Six
Edinburgh was bristling with British troops.
Rory had donned one of his most extravagant waistcoats, a bright blue garment embellished with gold lace and gold buttons, and a pair of plaid trews that fit his legs as if they were painted on them. Over the waistcoat, he wore a plaid of chequered tartan. On his feet, he wore a pair of shoes with gold buckles.
He hated the bloody shoes, just as he despised the heavy wig that decorated his head under a bright blue bonnet, also trimmed with gold. He’d much prefer the supple comfort of well-worn boots, but he looked much as he wanted: a foolish Scot aping a foolish English dandy
No soldier stopped him, no one asked for papers or the nature of his business. Some turned away with disgust in their eyes, some with contempt. Few took a second look.
He rode to the Fox and Hare, a tavern where he often stayed. Located near the Edinburgh Royal Theater, its patronage included a wide assortment, ranging from actors to British officers, who enjoyed the proximity of the latter, particularly the actresses. For the past five months, Rory had maintained a permanent room over the tavern. Several British officers also kept rooms there.
He greeted the officers in the taproom, recognizing most, spotting one or two he’d not seen before.
“Ah, Captain Lehgrens,” he said, swooping down on one of the officers as he waved his arm in an extravagant manner. “A game of hazard this evening?”
“My good fellow,” Lehgrens replied, “you’ve been gone far too long. It’s not good gamesmanship to win, then leave.” He eyed Rory’s clothing. “You’ve become quite a dandy.”
“Since my father’s … departure from this world, I can now indulge my tastes.”
“I seem to recall you’ve always indulged them, but not quite as flamboyantly in dress.”
“But now I have a bride to impress,” Rory said with a grin. “The king’s own choice.”
“So we’ve heard. The notorious Rory Forbes a husband.”
Rory wagged a lace handkerchief. “Braemoor, my dear captain. You keep forgetting I am now the Marquis of Braemoor.”
Lehgrens gave him a mocking bow. “My lord.”
“Ah, that’s more like it,” Rory said. “A little subservience.”
Lehgrens stretched out. “You have it, as long as you lose. Now about this wife. Is that why we have not been graced recently with your presence?”
“Nay. No lass will ever tie me down.”
Lehgrens frowned. “We were hoping your … marriage would open Elizabeth’s door to us.”
“Elizabeth can play with whomever she chooses.”
“For some reason, she chooses you.”
“Or she doesn’t choose you,” Rory said, leaning back with a smile pasted on his lips. If only they knew. As with Mary, Elizabeth was one of his couriers and, as important, supplier of the items he needed for disguise. She had also taught him to use them.
Elizabeth was fifteen years his senior. She had, in fact, initiated him in the ways of love when, as a seedling, he’d appeared backstage after one of her performances. He looked extraordinarily needy, she had teased him. She had become his friend in days when he’d had none, and because he’d been totally indifferent to politics, she’d confided in him about her Jacobite roots. When he’d become the Black Knave, he visited her in Edinburgh, trusting her with his deadly secret because he so badly needed her help. He needed to go places that Rory Forbes could not go; he needed the expertise to make himself into an old man, or a vicar, or even a woman.
Everyone believed he shared her bed, though that aspect of their relationship had ended years ago. He’d chosen to allow the myth to continue. It protected Elizabeth, and it suited him to have his father believe he was dissolute. So wags had him bedding Mary at Braemoor, and Elizabeth here. He was considered a cocksman of great repute.
A wife and two lovers.
If only the Brits knew the truth of it.…
He’d indulged in no lovemaking since before Culloden. ’Twas too dangerous for both him and the lady. He intended to take no one to the gallows with him if he were caught. His wife should be safe, since she was forced into the marriage by the king himself. Mary and Elizabeth knew the risks they were taking, but Mary’s heart obviously belonged to Alister, and Elizabeth … well, he and Elizabeth had forged a friendship that no longer had a place for sex. He also suspected that her heart was already claimed.
“A tankard of rum?”
Rory looked at Lehgrens. “Rum? Have you sunk that low, my dear fellow?” He turned to the barmaid. “Claret, my love. The best.”
“Your fortunes have indeed changed, my lord,” Lehgrens said. “’Twas not so long that you bought your lodging with my money.”
“Before you were run out of Edinburgh by Charlie,” Rory retorted. The young prince had taken Edinburgh in September the previous year.
“I heard you stayed none too long yourself, Rory.”
He shrugged. “My family’s loyalties were well known.”
“And where were you during the fighting?”
“Beside my father, of course. Earning the king’s gratitude.”
“I thought you were a lover, not a fighter.”
Rory took out a snuffbox, took a sniff or two. “I can swing a sword. I fostered with the earl of Fallon.”
The captain looked at his clothing dubiously. “I never would have guessed it.”
Rory waved his handkerchief in Lehgren’s face. “I avoid reminders as much as possible. You were quite right to observe I care little about the … discomforts of the battlefield.”
“And now you have a wife, a battlefield of another kind, I trust. I’ve heard MacDonells were quite fierce.”
Rory inwardly winced at the word “were.” Outwardly, he shrugged. “She is tame enough.”
“I heard she was plain.”
Plain? Mayhap in some eyes. For a moment, he thought of the thin, determined face, recalled the desire that he felt when he’d touched her. She aroused something in him. He wished she didn’t.
“The fortune she brings makes her quite presentable,” he said. “Now about that game. I have a few errands first.”
“The fair Elizabeth?”
“A gentleman never discusses a lady.”
“Give her my best,” Lehgrens said. “Tell her that if she ever gets bored with you, I would be more than happy to take your place.”
“I will do that, my friend,” he said, rising. “Ten o’clock tonight?”
“If you promise not to run off as I am winning.”
“You have lost none of your optimism, Captain.”
“I need some recreation. The Stuart bastard continues to allude us. Cumberland is not a happy man.”
“I hear you’ve caught a number of Jacobites.”
Lehgrens’s face clouded. “Some. Not enough. That damned fellow called the Black Knave is smuggling them out of Scotland. Damned if I know how. The duke has put a five thousand pound price on his head.”
Rory shrugged. “It’s thirty thousand pounds for Charlie, is it not? No one has come forth yet.”
“The Black Knave is no Charlie. They might protect their prince, but not an outlaw.”
Rory brushed at his face with a lace handkerchief. “Mayhap you are right. Do you have any idea who he is?”
“Some Jacobite. They say he’s a graybeard, but he’s as agile as a fox.”
Rory stood. “I am quite confident the king’s forces are capable of finding the blackguard. Still, it’s discomfiting knowing the brigand is running around free. He might well turn on honest citizens.”
“He has protection. But we’ll root out the traitor if we have to arrest every Scot in this damned country.”
Rory raised an eyebrow.
“Excluding present company, of course.”
“Thank you,” Rory said, throwing several coins on the table. “I will see you in a few hours.”
Elizabeth would be at the theater at this hour of the day. Rory, a frequent visitor, was allowed in a side door, then to her dressing room.
She was alone, applying cosmetics for her evening performance. She was an artist in the medium, able to transform a man into a woman, or a woman into a man, a young man into a graybeard.
She obviously saw him in her mirror and turned, a broad smile on her lovely face. The daughter of a dispossessed lord after the “Fifteen,” the Jacobite rising in 1715, she was left penniless with naught but a pretty face and a talent for acting. She’d made her way to Edinburgh and, adopting an English surname, became a fashionable courtesan, then actress. She’d also been mistress to a number of English and Scottish lords. Now she had the funds to do exactly what she wanted, and that was mainly to tweak the noses of men who’d used her and destroyed her father.
“Rory. It is good to see you, even in that hideous coat.”
Rory struck a pose. “’Tis the height of fashion.”
She raised a haughty eyebrow.
“And as comfortable as striding barefoot across hell,” he added drily.
“You should try some of the garments we women must wear.”
“I might be doing that,” he said. “How do you think I would look as an elderly woman?”
She looked at him critically. “A very tall elderly woman.”
“I canna shrink,” he said, “but I can bend a little.”
“Hmm,” she said, her gaze sharpening. “A challenge.”
“And you love them.”
“Some. But you risk much, my new lord.”
“No more than you.”
She turned back to the mirror. “I hear you have a wife.”
“The whole of Scotland apparently has heard that.”
“A Jacobite wed to a king’s man? ’Tis news, Rory. And unexpected, at that.”
“I was given little choice, and my new bride even less. If I did not marry her, God knows what fate Cumberland would have dealt her.”
“Always the rescuer.”
“I received land in exchange,” he said defensively.
“But that is not why you did it, is it Rory?”
“I would have been suspect had I not. I am a wastrel, remember, and what wastrel would turn down the king’s favor and new lands?”
“And how does the bride accept this?”
“My marriage seems to be the principal topic of conversation,” Rory said irritably.
“Only because it is so out of character.”
“’Tis true I have little faith in the institution. If you had known my mother, and my legal father, you would understand why. It is a marriage in name only, one that both the lass and I hope will end soon. But her younger brother is being held by Cumberland and you know my own precarious position.”
“But does she?”
“Good God, no.”
“Do you not trust her?”
“I do not want another life in danger. And she wants her brother freed. I am no’ so sure what she would, or wouldn’t, trade for it.”
“Ah, Rory, sometimes I think you enjoy complicating your life.”
“And you do not? But enough of this. Young Ogilvy has been taken, the last of his particular family. I wish to free him.”
She stopped what she was doing and turned her body around. “You’ve only smuggled out fugitives before. Do you now intend to storm one of Cumberland’s prisons?”
“Aye, that is exactly what I intend.”
“You are daft.”
“You’ve said that of me before.”
“I’ve not changed my mind.”
“I need some more cosmetics.”
“Of course,” she said wearily. “Can you tell me what you have in mind?”
“I know the gaol where they are keeping him. One of my men will instigate a fight and hopefully be thrown into one of the cells. Then his dear old mother will visit him, and on her way out ask to see the notorious Jacobite.”
“And you are the dear old mother.”
“Aye. Do you think you can do it?”
She eyed him far more carefully. “More to the point, can you?”
“I make a great greybeard,” he said testily.
“A woman is a trifle different, my lord.” Her hands touched him at his waist, bending him slightly. “If you bend, we will need to give you a hump. A cane would not hurt, either. I have a gray wig we used not long ago. A few handkerchiefs to give you a bosom, then a pillow some bulk. You will make an ugly woman, my lord, if you’ll be forgiving me for saying so.”
“I’d rather be ugly than fair,” he said. “I donna fancy British hands on me.”
“You will not have to worry about that, not when I finish with you.”
“When?”
“When do you plan to return?”
“Day after tomorrow.”
“Then come tomorrow night after the performance. I will have everything you need.”
He took the several steps over to her, leaned over and planted a kiss on her cheek.
“Now you’ve ruined all my efforts” she fussed, even as she looked pleased. “I’ve missed you, Rory.”
Bethia nursed the pup for the next few days, waking up several times during the night to give him another feeding.
She had fixed a soft bed for it, but its soft whimpering had struck a chord in her, and she allowed the pup up in the bed with her, its tiny little body snuggling next to hers. The comfort was not all the dog’s.
On the second day of the marquis’s absence, she decided to try to learn more about him. The place to begin, she thought, was the man who had been so kind to her the day of the wedding: the blacksmith. Alister.
She thought of sending for him, but felt he would be less prepared if she suddenly appeared. He came to Braemoor at least once a week to shoe horses and do whatever other chores were needed. The rest of the week, except for Sunday, he apparently kept a shop in a village not far away. Since she was not allowed freedom outside Braemoor’s grounds, and he was apparently in residence this day, she planned a surprise visit.
Bethia again was surprised at his small stature, even as she noted the strength in his arms and shoulders. He grinned at her when she entered the hot, grimy building that served as the smithy.
“My lady. I am honored.”
“Then you are the only one,” she replied wryly. “My presence mostly instills resentment.”
“It will be gone quick enough,” he said. “Several of the servants had men killed by Jacobites at Culloden.”
“My brothers were also killed,” she said sharply.
“I am sorry,” he said.
She bit her lip. She would not cry in front of these people.
“Did you have need of me?” he said in a gentler tone.
She fidgeted. She did not know how to ask the questions she wanted to ask. A lady dinna go to a blacksmith to ask questions about her husband. And yet …
“You said …” She hesitated.
“I said?” he prompted.
“On … before the wedding, you said something about my husband.”
“Aye?” he replied carefully.
“No one else seems to …”
“Want to say anything good about him?”
“Aye,” she said, relieved that she did not have to pose the question.
She watched indecision flitter over his face. “Has he been … unkind to you?”
“He has been nothing to me,” she said flatly. “We have exchanged few words.”
“He doesna’ like to stay still.”
“So I am told.”
“Does that disturb you?”
“I think it is quite normal for a wife to want to know something about her husband.”
“What he wishes to tell,” the blacksmith said softly. “Not what others say about him.”
“You are his friend.” She had not been sure until this moment. His words now told her the truth of it. But she did not understand why the fop she knew as her husband would be friend to a hardworking blacksmith.
His lips thinned. “The marquis does not have friends such as I. I was sent by the duke of Cumberland to fetch you, and I said what you wanted to hear.” He bent over the forge, his hands easily working the tools that turned a piece of iron into a shoe, bending it with such accomplished ease that she found herself fascinated, even as she realized he was trying to change the subject.
Bethia’s heart constricted. She had thought, hoped …
After a moment, she tried again. “I … understand there is someone who grows herbs. I am in need of some.”
The moving hands of the blacksmith stilled. “I will fetch what you need, my lady.”
“I would like to see for myself what she has.”
He didn’t turn to her, nor did the expression on his face change. “It is dangerous, my lady, for a woman to travel these days. There are brigands about.”
“The Black Knave, you mean?” There, she had said the words.
“Aye, and others.”
“I heard he only goes about helping people.”
The blacksmith turned then, his face red from the heat. “That is dangerous talk, my lady. I would suggest you not say it to anyone else. He is a rebel with the king’s bounty on his head, and people here would not take kindly to any words said in his behalf. Your husband has just lost his father and brother to the Jacobites; he’ll have little sympathy with your interest.”
She drew herself up straight at the scolding. “You are among those who sanction having women and children burned out of their homes and innocent men hanged?”
“I do not sanction outlaws who defy the king,” he said in a cold voice, “and I advise you, my lady, to ask no other about this matter.”
She was going to receive no help from this source.
But even she had known what a flimsy hope it was. A kind word, and she had leaped upon it as if it were far more. It had been only a meaningless nicety, designed to disarm her and get her down to the altar.
She turned, her back rigid with shame that she had imagined she would receive anything from a member of this household, this clan that betrayed everything she’d been raised to respect and cherish.
“My lady?” His words followed her out the door, but she did not stop. She felt the mist of tears in her eyes, and she did not want anyone to see them. She would not show any of them, not one, the loneliness that clawed at her heart like some starving animal.
Her feet hurried toward the tower house, toward the sanctuary of her room.
Rory neared Braemoor, his pockets full of pound notes won from a churlish Lehgrens. Two kegs were tied down on a horse behind him. One of the kegs contained women’s clothes, paints, a wig and two British uniforms; the other held a rather fine wine. He opened the tap, the better for a patrol to test. He’d been stopped by two patrols, but was immediately and with profuse apologies released as soon as his identity was known and the kegs explained as a gift for Cumberland.
Neither asked to sample the wine after that explanation, and his precaution was for naught; still, if an officer had been with them rather than a sergeant, the keg might well have been inspected.
Rory skirted the lane to the tower house. He wanted no one from Braemoor to see him, to report his homecoming to his wife. In fact, he fervently hoped everyone would believe him still in Edinburgh.
The very thought sobered him. He had thought about her more than he’d wanted during the past several days. God knew he understood what it was to be alone, unwanted, even reviled. She would be all three, and he had no idea how to make her stay here more tolerable without putting both of them, and his friends, in mortal danger.
Damn Cumberland and his machinations. He would have to find out why it had been so important to the duke and to King George that Bethia MacDonell marry. They certainly cared little about the welfare of any other Jacobite woman, regardless of rank. What in the devil was it about the MacDonell lass? Not lass. His wife. That fact still astounded him every time he considered it.
He turned down the lane to Mary’s cottage just as the sun set. Mayhap Alister would also be there, and he could sit back and enjoy a tankard of brandy and discuss plans for tonight. Tonight would be his most dangerous mission. Never before had he tried to take a man from British custody. Rory suspected the reward on his head might well double after this night’s work. If he lived through it.
’Twas dusk when he rode up to Mary’s cottage. He slipped his heels from the stirrups and slid down. He tied the horse’s reins to a branch, then cut the rawhide strips binding the kegs in place. He lowered the first one to the ground, then the other. “You will be getting your reward soon,” he whispered to the horse, a sad-looking bony mare he’d purchased in Edinburgh. But with a little fattening up, she would improve greatly. She might make a good mount for … his wife once he was satisfied that the lass would stay put.
He knocked lightly, and the door opened almost immediately.
Alister was indeed there. He grinned when he saw Rory. “I wasna sure you would make it.”
“Neither was I. Patrols are heavy between here and Edinburgh.”
“They are everywhere,” Alister retorted. “I dinna know there were so many Englishmen alive. And now, it seems, they are all in Scotland.”
“Unfortunately.”
Alister eyed the barrels. “Is that what it looks like?”
“One of them,” Rory said. “The other includes some items of clothing. I think Mary will have to assist me with them.”
Mary stepped out then. “Rory, thank God ye are safe.”
“I’m far too wicked to die.”
“Your brother managed it.”
He looked at her face, suddenly tight and tense, and he remembered when he’d been riding past the cottage years ago, and heard the scream. He’d hesitated only a moment, then went bursting into the cottage, only to find his brother on top of her.
Mary’s voice pierced his thought. “It is getting late.”
“Aye, it is,” he replied. “It will take me only a few moments.” He turned to Alister. “Do you have a man who will not object to gaol for a few hours?”
Alister nodded. “We will have to take him to France with our next load, however. It will be too dangerous for him here.”
Rory nodded. “Done. Now help me with these infernal garments.”
“Your taste is not improving, my lord,” Alister said with amusement. “And you might be interested to know your new wife paid a visit to the smithy.”
Rory stilled. He should have known that she would look for friendship somewhere. Damn him for sending her in Alister’s direction.
“She is lonely and she had questions about ye,” Alister said.
“I imagined as much,” Rory said. “But it is not wise for me to stay near her, even if I were more in residence at Braemoor. She cannot suspect anything.”
“She is a Jacobite.”
“Aye, but one that must stay in Scotland, at least until we can free her brother. Any change in her attitude toward me, a wrong word dropped, a whisper heard, could condemn us all. No, not until the time is right.”
Alister nodded. So did Mary, who was standing next to him.
“Now help me get this bloody thing on. We have business this night.”