“Spoken like a true miss, eh.” Mrs. Buchan chuckled, ribbing Mrs. Clark. “Instantly wanting tae know if the man is a bachelor.”
“Unfortunately, we cannae say. Ye thinking tae set your cap for him if he has no wife, Miss Penn-Leith?” Mrs. Clark peered over her spectacles.
A hot blush crawled up Leah’s cheeks.
Though neither lady was quite cruel enough to say so, their pitying looks were sufficiently clear—Leah was a fool to even contemplate such a thing.
Sight unseen, Mrs. Buchan and Mrs. Clark immediately assumed Captain Fox Carnegie was far beyond the reach of one such as Leah Penn-Leith. She was as firmly on the shelf as an aging spinster could be.
That they were entirely correct only added to the sting.
But Mrs. Clark wasn’t done. “What with Malcolm married now, ye surely are feeling pressure to marry, Miss Penn-Leith. I imagine it must have been difficult to hand over your household to the new Mrs. Penn-Leith.”
“A bit like becoming a guest in your own home,” Mrs. Buchan added.
And there it was . . . the predictable place this conversation had been heading from the beginning.
The worst part? Leahhadbecome a guest in her own home.
Both Malcolm and Aileen insisted Thistle Muir was as much Leah’s home as theirs, but given that Aileen was now in a family way, that would soon change.
With every passing year, Leah felt herself pushed more and more to the fringes of her loved ones’ lives, moving from the caretaker of their happiness to a mere spectator of it.
Vividly, the memory of Cousin Elspeth’s deathbed rose.
“Ye should have married when ye had the chance.” Elspeth coughed and fixed Leah with her dark eyes.
“Hush, dearest.”
“Nae, hear me, lass. I have lived my life as an unpaid servant in household after household . . . wondering with each Hogmanay if this would be the year I landed in the poor house. I weep tae think ye will end your life as I am ending mine—alone in a borrowed bed.”
Tears clogged Leah’s throat, choking her voice.
“There is still time, child,” Elspeth breathed. “If ye have the chance tae marry a good man—or even a mostly decent one—take it. Find a way tae escape my lonely fate. Promise me, pet?”
Leah wiped her tears and kissed her cousin’s cheek.
“I promise,” she whispered.
Cousin Elspeth had died two days later.
Papa’s cough had worsened, and he followed Elspeth’s mist-shrouded journey to the parish kirkyard not even a month afterward—their graves two dark slashes of damp earth in green grass.
For months, Thistle Muir had been almost unbearably silent. Night after night, Malcolm and Leah shared a quiet dinner before Malcolm would slip out to spend an hour walking with Aileen Mitchell, the miller’s bonnie daughter, along the River South Esk.
Ethan was hundreds of miles away in England, reading Classics at Oxford, writing poetry, and exceeding the expectations of Uncle Leith’s lavish attention. The youngest Penn-Leith was a bright star on a shooting trajectory with success and fame.
After mourning their father the requisite six months, Malcolm had married his Aileen on a blustery day in November. Leah had wiped tears again at seeing her taciturn brother, pink-cheeked and laughing, as he and his new bride left the church arm-in-arm. Marching before them, Mr. Auld piped “Highland Wedding,” leading the entire bridal party to the Lion Arms for a lavish wedding breakfast.
That spring, Ethan graduated from Oxford with Distinction and saw two of his poems published inThe Athenaeum.Uncle Leith rewarded him with a Grand Tour of Europe. Ethan sent effusive letters from Florence and Geneva, including brilliant snippets of poems that left Leah achingly proud and, again, weepy.
For her part, Leah handed the management of the house over to Aileen (as was only correct), darned socks, and watched the moss creep across the slate roof tiles of Thistle Muir each winter, only to retreat come spring—growing and receding—the tide of life measured in puffy clumps of green.
What was to become of her?
Leah smiled weakly at Mrs. Buchan and Mrs. Clark and said the only thing she could. “Malcolm and Aileen insist they are happy tae have me live with them for the rest of my life.”
It was true. Aileen had said as much just that week.
