Page 75 of Stealing Sophie
Chapter 20
“Where is our cousin?” Donald MacCarran glowered at Connor. Neill and Andrew rose slowly to their feet. Connor motioned for them to stand back and be calm.
“Fine and safe,” Connor said. “I have her. You should know I have married her.”
Donald, the shorter and darker of the cousins, began to draw out his dirk. “Stolen her and married her! And dumped us into the water while you were at it! And we were once friends.” He spit on the ground.
“Stop,” Allan said, putting a warning hand to his brother. Connor looked at Allan in surprise. The young man had the golden coloring of his Duncrieff cousins. “Rob said this might come about. But we did not expect it to happen like this,” he added.
“So he told you something of this?” Connor asked.
“A few months back, he said one day he would rather his sister married Kinnoull than Campbell. We knew what he meant.”
“He did mean Sophie and not Kate?”
“Aye. He knew his father had made some agreement with Campbell, but Rob, now Duncreiff himself, disagreed,” Donald said. “And now we disagree with his choice of you, MacPherson. He thought you a friend, but you were a poor comrade.”
“How so?” Connor narrowed his eyes.
“The night of the raid, weeks ago, when Duncrieff was taken,” Allan said. “Tell us the truth of that, MacPherson. We were there, Donald and myself, your lads too.” He nodded to Neill and Andrew. “We went ahead of you and Duncrieff, that night he was shot.” His gaze was bitter. “He said it was not a serious wound. We left him with you.”
“We should not have done that,” Donald said, hand back to his hilt again.
“He fooled all of us,” Connor said. “He had a slight wound to the arm, but he was pistol-shot in the back. He collapsed later.”
“And you left him to die?” Donald demanded.
“I had to leave him.” Connor hated himself for saying the words, for doing so.
“Why?” Allan, too, pulled at the handle of his dirk.
“They say he was betrayed by a friend,” Donald said. “You! Red soldiers took him because someone shouted out where he was, and fled. That was you.”
“If you thought so, why did you not come after me then?”
“We did not want to believe it,” Donald said. “We heard you went to Perth.”
“I went to see Duncrieff. The guards said he was ill and could have no visitors. I returned each day, but never saw him.”
“We went there too, but did not see you,” Allan said. “They would not admit us either, and we his kin. We have had no word since if he is alive or dead.”
The last time he went to the jail in Perth, the guards had said that Duncrieff had been taken to Edinburgh, dying on the way. But he did not know if it was true.
“Why did you leave the lad,” Donald snarled.
“When I saw how sore wounded he was, I knew I could not save him there, nor transport him safely,” Connor explained. “I had to gamble that the government would respect a clan chief, even a Jacobite rebel. General Wade has some decency in him,” he said. “I know the man. Duncrieff would have died that night had he stayed with me. I followed to make sure the soldiers took him to Wade, who ordered a physician, as I hoped he might.”
Allan and Donald watched him warily, hands on their weapons. Connor waited, tense but expressionless, knowing they had good reason to despise him.
He remembered, hurting to think of it, doing all he could to stem the bleeding. He remembered Rob’s demands that Connor leave him and flee, save himself. He remembered how bitterly they had argued, harsh words that still burned in his mind.
Leave me!Rob had said. Go, but make me one promise. Marry my sister. She will return to Duncrieff next week. I must have your promise on that before I die.
You will not die,Connor had insisted.You will not. I can take you—
You cannot. I will not make it over these hills with you. Do this for me, Conn. Marry her—here, take this page. She is named here, and I have set my seal on it...Save her, and Clan Carran, from threat. I will not be here to watch over them—
Seeing how pale and weak his friend was by then, Connor had given his word, promising anything to give him comfort, save his breath as he lay dying. He did not think of marriage, or sisters, but only of his friend. He owed Duncrieff so much, loved him and his clan.I can trust only you, Conn. Go, you must go—
