Part Three

Scotland 1792


"Find! Find!" Alistair Kennedy spoke in a hushed, but urgent voice and the two black and white spaniels whined their barely contained excitement and started off once more, zigzagging through the tall grass that was green and brown and interspersed with clumps of fragrant heather and yellow gorse. Their long, feathery tails swept from side to side, their silky ears brushing the ground as they searched for the elusive scent.

"Good dog, Cerdic! Find the bird!" Archie encouraged as one dog stopped in his tracks and glanced back at the hunters, hesitating. "Go on, boy! Find the bird!" Heartened, Cerdic gave a short, joyful "yip" and turned, bounding off in pursuit of his companion who was methodically working the cover some fifty yards ahead.

The sun was still only halfway to its height, but held a warm, golden promise for a mid-September morning, although the grass was still tipped lightly with frost as Archie and his cousin walked shoulder to shoulder through Viscount Aylesford's expansive grouse moor, which was by all accounts, if Milord did say so himself, one of the oldest, finest, and best kept preserves in all of Scotland, if not all of Britain.

His philosophy of gamekeeping and sport was one topic on which Archie's otherwise excruciatingly taciturn sire was seldom reluctant to expound, although his remarks were typically diffused to all within hearing distance through the filter of his faithful ghillie, one Angus MacBean, a retainer of great, but indeterminate age and mysteriously immutable physicality. MacBean was well over six feet tall, lean and straight and hard as a pillar of granite with a face that looked to be hewn of the same unyielding stuff. His hair was white, his eyes a cold and flinty grey. It seemed to Archie that MacBean had always looked the same, and he fancied that the old man had somehow reached a point at which the material of his body could decline no further and had hardened into it's present, eternal form, much like the remains of the ancient forest that stood even now at the furthest extent of Archie's father's lands. There, the stumps of tree trunks still stood in perfect replication of their once living selves but somehow, by the passage of eons of time, had turned mysteriously to stone.

"You know, Angus," Lord Aylesford had said as the party set out that morning, prior to splitting off into separate stalking parties, each with a dog or two between them.  "That I think little of these so-called modern methods of birding---beating and netting and blasting away at the poor creatures without so much as moving from one spot. It ain't sport, it's slaughter!"

"Aye, Milord," Angus agreed, nodding gravely.

"The true sportsman glories in the stalk and chase, does he not? The kill is secondary to the thrill of the hunt, the pride one takes in one's lands and one's birds, the pleasure of watching a good dog do its work. Look at Cynric here, how keen he is! Here Cerdic! Cawlin! Sitric and Elfled and Balder and Ban!"

The dogs gamboled happily around their master, tongues lolling, lush tails swishing, all bright-eyed, quivering eagerness, and his lordship stooped to stroke a silken head.

"Just to stand and shoot?" he went on with a shake of his head, "It s a senseless waste of good stock if you will ask me. If all they want is to practice their aim, let 'em join up to go and shoot at Frenchmen, eh, Angus?"

"Oh, aye. Hic! Cawlin, mind ye, get off her!"

"You anticipate war, my lord?" asked Archie's brother-in-law, Lord Langford. "It seems only yesterday that we were hearing Mr. Pitt speak of the upheaval as an event highly favorable to us---that surely a self-obsessed France would be less likely than ever before to threaten our interests abroad."

Archie ducked his head and glanced sidelong at Alistair, grinning silently as his father's head snapped 'round and his sharp blue eyes fixed on Langford, for all the world as if he had only just become aware that there were others beside himself and Angus MacBean abroad this hunting morning.

"Surely you do not believe, as some, that there is yet any danger of a similar uprising on our own shores?" Langford continued. "And with Austria and Prussia now on the march---"

 Milord waved a dismissive hand. "T'won't happen here, naturally. Trouble with the Frogs has always been that them that should don't have a proper sense of their responsibilities as we do. Brought it all on themselves they have, certainly, but yes, I do believe it will soon lead to war, if this madness continues. Madness—it's all foolishness! Did I not say to you only yesterday, Angus, 'All right, perhaps some of these people have missed the odd meal or two, but lopping off the heads of the nobility's not going to fill their bellies, is it'? "

"Aye. Do I loose them dogs, my lord?"

***

Suddenly the dogs were hot on a scent and were making off in a straight line through the grass. Archie and Alistair unslung their guns and took off at a run after them. At some distance Archie caught sight of the quarry, a frantic stirring of motion in the grass, a flash of white and the unmistakable red cap of the rooster. At fifteen yards the younger dog, Elfled, froze and set beautifully, and Cerdic closed in. With an explosion of wings, a magnificent pair of male red grouse flushed. In the space of a few seconds Archie chose his bird, stopped, braced and fired, and the rooster dropped without moving just as Alistair's shot cracked loudly in his ear and the second bird tumbled to the ground, cleanly killed.

Archie's heart was racing with exhilaration and relief. He knew he was a fair pistol shot---the best aboard Justinian, save one---but it had been some time since he'd hunted, and he been pleasantly surprised at the remarkable accuracy of the new fowling piece he carried. The slim, rifled barrel, worked on the inside with small, spiraling grooves, made it a nuisance to load but increased the precision and range astoundingly. Which was a very good thing, for another fundamental tenet of Archie's father's sporting philosophy was "shoot to kill", and if one did not, one was responsible for tracking the wounded game until it was found, and Archie and his brothers had learned their lesson the hard way that a downed grouse or pheasant could be one of the most elusive things on earth!

"I believe this one is yours," Alistair said, as he raised one fat bird by its white-feathered legs, its head shot off completely. "You've guillotined him, sir!"

"It is all the fashion, or have you not heard?" Archie replied, crouching to fondle the dogs, scratching under their chins and pulling gently on their long ears. "Well, the cook will thank me, at any rate. Yes! Good dogs!"

"That's a brace apiece," Alistair said, tucking the second bird into the bulging game bag that was slung on his back. "Is your bloodlust satisfied?"

Archie laughed softly and nodded. "Such as it is."

His cousin looked at him curiously. Alistair might have been Archie's brother, so alike were they in looks, although Alistair, who had always been horse-mad, was half a head taller, and spending most of his life in the saddle, was horseback lean, where as Archie had always tended a little to stockiness. But the kinship went deeper than looks, for Alistair had always been a companion and friend, while his brothers, Malcolm and Duncan, at best, were little more than strangers, and at their worst, a pair of antagonists to be tolerated—or avoided altogether.

"You're not anxious to see battle, Archie?"

The dogs fell in behind them as they turned to retrace their steps. Archie thought for a moment. Before him the expanse of grass seemed to roll on forever, rippling, undulating like the surface of the sea. Off to his left, situated on a rise beyond a distant stand of trees rose the ruins of Kinhenzie, the ancient castle keep of his warrior ancestors.

"I have…thought of it. But I do not know. I am not afraid, I don't think. It is just…Well, it isn't as if I've got a choice. It will be my duty to fight and I supposed if I'm to fight I'm damned if I won't fight well."

"Well, I have thought about it," Alistair said. "You know that all I've ever wanted is the cavalry, but Mama still won't allow my father to buy me a colour! What then was the point of sending me to Vienna and the academie at Angers? She says she will only consider the Life or the Household Guards for me, but she knows the cost is much too dear---and besides, I want to fight! Not to dress up like a great, prinking fool and parade back and forth from the Palace to Whitehall!"

"Damn, Archie, I'm eighteen! I've not got time to waste. If it comes to it, I'll go in as a Volunteer," Alistair said with determination, "Moira's the Colonel of the Seventh. He's seen me ride and he says I'll have my commission in a trice once we're in it. For that matter, I can't see that mother won't give in then, rather than see me in the ranks!"

Archie had to smile at that. Aunt Caroline was nothing if not a high stickler, and would likely succumb to an attack of the vapours if anyone were even to suggest that any child of hers, never mind her favorite middle son, was to go for a common soldier.

"What is the cost of a commission?" Archie asked. "Out of curiosity?"

"At least three-hundred and fifty pounds for a cornetcy in any decent regiment. And then there are your horses and all the rest. George has said she'd give me the money, but of course that would never do…"

"George!" Archie exclaimed, and realized as the name escaped his lips that his voice sounded most peculiar, and indeed Alistair turned and looked at him oddly.

"Yes…" he drawled. "Our old friend Georgiana? Lady Trim? Baroness Keene? Friend of your sister's. Most attractive lady. Amazing red hair—you met at dinner last night."

"I know who you're talking about," Archie replied a little sheepishly, shifting his gun to the other shoulder.

"I daresay you do," Alistair grinned. "Saw you last night. You couldn't take your eyes off of her. I've always liked George. Like a big sister, but I can't say there ain't something about her. Do you suppose its all true?"

"Suppose what's all true?" Archie asked uncomfortably.

"Well, you know---that Trim got killed fighting over her, and then her lover, Freddy Fitzgerald, fled abroad so as not to answer for the killing, and got himself drowned on the way to France?"

Archie hadn't known any of it. He'd been away for nearly three years, and the members of his family were none of them much better than spotty correspondents. His sisters, Alice and Margaret were the most faithful, but it was not as if they were about to share scurrilous gossip with their teenaged brother! He'd arrived only yesterday, having come all the way from Portsmouth by stage, an exhausting, bone-rattling four day journey, but he'd been glad of it, even if along the way, he'd been thinking he'd only be changing one uncomfortable situation for another. The change was doing him good already. The estate was beautiful, Alistair was here, and Alice had welcomed him kindly and had seemed genuinely glad to see him. Three years married, she seemed well and determined to become, in her own laughing words, "formidable", and in addition to playing hostess at her husband's estates and London establishment, was set on acting in place of her mother on behalf of her widowed father as well, hence this shooting party, which she had insisted that he attend.

It was good to forget, if only for a short time, the tedium of Justinian, and the troubles he left behind him.

"Fitzgerald was her lover?" Archie asked. He looked straight ahead as he walked, attempting to sound coolly disinterested. In truth, from the moment he'd spied the Countess, seated at the other end of his father's table last night, he'd been able to think of little but the disturbing incident he'd secretly witnessed three years before. So the men had fought and the Earl had been killed? Archie felt a grim satisfaction at the knowledge.

"So they say," Alistair replied. "And you can imagine what was said when she bore a child eight months later."

"Poor George," Archie said softly, and again, Alistair looked at him oddly.

"Indeed. The Earl's family took action against her and had the boy removed to their custody."

"Then it would seem that they are satisfied that he is the legitimate heir, at least," said Archie.

"Who's to know? They said it was to protect him from her influence. But after her child was taken from her, Archie, they say she just went wild, cutting a swath through London and Dublin—gaming, the worst sort of men. It was as if she didn't care---as if she set out to become completely notorious!"

"I am determined to prove a villain," Archie murmured.

"Mama says if it hadn't been for your sister's and Langford's friendship, she'd have been completely ruined, even if she is a baroness in her own right. It was Alice finally got her back home and kept her there until at least some of the scandal died down."

Archie could not help a little smile. Yes, it would be just like Alice to stand in the face of the furious ton and defy them to cut her for standing by a friend---and she but a girl of twenty-two! Formidable indeed. And now it seemed this little party of hers was to be the first stepping-stone to George's re-entry into society. Aunt Caroline must be fit to have kittens.

At dinner last night Lady Trim had seemed happy. She was lively, even a little flirtatious, Archie had thought, even though he was too far away to hear what she was saying to her companion. It was true he could hardly keep from staring at her, and he knew she'd caught him more than once. How many times over the past few years had he remembered that afternoon in the library, watching her stand up to her bully of a husband, and the shame he had felt at doing nothing to help, even though he knew that even in her defiance, she was so afraid? It had changed him. It had made a difference, somehow, to know that he was not the only one, to see her strength, and he was stronger now, not just in his body, but in his soul.

He could not help looking. She was very slender, very pale, and her face was fine and handsome, rather than sweetly pretty, with a longish nose and deep green eyes that seemed dark, almost black in the candlelight. With her red hair, there was an almost foxy look about her. She wore a gown of cream satin, embroidered all over with beautiful, fanciful, coloured birds. The neck was low, the style very plain; the fabric itself was so elaborate as to require no further decoration, trim, or jewel, Archie thought. And she did have the most amazing hair, just as Alistair had said. The most vibrant colour, and curiously thick and brushy—it must be a nuisance to try and comb, but someone had managed to dress it beautifully, tucking in a trio of cream-coloured roses at the crown.

The third time she caught him looking she had stared right back for the longest time, and finally she had smiled, ever so slightly and Archie felt himself flush hotly, as he realized what she must be imagining him to be thinking. He looked away, and then he flushed again when he realized, rather to his surprise, that he had in fact been admiring her---thinking how the flickering candles cast such intriguing shadows on the bones of her face, in the hollow of her throat, and at the dip of her decolletage. He'd been thinking that her skin looked as white and smooth as milk, and he wondered what it would be like to touch her.

He turned his attention to his plate, occupying himself completely in dividing a small lamb cutlet into pieces that were as near as he could make them to the exact same size and shape. The back of his neck prickled as he fought the terrible urge, but finally he could bear it no longer and he glanced again, quickly, furtively, down to the far end of the table.

And met her eyes again.

Go to Part Four.