Wild Wicked Scot

CHAPTER FOUR

Balhaire

1706

ARRAN COULDN’T UNDERSTAND HER. She had everything she might possibly want, and yet she cried.

Jock, Griselda’s brother, said Arran should simply command her to stop crying. Jock’s father agreed.

“How am I to do that, then?” Arran asked impatiently. “You canna simply command a woman to cease her tears.”

“You take a strap to her, that’s how,” said Uncle Ivor.

Arran blanched. “Never,” he’d said thunderously, “and God help me if you’ve taken a strap to Aunt Lilleas!”

“’Course I’ve no’,” Uncle Ivor thundered right back, appalled. “She’d skin me like a hare if I had as much as a fleeting thought of it.”

Arran didn’t understand his uncle, either.

The three men fell silent, thinking about women.

Uncle Ivor suddenly surged forward and slapped the table. “Diah, why’d I no’ think of it before? It’s her courses!” he said, casting his arms wide as if all the mysteries of the world had just been solved. “Women are like beasties when they have their courses, aye? Put a child in her, Arran. That will put it to rights.”

Jock snorted. “Molly Mackenzie sobbed buckets of tears when she was with child. Putting a child in Lady Mackenzie will help nary a thing.”

“What do you know of it?” Uncle Ivor challenged his son. “You’ve no’ looked at a lass all summer.”

“I’ve looked!” Jock protested, his ruddy cheeks turning slightly ruddier. “I’ve been a wee bit occupied, have I no’, with the expansion of our trade.”

While Uncle Ivor and Jock argued about whether or not Jock had sufficiently perused the unmarried lasses of Balhaire, Arran brooded. The truth—which he would never admit aloud, certainly not to these men—was that he felt quite a failure for not knowing how to make his wife happy. It was a dilemma that he’d not given much thought before Norwood had presented an alliance through marriage to him.

He’d been surprised by the agent who had come on Norwood’s behalf, but then again, with the union of Scotland and England upon them, men on both sides of the border were scrambling to take advantage of opportunities. There was no doubt that a match with the heiress Margot Armstrong of Norwood Park was one of great advantage for Arran and his clan.

Even so, Arran had not been convinced of it until he’d laid eyes on her. He would never forget that moment—auburn hair, mossy-green eyes, and little paper birds, of all things, in her hair. Arran had traveled in his time, had seen women and their dressing—but he had not seen a beauty quite like Margot, and that was all he’d really needed. Lamentably, his cock had been so convinced of the efficacy of the match that his head had never imagined it would be such work to make her accept Balhaire as her home.

When it was clear Jock and Uncle Ivor would be no help to him, Arran later appealed to Griselda for help.

She was even less helpful. “Why do you ask me, then?” she’d snapped at him. “’Twas no’ my doing to bring a dainty English buttercup to Balhaire.”

Griselda did not care for buttercups, he surmised. “You might befriend her,” he pointed out. “You’ve no’ been particularly welcoming, aye?”

Griselda shrugged and picked at a loose thread in her sleeve. “Aye, perhaps no’. But I tried to make amends!” she added quickly. “I invited her to join in my falconry, and she acted as if I’d invited her to run bare through the woods!”

“Please, Zelda,” Arran pleaded.

Griselda moaned to the ceiling. “Aye, all right. For you, Arran, I will try again.”

True to her word, Griselda came back a day later, sat down beside him in the great hall and said, “Your wife wants society. Bloody English, that’s all they think of—society.”

Arran had no idea what the English thought about, but no matter—he was confused by it. “Here is our society,” he said, gesturing around them to his large extended family.

“Proper society, Arran. A celebration, a ball. Where she might display her jewels and whatno’,” Griselda said, gesturing to her chest uncertainly. Griselda had never been a fancy lass. Griselda liked to ride and hunt and wager on cards. She’d never thought of balls as far as Arran knew.

Moreover, he was quite certain there had never been a ball at Balhaire. But if that’s what would make Margot happy, he was more than happy to oblige her. He decreed that a ball would be held to welcome Lady Mackenzie to Balhaire and the Mackenzie clan, and frankly, the idea was so grand that he wondered why he’d not thought of it before.

Margot seemed rather excited about it. “A ball? For me?” she’d asked him excitedly, her eyes sparkling with delight.

“Aye, for you,” he said proudly. They were seated in the morning room, she with some sort of needlepoint, and he lacing spurs to his boots.

“Arran...thank you,” she said, putting down her work. “That is precisely what I need! A ball,” she said dreamily. “We might invite your neighbors, won’t we? And we’ll have marzipan cakes.”

“Marzipan,” he repeated uncertainly. He wondered if Aunt Lilleas knew how to make them.

“No matter. We can do without the cakes. But we must have champagne and ices, of course.”

Arran had no idea where he would get either champagne or ices, and he had almost said so. But Margot leaped to her feet, threw her arms around his neck and kissed his cheek, surprising the life out of him. “Thank you!”

He decided then and there he would find champagne and ices.

Great preparations were made for the ball. The rush torches were changed out. Carpets were beaten. The tables where his clan took their meals were pushed back against the wall, and proper musicians were hired from Inverness. The clan was instructed to wear their finest clothing.

Margot surprised Arran again one afternoon by inviting him into the rooms she’d taken at the top of the old tower—as far from the newer master’s chambers as she could possibly be. He’d trekked across the breadth of Balhaire to sit in her dressing room to help her select the gown she would wear to the ball.

“What do you think of this?” she asked, holding up a scarlet gown to her.

“Aye, it’s bonny,” he said. He was far more interested in her skin. It was glowing.

“Do you like it more or less than this one?” she asked, and held up a gown of pale blue silk with tiny seed pearls sewed along the hem and sleeves.

“Bonny, the both of them, aye,” he agreed.

Margot’s brow creased. She stood studying the wardrobe. She pulled out another gown that, quite honestly, looked like the others. The only difference was that it was a forest green. She looked at Arran, then at the gown. “What do you think?”

He thought she ought to choose a color and be done with it. They were all the same to his undiscerning eye. He shrugged. “Bonny,” he said again.

Margot sighed with irritation. “Will you not help me? I haven’t the least idea which to wear. Which one suits? And please, for God’s sake, don’t say bonny.”

“What will you have me say, then?” he asked, confused. “All of them are...boidheach.”

Big green eyes blinked back at him. “I don’t know what that means!”

“It means...bonny,” he said helplessly.

Margot groaned to the ceiling. “Will you please choose one?”

“All right. I choose the red one,” he said, pointing to the first one she had discarded across her daybed.

Margot looked at the scarlet one. She frowned. She looked at the forest green one she held. “Not this one?”

“Ach, I canna help you,” Arran said, and stood up, striding across her dressing room. “Wear what you like, Margot. They’re all bloody well bonny!” He strode out the door, frustrated that he’d walked all the way here to be tormented in such a way. He was a laird, for God’s sake. He had no business choosing gowns.

But the excitement in and around Balhaire was infectious, all the same. Mackenzies were suddenly taking airs, concerned about ghillie brogues and sporrans and the like. On the night of the ball, Arran dressed in the tradition of plaids and formal coats. He went to Margot’s dressing room and entered without knocking. She’d complained of that, too, by the by, and thought he ought to be announced in his own bloody house before he entered. He maintained if he would be made to march halfway across the Highlands to see her, he’d enter as he pleased.

This time, though, he was instantly brought to a halt. His wife, his beautiful wife, was dressed in the dark green silk gown with seed pearls interspersed between red crystals in a display of spirals and curls across the stomacher. Her hair was styled in a towering pile of auburn, with more seed pearls threaded into her hair. She looked regal and beautiful, and he was overwhelmed with a rush of prideful affection that made him feel warm in his coat. “Margot,” he said. “Diah, but you are bonny, aye? You bring to mind a noble queen.”

She beamed with delight at him, and her smile filled him up with pleasurable warmth. “A queen. That’s very kind of you to say,” she said, blushing, and curtsied grandly. “Thank you. What do you think of this?” she asked, and laid her fingers across a strand of pearls that looped twice around her throat, and from which hung a ruby that brushed the swell of her breasts above her stays. “I’m not certain of it. Nell said it was perfect, but I thought it might be too ornate.”

“Lass...you’re a vision. You are perfect.” He bowed formally and held out his hand to her. She smiled and put her hand in his. She was happy. Quite happy. Arran thought that perhaps things would turn now, that this was what was needed to make her feel at home here.

He was, at last, giving her what she wanted.

The walked down to the great hall together, Arran assuring her the champagne had come. A hush fell over the great hall when they entered. Arran was proud—his clansmen seemed as taken with Margot and her attire as she was with the changes in this room. He could see them all studying her, could see women glance down at their best gowns and could imagine them finding the garments wanting. Was that not the way it should be? Should not the lady of the house be dressed in the finest? Nevertheless, he was proud of his people, too—they’d all dressed for the occasion. Plaids were cleaned and pressed, and the ladies’ gowns a sea of color.

But none of them had styled their hair as Margot had. None of them wore jewels glittering at their throats. None of them had seed pearls embroidered into their stomachers.

Margot’s grip of his arm tightened. “They’re wearing the plaid,” she whispered.

“Aye.”

“But...” She glanced up at iron candle rings above the hall.

“The candles are beeswax,” he bragged.

Her gaze moved to the tartan draperies he’d ordered hung over the windows so her view was not that of the bailey. He’d even had the dogs taken down to the kitchens tonight so they’d not be underfoot for the dancing.

“Come,” Arran said. He had to tug her a little, but Margot came with him across the great hall. She smiled at the Mackenzies and politely thanked them for attending. When they reached the dais, Arran seated her in an upholstered chair and motioned Fergus to come forward. “Champagne for milady,” he said. “Whisky for me.” Then he sat beside her, took her hand in his and asked warmly, “What do you think, then, wife? Here is your society,” he said proudly, sweeping his arm to the many souls gathered in the hall.

“My society?”

“Aye. It’s what you’ve wanted, it is no’? Society.”

She looked at him as if he were speaking Gaelic. “Yes, but...where are your neighbors?”

“My neighbors?” He laughed. “These are my neighbors.”

She seemed oddly disappointed by that. But she smiled again when Fergus served her champagne in a crystal flute, and asked excitedly, “When will the dancing begin?”

“Now.” He signaled the musicians, and they began with a familiar jig.

Griselda, he noticed, was the first one to stand up with her current suitor.

“Would you like—”

“No, no...let them begin. We’ll dance the next set, shall we?” She smiled and sipped her champagne.

The floor was quickly full of dancers, and they began in earnest, kicking up their heels in true Scots fashion, the voices around them rising with the gaiety of the occasion. They’d gone down the line once, and Arran looked to Margot to see her enjoyment.

But Margot didn’t look as if she was enjoying it at all. She looked dismayed. “What is wrong?” he asked.

She turned her gaze to him, and he was surprised by the terror in her eyes. “Nell and I practiced all week.”

Arran laughed. “You donna need a lot of practice for this,” he said, and stood up. “Lady Mackenzie, will you dance with me, then?”

“No,” she said immediately. “No, I can’t.”

“Margot—”

“Please don’t ask me again, Arran. I won’t dance.”

She stood up and hurried off the dais, disappearing into the crowd.

Arran slowly resumed his seat, bewildered. What had just happened?

It was a quarter of an hour before she came back, coming up the dais steps as if she were trudging to her doom. She took her seat and stared straight ahead, her hands curled tightly on the arms.

All around them, Mackenzies were dancing and shouting in their tongue, drinking ale—they did not seem to care for the champagne he’d had brought in from England for a dear price—and calling up to the laird and lady their felicitations on their marriage. Margot said nothing. She did not smile, did not nod, did nothing to acknowledge them.

Arran grew angry with her. He didn’t understand her sullen behavior, her refusal to dance when she’d seemed so excited by the prospect. When he could bear it no more, he stood up and walked off the dais, and asked a lass to dance with him.

He didn’t know how many sets he spun through, but he drank and laughed and enjoyed himself. He would not sit on the dais with his sullen bride.

When he at last looked to the dais, he was not surprised to see she’d gone.

Fueled by whisky and humiliation, he went in search of her. He found her in her bed. Margot’s beautiful dress was lying in a heap on the floor, and the pieces of hair she’d used to arrange her coif were thrown onto her dressing table. He sent the maid scurrying.

“What is the matter with you, then?” he demanded.

She sat up and stared at him. “Is it not obvious?”

“Obvious?” he exclaimed hotly. “There is no’ a bloody thing obvious about you, Margot. I gave a ball for you, and here you are, crying into your pillow like a child!”

“I’m not crying into my pillow. I am plotting my escape!”

“You want to escape?” He threw open the door and gestured to it. “Go. Escape.” When she did not move, he slammed the door shut and heard the sound of it reverberating down the stairs.

“You canna imagine the effort it has taken to give you this ball—”

“That wasn’t a ball!” she cried, and suddenly swung out of the bed, stalking to her vanity. “That was just another night in your great hall!”

“Diah, but you are a petulant child, are you no’? Those people came to celebrate your marriage, and what do you do, then? You sulk and mope and then flee like a rabbit instead of welcoming them as you ought as lady of this house and clan!”

She slammed down the hairbrush she’d just picked up. “I tried to greet them, but they speak in that awful language! Not one of them wore a ball gown or a proper evening coat. It was all plaid! They wouldn’t drink the champagne, and dear God, the dancing!” she exclaimed, shaking her hands to the ceiling.

“You wanted dancing!”

“Not that sort of dancing! I’ve never seen anything like it!”

“You hate it all, is that it?”

She gasped and looked at him. “No, that’s not—I never said that.”

“You didna say it, Margot, but it is in your every move, your every glance, your every look! You are—”

He caught himself. He ran both hands over his head and sighed.

“What? What am I?” she demanded, folding her arms tightly. Defensively.

“Bloody impossible, aye?”

“So are you. And this place.”

“Diah, what is wrong?” he roared to the rafters. “I canna put it to rights if you willna tell me what it is.”

Margot stared at him. She seemed to be debating what she would say. She rubbed her nape and said, “Frankly, I’m a poor dancer and I don’t know—”

He snorted.

Her face darkened. “You asked, didn’t you?”

“For all that is holy, I donna know how to please you,” he said coldly.

“And I don’t know how to please you,” she snapped.

Her tone undid Arran—he strode forward, caught her by the arm and whirled her around. “Enough of playing the wounded lass, Margot. We are married, we are, and you may as well learn to live with it as fight it, aye? You are a Scot now.”

“Never,” she said defiantly.

Her eyes were glittering in the low light. Her hair fell wildly about her shoulders. It was funny in a strange way—Arran had always thought himself full of might, capable of anything. But he was a very weak man when it came to Margot. She was wretched and haughty, and yet he could see her youth and the abject vulnerability in her eyes.

He cupped her face with his hand, stroked her cheek. “I’m asking...no, I’m begging you. Donna make this harder than it is, aye?”

There it was, a single tear sliding from the corner of her eye. “I can’t possibly make it any harder than it is,” she muttered, and closed her eyes and lifted her face to him.