скачать книгу бесплатно
‘Are you a good sailor, Mr Sinclair?’ I enquired. ‘One would hope so, since you are in the Royal Navy.’
Neil Sinclair smiled without mockery for the first time—a real smile that reached his eyes and made my heart jump, and almost made me forget that I disliked him.
‘No, Miss Balfour, I am not,’ he said. ‘I, too, was sick as a dog on my first few voyages, but unfortunately there was no bucket to hand.’
I smiled, too. ‘You said that you know my uncle, sir,’ I said, on impulse. ‘What manner of man is he?’
Mr Sinclair was silent for so long that I started to feel nervous. ‘Your uncle is a dour man,’ he said at last. ‘You’ll have little conversation out of him, mistress.’
That was not encouraging. ‘And my aunt?’ I asked, wondering if I wanted to know the answer.
‘Mrs Balfour suffers from her nerves,’ Mr Sinclair said.
I did not really understand such a complaint, having not a sensitive nerve in my body, or so I had been told. Lady Bennie, who suffered from nerves herself, mostly when Sir Compton spent time with his mistress in Inverness, had commented sourly on my lack of sensibility on more than one occasion.
‘Oh dear,’ I said. ‘And my cousin Ellen?’
Mr Sinclair smiled. ‘Miss Balfour is delightful,’ he said.
I felt an unexpected rush of jealousy and wished I had not asked.
The conversation waned. Mr Sinclair seemed disinclined to speak any further of my relatives, and I was sufficiently discouraged to think of my dour uncle and delicate aunt that I did not persist in my questioning. It did not sound as though a very warm welcome awaited me at Glen Clair, and I wondered once again why they had offered to take me in.
That night we stopped at the inn in Sheildaig, a building of whitewashed stone on the harbour. The bedchambers were clean and the linen fresh, if threadbare. I wanted to open the window, because the room felt stuffy and unaired, but when I pushed the creaking casement open the smell of gutted fish blew in and overwhelmed me. It takes a great deal to put me off my food—grief had certainly increased rather than diminished my appetite—but the rotten fish smell almost robbed me of any. I washed and went down to the parlour, where I took a little bread and cheese for supper and then retired for the evening. Mrs Campbell seemed relieved to see me go, for I think she was exhausted from a day’s travel on poor roads. Mr Sinclair got politely to his feet and came to the bottom of the stairs with me to light my candle, then wished me a goodnight.
A thunderstorm was brewing as I prepared for bed, the wind rising from the west battering the eaves and whistling through the cracks in the windowframe. When I was undressed to my shift and petticoats I did not immediately get into the bed, but sat on the window seat with my elbows on the sill. The stinking harbour was in darkness now, and the view was a deal more appealing than the smell had been. Half the sky was clouded over with the gathering storm, and the rain was sweeping in over the islands out to sea, but to the north the moon rode high on ragged clouds, attended by a scattering of stars and laying its silver path across the black waters. I stared, enchanted.
The noise from the taproom downstairs was growing now as the fishermen came in. I was tired from the jolting of the coach and my head ached. I took my tincture of lavender from my bag and rubbed my temples, breathing in the sweet, strong scent. Tomorrow a carriage would come to meet me and take me to Glen Clair and my father’s family. Mrs Campbell would return to Applecross on the drover’s cart. And Mr Sinclair…Well, from the conversation I had overheard between him and Mrs Campbell earlier, I understood that he was posted to a naval station some way up the coast at Lochinver, but since the signing of the Treaty of Amiens the previous month he had been granted some leave.
I wondered idly where he would be spending it, and with whom. Perhaps he would choose to spend the time with his family at Strathconan? Or perhaps he might go to Edinburgh to enjoy the entertainments of the city? Inexperienced as I was, I did not for a minute doubt that Neil Sinclair lacked for female companionship when he had the opportunity.
There was the scrape of a step in the inn doorway beneath my window. The lantern swung in the rising wind. A movement caught my eye and I looked down. Neil Sinclair himself was in the street directly below my window. He was looking up at me. And in that moment I realised what I must look like, with the candlelight from my chamber window no doubt turning the thin linen of my shift quite transparent and my unruly red hair loose about my face.
Neil Sinclair did not look away. He held my gaze for what seemed for ever, as the hot colour flamed to my face and my traitorous limbs turned to water. I could not move. Then he smiled, his teeth showing very white in his dark face, and raised a hand in deliberate greeting.
Suddenly freed from the captivity of his gaze, I stumbled back from the window and closed the shutters with such a sharp snap that I almost pulled them from their hinges. I realised I was shaking. Of all the foolish, immodest and downright dangerous things to do—leaning from my window like a wanton Juliet! I should have realised that someone might see me. I should have thought how abandoned I would look. But the trouble with me, as I already knew, was that I almost always acted first and thought later.
There was a knock at the door. Assuming that it was Mrs Campbell, come to help me with my laces, I went across and opened it.
Neil Sinclair stood there. I realised that he had come directly up to my chamber. Though I had been thinking of him only a moment before, I could not have been more shocked had it been Mrs Campbell herself running down the inn corridor in her shift.
Before I could prevent it, he stepped inside the room and closed the door.
I found my voice—and grabbed my gown to my chest to cover my near nakedness.
‘What do you think you are doing, sir? Leave this room at once!’
He smiled again, that lazy, intimate smile that had such a distressing effect on my equilibrium. I felt my legs tremble a little.
‘Do not be afraid, Miss Balfour,’ he said. ‘I merely wish to speak to you.’
‘This,’ I said, ‘is not the time nor the place to talk, sir. You are no gentleman to stand there staring at a lady in a state of undress!’
He gave me a comprehensively assessing glance that started on my heated face and ended with my bare feet, and he made no attempt whatsoever to disguise the fact that he was enjoying looking.
‘No gentleman, perhaps,’ he murmured, ‘but a man nonetheless.’
My hands clenched on my gown. I would have slapped his face to emphasise my point except that that would have necessitated dropping the garment and revealing even more of myself to his gaze. I was not exactly over-endowed with a bosom, but there was enough of it that I did not wish to expose it to him. Whilst I hesitated with this ridiculous dilemma of to slap or not to slap, he spoke again.
‘And I am beginning to think that you are no true lady, Miss Balfour.’
I froze, astounded. ‘I beg your pardon, Sir?’
‘No lady would see fit to undress and then lean from the window of a tavern in her shift, like the veriest wanton.’
I blushed hotly, the pink colour flooding not only my face but prickling the skin of my chest and shoulders as well. Having so pale a complexion can be such a curse.
‘That was a mistake!’ I said furiously. ‘I did not realise—’
His dark brows rose in quizzical amusement. ‘Indeed. You are wild, Miss Balfour, whether you realise it or not.’
We stared at one another, whilst the air between us seemed to sing and hum with something I did not understand. I was woefully inexperienced in the ways of men, but I could see desire darkening his eyes and I could feel an answering warmth in the pit of my stomach. I was shivering as though I had an ague, the goose pimples rising on my bare skin, but at the same time I felt hotter that I had ever felt before in my life. The fire hissed in the grate and the wind battered at the window, and I seemed sensitive to every sound and every sensation and most particularly to the turbulent heat in Neil Sinclair’s eyes.
‘You need not travel on to Glen Clair tomorrow,’ Neil said softly. ‘There is nothing for you there. Come with me to Edinburgh instead. You will have a house, with servants to attend you and fine clothes and jewellery. I would come to you often.’
I drew a deep breath. My heart was hammering. ‘Are you by any chance asking me to be your mistress, Mr Sinclair?’
No doubt the Miss Bennies would have collapsed with the vapours by now to be so treated, but even though I had no practical experience I was not a sheltered lady who did not know what went on between a man and a woman. Living in a small village one became aware of such matters. Besides, I was as blunt spoken as any man.
A disturbingly sensuous smile curled Neil Sinclair’s lips. ‘Would that be so very bad, Miss Balfour? I am offering you a comfortable home, instead of a ruin in the back of beyond with relatives who do not want you.’
‘You are not offering it for nothing!’ I snapped.
His smile deepened. He put out a hand and touched my cheek gently. I was so shocked at the physical contact that I jumped.
‘All I ask in return,’ he said, ‘is something that should be intensely pleasurable for both of us.’
Once again I felt that jolt deep inside me—the tug of desire that had me thinking all kinds of wanton thoughts. I swallowed hard and pushed away the heated images of lust and loving.
‘I thought,’ I said, ‘that you did not even like me very much.’
I saw something primitive and strong flare in his eyes, scorching me.
‘Then you know little of men, Miss Balfour,’ he said. His tone had roughened. ‘I wanted you from the first moment I saw you.’
‘Which was only yesterday,’ I said.
‘Sometimes it does not take very long to know.’
I spoke slowly. ‘You think me wild?’
His eyes were very dark. His hand fell to my bare shoulder, his touch light as feathers brushing the skin, and I shivered all the harder. He traced a line down my arm from the hollow of my collarbone to the sensitive skin of my wrist where the pulse hammered hard.
‘You are as fierce as a Highland cat, and with me you could always be as wild as your nature leads you to be.’
His words, so softly spoken and so intimate—so perilously tempting—made my stomach clench tight. But even so I knew that I had to stop this. Already, in my naivety and accursed curiosity, I had let it go on far too long. I should have thrown him out of my chamber within a minute, instead of allowing myself to be drawn in. The difficulty, the danger, was that Neil Sinclair was right. I was wild. I always had been. He had had my measure from the start.
My wayward mind whispered that it would be exciting, deliciously enjoyable, to be Neil’s mistress. My knees threatened to give way completely at the mere thought of him seducing me. I realised with a shock that I wanted him as much as he wanted me.
But I was not stupid. I would not trade my good name to be a rich man’s mistress, with my body entirely at his disposal. I would not do it even for those mysterious and seductive pleasures he promised. Yes, I concede I was tempted. Very well, I was greatly tempted—to within an inch of accepting. But…
‘So,’ I said, ‘you know I am alone and unprotected. You know I am penniless and dependent on the charity of relatives you say have none. So you make your dishonourable offer. You are a scoundrel, Mr Sinclair.’
He took a step back. He looked rueful now, and a little chagrined. I knew that he had sensed the struggle in me and realised that this time my honour had won out.
‘I am sorry that you see it that way, madam,’ he said.
‘How else is there to see it?’ I demanded.
He shrugged. ‘If you put it like that—’
‘I do!’
He raised his hands in a gesture of reconciliation. ‘Very well. I apologise. I made a mistake.’ He gaze went to my whitened knuckles, still clasped tight about the gown at my breast. ‘Have no fear, Miss Balfour. I am not a man who would force a woman against her will.’ He laughed. ‘It has never been necessary.’
Well! The arrogance of the man!
‘Good,’ I said. ‘Because I am not a woman to shout for help and bring the whole inn down about our ears—but I will if I have to.’
He smiled, and for a moment I felt my all too precarious determination falter. ‘But you were tempted by my offer,’ he said. ‘Admit it, Catriona.’
‘I was not.’ I turned my face away to hide my betraying blush and he laughed.
‘Liar,’ he said softly.
My chin came up. ‘I like Edinburgh,’ I said. ‘I like the shops and the galleries and the exhibitions and the lectures. I would like to visit again. But not at the price you offer, Mr Sinclair. I am not for sale.’
‘You have more resolution than I gave you credit for,’ Neil said. The smile was in his eyes again, admiration mixed with regret. ‘I should have remembered that you are a Balfour of Glen Clair. They can be damnably obstinate.’ He sighed. ‘I do not suppose,’ he added, ‘that you trust me now.’ There was an odd tone in his voice, as though he sincerely regretted it.
‘If I do not it is your own fault,’ I said. I smiled a little, being unable to help myself. ‘I never did trust you, Mr Sinclair. Not really. I always suspected you were a dangerous scoundrel.’
That made him laugh. ‘Just as I always knew you were wild—even when you pretended otherwise.’
‘The door is behind you,’ I said. ‘Goodnight.’
When Mrs Campbell came in a bare two minutes later, to help me with my laces, she found me sitting on the edge of the hard little bed with my gown still clutched to my breast, and she was forced to point out that it would be quite ruined to wear in the morning.
Chapter Four
In which I meet with strange travellers on the road and see Mr Sinclair again sooner than I expect.
The rainstorm blew itself out in the night. The clouds scattered on a fresh wind from the sea. Dawn crept in at about five-thirty in the morning, the light spilling over the mountains to the east.
I had been awake on and off all the night, my dreams, when I had them, broken with memories of my parents and fears about the new day, as well as with strange desires and longings that seemed to feature Neil Sinclair rather more than was wise. I heard the first of the fishermen drag his nets across the cobbles, and the splash of the boat putting to sea before it was properly light. I was ready, with my bags packed, by seven thirty.
Mr Sinclair greeted me at the bottom of the stair when Mrs Campbell and I went down together. I had wondered how I would feel to see him in the daylight, but his manner was so impersonal that I had the strangest feeling that the scene between us had been just another of my broken dreams. We took bread and honey and ale for breakfast, and then I went out onto the quay for a walk.
The carriage from Glen Clair did not come. The clock crept around to nine, then nine-thirty, and then ten. I walked the length of the quay in one direction and then back again, and then around for a second time. As I passed the inn I could see Mrs Campbell sitting in the parlour, her face starting to tighten into nervous lines. The drover’s cart was due to leave for Applecross immediately after midday and I knew she did not want to be left behind.
I sat on a bench, looking out to sea, and thought of my new relatives—who did not appear to have sent their carriage for me and had not sent a messenger to explain why. It scarcely argued an eagerness to see me. Even though the sun was warm again I drew my shawl a little closer about me. The seabirds were soaring and calling out in the bay. From here my road turned eastwards, away from the coast and into the mountains to Torridon and Kinlochewe and on to Glen Clair. I had lived by the sea all my life. It was in my blood. And though Glen Clair was only a day’s drive inland, it felt as though I would be leaving a part of me behind.
I stood up, stiff and a little cold from the sea breeze, and made my way back towards the inn parlour. I could hear the chink of harness where the drover’s cart stood waiting in the yard. Mrs Campbell would be starting to fuss.
She was. The maidservant had brought in plates of crab soup and crusty rolls for our luncheon, and just the smell was making me hungry, but Mrs Campbell was too nervous to eat. She sat fidgeting with her soup spoon.
‘There is not another cart back to Applecross for nigh on a week,’ she was saying, ‘and my cook and maid cannot manage a Sunday dinner alone. What am I to do?’
I laid a hand over hers. ‘Dear ma’am, please do not concern yourself. I can await the carriage here on my own. I am sure the landlady will stand chaperon for a short while.’
Mrs Campbell’s anxious face eased a little. ‘Well, if you think that would serve—’
‘There is no landlady,’ Mr Sinclair said helpfully. ‘The landlord is a widower.’ He had come in from the stable yard with his dark hair ruffled by the breeze, and he smelled of fresh air and horses and leather. It was not unpleasant. In fact it was rather attractive, and I was annoyed with myself for thinking so.
I frowned at him to compensate. ‘I am sure there must be someone who could help me?’
‘I could help,’ Mr Sinclair said. ‘I could escort you on to Glen Clair.’
I looked at him. ‘That would not be appropriate,’ I said. ‘Given that…’ I paused. Given that you are a scoundrel who tried to seduce me last night. I did not say the words aloud, but I could see from the bright light in his eyes that he was reading my mind. He waited, head tilted enquiringly.
‘Given that we would not be chaperoned,’ I said.
He smiled. ‘But we are cousins of a kind,’ he said, ‘so it would be entirely proper.’
Mr Sinclair had a habit of silencing me.
‘So we are cousins now, are we?’ I said, when I had recovered my breath. ‘How very convenient.’
His smile deepened. ‘I swear it is true,’ he said. ‘I am third cousin twice removed to Mrs Ebeneezer Balfour on my mother’s side. You may check the family bible if you do not believe me.’
‘Oh, well,’ I said sarcastically, ‘that is quite acceptable, then.’
Mrs Campbell frowned. ‘I am sorry, Catriona,’ she said, ‘but I do not think that so distant a connection is entirely reliable.’
‘No,’ I said, trying not to look at Mr Sinclair, who looked the absolute antithesis of reliable. ‘Perhaps you are correct, ma’am.’
We were saved from further dispute by the arrival of the carriage from Glen Clair. With a cry of relief, Mrs Campbell swept me up, carried me out into the yard and installed me in the coach without even permitting me to finish my crab soup.
‘All will be quite well now, my love,’ she said, ignoring the fact that the coachman was the most villainous-looking fellow that one could imagine. ‘You will be safely in Glen Clair by nightfall, and I know your family will be delighted to see you.’ She kissed me enthusiastically on both cheeks. ‘Pray write to me often.’
