4
Night Noises
Caitlyn visited Eileen one more time before she retired. She was asleep, but Teresa was awake, sitting and calmly sewing, humming slightly under her breath. The coziness of the firelit room and the banality of the woman pursuing a domestic pastime soothed her somewhat, and she kissed her mother on the cheek, intending to leave at once and go to bed.
“Wait, Mistress.” Teresa approached her with a look of concern. “What is amiss? Ye look as if ye’ve seen a ghost!”
“I am fine, Teresa,” Caitlyn replied, trying to pin a reassuring smile on her face. “Really. It’s nothing at all.”
Teresa frowned. “Weel, Mistress, when it becomes somethin’ an’ I can help, let me knaw—while yer mammy’s sick, that is. When she is well she should aye be yer best counsel.”
“Thank you, Teresa,” Caitlyn replied, then turned and left.
As soon as the door closed, Teresa took out her rosary beads, crossed herself, and began to pray. Despite Caitlyn’s words, she knew that something was troubling her.
As Caitlyn crept back to her bedroom, she was aware of every creak and bump that the old stone and wood structure of the castle made while it settled down for the night. She tiptoed along the passage to her bedroom and entered it, taking great care to be quiet, then closed the door behind her noiselessly, as if trying not to disturb anyone outside it.
The sheets and blankets were cold, and she shivered as she pulled them over her. She thought that was the reason she could not sleep at first, but the cause of that had nothing to do with her physical discomfort. It had everything to do with Alastair and his treatment of her. He had offered her an apology in the morning, then, despite her best efforts at conversation, despite her trying to establish a connection between them, he had not even tried to meet her halfway. Caitlyn had no meanness in her nature, and this kind of spiteful treatment was incomprehensible to her.
She lay awake for hours, tossing and turning until the sheets were tangled around her body and she was extremely uncomfortable. She got up to straighten them, then saw that there was a full moon.
If she had thought that the grounds of Mullach were picturesque during the daytime, they were doubly so at night with the cold light of the moon painting each branch of tree, each blade of grass and field of heather with a silvery-blue sheen. The sky was velvet black, because the bright lunar goddess had outshone all the stars, but she would soon have to give way to the king of the sky, against whom she was but a pale imitation. If the moon was the queen, the sun was the king.
She felt peace steal into her heart, and stood by the window for ages looking at the moon goddess pouring her blessings on the land, till she heard a thud outside followed by a muffled curse. She crept across the room and opened the door just a crack, to see Alastair nursing his foot, having tripped over something on the floor. She almost laughed, taking a wicked delight in his pain. She could not see clearly, and she was too scared to follow him, but she fancied that he was going into the room he had been in earlier.
Moreover, she was absolutely sure there was a woman in there. It was an isolated corner and she wondered if perhaps he was hiding her, holding her captive for some sinister reason of his own. She shuddered at the thought.
A little while later she heard footsteps again, and again she peeked around the door. Alastair was tiptoeing back the other way, trying to be as quiet as he could, but Caitlyn had very acute hearing. She watched him under the faint moonlight till he passed out of her sight, then she heard him climbing stairs and shutting a door.
After that it was deathly quiet, but still she could not sleep. She laid down and closed her eyes, eventually falling into a fitful doze. She woke at dawn and lay for a long time. Her eyelids were swollen and her eyes were red. She expected that the servants would have much to say about her appearance, but she pitied the first person who made a comment.
They would not know what had hit them, for Caitlyn had a tongue like a viper on the very odd occasion when she chose to use it. Alastair was fortunate that it had not been used on him—yet.
Her restless and mostly sleepless night had left her more tired than she had been the night before, and she had changed her mind about where she ate her meals. She decided that she would not keep her promise to stay in her room and have her food there; then he would have beaten her. Her meals would be eaten in the dining room, and before she left she would offer him some financial recompense for his hospitality; that would be a huge insult to him.
Alastair was lying in his bath thinking, and it would have surprised Caitlyn greatly to know that he was thinking about her. He had never seen such a beautiful woman, and she had upset the tedious but even routine of his daily life. He thought back to that morning; she had thought that he was being rude and discourteous, but he had not meant to be; he had simply lost the ability to speak to a woman.
Ever since he had first seen her she had moved him in a way no other woman had for a very long time. His upbringing had involved hard work on the land and the huge responsibility of running an estate without any help from his wastrel of a father.
There had been no time for ceilidhs, drinking with men friends, and flirting with pretty girls, even if he had wanted to indulge in such pastimes. He had only ever opened his heart to one woman, who had wounded it so badly that he had built a wall around it.
Now Caitlyn had come into his life and for the first time ever there was a crack in the wall.
He had wasted yet another chance to build a bridge between them, and he had once again treated her to a demonstration of the very worst side of his nature. She had told him that she would stay away from him, and who could blame her?
He sighed and stood up, then Hector, his manservant, helped him to dress. “Is it raining, Hector?” he asked. Hector was the only one of his staff that he allowed close to him. Everyone else was kept firmly at arm’s length.
“Pourin’, M’Laird. Absolutely peltin’ doon!” he answered with the relish of someone who did not have to venture out in a downpour.
Alastair groaned. He was going to see one of the tenants who was having trouble with one of his farrowing sows. It was a filthy job at the best of times but the rain would make it unbearable.
The sooner it is done the better,he thought grimly. He clattered downstairs, scattering servants everywhere as they got out of his way. Standing, even accidentally, in front of the Laird always brought on a sharp reprimand. Laird Duncan was a fair man and he worked hard, and for that his staff respected him, but he was not known for his good humor.
Hector had not been exaggerating when he said that the rain was pouring down. It was falling in sheets, driven by a vicious gale from the sea. Alastair prided himself on the fact that he could work as hard as any of his tenant farmers, but even for hardy Scottish peasants this was not a day for laboring outside. He sighed and went back into the castle, reasoning that he could always attend to the account books instead of wasting time. The idea of relaxing never occurred to him.
He went up to his study and took out one of the big ledgers with the accounts in it, but he found that he could not concentrate. His mind kept wandering to Caitlyn, wondering if she was still angry with him. That was stupid—of course she would be. However, he told himself he did not care; in a few days she would be gone and he would never see her again.
Eventually he gave up doing any work for the time being. He went to the window and looked out to see if there was any change in the weather, but the rain was unrelenting. Not quite sure what to do with himself, he ordered a glass of warm spiced ale and went downstairs to drink it.
