Far Horizons (17 page)

“If one letter went astray,” Margaret objected, “perhaps there were others.”

“I don't think Sir James cares enough to keep the letters from me,” Harriet said after a moment. “He only took the one to show his power, I'm almost certain of it. He's like a cat, and everyone under him a wee mouse.” She shivered. “But never mind him. I'll wait for a letter from Allan, and then I'll write. If there's anyone you should think is playing false...”

“Allan would never!” Margaret cried. “If you knew him at all, you'd never doubt him. His word is his honour.”

“Margaret, please.” Harriet touched her hand. “Let's not fight like this. Surely there's enough going on without harsh words between us. I'll write Allan, I promise I will.”

“I don't want to quarrel.” Margaret sighed and shook her head. “But don't write Allan for my sake!”

“No, I will not,” Harriet agreed with an answering smile. “It will be for mine.”

“Well done, Caroline!” Harriet clapped her hands as the little girl finished a simple piece. “You've been practising, I see.”

Caroline, for once, did not have a stinging retort. Instead, she ducked her head and blushed prettily.

Harriet marvelled at the steps the little girl had taken, both in musical ability and manners. As it'd turned out, Caroline responded to vinegar rather than honey--Harriet had won her through plain speaking and a no-nonsense approach rather than any cloying overtures of friendship that rang false.

“I think we're finished for today.”

“Will you join us for tea, Miss Campbell?”

Harriet hesitated. Normally she would've accepted but Margaret's rebuke still rang in her ears. She didn't want to become too familiar with any of the Riddells.

“Very well.” For Caroline's sake, she would make the effort. As for Andrew... hopefully she'd put paid to any plans for friendship from that quarter.

They passed a pleasant half hour in the drawing room, with Caroline amusing both her and Andrew with her girlish antics.

“She loves a show,” Andrew said wryly.

“Perhaps it runs in the family,” Harriet returned, and was rewarded with a shout of laughter.

“I see you're all enjoying yourselves,” Sir James said as he entered the drawing room. “Excellent. And tea as well. I'll have a cup, if Miss Campbell will be so good as to pour.”

“Of course,” Harriet murmured.

Sir James took the cup and beamed at them all. His eyes were bright, his face flushed, and Harriet felt a strange stirring of unease. He looked almost too happy.

“You look as if you've had some good news, Uncle,” Andrew remarked mildly.

“Indeed, I have.” Riddell turned to Harriet. “I met your brother in town today, Miss Campbell. A fine lad. We did a bit of business together... I'm sure it will be to our mutual benefit.” His thin lips curled in a smile Harriet didn’t like at all.

“Business?” She swallowed her tea, and tasted the sharp tang of fear. Ian had left for Fort William this morning, to see their man of business--not Sir James Riddell. “What business might that be, pray?” she asked faintly.

“I assume you knew of the arrangements,” James replied. “Ian seemed to think so, at any rate. I've bought Achlic Farm.”

Harriet was sure she'd heard wrong. “You mean Ian sold the back pastures to you,” she corrected. “The twenty acres.” She'd no idea why Ian would've sold to the Riddells instead of through their man, but she couldn't argue that point now.

“No, my dear.” Riddells's voice was almost gentle even though his gaze remained narrowed and shrewd. “I've bought the whole farm. Everything.”

CHAPTER EIGHT

Harriet slammed the kitchen door of the farmhouse, not caring if dishes broke or her father woke up. Fury and fear stormed within her in a terrible gale.

Margaret looked up from the pastry she was mixing in alarm. “What on earth is wrong?” She rose from the kitchen table, one hand on Eleanor's shoulder.

“Eleanor, please go fetch some potatoes for dinner.” Harriet's voice shook, and she strove to control it. She'd had the long walk home to calm herself and think of a way out of this disaster, but it hadn't helped.

Eleanor, her face pale, slipped quietly from the kitchen. Harriet hadn't fooled her sister, but Eleanor was too wise and kindhearted to make a fuss.

“Harriet, what has happened?” Margaret stood in front of her, hands clasped.

“The worst thing.” Tears pricked Harriet's eyes and she blinked them back. “We've lost Achlic.”

“No! How?” Margaret's face was white with shock.

“It seems Ian...” Harriet swallowed, hardly able to believe what James Riddell had told her. “Ian sold the farm to Sir James Riddell, instead of through our man of business.”

Margaret blinked. “You mean the back pasture.”

“I wish I did! Riddell showed me the contract himself.”

“I don't understand...”

The door opened, and a merry voice filled the room. “I'm back... hello, Margaret. Harriet.” Ian smiled at them all, his eyes twinkling with excitement. “I've done as you said, Harriet, and I got an even better--”

“Done as I said?” Harriet cut across him, her voice sharp and cold. “If you'd done as I said, Ian Campbell, we'd have money in our pockets and a roof over our heads! Instead of... instead of...” She choked on a sob, and then forced it back. “What on earth possessed you to deal with Sir James himself, instead of through our man?”

“You know about that?” Ian looked surprised, but not particularly discomfited. “Today's your pianoforte lesson, isn't it? Well, then... yes, I did, but our man of business must be crooked, Harriet! The price he quoted was much less than what Riddell was willing to pay, and I thought...”

“Our man isn't crooked! If anyone is, it's that scoundrel Riddell. How could you trust him?”

“We did business together, Harriet. I sold him the back pasture, just as you instructed.”

“Wait.” Margaret held out a hand, staying Harriet's temper for a moment. “Something's amiss. Ian, tell us what happened exactly.”

Briefly Ian told them the story, how Riddell had met him in the street on the way to the offices, and asked him if he was selling Achlic Farm. When Ian explained he was only intending to sell the back pasture, Riddell expressed an interest and offered a price higher than the man of business would.

“But you didn't even know what the man would offer,” Harriet interjected.

“I know, and I told him that. He told me to meet him in the Lantern Inn after I met with Mr. Franklin, and we could discuss it then. I needn't make a decision either way, he said, till I'd thought about it...”

“Then why didn't you?” Harriet asked bitterly. “You should've discussed it with all of us, Ian, not gone haring off on your own!”

Ian flushed guiltily, although his chin lifted. “I think I'm capable of making decisions as the man of the family.”

Harriet bit back the insult she wanted to fling at him. “Don't you realise what you've done?” she asked despairingly.

“Riddell offered a higher price. He told me he was interested in acquiring more land on Mull, and so he was willing to pay for it. While I was meeting with Mr. Franklin, he'd had his own man draw a contract up. He told me I could have the money in my hand, right then, if I signed it... and look, Harriet, I do!” Ian fumbled with his pockets. “If we'd gone through Mr. Franklin, it would've taken ages... and the price was less! So what have I done wrong?” Ian gazed at them both, his face paling as realisation sunk in. “Something's happened. You look as if you've seen ghosts, the two of you. What is it?”

“Ian,” Harriet said quietly, “did you read the contract Riddell put before you?”

“I looked at it.” Ian shifted uncomfortably. “He told me what it said and... well, there were a lot of words! I was in a hurry and I wanted the money... why? What does it matter?”

The anger drained out of Harriet, leaving her limp and utterly hopeless. “The contract wasn't for the back pasture, Ian. It was for Achlic Farm... all of it. You sold everything to Riddell, including the roof over our heads.”

The sun shone brightly on the golden green fields and red soil of Prince Edward Island as Allan strode along. It was late summer, just turning to autumn, and the maples and birches which lined the road were tinged with red. The sun was warm on his head, but in the evening there would be a nip in the air, and in a few weeks there would be a frost.

It'd been almost a year since the MacDougalls had landed in Pictou, and six months since they'd finished their cabin and begun farming their own land. Since then they'd prospered, and their first harvest of wheat, potatoes, and barley looked to be a good one. Yet despite all this Allan was troubled.

Only yesterday evening the family had sat together on the porch, watching the sun set over the river. Everything should have been peaceful and perfect, and instead a pall of unhappiness hung over the MacDougall home.

Allan had tried to speak of it with his mother. “We didn't come to the new world for this, did we, Mother?” he asked softly, when Sandy had gone inside.

Betty turned to him, her face troubled, her eyes clouded with disappointment. “I don't know what you mean, Allan. Surely we've everything we want here.”

Allan shook his head and reached out to gently clasp her hand. “You can't be that simple with me. I see the way you look... and Father. Why won't he involve himself in the community? He's shut himself out completely.” Ever since the meeting several months ago, Sandy had withdrawn from the Scots community. He gave a civil nod to someone in passing, and that was all. The rest of the Scots on the island were close knit, sharing each other's joys and sorrows. “We're pariahs,” Allan said aloud. “And it's our own fault.”

“You mustn't speak such!” Betty exclaimed in a low voice, but Allan saw the truth of it in her face.

“You must feel the worst of it, Mother.” Allan didn't know all that much of a woman's world, but he guessed that Betty missed the camaraderie and shared chores the other women enjoyed, the cycle of birth, marriage and death in which the other women supported each other.

Sandy's footsteps could be heard, and Betty shook her head, lips pressed firmly together. “Let's not speak of it,” she said quietly, and Allan acquiesced to her wishes.

Now, with the sun shining on his bare head, Allan wished he could throw off his cares. Yet his future looked as bleak as ever, even with their first good harvest about to be gathered.

His father’s isolation from the Scots community made his own burden much harder to bear, his father’s orders harder to take. There was no relief, no one to talk to, not even any slender threads of hope upon which he could cling.

He’d tried speaking to his father once, as they surveyed the field of potatoes seeming to stretch to a cloudless horizon. Sandy had been in a buoyant mood.

“It’s good work, this, isn’t it, lad?”

Allan shaded his eyes from the sun and watched as Archie strode to the shore of the river and sluiced himself with water. “Aye, it is.”

“Another harvest like this, and you’ll be sending back for Harriet. I thought the two of you could have the back bedroom. It’s more private.” Sandy winked, and Allan stared at his boots, the toes grimed in red dirt.

“I thought we’d build our own cabin,” he said after a moment. He’d thought of this at night, listening to the crickets chirp their happy chorus and watching the clouds shift across the moon. He knew he couldn’t leave his father, the ties that bound them together also held him with cords of duty and honour.

Still, there had to be a way to be his own man, a man of property and responsibility so he could return to Mull with his head held high.

“Your own cabin,” Sandy repeated, his voice dangerously neutral.

“You know Campbell wants a man of property for his daughter,” Allan said quietly. He could feel the thud of his own heart, and hated the way he had to present his ambitions to his father as if they were broken toys. “I thought perhaps when Harriet and I marry, I could take some of the acreage on the other side of the river. The farm is MacDougall land, of course, all of it, but it would be good to farm my own land.”

Sandy stared at the fields before them, his expression unreadable. “Well, we’ll see about that,” he finally said in a tone that told Allan the discussion was over.

Archie came over the knoll, his hair and shirt soaked, a broad grin on his face. There had been a new, relaxed ease to his brother that only put Allan more on his guard. What was Archie planning? For his own plans looked to crumble to dust once again.

Now other troubles crowded in his mind as well. In the year since he'd left Scotland, he'd heard from Harriet only once. He'd written fifteen times, yet never a response. Only this morning he'd sent another letter to her. He thought now of the words which had poured from his heart:

How can I express the consternation of my heart, or account for the long and cruel silence on your part? This is the fifteenth letter I have written you since, but I am afraid they never got your length, or you would not be so long in writing me. I know you too well to imagine you capable of any change or caprice towards me, and I hope you know me too well to expect any change on my side...

Had his words been foolish? Perhaps she had changed. Perhaps she'd found someone else. David Andrews had always had a fondness for Harriet. What if...

There was no point thinking such things. Allan had promised to be faithful, and he would. It was Harriet who was free, not him.

“Hello there, Allan MacDougall.”

Allan turned in surprise. A pretty girl with blond curls and laughing, hazel eyes stood behind him, smiling. Allan knew her slightly. She was Elizabeth Campbell, the daughter of their neighbour, and the girl Archie had once fancied.

“Good afternoon. A fine day, isn't it?” He spoke brusquely, and wished he'd moderated his tone.

Elizabeth's eyes seemed to laugh at him, as if she knew his thoughts. “It is, indeed. I'm going down to the river, to the raspberry patch by the bend. Are you going that way? Will you walk a ways with me?”