“Fenella,” Saidh said with realization.
“Aye,” Lady MacDonnell said solemnly. “Allen’s own betrothed had died while still a child, but there were a surprising number of women in the same position. He met with many o’ them to consider them as brides, but most were too eager and spoke o’ wanting babes right away, and many babes to boot. And then he met Fenella, who seemed to shrink from his touch and avoid his gaze, and so he tried to find out more about her.” Mouth tightening, she admitted, “There had been whispers when Hammish Kennedy lived, of his strange tastes and cruelties in the bedchamber, and there had been a great deal of talk and dismay at how much blood covered the bedsheets they hung in the hall the day after his wedding to Fenella.”
Saidh swallowed and nodded as she recalled those sheets herself. She’d been rather horrified too. It had looked like they were the sheets of someone who had been dealt a mortal blow and bled out in their bed, and Fenella had been so pale the next morning.
“Allen suspected Fenella feared the marital bed and would no’ trouble him o’er much for his presence in her bed,” Lady MacDonnell continued sadly, “And so he married her at once and brought her home.”
Saidh sat back in her chair, her mending forgotten in her hands. “Well, that explains his kindness in no’ claiming his husbandly rights.” She smiled crookedly and admitted, “Allen was right, Fenella was terrified o’ the marital bed after her first marriage. Actually, I suppose they were perfect fer each other.”
“Aye,” Lady MacDonnell agreed.
Saidh tilted her head and asked, “And yet ye still suspect her o’ killing him. Why?”
“Fer the most part, Fenella was fine. But sometimes she’d get this look in her eyes . . . a flatness, cold and empty,” Lady MacDonnell said slowly, almost as if she was trying to understand herself what made her suspect the woman had killed her son. “And then there is the feather.”
Saidh didn’t hide her confusion. “The feather?”
Lady MacDonnell set down her sewing, her gaze far away as she explained, “The senior MacIver was an old and dear friend o’ me husband’s when he lived, and so I attended his wedding to Fenella,” she explained. “I was still there in the morning when he was found dead in their bed. Fenella was . . .” She frowned and shook her head. “Well, she was crying, as usual. So meself and several of the other women still present offered to prepare the body fer burial.”
Saidh nodded and simply waited for her to continue.
“We were washing the body,” she said slowly. “I was working on his face and noted that his eyes were bloodshot.”
“Oh?” Saidh didn’t have a clue what that might suggest.
Lady MacDonnell seemed to realize that and explained, “Allen was no’ me only child. I had three sons ere him, and all o’ them died ere they reached a year in age, and all in their sleep. I thought it was me fault, that I was birthing weak babes, but then when Allen was a wee tot, just months old, I woke in the middle o’ the night, suddenly anxious o’er him and went to check on him. I caught the wet nurse trying to smother him with a pillow. She confessed she’d done the same to each of my other sons.”
“I’m so sorry,” Saidh said sincerely, horrified at the tragedies the woman had suffered in her life. She’d lost four sons, all told now.
“Thank ye,” Lady MacDonnell said solemnly. “But ye see, me three dead boys had bloodshot eyes too and once I kenned what the maid had done, I did wonder if it were no’ somehow a result o’ the smothering.”
“And Laird MacIver had bloodshot eyes,” Saidh said slowly.
Lady MacDonnell nodded. “O’ course, that was no proof. Laird MacIver was an old man and his eyes were often bloodshot and rheumy.”
“Oh.” Saidh nodded again.
“But there was also a goose feather in his mouth, caught at the back o’ his tongue,” Lady MacDonnell added grimly.
“Ye think Fenella smothered him with a goose?” Saidh asked uncertainly and Lady MacDonnell gave a surprised laugh.
“Nay, me dear, Laird MacIver was wealthy and had had his pillows and mattress stuffed with goose feather and herbs to encourage sweet dreams,” she explained.
“Oh.” Saidh grimaced and then admitted, “Our pillows were stuffed with wool and rags.”
“Ah.” Lady MacDonnell said with a smile.
“So ye think Fenella smothered him with his pillow and one o’ the feathers was somehow . . .”
“Sucked into his mouth as he gasped fer breath,” Lady MacDonnell said quietly. “I now think ’tis a possibility. Although, at the time I just assumed the feather may have been loosed in his efforts to bed Fenella, and that he’d sucked it in then.” She grimaced and shook her head. “The senior MacIver was an old man, after all, and ’tis doubtful she’d have had long to wait to be widowed anyway, so why would she take the risk and kill him? Besides, the senior MacIver was only her second husband and the first had been killed by bandits who had struck her down as well.”
Saidh bit her lip and held her tongue.
“Even when Laird MacIver’s nephew married her and then died so precipitously I did no’ think she may ha’e killed either man. After all, the younger MacIver was out riding alone and she was in the castle with his mother and aunt, so ’twas no’ as if she could ha’e done it.”
“Aye,” Saidh muttered, but she was recalling the pin in Joan’s horse that had made it go wild and throw her.