Page 44 of A Rogue in Moonlight
She had been surprised at how quickly the school was flourishing. Kinloch and his uncles had seemed eager for her to leave the glen, so she thought they might interfere with her work, though that had not happened yet. After the events in the moonlight the other evening, she understood more of the business in the glen. The nighttime wanderings could be hampered if a gauger’s sister saw what they were doing. They did not trust her, and she could not blame them for that. She would never report what she saw, but they did not realize that yet.
Her brother had sent a message to Fiona the following day, carried by a man who beached a small boat in the covebelow Mary MacIan’s house and knocked on the door with the sealed note.
Dear Fiona, Patrick wrote,If you are ready to leave Glen Kinloch, send word with Mr. MacGrath, the bearer of this note. He is Eldin’s man. I can send a carriage for you. If you intend to stay, tell MacGrath you are content.
But if you do not feel safe, gather your things and go with MacGrath. He will bring you to Auchnashee today.
Fiona had read the note while the man drank a cup of Mary’s good brown beer, brewed that week. Had Kinloch told her brother that she must leave the glen?
That was not going to happen. “Mr. MacGrath, please tell my brother I am content to stay. I will give you a note to deliver to him.” He had nodded and soon left.
Now she frowned, standing at the slate board lost in thought. Wrong or right, smugglers or none, she would stay. Kinloch was a stubborn man, but she was stubborn too. She had agreed to teach, and she had to satisfy her grandmother’s request, if that could ever be accomplished.
Sighing, she knew her situation was already complicated. She was losing her heart, quickly and unexpectedly, to the laird. But she could not meet her grandmother’s conditions if she fell in love with a poor Highland smuggler.
Love.The chalk paused on the board. Did she feel that? She longed for it, wanted marriage, a family, a home of her own. After Archie’s death, she had never expected to feel love, or loved, or happy again.
This was not love, only fancy, she assured herself. This was just the romantic notion of a Highland smuggler on a moonlit night, a man unlike any she had ever known. Her feelings sprang from an insubstantial daydream.
Besides, Kinloch did not share her feelings. His kisses and kindnesses were only meant to coerce her into leaving the glen so he couldsmuggle undisturbed.
Lifting her chin, resolve set, she wrote fiercely on the slate. The chalk cracked.
She only felt more determined to stay. She cared about her students, wanted to encourage them and help them learn. She wanted the glen school to succeed. The students needed a teacher who would stay and help them grow.
They were quick-witted young scholars and quick learners, and she had to be alert and diligent to keep pace with them. She spent evenings writing lessons by lantern light until her eyes stung from oil smoke and her fingers were ink-stained. Soon she planned to challenge them further, adding more mathematics, even some geography; she had found a dusty book of maps in a cupboard in the schoolhouse.
Her work was going well, for she was finding time in the afternoons to search for fossils and rock formations, and make sketches and rubbings. Of course she had found no trace of fairies and never would. But she would find some way to fulfill the request.
As for the stipulation that she marry a wealthy and titled Highlander—she could not easily find one let alone expect marriage. And her infatuation with Dougal MacGregor would soon pass, she told herself. She was too busy to think about him or look for chances to encounter him. The time would pass quickly until summer came.
If nothing else, she thought with a quick intake of breath, she would consider marrying Lord Eldin—he might be interested, for he seemed to have a fondness for her, a weakness for her, one of her brothers had said once. They were not close cousins. Marriage to the Earl of Eldin would certainly meet the requirement and solve a host of problems.
And stir up others, she thought. Eldin was a cold, mysterious, and selfish fellow, though he had been a good and friendly lad and youth in their childhood. Something had happened to change him. She did not know if she could bear life with a man who had closed off his heart socompletely.
Kinloch MacGregor was much the opposite, and no matter how hard she tried, he was never far from her mind.
Still, though she walked by his tower house daily going back and forth to the school, she had not seen him for days. When she did next, he would just urge her to leave Glen Kinloch. He did not care about her, she reminded herself. He was only doing what he thought necessary to protect his secrets from a troublesome woman. However unfair his misconception, she should simply ignore it.
Hearing chatter rising behind her, she turned. “Lucy MacGregor, that is enough,” she said crisply. Lucy had been whispering to her cousin Jamie, and now the girl looked up with an innocent smile.
“Lucy, please fetch fresh chalks from the basket and give them to everyone,” Fiona suggested. Lucy nodded and set to the task. The child had no malice, Fiona knew, just a strong spirit and an impish nature.
She glanced at the two new students who had arrived that morning. Duncan and Sorcha, a young brother and sister, sat quietly working on their slates. She smiled, nodding her approval, and they looked pleased. She was glad that the people of the glen were sending more students as word spread.
Returning to her desk, she took up quill and ink to record a few comments in a leather-covered notebook.Duncan MacSimon, 10, Sorcha MacSimon, 8. Cousins of the laird,she wrote;father is the miller at Drumcairn. They speak a little English. Have a long walk to reach the school, accompanied by an older brother. Starting a new line, she noted,Lucy MacGregor needs more challenges to occupy her mind and energy. Should speak to her guardian.
But the teacher was not quite ready to face Lucy’s guardian.
Standing, Fiona folded her hands calmly. “Good work with the vocabulary, students. Now, let us try something new,” she told them in Gaelic.
Soon she would speak English more often, though she was allowingthem time to grow more accustomed to lessons. Picking up a sheaf of papers bound in string, she opened the pages, which she had painstakingly copied one night.
“When I was a girl, I loved the Gaelic songs my Highland nurse taught me. I translated some into English for you. Jamie, please hand the pages around.”
The redheaded boy jumped up to pass the handwritten sheaves around the room. The students chatted as he did so, and Fiona raised her hand for silence.
“We will recite the verses. If you cannot read the English, just follow along, and place your finger on each word as we say it, to help you recognize the word again. First in Gaelic, then in English,” she said, and continued:
