Page 46 of Who’s That Earl

At that, Thomas playfully squeezed her hand. Jane jumped, drawing Mr. Donaldson’s eye to her for a moment before he moved on. “There are those among us glad to do the Devil’s work for him. Let us have no dealings with the Devil’s middlemen.” Out of the corner of her eye, she watched the dimple slide into place on Thomas’s cheek, as if he saw himself in that description. “Following the exhortation of Saint Paul,” Mr. Donaldson finished, “‘abhor what is evil.’”

Under cover of the closing hymn, Thomas leaned down to her and whispered, “He left off the best part: ‘hold fast to what is good.’” His eyebrows waggled suggestively.

Though it was surely sacrilege, it was impossible not to think then of the sensations she’d so recently experienced within the circle of his powerful arms. She narrowly managed to disguise a shivery gasp as a cough.

When the small crowd began to make its way out of the church, the buzz of conversation rose again. But when Mr. Shaw shouted out, “Tommy Sutherland, as I live and breathe,” Jane realized she had misunderstood the nature of the village’s curiosity.

With a slight touch to her elbow, Thomas left her side to go to the older man, who clearly had known him as a lad. From there, he was swept up in a whirl of greetings, even a kiss on one cheek from Elspeth, who would have been just out of girlhood when he last came to Balisaig. Mr. Campbell, the village blacksmith, who had been speaking quietly to Davina Ross, came forward with hand extended. Thomas brushed aside the gesture in favor of a back-slapping hug.

She smiled at the sight, despite the sensation of something in her chest tying itself in a knot. Would he be thinking of how—or even if—those same people would greet him if they knew he was Lord Magnus? Perhaps. But he must also see that he was beloved here, whatever mischief he might have caused in the past. They were glad to have him in their midst again.

Right where he belonged—if Robin Ratliff were not occupying his castle.

Quickly, Jane made her way to the back of the church, nodding politely here and there, and dipping a slight curtsy to Mr. Donaldson, who stood in the vestibule, the last obstacle between her and a sorely needed breath of fresh air.

But the clergyman was not to be put off with the mere forms of politeness. “And who is our visitor this morning, Mrs. Higginbotham?” he inquired, flashing his large yellowish teeth in something he probably intended as a smile. “I refer, of course, to the gentleman in regimentals.”

Jane successfully fought down the impulse to glance over her shoulder, merely for another look at Thomas smiling among his friends. “Lieutenant Sutherland. Lately returned from the West Indies, where he was stationed for some time.”

“A guest at Dunnock, I take it?” He seemed not at all bothered by the possibility that his questions might be considered prying.

Generally, she tried to avoid bald-faced lies to clergymen, particularly while standing under the roof of the church. But today she was grateful for her storytelling gift. All the truth was no longer hers to tell.

“Mr. Ratliff, my employer, has determined he will spend the rest of the winter in Edinburgh again. But he did not want to leave the castle residents entirely without a gentleman’s protection. I’m sure you understand,” she added, casting her eyes down to the flagstones. Though she would never claim to know Mr. Donaldson well, she felt certain he wasn’t the sort to believe a woman could take care of herself.

“Indeed, I understand perfectly.” When Jane lifted her gaze, his face was pinched. “Although I must say I am somewhat surprised to hear that Mr. Ratliff does. What I have been told did not suggest to me that he was a man of...finer feelings.”

Jane stretched her own expression into something like a smile. “Perhaps, Mr. Donaldson, your next sermon should exhort the congregation about the evils of gossip?”

He gave an odd sort of twitch, ready to agree with the suggestion, yet somewhat suspicious of a trap. “You remind me, ma’am, that I intended to ask if you had time to step over to the manse after services? I would like to enlist Balisaig’s leading ladies in an effort to raise the tone of our little village. Perhaps we might form a little committee to establish some regular entertainments, something more wholesome than one finds at the Thistle and Crown?”

When she returned a vague nod, he clapped his palms together, a more fervent expression of joy from him than she had ever seen. “Excellent. I’ll just speak with Mrs. Abernathy and—Mrs. Shaw, do you think? I do worry about her son’s immortal soul.”

Jane was spared having to reply by his hurrying away to catch the apothecary’s wife. When she let herself look back, she saw Thomas still enmeshed in conversation. She had little excuse to avoid the meeting at the manse entirely. Perhaps, however, she could get away more quickly by claiming they had agreed to walk back to Dunnock together. Though, of course, there had been no conversation of the sort. They had avoided all discussion of what would happen next.

Was there a way for the two of them to have a future together?

Rather than wait for the other ladies, Jane made her way to the manse, a picturesque stone building like the church, hardly more than a cottage, just two rooms up and two down. Mrs. MacIntosh would have been given the day off, of course, so she was not surprised to find the little house empty. The front door opened on a modest entryway, hardly wider than the stairs that dominated it. The walls had been painted a dun color, and the wooden floors were clean-swept but bare of any softening carpet or floorcloth. To the left and right, doorways led to the sitting room and the study.

Jane pushed back her hood, unbuttoned her pelisse, and prepared to wait in the former, where the furnishings were comfortable, though far from fashionable; the wallpaper was faded, and the carpet might fairly be described as threadbare. Mr. Parkham had wanted to change nothing that carried with it a memory of the late Mrs. Parkham, and doubtless Mr. Donaldson, a bachelor, had little interest in or concern for such matters.

After what seemed an eternity, and was doubtless less than a quarter of an hour, she pushed herself up from a chair covered in floral chintz and crossed the narrow entry hall to the study, from whose windows she expected to be able to see the front of the church. Probably Mr. Donaldson was having some difficulty extracting Mrs. Shaw from a chat with her friends, or he had thought of others to invite.

Though the sitting room was simply furnished, the study was crowded with bookcases, a large desk, a pair of leather chairs near the window, and a worktable between them. Given the clergyman’s general air of fastidiousness, she was surprised to find every available surface covered by books, pamphlets, newsprint, and papers in haphazard-looking piles. As she made her careful way to the window, she brushed against the corner of an open book where it overhung the edge of the desk, sending it and several papers tucked beneath it and between its pages to the floor.

When she bent to retrieve it and return it to its place, she laughed aloud at the discovery Mr. Donaldson had been reading The Necromancer’s Bride. Almost certainly for the pleasure of ripping it to shreds, she could guess, although she was curious whether he hadn’t taken another sort of pleasure in it too.

As she began to gather up the other papers, a sardonic smile on her face, her eye was drawn to a number of furious underlinings. Not in the book itself, but on the other pages—clippings of assorted reviews of the book. The cruel phrases highlighted by the pencil markings were distressingly familiar after last night’s letter. Hastily, she stuffed the loose papers inside the cover and laid the book in the place where it had been—or as close as she could come, hoping he would not notice the difference.

Moving more quickly now, she stepped toward the worktable, intending merely to peer through the curtains. But she could hardly avoid glancing down at the project on which Mr. Donaldson was currently at work. Like the desk, the table’s polished surface was covered with stacks of books and various loose papers. Random newspapers, some sorely out of date. A jar of paste. And a tool, not unlike a penknife and wickedly sharp.

On the center of the table a book lay open to an essay entitled “On Female Virtue,” in the main a critique of novel reading and the depraved young ladies who indulged in it.

What shall we say of certain books, which, we are assured (for we have not read them), are in their nature so shameful that she who can bear to peruse them must in her soul be a

The final word had been painstakingly excised by the nearby knife.

She knew exactly what the missing word was, but her mind skittered away from the truth. Was the room colder so close to the window? She was shivering. When Mr. Donaldson worked in his study, he must have a fire.