminutive woman who had been his grandfather’s second wife. Although in her seventies, she seemed much younger. Her brilliant silver hair was arranged in a simple bun, her face only lightly lined and now graced with a radiant smile and faded, twinkling blue eyes.

She sat on the settee in front of the fire, one hand clasping a brass bird fixed on the top of a cane. Her attire was simple, the pale gray mourning dress reminding Alisdair that the man whose death had complicated his life had been her son.

“I’m sorry for your loss,” he murmured softly, releasing Iseabal’s hand to bow slightly in front of the older woman.

She took him aback by placing a hand on his forearm and squeezing lightly. “David had a rich, full life, thanks to your
father,” she said, her bright smile momentarily dimmed with sadness.

“Please join me.” She motioned to the space beside her. “I trust your journey was an easy one,” she added, glancing curiously at Iseabal.

Alisdair stepped back, also glancing at Iseabal. “May I introduce Iseabal Drummond to you, Countess,” he said.

At her inquiring look, he hesitated. “My wife,” he added.

“Not truly a wife,” Iseabal replied, looking over at him. “Alisdair wishes an annulment.”

Alisdair stared at her, unprepared for her candor and wishing she’d chosen another time to be so outspoken.

Patricia looked from one to the other, her brow furrowing. “I did not realize you were married.”

“It’s a recent event,” he said, annoyed.

Iseabal glanced at him, her gaze filled with irritation. “We’ve been wed but a week,” she contributed, turning to Patricia.

“I do not understand,” the older woman said. “Why should you wish an annulment? Is there some impediment to your marriage? Some relationship that has just become apparent?”

“Our marriage was not a question of choice,” Alisdair countered, “but of command. Her father’s,” he added.

He and his crew had fought bandits in the Orient and privateers in the Caribbean. Twice Alisdair had stared down the barrel of a pistol, certain he was about to die. But he’d never once considered that he might be at a loss with two women glaring at him as if he’d grown a horn in the middle of his forehead.

“What did you do, that he insisted upon marriage, Alis
dair?” Patricia asked, her tone for all the world as if he were nine and had pushed James into the bay.

“It wasn’t what I did, but what I wanted,” he answered, disconcerted to see her lift an eyebrow imperiously at him. “MacRae land,” he explained stiffly. “Drummond was using it for sheep fodder.”

“You were married in Scotland, then?” Patricia addressed her question to Iseabal.

“Yes,” she said quietly. “At Fernleigh, my home.”

Patricia glanced at Alisdair once again and for a moment he thought she might say something else. But she clamped her lips together and reached up to take Iseabal’s hand, drawing her down to the settee.

She bent and spoke in a soft tone to Iseabal, leaving Alisdair with the curious feeling of being dismissed.

He walked over to the blazing fireplace, staring up at the paintings mounted above the mantel. To his right was a portrait of a man of middle years, his sweet smile of contentment and look of vacancy in his eyes revealing his identity. The recently deceased Earl of Sherbourne had been a man in form, but a child in mind.

On the left was a painting of a man attired in a brilliant red tunic, a row of medals aligned over his heart. He was pictured mounted on a white horse whose bridle and saddle were laced with silver.

“Your husband?” he asked Patricia. She had married again after his grandfather’s death. Due to the nature of David’s malady, he guessed that this man had been the true steward of the Sherbourne wealth.

“Nigel Wescott,” she said, glancing up at the portrait.

“General Wescott?” Alisdair asked, surprised. Wescott
was the man who might well have sent his father to the gallows, had the MacRaes not been able to escape.

“We struck up a friendship, the general and I,” Patricia said, reminiscing. “The night your father and the MacRaes left Scotland, we discovered a great many things in common.”

“Because of you, they were able to leave,” he told her. “They never forgot your courage,” he added. “A great many baby girls were named Patricia in honor of you.”

Patricia smiled. “Thank you for telling me that, but I’m afraid it wasn’t courage as much as fascination,” she confessed, glancing up at the portrait with a wistful smile. “Nigel was a truly wonderful man. For years he acted as earl, since David held the title but could not perform the duties. He’s been gone now for seven years and I miss him every day.” She looked at Alisdair. “I loved your grandfather as well, Alisdair, but his heart had already been taken by Moira.”

A footman entered just then, bearing a tray laden with a round china pot and matching cups and saucers, along with an assortment of pastries. A crystal decanter and matching tumbler rested on another salver carried by the second footman.

“Thank you,” she said softly, smiling at the servants. “My butler took for granted that you would prefer whiskey over chocolate, Alisdair,” Patricia said, her eyes teasing. “Was he incorrect?”

“No,” Alisdair admitted, sitting in the chair next to the settee.

The fire was taking the dampness from the air, adding a cozy cheerfulness to the room. A brightly flowered rug in a Persian style covered the floor. Dozens of gilded sconces were mounted on the pale yellow silk walls, the beeswax
candles lit against the gloom of the day. Elaborate plaster carvings of flowers festooned the corners of the ceilings. To complete the air of a feminine chamber, each table bore spindly legs, and each footstool arranged in front of the chairs was upholstered in needlepoint.

The only exception was the large wing chair in which he sat. The leather arms were worn and smelling faintly of tobacco. He couldn’t help but wonder if the general had sat here at night in quiet companionship with Patricia.

“Is there a portrait of my grandfather?” he asked as the footman handed him a heavily cut glass half filled with whiskey.

She shook her head. “A small one,” she said. “It was, after all, his duty to be pictured. Gerald did not approve of portrait painters, although he had your grandmother’s likeness done.”

“I’ve heard she was very beautiful,” he said, glancing at Iseabal. She sat quietly again, her annoyance tamped beneath good manners. She was not unlike a volcano he’d once seen in the islands, Alisdair thought. Dormant and quiescent, it nevertheless had the power to crack the earth miles away. Sometimes steam erupted and large holes revealed secret rivers of molten lava.

What fierceness of temperament was hidden beneath Iseabal’s façade?

Patricia stared down at the contents of her cup as if viewing something other than chocolate. Alisdair had the feeling that she was debating the wisdom of her words before continuing. Finally she replaced the cup in its saucer and gently set both on the table in front of her.

“Do you want to see Moira’s portrait?” she asked. “It took months, I understand, until Gerald was satisfied. It’s always hung in his chamber,” she added, leaning on the cane and
slowly standing. “Why don’t I take you there now, and you can see it for yourself?”

Iseabal scowled at Alisdair, but he didn’t see her, being so intent on assisting Patricia up the stairs.

Not once in her life had she ever deliberately harmed anyone, but at the moment, Iseabal wanted to hit the MacRae over the head with her mallet.

He’d introduced her nonchalantly, as if she were nothing more than an object.
This is a box, a trunk, a companion. My wife. Do not become accustomed to the fact of her; she is soon to be dismissed
.

Frowning at him, Iseabal trailed behind the two of them.

At the landing on the second floor, Patricia rested, one palm pressed against her bosom.

“I rarely come to this floor,” she admitted after catching her breath. “My chamber is behind Nigel’s library. A precaution my physician ordered.”

“Then you should not have come,” Alisdair said, his concern evident.

“I wanted to,” she said gently, patting him on the arm in reassurance. “My health is an impediment to my wishes, a nuisance, nothing more.”

Iseabal followed them down the corridor, tilting her head back and marveling at the rectangular sections of black-and-gold molding set into the ceiling. Painted inside each section was a vignette—tiny pointy-eared figures frolicking near naked in a glade, or toga-draped couples sitting amongst blue-edged clouds. The detail was apparent even from here, each separate painting unique and different.

“I have not been here in years,” Patricia told him, slowly
opening the door. “But I keep it just as it was in your grandfather’s day, Alisdair.”

The older woman went to the window, pulling aside the green-and-gold draperies before opening one of the panes. For a moment, she stood looking out at the view of the lawn, sparkling with rain droplets, and thick trees, their branches laden with watery leaves.

The sun, diffused by the growing mist, was still bright enough to illuminate first Patricia, then the room, revealing its pristine condition. Almost, Iseabal thought, as if Gerald’s chamber had been as carefully kept as a shrine. And the woman at the window, made young by the subtle shading of light, was its mistress and guardian.

There was something unbearably sad about the Countess of Sherbourne at this moment. As if the determined patter of the past few minutes had faded beneath the somberness of this place. Or perhaps, Iseabal thought, being in Gerald’s room had simply opened up a store of memories, old and dusty and rarely recalled.

Dominating the room was the bed, draped in emerald fabric that shimmered in the faint breeze from the open window. Four tall and ornately carved posts marked each corner of the bed, and supported a tester elaborately shirred in the pattern of a sunburst. The headboard bore a crest of a lamb and a lion, each on a shield and separated by a diagonal line.

The other pieces of furniture, although smaller, were just as distinctive in style. The front of the armoire was decorated in inlay, both shades of wood, light and dark, portraying a landscape of willowy trees beside a tranquil river. The side tables and chairs were all crafted with slender legs that curved, bowed, and tapered to end in clawed feet.

Iseabal walked inside the room, her interest captured by the leather-and-gold-tooled top of a writing desk. Her fingers stroked over the deeply embossed pattern of green leaves and gold berries stretching around all four sides.

“Gerald shared this room with Moira,” Patricia said, moving to the fireplace. No fire had been laid there, but the older woman extended her hands to nonexistent flames. “He continued to use it after we married.” She glanced up at the portrait mounted above the white stone mantel. “I think it pleased him to remember better times.”

The portrait of Moira MacRae was a simple one, that of a woman and her child. In the background was Gilmuir as it had once been. Moira’s blue dress accentuated the color of her eyes, the same shade as Alisdair’s. But that was not the only similarity between them. His grandmother’s smile had been transferred to his face and the angle of nose and chin transformed to a masculine version. Anyone looking at them would know they were related, and closely so.

Moira looked down at her child with such joy on her face that Iseabal envied the long-dead woman. Would she ever feel that happiness?

Reaching up, Iseabal traced the line of the child’s face a few inches above the canvas.

“Your father?” she asked.

Alisdair nodded.

“I love him dearly, even though he is not my own,” Patricia said, smiling fondly. “My dream was realized when I received his letter all those years ago. You had just been born, Alisdair, and he was filled with tales of his bride and his son.”

“There are five sons now,” Alisdair said, turning his attention to her. “And all of us proud to call him father.”

Patricia looked around the room, her gaze touching
fondly on one object after another. “Gerald would be pleased to know that his grandson has returned to claim his heritage.”

Iseabal glanced at Alisdair, wondering why he didn’t mention that he had no intention of accepting the title. Perhaps it was the sheen of tears in Patricia’s eyes that rendered him silent.