Chapter 8

S idony’s lips were still burning from Giff’s kisses as she went slowly upstairs to Isobel’s bedchamber. She met Will’s nurse leaving the room.

Isobel said, “Come in, dearling, do. Nurse says that Will is still sleeping, but I told her what Michael said to do if the poor laddie wakens. Pull up a stool.”

“Nay, for I must not keep you from your bed,” Sidony said. “I only stopped in to see if you still mean to attend mass at St. Giles in the morning.”

“Aye, sure, with Ealga, and I hope you’ll go with us, because Michael says he cannot stay long enough for kirk. The business that took him west involves Rob and Hugo as well, and he says he ought to have gone straight to Roslin to tell Hugo what he learned. But he came here instead, so he leaves at dawn for Roslin. I warrant he’ll ask Giff to have Rob meet him here and ride with him.”

“Adela won’t like that,” Sidony said. “Rob was at Roslin today, after all, and it is a long way to go two days in a row. Surely, he can just come and hear whatever Michael has to say before Michael leaves.”

“They’ll decide that between them, I expect. And the ride is not so long as that. You told me as much yourself only today, did you not?”

Isobel looked tired, and Sidony knew that, despite the early hour and whatever she had said about waiting up for Michael, he expected her to go to bed and likely go right to sleep. Still, the opportunity to ask her opinion about what the men might have been doing in Roslin Gorge might not soon present itself again.

Accordingly, she said, “I warrant Rob won’t mind the ride. I was just thinking of Adela. But if I may, I want to ask you about something I saw today.”

“Certainly, what did you see?”

Sidony described the scene, taking care to give as much detail as she could, including her brief notion that the men had seemed to emerge from the gorge wall.

“I did not see a track of any sort, although I did see a burn trickling into the Esk from the woods,” she added. “What do you think they might have been doing?”

“Faith, how should I know?” Isobel said, reaching to remove the pins from her caul so she could take it off. “Did you ask Giff?”

Sidony grimaced. “He said it was some business of Hugo’s, but I expect he just meant he did not want to tell me.”

“Most men do not like women who pry, my dear,” Isobel said. “You must take care not to let him catch you doing so.”

Sidony smiled and said, “Such advice seems odd coming from you. You were always the one so curious as to do almost anything to find out things.”

“Aye, sure, but I’ve no need to do that anymore. Michael tells me nearly anything I want to know.”

“Then perhaps you could ask him what they might have been doing.”

“Aye, sure, but”—Isobel had been avoiding Sidony’s gaze, but she looked directly at her now—“if I did that, and Michael told me what they’d done, I would not tell you, my dear. A good wife does not talk about things her husband reveals to her. If she did, I promise you, he would soon stop telling her anything.”

Further questions being clearly futile, Sidony soon bade her good night and retired to the chamber that served as her own when she stayed at Sinclair House. The maidservant who attended her was already there.

“The housekeeper told me her ladyship would retire soon, so I came along to put out your things, me lady, but will ye be going to bed now, too? It still be early.”

“I don’t know that I shall just yet,” Sidony admitted. “But if you will light those candles and fetch my tambour frame, I can do some stitching.”

The maid did as she asked, then left her to her task.

As Sidony worked in the glow of candlelight, her thoughts turned back to Giff MacLennan, and her lips burned again at the image that leaped to mind. Abandoning her needle to press two fingertips against her lips, she wondered why her own touch created none of the heat that his lips had sent blazing through her.

She wondered at herself, too, for allowing such a liberty. She had not made the tiniest squeak of protest. And how startled she had been when he had stepped away so abruptly! She had had all she could do seconds later to keep from letting Michael see exactly what had happened and how much she had enjoyed it.

For all the heed she had paid to aught else while Giff kissed her, Michael might have walked up unseen and demanded to know what they meant by it.

She smiled at the image, but thinking of Michael stirred her curiosity again. What had they been doing in the gorge? They’d had four men with them, doubtless men who usually rode in Hugo’s tail but who, strangely, had been fishing in the river. She had never seen men in Hugo’s tail do such a thing before. They were his bodyguard, after all, and rarely diverted their attention from him for any cause.

But they had been fishing!

She wondered if Michael and Giff were still downstairs talking in the parlor and wished briefly that the room they were in boasted a laird’s peek as Roslin Castle did. With a sigh, she abandoned that fantasy. Even at Roslin it would bear no fruit, because that cupboard was always locked now.

Nor would trying to listen at the parlor door serve any purpose other than to stir one of Michael’s rare displays of wrath. The doors at Sinclair House were heavy and solid, and the servants well trained. If she were foolish enough to put an ear to that door, the first to see her would report it to him immediately.

Candlelight not being as accommodating as daylight for setting stitches, she set her tambour frame aside after an hour and went to the nursery to find Will snuffling a little but otherwise sleeping peacefully, whether from exhaustion or brogac she did not know. On a nearby cot, his nurse also slept.

Hearing voices below as she crossed the stair landing, she paused hopefully but heard no more than Michael bidding Giff a safe ride, and Giff’s good night.

Returning to her chamber, she undressed and prepared for bed, then blew out her candles and was soon fast asleep. If she dreamed, she had no memory of it when she awoke the next morning. But when the maid came to help her dress, she brought the welcome news that the lady Adela had accompanied Sir Robert to Sinclair House and meant to attend mass at St. Giles with them.

In Sidony’s opinion, the priest talked too slowly and much too long. Her prayer stool lacked sufficient padding for such a tedious service, and when at last it was over, she leaped up, left her stool for the gillie who had accompanied them to carry back, and hurried outside to breathe in the fresh, faintly salty spring air.

When her sisters and Lady Clendenen joined her, Adela said, laughing, “You wriggled so much in there, I thought you’d fall off your stool.”

Sidony grinned, her mood changing at the memory that Adela had left wee Anna at Sinclair House. “Can we go back straightaway?” she asked her in an undertone. “I don’t feel much like talking with folks today.”

“I agree that we should go soon,” Adela said. “I know you must all be eager to see our Anna.”

“Unless she is teething,” Isobel said with a laugh. “Sidony abandoned me yesterday, saying she’d had enough of screaming babies.”

“Faith, Sidony, I thought you doted on the creatures,” Adela said. “But pray, don’t abandon us today. I feel bereft enough with Rob gone again, although he promised to be home for our supper party even if he has to go right back again.”

Isobel said, “Michael and Hugo have to stay at Roslin to deal with any lingering needs for Isabella’s cavalcade. Doubtless, Sorcha will stay with them.”

Then, at last, Lady Clendenen asked the question that Sidony had been burning to ask but dared not. “Did Sir Giffard go to Roslin with Michael and Rob?”

“Nay, for he said he had duties here to attend,” Adela said, exchanging a glance with Isobel. “He insists on coming to Sinclair House later today, though, to escort me back to Lestalric. I cannot think why he should.”

“Nor I,” Isobel agreed. “Not when Rob has provided you with a tail as impressive as his own. I hope you invited Giff to join us for supper.”

“Aye, sure, I did.”

Sidony noted the look that passed between them and wondered at it, but she would not give either the satisfaction of snubbing her by asking what they meant by it. They would snub her, too, especially with Ealga there, and as Isobel had invited Ealga to dine with them before returning to Clendenen House, they would have no time for private conversation until she had gone.

At Sinclair House, they adjourned upstairs to the ladies’ solar and chatted about the King’s upcoming return to the Castle and Countess Isabella’s impending pilgrimage from Roslin until the steward announced that dinner was ready.

At the table, Lady Clendenen said, “You know, I should like to ride out to meet Isabella if the day is pleasant and one of you will agree to ride with me. I am sure she would be pleased to have us join her retinue before she enters town.”

Isobel declined gracefully, and Adela said she did not think she was ready yet to leave young Anna for an entire day, but Sidony accepted at once.

By the time Lady Clendenen left, Sidony had come to think she might have made more of a simple look between her older sisters than it warranted, so instead of asking them to explain themselves, she went to play with her niece and nephew and let her sisters visit together without distraction.

If the children received only half of her attention, it was because the other half was mentally sorting through her favorite dresses for one that was becoming enough to wear to supper.

Leith Harbor

Giff stepped out of the coble that had carried him back to shore after a satisfactory meeting with the captain of the Dutch ship, who seemed perfectly willing to hire out his vessel long enough to suit their purpose. Giff’s plan was to take the Dutch ship only as far as Castle Girnigoe, where Michael was certain Henry would provide one of his own to carry the Stone the rest of the way.

“Fife will never get ahead of you if you can hire a ship and get away before he even knows you’re going,” Michael had assured him the previous night. “The winds are contrary, for one thing, and Fife is a nervous, inexperienced sailor.”

“His captain is likely to be an excellent one, however,” Giff had replied.

“Aye, sure,” Michael said, grinning. “Fife will ever hire the best, but he does not know when to give a horse its head, let alone his captains. He sticks his thumb in everything. And you, my friend, are not known as King of Storms for naught.”

Dismissing the Lestalric boatmen who had rowed him out to the merchant ship and back, and shifting his sword to its proper place on his back, Giff paused to look again round the busy harbor before reclaiming his horse from the harbor stable.

Looking again at the wide-bodied Dutch merchantman, he let his gaze drift to the ship Rob had pointed out as Fife’s and decided that Michael was probably right. The Dutch ship was eminently seaworthy and would weather rough water well. Fife’s vessel, being of newer design and as yet untried by its crew, might prove less capable. If its captain should be an Edinburgh man and lack experience directing oarsmen, he’d be most unlikely to know how best to employ their skills.

Knowing that speculation without facts was pointless, Giff walked away with the intention of returning to Lestalric to enjoy his midday meal and consider what to do about the Dutch crew. He had said nothing to their captain about them but was well aware that the man expected him to hire both the crew and himself.

Giff decided to discuss the problem with the others, but his preference, if Henry agreed, would be to pay the Dutch crew to stay in Edinburgh while a Sinclair crew manned the ship. Hugo had told him that Henry’s men at Roslin and at Girnigoe—at least, all who were willing and able—trained both to row and to sail, and would therefore be a far more trustworthy crew than any foreign lot could be.

Male voices raised in anger and a childish shriek close behind him spun him around in time to see several grown men, including one black-clad ruffian with a raised club, chasing a wiry lad of eight or ten summers, who dodged nimbly around and over obstacles in his path as he sped toward Giff.

“Stop that thief!”

The lad saw Giff and abruptly changed course to dodge him, casting a glance over his shoulder at his pursuers as he did.

Leaning sideways, Giff scooped the boy off his feet, kicking and wriggling.

“Lemme down! They’ll throttle me! D’ye want t’ get me killed?”

“Tether that tongue of yours unless you want to feel my hand,” Giff said curtly as he set the boy on his feet, retaining a firm grip on one arm.

“Good, ye caught the wee villain,” the first of what had become a string of pursuers said angrily. “Thank ’e, sir. I’ll take him now. He’s due for a good hiding.”

“Are you his father?”

“Nay, but I doubt he’s got one, the wee menseless fouter.”

“I’m nae fouter, ye sappie-headed puddin’,” the lad retorted belligerently.

As the irate man reached again for him, Giff gripped the bony arm tighter and eased the boy behind him as he said, “What is the lad accused of stealing?”

“Yon pie man said he took summat,” the accuser said. “I didna see it m’self, but the wee fouter clouted me in the cods wi’ his elbow as he ran past me.”

“He cannot have hit you very hard if you outran those others,” Giff pointed out. “More importantly, though, where is the pie man who raised the hue and cry?”

“Yonder,” the man growled, jerking his thumb at the gathering crowd.

“Stand away, then,” Giff said in a tone that brooked no argument. “I’ll attend to the pie man, but I fail to see how this concerns you any further.”

The man hesitated, glanced behind him and at Giff again, then moved to stand by the man who had waved the club.

“That’s tellin’ ’im,” the small figure behind Giff muttered.

“You keep silent,” Giff ordered, giving the arm a shake without taking his eyes off the men before him. More loudly, he said, “Which of you is the pie man?”

“Here, m’lord,” a middle-aged man almost as wide as he was tall said, wiping his hands on his apron as he hurried forward. “An it please ye, sir, the wee scamp made off wi’ one o’ me fine meat rolls, hot out o’ the pan.”

Giff silenced a snort from behind him with another shake.

“How much?” he demanded, reaching for his purse with his free hand and raising it to his teeth to unfasten its cord.

The crowd began to disperse, and the pie man, smiling in anticipation of satisfaction, said airily, “Nobbut three shillings, m’lord.”

Giff looked at him.

With a rueful shrug, the man said, “Eight pence, sir.”

“Still too much,” Giff said. “I doubt you charge tuppence for a meat roll, and I don’t know that the lad stole anything from you. But if he did,” he added before the man could voice obvious protest, “you deserve a shilling for your trouble. Moreover, it will teach him a good lesson to have to repay me.”

“Aye, sir, that it will,” the pie man said, accepting the shilling. “But I hope ye teach him another one afore then,” he added with a minatory look at the culprit.

“I may, at that,” Giff said, casting a glance around to see that most of the men who had joined the chase had walked away. Only the disgruntled one who had led it and his club-bearing companion were still in sight, but they seemed to be chatting amiably together and paying no heed to anyone else.

Giff turned to face his captive.

“Ye gave that mowdiewort a whole shilling!” the lad said indignantly. “If ye think I’m paying ye back any such addlepated sum, ye’d best think—hey!”

Giff lifted him off his feet and held him so they looked eye to eye. “Not another word if you don’t want that hiding right now.”

“Right then, I’m mum, so ye can put me down. But ye should ken fine that ye’re actin’ a right bangster.”

Stifling an impulse to laugh, Giff said, “I’m no bully, and I’ll put you down, but if that is your notion of keeping mum, you should know it is not mine.”

Black-lashed hazel eyes twinkled at him, but the lad kept quiet until he was on his feet. Then his gaze shifted past Giff, and he exclaimed, “Look out, ahind ye!”

Suspecting a ruse that would allow the young scoundrel to escape, Giff might have ignored the warning had a trusted sixth sense not raised the hairs on the back of his neck. As it was, he turned, shoving the child out of the way, just as the black-clad ruffian with the club leaped at him, swinging hard.

Giff’s left hand shot up in a slash that snapped its hardened edge against the other’s uplifted wrist, blocking the blow. At the same moment, his right fist shot into the ruffian’s jaw with all the power of his shoulder and back behind it.

The club flew left, and the ruffian collapsed and took no further interest in the proceedings. But his companion, the lad’s erstwhile angry accuser, was moving to take his place when a small figure darted at him, head lowered, and butted him in the same place that the man had accused him earlier of planting his elbow.

The victim bent double, reaching awkwardly for his attacker with one hand while he sought to ease his pain with the other. But, with an agility Giff thought would well serve any man in training at Dunclathy, the lad nipped away out of reach.

The pie man and two others hurried up, the latter taking charge of the unresisting victim of the lad’s attack, as the former was saying, “We saw what happened, and we’ll gladly take them louts in charge to the magistrate, me lord.”

Thanking them and leaving them to attend to both men, Giff turned back to find his small assistant bouncing up and down on his toes. “Aye de mi, that’s done ’em!” the lad exclaimed. “Ye dunted yours flat onto his hunkers!”

Giff grinned. “Hunkers?”

The urchin returned the grin, showing a ragged gap that large, new front teeth were just beginning, unevenly, to fill. “Aye, sure,” he said. “Me da’ says I’m no’ old enough yet t’ say arse.”

“Then you should not say it,” Giff said.

“I didna!”

Giff raised his eyebrows.

Another grin. “Och, aye, I did, but no’ till I told ye about me da’.”

“So you do have one, then.”

“Aye, sure, don’t you?”

“I do,” Giff said, sobering. “And if I took something that did not belong to me, he’d give me a thorough hiding.”

“Nay, then, ye’re too big.”

“I was not always so big. Did you take the meat roll?”

The boy’s mouth opened and shut again as he eyed Giff’s stern face. Then, lifting his chin and squaring his shoulders, he said, “Aye, I did.”

“Where is it?”

The twinkle returned as the urchin reached up his sleeve and showed a bare inch of a thick, buttered-crumb-covered meat roll, then pushed it back out of sight.

“Why did you take it?”

“T’ see if I could,” the lad answered frankly. “Yon greedy lick-penny wha’ sells them never asks will ye lick or taste, and I wanted to see what they was like.”

“The usual way to do that is to buy one.”

“Aye, sure, but for that a man needs gelt.”

“And you have none?”

The lad shrugged.

“What’s your name?”

He hesitated. Then, in much the same tone as the pie man had used to suggest three shillings for his pie, he said, “Most just calls me ‘the wee mannie.’”

“What does your father call you?”

A fleeting grimace gave way to a wide-eyed look. “Did ye ken them louts was a-watchin’ ye when ye rowed out to yon Dutchman’s boat? I seen ’em m’self, and they was still a-watchin’ when your lads rowed ye back t’ shore. What did ye want wi’ yon Dutchman that interested them so, d’ye think?”

“I cannot imagine,” Giff said. Then, deciding that a bit of misinformation floating around the harbor might prove useful, he added, “I’ve been thinking of traveling north to the Moray Firth. I was just asking him about possible transport.”

To his surprise, the lad snorted again and shook his head. “Ye dinna want t’ go north wi’ nobbut that great barge under ye. There be rough waters t’ sail there.”

“And what do you know about boats, Master Long-Wit?”

Rolling his eyes, the boy said, “I ken fine that ye’d do better t’ sail wi’ me da’. He’s going north, and if ye swear t’ forget about yon addlepated shilling and promise no’ t’ tell ’im about the meat roll, I’ll ask ’im will he take ye with us.”

“So which boat does your father captain?”

“Yonder, wi’ the oars a-standing up and the tall mast.” He pointed.

“That boat belongs to Lord Fife,” Giff said, eyeing him sternly.

“Aye, sure, the Serpent Royal , but me da’s its captain all the same. ’Tis why they call me the wee mannie, though me true name be Jake Maxwell. But if ye ken nowt o’ boats, ye’d no’ had understood that about mannie,” he added kindly.

“The wee captain is what that means,” Giff said. When his companion’s face fell, he added, “Do you really think he might provide space for a passenger?”

Smiling again, the boy said, “An ye agree t’ me terms, I could take ye to ’im, and ye could put that notion to ’im yourself.”

“I won’t tell your father, but neither will I agree about the shilling,” Giff said. “You deserve to repay the full amount, and I mean to see that you do.”

Jake eyed him measuringly, then sighed. “I’ll do it, then, someday,” he said. “Although I dinna ken how.”

“You’ll think of something,” Giff said. “Shall we go see your father now?”

“Aye, sure, the boat’s yonder on the shingle, and our lads will take us.”

“Pull out your meat roll,” Giff said as they headed back toward the water.

“Why should I?”

“Aren’t you hungry?” Giff drew out his knife. “I’m going to miss my dinner, so I thought perhaps you would like to share yours.”

“Aye, sure,” Jake said, flashing his grin. “I got a mutton bridie, too, in me poke. And a fine currant scone for a sweet.”

“A feast, in fact,” Giff said dryly as the boy pulled the poke from his breeks and showed both the pastry-wrapped bridie and the scone. “You acquired those the same way you acquired the meat roll, I presume.”

“Aye, sure, and still warm, but since ye promised no’ t’ tell me da’—”

“Oh, I won’t do that,” Giff said. The emphasis in his tone brought the youngster’s head up and put a questioning look in the limpid hazel eyes.

“You’re going to do that,” Giff told him cheerfully as he cut the roll. When visibly tensing muscles told him the lad was on the brink of fleeing, he added, “Unless you’re afraid, of course. A man takes responsibility for his actions.”

Indignant again, Jake said, “I dinna fear nowt!”

“Good lad,” Giff said, putting the knife away and extending half of the meat roll to him. “Here’s yours. It smells delicious.”

“It ought to, for a whole shilling,” Jake muttered, adding in a tone that revealed a lack of eagerness now to row out to the Serpent , “That’s our boat, there.”