The Lord’s Highland Temptation

Mrs Cross rubbed her brow. ‘Let me think. Your mother will not want to see you polishing furniture, but you could tidy up her room and your father’s like yesterday.’

‘I will see to it.’ It did not seem like enough to do. Mairi turned to Cook. ‘Mrs MacNeal, Nevin will be down directly to bring Mr Lucas his breakfast. Shall I put together a plate for him?’

Mrs MacNeal shook flour from her hands. ‘Miss Mairi, the fellow left already. Robert told us.’

‘Left?’ But he was still ill! ‘When?’

‘A while ago, miss,’ the cook responded. ‘Robert told me right when I took the loaves out of the oven.’

Mairi touched one of the loaves. It had cooled considerably.

Still, Robert might have been mistaken.

Mairi hurried out of the kitchen and ran to the footmen’s room, but Robert was not there. She hastened to the butler’s room, opening the door without knocking. It was empty. There was a stack of coins on the table. She picked them up and counted. Enough for the doctor’s bill and more. She sank into a chair and fingered the coins.

Things were back to rights again, then, were they not? As if he’d never been there. They could all go on as they had done before...

Except he’d been ill the night before; she was certain of it. His forehead had glistened with sweat and his skin had been hot. The fever certainly had returned, just as the doctor said it might.

She placed her hand over her mouth. Goodness, what if he collapsed again? What if he were not found until he was dead? How would Davina and Niven feel then?

How would she feel?

She glanced at the clock. There was time before she’d need to tidy her parents’ rooms. She could go in search of him and reassure herself that he would not die on his way to wherever he was going. She had enough on her conscience; she did not need to feel responsible for a man’s death.

She rose and resolutely walked out of the room. On her way past the kitchen, she called out, ‘I am going out. I will be back soon.’ Without waiting for an answer, she grabbed her old cloak, which hung on a hook by the garden door. She swung it around her shoulders and went outside.

He had probably followed the track that the wagons used to deliver goods to the back door of the house. She walked briskly down it.

Before it met the main road, she called to John, the stable worker, who was exercising an unfamiliar horse in a paddock. Her father’s latest purchase, no doubt. ‘Did you see a stranger walk by here?’

He nodded. ‘He asked directions to the village.’

‘Thank you!’ That, at least, was a more sensible plan than traipsing over the hills as he must have done before.

Mairi walked as quickly as she could down to the main road that led to the village. If he was as ill as she feared, she would catch up to him.

* * *

Over a quarter of an hour later, she saw a figure seated at the side of the road.

The Englishman. Head bowed. Elbows resting on his knees.

She quickened her pace. ‘Mr Lucas!’

He raised his head, apparently with some effort. ‘Miss Wallace.’

He was certainly still ill.

She stood in front of him. ‘What are you about? Your fever is back, is it not?’

He rose to his feet.

She continued her scold. ‘The doctor said you must rest. For ten days at least. Now look. You are sick again.’

‘Do not concern yourself, Miss Wallace.’ He swayed.

She glared at him. ‘You can barely stand up.’

He straightened. ‘I am well enough to make it to the village.’

But the village was three more miles from here. At this rate it would take him all day to reach it. ‘Are you? You looked fatigued enough after walking this short distance. How long have you been walking? An hour? It will only get harder the further you go. I am persuaded that someone might very well find you in a ditch. Imagine how my brother and sister will feel when they hear you are dead, after they went to such exertions to save you.’

‘None of you should think of me at all,’ he protested.

She crossed her arms over her chest. ‘Davina and Niven will, though. You owe them your life. You should consider their feelings in this matter.’ And hers.

He glanced away. ‘Tell your brother and sister I reached the village.’

If he did make it to the village, Mr Grassie would undoubtedly learn of it. Perhaps people would say her father had turned out a sick man. The last thing they needed was more talk about their family.

‘Come back with me,’ she insisted. ‘Come back and remain the ten days. Or more if necessary. Stay and make Davina and Niven feel they’ve done something that counts.’

And because she could not bear it if he died.

* * *

Lucas could make it to the village. He was not that ill. The tower of the church was visible on the horizon, as were some village rooftops. It wasn’t far. He’d endured worse hardships than this. He’d withstood long marches through Spain. He’d fought on when stabbed by enemy swords. He’d come close to death, but pushed through to keep his brother from being killed.

Except at Waterloo. At Waterloo he’d abandoned Bradleigh.

How could he explain to the lovely Miss Wallace that he did not deserve to live? All he wanted was to forget; to numb the pain.

She ought to have let him die. She should not have pulled him back with her entreaties to live. She should leave him now and, if he were lucky, he would die in a ditch, like she had warned him against.

Suddenly weary again, he sank back to the ground.

She stood above him, hands on her hips. ‘Is this where you would like Davina and Niven to find you dead?’

The fresh, earnest faces of those two young people flashed through his mind. Would he indeed be injuring them if he simply let go of life, here at the side of the road?

Miss Wallace lowered herself to sit next to him, hugging her knees. As she did so, Lucas suffered a spasm of coughing. She lifted an eyebrow as if to say, See? You are sick.

When he could talk again he looked her in the eye. ‘Why do you want me to return with you, Miss Wallace? Your family is in straitened circumstances, I understand. I am only a burden to you.’

Her eyes widened in surprise, then narrowed. ‘I should throttle Niven. You could not have learned that from anyone else.’

Not that he would tell on the boy.