Chapter 7
Midsummer's Eve on June twenty-first marked the halfway point in the growing season between May Day and Lammas-tide on August first. In Ulster this year it dawned unusually sunny. Kieran Devers rode that day from Erne Rock to Mallow Court to make certain his father's estate was being managed properly in his absence. He was very surprised to find his sister, Lady Colleen Kelly, in residence.
'When did you get here?' he asked her, giving her a kiss.
'Mama wrote from England that I should come and check on you,' she told him with a smile. 'Where have you been, Kieran? I have been here three days already, and the servants were most mysterious.' She was a pretty young woman with black hair like her brother's, and fine blue eyes. 'Mama is still smarting over the fact that Willy was turned down by Lady Lindley, and yet she is already planning his wedding to Emily Anne. She says he is coming around, which of course means she has finally badgered him into submission.' Colleen laughed. Then she said, 'Was Lady Lindley really as awful as Mama says she is?'
'Fortune Lindley is independent, headstrong, intelligent, clever, and beautiful,' he replied. 'She would have made Willy absolutely miserable, for he would have found himself torn between her and his mother. She was wise enough to see it, and so she sent him away, albeit gently for she is not unkind.'
'You seem to know her well, big brother,' Colleen Kelly said softly, her blue eyes curious.
'I'm going to marry her, Colleen,' came the surprising reply.
He put an arm about her shoulders. 'I know, Colleen, I know. Fortune and I have done the unthinkable. We have fallen in love. We will not be forgiven by Lady Jane, or Willy, for our recklessness, but there it is. It is impossible to control the direction of the heart as I have found much to my surprise.' He smiled at her wryly.
'Mama has had her eye on Maguire's Ford ever since she learned from the Reverend Steen it was owned by a duchess with an eligible daughter. For you to steal that girl from under her nose is an insult she will never forgive, Kieran,' his sister warned him.
'Once she met Fortune she didn't even like her, and did all in her power to remove Willy from the girl's influence,' he replied.
'But for you to acquire Maguire's Ford, which is so much bigger, and more prosperous than Mallow Court, after Willy has been sent down by this heiress is a terrible affront. You know it as well as I, big brother. If Mama would not allow you to inherit Da's holding one day unless you became a Protestant, do you really think she will be content to sit by while you snap up a larger and richer estate from under her nose?'
'Maguire's Ford does not belong to Fortune,' Kieran told his younger sister. 'It belongs to her mother, the duchess of Glenkirk. It was only to be Fortune's if she married a Protestant. Lady Leslie is no fool, Colleen. Fortune and I will go to England, and from there we will probably go to the New World. Neither of us has ever felt at home in any place we have lived.'
'Why can you not simply become a Protestant? Just think if your Fortune managed to bring you to our church how frustrating it would be for Mama after all her years of trying,' Colleen chuckled.
'You know why I will not convert,' he said quietly.
'Kieran, our mother has been dead these twenty-seven years. You have made your point. I hate it that you will have to leave Ireland! We will never see you again. If you did not have that tiny miniature of our mother you would not even remember what she looked like,' Colleen told him desperately.
'She looked like you, Colleen,' he replied with devastating effect. 'She was fair with her blue eyes, and raven's wing hair, and she was but twenty years old when she died birthing you. I do not blame you for what happened, Colleen. You were only two when Da remarried. I do not blame Moire, for she didn't want to be cut out of Da's life. As for me, I made my decision long ago. I see no reason to change it.'
'But you aren't even particularly devout, or prayerful,' his sister noted. 'Why you even care is beyond me.'
'Come with me over to Erne Rock Castle, and meet Fortune,' her brother said. 'The Leslies are very hospitable folk.'
'Nay,' Colleen said, shaking her head vigorously. 'If I go I shall have to tell Mama I knew what you were up to, and I don't want to do that, Kieran. You recall our mother, but remember that Lady Jane is the only mother I have ever known. She made no distinction between me, or Mary, or the children she bore our father. And even when I disappointed her by marrying an Irish Protestant rather than an English one, she never deserted me. Even Mary loves her. You were the only one of Da's offspring who could not get on with her, Kieran.'
'You'll be going back home,' he wheedled her, 'and not see our dear stepmother until Willy's wedding to Emily Anne. By then it will be known that Fortune and I are to be wed. Our stepmother will be so torn between her joy over getting Emily Anne as a daughter-in-law, and her outrage at my own marriage, she won't think to wonder if you met the Leslies while you were here in Ulster checking up on me. She will assume I slyly kept it from you because you would certainly have told her had you known. You've always been so good, Colleen; our stepmother would never suspect you of a subterfuge.' He grinned mischievously at his younger sister, then grew serious again. 'It will probably be the last time we see each other, Colleen, and the only opportunity you will have to meet Fortune. I want you to know the girl who is to be my wife. You are my favorite sister, and our true mam's last gift to her family.'
'Damn you, Kieran,' she said, tears in her eyes. 'You have the tongue of the devil himself. Very well, I will come and meet your lass, and then I shall flee south to my own home. Mama will be home shortly after Lammastide for Willy's wedding which is planned for Michaelmas.'
'I need a few hours to go over the estate books for Da,' he told her. 'I'll remain the night, and then tomorrow we'll ride over to Maguire's Ford.'
'I'll have to pretend I'm departing for home,' Colleen said. 'I don't want Mama's servants gossiping when she returns, and they will. It doesn't matter to you, I know, but it does to me, Kieran.'
'Aye,' he replied. 'I really do understand, Colleen, but I wanted you, of all my siblings, to know that Fortune is not the terrible creature Lady Jane claims she is.'
'God's blood, Kieran,' his sister swore softly. 'You're in love! Really in love! I would have never thought it of you.'
'Catholics fall in love, too,' he remarked dryly.
