Page 83 of Rogue with a Brogue
Mary sent him a dubious look, but Arran was smiling. “That’ll give the Campbells pause, I wager. Whatever ye please, Peter Gilling.”
“You don’t think they’ll hear him?” she whispered.
“Nae. With this rolling land he’ll echo like a banshee. And they’re likely to spy us before they hear us, anyway.”
Then, as she was looking about for something to jam in her ears, the sweetest tenor she’d ever heard began, and she froze. “Twa Bonnie Maidens,” a song even she knew despite her limited visits to the Highlands, soared up around them.
There were twa bonnie maidens, and three bonnie maids,
Came o’er the Minch, and came o’er the main,
Wi’ the wind for their way and the corry for their hame,
And they’re dearly welcome to Skye again.
“Ye think we’re nae in enough trouble already, that ye choose a Jacobite song?” Arran said, but he was chuckling and already tapping his foot.
Come along, come along, wi’ yer boatie and yer song,
My ain bonnie maidens, my two bonnie maids!
For the night it is dark, and the redcoat is gane,
And ye are dearly welcome to Skye again.
By the second chorus she and Arran were singing along, and she thought his fine, rollicking baritone seemed even more delicious than it had in Wigmore. Perhaps he wasn’t Bonnie Prince Charlie returning to the Highlands in the guise of a maid, but hewasa Highlands prince returning home. And she was going home, to a place she’d only ever been allowed to glimpse.
Even Howard attempted the last chorus, which nearly made Peter fall off his seat. “I think ye might be part Scottish, Howard Howard,” he proclaimed, chortling.
“I like the tune,” the driver admitted, humming as he turned up the lapels of his coat against the chill. “Will you teach it to me, Gilling?”
“Aye. Dunnae sing it in London, though. They might hang ye fer it.”
“I actually had a thought that I might try to make a go of it here,” Howard returned after a moment. “I left nothing behind but a room in Whitechapel I shared with three other lads, and a drawer full of clothes which they’ve likely divided among themselves by now.”
Mary had never considered whether he might have a wife or children waiting for him back in London. The fact that he didn’t was small excuse for her thoughtlessness. All she could conjure in her defense was that he’d seemed to belong with them from the beginning, and he’d never mentioned anything he needed to return to.
“I dunnae expect we’ll have a grand hoose, Howard,” Arran said slowly, removing his coat and tucking it around Mary’s shoulders. “But when Peter returns to his duties at Glengask, I reckon I’ll have plenty of work fer two men to do. Nae driving though, more than likely.”
“I’ve always had a yen to try my hand at farming, my lord. I’d be honored to join you if you’ve a place for me.”
“It’s settled, then.” Arran crushed Mary to him in a tight hug. “I told ye he was ours,” he whispered, chuckling.
She stifled a laugh in the warm folds of the wool coat. However odd the entire conversation, the notion that a London hack driver would become a Scottish cotter to a pair of exiled aristocrats made as much sense as anything else.
“I’ve been thinking some thoughts myself, Laird Arran,” Peter said abruptly. “My task as given me by yer brother was to look after ye. And so I think I might continue with seeing ye and yer lady safe.”
“Ye grew up aroond Glengask, Peter. I dunnae want to take ye away from that.”
“And ye grew up inside Glengask,” the footman countered. “I reckon I like this wee clan o’ yers, and so I’ll be staying. And that’s the end of that.”
“As ye say, then.”
Arran’s light blue gaze remained on the horizon. Mary could guess what he was thinking; they both came from large, powerful clans. And now with Peter joining them, and counting her aunt and uncle, they were six. She leaned up and kissed him on the cheek. “We’re not alone,” she murmured.
He blinked, looking down to kiss her mouth in that possessive, toe-curling way of his. “Nae. Our clan’s grown again by a third just in the past five minutes.”
She was fairly positive that they would be adding yet another to their number in just under nine months, but she would wait to tell him that until she was absolutely certain. That was a conversation for just the two of them, anyway.
