putting it mildly,” rejoined Alasdair, starting the car. “I can’t believe it…that he would leave without speaking to us.”
We were both silent a few seconds.
“I’m sure he was thinking of us,” I said after a moment as we pulled away from the parking lot.
“Maybe,” sighed Alasdair. “Still, it seems to me a strange way to do it.”
The next silence was longer. We were nearing the outlying houses of town when Alasdair spoke again.
“I will miss Reddy,” he said. His voice was low, thoughtful, sad. “He was my best friend, and—”
He glanced away and again sighed deeply.
“I was looking forward to trying to be a friend to him again,” he added in a voice that was softer yet and a little shaky. “After waiting so long, to have it so suddenly gone…I just wasn’t ready for this, Marie. It is a blow.”
I was glad for the open window and the gentle breeze against my hot eyes and cheeks as we drove. We were both pensive.
A huge chapter in our lives had suddenly been closed. The chapters titled “Iain Barclay” told very different parts of each of our life stories. Suddenly both had ended on the same day.
Instead of going back to the castle, Alasdair turned east on the A98 and we drove along the coast. It was a lovely day. The sea was a spectacular shade of blue. Neither of us spoke for a long while. Eventually we wound up in Banff, where we walked through the town, then had lunch at a small tearoom before returning to Port Scarnose about three.
Chapter Six
The Duchess and the Laird
Oh summer days and heather bells
Come blooming owre yon high, high hills.
There’s yellow corn in a’ the fields,
And autumn brings the shearin’.
—“The Band o’ Shearers”
H aving Iain gone simplified things, I suppose.
There had been no awkwardness leading up to the wedding. I am certain there wouldn’t have been any had he still been in Port Scarnose. But in some ways it probably made it easier for us to begin anew as husband and wife, as duke and duchess.
Alasdair missed Iain more than I would have expected. Of course we spoke of Iain, wondering when we would hear from him, hoping he would come for a visit. There were times Alasdair actually pined for his friend. To have regained the treasured friendship after so many years, then to lose it—it was hard for him. At the same time, however, as crestfallen as he was at first—for a couple of days I saw hints of his former moody nature that I had not seen once since our engagement—I think Alasdair may have been liberated in some ways by Iain’s departure as well. Without Iain’s shadow hanging over his past, he was able to be his own man, as the saying goes.
When I had come to Scotland a year before, the rift between Alasdair Reidhaven and Iain Barclay—childhood friends, rivals in love as young men, and in the eyes of the community adversaries who had not spoken to each other ever since—was known by everyone for miles around. It had long since ceased to be a matter of daily gossip, and though it was not put in such stark terms, most people more or less took one side or the other in the unspoken debate about who had caused what, who loved whom, and what were the real reasons behind the ill-fated first duchess Fiona Reidhaven’s death. Doubts, therefore, had circulated for years about Iain as well as about Alasdair. Yet Iain’s role as parish curate had slowly succeeded in raising him in the esteem of the community, while Alasdair’s Howard Hughes imitation at the castle had diminished his. Because of his sister Olivia’s subtle methods of swaying opinion, few recognized the true cause of Alasdair’s self-imposed exile.
But most people are influenced more by example and practice than by persuasion. Olivia had been so successful in poisoning the general outlook of the community against Alasdair only in the absence of the counterbalancing influence of his own example. The moment Alasdair became visible again, first with me, then with
We were both silent a few seconds.
“I’m sure he was thinking of us,” I said after a moment as we pulled away from the parking lot.
“Maybe,” sighed Alasdair. “Still, it seems to me a strange way to do it.”
The next silence was longer. We were nearing the outlying houses of town when Alasdair spoke again.
“I will miss Reddy,” he said. His voice was low, thoughtful, sad. “He was my best friend, and—”
He glanced away and again sighed deeply.
“I was looking forward to trying to be a friend to him again,” he added in a voice that was softer yet and a little shaky. “After waiting so long, to have it so suddenly gone…I just wasn’t ready for this, Marie. It is a blow.”
I was glad for the open window and the gentle breeze against my hot eyes and cheeks as we drove. We were both pensive.
A huge chapter in our lives had suddenly been closed. The chapters titled “Iain Barclay” told very different parts of each of our life stories. Suddenly both had ended on the same day.
Instead of going back to the castle, Alasdair turned east on the A98 and we drove along the coast. It was a lovely day. The sea was a spectacular shade of blue. Neither of us spoke for a long while. Eventually we wound up in Banff, where we walked through the town, then had lunch at a small tearoom before returning to Port Scarnose about three.
Chapter Six
The Duchess and the Laird
Oh summer days and heather bells
Come blooming owre yon high, high hills.
There’s yellow corn in a’ the fields,
And autumn brings the shearin’.
—“The Band o’ Shearers”
H aving Iain gone simplified things, I suppose.
There had been no awkwardness leading up to the wedding. I am certain there wouldn’t have been any had he still been in Port Scarnose. But in some ways it probably made it easier for us to begin anew as husband and wife, as duke and duchess.
Alasdair missed Iain more than I would have expected. Of course we spoke of Iain, wondering when we would hear from him, hoping he would come for a visit. There were times Alasdair actually pined for his friend. To have regained the treasured friendship after so many years, then to lose it—it was hard for him. At the same time, however, as crestfallen as he was at first—for a couple of days I saw hints of his former moody nature that I had not seen once since our engagement—I think Alasdair may have been liberated in some ways by Iain’s departure as well. Without Iain’s shadow hanging over his past, he was able to be his own man, as the saying goes.
When I had come to Scotland a year before, the rift between Alasdair Reidhaven and Iain Barclay—childhood friends, rivals in love as young men, and in the eyes of the community adversaries who had not spoken to each other ever since—was known by everyone for miles around. It had long since ceased to be a matter of daily gossip, and though it was not put in such stark terms, most people more or less took one side or the other in the unspoken debate about who had caused what, who loved whom, and what were the real reasons behind the ill-fated first duchess Fiona Reidhaven’s death. Doubts, therefore, had circulated for years about Iain as well as about Alasdair. Yet Iain’s role as parish curate had slowly succeeded in raising him in the esteem of the community, while Alasdair’s Howard Hughes imitation at the castle had diminished his. Because of his sister Olivia’s subtle methods of swaying opinion, few recognized the true cause of Alasdair’s self-imposed exile.
But most people are influenced more by example and practice than by persuasion. Olivia had been so successful in poisoning the general outlook of the community against Alasdair only in the absence of the counterbalancing influence of his own example. The moment Alasdair became visible again, first with me, then with
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