Days of Gold (35 page)

“I did not—” Angus began but Malcolm cut him off.

“Could you boys wait a while before fighting? I think we need to get to the others, and Tam wants to see you.”

“Aye, Tam,” Angus said, grinning, his arm still so tight around Malcolm’s strong shoulders that he was causing the man pain, but Malcolm didn’t complain. “You got them
all
?” Angus asked, looking at Shamus as though he doubted that he really could take down six men.

“Hmph!” Shamus snorted. “Didn’t take me but a minute. They were standing in plain sight. Anyone could have seen them.”

Angus couldn’t help grinning at Shamus’s arrogance. He looked at Malcolm. “So what do you think of this new country?”

“Too hot,” Malcolm said. “Give me the coolness of Scotland. And their whiskey is bad.”

“And they think we’re English,” Shamus said, as though that was the final insult.

“With your accent?” Angus said happily. “Can they understand you?”

“Not many can,” Shamus said, and for a moment his eyes told Angus that he was glad to see him.

“Up there,” Angus said, nodding toward the path to the cave. Shamus went up, but Angus stood where he was, with his arm firmly around Malcolm’s shoulders.

“You must let me go, lad,” Malcolm said gently. “I’m not a ghost and I’m here to stay.”

“Ghost,” Angus said, smiling. “You didn’t come here in a coffin full of sawdust, did you?”

“No,” Malcolm said slowly, “but why would you ask that? Is that how
you
sneaked into this country?”

“No,” Angus said, his smile widening. “I came here as an English gentleman.”

“I want to hear every word of this story,” Malcolm said.

“I’ll be glad to tell it to you.”

N
O, NO, NO
, no!” Angus said, his words echoing off the cave walls. “I will
not
do it. I refuse. And that’s the last time I’m saying it.”

Last night, a fire had made the cave almost homelike. Mac had taken Angus’s horse and was on his way back to the fort to get help, while T.C., Matt, and Naps had stayed with Angus. Thanks to Matt’s surgery and the plants that T.C. had found, Naps was resting comfortably, passing drowsily in and out of consciousness from the brew that T.C. had given him.

Tam, Shamus, Malcolm, and Angus sat around the fire and talked in the Scottish burr that the other men couldn’t quite make out.

They’d spent hours exchanging stories. Angus made them all laugh uproariously with his account of how he got rooked into helping Edilean escape her uncle’s treacherous plan. The first time he said her name, his breath caught and he didn’t know if he could go on, but the second time was easier. By the time he was well into his story, he was smiling and remembering it all fondly.

He started telling the men about James Harcourt’s wife’s ugliness and how she’d tried to get him to stay in bed with her, but Malcolm cut him off by sending a burning branch flying. When they got it cleaned up, Malcolm asked about James, so Angus told of hitting James on the head with a candlestick. “And Edilean shaved me,” he said in an almost dreamy voice.

“She shaved your beard off?” Shamus said. “I knew there was something different about you.”

Throughout the story, Shamus kept shaking his head and muttering, “A wagonload of gold. The trunks were full of gold.” He sounded as though he couldn’t believe what he was hearing—and what he’d lost.

Angus told of dressing in James’s clothes and boarding the ship. For a few moments he was silent as he let himself remember the time with Edilean on the ship. He thought of tying her corset, of teasing her, of making her laugh. He could see it all so clearly that it was almost as though he could touch her.

“Angus!” Tam said, bringing him back to where he was.

Angus smiled, even though he hardly recognized him. Tam had grown until he was as tall as Angus. He was no longer the boy who trailed after his bigger, older cousin. In the four years that they’d been separated, Tam had become a man, and Angus regretted that he’d not been there to see him grow and change. But then, Angus wondered if his going was the reason that Tam had grown up so quickly. With Angus gone, Tam was now the one to inherit... What? Angus thought. There was nothing left of the McTern clan to inherit but the responsibility.

“I’ve entertained you enough,” Angus said at last. “You didn’t come all the way across the ocean just to hear my stories. What have you come for?”

“We—” Shamus began, but when Malcolm gave him a hard look he closed his mouth.

“Kenna thanks you for the silk dress you sent her,” Tam said.

“And how is she?” Angus tried to keep his voice steady as he thought about the sister who’d once been so close to him. “How many children does she have now?”

“Six,” Malcolm said. “She liked that the dress you sent her had...” He didn’t quite know what to say.

“An expandable front,” Angus said.

“Ah, so that’s what she meant,” Malcolm said, then sipped his coffee and was silent.

“What are the lot of you up to?” Angus asked suspiciously. “How did you even find me?”

“That was easy enough,” Shamus said. “What with your picture everywhere, there were a lot of people with information about you.”

Angus grimaced.

“That’s true,” Malcolm said slowly. “But it’s also true that we wanted to see you.” He glanced at the leather clothes Angus had on. “This country suits you.”

“When you can stay alive,” Shamus said.

“Out with it!” Angus said loudly, making the men on the far side of the cave jump. Even Naps stirred in his sleep.

“Miss Edilean’s uncle died,” Tam said.

“Did he?” Angus said and couldn’t help a bit of a smile. It was one less person who was after him.

“And he left all his property to Miss Edilean.”

“Good,” Angus said, looking from one to the other of them, but they were silent. “You want to buy the place from her, don’t you?”

“For a peppercorn a year,” Malcolm said quickly.

“I think she’d agree to that.”

“She don’t need the money,” Shamus said, “not with all those slave girls of hers.”

“Slaves?” Angus said. “I can’t imagine that Edilean would own a slave.”

“That’s not what he meant,” Malcolm said, glaring at Shamus to keep his mouth shut. “Miss Edilean has... Well, it’s...” He looked at Tam for help.

“She started a business in Boston called ‘Bound Girl.’ ”

Angus looked at him in astonishment. “Are you saying that she opened a... a house of... ?”

“Did this new country put your mind in the gutter?” Malcolm snapped. “Miss Edilean is a
lady
. Mind what you say about her, boy!”

“Or you’ll turn me over your knee?” Angus asked, smiling at the familiarity of it all.

Tam leaned forward. “She sells the best and the most vegetables and fruit in Boston. She has a company that she owns and runs with the help of women who used to be indentured servants.”

“I like her handbill,” Shamus said, grinning.

“What’s he talking about?” Angus asked.

“Well,” Tam said slowly, “Miss Edilean does have a rather, uh, enticing sign for her business.”

“A girl,” Shamus said, “big and healthy, with her sleeves rolled up. Good muscles on her, and she’s got—” He made a gesture to show a large bosom. “Damn handsome woman!”

They all looked at Shamus for a moment, then turned back to Angus. “Is this true? Edilean runs a business?”

“From what we were told, she has over a hundred employees, all women, and she owns half a dozen farms,” Malcolm said. “How long has it been since you’ve seen her?”

“Four years, three months, and twenty-two days,” Angus said quickly, then looked embarrassed. “I think. It’s just a guess.”

“You always were good at guessing,” Malcolm said but lowered his head to hide his smile.

“So Edilean started a business,” Angus said in wonder. “And it’s doing well?”

“Very well,” Malcolm said. “She earns a lot of money, and she’s used it to set up a couple of houses for women without husbands, widows and such. She helps a lot of women.”

“There were nine bound women on the ship when we came over,” Angus said, staring at the fire, remembering. “But Edilean didn’t like them. She hired one of them to do some sewing for her, but I could tell that she had no intention of keeping her on after the voyage. Funny how you think you know someone but don’t. I can’t imagine Edilean running a business and certainly not hiring women like them.”

When his head came up, he was smiling. “She got into a fight—a bloody fistfight—with one of the prisoners named Tabitha. Edilean—”

“Big girl? Pretty?” Tam asked.

“Yes,” Angus said. “You didn’t meet her, did you?”

“If she’s the Tabitha we heard about, she’s Miss Edilean’s farm manager,” Tam said. “She runs all the farms and she doesn’t take any guff off anyone.”

Angus’s mouth dropped open. “Edilean and Tabitha work
together
?”

“What did they fight about?” Shamus asked, his eyes alight at the thought.

“Diamonds,” Angus said, and looked back at Malcolm and Tam. “Edilean and Tabitha together. What a world this is! Tell me, is Edilean still living with Harriet Harcourt?”

“Oh, yes,” Tam said. “Harriet takes care of the money for all of the business.”

Angus narrowed his eyes at them. “How long have you three been in this country?”

“A while,” Malcolm said.

“Over three months,” Shamus said. “It took some time to find you. It wasn’t hard, mind you, but it took time. Did you know that we could turn you in for a thousand pounds?”

When Angus started to say something, Tam interrupted. “Don’t worry, James Harcourt is taken care of. His sister Harriet pays him to stay away from Miss Edilean.”

“She does what?”

“Pays him to stay away,” Shamus said loudly, as though Angus were deaf. “Gives him a remittance. It’s common enough.”

“Are you telling me that the lot of you have spent three months snooping into Edilean’s private affairs?”

Malcolm looked at Tam who looked at Shamus, then they all looked back at Angus. “Yes,” Malcolm said. “That’s just what we’ve been doing.”

“And what does Edilean know of this?”

“Nothing,” Tam said. “We were careful to stay out of her sight. And that wasn’t easy, as she runs around in her little carriage constantly. I remember one morning I was walking down the street and there she was. I was sure she’d recognize me, but she was having it out with some man about some fruit—she doesn’t like for it to be bruised—so she didn’t see me.”

The story was so like Edilean that it caused a pain in Angus’s chest. “Has she—? I mean, are there... ?”

“Men?” Shamus asked, then when the others glared at him, he threw up his hands. “What’s the problem with all of you? I think you should get on with it and
tell
him.”

“Tell me what?” Angus asked.

“We worked with a lawyer,” Malcolm said, and turned to Tam. “You tell him.”

“We thought that since Miss Edilean is so rich, what with the
gold and the business, we might persuade her to give the McTern estate back to us. We don’t think she wants it. It means nothing to her.”

“You told me that, and I said that you won’t have any trouble. Edilean has a very generous nature. I’m sure she’ll give you the rotting old place even without the peppercorn. Don’t tell me you’re afraid to ask her.”

“It’s not that...” Tam said, looking at Malcolm.

Angus turned to Shamus. “Would you tell me what they can’t seem to get out?”

Shamus opened his mouth to speak, but Malcolm blurted out the truth. “You’re wanted for kidnapping her, so she has to swear before a judge that she ran off with you of her own free will. Once you’re cleared, she can give the place to you because you’re the laird, then you can give it to Tam, as he’s next in line.”

“I see,” Angus said. He sat still for a moment, then got up and walked to the back of the cave. Naps was asleep, but T.C. and Matt looked wide awake as they listened to what the Scotsmen were saying. Angus didn’t know how much they could understand, but from the looks on their faces, they were getting the gist of what was going on. Angus thought of the words
kidnapping
and
wanted
that were being bandied about.

He looked back at Malcolm. “You’re saying that you want
me
to go to Edilean and ask her to tell a judge that I didn’t kidnap her, and that she went with me of her own free will.”

“Exactly,” Malcolm said brightly. “She could give the place directly to Tam, but he’s not the laird. It has to go down the line, all in proper order.”

“And the problem with that is that I’m thought to be a criminal.”

“Lawler was the only one who had any right to want you dead,” Tam said.

“That’s because it was his niece and his gold that you stole,” Shamus said.

“I didn’t—” Angus began, but then stopped. “I’m sorry, but I can’t do what you want.”

“Why not?” Tam asked, his face showing his anger. “You want to keep being the laird even though you live
here
?”

“Of course not!” Angus said, but he thought about Tam’s words. To give up his birthright? Could he do that? He’d spent most of his life trying to give honor back to the name that his grandfather had almost destroyed, so could he just walk away from it?

“He won’t do it,” Tam said to Malcolm. “I told you he wouldn’t.”

“Do you want to go back to Scotland?” Malcolm asked softly, looking at Angus. “Is that what you want, lad?”

Angus glanced at them and knew he couldn’t say what was in his mind. They were so fresh off the boat from the old country that they still smelled of heather, but Angus had been in America for years, and he liked the feeling that a man could do or be anything. Right now, if he waited long enough, he’d get a thousand acres. The land would be his own, and he could do with it whatever he wanted. In Scotland, nothing had belonged to him, and what he did was always overseen by others. Even now, if he were given charge of the McTern lands, he’d still be expected to look out for hundreds of people. No, he didn’t want to go back. “No,” he said at last. “I want to stay here.”

Tam’s face lost its angry look and he seemed a bit ashamed of the way he’d nearly attacked his cousin.