Tender Feud

Chapter Seven

“When it suits him,” Katrine muttered as she rubbed soap from her eyes, angry all over again at Raith’s refusal to negotiate her release in a timely fashion. She had thought of little else since their discussion two mornings ago, and her frustrated fury was nearly hot enough to set her bathwater to boiling.

Still fuming, she finished rinsing her hair with fresh water from the ewer and reached for a linen towel. Before she stepped from the tub, however, she glanced at the closed door to the laundry. She’d been careful to latch the door and fasten the shutters to ensure privacy, yet she had little confidence that she wouldn’t be disturbed.

Not that she expected company. Callum MacLean might be ungentlemanly enough to spy on a lady at her bath, but he had departed yesterday for regions unknown and, as far as Katrine knew, he hadn’t returned. And since it was Sunday, Flora and the other servants had gone to kirk. The Ardgour MacLeans weren’t the popish royalists so many of the Jacobites were, but rather Presbyterians like her own clan.

She was surprised when Flora raised no objections to her appropriating the copper hip bath in the laundry for the morning. She was anxious to wash her unruly mass of hair, and the washbasin in her room wasn’t nearly large enough for the task.

The upstairs chambermaid had voiced her own comments, though. Wasn’t it like a Campbell, the girl observed with a sneer, to consider herself too good to bathe in the burn like a true Highlander?

Katrine had bitten her tongue, not allowing herself to be goaded into accepting a foolish challenge. She had no desire to brave the icy waters of the stream when there was a perfectly good hip bath at her disposal. Besides, it was raining outside, a cold, miserable, drizzling Highland rain. Not having been bred to such harsh conditions, she feared she would catch an ague if she attempted such hardy bathing. And so she’d carried and heated her own water.

After she dried herself off, she donned the fresh clothing Flora had provided her. The bodice was worn and ill-fitting, and the skirt still too long, but Katrine considered the outfi

t an improvement. It might help, she reflected, if she remembered to ask Flora for a needle and thread so she could take up the hem.

When she had draped a linen kerchief around her shoulders, she began the task of emptying the bathwater. Filling her bucket from the tub, Katrine unlatched the door and flung it open, only to discover she had a young visitor.

“Meggie!” she said with a soft smile. “You didn’t attend church either, I see.” Privately Katrine thought it scandalous the way the child’s religious instruction was being neglected, but she suspected there was a good reason Meggie hadn’t accompanied Flora to the kirk; no doubt the young girl was frightened of crowds.

“You must be as lonesome as I am,” Katrine observed as the girl stood before her, looking lost and forlorn. “Would you care to keep me company this morning?”

The only response she received was a solemn, wide-eyed look. But having learned Meggie’s tragic history, Katrine had expected nothing else. Setting down her bucket, she held out her hand. No matter what Raith MacLean had ordered, she couldn’t turn her back on this lonely little waif. Besides, it gave her a certain satisfaction to defy him in this small way. “Come, you can sit with me while I comb my hair. It will take me forever to remove the tangles.”

A long moment passed, during which Meggie stared up at her proffered hand. Katrine waited patiently, knowing she couldn’t force the child’s trust, yet hoping for it all the same. Her heart warmed when the small fingers finally clasped hers. Pleased beyond measure, she led Meggie into the room, and drew up a second wooden stool before the hearth fire. “Here now, you may sit here, next to me.”

Launching into a spate of pleasant chatter, Katrine took her own seat and began the long process of combing out her damp tresses. She kept up the one-sided conversation until she felt a slight pressure on her arm. Meggie, she saw, had reached up to touch a curling lock of red hair, and was regarding it with awe.

Katrine paused, the hand that held the comb going still. For a moment she gazed down at the child, wondering how to reach her.

“I know,” she said finally, “my hair is an absurdly bright color, and it always wants taming. I wish I had your hair, Meggie. Yours is so straight and fine.” She hesitated, giving the child an appraising look. “Your hair would look even prettier if it were washed and combed and tied back with a ribbon. Perhaps you might like me to help you?”

Meggie glanced from her to the copper tub.

“Would you like that, Meggie? I would be happy to warm the bathwater for you. Then you can show Flora and your guardian how lovely you can look.”

At least the child understood what a bath was, Katrine thought as Meggie bent over to tug off her slippers.

Stockings followed, before Meggie climbed down from the stool and began to struggle with the lacings of her small stomacher. Katrine tried to help her undress, but Meggie wouldn’t allow it. She didn’t like to be touched, Katrine realized when she flinched away.

Accordingly, Katrine kept her distance, but her heart ached to see such silent suffering. She wished fervently that she could somehow ease the child’s pain. But perhaps she could, Katrine reflected as she busied herself pouring more hot water from the kettle into the tub. What Meggie needed was a healthy dose of laughter and friendship and love; Katrine had never known a child who needed it more.

Returning the kettle to the hearth, Katrine bent down before the fire, her eyes searching for what she needed. Finding a charred sliver of wood about six inches long, she drew it out and let it cool. When Meggie had scurried into the bath and was occupied with a sliver of soap, Katrine went to the whitewashed wall nearest the door. She stood there thinking a moment before she quickly began to sketch.

She possessed a fair amount of artistic skill, although her past governesses had been wont to complain that her taste was too wild to be proper. Indeed, her drawings were not the tame endeavors of most young ladies. Her bold slashing strokes with a charcoal pencil delineated details that made any subject more vivid, perhaps even savage.

In this instance, however, Katrine tried to gentle her hand as she drew two portraits of Meggie. Each sketch had wide dark eyes and a sharp little chin, but one depicted a wild little gypsy with a dirty face and disheveled hair, while the other showed a young girl with a beribboned coiffure and a quiet smile.

Then Katrine stood back, hoping that even a child who couldn’t speak possessed a little feminine vanity. “Well then, what do you think? Isn’t the one on the right much more pleasing?”

Meggie didn’t answer, but she seemed fascinated with the portraits. She kept staring at them all through her bath, her attention so distracted that she actually went so far as to allow Katrine to wash her hair.

“Come now,” Katrine said when Meggie had finished her bath and was swathed neck to toe in linen towels. “Why don’t you lead me to your bedchamber, and we’ll find a clean frock for you to wear. You do have some ribbons, don’t you? I hope so, for all of mine are in my trunks at my uncle’s house.”

Again Meggie made no reply, but she reluctantly suffered Katrine to take her hand. As they passed the wall, however, Meggie paused and reached out to touch the charcoal sketch of the smiling girl. Then amazingly, she turned and smiled up at Katrine.

If it was possible for a heart to go out to someone, Katrine’s did at that moment. Carefully, gently, she reached down to stroke the child’s dark hair. This time Meggie didn’t flinch away.