Highland Ballad Part 15

Mastering her fright as best she could, fiercely determined to protect her young, she went to the door. . .and opened it.

But for all her resolve, her eyes were unprepared for the spectacle which greeted them. The Lord Henry Purceville himself stood before her. And beyond his hulking form, she saw the bodies of two men slung across spare horses, one of which, dressed in ill-fitting clothes, pale and stained with earth..... It was only by supreme exertion that she kept herself from swooning. There were twenty riders at least, all tainted with the smell of smoke.

"Where is she?" bellowed Lord Purceville, pushing her aside with such force that she really did stagger. Then to her bewilderment his son, who had followed him in, caught her up, and in the moment it took to steady her, whispered in her ear:

"Tell him nothing. I'll do what I can to protect you." The older man whirled angrily.

"I tell you I want her. Ballard! Tear the place apart. Stubb! Take the rest of the men and search the surrounding countryside. Meet me back at the barracks with your report; and if you value your hide, don't come back empty!"

With this all but two of the men---the one called Ballard, and another he detained by seizing his collar and shoving him forward---rode off.

These entered quickly, and began going through the rooms, opening drawers and overturning furniture.

Of the two only Ballard, a large, swarthy man whose hands and face were darkened with soot, seemed to enjoy the work. The other, a lad of sixteen or thereabouts, only followed with a scared look, doing what his Lieutenant commanded. As for Lord Purceville, he sat himself in the chair that Mary had occupied, and stared at the woman icily, beckoning (ordering) his son to sit across from him. The widow Scott could only look back at him in dismay, and try not to notice his thick black boots, resting at the very edge of the carpet.

He was heavier, and grayer than she remembered, those many long years ago. But her first impression of him then---that of a bull about to charge---still held true. He was a big man, both taller and more thickly muscled than his son. Their faces were much alike, except that the father's was fuller: more rudely carved, more deeply lined, more savage.

But if harsh features were a mark of lesser intelligence, then the rule was broken here. His mind was more than a match for his son's, or even Mary's. The truly frightening thing about him, as she would soon learn, was that this glowering beast, this physical brute, was also sharper and shrewder than any man she had ever known. She could not feel brave in his presence, only vulnerable and afraid.

But as the two men returned from the loft, reporting, "No sign that anyone's been here but herself, though the upper room is undoubtedly a young lady's," she remembered the dangerous nearness of those she had sworn to protect, and the injuries they had already suffered at the hands of such men. Her pride returned, along with the instinctive cunning of a woman cornered.

"Of course," she said, feigning indignation against the search alone, and total ignorance of what they could want from her. "It is my niece's room, to return to if and when she chooses."

"And where is she now?" demanded the tyrant.

"She has gone to live with her mother, as I told your son not a fortnight since. I suggest you look for her there." It occurred to her only after she had said this that it might endanger her sister-in-law.

"It may please you to know," he said calmly, taking a sharpened letter-knife from his coat and twirling it carelessly between his fingers, "that we have already been to see the widow MacCain. She, too, had the insolence to speak to me in such a manner. Would you like to know what we did to her?

Tell her, Ballard."

"Burned her for a witch, we did---tied to a tree, right up on her own roof." The man smiled, as if he found this detail particularly satisfying. "My one regret, Lord, is that you hit her so hard in the questioning, she never regained her senses to enjoy it. One would have thought she was dead already."

"That will be all, Lieutenant. Take the bodies back to the Castle. But first, check the neighborhood. See if you can't flush out a kilt and jacket for our amorous red-haired friend, if you follow my meaning."

"I do at that, sir. And I don't suppose it would hurt to brand him for a prisoner as well?"

"Number 406. Good day, Ballard." The Lieutenant pushed the younger man forward, then followed him out, closing the door behind.

"As you see," continued Purceville, "I have ways of arranging circ.u.mstances to meet my own ends. And I have no qualms at all about eliminating women who oppose me. I can think of at least a dozen pretexts to end your life right now. Would you like to hear them?"

"I have told you already," said the woman, vainly trying to suppress the image of her sister engulfed in flames. "I have told you that my niece is not here, that she left me a week ago. Your son himself can attest to that..... I do not know where she is."

"That is the second time today you have referred me to my son. The truth is, dead woman , that I have no strong inclination to believe him. I don't know what it is about the MacCain girl that causes those around her to feel so protective---the illusion of innocence, no doubt---but it seems I must accept the fact. My own son has lied to me about the 'cousin' who saved her from a.s.sault, neglecting to mention that the man was also a Jacobite, and one of the fugitives we sought. Fortunately, as you saw, I take nothing for granted. I found it out for myself, and now have the evidence I need to hang her, if I so desire."

"On what charge?"

"Harboring a fugitive!" he bellowed. "And conspiracy to murder soldiers of the crown! One of my men was killed in this alleged 'a.s.sault', and another has disappeared entirely. All serious crimes, punishable by death." He paused, letting this new threat sink in. "Now do you have anything to say to me, to save the girl's life, as well as your own?"

The widow glanced quickly at the son, wondering when, if not now, he intended to come to her aid. But he only turned away, and she surrendered all hope of it. Looking back at the father, who had stopped twirling the knife, and only stared back at her with cold murder in his eyes, she could not help but feel that the end had truly come.

She had been prepared for the worst, and ready to sacrifice all.

Because of this, and because of the skilled aggression of the Lord Purceville, everything she saw and heard only worked to confirm her darkest imaginings. Her heart went cold inside her as he rose to his feet, the knife clenched firmly in his hand. Her eyes misted and her limbs trembled; but she never once thought of betraying her son. She hung her head and was silent, waiting for death.

She waited in vain.

Stephen Purceville did not intervene, among other considerations, because he knew that his father was bluffing. Even a Governor could not kill a woman without cause, and Stephen was astute enough to know it. The political winds, to which his father was not immune, were shifting. A move toward reconciliation had begun, and such acts of wanton violence, as well as the men who employed them, were rapidly losing favor in the eyes of the Court. Also, his father had made many enemies in his rise to power, men who would use such a thing against him, as they had tried to use the escaped prisoners. To burn a corpse as a scare tactic was one thing. To murder a woman in cold blood was quite another. Not that the younger man put it to himself in this way.

He did not have to. He knew the realities, and he knew the man. His father was bluffing.

The woman was startled out of her black study by the last sound on earth she expected. Rather than the slow, sinister footsteps she had tried to antic.i.p.ate, she was called back instead by the sound, infinitely more mocking than laughter, of strong male hands striking together. She looked up, and he was clapping!

"Madame," he said, "I salute you. You have withstood the first a.s.sault. I can afford to be magnanimous, for you will not survive the second." And again the face turned deadly serious, though the look of restless violence was gone. It was impossible to believe that it had been feigned. It had not. But neither had it brought the desired result; and he was wise enough, now, to adopt a different course.

For he had no doubt that the woman was hiding something. The hard edge of his foil remained, but the strokes became finer, more mincing.

"A lesson for you, Stephen. Most women, indeed, almost all, can either be bought, or threatened into giving up what is wanted. Why? Because they lack the simple courage---to face life in the first case, and death in the second. They use money, and men, as a shield against life; and nothing on this earth can induce them to face death, or even the thought of death.

"I have heard it said that if women ruled the world, there would be no war. That is true, but hardly a compliment. The reason there would be no war is that none of them would have the courage to fight it. At the first shot they would all throw down their arms and run away. Deceit, manipulation, love. These are the weapons they employ.

"But as witnessed here, there are a few scattered instances of honest character, of a woman standing up to death. But almost always it is done in the defense of her immediate family: her husband, her child.

That is what puzzles me here. Having threatened her own life unsuccessfully, I took the next step, as I taught you long ago: threaten the thing she is trying to protect, and mean it. But even this brought no result. Why? At such times one must draw back, look beneath the surface, examine motive .

"The implied motive here is to protect her niece alone, but I do not believe it. No woman is willing to die for the b.a.s.t.a.r.d child---oh yes, I know!

---of her sister-in-law, and a man she both fears and detests. Perhaps she raised her from a child? Still not enough. We must look for some deeper relationship.

"Did you see, when she thought I meant to kill her, the way she hung her head, and reached down into some secret place she believes I cannot touch? Whose image did she turn to in her moment of need? For I tell you, Stephen, she was prepared to die. And it wasn't for any half-breed girl."

He took a sheet of folded parchment from an inner pocket, and settling more deeply in the chair, smoothed it open against his thigh. "I have here a list, names and numbers. It was brought to me yesterday, along with more detailed information, concerning the prisoners still at large---thankfully, very few. I think you will find our information quite thorough and up to date. Now I know not only the men who hail from this country---and are therefore likely to return---but also the friends they kept in the stockade, and the smaller groups they split into after the escape.

"You heard me tell my Lieutenant to brand the number 406 on our dead comrade's body---though I warn you, I may still use it to incriminate your niece. Why that particular number? I will tell you. It is the number of one of the men decidedly traced to this area: the companion, protector, and...could it be...the cousin of our heroic James Talbert? Are we coming nearer the mark, Mrs.

Scott? You look quiet pale; would you like to sit down?"

"I will stand," she said desperately, trying to prepare herself against the coming blow. For now he had found the weak place in her armor, the secret refuge of her soul. One thought only kept hammering at her brain. Admit nothing.

At all costs she must not let this shark catch scent of her son's blood.

And in fact the ident.i.ty of the second prisoner was not known to him, though his insight and shrewd guesses had brought him dangerously close to the truth. Beside the number 406, the reported friend and fellow fugitive of James Talbert, were written these words: No name given, possible memory loss from head wound, called by fellow prisoners 'Jamie'

. This was the small victory that Michael had won during the first brutal year of his captivity: he would not give up his true name. His ident.i.ty, and therefore his life, remained hidden.

But through the uncanny memory for persons and places which every tyrant must possess, the Lord Purceville recalled a st.u.r.dy youth, several years older than his son, who had once accompanied the Scotts on a visit to Margaret MacCain, during the time of her employment at his estate---the fierce disdain he had shown as he stepped from the carriage, and spied its hated Master. Where was this fiery-eyed youth now, who must surely have been of fighting age and temperament at the time of the revolt? Had he been taken prisoner, and escaped along with James Talbert, or merely been killed in the war? In any event the mention of his name was bound to cause an emotional reaction in the mother, which might lead him in turn to the girl. Like a skilled fortune-teller he would draw her out, read the story in her face, and follow where it led. Between pauses:

"What was this prisoner's name, you ask? Why, his last name appears to be Scott. Could that be your son? Has he been here of late, to visit you? Is it he you are trying to protect? Is he in hiding along with Mary? Yes, of course. That's it. They grew up together, did they not? Were they very close, your strong, golden-haired son and fair, emerald-eyed niece?

They say that cousin is a dangerous relationship; surely there was an attraction. Could they have been more than friends. . .even, lovers?"

At this Stephen's head jerked towards her, as if he had been scalded.

The woman could bear it no longer; she felt herself ready to explode.

But just as fear and rage rose irrepressibly inside her, she instinctively channeled the outburst to lead him away from her son.

"Have you no shame, sir! My son is dead and buried these three years, as a short walk to the gravesite of our clan will plainly show. He was a brother and father both to my niece, and as fine a man as you could ask. You will not speak against his honor in my house! He was willing to die to stand up to the likes of you, and so am I. Kill me, if you have the courage. By G.o.d, I'll listen to no more of this!"

"Careful, Mrs. Scott. You say your son lies yonder in the grave, but that too could be a hoax. I have unearthed two bodies already. I will not hesitate---"