A lackey came running to help her dismount. "Your father would see you straightaway, Mistress Laura," he said, his countenance carefully wooden.
"Thank you, Willie. Must I truly go to him at once, or have I time to make myself tidy? There was a raid, you see, and-"
"Aye, we ken well about the raid, mistress. Were ye … That is-"
"I barely saw them," Laurie said, cutting in to allay his embarrassment. "One of the shepherd lads brought warning, and we hid. That's why I look such a fright."
"Well, he did say ye should come to him straightaway, but I wager he'll no mind if ye brush your hair and … and mayhap change your gown first."
"Where is he?"
"In the hall, I expect. That's where he said to send ye."
"Then I shall go in through the kitchen," Laurie said.
Hurrying across the forecourt, away from the main entrance in the tall, square tower that housed the great hall and two floors of bedchambers, she approached the newer section, housing the kitchens and a ladies' parlor above them.
The door into the kitchen and bakehouse stood ajar, but she slipped silently along the stone passageway between them to the narrow, circular service stair that led to the upper floors.
Her bedchamber and the one that her two younger sisters shared were two floors above the great hall, but to reach them, she had to pass by the southeast corner of the ladies' parlor. Although she knew that she could rely on the servants not to tell her father she had returned unless he asked them, she hurried, her bare feet nearly silent on the stone steps.
As she approached the servants' entrance to the ladies' parlor, she slowed, straining her ears to hear the slightest sound from within.
She could not see directly into the parlor, for an angled wall blocked her view. That wall separated the parlor from the ladies' closet and the servants' stair.
On tiptoe now, holding up her skirts with one hand, she used the thick, oiled-rope banister with the other as she went up. She had taken but three steps beyond the parlor entry, however, when an all-too-familiar voice stopped her in her tracks.
"So, you come sneaking in like a thief in the night, do you? You've been up to mischief again, I'll warrant. Turn around and show yourself properly, girl."
Obeying reluctantly, Laurie faced her stepmother.
Blanche, Lady Halliot, stood with her hands primly folded at her waist, looking, as always, precise to a pin. Taller than Laurie by a head, she bore herself with natural elegance.
She wore a simple, crescent-shaped French hood tilted away from her face, with a semicircular white veil sewn at the back. Her dove-gray, pearl-trimmed bodice fit her trim figure flatly and smoothly without bulge or wrinkle, and her corset was laced so tightly above her wide farthingale that when she moved, she seemed to do so only from the waist down.
Like most Border women of rank, Lady Halliot wore a great deal of jewelry-several gold chains and bracelets, a long string of pearls, two brooches, rings on every finger, earrings, and gold tips to her lace points.
From gold chains attached to the girdle at her waist hung a jeweled black pomander ball, a black feather fan, and her gilded hand mirror, scissors, and needle case. Thanks to the pomander, a veritable cloud of ambergris and cloves accompanied her everywhere she went.
Laurie had often wondered how Blanche moved under so much weight, but Blanche seemed supremely oblivious of it.
Certainly, Blanche was not thinking of baubles now.
"Just look at you," she said scornfully. "You should be ashamed of yourself, Laura. Up to your pranks again, and on such a day as this one! Here," she added, stepping back, "come into the light where I can see you properly."
Laurie obeyed, dismally conscious of her unkempt hair, filthy skirts, and an odor that even Blanche's pomander would not hide. To her relief, except for themselves, the ladies' parlor was empty.
Since her stepmother clearly meant to berate her, she took some small comfort in the fact that her sisters would not be present to hear what she said.
"Disgusting," Blanche said. Raising her chin sharply and wrinkling her nose as Laurie stepped into the sunlit room, she said, "Whatever is that dreadful smell?"
"We had to hide from the raiders," Laurie said quietly. "There was a boar, and when someone shot it-"
"One does not wish to hear the sordid details," Blanche said. "Nonetheless, why did you have to hide? One would presume that even murderous English invaders would not dare lay a hand on a daughter of Sir William Halliot."
"I do not know if they would have dared or not," Laurie said. "I did not think I would be wise to test them."
"Wise? You think yourself wise, Laura? Such a notion is utterly laughable."
But Blanche did not laugh. Instead, she regarded Laurie with much the same expression of distaste as she might have assumed upon discovering a toad in her wardrobe.
The silence lengthened until Laurie shivered.
"If you are cold, you have only yourself to blame," Blanche said unsympathetically. "You deserve beating."
Laurie did not reply.
"If your father is sensible, this time he will take a good stout switch or a strap to you. He certainly will have much to say to you."
"Yes, madam. He is awaiting me even now in the hall."
"Then you must go to him at once."
"I … I would prefer to change my dress first and tidy my hair."
"One should be gratified to learn that for once you care about your appearance, I expect, but it is more important that your father see exactly how his daughter comports herself. I shall take you to him myself, as you are."
Swallowing hard, Laurie followed Blanche to the far end of the parlor, where a gallery led to the great hall and the main stairway. Determined to behave as though nothing were out of the ordinary, she strove to keep her head high.
Ahead of her, Blanche passed gracefully through the arched entry to the hall. Ignoring members of the household and men-at-arms who attended to various duties there, she approached burly, richly attired Sir William Halliot, who sat in a carved wooden armchair, hunched over the high table.
Surrounded by ledgers and numerous, important looking documents, he was carefully reading one of them and did not look up. A slender scribe perched on a stool beside him dipped his quill into the inkpot and wrote steadily on, clearly oblivious, as his master was, of Blanche's approach.
"Sir William," she said in a clear, sharp voice that brought both men's heads up, "you will be gratified to learn that your daughter has returned at last from her illicit morning ramble. Although she attempted to disobey your command that she present herself at once, I soon put a stop to that."
"So I see," Sir William said gruffly, frowning at Laurie. "What the devil have you done to yourself, daughter? You look as if you'd been dragged through a swamp and half-drowned."
"I was caught in the rain, sir."
"Did you not have a cloak?"
She had forgotten about her cloak. "I did have one, but I left it in Davy's cottage when the raiders came. I don't know what became of it after that."
"And your shoes?"
Laurie looked down at the dirty bare toes peeping out from beneath her skirts. "I forgot them, too," she said.
"At Davy Elliot's?"
"No, sir, here," she admitted with a sigh. "I do not like wearing shoes."
The hall had become uncommonly quiet-and extraordinarily so, considering the number of people there.
Imperiously indifferent to the fascinated audience, Blanche said, "Such behavior must cease, Sir William. This unnatural girl has grown as wild as a gypsy and is a sad disgrace to the Halliot name."
"Now, madam, surely-"
"You have allowed her to defy you for too long, sir," Blanche went on without a pause. "She defies you in every way, even refusing every effort that you have made to see her properly married. Surely, you see now that she must be tamed before anyone will have her. Having flouted your orders yet again by running off to consort with low persons, this time endangering even her own life, she surely deserves a sound beating. Moreover, although perhaps you cannot smell her, apparently she rolled in dung of some sort before presenting herself to you."
Hearing muted, hastily stifled chuckles from some of the observers and feeling heat flame in her cheeks, Laurie did not dare meet her father's gaze.
Curtly, Sir William said, "Clear these people out of here, Samuel."
The scribe got up at once and cleared the hall, taking himself out with the others. Other than a couple of hounds stretched on the hearth before the roaring fire, only Blanche, Sir William, and Laurie remained.
Sir William said grimly, "You do deserve beating, daughter."
Laurie, saying nothing, heard Blanche's sigh of satisfaction.
Sir William went on, "This is no example to be setting for your younger sisters. You must do better, lass."
"Yes, sir.
Haughtily Blanche said, "One need not fear that my daughters would ever be so foolish as to follow Laura's bad example, Sir William. God in His mercy has seen fit to give you two children whose behavior is faultless."
Sir William smiled faintly at her. "You have done well with May and Isabel, Blanche. I'll not debate that with you."
"One hopes that no debate will arise betwixt husband and wife on any point, sir," Blanche said, bowing her head with apparent submissiveness.