The Winter Sea

But he spoke first. He said, ‘“The best laid schemes o’ mice an’ men…”’

He’d meant for me to smile, I knew. I didn’t.

Graham said, ‘You realize Stuart thinks of you as being his?’

‘I know.’ I raised my head at that, and met his eyes. ‘I’m not.’

‘I know.’ His voice was quiet, willing me to understand. ‘But he’s my brother.’

And just what, I thought, was that supposed to mean? That since his brother had such clear designs on me, he didn’t think it right to interfere? That, never mind my preference, or the fact that something seemed to be developing between us, Graham thought it best to just forget it, give it up, because his brother might object?

‘Here you are,’ said Stuart, breezing through the doorway of the sitting-room, my coat in hand. The one good thing about self-centered men, I thought, was that they were oblivious to everything around them. Any other person walking into that room at that moment would have surely been aware of something hanging in the air between myself and Graham.

But Stuart only held my coat for me, while Jimmy, coming back, said, ‘Div ye want one o’ the loons tae walk ye hame?’

‘No, that’s all right.’ I thanked him once again for lunch and shrugged my coat on and, still with my back to Stuart, somehow summoned up the thin edge of a smile to show to Graham. ‘I’ll be fine,’ I told them, ‘on my own.’

So, not a problem, I assured myself. I’d come to Cruden Bay to work, to write my book. I didn’t have the time to get involved with someone, anyway.

My bathwater was cooling, but I settled deeper into it until the water lapped my chin. My characters were talking, as they always did when I was in the bath, but I tried shutting out their voices—in particular the calm voice of John Moray, whose grey, watchful eyes seemed everywhere around me.

I regretted having made him look like Graham. I could hardly change it now, he’d taken shape and would resist it, but I really didn’t need an everyday reminder of a man who’d thrown me over.

Moray’s voice said something, low. I sighed, and rolled to reach the pen and paper that I kept beside the tub. ‘All right,’ I said. ‘Hang on.’

I wrote his words down, and Sophia’s voice spoke up with a response, and in a minute I had pulled the plug and stepped out of the bathtub and was buttoning my clothes so I could head for the computer, smiling faintly at the thought of how the worst things in my life sometimes inspired the best plot twists.

When I’d stood and talked to Graham in the stables, only yesterday, surrounded by the horses and the dog curled in the hay, so like the scene that I’d just written in my book, I had been thinking how life echoed art.

And now the time had come, I thought, for art to echo life.

VII

MORAY’S GAZE HAD SWUNG away and out to sea, and suddenly he pulled upon the gelding’s reins and brought him to a standstill.

Stopping too, Sophia asked, ‘What is it?’

Even as she spoke the words, she saw it, too—a ship, just coming into view around the jagged headland to the south. She could not see its colors yet, but something in the way it seemed to prowl the coastline made her apprehensive.

Moray, with no change of his expression, turned his horse. ‘’Tis time we started back.’

She made no argument, but turning with him, followed at that same slow, measured walk that gained them little ground before the silent, purposeful advance of those full sails. Sophia knew he only held them to that pace for her own comfort, and that chivalry would keep him from increasing it, so of her own accord she urged the mare into a rolling canter that would speed their progress.

Moray, left behind a moment, unprepared, was quickly at her side again, and when they reached the stableyard of Slains he stretched a hand to take the bridle of the mare and hold her steady as she halted.

He was not exactly smiling, but his eyes held deep amusement. ‘I believe ’tis proper form, when running races, to inform the other party when to start.’ Swinging himself from the saddle, he came and put his two hands round her waist to help her down.

Sophia said, ‘I did not mean to race. I only—’

‘Aye,’ he said. ‘I ken what ye intended.’ She was standing on the ground now, but he did not take his hands away. He held her very differently than Billy Wick had done—his hands were gentle, and she knew that she had but to move to step clear of their circle…but she felt no will to move. The horse, still standing warm against her back, became a living wall that blocked her view of everything except John Moray’s shoulders, and his face as he looked down at her. ‘If ever ye do find my pace too slow,’ he told her, quietly, ‘ye only have to tell me.’

She knew he was not speaking of their ride. She felt the flush begin to rise along her throat, her neck, her cheeks, while in her chest her heartbeat leaped against her stays with…what? Not fear, but something strangely kin to that emotion, as she thought of what might happen if she were to give him any answer.

‘Colonel Moray!’ Running feet approached and Rory broke upon them, taking little notice this time of their close position. Other things of more importance occupied him now. He said, ‘Her ladyship does ask for you, without delay.’

Sophia felt the hands fall from her waist as Moray gave a formal nod and took his leave of her. ‘Ye will excuse me?’

‘Certainly.’ She was relieved to find she had a voice and that it sounded almost normal, and was more relieved yet to discover, when she took a step, that her still-trembling legs could move at all, and hold her upright.