Jillian was wearing a stunning black-and-gold-sequined cloche and a black satin flapper coat covered in two-tone gold fringe and embroidered in gaudy Deco designs. Beneath it was an eye-popping gown of gold lame and black velvet equally encrusted with bead and fringe. The whole combination looked lovely by candlelight but was rather loud in anything brighter.
It was one of Hexy’s least favorite outfits in Jillian’s collection; but then, she did not care for many of Beer’s dresses, which Jillian adored.
Little as she cared for the dress, Hexy liked its purchaser even less. Donny, known to the rest of the world as Donald Mitchell Healey, wasn’t a bad sort, but he was egotistical and obsessed with things mechanical, and he tended to bore on about his specially designed motorcar, which had just won him some RAC race. He also tended to go about in the evening in tuxedos with silk shirts and shoes with high gloss.
Scotland, especially so soon after the war, did not run too much toward fashion exotica. This was not a wealthy place, and Jillian and Donny were examples of the tasteless but fascinating rara avis that sometimes visited there.
Donny had another flaw. He seemed incapable of remembering Hexy’s name, preferring to call her Hussy, a quip he found uproariously, and apparently endlessly, funny.
Before Donny’s time, the one in the driver’s seat had been William Morris, of MG Special four-seater Sports fame, the car that had taken first the racing world—and then Jillian—by storm. Jillian liked men who built automobiles, probably because they lent them to her. Until they actually saw her driving. After that, they always offered a chauffeur along with the automobile.
Hexy had rather liked William, though she’d found his new lower-chassis cars to be alarming to ride in. It was a pity he hadn’t been able to see his way clear to putting up enough funds to keep Jillian, her new show, and Fintry all in the style to which they were accustomed; but, selfishly, he had wanted to spend most of his money on developing his automobiles.
“Well, I’ll just go and pack your coat, shall I?” Unable to stop herself, Hexy gave the fur a small caress.
“You might slip on that yummy black chiffon gown and come with us,” Jillian suggested. And then, with a closer look, she added with masterful understatement: “After you powder your nose a bit. I think you’ve had a bit too much sun and wind. You—you didn’t run into anyone
unpleasant
, did you?”
Hexy shook her head, almost smiling at Jillian’s nervous question. “Didn’t see a soul, with
fins or without. And no, thank you. You and Donny have a grand time.”
Hexy didn’t tell the relieved-looking Jillian, but she didn’t plan on wearing that black dress ever again. It had been the black chiffon gown that had gotten her into trouble with James. It didn’t look like something that would belong to a working girl, and she didn’t want any more mistakes being made about who and what she was.
“You’re certain? Things are so dull here at night.”
“Absolutely certain. There isn’t much room in Donny’s auto, and I want to make sure that you are all packed up and ready to go when you leave tomorrow morning. You know that Donny gets impatient when he’s kept waiting.”
“Dear Donny.” Jillian’s tone wasn’t as caressing at it might have been. “Well…as you like, darling. It is grand of you to give up your evening to see to my things. Marthe is good about packing, you know, but she doesn’t have your touch.”
Or patience. She needn’t have, as her job was secure. Getting anyone to work at Fintry now that the MacKenzie owner was dead, even with the depressed economy, was a Herculean task. There
were too many wild stories about the castle being haunted. What few servants there were at Fintry got away with everything up to bloody murder.
“Have a good time. I’ll see you later this evening,” Hexy said, picking up one of the oil lamps on the downstairs whatnot and turning up its flame.
“Do you think it will rain? Should I take my fur?” Jillian asked, peering over her shoulder at her dainty slippers in a vain attempt to see if the seams in her stockings were straight.
They were. Her stockings were always perfect.
“It is April in Scotland,” Hexy reminded her. “The odds of rain are about fifty percent. But your fur doesn’t go with that outfit.”
And she didn’t want to let it go. It would be wrong for Jillian to wear the coat right now. Hexy needed to keep it with her.
Jillian sighed.
“You are probably right. It will make Donny cross, but he’ll simply have to put the hat on the car.”
“The
top
,” Hexy corrected. “And I am sure that he will have done so. He was quite upset at having his upholstery soaked last week.”
“He was, wasn’t he? Men are so temperamental. Well, good night, darling. Don’t stay up too late fussing with the luggage,” Jillian instructed, magnanimous since she was going out.
Hexy sank her fingers into the fur coat.
“I won’t. Good night.”
She picked up the lamp and hurried upstairs. It was suddenly imperative that she take the coat away from Jillian before she changed her mind and decided to wear it. It was wrong that such a coat should belong to someone like Jillian Foxworthy. It needed to be with someone who would guard it and care for it—and love it as it was meant to be loved.
Someone like you?
“Yes. Why not me?” she muttered.
Jillian waited in the hall while her bags were carried out and stowed in the motorcar. She had no choice but to stand by and look ornamental because she was wearing a silly blue hobble gown, which forced her to mince when she walked. Of course, it did show off her figure to perfection, and she didn’t really want to be useful anyway, so being idle while others worked didn’t matter.
Hexy embraced her employer carefully, keeping a safe distance from her finely executed maquillage and the silver net collar that stood out like an Elizabethan ruff and framed her immaculately groomed face.
“You know, darling,” Jillian breathed in an undertone, “I could marry again, for he has asked me and it would be most convenient, but I just can’t stick that awful word
obey
. If only I thought he had a sense of humor about it! But he always does what the earl says, and his father hasn’t any sense of humor at
all
. I fear this may be a tedious vacation if he is forever importuning me for an answer.”
“If you can’t bear to repeat the vows with Donny, then you had certainly best wait for another rich orphan like Mr. MacKenzie to come along,” Hexy murmured absently, distracted from the conversation by losing sight of the trunk in which Jillian’s fur coat was packed.
It had taken an act of will to close the lid on the fur and then to latch it. She’d slept with it last night, rolled in it tightly as if in the arms of a lover, and hadn’t been able to bring herself to actually pack the thing until a few minutes earlier. The pangs of separation were strong.
She certainly missed the fur more than she did James.
“I quite agree, darling. I’ll be working on it in Italy. There must be some agreeable rich orphans there.”
“I’m sure there are.”
“Now remember what I said. I know you think it’s all just superstition, but—well, stay
away from the beach at night. Mr. MacKenzie was always very firm about that.”
“I know. I won’t let the sea monsters get me.”
“It’s the lovers, not the monsters, that I worry about. They sound lovely, but apparently they never stay for long, and that won’t do, you know. One doesn’t even get any property out of the arrangement,” Jillian muttered, leaving Hexy slightly nonplussed.
“Uh—”
“Anyhow ta-ta, darling.” Then Jillian added mendaciously, but with genuine goodwill: “I’ll write soon, for I know I shall miss you.”
Jillian stepped back and pulled on her gloves. In another moment she was out the door, her heels making a staccato burst of sound on the flagstone floor.
Hexy walked out onto the terrace and waved her employer off, uncertain whether she was sad or relieved to have her gone. In this mixture of sentiments, she suspected that she was a great deal like her new northern neighbors.
Hexy smiled suddenly. Probably she should order up a vast number of willow wreaths to distribute among the abandoned locals, as they had just been deprived of their favorite entertainment and were likely to feel the loss. Gossip about the cost of repairs at Fintry could only come in a distant second to the fun of repeating—and probably embellishing—the salacious
details of Jillian’s love life and the goings-on of the London riffraff she invited to visit at her late husband’s castle.
They would be quite disappointed by Hexy. She was such a boring proxy that they might, in fact, not be interested in her at all—unless she actually was kidnapped by a sea monster. Living here for the summer was going to be a strange sociological experiment. And possibly a lonely one, unless some of the workmen hired to do the repairs on the castle proved to be either very handsome or brilliant conversationalists—something most unlikely, as there were very few able-bodied men left in the village.
Ruairidh looked about in bewilderment and some alarm. His skin was nowhere to be found. It should be atop the very rock he was standing on. Quite obviously it had gone astray—but
how?
The tide had not yet turned its course. There had been no wind to blow it away. No one ever visited this beach at this time of year.
And yet something or someone had taken his skin.
For a moment, he wondered if it was the finmen he had smelled up at the furrier’s cottage.
He knelt down on his hands and knees and lowered his nose to the rough stone, searching for their foul scent. He knew it now, for it had
been all about the grounds of the abandoned Crot Callow.
Instantly he reared back, shocked at the scent that was at once foreign and yet completely recognizable. No one among his people had had firsthand experience with it for several generations, but he knew it all the same. The smell tightened the hair of his scalp and sent shivers over his bare flesh.
A woman had been here and performed the ritual of summoning! She had come to the sea at sunset and shed her requisite seven tears onto the sea’s stones where they were collected at the high tide—and then she had taken his skin away with her!
It seemed unthinkable, but there was, at this very moment, when he needed urgently to return to Avocamor with his news, some brash female demanding that he join her in an affair.
Ruairidh muttered a phrase he had learned from some drunken Orkney merrows and then started angrily up the trail that led to Fintry Castle. This was an outrage! It wasn’t even Johnsmas eve—midsummer eve, the humans called it. The People should be free to bask on the skerries and rocks for weeks yet without being molested by aggressive females! But this one had obviously decided to get a head start on her peers and resorted to the old trick of stealing a selkie skin to get herself a lover.
What was the world coming to that first a fisherman’s father should violate a century-old pact against hunting, and then some over-bold female should steal his skin before midsummer eve?
Probably she is very ugly and shrewish and had need of such vile trickery to get a mate! Or maybe she was an earth witch!
The thought made him wince. It was unjust, but the rules said that he was bound to her until his skin was returned or she was with child. The consideration of her ugly nature added to his infuriation with the situation. It would be even more difficult if she knew some magic. Witches were the worst—hard to control, tricky about trying to trap selkies by feeding them land salt and hiding their skins in clever places—and they were nearly always barren. He couldn’t afford to spend his life with a barren woman.
Well, he simply had to get the fur back. He was needed in Avocamor! The People were on the verge of being attacked by the finmen. He did not like being sneaky with women—especially not elderly ones—but he would compel her to give back his skin even if it meant cheating at the traditional bargain. There were things that could be done to bring a female under control without actually making love to her.
Ruairidh leapt from the rock and landed a dozen feet below on the grainy sand, his ankles untwisted and his joints unjarred. Taking a deep breath of air, he turned into the scent and followed the trail of the fur thief.
Hexy jumped at the sound of angry pounding at the castle door. The old knocker had finally been eaten away by corrosion, and they had temporarily installed a hammer by the strike plate. The noise was always loud, but whoever had come to visit was clearly very agitated and determined to call immediate attention to his presence.
Knowing that Marthe and Robertson were both busy and would be slow to answer the summons, she went herself to answer the door, hoping that it wasn’t anyone she knew socially; her eyes were itching fiendishly and were probably quite red.
The ancient door’s bolts were rusted; it took a bit of effort to unlatch and open them. Thus she had a moment to take in her visitor through the growing crack before he strode over the sill on long, lithe legs, a fair stretch of which showed beneath his rumpled kilt.
“De tha thu ‘deanamh?”
the man demanded of her, his bottomless brown eyes framed in the longest, silkiest lashes she had ever seen.
“What?”
The eyes narrowed, but he repeated the question.
They were beautiful eyes, Hexy thought, but they were also alive with a hypnotic ire that did not seem entirely normal.
Hexy blinked once and laid her hands on the reassuringly solid wall behind her. Her heart began to beat heavily and she felt a little dizzy. Something about this man was very familiar, but also a bit frightening in a delicious sort of way.
“Are you the carpenter from Aberdeen?” she asked, rather hoping that it was the case even if he was somewhat alarming, because she had not seen such a splendid specimen of Scottish manhood since crossing into the north.
His coffee brown eyes finally blinked back at her, his dark brows drawn together beneath his glossy, unbound hair—which in spite of being unrestrained still managed to look kempt as it grew straight back from his face and spilled down his back in a neat line showing small ears laid nearly flat against his head.
“A bheil ghaidlig agad?”
he asked her.
“I’m sorry,” she answered, trying out a smile of welcome and offering her hand. Unaccountably, both lips and fist trembled noticeably. “I don’t speak Gaelic. Um…
chaneil ghadilig agam
.”
The long lashes veiled the intruder’s eyes for
a moment as he looked down at her outstretched fingers.
“Ye’d be one of the Sassenach women, then,” he said, his deep voice shifting into heavily accented English that resembled the local Scots dialect. He stared at her palm for a several seconds, clearly debating whether to take it.
“Actually, I’m American. My ancestors may have had the Gaelic at one time, but we’ve been in the States since the Revolution. I’m afraid that I don’t know much about the language or customs of the north.” The need to babble to this handsome stranger was involuntary and undeniable. Hexy had just noticed that he wasn’t wearing a shirt, and she was having a difficult time keeping her gaze on his face. Without a doubt this was the most beautiful, most compelling man she had ever seen.
The tall visitor digested this and then asked with a shade more patience, “So if ye do not know the customs, and ’tis all a simple error, will ye not return my fur tae me?”
“What fur?” Hexy noticed that her fingers were covered in gray dust and quickly let her hand fall. Between her red nose and dirty hands, it was no wonder this stranger wasn’t anxious to touch her.
“My fur. Ye took it from the beach. I want it back. Now.”
“I didn’t take—” she began, only to stop
when he leaned over and sniffed at her. “What are you—”
His tongue darted out, and he tasted one of her allergy-induced tears as it welled out of her eyes.
She stood still, shocked into immobility and incredulity as she watched his pupils first expand and then contract down to pinpoints.
“Aye, yer the one. There’s nae point in denyin’ it. I’ll dae my duty by ye, lass, and lay wi’ ye if that’s what ye wish. But I want my skin back first.” He looked stern as he straightened to his full height. “Though why a bonnie lass like yerself would be out fishing for a lover…”
Hexy gasped and prayed she wasn’t blushing. Allergies had made her quite red enough. Embarrassment was simply adding insult to injury.
“Look here—
what is your name?
” she belatedly asked. “And who are you? And why are you being so—so rude to someone you don’t know?”
The man struggled with himself, clearly not wanting to respond to her question, but finally answering, “Some in these parts call me Ruairidh O’Uruisg. And I’m no ruder than ye’ve been yerself. Ye know that yer not supposed tae be askin’ my name yet. Why did ye call me by ritual if it means sae little tae ye?”
Hexy blinked, taken aback.
Had she been rude?
Marthe was always saying failte when strangers
came into the house. Had she insulted this man by not obeying the local custom? Had she truly outraged Gaelic social convention by asking for his name too early in some greeting ritual?
“Roaring Oorushk? I can’t call you that,” she objected, speaking her thoughts aloud as she pinched her nose, fighting off a fit of sneezes. “Haven’t you some normal name?”
She regretted her thoughtless words as soon as she saw his offended expression. Her habit of talking to herself had once again landed her in trouble.
“Look, I am sorry. That
was
rude. But I told you that I haven’t the Gaelic and don’t know all your customs. I’m foreign. Take pity on me. Haven’t you an English name I could use?”
“Aye.” The man seemed to be chewing his tongue, but eventually he spat out: “If ye must know, some here have called me Rory.”
“Rory?” Hexy repeated, feeling suddenly feverish. She hadn’t thought of her brother for months and suddenly his name and image were everywhere around her. Another tear slipped from her eye and she raised a hand to wipe it away. “That’s…that’s a nice name. It was my brother’s. He—he’s gone now.”
The stranger watched her hand as she rubbed at her cheek. His tense expression finally relaxed a trifle and his nose twitched. His lips eased into an almost smile. Belatedly, Hexy
recalled how dirty her hands were and realized that she had probably just smeared gray dust all over her cheeks.
“I am starting tae believe in yer innocence,” he told her, his voice gone soft as a lullabye. It was mesmerizing, somehow spinning cobwebs over her mind. “Ye may be daft, but I dae believe yer guileless.”
“Why are you smiling?” she asked, fascinated by the sight of the corners of his mouth curving upward. She had never seen anyone smile that way. Unable to control her thoughts or speech, she added, “It isn’t because I’m a mess, is it? That would be mean.”
More confident now, he ignored her question.
“It’s a strange accent ye have, mistress. And what might yer own name be, O thief of furs, whose brother was also called Rory?”
“Oh, I’m Hexy Garrow. Hesiod Garrow, actually, but everyone calls me Hexy.” The words spilled out as if compelled by some unseen force.
“That’s a bit of an odd name, Mistress Hesiod.
Hexy
.” For the first time, her name on a man’s lips sounded like a caress. “There’s something almost
pixiating
about the sound of it.”