Cathy Maxwell - [Chattan Curse 03] Read online

  It was a good time to leave.

  Heath grabbed both the freshly poured tankard the dumbfounded Nate still held and Rowlly’s collar. Two more of Augie’s clansmen had entered from other rooms, ready to join the brawl. Augie himself was starting to rouse, no doubt brought to his senses by the fresh ale on the floor.

  Gulping down his pint, Heath shoved Rowlly out into the hall and then threw the empty tankard at the Campbells following him. It hit one over the eye. He hollered. The others shoved past him.

  Rowlly and Heath charged out the front door, running for Admiral, Heath’s horse tied at a post. “Hurry,” Rowlly shouted, but he needn’t have bothered. Heath was right on his heels. It had been a long time since Heath had moved so fast.

  The cousins mounted Admiral just as the Campbells came pouring out of the pub. Heath put heels to horse and they were off and safe. There was no one who could outrace Admiral; the long-legged draft horse had the spirit of a Thoroughbred when given his lead.

  They dashed toward the open road. The wind against Heath’s sweaty face felt good. His hands stung and he’d have a bruise beneath one eye, but in this moment he was alive.

  Months of struggles and sadness fell away. He’d find them again; they were not lost completely. But for right now, the tension that had become his constant ally had been dispersed.

  When he was certain they weren’t being followed, Heath brought Admiral to a walk. The horse was fair winded. After a few minutes, Heath turned off the road into a forest before reining the horse to a halt. Rowlly slid off Admiral’s rump and raised his fist in triumph.

  “We gave them something to think about, didn’t we?” He still smelled of the ale Augie had poured over him. “They will think twice before they pull that nonsense on a Macnachtan.”

  “How did you find yourself in that situation?” Heath wanted to know. He would have assumed that with him gone to Glasgow for a few days, Rowlly would be so busy he’d not have time to drink in the Goldeneye.

  Instead of answering the question, Rowlly said, “It was like old times when you and Brodie and I used to regularly teach those lads their manners. In those days, no Campbell would have been disrespectful to a Macnachtan, but you showed them today that they’d best still think twice. Where did you learn to jab like that?” He punched the air with his fist, demonstrating what he meant.

  “I’ve had to use my hands a time or two,” Heath said, walking Admiral.

  “Not in the King’s Navy?” Rowlly said with teasing mockery. “I thought you had a bevy of sailors to command wherever you went.”

  “Once they respect you,” Heath agreed. “Until then, there are hard lessons to learn.”

  “Well, we tried to raise you right, Laird. And we did indeed. It will be a long day before Augie lives this one down. He doesn’t receive his comeuppance often enough. By the by, how did the meeting in Glasgow go?”

  Heath frowned. “Not good. I’ve been advised to sell the land.”

  “Can you?”

  His cousin’s response surprised him. “Should I?” he countered. “I could. It is not entailed. Not even our grandfather thought it important, so neither did Father or Brodie. I can hear the three of them now, why entail what you will not sell?”

  “And are they right?” Rowlly said as he started to pay attention to the damage the ale had done to his clothes.

  Heath’s own clothes were in need of repair as well. He’d torn the seams of his sleeves in the fight. His sisters would not be pleased—

  He’d forgotten his cloak. “Damn it all,” he swore.

  “What?”

  “My cloak. It is either still on a peg by the Goldeneye’s door or Augie is wearing it.”

  “Augie’s wearing it,” Rowlly assured him. “He won’t let that opportunity pass by but you can take it from him again.”

  “He’ll probably piss on it.”

  “That he will,” Rowlly agreed with a grin.

  “Damn,” Heath repeated, and cursed himself as well. At eight and twenty, he was too old to be brawling. His knuckles hurt, as did his right shoulder. Age was not kind.

  “Did the solicitor have any suggestions for us?” Rowlly asked.

  “Other than selling? No. He even had a buyer for me.”

  “Who?”

  “Owen Campbell.”

  Rowlly made a deprecating noise. “That is not news. How many times has he offered to buy Marybone? Now I understand why you were such a fighter in there. And here I was thinking you were protecting my honor.”

  “I was. Augie deserved a lesson. However, the Macnachtan and Campbells have always been allies of sorts. I have nothing against them,” Heath said as he picked up Admiral’s reins. “Even Owen.”

  Rowlly reached a hand up to rub the horse’s muzzle and asked, “Are you going to sell?”

  “You’d be out of a position if I did that,” Heath answered.

  “We all would . . . although you and the girls would be fine.”

  Heath frowned and focused on adjusting his saddle’s girth. Rowlly was right. Selling would mean good things for his immediate family.

  “I mean, now that their mourning is past, you will need to find husbands for them,” Rowlly said. “Not that you couldn’t find good men for them, but not men of their station—not without dowries.”

  “What of loyalty, Rowlly? What of a chief’s responsibilities to his clansmen? If I sell to Owen, I know what he will do. The man is after money. He’s a younger son of a duke’s younger son and he is ambitious. If he buys Macnachtan lands, he’ll clear them like a good number of our ‘noble’ gentry have. They’ve turned out people who have given generations of loyalty and replaced them with sheep. Owen will send our clansmen packing without even so much as a fare-thee-well and to go where? There is no place for them.”

  “Well, if Swepston is fired up over the modern changes you’ve made, including choosing new crops, he’ll be mad as the devil if that land was sold.”

  “Now there is a tempting thought in favor of selling,” Heath replied. Swepston was Heath’s crown of thorns. The crofter resisted any inkling of change. He was a charismatic figure who lauded the old ways, the “ancient ones,” he called them, and his personality was such that he’d recruited a number of people to his opinion. Heath had stopped counting the number of his clansmen who now wore small bags of herbs and who-knew-what around their necks on Swepston’s say-so.

  “I don’t care if he believes himself some Druid,” Heath said, “as long as he leaves new equipment alone and lets us work in peace.” Heath couldn’t prove it but he thought Swepston was behind the disappearance of the barley seed purchased for crop rotation.

  “The land does belong to the laird,” Rowlly said. “You could do the same as Owen Campbell if you had a mind to instead of going bloody broke filling all of their bellies. I know a bit about sheep.”

  “I’ll not do that, Rowlly. Not even to Swepston.”

  Rowlly fell into a somber silence then and Heath did nothing to change his mood. The situation was not good and no amount of positive spirits would change it.

  He prepared to mount, gathering up the reins until he realized exactly where he was. This stretch of the woods was familiar. Very familiar.

  When he’d first returned to Loch Awe, he’d come this way every day.

  He knew he needed to return home. His sisters waited, but suddenly the pull was too great to ignore.

  “Stay here with Admiral,” he ordered Rowlly, and began walking deeper into the woods.

  Rowlly did not obey. “Laird, Heath, wait. Where are you going? Och, not there. Not again. Why are you doing this? Why are you going there now? Leave it alone.”

  Heath ignored his cousin. It had been a few months since he’d visited this place, and right now, he needed to return.

  It was almost as if Brodie was calling him.

  “All right, I’ll come with you,” Rowlly said, almost as if it was some threat. “Come along, Admiral, let’s save him from torturing himself.
”

  “It is not torture,” Heath answered tightly, shoving aside thorny bushes and bare branches. The forest was thick here, even in winter. There was no path. Few people came this way.

  His footsteps made no sound on the floor of damp leaves. A smattering of snow was still on the ground. All was peaceful. Dark.

  Heath had been first officer aboard the HMS Boyne when he’d received word of his brother’s death. As the heir and only male relative, Heath had been expected to return to Marybone, and it was then he’d learned Brodie had been murdered. The news had shocked him even more than the news of his brother’s death. He himself could be an arrogant son of a bitch, but Brodie had been a good and fair man. Who would want to kill him?

  There wasn’t even anyone who stood to gain anything from Brodie’s death—save for himself.

  And he would have never harmed Brodie. He had loved his brother. He’d respected him.

  “You must let it go,” Rowlly was saying. “If we could have caught the killer, we would have done so by now. It’s been over a year—”

  “I know how long it has been.”

  There was a long pause, and then Rowlly said, “We did hunt for the man who did that to him, Heath. We left no stone unturned.”

  Heath didn’t answer.

  He had his doubts.

  Rowlly fell silent then. A brooding silence.

  Through the tangle of undergrowth and trees, Heath reached the giant oak. Mistletoe grew from its trunk. The tree’s bare limbs were as thick and strong as a man’s arms. They reached out as if stretching for every corner of the forest. A crofter had found Brodie’s lifeless body pinned to its trunk by three arrows shot from a crossbow.

  A solemn stillness seemed to circle this one place.

  Heath approached the tree. Every time he came here, his gut tightened and he knew he would have no peace until the man, or men, who had done this to Brodie was brought to justice.

  His brother’s blood still stained the tree. It was as if it would not leave. Heath placed his hand over the largest of those stains. The arrow entry holes had grown over, but the stains remained.

  Rowlly stood beside Admiral, watching.

  “Why would someone do this?” Heath asked. “We Macnachtan are a poor lot. We are fisherman, crofters, woodsmen . . . not murderers.” He looked to Rowlly. “Would Swepston have done this?”

  “No. He may buck your authority but he had complete respect for Brodie. They saw things alike. Brodie wouldn’t have modernized the way you have. He honored the old ways.” Rowlly took a step forward. “None of us would have killed him. He was our laird. It had to have been someone else. Someone from the outside.”

  “A thief?” Heath frowned at the stain. “What did Brodie have to steal?” He turned to his cousin. “There was a time when I began to suspect a Campbell. After all, everyone knows Owen has coveted our land for a good three years. But Owen was away in London at the time of the murder. I could learn of no one else who might gain from Brodie’s death. Can you think of anyone?”

  “As I’ve told you before, Laird, I cannot.”

  “Could it be one of us?” Heath had to ask one more time. The question haunted him.

  Rowlly straightened. “Are you accusing me?”

  Heath paused a moment, and then said, “I don’t know.” He hesitated, realized what he was implying and said, “No, I don’t suspect you. Of course, there are times I am suspicious of everyone.”

  “And that is madness. Do you also distrust your sisters? Or Dara?” He referred to Brodie’s wife. Dara and Brodie had always been a couple, ever since the first moment they’d met in her father’s church.

  Heath took a step away from the tree. Ignoring Rowlly, he murmured, “I don’t understand why Brodie was here, in this place. It is so out of the way.”

  “I don’t know why he was here, either,” Rowlly said. “Especially at nine in the evening. This part of the forest would have been darker than Hades.”

  “The better to ambush him.” Heath tried to picture himself in his brother’s mind. Why had Brodie left his warm hearth and willing wife to traipse around in the night?

  “He had to have been meeting someone,” Heath insisted. “It couldn’t have been random.”

  And the fact that his killer still roamed free chewed at Heath’s soul. If he accomplished nothing else in this world, he would discover the murderer—

  Heath heard a sound behind him.

  He turned, readying his fists, thinking Augie and his ilk had tracked them here—but then lowered his hands at the sight of a magnificent stag not more than twenty feet away from them. The regal animal had to be close to seven feet tall. He held his antlers proudly as if wearing a crown.

  “Have you seen the likes?” Rowlly said, his voice the barest whisper.

  For a long moment, men and beast eyed each other. Heath wished he had a gun. They needed meat for the table.

  Then again, this animal was too bold and courageous to be taken down. There was pride in him, just as there was pride in Heath.

  At that moment, a piece of flimsy material drifted down from the sky, floating into the clearing. Startled, the stag went bounding off.

  Heath swore and moved forward to catch the material. He was surprised to discover it was a woman’s petticoat, one made of the finest stuff.

  “What is it?” Rowlly asked.

  “Smallclothes,” Heath answered, holding up the petticoat with its expensive trim of lace and ribbons. “For the ladies.”

  “I’ve never seen anything like that,” Rowlly declared, a dull red coming to his cheeks. “But I’ve heard of them.”

  Heath walked in the direction he thought the clothing had come from and noticed more clothes snagged on the trees and winter brush. “There is more clothing here,” he said. “All women’s clothes. If it hadn’t been for the stag, I wouldn’t have noticed them.”

  He started collecting the clothing but as he moved away, Admiral snorted and stamped his mighty hooves as if warning him. Heath frowned. He glanced in the direction of the trail of clothing and then back to his horse.

  A sense of disquiet settled over Heath. He pushed it away.

  “Tie him up,” he ordered Rowlly. “I want to explore this.”

  “I’m coming with you,” Rowlly said, and hurried to secure Admiral.

  The horse didn’t put up any more fuss, instead following them with grave eyes.

  Heath recognized London tailoring when he saw it. These clothes were expensive, too expensive for wandering around the Highlands. Too soon, clothing gave way to broken pieces of a coach that led to the lifeless bodies of men and horses.

  Rowlly swore under his breath.

  The accident was a grisly sight.

  Heath was no stranger to death. He’d seen men blown to pieces by cannon fire, but he’d not witnessed anything like this. The bodies were broken as if they had been thrown to the ground and seemed more damaged than just a coaching accident would warrant.

  Scanning the forest, Heath saw the direction the coach had fallen. They must have been coming from the north, traveling on the mountain road.

  “Was there a storm yesterday?” Heath asked.

  “A bit of one. Nothing bad,” Rowlly managed to answer. “A fair amount of wind.”

  “Wind shouldn’t have been a problem for a coach this large,” Heath answered. “We’ll need a crew of men to clean this up. Could the road have washed out?”

  “I’ll check on it,” Rowlly said. He hung back as if overwhelmed by so much carnage. “We will need to see to decent burials for all those who have lost their lives.”

  “Aye, it will be grim business.” Heath began counting the bodies. Several wore a nobleman’s livery. One of the men was an Indian in English clothes.

  Heath noticed he was breathing. He knelt beside the man. “Here is one who is alive.” He felt for a pulse. “Just barely though. Fetch Admiral and we’ll carry him to Marybone.”

  While Rowlly went for the horse, Heath used le
ather reins he found on the ground to lash together a makeshift sled, using the roof of the coach for the base. He and Rowlly lifted the Indian onto the sled. Admiral was not pleased at his new duty, but he’d do as Heath wished.

  “Let’s leave,” Rowlly asked. He was growing more green around the gills.

  “Not yet. Where are the women?” Heath still held the petticoat. He expanded his search of the area and found a woman of middling years dead in the brush. She was not the sort to wear such a fine petticoat.

  Heath kept searching.

  And then he found her.

  She lay in a copse of stately pines. The late afternoon sun didn’t penetrate this place, giving it the feeling of being in another world. The forest floor was cushioned with their needles and the air carried their scent. She was on her back, her hands folded at her waist, her eyes closed, her face so serene, she could have been sleeping . . . and she was very beautiful.

  Black hair curled around her shoulders. Her lips were red, her complexion flawless.

  Heath recognized her immediately.

  He heard Rowlly draw in his breath. “What is something like her doing here?”

  “That is a good question. Lady Margaret Chattan rarely strays from London.”

  “Chattan?” Rowlly immediately recognized the name, and he spit on the ground as any good Macnachtan would. “I thought they had only males.”

  “They did, until she was born.” Heath stepped forward.

  In London, they called her the Unattainable and she was rumored to be worth three times her weight in gold.

  He’d seen her once in the city. She’d been followed by a flock of male admirers who trailed in her wake like lap dogs. The crowds on the street craned their necks for a better look as if she were the queen herself.

  Heath had been struck by the blueness of her eyes and the perfection of her figure. Hers was a face no man could ever forget. They fought over her, they begged for her favors, they worshipped her—and yet they said her heart had never been claimed.

  That day, almost five years ago, Heath had gazed upon her and told his fellow officers he had the feeling that one day their paths would cross again. They had assured him he was deluding himself. A beauty of that caliber would not waste herself upon a Scot, especially a Highlander. They’d enjoyed much sport over his infatuation.