The Scottish Bride (Sherbrooke Brides 6)

Her mother jerked suddenly, and Mary Rose realized that she’d pulled the brush too hard through her hair. “I’m so sorry, Mama. Oh dear, are you all right?”

“Braid my hair for me, Mary Rose, on top of my head. I think I would like to go downstairs today, perhaps out in the garden.”

“That would be wonderful,” Mary Rose said, and crossed her fingers. Please, she prayed, let her come back to me. Don’t let her mind cloud up again. “I want to work on my roses. You can give me advice.”

Her mother was silent for a very long time. Then she said, “The English are untrustworthy. Not as untrustworthy as your uncle, but you still should never put your faith in one of them, even a vicar, Mary Rose, or you will be sorely disappointed.”

“If you are thinking of the new Lord Barthwick, it’s true he is an Englishman and a vicar, Mama, but he is utterly trustworthy. I would wager my last groat on that.” Mary Rose paused a moment and smiled at the smooth braid she was plaiting. “I should have said that since I don’t have a last groat—or a first groat for that matter—my belief in him will have to suffice.”

“Does Donnatella still claim that Ian was going to wed with her, that he was her betrothed?”

“Yes, but it would have mattered only if Ian had lived. It doesn’t matter now. Let her say what she will. She was very fond of him too.”

“No, she wasn’t. She just wanted him because he would be the new Lord Barthwick, and because he wanted you. She is dangerous, Mary Rose.”

Mary Rose had nothing to say to that. She helped her mother dress in a lovely pale-yellow muslin gown that was many years out-of-date, but it didn’t matter because her mother was beautiful and so was the gown. She found some yellow ribbons to weave into her mother’s thick braids. “I wish Miles would soon return,” her mother said.

“I do too. He is such a nice man, always so very polite to me. I very much like the way he’s always come over here to visit with us.”

“Oh, yes,” said her mother.

Mary Rose dressed herself quickly and walked carefully beside her mother downstairs.

She saw Tysen standing in the entrance hall, looking up at them. Sir Lyon was at his side, looking up as well.

Her mother raised her hand in a small wave, looked at him for a very long time, and then she said to her daughter, “Do not trust an Englishman. He is far too handsome. When a man is that handsome there is inevitably sin in his nature.”

“No, Mama, really, it’s not true,” Mary Rose said in a low voice, hoping Tysen hadn’t heard her.

“I was told,” Tysen said clearly, his vicar’s deep voice carrying easily to every corner of the grand entrance hall, “never to trust a Scotsman.”

Sir Lyon threw back his head and laughed.

Donnatella came out of the breakfast room. She said, looking for just a moment over her shoulder at Gweneth and Mary Rose, “Ignore her, my lord. She is only Mary Rose’s mother, and she is quite mad.”

Gweneth Fordyce said, her fingers tightly clutched to Mary Rose’s arm, “I am mad when it suits me to be mad, Donnatella. You, however, are a bitch whether you wish to be or not.”

Perhaps, Mary Rose thought suddenly—a revelation, really—that was the truth of things. Her mother purposely chose to live in a world of her own creation. Gweneth broke away from Mary Rose and walked gracefully down the stairs, her head back, looking like a queen. “I wish to have breakfast now, daughter. Bring the new Barthwick laird and I will question him.”

“Yes, Mama.”

Tysen gave her a brief bow. “I should be delighted, ma’am.”

It had been a strange hour, Tysen thought later, riding beside Mary Rose. Because he had hours and years of experience dealing successfully with people of vastly diverse manners and behaviors and levels of impertinence, dealing with Gweneth Fordyce hadn’t overtaxed him. She had, however, embarrassed her daughter very badly in front of him, and he was sorry for that. She shouldn’t have kept harking to Mary Rose’s blind faith, particularly in men, when everyone knew that men were created by the devil to ruin women.

Tysen had chuckled and said, “Sometimes I have held that opinion myself, Mrs. Fordyce.”

“I am a spinster, Vicar.”

“Yes, ma’am. Indeed you are.”

“And perforce, my dearest daughter is a bastard.”

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“An appellation that perhaps fits the facts, ma’am, but not her character.”

Mary Rose had stared at him, then abruptly choked on her tea.