The Heiress Bride - Catherine Coulter [19]
“How long has he been the earl of Ashburnham?”
“Just six months. His brother was a wastrel, as was his father. Together they ran the estate into the ground. He has a huge barn of an old castle that will require vast sums to bring it back to what it was. Then there are the crops, the sheep, the poverty of his people—crofters, they’re called in Scotland.”
“So,” Alex said slowly, “when he became the earl and discovered the true state of his affairs, he made a decision, the only one he could make. You don’t dislike him for that, do you, Douglas?”
“No. It’s just that—”
“That what, my dear?”
“Sinjun doesn’t know him. She’s infatuated, that’s all. She’ll end up in Scotland, with no one to protect her, and what if—”
“Do you believe that Colin Kinross is an honorable man?”
“I have no idea. On the surface, I’d say yes. What goes on in his mind? In his heart?”
“Sinjun will wed him, Douglas. I only hope she doesn’t seduce him before they’re wed.”
He sighed. “I hope so, too. Now I must go to speak with Mother. She is squawking again, driving her maid insane, demanding that the young man be brought to her. She is threatening to send Sinjun to Italy until she has forgotten this foreign bounder. The strange thing is that she doesn’t at all mind that he is marrying her daughter for money. What she minds is that he is a Scot. She says all Scots are hard and mean-fisted and Presbyterian.”
“Perhaps you should quote some Robert Burns poetry to her. It’s really quite lovely.”
“Ha! It’s a foreign language and she’d have even more fits than she’s having now. Damnation, I wish Sinjun weren’t lying in her bed with a headache. She is never about when I need her.”
“Shall I come with you?”
“If you were to do that, Mother would rage until we were both deaf. You still haven’t won her over, my dear. I doubt not she will soon come around to blaming you for this debacle.” Douglas sighed and left the room, mumbling about his damned sister and her equally damned headache.
Sinjun didn’t have a headache. She had a plan and she was well into its execution. She had carefully molded a bolster into a reasonable human shape and covered it. Excellent. If there were no close inspection, the bolster would pass muster as a likely female. She patted her own pants leg, straightened her jacket, and pulled her felt hat more fully down over her forehead. She looked like a boy, no doubt about it. She turned and looked at her back in the long mirror. Just like a boy, even to her black boots. She whistled softly. Now all she had to do was climb down the elm tree into the garden. Then she was off.
Colin’s lodgings were on the second floor of an old Georgian town house on Carlyon Street, only three streets away. It wasn’t yet dark and she kept whistling to keep away any fears that might try to nibble at her, and to make anyone who saw her see only a boy, out for the evening. She saw two gentlemen in their swirling cloaks, laughing and smoking cheroots, but they paid her no heed. There was a ragged boy sweeping the path for anyone who passed, and she thanked him and gave him a pence. Sinjun found Colin’s lodging without problem and strolled to the front door as if she hadn’t a care in the world. She pounded the huge eagle’s-head knocker.
There wasn’t a sound from within. She knocked again. She heard a giggle and a girl’s high voice scolding, “Now, sir, don’t you do that! No, no, not there, you mustn’t. Now, we’ve a visitor. No, sir—” There were more giggles and when the door opened, Sinjun was face-to-face with one of the prettiest females she’d ever seen. The girl’s neckline was low over very white, full breasts, and her pale hair was mussed and her eyes were bright with excitement and fun. She was grinning