“All is well at Rath, I assume,” Angus Ferguson said, chuckling at both Agnes’s remark and his brother’s reaction to it. He could see that his young sister-in-law was going to prove a lively addition to his household.
“Aye,” Matthew said. “The laird and his wife are well, saddened by yer loss, but hopeful that another bairn will soon be on the way.”
“So Mistress Agnes considers ye a delightful traveling companion,” the earl teased his younger brother.
Matthew flushed. “She’s an interesting little minx,” he said.
The two men joined the two women in the hall, where Agnes was taking a cup of wine from a servant.
“I think ye are no longer quite so plain, Annabella,” the men heard Agnes say. “Ye’re actually beginning to look pretty.”
“I am happy,” Annabella said quietly.
Angus Ferguson sat down next to his wife on the settle by the great hearth. Taking her hand, he gave it a little squeeze, which she reciprocated.
He loves her!Agnes thought to herself.That’s what I want. A man who will love me. How fortunate my sister is, but she deserves her happiness.
“Mama writes that ye have many suitors,” Annabella noted.
“They only want me because I am beautiful,” Agnes said scornfully, “and they want my gold dower. They do not wantme. I have never been like Myrna, who was content in her beauty and thought it was enough. Nor am I like Sorcha, who is pleased to have married into a family more important than the Bairds. And I am not like you, Annabella. You were happy to have been given a husband at all, for no one thought such a plain lass would ever wed. It was believed ye would remain at Rath looking after our parents as they aged, and thus free any wife Robbie took from that burden.”
Although the earl bridled at his sister-in-law’s thoughtless tongue, Annabella merely laughed. “And yet I was given the greatest prize of a husband,” she said. “One never knows what will happen, Aggie. Dinna despair. Ye and yer true love will find each other one fine day. Ye are, after all, only fifteen.”
“Sorcha was sixteen when she wed,” Agnes reminded her sibling.
“Then surely within the next year something wonderful will happen for ye,” Annabella teased. She reached out to touch her sister’s cheek. “I am so glad ye’re wi’ me, Aggie. I have missed ye, and I have a great deal to show ye here at Duin.”
Agnes Baird had arrived at Duin at the end of the month of May. Her sister’s home was a wonder to her. Like Annabella, she had never before lived in so large a dwelling; nor had she seen the sea. The water, the waves, the soaring gulls all delighted her. She loved the vivid sunsets. One clear day Annabella had insisted that Matthew take Agnes to the rooftop of the castle to see the magnificent view.
With much grumbling Matthew Ferguson climbed the narrowing staircase to the very top of one of the square towers. Agnes was right behind him. Opening a small door, he carefully stepped out, then reached back to take her hand and pull her up onto the rooftop. Together they walked to the stone parapet that bordered the edge of the tower.
“Look out across the sea and tell me what ye see,” he instructed her.
Agnes stared, seeing in the distance something she had never noticed before when she looked out over the water. “Is that land out there?” She looked up at him for the answer. “Is it an island?”
“Nay, ’tis the northern end of Ireland,” he told her. “On a very clear day like today ye can see it. The Irish used to raid Scotland. They haven’t come to Duin in my memory, although I understand they still raid this land. Perhaps we are too strong.”
“Could we take a boat and sail there in a day?” she asked.
“Aye, wi’ a good stiff breeze we might just make it,” he said, admiring her spirit of adventure. “But why would we go?”
“To see what’s there,” Agnes answered him. “Why don’t we?”
“Because I am the steward of Duin. I have my duties to perform daily, Aggie. ’Tis the way of the world. A man toils. The woman keeps the house and bears the bairns,” Matthew told her.
“Then I might just have to go myself,” Agnes said pertly. She looked up at him and smiled. “Would ye miss me if I went, Matthew?”
He gulped. There was no way she could know that he had been thinking a great deal about her ever since she had arrived at Duin over a month ago. “Nay,” he boldly lied. “I should not miss ye.” He waited for her to either weep with disappointment or castigate him for his words.
But she did neither. Instead Agnes Baird smiled a knowing little smile at him.
Matthew Ferguson was suddenly uncomfortable. “If ye’ve seen enough, then,” he said in a tight voice, “I hae more important duties to attend to, mistress. We will return to the hall.” He went down the steep ladder that led from the roof to the stone floor of the tower’s landing first, then reached up with both hands to help her down.
June slipped into July and August. Agnes Baird was quite comfortable in her sister’s house. It was Angus who suggested she might want to remain for several more months. Annabella agreed with her husband that it would please her greatly, and Agnes was delighted. A messenger was sent off to Rath, and returned with permission. The sisters rode out daily. They hunted with the men, and shot at the archery butts set out in the courtyard. They spent lazy September afternoons lying in a meadow talking.
The days were becoming cooler and shorter. The warm hall was very welcoming in the evenings, when they would play chess with Angus or Matthew. The earl had been careful of his wife since the loss of their child, but now with the long nights he felt his need for her rising, and sensed that she felt the same. Catching her briefly alone in the hall late one afternoon, he took her hand up, kissed it, and said, “I miss ye. I need ye in my arms again, Annabella.”
Her gray eyes filled with warm laughter. “I thought ye would never ask,” she surprised him by saying. “I hae missed ye too. Jeannie said I was well healed several weeks back, but ye seemed more interested in the possibility of English raiders and the cattle than ye did in me, my lord.”
