Temptation

“What an extraordinary letter,” Melanie O’Neil said to her husband, Angus, as she finished reading it aloud.

“I think I’d better bring her back here,” Angus said, scowling. “It sounds to me like she’s turning my nephew’s whole village upside down.”

“It does, doesn’t it? But then, Temperance is so much like her father. Neither of them could ever see an obstacle. Whole mountains used to get in his way, but he’d just walk right through them, and smile while he was doing it.”

“Miss him, do you?” Angus said, looking at her over the top of his reading glasses.

“Oh, my, no. Living with him was like living in the middle of a hurricane. There was much too much energy for me.” She looked at the letter again. “But what is odd about this letter is that she mentions James so often. Look at this. ‘Skating with James.’ ‘Looking for treasure with James.’ ‘What James said about business.’ ‘How James paid for the food and drink.’ And here she talks of the kindness of James and how he lit a fire to take off the chill.”

“Damned waste of fuel and money, if you ask me,” Angus said, the newspaper again before his face.

She looked back at the letter. “The last pages are nothing but about James, James and James. I’ve never heard her talk about a man like this.” She looked up at her husband. “You don’t think she’s falling in love, do you?”

“Temperance?” Angus snorted. “Not likely. But maybe she’s met a man she can respect.”

“What’s this treasure she’s talking about?”

Angus gave another snort, this time of laughter. “A stupid, senseless legend, that’s all it is. My father used to say that my mother was spending the McCairn fortune and hiding everything she’d bought somewhere inside the house. It was absurd, of course, but it amused the children to search for the treasure.”

“And what’s this about cards?”

Angus shifted his newspaper. “I have no idea,” he said, but then he put his paper down to look at her. “He must mean the playing cards. My mother had four sets of them made and gave one each to . . . I don’t remember who. The nongamblers, I guess.”

“Then you received a set?”

“I did, actually. My mother swore us to secrecy and made us promise that we would keep the cards forever.”

“I see,” Melanie said softly. “And where would your pack of cards be now?”

Angus picked up his paper again. “I have no idea. In the attic probably. In one of the old trunks maybe.”

“Who would know where the other decks are?”

“My sister. She knows everyone and everything. She was always interested in that sort of thing, not me.”

“I see,” Melanie said again, then got up to go to the little writing desk in the corner to start writing a note to Angus’s sister, who lived nearby in Edinburgh. She asked if they could have tea together on Thursday, at the sister’s house.

“Oh, you are a wicked woman,” Angus’s sister Rowena said to Melanie. “I’ve met that vain, silly girl, Charmaine Edelsten, and her dreadful mother. How could you send that girl all the way out to McCairn to meet James of all people? James would eat her alive.”

“Yes, I figured as much from Angus’s description of him. But I wanted to give my daughter some time away from the rigors of New York. Temperance is such a studious young woman, and so very serious. I’ve spent years of my life begging her to take a holiday, but she never will. So when Angus told me he was going to get Temperance to find a wife for his nephew, it seemed the perfect opportunity to force her to take a holiday. But if I’d sent some lovely young woman the first week, Temperance would have left McCairn and not had the vacation she needs so much.”

“From what you’ve told me, it doesn’t sound much like she’s taking any time off from saving people.”

Melanie put down her teacup. She had liked Angus’s sister from the moment she’d first seen her. Angus had said that Rowena was too bossy for his taste, but Melanie liked bossy people. If she hadn’t, she wouldn’t have married Temperance’s father or Angus.

“Oh, but Temperance is having a holiday. She hasn’t skated since she was a girl, and what could possibly have ever happened on McCairn that could rival New York City?”

At that Rowena let out a snort of laughter. She was only a year or two older than Angus, but she looked a hundred. She wore an ancient dress of what Melanie was sure was handmade lace, but the face the lace surrounded was dark and wrinkled; it was the skin of a woman who had spent her life on the back of a horse in all weather. “Like setting an iron teacup on a lace doily,” Angus had said about his sister, whom he rarely saw.

“The things I could tell you about that place would curl your hair,” Rowena said.

“My maid would thank you,” Melanie said softly.

It took Rowena a moment to understand her meaning; then she let out a hoot of laughter. “I like you better than the other two women Angus married. For all that you look like a plump little dumpling, you’ve got steel inside you. My guess is that there’s more of you inside that hellion daughter of yours than either of you knows.”

“Oh, please don’t tell Angus,” Melanie said, smiling. “He thinks he likes soft women.”

Again Rowena laughed heartily. “So I take it you came here to hear the history of Clan McCairn.”

“If you don’t mind, that is. And there are two decks of cards missing.”

“My, my, you have been snooping. I have two sets, mine and my sister’s, may she rest in peace. Don’t tell me you found Angus’s set?”

“Yes,” Melanie said tiredly. “It took three maids and I two days, but we found them.”

“Yes, indeed. Steel in you.” She leaned toward Melanie so she could see her better. Like many truly ugly women, she was very vain and refused to wear her glasses. “What are you after? Really after?”

“I’m not sure, but I think I might be matchmaking my daughter and your nephew.”

“Well, well, well. Think your daughter can stand up to a ruffian like my James?”

“Can your nephew stand up to my free-spirited daughter?”

Rowena didn’t laugh, but she did smile. Then her smile grew broader. “You may know about the cards, but do you know about the will?”

At that Melanie’s eyes widened. “The will?”

“My brother is an idiot! You don’t think he sent your daughter all the way out to McCairn to find James a wife just because he wants his nephew to be married, do you?”

“Well, actually, I don’t think I questioned his motives.”

“Angus! Playing cupid? Ha! He wants to sell James’s wool.”

“But he does sell James’s wool. I don’t understand.”

“Angus wants to continue selling McCairn wool, and—How about if I order some more tea and . . .” She looked Melanie up and down. “—and some cakes. You won’t mind that, will you?”

Melanie smiled. “I am rather fond of cakes,” she said.

Rowena smiled. “All right. Cakes for you and a bit of whiskey for myself. You don’t mind, do you?”

“We all have our vices,” Melanie said with a smile.

“Then settle down and make yourself comfortable, because I have a lot of territory to cover.” At that she picked up a little bell and gave it a good, hard ring. Instantly a maid appeared.

“Yes, ma’am?”

“Tea, cakes, and whiskey. And lots of all three. And hand me that box over there.”

Obediently and swiftly, the maid handed her mistress a small ebony box, then left the room. Rowena handed the box to Melanie.

Inside were two decks of cards. They seemed to be ordinary cards except for the pictures of the art objects and jewelry on the fronts.

“Angus never believed any of it, nor did my sister, but I think those are pictures of what my mother bought and hid somewhere in McCairn.”

“My goodness,” Melanie said, holding up one of the cards. It had a picture of a sapphire ring on it. “I hope the maid brings lots of cakes and lots of tea, because I want to hear every word of the story that you can tell me.”

“Gladly,” Rowena said. “It will be nice to talk to someone of the younger generation. All my friends keep dying on me.”

Melanie couldn’t help smiling. How kind the woman was to call her “the younger generation.”

It was three hours later that Melanie O’Neil McCairn left her sister-in-law’s house. By that time Rowena was drunk and Melanie had eaten three platefuls of the most exquisite little cakes. She would have eaten more, but her corset stays wouldn’t allow it.

So now, riding home in the carriage, she was thoughtful, for she’d been told an extraordinary story. If James McCairn didn’t marry for love within the next six weeks, before his thirty-fifth birthday, he was going to lose his ownership of McCairn.

“He’ll keep the title of laird, not that it’s worth much, but he’ll lose the property,” Rowena had said.

“But from what my daughter tells me, he loves that place and those people. They’re his life. Who would like the place better?”

“No one would like the place,” Rowena said as she poured herself more whiskey. “But his younger brother, Colin, would love to have the land. He could sell it and gamble away the proceeds, small as they would be. He has the family illness. Too bad he isn’t a drinker like me; it’s much cheaper.”

“Oh, my,” Melanie said, her mouth full of cake. “But, truly, I’m confused. If James loves the village and wants to stay there, why is he resisting my husband’s efforts to find him a wife?”

“Because James doesn’t know of the will.”

“Doesn’t know . . . ?”

Melanie had put down her empty plate while Rowena had picked up the whiskey bottle to pour herself more, but it was empty. Leaning back against the cushions of the couch, she looked at Melanie. “It was the worst argument that Angus and I ever had. Just prior to the time of his father’s death, James was in a bad way, locked into a miserable marriage and, from where he stood, he had no immediate future, as his father was still a young man. James used to beg his father to be allowed to try some things with the sheep or whatever, but my brother always said no.

“Then Ivor died in an accident. He was attending a Friday-to-Monday house party at some great estate in England and fell off the roof to his death. Afterward no one would admit to having been on the roof with him, but, knowing my older brother as I did, I’m sure he was probably chasing a housemaid.

“Anyway, James couldn’t be found for nearly three weeks after his father’s death. He had gone stalking in the Highlands with just a gillie, and no one knew where he was, so Angus and I had that time to hear the reading of the will and attend to what we heard.”

“That James was to marry for love before he was thirty-five,” Melanie said thoughtfully. “But James was already married at the time.”

“Yes. The will had been written some years before.” Here again, Rowena’s eyes bored into Melanie’s.

“I see,” she said. “For love. That’s the key. Everyone could see that there was no love between James and his wife, so that meant that when he was thirty-five, if he was still married to his current wife, the estates would automatically go to Colin.”

“Yes, exactly. But Colin—for I’m sure that he knew every word of that will—didn’t think that the young woman would die within a year and thereby give James a second chance to complete the will’s requirements.”

Melanie thought about that for a moment. “But the horror of his first marriage had no doubt soured James on marriage, so he’s been a confirmed bachelor all these years.”

“Yes, and Angus and I have tried everything we can think of to get him married again.”

“Without telling him the reason,” Melanie said. “I see. If he thought he had to marry ‘for love,’ he’d never be able to do it, would he? You can’t set out to be in love, but you can . . .” Her voice lowered. “—you can lie,” she finished.

“Now you see the argument that Angus and I had. Angus said that James should be told everything so he could get himself some pretty little girl and act like he loved her, marry her, and keep what he wanted. How hard could that be?”

“But James isn’t the ne’er-do-well that I’ve heard that Colin is, is he?” Melanie said. “Colin could act the part but not James. But then, who is to be the judge?”

“The reigning monarch.”

“What?!” Melanie said in disbelief.

“At the time of Ivor’s death, Victoria was queen, and she agreed to be the judge in the dispute. Ivor and Colin were frequent guests at her house in Balmoral, and as he did with everyone, Colin charmed her—she liked the idea of marrying ‘for love’ so much that she agreed to be the judge.”

“She certainly did believe she was going to live forever, didn’t she?” Melanie asked.

“Yes, but, as far as I know, her agreement is still binding on her son Edward.”

“My goodness,” Melanie said. “I wouldn’t want the responsibility to judge whether or not someone was in love.”

“The king has a great deal of experience in that area, if you know what I mean.”

At that Melanie smiled, for King Edward VII’s affairs with beautiful women were all the talk of society. The talk was discreet, but it was still rampant. “What a state of things,” Melanie said. “And James knows nothing of this?”

“No. I won the argument over Angus, so we agreed not to tell James.”

“No wonder Angus keeps sending young women to his nephew.”

At that Rowena shook her head. “We’ve had ten years of it! You can’t imagine the number of women we’ve sent to my nephew. And when James comes to town . . . Heaven help us, but we parade them in front of him.”

“But he’s not tempted.”

“Not in the least.” At that Rowena’s eyes closed for a moment. “My goodness. I’m too tired to talk anymore. Come tomorrow and I’ll have Cook bake you some seed cakes. You’ll like them; they’re half butter,” Rowena said, then she put her head on her chest and instantly went to sleep.

Melanie took a moment to pull a hand-crocheted spread off the back of the hard little couch and tuck it around Rowena before she left the room. But her mind wasn’t on where she was; instead, she was thinking about all that she’d been told.