Page 74 of A Scot in the Storm
She stopped at the wool merchant’s pitch, stood in front of the hanging cloth the same way she stood before his clock gears in the lantern room. Too still. Head tipped slightly. Hands held carefully at her sides.
The wool merchant was an old fellow missing half the teeth on the right side of his mouth. Rory saw him glance at Abigail sideways with the cautious hope of a man trying to determine whether the strange foreign woman in the lighthouse captain’s company intended to spend silver or only admire the goods.
Abigail only intended to admire. The colors were finer than most of the market row. Deep madder reds. Soft saffron golds. Indigos dark enough to pass almost black until the cloth shifted in the wind and the winter sun caught the weave sideways. There were heathered greys spun through with muted greens and russet browns where different fleeces had been mixed by hand.
Good dye work. Very good dye work.
Rory had known enough wool merchants since boyhood to recognize craftsmanship when he saw it. He watched Abigail pick up a length of indigo twill. She held it toward the light, ran her thumb slowly along the selvedge.
Then, with obvious reluctance, set it back down. A moment later she tucked her hands beneath her arms exactly the way he’d known she would.
Then she turned and started back toward the cart. He left her there a short while later under the pretense of one final errand, then he doubled back through the market.
The shawls hung from a wooden frame, stirring softly in the wind coming off the harbor.
Most were practical pieces. Rough wool in sturdy browns and greys meant for working women, and thick enough to survive the sea wind, kitchen smoke, and years of hard use.
But one stood apart from the others. Blue-grey. The color of the sea in winter just before sunset, when the light drained slowly from the water.
The weave was fine and even beneath his fingers, the fringe carefully knotted, the wool soft without being delicate.
It was costly. Far more expensive than a sensible man ought to spend on a woman that wasna his, no matter how he wished she was.
Rory handed over the silver. A shawl like this, wrapped around the shoulders of the foreign American woman who walked beside the lighthouse captain, said something very clear to a town like Fraserburgh.
She belongs with me.
It was a dangerous thing to say without words, and he knew exactly how it would be talked about in every tavern and kitchen from the harbor to the kirk.
He didn’t care.
The merchant wrapped the shawl carefully in brown paper and tied it with twine. Rory carried it back through the market feeling absurdly conspicuous. Which, he supposed, was the point.
They’d nearly reached the cliffs again before he handed the parcel to her.
“Here. For you.” His voice came out rougher than intended. “Mrs. Gable’s shawl is good enough for the house, but ye’ll need something warmer for when ye go on yer wee walks.”
Abigail took the parcel, unwrapped it slowly. Her fingers lingered over the wool exactly the way they had over his clockwork gears the day they met.
Then she held it up in front of her, the blue-grey wool catching the light. And suddenly she looked like part of the coast itself. Sea and sky and winter.
“It’s beautiful,” she said softly.
“It’s practical. Ye’re always freezing.”
She held the shawl gathered against her chest, and there was something in her expression that made his breath catch.
“Thank you,” she said. “Really. I’ve never…”
Her voice faltered. She pressed the wool briefly against her cheek.
“It’s only a shawl.”
Her gaze lifted back to his.
“No,” she said quietly. “It isn’t.”
She took off the borrowed shawl, folded it neatly and stowed it in the cart. Then she wrapped the new one around her shoulders, tucking one end neatly beneath the other. It settled against her as though it had been made for her.
