Lady Dunsany looked distinctly out of place in the stable. Small, plump, and impeccable in black linen, she looked like a china ornament, removed from its spot of cherished safety on the mantelpiece, and in imminent and constant peril of breakage, here in this world of rough animals and unshaven men.
Hughes, with a glance of complete astonishment at his mistress, bowed and tugged at his forelock before retreating to his den behind the tack room, leaving MacKenzie face-to-face with her.
Close to, the impression of fragility was heightened by the paleness of her face, touched faintly with pink at the corners of nose and eyes. She looked like a very small and dignified rabbit, dressed in mourning. Jamie felt that he should ask her to sit down, but there was no place for her to sit, save on a pile of hay or an upturned barrow.
“The coroner’s court met this morning, MacKenzie,” she said.
“Aye, milady.” He had known that—they all had, and the other grooms had kept their distance from him all morning. Not out of respect; out of the dread for one who suffers from a deadly disease. Jeffries knew what had happened in the drawing room at Ellesmere, and that meant all the servants knew. But no one spoke of it.
“The verdict of the court was that the Earl of Ellesmere met his death by misadventure. The coroner’s theory is that his lordship was—distraught”—she made a faint moue of distaste—“over my daughter’s death.” Her voice quivered faintly, but did not break. The fragile Lady Dunsany had borne up much better beneath the tragedy than had her husband; the servants’ rumor had it that his lordship had not risen from his bed since his return from Ellesmere.
“Aye, milady?” Jeffries had been called to give evidence. MacKenzie had not. So far as the coroner’s court was concerned, the groom MacKenzie had never set foot on Ellesmere.
Lady Dunsany’s eyes met his, straight on. They were a pale bluish-green, like her daughter Isobel’s, but the blond hair that glowed on Isobel was faded on her mother, touched with white strands that shone silver in the sun from the open door of the stable.
“We are grateful to you, MacKenzie,” she said quietly.
“Thank ye, milady.”
“Very grateful,” she repeated, still gazing at him intently. “MacKenzie isn’t your real name, is it?” she said suddenly.
“No, milady.” A sliver of ice ran down his spine, despite the warmth of the afternoon sun on his shoulders. How much had the Lady Geneva told her mother before her death?
She seemed to feel his stiffening, for the edge of her mouth lifted in what he thought was meant as a smile of reassurance.
“I think I need not ask what it is, just yet,” she said. “But I do have a question for you. MacKenzie—do you want to go home?”
“Home?” He repeated the word blankly.
“To Scotland.” She was watching him intently. “I know who you are,” she said. “Not your name, but that you’re one of John’s Jacobite prisoners. My husband told me.”
Jamie watched her warily, but she didn’t seem upset; no more so than would be natural in a woman who has just lost a daughter and gained a grandson, at least.
“I hope you will forgive the deception, milady,” he said. “His Lordship—”
“Wished to save me distress,” Lady Dunsany finished for him. “Yes, I know. William worries too much.” Still, the deep line between her brows relaxed a bit at the thought of her husband’s concern. The sight, with its underlying echo of marital devotion, gave him a faint and unexpected pang.
“We are not rich—you will have gathered that from Ellesmere’s remarks,” Lady Dunsany went on. “Helwater is rather heavily in debt. My grandson, however, is now the possessor of one of the largest fortunes in the county.”
There seemed nothing to say to this but “Aye, milady?” though it made him feel rather like the parrot who lived in the main salon. He had seen it as he crept stealthily through the flowerbeds at sunset the day before, taking the chance of approaching the house while the family were dressing for dinner, in an attempt to catch a glimpse through a window of the new Earl of Ellesmere.
“We are very retired here,” she went on. “We seldom visit London, and my husband has little influence in high circles. But—”
“Aye, milady?” He had some inkling by now of where her ladyship was heading with this roundabout conversation, and a feeling of sudden excitement hollowed the space beneath his ribs.
“John—Lord John Grey, that is—comes from a family with considerable influence. His stepfather is—well, that’s of no consequence.” She shrugged, the small black-linen shoulders dismissing the details.
“The point is that it might be possible to exert sufficient influence on your behalf to have you released from the conditions of your parole, so that you might return to Scotland. So I have come to ask you—do you want to go home, MacKenzie?”
He felt quite breathless, as though someone had punched him very hard in the stomach.
Scotland. To go away from this damp, spongy atmosphere, set foot on that forbidden road and walk it with a free, long stride, up into the crags and along the deer trails, to feel the air clearing and sharpening with the scent of gorse and heather. To go home!
To be a stranger no longer. To go away from hostility and loneliness, come down into Lallybroch, and see his sister’s face light with joy at the sight of him, feel her arms around his waist, Ian’s hug about his shoulders and the pummeling, grasping clutch of the children’s hands, tugging at his clothes.
To go away, and never to see or hear of his own child again. He stared at Lady Dunsany, his face quite blank, so that she should not guess at the turmoil her offer had caused within him.
He had, at last, found the baby yesterday, lying asleep in a basket near the nursery window on the second floor. Perched precariously on the branch of a huge Norway spruce, he had strained his eyes to see through the screen of needles that hid him.
