The Bonny Bride
“It was a bonny story,” she said. “Except that Ivanhoe should have married Rebecca.”
Harris cast her a sidelong glance, one brow arched expressively.
“He should,” she insisted. “There was more between Sir Wilfred and Rebecca. Mind how she nursed him after Ashby and how he fought the Templar to save her from burning at the stake?”
The lilt of music and laughter drifted back from the foredeck. Off watch, the crewmen often gathered there in the evenings to tell stories, sing and drink their watered-down rum.
Harris nodded in the direction of the forecastle. “Care to go up and join in the festivities?”
Flushed with the exhilaration of finishing her second book, Jenny accepted the invitation eagerly. She and Harris made their way forward and hovered on the fringes of the gathering. The sailors sat or stood in a rough circle, a few lounging against the rails, some perched in the rigging.
The air throbbed with an infectious, rollicking beat. Callused palms clapped together. Bare feet slapped against the planks of the deck. Wooden spoons drummed a tattoo on the lids of the bilge barrels. Above the chorus of deep male voices piped the spritely trill of a tin whistle. Jenny recognized the tune but not the words, which recounted the charms of the women in various ports of call. She soon found herself clapping in time to the music. The singing ended with a loud, joyous whoop.
“Chisholm! Miss Lennox! Come join us,” called the burly boatswain. With a flick of his thumb, he motioned a young seaman to vacate his seat on a sawed-off cask so Jenny could sit down. “We’ll mind our language, ma’am,” he assured her.
“Pay me no mind.” She waved away all worries of propriety. “I’ve seven brothers, so I’m used to the way men go on.”
As if taking Jenny’s reply as his cue, Tom Nicholson raised the tin whistle to his lips and began to blow another rousing tune. One of the many Irish fighting songs, it gradually picked up a lusty chorus. Several similar songs followed. Then someone called for a jig. The apprentice boy obliged by piping up a lively air. Two young crewmen were pushed into the midst of the circle. After an awkward start, they soon picked up the rhythm and broke into a nimble step.
One of the dancers reached down and caught Jenny by the hand. Hauling her to her feet, he began to spin her about the deck in time to the exuberant music. She’d only danced once before—a few tentative steps at a cousin’s wedding. This was altogether different. Her feet moved over the gently swaying deck with an impetuous ease all their own. The sweet, vibrant music pulsed in her veins. Her partner whirled her off into another pair of arms.
A hectic flush crept into Jenny’s cheeks. She spun away to a third partner and a fourth. Strands of her hair escaped their confining pins, as though anxious to take part in the revelry. She could only toss her wayward curls and laugh, delighting in the wild joy of the moment as the music built towards its feverish climax. The crewmen greeted her performance with noisy approval, clapping and whistling.
Laughing with what little breath she had left, Jenny subsided dizzily against her partner.
“Roderick Douglas won’t care how well ye read, when ye can dance like that, lass.” Warm with admiration, Harris’s deep voice murmured in her ear.
Something told Jenny she should pull away, with a sharp rebuke to Harris Chisholm for holding her in so familiar a fashion. But she dared not let go. She was off balance. It would be too easy to fall. So she lingered in his arms longer than was seemly, anchored by his strength. Clinging to him for the few steps it took to reach her seat, she collapsed onto her improvised stool.
Some remnant of giddiness left from the dancing must have possessed her, for she slid over, patting the lid of the barrel. “There’s room for two,” she said in a breathless rush.
Without a word, Harris dropped down beside her.
High spirits exhausted, the crew’s music slowed and softened. Tom Nicholson gave his tin whistle a rest. One of the men sang a mournful, meandering ballad about an ill-fated cattle raid. Then three of the lads joined in close harmony on “Annie Laurie.” Until that night, Harris had given the extravagant love protestations of Robert Burns a rather cynical reception. The pleasant recollection of hours spent with Jenny and the unsettling awareness of her hip pressing against his gave him a new perspective.
“‘For bonnie Annie Laurie, I’ll lay me down and die.”’
Suddenly Harris could imagine what it must be like to feel that way about a woman. He wasn’t sure he cared for the idea, though. It was tantamount to putting a loaded musket into a woman’s hands and offering his heart for target practice. What if the fickle, perfidious creature pulled the trigger?
“Will you give us a song, Miss Lennox?” one of the men asked at the conclusion of “Annie Laurie.” “There’s some just don’t sound right unless they’re sung by a woman.”
“Aye, like ‘Barbrie Allen,”’ another crewman piped up.
“Nah, not that one.” The boatswain pretended to blubber into his handkerchief. “It always sets me bawlin’. Boohoo-hoo!”
“I’ll go easy on yer tender heart,” Jenny assured the boatswain. Laughter bubbled musically beneath her words. “How about ‘Lizzie Lindsay’? That one ends happily enough.”
“Aye, it’s a sweet tune,” agreed Tom Nicholson. He raised his tin whistle and began to play.
Harris had to agree with the boy’s assessment. The music floated on the night breeze, softly melodic. It had a haunting quality that warned Harris he’d be hearing it in his dreams and humming it for days to come. Beside him, Jenny began to sing.
“‘Will ye gang tae the hielands, Lizzie Lindsay?
Will ye gang tae the hielands wi’ me?
Will ye gang tae the hielands, Lizzie Lindsay,
My bride and my darlin’ tae be?”’
In the next verses, Lizzie’s mother and sister told how they’d eagerly elope with the handsome stranger, if only they were the right age. Miss Lizzie proved a lass of more practical bent. She had no intention of being swept off her feet by a man she knew nothing about.
Harris sat there drinking in the music of Jenny’s high, clear voice. Every note rang with a sweet purity, as though pealed by a golden bell. Each one set echoes resonating in his heart.
In the next-to-last verse, Lizzie’s suitor revealed himself as the powerful Highland laird, Ranald MacDonald. Discovering his identity had a marked effect on the young lady’s scruples.
“‘Lizzie kilted up her coats of green satin,
She kilted them up to her knee.
Now she’s off with Lord Ranald MacDonald,
His darlin’ and his bride to be.”’
As the last golden note died away, the crew broke into a warm round of applause, calling for Jenny to sing again.
“Another time, gentlemen.” She stood and executed a dainty curtsy. “For now, I must beg ye to excuse me. If I don’t soon get to my bed, I fear I’ll fall asleep sitting here.”
When Harris rose to accompany her, Jenny motioned him back good-naturedly. “Ye needn’t leave on my account. Stay and enjoy yerself. I can find my cabin well enough by now.”
He followed her anyway, after a parting wave to the sailors of the St. Bride. When he caught up with Jenny, Harris found her leaning against the afterdeck railing. Silhouetted by the bright moonlight, her loose tendrils of hair wafted on the sea wind in a most bewitching fashion. He stood mute, watching her commune with the ocean, with the night, and with her future.
At last he spoke up. “Yer singing sounded pretty.” He could not keep himself from humming part of the tune.
Though she’d given no sign of knowing he was there, Jenny did not startle at his words. She replied matter-of-factly. “Kirstie taught me that song.” Her voice took on a note of private remembrance. “We used to argue over it all the time.”
“Argue over a song?”
“Aye. Kirstie said it wasn’t very romantic for Lizzie to quiz her beau about his prospects. She said the lass should’ve accepted Lord Ranald before she found out who he was.”
Perhaps Kirsten Robertson had a crumb of sense in her pampered golden pate, after all.
“Ye disagreed?”
Jenny gave a derisive sniff. “I should say so. Lizzie Lindsay was a wise lass. It’s as easy to love a rich man as a poor one. A sight easier to stay in love with him after the courting and the wedding, too.”
“Do I hear the voice of experience?” Harris asked quietly. He had the feeling Jenny was talking more to herself than to him.
“Aye.” It was a small word to hold so much bitterness. “There’s nothing romantic about working yerself to death to make ends meet. Worrying how ye’ll scrape together a few bawbies to pay the doctor bill. Flowery dreams are well enough, but they wither fast in a cold wind.”
“Ye do love this Roderick Douglas, though. It’s not just his money?”
“I used to sit in kirk and watch him,” murmured Jenny. “He was that handsome, with his dark hair and dark eyes. He had such a fine, confident way of moving and speaking. Ye just knew he’d go places and do grand things. Wedding him will be my dream of a lifetime come true.”
Harris listened as Jenny recounted the merits of her future husband. With a pang of regret, he realized that he could never measure up to her ideal.
“Ye ought to get some sleep.” He didn’t mean them to, but the words came out as a gruff command.
“Aye.” Her reply floated on the wind like a sigh. Turning from the rail, Jenny picked a cautious path to the companionway. Harris dogged her footsteps like a morose shadow.
At the door to her cabin, she turned to him. “We’ll start reading Waverley tomorrow. Good night, Harris. I had a fine time this evening.”
Before he could turn away, she raised herself on the tips of her toes and planted an impulsive kiss on his cheek. It landed a little low of the mark, brushing against the scars on his jawline. Harris opened his mouth to say something. Before he could get anything out, Jenny bolted into her cabin and firmly closed the door in his face.
Chapter Four
“Where are we now?” Jenny peered around Harris, toward a distant smudge of land perched on the horizon.
After six weeks at sea, she felt as though she’d always lived on a boat, instinctively adjusting her walk to the roll and pitch of the deck. For the longest time there had been no tangible evidence they were getting closer to their destination. Captain Glendenning had his chronometer, of course, and something he called “dead reckoning.” As far as Jenny could tell, they might have been sailing in circles around the Atlantic.
Then, suddenly, there it was. Land. It beckoned Jenny with promises of her new life.
“Ye’ve asked me that same question every hour since yesterday when we hailed that Nantucket whaler,” Harris snapped, without even bothering to look at her. “We’re an hour closer than we were the last time ye asked.”
Abruptly he pulled back from the bow railing and stalked off without a further word. Jenny, who’d been leaning against him, lurched forward, barking her shin in the process.
“Now what’s got into him?” she grumbled, rubbing her injured leg. “Much good it’s done, my trying to teach him some manners.”
In the past twenty-four hours, Harris Chisholm had reverted to his old sullen self. Brusque, unapproachable…downright rude at times, Jenny would have been quite happy to leave that Harris Chisholm back home in Scotland. Harris, the patient teacher. Harris, the enthralling storyteller. Harris, the endlessly stimulating companion. Where had he gone?
“We’re offshore of Nova Scotia, Miss Lennox.” The master of the St. Bride appeared at Jenny’s elbow. He pointed westward, at a slight indentation in the irregular strip of coastline. “We’re making for a wee channel that cuts between the mainland and the Island of Cape Breton. It’ll take a day or more off our journey, not having to sail all the way around Cape Breton.”
“Do all the ships from Miramichi go that way?” Jenny asked, Harris Chisholm temporarily forgotten. She was eager to learn as much as possible about shipbuilding and seafaring, so she could discuss those subjects knowledgeably with her betrothed.
Captain Glendenning shook his head. “Canso’s a treacherous passage in foul weather or with an inexperienced crew. We’ll get through her fine today, though. I can smell a squall brewing in the sou’west, but we’ll be well through Canso afore she hits. With any luck she’ll hold off until we make harbour at Richibucto. The shoals and sandbars at the mouth of the river are dangerous enough in fine weather. More than one ship I’ve lost…”
“Richibucto?” Jenny asked, with a mixture of annoyance and alarm. “I thought we were destined for the Miramichi.”
“So we are, lass. So we are,” the master reassured her. “We only stop in Richibucto a day or two—more’s the pity.”
Jenny cast him a questioning look.
“It’s my home port,” Captain Glendenning explained. “Got a little farm near there, where my wife and family live. I won’t get much chance for a visit with them this time. Though I may be able to help my brother-in-law get some hay in.”
“It must be hard for yer wife, having ye away from home so much,” said Jenny.
The captain shrugged, but she detected a slight flinch in his craggy, weathered features. “It costs money to build up a good farm. Money for seed, tools and stock. A man can make good pay with his master’s papers. Besides,” he owned, somewhat sheepishly, “I’m one of those bootless fellows with salt water for blood. Every winter I say I’m done with it, going to settle down on the farm for good. Then come spring, when all the wee shipyards on the river launch their new crop of barques and brigantines, I get bitten by the sea bug again, and I’m off.”
Jenny had to admit the attractions of the life Captain Glendenning described. In six short weeks, she’d come to feel quite at home on the St. Bride. She loved the clean tang of the ocean breeze, and the rhythmic slap of the waves against the hull that lulled her to sleep each night. When a freak easterly filled the barque’s sails and sent her bousing along with her rigging taut and straining, something in Jenny’s soul stirred with a sense of expectancy and adventure.
“If you’ll excuse me, Miss Lennox.” The captain touched the peak of his cap. “There’s a few things I must see to, before we make Canso.”
Jenny excused Captain Glendenning with a cheery smile. At the moment her heart brimmed with goodwill toward the whole human race. By nightfall they’d be through the Strait of Canso, heading for a short stopover at Richibucto and then on to the Miramichi. Impossible as it had once seemed, her dream was coming true. Thinking of her dream made Jenny remember the man who had made it a reality.
“Thomas,” she called up to the apprentice boy scaling the rigging. “Any sign of Mr. Chisholm?” If Harris was on deck at all, Thomas Nicholson could easily spot him from aloft.
“Back by the poop deck, Miss Lennox,” the boy yelled down.
So Harris was waiting for her in their outdoor school. That was it, Jenny decided in a flash of insight. Preoccupation with the end of their journey had made her forget her reading lessons. That was why Harris had spoken to her so impatiently. She’d sensed his enjoyment of their studies together. It must be a marvelous feeling to open another person’s mind to the world of books and knowledge. One day she would pass along the precious gift Harris had given her, by teaching others to read.
She must settle down and concentrate on her lessons, Jenny chided herself as she went in search of Harris. For one thing, it would help make these last anxious days pass more quickly. Besides, she should enjoy it while she could. Soon there would be no more lessons. No more stimulating discussions. No more good-natured arguments. Somehow, that thought cast a dark cloud over Jenny’s dream of a sunny future.
Harris sprawled on the steps of the poop deck, gazing blindly at the pages of Scott’s The Heart of Midlothian, open before him. He knew enough anatomy to realize that the human heart was merely a muscle pumping blood through the body. Yet he could understand why people had once believed it to be the seat of emotion. Love, in particular. For when love went awry, as it invariably did, it left a heavy weight pressing down on one’s chest. With every beat came a twinge of pain.
Harris heaved a sigh that started somewhere in the region of his toes. He’d been right, back in Dalbeattie, to avoid women. The creatures were nothing but trouble. Not knowing what he might be missing, he’d felt a certain restlessness, a vague sense of discontent. Now his longing had a focus—Jenny. That focus served to concentrate and hone the feeling, until it was heavy enough and sharp enough to lance his heart.
Day after day he’d sat beside her, their hands sometimes brushing or their eyes meeting over the pages of a book. She had a way of looking at him, with those immense heather-colored eyes, that made Harris feel he was the font of all received wisdom. A sage. A hero. Capable of any daring exploit. Her soft, musical voice had wrapped itself around his heart and invaded his dreams.
Jenny Lennox was everything a woman should be—an amalgam of the best of Scott’s romantic heroines. As beautiful as Rowena, as tender as Rebecca, as spirited as Flora MacIvor. And Harris had promised to deliver her to another man. With the date of delivery rapidly approaching, Jenny was eager for it to come. Only one other time in his life had Harris felt so abjectly miserable.
He had no one to blame but himself. He should have known better than to fall in with Jenny’s plan. Six weeks spent with any lass in the close quarters of this barque—had she been half as bonny as Jenny and one-tenth as good-natured—a man would still likely have developed feelings for her. How could he have been so daft?
Well, the time had come to cut his losses. Bandage up his poor mauled heart and buffer it against any worse abuse at the deft, gentle, deadly hands of Jenny Lennox. Harris felt his features freeze into his old intractable mask.
“Harris?” Jenny offered him a conciliatory smile. She was graciously willing to overlook his recent churlish behavior. “Am I late for lessons?”
He didn’t move aside to offer her accustomed seat. Glancing up absently, Harris looked as though he’d been thinking of something else and had scarcely heard her.
“Captain Glendenning says we’ll be through the Strait of Canso by nightfall,” Jenny informed him. “If I promise to concentrate and not go tearing off to the railing every five minutes, do ye think we stand a chance of getting through this next book before we reach the Miramichi?”
“There’s nothing more I can teach ye.” He thrust the book at her. “All ye need now is practice. It’s a sight quicker to read it yerself than to read aloud. If ye keep at it, I’ve no doubt ye’ll get it finished in time.”
Jenny just stood and stared at him. She could not have been more taken aback if Harris had hurled the heavy volume at her head.
“I…I ken ye’re probably right,” she finally managed to say. “It’s just, I enjoy talking the story over with ye, Harris. Ye’re a dab hand at explaining all the parts I don’t understand.”
“Aye, well…” His expressive brows drew together and his lip curled in a frown of distaste. “I fear I won’t have time, Miss Lennox. As ye’ve pointed out quite frequently in the past twenty-four hours, we’ll soon be reaching our destination. I have plans to make.” He waved a hand airily. “Important considerations to review.”
Miss Lennox, was it now? A wonder she didn’t get frostbitten by Mr. Chisholm’s chilly politeness. Jenny composed her face into a mirror image of his haughty expression. She felt a little sick flutter in her stomach. Curse these choppy offshore waters. Her eyes were beginning to sting as well. Blast this briny wind!
“I’d hate to be responsible for taking up yer valuable time, sir. Not when ye have grand plans to make and important decisions to consider.” She snatched the book from his hand. “I’ll remind ye, though…this business of teaching me to read was yer idea, not mine. So ye can quit acting like I’ve imposed on ye.”
Harris refused to meet her challenging stare. “I only thought it was time for ye to get used to reading on yer own. Ye soon won’t have me around to read with.”
Contemplating that prospect made Jenny’s knees tremble. This whole upset, this sudden unexplained hostility between them, provoked a battery of strange and unwelcome emotions in her. Damn Harris Chisholm for getting her all riled up!
“No doubt ye’re looking forward to having me off yer hands,” she said coldly.
“Now, Jenny, I didn’t mean to imply that.”
“Oh didn’t ye, indeed? I’m sure ye’re too polite to come right out and say so. All the same, ye must be relieved I’ll soon trouble ye no further.”
“Now see here…”
“I’m willing to absolve ye of all responsibility here and now,” Jenny pressed on, proud that she’d been able to marshal a couple of impressive words from her growing vocabulary. “I’ve nothing to fear from any man on this vessel. My father’s a thousand miles away. He’ll never know the difference. Consider yer duty honorably discharged and we can go our separate ways.”
A battalion of gulls careened in the sky above the barque’s mainmast, screeching shrilly at one another. Before Harris had a chance to reply, Jenny spun about on her toe and flounced off. She clutched the weighty tome of Walter Scott’s prose to her heart like a protective shield.
In her dark, cramped little cabin, Jenny made a stubborn effort to read by the wildly swaying beam of her lantern. Her lips moved as she scanned each line of print, clamping together angrily when she came upon an unfamiliar word.
Blast Harris Chisholm straight to Hades! Jenny’s strong, slim fingers tightened around the pages of the book. She’d felt a connection with him, a friendship even sweeter than the one she’d enjoyed with Kirstie Robertson. It hurt to discover he’d only been suffering her company, gritting his teeth, biding his time until they reached North America. Then he’d drop her at the feet of Roderick Douglas, like some odious parcel he was glad to be rid of.
Suddenly she noticed the tempo of footsteps quickening on the deck above. How long had she been shut in her cabin? Jenny wondered. Perhaps they had reached that Canso place already. Closing the thick book, Jenny laid it on her berth. She smoothed her skirts and pinned a wayward lock of her hair severely back in place. She’d go up and catch a closer glimpse of North America as the St. Bride sailed through the narrow strait. She’d show a certain person she was quite capable of looking after herself, and that she didn’t care a whit for his regard.
As she emerged onto the deck, squinting against the bright sunlight of late afternoon, Jenny collided with the tall, substantial person of Harris Chisholm.
“Jenny.” He grasped her by the shoulders. “Ye’ve got to get below at once.”
Drawing back from him, she fixed Harris with a stare of chilly severity. “I’ll thank ye to move out of my way, sir.”
In spite of her stiff retort, Jenny’s heart gave a traitorous leap, for Harris had called her by her first name in a tone that had lost its cold, clipped edge.
“I’ve no time to stand here arguing with ye, Jenny. Ye’re going below.” With that, he grasped her around the waist and hoisted her effortlessly over his shoulder.
“Put me down, Harris Chisholm!” Jenny flailed her feet and pounded in vain on his back. Her cries filled the narrow companionway. “Let me go this minute, ye great ruffian!”
To restrain her squirming, Harris adjusted his hold on Jenny, bringing one hand to rest on the swell of her backside. The pressure of his hand set a tight, tingly sensation quivering deep in the pit of her belly. It fueled her anger and outrage. “Let me go, or I’ll have Captain Glendenning throw ye in the brig!”
Pushing open her cabin door, Harris tossed Jenny unceremoniously onto her berth. “The captain has worse ruffians than me to contend with just now.”