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lass.”
    Beth went white with shock.
    Tina said, “Don’t take everything so seriously. Men like to laugh. Listen to how rowdy they are. It takes a special talent to draw their attention from men’s affairs and hold that attention. Let me show you.” The light of challenge made Tina’s eyes sparkle. She took off her shoes and stockings and kilted up her skirts to display a delicious length of bare legs, and the men moved toward her like steel filings attracted to a lodestone. When their remarks and suggestions became risqué, she kicked cold water over them, and Beth looked on in amazement that they didn’t retreat because of the drenching they risked but instead became more daring in their antics, pushing and shoving each other like rams locking their horns over an ewe. Valentina managed to chase them away, like a queen banishing them from her presence. She sat down upon a rock to put on her shoes, stuffing her hose into her pocket.
    “Tina, why don’t I take supper in your chamber so we can spend the evening together?” Beth suggested hopefully.
    Tina looked at her blankly. “Tonight is Beltane—I’m offand away.” Beth’s face fell. “Come with me!” Tina invited generously.
    “Heavens, no! Aren’t you afraid?” Beth cried.
    “Only a tiny bit, but that’s what makes it exciting, like going to the graveyard at midnight or bathing in the waters of Black Loch naked.”
    “Kirsty said you were wicked,” confided Beth, beginning to believe it.
    “Did she?” Tina asked, sounding inordinately pleased. “I’d rather be wicked than frightened as a rabbit. There’s nothing to fear. Heath’s back. He’ll look after me.”
    Beth flinched and wrinkled her nose. “That ragtag Gypsy?”
    “That ragtag Gypsy is more man than any woman could wish for in her wildest dreams.” But Tina admitted to herself, she was relieved that Beth didn’t want to come. She brushed the lovely blond strands of hair from Beth’s face and nodded toward the group of attractive red-headed men. “They’ll all be gone tomorrow. They only came to bring their wool for export. I want you to dine in the hall tonight. Wear your prettiest gown.”
    By early afternoon, Hotspur Douglas had been in the saddle eight hours, and before dusk fell he would be in the Highlands in the magnificent Grampian Mountains. To cover this great distance in so short a time, he had taken an extra saddle horse and alternated between the two sturdy mounts. At five in the morning he had shaken awake one of his men and thrust the Gypsy girl into his arms with orders to return her to her valley. Then he had chosen two of his fleetest moss-troopers and told them that by dark tomorrow night, they would have the herd they were going to fetch, back at Douglas.
    The wild, unbroken horses had been brought up in the northern forests so they could withstand cold and severe weather. They could run a dozen leagues without food. These sure-footed garrons were preferred by border mosstrooperswho had to patrol endless miles of wild, wide-open rugged carse and moors. The Douglas stables boasted more than their share of blooded, well-fed stallions. Ram’s favorite mount was a black brute that stood more than nineteen hands high. It amused him to call the animal Ruffian, a most misleading misnomer. He could vault into the saddle totally ignoring the stirrups, and many would-be imitators had come a cropper trying to master the trick, especially wearing heavy chain mail.
    Ram Douglas had as sharp an eye for a horse as he did for a woman, and he soon cut the choicest mares and sturdy stallions from the herd. He left the foals with their dams to run free another year and laughed when the dominant stud stallion tried to attack him for stealing his mares. There was no way he was going to take him south to a possible gelding. Ram pulled a bullwhip from his belt and cracked it in the air whenever the stallion approached, and he shouted, laughing, “Get the hell away! If ye follow