Mr Hall came two days later.
He stayed closeted some time with Colonel Hooke and then departed, pausing only long enough to pay his respects to the countess, who was sitting reading with Sophia in the sunlight of the drawing room.
‘You will stay and dine with us, surely?’ she asked him.
‘Forgive me, but no. I must start back as soon as I am able.’
With an eyebrow arched, the countess said, ‘Then do at least allow my cook to make a box for you. It will take no more than a few minutes, and the duke will surely not begrudge you that.’ She called to Kirsty, and with her instruction given, asked the priest to sit. ‘I have been reading to Miss Paterson some pages of Mr Defoe’s excellent reportage of the hurricane in England, of a few years back. She did lead a sheltered life before she came to us and had not heard the fullness of the tales.’
He nodded. ‘Yes, it was God’s punishment upon a sinful people who have put away their rightful king and will not see the error of their ways.’
The countess looked at him, and glancing up, Sophia saw the humor in her eyes. ‘Good Mr Hall, you cannot think that God would send so fierce a wind against a country for its sins? Faith, all the world would be so plagued with winds no house would stand, for we are none of us unstained. ’Twas not the English who sold Scotland’s independence, in our Parliament.’ She smiled, to soften her reminder of the way the duke had voted. ‘Still, if God does send us wind, we can but hope he’ll put it at the back of young King Jamie’s sails, to bring him to us faster.’ Turning the book in her hand, she regarded it. ‘Mr Defoe is a very good writer. Have you had occasion to meet him, in Edinburgh?’
‘Daniel Defoe? Yes, I have met him a few times,’ said Mr Hall. ‘But I confess I do not like the man. He is canny, and watchful. Too watchful, I thought.’
She took his meaning, and, with interest, asked, ‘You do believe he is a spy?’
‘I’ve heard he owes much, for his debts, to Queen Anne’s government, and is not to be trusted. And the duke does share my views.’
‘No doubt he does.’ The countess closed the book and set it to one side. ‘Perhaps the duke will see his way to warn me if he knows of any others who are spying for the queen,’ she said, ‘so that I may be careful not to have them here at Slains.’
Sophia held her breath a moment, because she felt sure that from the smooth challenge of the countess’s tone, Mr Hall could not have failed to guess the countess’s opinion of his master and of where the duke’s own loyalties did lie. But Mr Hall appeared to miss the thrust entirely. ‘I shall ask him to,’ he promised.
Whereupon the countess smiled, as though she could not find the heart to spar with such a gentle man. ‘That would be kind of you.’
The conversation ended there, for Kirsty reappeared with a packed box of Mrs Grant’s good food—cold meat, and cakes, and ale to keep him nourished on his journey.
They went out into the yard to see him off, as did the earl and Colonel Hooke—and even Moray, who stayed back a pace. The mastiff, Hugo, having come to view him with affection, circled round and barked as though to call him to a game, but Moray only gave the dog an absent pat. After watching Mr Hall ride out of sight, he turned on his heel and, with a few words, took his leave with a shuttered sideways glance toward Sophia that she knew was his unspoken signal she was meant to follow.
Hugo helped. He was still circling, and the countess, taking pity on him, said, ‘Poor Hugo. Every time young Rory goes away, he is fair desolate.’
It wasn’t only Hugo, thought Sophia. Kirsty, too, had been at odds these past two days, with Rory sent to carry messages to all the lords on whose behalf the Earl of Erroll had just signed his name to Hooke’s memorial, so they would know the business was concluded. But Kirsty, at least, had her work to attend and Sophia to talk to. The mastiff was lost.
‘Shall I take him for a walk?’ Sophia offered, on a sudden inspiration. ‘He would like that, and we’d not go far.’
The countess gave consent, and having fetched Hugo’s lead from the stables, Sophia set forth with the great dog beside her, taking care to appear to be taking a different direction than Moray had. ‘Now, then,’ she said, to the mastiff, ‘behave yourself, or you’ll be bringing me trouble.’
But Hugo, so happy to be in human company, seemed perfectly content to go wherever she would lead him, and when they came out at last upon the beach, amid the dunes, and he discovered Moray sitting waiting for them, Hugo’s joy exploded in a burst of body-wagging gladness. Groveling in the sand, he stretched his full length with a grunt of satisfaction, rolling to be petted.
‘Away with ye, great foolish beast,’ said Moray, but he gave the massive barrel of a chest a scratch. ‘I’m not so fooled. Ye’d tear me limb from limb if someone told you to, and never shed a tear.’
Sophia took a seat beside them. ‘Hugo would not do you harm,’ she said. ‘He likes you.’
‘It’s got naught to do with liking. He’s a soldier like myself. He follows orders.’ He looked seaward, and Sophia did not ask what his own orders were. She knew, with Mr Hall gone, there was no cause now for Colonel Hooke to linger here at Slains, and when the French ship came again it would take Hooke and Moray with it.
But he had not brought her here to tell her what she knew already, and she’d learned his moods enough to tell that something else lay heavy on his mind. ‘What is it, John? Do the proposals Mr Hall brought with him worry you?’
He seemed to find some cynical amusement in the thought. ‘The Duke of Hamilton’s proposals were a waste of ink and paper, and he knew it when he wrote them. That,’ he told her, ‘is what has me worried.’
‘Do you still believe that he did mean but to delay you?’
‘Aye, perhaps. But it is more than that. I’ve no doubt the duke has been gained over by the court of London, and that he seeks to play us all as neatly as a deck of cards—but what his own hand is, and what the rules, I cannot yet discover.’ The frustration of that limitation showed upon his face. ‘He knows too much already, but he knows that he does not know all, and that, I fear, may drive him to new treachery. Ye must be careful, lass. If he does come here, guard your words, and guard your feelings. He must never learn,’ he said, ‘that you are mine.’
The deep, protective force with which he said that warmed her spirit, even as his words ran cold across her skin, more chilling than the swift breeze from the sea. She had not thought of danger to herself, but only him. But he was right. If it were known that she was Moray’s woman, she would be a playing piece of value to the men who wished to capture him.
He held her gaze. ‘I would not have ye suffer for my sins.’
‘I promise I’ll be careful.’
Seeming satisfied, he gave the mastiff lying at his side another thump, and in a lighter tone remarked, ‘I had a mind to tell ye not to walk so far from Slains, while I’m away, without this beastie with ye, but I’m thinking now he’d be of little use.’
She couldn’t help but smile. ‘You said before you had no doubt he’d kill you, if he were so ordered.’
‘Aye, but look at that.’ He rocked the lazing dog from side to side, in evidence. ‘He’s barely conscious.’
‘’Tis because he trusts you,’ said Sophia, ‘and he knows that I am safe. If I were truly threatened, he would be the first to rise to my protection.’
‘Not the first,’ said Moray. Then he looked away again, towards the distant line of the horizon, and Sophia, falling silent, looked there, too, and found some peace by watching swiftly scudding clouds, small wisps of white, dance in their free and careless way above the water, running races with each other as they caught, and held, and changed their shapes at will.
And then one cloud, which seemed more steady than the others, drew her eye, and as it moved, she saw it was no cloud. ‘John…’
‘Aye,’ he said. ‘I see it.’
Hugo caught the change in Moray’s tone, and rolled in one long motion to his feet, nose raised to test the wind— the same wind that was bearing those white, billowed sails toward them.
‘Come,’ said Moray, standing, holding out his hand. ‘We’d best get back.’
His voice was clipped, as though he wished to waste no time, and dreading as she did the time that he must leave, she could not help but find his cold reaction to their sighting of the ship a disappointment.
‘I had hoped that you might not be so pleased,’ she told him, stung, ‘to see Monsieur de Ligondez return. Are you so eager, then, to be away?’
His gaze had narrowed on the distant ship, and now it swung to hers with patient tenderness. ‘Ye know that I am not. But that,’ he said, and nodded seaward to the swift-approaching sails, ‘is not Monsieur de Ligondez.’
The ship was yet too far away for her to see its ensign, but she trusted Moray’s eyes enough to scramble to her feet and take the hand that he was offering, and feeling as a fox might when it runs before the hounds, she followed him, with Hugo, back along the path that climbed the hill above the shore.
‘I wonder why your Captain Gordon does not come ashore to us,’ the Earl of Erroll asked his mother, who, like him, was standing at the window of the drawing room, her hands behind her back, brow furrowed slightly as she gazed in consternation at the ship that lay now anchored off the coast.
‘I do not know,’ the countess said. Her voice was quiet. ‘How long has it been, now, since he did appear?’
‘An hour, I think.’
‘It is most strange.’
Sophia did not like the tension that had fallen on the room. It was not helped by Moray’s choice to stand so close behind her chair that she could all but feel the restless energy within him, held contained by force of will.
Colonel Hooke had given up on standing and was sitting now beside Sophia in a rush-backed chair, his face still bearing witness to the illness that had plagued him through this journey, and which would, no doubt, be worsened by his passage on the sea. His mood had altered since his talk with Mr Hall. He seemed less patient, and had gained the air of one who had been sorely disappointed.
This new turning of the tide, with Captain Gordon’s ship, bearing all its great guns and its forty-odd soldiers, appearing from nowhere to stand between Slains and the open North Sea, all but drove Hooke’s raw temper to breaking point.
‘For God’s sake,’ he said, ‘can we not send a boat out ourselves to ask what he intends?’
The countess turned, and in the face of Hooke’s impatience seemed herself more calm. ‘We could, but I have never yet had cause to doubt the captain’s loyalties. If he does keep himself aloof, I’m sure he has good reason, and if we were to blunder in, we may yet do ourselves the greater harm.’
Her son agreed. ‘We would be wisest,’ said the earl, ‘to wait.’
‘Wait!’ echoed Hooke, in some disgust. ‘For what? For soldiers to approach by land, and trap us here like pigeons in a dovecote, with no window left to fly through?’
Moray’s voice, behind Sophia, held a quiet edge. ‘If we are trapped, ’tis no fault of our hosts,’ he said, as though he would remind Hooke of his manners. ‘They had no part in keeping us at Slains these few days past our time. That was, as I recall, your choice, and ye’d do well to pick that up and carry it yourself, not seek to lay the burden and the blame on those who’ve shown us naught but kindness.’
It was, Sophia thought, one of the longest speeches he had made before the others, and they seemed surprised by it. But it had hit the mark, and, chastened, Hooke said, ‘You are right.’ The fire fading from his eyes, Hooke told the earl, ‘I do apologize.’
Accepting, the earl sent a glance of gratitude to Moray before turning once again to the long window, and its view upon the sea. He watched a moment, then Sophia saw him frown. ‘What is he doing now?’
His mother, watching too, said, ‘He is leaving.’
Hooke sat upright. ‘What?’ He rose and went to look himself. ‘He is, by God. He’s getting under sail.’
They all looked then, and saw the white sails rise and fill with wind, and watched the great ship roll away from shore, while on her tilting deck the moving figures of the men worked hard to set her course. Sophia could not see the blue of Captain Gordon’s coat among them.
It was Moray who first saw the second ship, just rounding into view around the southern headland. It was another frigate, and the countess said, ‘I’ll wager that is Captain Hamilton, the colleague of whom Captain Gordon told us when he was last here.’
Sophia remembered how Gordon had said that his younger associate, sailing so often behind him, would soon grow suspicious if French ships were spotted too often off Slains, and might prove himself to be a problem.
‘Captain Hamilton,’ the countess said, ‘is no friend of the Jacobites.’ She had relaxed. ‘This does explain why Captain Gordon did not come ashore.’
The second frigate passed the castle by. It flew the ensign of the new united British navy, bright against the sky, and followed swiftly on in Gordon’s wake—a smaller ship, but seeming to Sophia more the predator, and she was glad when it had gone.
The Earl of Erroll was the first to turn away. ‘At least,’ he said, ‘we know, now, where the frigates are, and likely we will have some days before they do return. Monsieur de Ligondez should find his way the clearer, now.’
Which doubtless pleased the others. But Sophia, standing there before the window, found no comfort in the knowledge, and the brightness of the sun upon the water hurt her eyes.
She was shaken awake by a hand on her shoulder.
‘Sophia!’ The countess’s voice, close beside her. ‘Sophia!’
Her eyes fluttered open, confused for a moment, then coming alert quickly glanced to the side in remembrance, but Moray was gone, and the pillow showed barely an imprint of where he had lain. With an effort, she pushed herself up till she sat in the tangle of blankets.
The sun was not long up, and slanted low across the windowsill, its light still pale and tinged with all the splendor of the dawn. ‘What is it?’
‘The French ship is come.’
She noticed now the countess, for the early hour, was fully dressed and wide awake. Sophia, in her shift, stood from the bed and slowly crossed to her long window. She saw the high masts of the Heroine some distance still off shore, but bearing steadily towards them.
‘Get you dressed,’ the countess said, ‘and come downstairs. We will have one last meal together, and wish Colonel Hooke and Mr Moray well before they must depart.’
Sophia nodded, and she heard the door close as the countess left the chamber, but she seemed to be stuck fast upon the spot, her gaze fixed fiercely to the French ship’s sails, as though she somehow could hold back its progress, if she tried.
She was so focused on it that she nearly failed to see the sweep of movement at the far edge of her vision, as another ship came darkly round the shoreline, like the shadow of a shark. It was the second British ship that they had seen the day before, not Gordon’s ship but Captain Hamilton’s.
Monsieur de Ligondez had seen it, too, and must have known he’d get no friendly welcome from this interceptor bearing down upon him. French ships on the coast of Scotland were but seen as privateers, rich prizes for a man like Captain Hamilton to capture. Sophia, with her breath held, watched the great prow of the Heroine begin to turn about, sails changing shape and swinging desperately to catch the wind. Go on, she urged, go on!
But Captain Hamilton was closing. In a few more moments he would surely be in range to use his guns.
Sophia’s knuckles whitened as her fingers gripped the window-ledge, as though she could herself control the French ship’s helm, and turn it with more speed.
There seemed to be a rush of new activity aboard the Heroine. The flags at both the topmast and the mizzen fluttered downward to the deck, and different colors were hauled up the ropes to take their place against the sails. Sophia recognized the Holland ensign, and the old Scots blue and white. The signal, she thought suddenly—the signal that had been arranged between Monsieur de Ligondez and Gordon so the ships would know each other when they met.
Except the ship that now had the French frigate in its sights was not in the command of Captain Gordon.
Captain Hamilton took no apparent notice of the changing of the ensigns, but continued on his course to close the distance between his ship and the Heroine.
And then, across the water, came the rolling boom and echo of the firing of a gun.
Sophia jumped, she could not help it. She could feel the very impact of that shot within her chest, and feeling helpless, turned her eye towards the Heroine, to see the damage done.
To her relief, she saw the French ship sailed as swiftly as before and seemed unharmed. And then a third and even larger ship slid smoothly from behind the northern headland and came fully into view, its great sails billowed with the morning wind. Again a great gun sounded, and Sophia this time saw it was the third ship that was firing—not upon Monsieur de Ligondez but out to sea, apparently with no intent of hitting anything.
The ship was Captain Gordon’s, but she did not understand his purpose until Captain Hamilton began to turn, reluctantly, and change his course.
And then she knew. The gun, she thought, had been a call for Hamilton to give up his pursuit. How Captain Gordon would explain that to his colleague, she could not imagine, but she did not doubt that he would find some passable excuse.
His ship was running close along the shore of Slains now, close enough for her to see him standing to the starboard of the mainmast. And then he turned, as though to give an order to his crew, and in a crashing spray of white the great ship passed, and headed south behind the ship of Captain Hamilton, while out to sea the white sails of the Heroine danced lightly on the fast-receding waves.