The Revelation is Love Page 13
“Law Officers! You have no proof we have done anything.”
“I have witnesses – ” Rupert responded steadily.
“The dead cannot witness,” snarled Hamish, his lip curling disdainfully.
“Be silent!” his father commanded.
“Your words should be enough to condemn you. However, you are making a habit of leaving your victims for dead without ensuring that they actually are. Duncan’s head is far too solid for him to be despatched by a blow from you and you failed to find a terrified stable lad. Both saw you and can identify you.”
Lord MacLean and Hamish exchanged looks, then turned and retreated inside, slamming the door in Rupert’s face.
He forced it open and followed them into the Great Hall.
Lord MacLean flung himself into a chair, drew one of the bottles that littered the table towards him, filled a glass with whisky and took a deep draught.
“You claim to know the truth about the heirloom,” he snarled without looking at Rupert. “What is this truth?”
Rupert placed his saddlebags on the table.
Hamish sat down on his father’s right, lolling in an insulting manner and supplied himself with whisky.
“Brought it with you?” he asked in a taunting voice. “Going to give it to us?”
He produced a revolver from his waist and pointed it at Rupert.
Rupert refused to be daunted.
Opening the saddlebags, he produced his pieces of evidence.
“So you see,” he asserted, pointing to the relevant entries in the Bible and Celina’s family tree, “extraordinary as it seems, we are remote cousins.”
Lord MacLean and Hamish seemed quite incapable of registering this fact. Their attention was riveted on the satchel, which Rupert produced last of all.
“This is the Beaumarche heirloom,” he announced.
To silence he unwrapped and placed the chalice on the table.
Amidst such a collection of empty and half-empty bottles, the golden chalice glowed with an unearthly light.
For a moment the two MacLean men were transfixed.
“Then the Beaumarche heirloom,” Lord MacLean crowed triumphantly, “you admit it, is ours!”
He grabbed the chalice and held it up, turning it this way and that.
“No,” Rupert asserted firmly. “It is not.”
He produced the document stating that the chalice was the inheritance of the eldest Beaumarche son and went back over the family tree again.
“So, as the Beaumarche male line ran out in 1793, the chalice is vested in the Crown.”
“No!” roared Lord MacLean.
With his free hand, he swept the books and papers off the table.
He looked expectantly at Hamish.
“Shoot him!”
CHAPTER TEN
Celina remained in the kitchen and listened to the sound of the horse’s hooves vanishing into the distance.
“Ye love the laddie,” Duncan grunted, opening his eyes.
Desolation gripped Celina.
She was certain she would never see Rupert alive again.
“And it’s that plain, he’s stricken with ye,” added Duncan happily.
Celina hardly heard him.
She felt deeply that her uncle would never allow his enemy to walk away free from Beaumarche, and she knew Rupert had taken hold of her heart in a way that Hamish had never come near to achieving.
The revelation that had shown the dark side of the MacLean’ had also brought her true love.
She had never felt for Hamish the passion that now consumed her for Rupert.
He was her perfect, gentle knight – a man not only handsome and strong, with all the physical attributes that she had once admired in Hamish, but he had the noble characteristics that her ex-fiancée lacked.
This was a man of deep principles, intelligence and compassion.
He made her laugh, had opened her eyes to a life beyond Scotland, and shown her consideration and respect.
And now he intended to put himself at the mercy of her uncle – a man who knew no mercy, a man possessed of a primitive urge to take whatever he wanted at any time.
Which would include the Beaumarche heirloom.
“The Laird’ll be alright,” Duncan now assured her. “He’s a man who can take good care of himself.”
She tried to feel as confident as he was.
“Is it that you want to follow him, lassie? Ye ken fine well ye can leave me. I need no nursin’ now.”
He tried to put his wounded leg on the ground and strangled a cry of pain.
She rushed over to prevent him from putting any of his weight on the leg.
“Not until it’s in plaster, Duncan. After the doctor has done that, then you can try standing.”
He allowed her to return his leg to the bed.
“I see I canna stand for now, but that dinna mean I need ye here, lassie.”
Celina looked at brave Duncan, trying to appear full of life and able to take care of himself. She just could not abandon a man who had undergone such punishment – and at the hands of her own relatives.
“Duncan, of course you are fine now, but my place is here. Lord Fitzalan would be very upset if he discovered that I had left you.”
She went out into the courtyard to hide her tears.
There, Walt brought her three eggs and a couple of carrots from the Castle’s small garden.
“We may be able to eat after all,” she said, smiling at him.
Then she remembered what Rupert had said to her about teaching the boy how to handle the blunderbuss.
Here was a task for Duncan.
Leaving him instructing Walt, Celina went back out to the courtyard with some idea of trying to find an activity that would banish her vision of Rupert walking into a trap at Beaumarche Castle.
There came a pounding at the gate.
Opening it, she found a horse carrying two people she immediately recognised.
“Her Ladyship has sent us,” piped up Gordon Hall, Lady Bruce’s Steward, leading in his horse and helping the maid, who had been looking after Celina at Lady Bruce’s, down from her pillion seat.
“When you didna return last night, she was afeard things had not gone right. If I found all in order here, I was to leave Mary with you and return to Drumlanrigg.”
Celina clearly understood the unspoken message – Lady Bruce was worried for her reputation.
She hoped that sending Mary to her would at least give her a semblance of propriety.
Celina turned to Gordon.
“I have to go after Lord Fitzalan,” she explained. “Lord MacLean – ”
The Steward knew only too well exactly what her uncle was capable of.
“If you and Mary are here to watch over Duncan, then I can leave.”
She called Walt and told him to harness the fastest of the horses in the Fitzalan stable.
He looked abashed.
“There isna one here that’s fast, miss. Jessie’s the strongest, she’s the one that pulled the trap.”
“Then harness Jessie, and please be as quick as you can, Walt.”
“And we havena a side saddle.”
“An ordinary one will be fine.”
He ran off.
The two servants looked aghast at the state of the courtyard.
Mary clutched a bundle and she handed it to Celina.
“It’s a change of clothes, miss,” she said, giving a little dip of a curtsy.
Celina took the bundle gratefully.
While Walt was harnessing Jessie, she went into the salon and put on the fresh clothes, relieved to see that the skirt was a full one.
Then she carefully loaded the revolver, ensured the safety catch was on and stuck it into her waistband.
Walt brought her the little mare that had done such splendid work pulling the trap.
Celina inspected the saddle and recalled the days when she first went to live with the MacLeans and always rode astride, until Lady Bruce insisted that sh
e was too old for such ragamuffin ways and must ride side saddle.
“Help me up, please,” she asked the Steward.
“Her Ladyship will no be pleased to hear ye’re to ride like that, Mistress Stirling,” he objected.
“Maybe she will not have to hear,” replied Celina, raising her eyebrows and adjusting her skirt to accommodate her legs astride.
She settled her revolver more comfortably and then dug her heels into Jessie’s side.
A few moments later she was out of the Castle and heading towards Beaumarche.
She soon recognised that Walt had been right about Jessie’s speed.
Celina reckoned that Rupert on Prince would travel much faster than she could. However, he did not have her familiarity with the countryside.
There was a way over rough land that shortened the distance between the Castles Fitzalan and Beaumarche. It involved negotiating a narrow ledge round the side of the mountain that reared up between the two estates.
As long as Jessie was not scared of the straight fall to the river below, then the route would mean she should reach Beaumarche not too far behind Rupert.
Celina’s heart was in her mouth as they reached the narrow and precipitous path.
The horse might not be speedy, but she was brave and trusting. essie did not flinch for a moment and after ten minutes of heart-stopping balancing, the path widened and soon they were trotting along in perfect safety.
The towers of Beaumarche Castle came into view.
As though the horse realised what was needed, she put on a spurt and very soon they were clopping over the cobbles of the stable yard.
She dismounted before a groom emerged.
His eyes widened as he saw her.
“Hello, Tam,” Celina called out as though nothing could be more natural than that she should ride in astride a strange horse.
“Lord MacLean and Hamish at home, are they?”
Tam gulped.
“Aye, Mistress Celina, that they are. And they’ve a visitor with them.”
“Ah, that’ll be Lord Fitzalan,” remarked Celina in a conversational tone. “I’m glad to have caught him. Been here long?”
Tam shook his head nonplussed.
“Not long at all.”
The perilous journey over the mountain had gained her valuable time.
“Look after Jessie for me, will you? She could do with a drink, a rub-down and some oats.”
She tossed him the reins and walked calmly off into the house.
Using the back entrance, she stole past the kitchen without being noticed, took off her shoes and in stockinged feet crept noiselessly along to the service side of the Great Hall screen.
Through its carving, she could see Lord MacLean and Hamish sitting at the refectory table and facing them was Rupert.
Celina felt her heart contract as she heard his voice, measured and calm, relating to them the facts regarding the inheritance of the chalice.
Then she saw that her uncle held it in his grasp.
She could imagine the light of possession that must be sparkling in his eyes.
There came a sudden roar,
“No!”
Books and documents were swept onto the floor.
Then,
“Shoot him!”
Celina had not realised until then that Hamish held a gun. She caught her breath and cursed the fact she had not drawn her revolver and removed the safety catch.
There was no chance she could fire before Hamish.
But she could shoot him afterwards.
She pulled out the revolver.
“No, Father,” murmured Hamish. “Were you not listening? That chalice does not belong to us. The old Laird was right all along. We have no title to it.”
“Hamish, we inherited the Beaumarche estate, it’s ours. Shoot the blackguard and then there will be none to argue otherwise.”
Celina’s heart beat frantically.
Should she shoot or wait to see if Hamish won out over his father for the first time in his life?
Hamish stood up straight.
“You stupid old man! You are ruining all our lives. You lost me the woman I love – and now you want me to commit murder.”
Lord MacLean sat very still.
Celina could well imagine his eyes narrowing as he regarded his son and heir.
“What foolishness is this, boy?” His voice was steely quiet. “You were eager enough to attack this upstart, this apology for a Highland Laird, before. What has changed?”
“Maybe I have,” Hamish sounded tired. “Maybe I no longer want to carry on with this useless feud.”
“But without this,” Lord MacLean held up the golden chalice, “we will lose Beaumarche. With it we can clear our debts and start again.”
Rupert intervened.
“I am willing to lend you money – if it will end this horror.”
“A Fitzalan varlet to lend us money?” roared Lord MacLean. “So you can have us in a vice? Never! Shoot, Hamish, shoot him!
Celina then moved silently into the Great Hall and aimed her revolver at Hamish.
None of the men saw her.
Before she could fire, Hamish threw his gun on the table and stated firmly,
“No, Father. It’s over!”
Lord MacLean picked up the weapon.
“Then, by God, I will.”
Before he could shoot, Celina pulled her trigger.
Lord MacLean collapsed in his chair.
“Father!” cried Hamish, bending over him.
Celina came forward.
She was shaking.
Lord MacLean looked at her, his eyes full of hatred.
“You have betrayed us, your own kin,” he hissed, his voice was low and heavy with passion, as his left hand grasped his wounded shoulder.
The gun he had been holding dropped to the floor.
Rupert kicked it to the back of the Great Hall, out of reach of both Hamish and his father, and then picked up the chalice from where it had fallen onto the table.
“Uncle Robert, I loved you once,” Celina spoke up, forcing her voice to be steady. “Both you and Hamish.”
She looked across at the young man standing on the other side of the table, his face pale, and agonised.
“You have destroyed that love. I cannot deny my MacLean heritage, but all my loyalty is now given to the Fitzalans. I am sure that Lord Fitzalan has explained that we are all distant relations.”
She saw Rupert raise a hand towards her – and then drop it again.
“If you continue to perpetuate this horrible feud, I shall stand beside your enemy.”
She then moved towards Rupert.
A shiver ran through Lord MacLean and he seemed to shrink in his chair.
He looked at Hamish.
“Help me – son,” he stammered in a voice that had lost all its usual authority. “I bleed.”
As if he had suddenly awoken from a deep coma, Hamish bellowed for a servant, grabbed a napkin from off the table, ripped the torn sleeve from his father’s wounded shoulder, poured whisky over it, then held the napkin firmly against the bullet wound.
As a servant came running, he ordered clean water and bandages.
Celina had seen Hamish act with the same skill and speed on the hunting field.
She then collapsed into a chair, placed her revolver on the table and hugged herself to try and stop shaking.
Rupert poured whisky into a horn cup and handed it to her.
“Once again, Mistress Stirling, you have saved my life.”
There was something in his voice that seemed to open a chasm between them and a chill entered her heart.
“When can we expect the Law Officers to arrive?” enquired Hamish.
“Ah,” responded Rupert. “I did not actually have time to alert them before my arrival.”
Hamish stared at him in silence for a while.
“Will you be summoning them after you leave?”
“That all depends on you and yo
ur father, Hamish MacLean. Swear to end this ridiculous feud now and I will then ignore everything that has happened since my arrival in Scotland. If not, I will lay my evidence before the Law and have you and your father here arrested on a charge of breaking and entering, not to mention assault and battery.”
Hamish looked at his father and back at Rupert.
“I give you my word that the feud ends now.”
“And you, Lord MacLean?”
Hate filled the eyes that glared back at Rupert, but Celina could see that all his spirit and energy had seeped away. He, who had always looked so much younger than his years, now looked even older than he was.
Slowly he nodded his head and mumbled,
“Aye, you have the word of a MacLean – ”
“Then that is good enough for me.”
Hamish looked across at Celina and pleaded,
“Will you not return to me, Celina? You know my heart is yours.”
She shook her head.
“What we had is over, Hamish.”
She drained the last of the whisky, rose and started to gather up the books and documents from the floor.
Rupert picked up the chalice.
“The Beaumarche heirloom will be handed to the Crown,” he asserted. “I hope that it can be displayed so that all may see and appreciate its sublime beauty. It has been hidden away for long enough.”
He looked across at Hamish.
“Please will you consider the offer I made of a loan? The fact that we are very distantly related should make it possible for you to accept, and it would be no more than a commercial transaction to enable the MacLean estate to put itself onto a sound footing.”
Hamish said nothing and Celina took this to mean that later he would accept Rupert’s offer.
Rupert wrapped up the chalice in the piece of plaid that had protected it for so many centuries and returned it to the satchel.
Celina added all the books and documents and then she turned to Rupert,
“Will you escort me to Drumlanrigg, my Lord?”
He held out his arm.
“It will be my honour, Mistress Stirling!”
Celina could feel Hamish’s gaze burning into her back as they walked slowly away.
She hoped never again to enter the Great Hall of Beaumarche Castle.
*
They retrieved their mounts and Rupert smiled as he helped Celina onto Jessie.
She tried to pull her skirts over her stockinged legs without much success.