“The pleasure is all mine.” Miss Van Etten immediately turned her head upward toward the cap of the structure in patent admiration. “This is one of the finest ones I have ever seen, and I’ve even been to Holland.”
David almost sprang into the air at the compliment, and Sinclair swore that his large frame actually vibrated. “Indeed! That is most wonderful to hear. I try my best to keep her in good repair. She’s a grand old lady now—well over a hundred years old.”
“I imagine it was some feat to import all of her wooden gears, especially the great spur wheel,” Miss Van Etten said.
David looked as if he wanted to sink down on his knees and ask her to marry him, regardless of the fact he was still madly in love with his wife of forty years. “You know about the parts of a windmill, lass?”
Sinclair would be more shocked himself if Miss Van Etten weren’t constantly surprising him. The lady was indeed a clever one.
“I’ve always been interested in mechanical things,” she said with a shrug. “I am friends with a member of one of the old Dutch merchant families, and he took me on a tour of his estates, including some windmills that he had decided to preserve.”
Miss Van Etten sounded like Reggie, talking about faraway places that Sinclair would never see. The both of them belonged to a different world than him. One of wealth and travel. For all the time Sinclair had spent in the sea, he’d never sailed farther than Hoy and the main island of Orkney.
“You must see the inner workings of mine!” David waved toward the entrance of the windmill like a medieval courtier presenting his queen—and a slice of panic slid through Sinclair. He had specifically told the miller toonlyshow her the ground floor. If David was about to offer a grand tour, Sinclair would need to think quickly of how to prevent it.
“The Earl of Mar must have been very pleased that his crofters had access to a meal mill like yours,” Miss Van Etten said.
David’s open expression immediately closed up, just as Sinclair himself stiffened. None of the islanders liked talking about the old laird. They’d all done their best to avoid Mar’s attention.
David cast his eyes in Sinclair’s direction. Everyone knew that it was Sinclair’s mother who had been the most hurt by the earl—not that Sinclair had escaped unscathed from living at Muckle Skaill.
“The earl wasn’t interested in the mill.”
“His loss,” Miss Van Etten said lightly. “Was his son any brighter?”
David’s gaze once again flew to Sinclair, clearly discomforted by the questions when standing in the presence of the toff’s unacknowledged offspring. It didn’t help matters that the half siblings had been publicly at odds before Reggie’s death. No one ever talked about his older brother in Sinclair’s presence. Miss Van Etten, though, seemed to be making a habit of bringing up Reggie.
“Did you know the late heir?” Sinclair asked, hoping to deflect her questions with one of his own. To his surprise, the inquiry made Miss Van Etten miss a step. Perhaps she had only tripped on the uneven ground, but then she seemed to intentionally pick up speed and duck through the open doorway. With her intelligence and previous experience with windmills, she must have realized that it would be too loud inside for any meaningful discussions.
WhywasMiss Van Etten buying Hamarray and Frest? It was the kind of spur-of-the-moment decision Reggie would have made. Could she have had an ulterior motive for the purchase? It hardly made sense. He could not see how two small islands in the North Sea would have any value to an American oil, hotel, and railroad heiress ... unless perhaps if she and Reggie had been lovers and this was her way of mourning him. There was a somberness that Miss Van Etten seemed to hide beneath her layers of outward frivolity.
But even that explanation did not make sense. Miss Van Etten didn’t seem the type to pine away on windswept isles, and Reggie had always kept his relationships light and frivolous.
Or perhaps Sinclair just did not like the thought of the heiress and his half brother together—which was definitely a reaction he didnotwant to analyze too closely.
“I would love to see your millstone and the brake wheel and, well, everything!” Rose shouted to Mr.Craigie, who was enthusiastically both promising to bring bread to the upcoming ceilidh and showing her how fine the barley flour was as it poured out from the chutes above. As much as she really did find the windmill machinery fascinating, she had another reason for wanting to see the upper floors, especially where they loaded the grain into the hopper. The structure was the tallest one on the low-lying island of Frest and was situated on a small jut of land with clear views of Scapa Flow. Rose had noticed a window at the very top, where the windshaft entered the structure and attached to the large brake wheel inside. It would have been the perfect hidden spot to spy on the British Grand Fleet. If the people of Frest had been supplying the Imperial German Navy with grain, what better place to look for periscopes of U-boats and secret signals than from the very place where the bere barley was ground?
“Of course you wish to see those! And the friction wheelandthe main driveshaftandthe hopper—we can’t forget those!” Mr.Craigie’s palpable love for his mill was surprisingly endearing, and Rose found herself hoping that the jovial man was not involved in any spy ring. In fact, she did not wish for anyone on Frest to be entangled in espionage. She generallylikedthese people, even the grumpy Mr.Flett, who so clearly doted on his children.
“The ladder isn’t stable enough for a visitor to climb.” Mr.Sinclair’s words came out in a rush as he physically positioned himself in front of a rather sturdy-looking set of rungs.
“I can assure you that I have faced worse dangers than that,” Rose said as she poked her thumb in his direction. “Besides, I clearly weigh less than either of you. If it can hold your tall frames, it should not break under mine.”
“No, Sinclair is right.” Poor Mr.Craigie looked utterly deflated as his big shoulders slumped. “It is no place for a lady.”
“Well, it is good that I don’t consider myself a lady, then,” Rose snapped. Either these men were hiding something from her or they thought her a delicate piece of porcelain, liable to break at the slightest peril. Either way, she was more determined than ever to climb to the top of the windmill.
She tried to dodge around Mr.Sinclair, but he was too quick. Every move she made, he countered. Mr.Craigie watched their strange dance from a few yards back as he scratched at his temple.
“Really, Mr.Sinclair, there is no need for this chivalry,” Rose shouted as she swiveled to her right.
“I’m afraid that is not true. The climb is highly dangerous, especially with all of the gears in motion,” Mr.Sinclair yelled back as he sidestepped to his left.
“I assure you that I will not be so foolish as to stick a finger or limb between them.” She tried going low and sliding behind him this time, but Mr.Sinclair anticipated her move and blocked her.
“You could slip.”
“I never slip.” Which was a good thing considering Rose’s face was somewhere near the level of Mr.Sinclair’s crotch at the moment.
