The Scottish Bride - Catherine Coulter [36]
He ignored that and forged ahead. “I would appreciate it, ma’am, if you would ask questions of me rather than of my daughter. If you wish to know about my family, ask me, and I will decide what you need to know.”
“Why? She’s a smart little gel,” said Mrs. Griffin, dressed in the same stiff pervasive black, spread over nearly the entire sofa. She was holding that black cane, waving it just a bit. It looked like a weapon in her large hand. “She told me everything I wanted to know, whereas you would likely have perseverated. Besides, you went off with Donnatella and were not available to me. Now, to be blunt about all this—I quite despair of Kildrummy ever recovering.”
“I don’t,” Tysen said. “However, ma’am, I think despair would be an excellent trait for you to cultivate.”
“I have no idea what you mean by that, and thus it is very likely irrelevant. Now, isn’t Donnatella a lovely little chit? And you were with her for a very long time, weren’t you? Alone.” She gave him an arch, leering look that made him want to throw an old leather hassock at her.
“Aye,” she continued, her leer even more pronounced as she looked him up and down, “if you weren’t a vicar, I would believe that you had yourself a very fine time indeed. On the other hand,” she added, the thin black mustache over her upper lip mesmerizing him, “it’s possible that since you’re an English vicar, you have no notion of what real sin is or isn’t.”
And even-tempered Tysen Sherbrooke, a man of cool detachment and sound judgment, leapt off the edge. He said, his voice utterly clipped and cold in his fury, “You are a malicious old woman. I do not wish you to remain here any longer, ma’am. You and Mr. Griffin will leave in the morning. Have I made myself clear?”
The black mustache quivered in outrage. Mrs. Griffin roared to her feet in a welter of black skirts and a great deal of energy. She swung up her black cane and aimed it at him, as if it were a blunderbuss. “You are a vicar, sir. You have insulted me, you have insulted my dear Mr. Griffin in absentia. You will beg our pardon.”
And Tysen, still furious to his toes, said in a voice as rigid as his father’s was whenever he’d been angry with his mother—not an unusual occurrence at all, “I apologize, ma’am. You and Mr. Griffin will still leave in the morning. I bid you good night and a pleasant journey back to Edinburgh.”
“We’ll just see what Donald MacCray has to say about this, my lord,” she shouted after him. “He is the Barthwick solicitor, a man of singular and impressive standing, and he will pin back your wretched little English ears for your horrid behavior to me! Vicar—ha, I say! A plague on you, sir.”
It was a fine parting shot, but he didn’t turn back to the miserable old besom. He just walked out of the drawing room, nearly knocking over his daughter, who had obviously been plastered against the door. He saw a glass of milk on the floor beside her.
“If I could send you away as well, Meggie, I would,” said Tysen and took the stairs two at a time, not looking back.
Two hours later, Reverend Sherbrooke was praying to God to forgive him for his illogical and highly odd anger, his unusual and passionately felt display of temper, his unquestioned rudeness in the face of rudeness that had, for whatever reason, driven him right over the brink. He’d landed facedown in an emotional quagmire. He’d wallowed in it, shamed his calling, riddled holes in his name. But, surely, what had come out of that dreadful woman’s mouth still was of sufficient weight to justify what he had said to the old bat.
He realized in that moment that he was trying to justify himself to God. It appalled him that he had sunk so low, had let himself fall off a righteous path so easily. God was an integral part of his life, His presence and strength filled Tysen’s very being. He was graced by God’s love and it gave him endless joy. And yet he had left Him in a ditch somewhere in this wretched country and continued on alone. Look what had happened to him.
He finally said, his soul stripped of false pride, of pretense,