The Lass Wore Black Page 20

  “That I no longer need to see you,” he said.

  “You never did.”

  “You stopped eating.”

  She looked away, annoyed that she couldn’t dispute that.

  “I think you were troubled in spirit, Catriona.”

  “I wasn’t.”

  “I think your world had narrowed, that it had probably always been narrow, accommodating only yourself and perhaps your sister.”

  She hadn’t expected him to dissect her character in such a manner.

  “You’ve allowed the accident and what happened to you to become a mirror, one you’ve wrapped around you. All you can see is what happened to you. Your wishes. Your wants. Your needs.”

  “I was concerned about the little girl.”

  He smiled. “A perfect example. Because you were concerned, you wanted action.”

  “How can you allow them to live that way?”

  He didn’t answer for a moment. When he spoke, his voice was somber with a touch of sadness. “Because I can’t save them all.”

  Mark didn’t speak again, even when the carriage stopped before the house. It was better that he didn’t. Otherwise, he might say something cutting and cruel.

  Or too honest for comfort.

  Chapter 24

  “Are you getting rid of your wardrobe?” Catriona asked, standing in the door of the parlor.

  Aunt Dina looked up, smiling.

  “It does look like that, doesn’t it?”

  All around her were piles of clothing. On the table before her were three stacks of what looked like aprons but on closer inspection were shifts and corset covers.

  “I’m sorting our donations,” she said. “People have been generous.”

  Catriona took a few steps inside the door. “Do you need any help?”

  Aunt Dina smiled even brighter. “Oh, my dear, I would love some help.”

  The older woman patted the settee beside her, and she made her way around the piles. The minute she sat down, Dina thrust some shirts into her arms.

  “There you go. Fold those, and we’ll have one whole household done.”

  For several moments they were silent as she followed her aunt’s lead. She didn’t think she’d ever folded a man’s shirt before this moment. At home, her mother had always handled her father’s shirts, and then Jean, when her mother was too ill. At Ballindair, she had never been assigned to the laundry, which was only good fortune, since Aunt Mary often used laundry duty as punishment.

  By the third shirt, she’d learned well enough that Dina was nodding in approval. That small nod gave her a glow, one that had been curiously absent in her life for a while.

  The last shirt finished, she reached for a pile of shifts.

  “Won’t you take off your veil, my dear?” Dina asked. “It’s just the two of us. Artis is off on errands. I’ve sent Isobel to rest, and Elspeth is cleaning my bedchamber.”

  Mark had gone, the role of footman no longer necessary. Blessedly, Dina didn’t mention him.

  Slowly, she raised the veil and pulled it back over her head. She closed her eyes at the touch of cool air on her skin.

  “Oh, my dear, you’ve been crying,” Dina said, reaching out and tapping the right side of her face with gentle fingers.

  “I couldn’t sleep,” she said. “That’s all.”

  Dina gently smiled. “We’ve had an eventful time of it, haven’t we? But the fire didn’t spread and we can rebuild the carriage house.” The older woman sat quiet for a moment, her hands on the garments in her lap. “I do need to write dear Morgan, but I haven’t yet.”

  “Why did you do it, Dina?” she asked, keeping her attention on her hands.

  Dina, thankfully, did not pretend ignorance or confusion. “You weren’t eating, my dear, and you refused to come out of your rooms.” She glanced over at Catriona and smiled. “If you’d once offered to help me as you’re doing now, I would not have been so concerned.”

  “So as long as I perform good works, you won’t interfere in my life?”

  Dina stilled, her busy hands resting in her lap. In those moments, she wished she could retract what she’d said. Words were easily spoken and impossible to call back, yet they could wound as surely as a spear.

  “I can’t promise that,” Dina said. “You see, I’ve become fond of you. When you first came to me,” she added, “you were a haughty young woman. For a good two weeks I debated whether or not to write Morgan and tell him to come and get you. I despaired of ever being able to teach you anything. Then, one day, I saw you here, in this very room. You were walking back and forth. I was about to interrupt you when I realized that you weren’t just walking, you were practicing walking. You got to the door and curtsied. Then you turned, walked the other way, and curtsied again. I realized that you weren’t arrogant as much as afraid.”

  She felt embarrassment warm her cheeks. “I didn’t know anyone had seen me.”

  “I began to feel affection for you,” Dina said, glancing over at her. “You were so determined to change yourself, make yourself over. I admired your spirit and your courage.”

  “I doubt I was all that admirable,” she said.

  “Oh, but you were. A pity that girl died in London.”

  Shocked, she turned to the other woman. Dina didn’t look away, but met her look squarely.

  “Back then, you wanted to become someone different,” Dina said, her words slow and measured, as if Catriona had difficulty understanding English. “You can do the same now.”

  “How?” she asked. “That girl was beautiful. You can hardly call me that.”

  Dina put the folded shift on the table before her.

  “Very well, your face is scarred, horribly so. Very well, some people will flinch. Very well, you might scare little children. But bitterness will strip beauty from you as fast.”

  She blinked at Dina. “You couldn’t have said what you just did.”

  “Why are you so surprised? That someone would tell you the truth? Or that it wouldn’t be so terrible once it was voiced?”

  She looked away, feeling as if she were floating in thin air. She tried to take a deep breath but her lungs were tied tight by a ribbon of emotion.

  People will flinch.

  You might scare little children.

  Your face is scarred, horribly so.

  The girl she’d been, at both Ballindair and newly come to Edinburgh, might have been afraid, but she’d been confident in one thing—her appearance. If she didn’t have that, what did she have?

  Now, when she said as much to Dina, the older woman reached over and patted her hand.

  “Even if the accident hadn’t happened, you would have aged, my dear. Beauty is like an orange, Catriona. You enjoy it, you savor it, but you never expect it to last forever.”

  She had never considered such a thing.

  Dina smiled. “You will have to discover who you are without your outward appearance. Who is Catriona Cameron?”

  The person she’d been the past six months was a martyr, a hermit, an angry, bitter woman. Is that the identity she wanted for herself? Is that who she wanted to be until she died?

  The bottle of laudanum sat in her vanity drawer, ready for her to end her life. Did she want to do that? Her mind veered from that thought so suddenly that she was certain she didn’t. But if she lived, what kind of life would she have?

  “You don’t have to decide tonight,” Dina said, as if privy to her chaotic thoughts. “You have the rest of your life to become the woman you wish to be.”

  “I don’t want it to take that long,” she said.

  Dina smiled.

  “I’ve often thought that the best way to help myself is to help others,” Dina said, handing her another bundle of clothes.

  She turned to look at her. “Am I very selfish?” she asked, and waited for the truth. Dina had always given her the truth, pleasant or not.

  The older woman sighed. “Yes, my dear, you are. For a time, it was a good thing, because you
needed to heal. Being so concerned about yourself was necessary. Your selfishness was like having a good coat in winter. Now, it’s like wearing that same coat in the midst of summer, cumbersome and uncomfortable.”

  She gathered up her courage to ask another question. “Is it easy to live alone?”

  Dina looked surprised.

  “You’ve been a widow for some time,” Catriona continued. “Is it bearable after a while not to have a man in your life?”

  “Marriage isn’t the only relationship, my dear. There is friendship as well.”

  Dina’s cheeks were pink, and growing pinker. Did she have a friend or a lover? Could a lover be a friend? The questions were so fascinating that she studied the other woman for a long moment.

  “Mark has left,” she said, when it was obvious that Dina wasn’t going to reveal any secrets.

  “Yes, he has. A fine man, Dr. Thorburn. Too many times, people complain about the poor and do nothing to assist them. Dr. Thorburn puts his efforts into doing what he can, especially treating the children who most need his help.”

  “You like him.”

  “I do. I admire him as well.”

  Several minutes passed in companionable silence.

  “Did he say anything to you about me?”

  “A great many things,” Dina said, smiling. “I’m to insist on fresh air and sunshine for you. I’m not to take any posturing from you. I’m to be my own woman and not allow you to run my household. I’m not,” she said with a twinkling look, “to be afraid of you.”

  “Afraid of me?”

  Dina nodded.

  “Why would he say something like that?”

  “I have no idea,” Dina said.

  “Annoying man,” she said. “I can’t imagine why you thought he’d do me any good.”

  Dina continued to smile.

  Andrew sat in the parlor, empty but for one chair, a table, and a lamp that gave off a faint yellowish glow. He’d built a fire earlier but the room was still chilled.

  He was feeling maudlin this afternoon, in a way that disturbed him. He’d not been himself since traveling to this godforsaken country a year ago. Once his mission was done, he’d turn his back on Scotland and never set foot across the border again.

  As the fire spat and hissed, memories occupied him. All of his life, his enjoyable life, seemed compressed into a few short weeks. Before he met Catriona he’d felt asleep. Had he ever known pleasure until then, or even joy? He’d most certainly never known the insecurity that had blossomed in her presence.

  He’d toyed with the idea of divorcing his wife in order to marry her. He’d made declarations of love to her, when he’d never said those words to another woman. He’d been willing to beggar himself for her, and she’d only laughed when she left him.

  Her death would set him free, as nothing else would. Once Catriona was in her grave, he’d be released. He would no longer feel this damnable yearning, the pain that resided, not in his heart, but in his chest or perhaps in the whole of him.

  At the knock on the door, he stood, consulted his pocket watch, and walked into the kitchen.

  “You’re late,” he said as he opened the door for Artis.

  “I couldn’t get away. Mrs. MacTavish is watching my every move. Afraid I might make life miserable for her two little lambs, she is.”

  He waved his hand in the air, as if brushing away her words. He didn’t have the patience or the time for her constant complaints.

  She removed her cloak. He hadn’t given her leave to do so, or to pull out the chair at the kitchen table. Short of banishing her, there was nothing he could do. She didn’t look the type to listen to a lesson on deportment.

  He hooked a chair leg with one boot, pulled it out, and sat opposite her.

  “Miss Cameron? How is she?”

  “Why you’re so interested in the likes of her, I don’t know, sir. She’s an odd one, taking to going with Mrs. MacTavish on errands to Old Town in the last few days. They take their basket of clothes and food and dole them out to their particular friends.”

  “Does she?”

  Artis nodded. “Mrs. MacTavish normally likes to take the minister with her, and a few other ladies. When Miss Cameron goes, however, it’s just the two of them and Johnstone. Not safe enough, I’d think.”

  “Does the footman not accompany them?”

  She shook her head. “Now him, that’s the strangest story. After the fire, he stopped coming to work. When I asked Mrs. MacTavish, she told me it was none of my concern.”

  He felt a frisson of alarm. She could ruin everything with her talking.

  “It’s important that you not call attention to yourself,” he said.

  “I’ve done nothing wrong,” she said, placing both elbows on the table. “Merely talked with a proper gentleman.”

  He couldn’t wait until his task was done. If he had to deal with Artis much longer, he’d shoot her first.

  Mark hadn’t allowed his father to interfere with his love of medicine. He certainly wasn’t going to allow a woman to do so.

  Yet Catriona was occupying his thoughts. He woke thinking of her. When he traveled in his carriage, instead of having to concentrate on the passing scenery to tolerate the closeness, he thought of her. She’d cooked for him, and whenever he ate, he remembered that night. She’d made him smile, and he recalled those moments in quiet times. She’d wept in his arms, and at night he recalled the feel of her, loving her, and holding her before sleep claimed him.

  His entire life seemed built around recollections of her, even when he deliberately tried to banish her from his thoughts.

  Even Sarah was conspiring against him. She lost no opportunity to ask questions about Catriona.

  “Is she scarred?”

  “I never saw her face,” he said. He didn’t tell her that he had an idea how extensive the damage was, however.

  “What did you talk about?”

  “How annoying I was, for the most part,” he said, which won him a laugh from Sarah.

  “What does she do all day?”

  Sits and mulls over the unfairness of life, an occupation that will only make her bitter. That, too, he hadn’t said aloud.

  When Sarah wasn’t being curious about Catriona, she was taking great pains to ridicule his days as a footman.

  “You forget I employ you,” he said one morning. For a quarter hour she’d indulged in a running dialogue with an imaginary servant, a footman of all things, with sidelong glances at him to ensure he was paying attention.

  “I can fire you.”

  “You wouldn’t,” Sarah said. “No one else would do for you as well as I do.”

  She was right.

  “Plus, who else would want to put up with you, all dour as you’ve been all week? Not to mention those medicines of yours. Scare a body to death.”

  “I’m sure I can find someone who would be overjoyed to work with a young, handsome doctor with an admirable disposition.”

  “Who is he? Will you introduce me to him, sir?” she asked cheekily.

  He raised one eyebrow and stared at her over his cup.

  “You might employ Edeen,” she said. “But then, I dare you to stop the gossips. I’m your mother’s age, so no one thinks anything is amiss with me.”

  “You never used to be so verbal, Sarah.”

  “You never used to be so foolish, Dr. Thorburn.”

  He frowned at her.

  “I’ll wager you think about the lass in black all the time.”

  He set the cup down on the saucer with too much force. “Where did you come up with that name?”

  “Isn’t that what she is? Don’t you?”

  “Are you divining my thoughts now, Sarah?”

  “I know the signs. You’ve been grumbling around here for days. You aren’t eating properly, and you’ve not been sleeping well. I’m the one who makes your bed, Doctor. I see those sheets every morning. It’s like you’ve fought a war in your bed.”

  “Very well, I ha
ven’t been sleeping all that much,” he admitted.

  But that was all.

  “I could have Anne on my mind,” he said.

  She folded her arms and shook her head.

  “No, you would have shown the signs earlier. It’s her, the lass in black.”

  “Don’t call her that.”

  She smiled.

  Perhaps his conscience was warring with him. He remembered every cutting word he’d said to Catriona. She’d just sat there, absorbing his criticism, making no effort to protect herself.

  Had he taken her to Old Town on purpose, to show her the other half of the world in which she resided? That question bit too close. Who was he to think he had that right? He healed the body, not the soul. Who was he to examine character?

  He should look to himself first.

  Perhaps Catriona was so much on his mind because of Johnstone’s words.

  After the visit to Old Town, he’d made his farewells to Mrs. MacTavish, informing her that Catriona now knew his true identity.

  “Is she terribly unhappy?” she’d asked.

  The truth won out. “Yes,” he said, “but I doubt if it’s at you as much as me.”

  She sighed, then perked up immediately. “I suppose it’s worth it, if she’s beginning to live again.”

  As he was leaving, Johnstone had motioned to him from the alley. He followed the man back to the charred ruin of the carriage house.

  “The paraffin oil barrel was knocked over,” the man said. Johnstone leaned against the door frame, pointing to the corner. “Someone knocked over the barrel. I’ve four horses in the stable there,” he said. “They could have died.”

  The driver turned to look at him. Even though the man didn’t speak, Mark could imagine what he was thinking.

  Two accidents too many.

  He glanced up at Catriona’s window.

  He depended on facts and the evidence before his eyes. The carriage fire might well be an accident and unconnected to what had happened in London.

  A wise man observes. A comment Dr. Cameron had once made to him. He was going to do just that, and while he was at it, he was going to take other precautions.

  Now, he stood and looked at Sarah. She knew him better than anyone and didn’t hesitate to either lecture him or keep his occasional confidences. He gave her another one, not looking away from her steady regard.