Page 23 of Laird of Secrets
She would not have been surprised, just then, to see a tall, dark-haired man in a rumpled plaid watching from a distance to make sure she boarded his coach. Let the infuriating Laird of Kinloch assume she would do his bidding, and let him go about his day. No doubt that day included something illegal.
She smiled. Let him be surprised to find her disobediently still here, she thought, shutting the door firmly. He had no right to expect her to obey his demands, even if this was his glen.
Chapter 5
Drone and melody filled the air, cresting off the mountain and returning faint and rich, a quavering that soared over the glen. The sound filled him inside so that he need not think, nor watch for the coach rolling toward Auchnashee carrying the bright and lovely lass he would never see again.
The last haunting note faded. He set his pipes over his shoulder and walked higher on the hillside, wind sifting through his hair. Stopping along the slope, he drew a breath, set the pipes again, and propelled air through the blowstick to inflate the woolen bag and the stretchable sheep bladder inside. The bag with its four chanters had belonged to his grandfather, and its sound was rich and resonant. Tucking the full bag under his arm, he let fingertips fly over the holes along the main chant pipe. The tune was older than his bagpipe, played over so many generations that the echo sounded as if the hills themselves rang it out.
Dougal preferred playing in solitude, for his own listening and for whatever sheep, cattle, goats, and wandering locals happened to hear. He did not play at weddings or funerals, nor at ceilidhs held in the glen villages—Garloch to the west, Drumcairn to the east, with Kinloch House halfway between. The two villages had a long rivalry, their competitive natures expressed in ceilidhs, kirks, ball games, free trading, and whisky brews. Over generations, the Lairds of Kinloch had been noncommittal. His father had played the bagpipes for social occasions, and his uncle, Fergus MacGregor, played for any and all. But Dougal kept to himself.
Keeping apart was protective, he knew, a habit developed by a boy who became a laird too soon, with all the responsibility of tenants and estate on his young shoulders. Loyal to his bones to the people of his glen, he did not pipe for them, nor did he involve himself overmuch in their lives. Truth was, he did not consider himself very good at piping. He simply enjoyed it.
He had learned much from his father, and after him, his father’s brothers, Ranald, Hamish, Fergus, and their great-uncle Hector. His kinsmen had taught Dougal nearly all he knew, guiding him, stepping in to father him as he grew. He had learned to make Kinloch whisky from his father and old Hector; to play the pipes from the red-headed blacksmith, Fergus; herding and husbandry from stodgy, calm Ranald; and Uncle Hamish had shown him how to repair nearly anything.
Everything but that blasted old coach, he thought. As soon as he and Hamish fixed it, the old thing would start to shimmy and creak once again.
Sometimes what was broken stayed broken, he told himself. Like his heart. Once broken, it had stayed that way. First with the early loss of his mother, then his father, and later the girl he would have married. She would have kept a neat house and a kind bed for him, but she had asked him to give up smuggling. He had refused, and she had left the glen to marry a shepherd.
And may she be happy with her four wee children and her placid husband, he thought. Since then he had realized that he was better off without a wife.
The last note he blew rang out like a lamb’s bleat, slightly off. He rested, looking toward the long loch below, and the pale ribbon of the lochside road. The old coach was nowhere to be seen.
After a while he saw Hamish walking along a ridge toward him, with two dogs at his heels, leggy gray beasts whose majestic, formidable forebears had ambled the halls of Kinloch House for generations. But this lazy pair, Dougal knew, wanted nothing more than to flop in doorways. Still, Sorcha and Mhor were fine guardians and amiable companions. And their presence meant that Hamish had returned to Kinloch House before following the sound in search of his nephew.
“So she refused,” Dougal said as Hamish approached.
“She did.” His uncle picked up a stick, tossed it. The dogs watched it fly, then settled at the man’s feet. “Useless beasts,” Hamish muttered.
“Fetching would make them seem obedient, and they cannot have that.”
“Aye, and that lass o’ yours is not the least obedient either,” Hamish said.
“My lass?” Dougal laughed. “Well, I did not expect her to agree, to be sure. But on the chance she saw the wisdom of it, I sent you with the coach. But I take it you could not convince her.”
“That lass has more than a touch of stubborn to her. It was a waste of time and breath to tell her to leave. She intends to stay.”
“Her brother is a gauger,” Dougal reminded him. “He will bring his comrades into our hills. She must go.” He felt a twinge of regret saying it.
“She is determined to open the school, and even now the reverend is out telling the families so. Mary said so while I was eating sausages at her table.”
“Sausages?” Dougal raised his brow. “Mary MacIan gave you breakfast?”
Hamish took a parchment bundle from his pocket. “For you and Lucy.”
Setting the bagpipe on the ground, Dougal unwrapped the packet and found several sausages and a stack of oatcakes. He ate a sausage, savory and still warm. The hounds stood, suddenly interested, and he tore off a bit for each of them. “Mary MacIan is a fine cook.” He licked his fingers.
“The Lowland lady made those for you,” Hamish said. “She made oatcakes and good strong tea, too. We shared a fine breakfast. You should have been there, Kinloch. She cooks.”
Dougal ate another sausage; it was seared, savory, perfect. He wrapped the rest to take home, wiping his fingers on his plaid. “So she cooks? That may be a reason to keep her, then.”
Hamish chortled. “True, now that your Aunt Jean has run back to her mother again, leaving the household to you and me once more.”
“Jeanie would come back if you were both less stubborn.”
“Bah. Life is peaceful without her. This Lowland lass can cook. That is enough for me.”
“Lucy is near old enough to help.”
