‘Did you tell them why?’
Mary shook her head. ‘That would only embarrass Dina, my cousin—our cousin?’ She seemed to gauge his expression. ‘Aye, she’s foolish, but I can be kind. I have concocted a taradiddle that the ingredients are a bit off and shouldn’t be served.’
You are kind, he thought. ‘And?’ he prompted.
‘No ring in those three cakes.’
She trilled her rs so beautifully. Ross enjoyed the sound, as well as the thickness of her accent. He found it almost a balm to his soul because it reminded him of earlier years, before Napoleon had decided to rule the known world. Ross thought of his mother suddenly and her well-nigh impenetrable brogue. Mam had died while he languished in a Spanish prison on the other side of the world in Caracas, Venezuela. He would have given the earth to hear her lovely voice one more time.
‘Captain?’ Her voice was soft and she looked concerned.
‘Just woolgathering,’ he told her. ‘I’ve been a long time away from a good brogue with no bark on it. The Royal Navy tends to smooth out most Scotsmen.’
‘You, included.’ She smiled at him, then glanced at his sleeping son. ‘I’m not so certain your wee bairn can understand much of what I said. Ah, well. I’ll be hopefully travelling back to Edinburgh tomorrow, triumphant with a ring, and you’ll be on your way to Dumfries.’
‘Aye.’ Funny that he wasn’t so pleased to think of that. Silence settled on them both, and he teased his vanity with the notion that Cousin Mary might miss him a little. He was done with dinner—or at least all he dared cram down his gullet—but he didn’t want to leave her orbit just yet. Time to snatch at a straw. ‘This fourth Christmas cake. Who has it here in Carlisle?’
She seemed not to mind his temporising. ‘Miss Ella Bruce, a chum of my auntie’s from their younger days at the Lorna McKay’s Select Academy for Females,’ she said with a straight face. ‘Don’t laugh! Aunt Martha learned to create any number of improving samplers.’
He laughed anyway, leaning back in his chair, still mystified by peacetime conversation. ‘Would it surprise you to know that there is someone on nearly every frigate, ship of the line and tender who has a sampler reading, “Great Britain expects every man to do his duty”?’
‘Do you?’ she teased.
‘Of course! My sister Alice Mae in Dumfries has two daughters.’ He sat back, thinking of the samplers, and Trafalgar, and Lord Nelson dead on HMS Victory. They were all in the employ of Napoleon, the grand puppeteer of Europe who pulled his strings so everyone would dance and caper about to his tune. But Cousin Mary didn’t know what that felt like.
Or did she? To his surprise, she leaned forwards and touched his hand, just the smallest touch. And here he thought he had trained his face to show no expression, especially not when things were going wrong and everyone looked at him to save them. Why in the world was he letting down his guard to this sweet lady intent on collecting Christmas cakes? Maybe he shouldn’t have eaten so much Cumberland sausage.
‘Do you know these people with the fruitcake?’ he asked, wanting to change the subject.
‘Not one of them,’ she said as quickly, maybe wanting to change it, too. ‘Only last week, my auntie asked herself why on earth she is still sending Christmas cakes to people she hasn’t heard from in decades. I suppose that is what people do at Christmas; ergo, Ella Bruce gets a fruitcake.’ She laughed. ‘Don’t look for logic, Captain; it’s Christmas.’
* * *
Ross couldn’t think of anyone, except his son, that he had ever sent anything to at Christmas. He opened his mouth to admit it when someone knocked on the door.
Mary gave the door a frown that hinted she wished they had not been interrupted, or so he wanted to think. As she got up to open the door, her hand just brushed his shoulder—again, the lightest touch. He had probably imagined this one, because he didn’t think she was a forward woman at all.
‘This will be Miss Bruce’s emissary,’ she whispered.
‘Eh?’
‘I sent a note to her home, explaining the situation, and he responded at length, but managed to impart amazingly little.’ Her voice dropped to a conspiratorial whisper. ‘D’ye think he’s a solicitor? Let’s hope he has the cake.’
Let’s hope he doesn’t, Ross thought suddenly as she opened the door. Maybe you could use a chaperon, if the cake has strayed. Pray God it has crawled away to die somewhere else.
Chapter Five
His name was Malcolm Barraclough, and he was the bearer of bad news. He was also prissy and overly dramatic, making Mary supremely grateful he was unknown to her. Let Miss Ella Bruce have the pleasure of his stultifying company once Mary quitted Carlisle.
After ten endless minutes of listening to Mr Barraclough explain who he was, Mary made a fearsome mistake—she glanced at Captain Rennie and witnessed an amazing eye roll. Maybe the Rennies truly were inclined more to plain speaking, as he had said. She doubted that the captain had wasted a word in his entire life. This led to her second epiphany: she needn’t suffer bores gladly.
Mary staunched Malcolm Barraclough’s haemorrhage of words. ‘Sir, please take a seat. You are Miss Bruce’s nephew and she has taken herself off to Stirling? Is that the gist of it?’
The man nodded, surprised, and obviously unused to interruption. ‘She will be back e’er long, but gone just long enough for your little errand to—ahem—save my bacon.’ He put his hand to his forehead. ‘I did a rash thing.’ He hung his head in manufactured shame. ‘I’m not certain what I was thinking.’
Captain Rennie laughed, but was rewarded with a fishy stare. ‘Were you foxed? Three sheets to the wind?’
The estimable Mr Barraclough drew himself up, which was amusing enough, because he was even shorter than Mary. ‘Captain, I am an elder in the Kirk!’
‘Ooh, no vices allowed?’ the captain asked in an innocence as manufactured as Barraclough’s humility.
‘None whatsoever.’
You have a playful streak, Mary thought, giving the captain her own fishy stare. She returned her attention to her sitting-room guest. ‘I was hoping you would just bring me the Christmas cake, Mr Barraclough. The ingredients were a wee bit off and my auntie wanted me to retrieve them. I explained this in my note to you this afternoon.’
‘I cannot return it, for I have sent the Christmas cake to another,’ Mr Barraclough confessed. His head hung lower. ‘My Aunt Ella has no idea.’ He struck a little pose. ‘I lay the blame at Cupid’s door.’
The captain turned away and his shoulders started to shake. Don’t look at him, Mary warned herself. She had to ask. ‘Cupid’s door? But this is Christmas, sir, not Valentine’s Day.’
‘Cousin Mary, people can fall in love at Christmastime, too,’ the captain said, his expression bland, except for a lurking twinkle. ‘Surely it happens all the time.’
Mary looked from one man to the other, one a tease and the other a prig, and fell back on her remedy for all ills. ‘Gentlemen, shall we have tea?’
Mr Barraclough agreed to tea, settling himself at the table with the air of a man prepared to stay all evening. Mary poured, wondering if tea had been a tactical error. She knew better than to look at the captain, who had seated himself on the sofa beside his sleeping child. She wanted to laugh when he crossed his legs and the peg rested atop his knee. He waggled it once or twice; Mr Barraclough stared, then coughed and looked away.
The sight of the peg-leg seemed to have deprived him of speech, which