Chapter 6

 

‘Why the Devil do you and your father put up with her?’

They were in the back lobby, a safe distance away from the kitchen and concealed by a sharp corner from anyone who might come into it. A selection of tartan plaids, cloaks and coats, including his own, hung from hooks on the back door. A glass lantern, smaller than those in the kitchen, sat on the deep windowsill to the right of the door. The candle flame was steady, bathing the small white-washed space in warm yellow light. It was striking glints off the little brass bowl which sat next to it, as well as the shining brass of the curved tops of the well-polished coat hooks.

‘I sometimes wonder. Och,’ she added, raising her arms and fisting her hands in a gesture of exasperation, ‘I’m so annoyed with her for being like that with you today! I really thought she had seen your worth.’

‘My worth?’ he queried, his voice grown very dry. ‘I have that, do I?’

‘Yes! You showed your worth yesterday evening when you and Mr Livingstone rescued Geordie and Joshua. Betty admires you for that, I know she does!’

‘Really?’ Catto drawled. ‘I doubt she admires anything about me. Not one little thing.’

Christian Rankeillor frowned. ‘She did spread that blanket over you last night. After you had fallen asleep in front of the library fire. She also got up early this morning to put the porridge on, so you could have a bowl before you left the house.’

He shrugged. ‘A temporary cessation of hostilities only. She sees me as a danger to your reputation. Which I am. Don’t stand in front of the window.’ Reinforcing the command, he took her by the elbow and pulled her back from the glass.

Her eyes widened. ‘You think someone might be watching us from out in the Physic Garden?’

‘I’m being careful. That’s all.’

‘What about when you go out there? In the dark?’

‘I can look after myself. Besides which, watchers watch. They seldom do more.’

She shivered. Damn. Somehow he knew she was thinking about the watcher who had done more. Or failed to. On Daft Friday, undoubtedly coerced into it, medical student Murdo Robertson had not had the stomach to dispatch Catto. She had been a witness to that event. It had scared her, of course it had. She had not lived a life like his, with danger lying in wait round every corner, liable at any moment to explode into violence. Dear God, he was so much more than a danger to her reputation.

‘Interesting times, Kirsty.’ Once again he raised one hand to her face, drawing his fingertips down the side of it, keeping his touch as soft as thistledown. ‘We are living in interesting times.’

She raised her own hand, circling her fingers around his wrist, under the narrow ruffle of his shirt cuff. ‘I wish you and I had met each other in very dull times. The most uneventful times imaginable!’

‘So do I, Kirsty. So do I. Not have to navigate our way through this bloody mess in which we find ourselves.’ Wondering how it was possible to feel so happy and so sad – and so desperately worried for her – all at the same time, a previous conversation sprang to mind. ‘Stumbled upon each other in a garden full of sunflowers.’

‘Och, Robert…’ she breathed. They kissed, gently this time. Then, unable to keep his hands off her, he stroked the gleaming fall of her hair.

‘I take it you’ve had a busy day.’

‘You might say that. Betty and I had to get everyone settled. What’s happened has upset Mary and Tibby too,’ she said, naming the two young maidservants who normally helped keep the Rankeillor household running smoothly. ‘We had our work cut out, making sure everyone was calm and comforted. Not to mention fed and watered.’

The wryly amused expression became a frown. ‘Even though Geordie had to be persuaded to eat anything.’

‘Give him time,’ Catto said. ‘Speaking of which, how long have we got?’

‘Until Betty comes through? She’s going to be fussing over my father for at least the next ten minutes.’

‘So taken up with him she’s forgotten her self-appointed task of guarding your virtue?’

She put her hands on her hips and looked at him as though he was a halfwit. ‘You’re hardly likely to ravish me up against the back door.’

‘Och, I don’t know. The idea does have a certain appeal.’

When she gave a quick little gasp, his eyes dropped to her lovely mouth. Her delicate pink lips were slightly parted. Desire. She felt it as much as he did. He raised his eyes again and saw the confirmation of that in her own.

His pulse quickened. Bugger. He might have to try thinking those horrible thoughts again. Or he could consider the other emotions chasing themselves across her so expressive face. Shyness. Nervousness. Embarrassment at his words. Her bravado had been replaced by a deep rosy blush.

‘Sorry,’ he offered. ‘Not something a gentleman should say to a young lady.’

She came out fighting. ‘Where’s the gentleman?’ she asked, pretending to look past him and around the lobby. ‘I can’t see one.’

‘You’ve done it again!’ he said, his voice an amused growl.

‘Done what?’

‘Made me laugh! Made me like you!’

She tilted her head back, giving him an appraising look. ‘That’s bad, is it? Liking me?’

‘It’s almost worse than the loving.’ Abruptly serious again, he lifted one of her hands and pressed a kiss on the back of it. ‘Kirsty. Let us not waste any of these ten minutes. The Lord President returns to Edinburgh sometime in the middle of January—’

‘Will you have incurred his wrath by what you did last night?’

‘Very possibly,’ he said, doing his best to sound unconcerned, even flippant.

She was having none of it. ‘You broke the law, did you not? And you are an officer of the law.’

‘A clever lawyer might be able to dispute that I broke the law. I did not actually take the boys away from Eastfield.’

‘Will it make a difference to the Lord President that you found them on the bridge at Musselburgh? You had gone out looking for Geordie. You had every intention of taking him from Eastfield if you had to. You have compounded the offence by also bringing Joshua back with you.’

‘I wasn’t going to leave him there!’

‘Of course you weren’t. You’re not made that way. What I mean is that the Liddells’ grievance against you is now even stronger than it was. The letter Charlotte sent to Mr Paterson the lawyer, accusing you of not being a fit and proper person to command the Town Guard—’

‘Which letter your friend the aforementioned clever lawyer flung into the fire.’

‘Which will not stop her from repeating her accusations to the Lord President once he returns to Edinburgh.’

‘At the moment I have her, her brother and their friend Mr Menzies of Edmonstone at a considerable disadvantage. Let me worry about that nest of vipers. Further oblige me by thinking about yourself for a change. Once I have given the Lord President the intelligence I have gathered, matters will be out of my hands. Much may depend on how I present my findings and Culloden does prefer striking bargains to—’

‘Throwing people into the Tolbooth?’ she suggested. ‘Hanging them?’

He rolled his eyes, once again trying to treat those words as something to be dismissed. Not quite succeeding. ‘Aye. But even a man as powerful as Duncan Forbes of Culloden is answerable to others.’

‘The Duke of Argyll,’ she supplied. ‘The Marquis of Tweeddale.’ She pulled a face when she said that name. ‘Whose Edinburgh home is no distance from here. Over the Cowgate and up off the Canongate.’ She inclined her head, indicating the direction in which Tweeddale Court lay. ‘Not that he spends much time there. A Secretary of State for Scotland,’ she added with studied contempt, ‘who prefers London to Edinburgh.’

‘Yes. Those two. Not to mention King George himself.’ He squeezed the hands he held. ‘And don’t tell me he’s the Elector of Hanover. Calling him that can get people into trouble. I’m going to do my damnedest to keep you out of this but you’ve got to help me. We must both tread carefully. As I’ve also already told you. On Yule Day, in case you’ve forgotten.’

‘I haven’t forgotten.’

‘Then why did you say you expected I would want a written statement from you as well as your father?’

Her defiant chin went up. One of the first things he had noticed about her. That and her eyes. Green as a summer meadow. So clear. So honest. Too damn honest.

‘The words slipped out of my mouth before I could stop them. Nor am I sorry for saying them, Robert.’

‘That’s what worries me. Also that more words might slip out of your mouth. In front of the Lord President and anyone else who might closely question you. Does Culloden know you are a gifted artist?’

‘You will show him the map I drew?’

‘Of course I will. I cannot not show it to him. But I’d rather not tell him you were the cartographer. I repeat. Does he know of your artistic talent?’

She shrugged, as though to deny the praise. ‘He knows I draw and paint. Which is not so unusual. Several of my friends also do so.’

‘This is no time for false modesty, Kirsty!’

‘Robert…’ She looked past him once again, this time in the direction of the kitchen. ‘Betty will be here soon.’

‘So look me in the eye and answer the question before she gets here.’ He tugged on her hands and her focus returned to his face.

‘Yes. He knows. He has complimented me on my drawings and paintings several times. I think he also suspects I do the anatomical drawings for my father.’

Catto groaned. ‘Then we must make it abundantly clear to the Lord President and any other interested parties that you drew the map whilst being ignorant of its true purpose. Which you were, were you not?’

Yes.’ She moistened her lips.

‘As we must also make abundantly clear you had nothing to do with the Jacobite agent. Did not even know he was here in Edinburgh. Or that he was being hidden in the Royal Infirmary. If the Lord President wants to speak to you directly, that is what you must tell him. Agreed?’

She did not immediately respond, only continued to look at him out of those too honest eyes.

‘Answer me, Kirsty.’

‘I think I can hear Betty coming.’

‘I can’t. So answer me. Now.’

 

Leaning against the old cloaks and coats, she listened to the sound of his footsteps as he walked away, straining her ears to hear them for as long as possible. Which was not long at all. She had to check an instinctive move closer to the window, in the hope of seeing his tall figure depart.

She glanced at the lantern on the windowsill. She could stretch out her arm, lift it, open the glass door and blow out the candle. Then she could look out of the window without fear of being seen. But any watcher hiding out there in the shadows of the physic garden might see the movement of her arm and hand. Interesting times. The words made her shiver.

She waited a moment longer, all the same. Were Robert Catto to look back, he would see the lit window. A flickering flame in the darkness pressing in all around them.

As she walked from the lobby back into the kitchen, the knob of the door through to the rest of the house turned. Carrying a wooden tray topped by an empty soup plate and spoon, Betty backed into the room. Christian set down the lantern she had carried through from the back lobby and hurried round the kitchen table to swing the door wide for the housekeeper.

‘Yon one’s gone, then?’ she asked, indicating the back lobby with a lift of her chin.

‘Captain Catto has left, yes.’ Now it was she who was on the receiving end of one of Betty’s glowers. The older woman turned and headed for the pantry with her burden. Christian could still feel the disapproval.

‘I hear he’s coming back the morn.’

‘He is. Betty, did you say anything to my father about the Captain?’

She regretted the words the moment they were out of her mouth. The tray still in her hands, the housekeeper swung round to look at her. The glower had been replaced by a look which combined anxiety with concern.

‘Is there anything I need to say to your faither? Anything he should ken about yon one wha’s just left? About him and you, lass?’

Care. She really cares about me. That’s why she’s asking. That’s why she looks so worried. Care. Kindness. Love, on both sides. It’s not going too far to say that. And there’s always been laughter. Lots of laughter. Hope too. God knows, we all need that. Especially now.

She looked back at Betty Gilchrist and wondered how she could even be contemplating lying to her. This woman who was the nearest she’d ever had to a mother. This woman who had looked after her throughout her life. This woman who had comforted her when she was upset and shared her joys when she was happy.

‘No, Betty,’ she said, giving the housekeeper the only possible answer. It might even be the honest one. Now her father was home, the chances of her and Robert Catto having the opportunity to meet up in private was more unlikely than ever. Vanishingly small. ‘There’s nothing you need to say to my father about Captain Catto and me. Nothing at all.’