God in heaven.
Fiona got up, dressed, and went to the sunny breakfast-room. There she had a very nice bowl of porridge with cream and sugar and two cups of tea while she went over her list for the day. Then, briskly, she began addressing the items before her.
It was wash day, and she spent a couple of hours overseeing the laundresses at their work. She walked through the kitchen garden with Monty, and after that they moved on to look, worriedly, at some of the beehives. She went for a ride on Gealag. She began the inventory of household linens, a daunting enterprise given the sheer quantity of them. She wrote letters to her mother and to her sisters. She went up to the attics, vast and cavernous, curious as to what they contained, and was stunned by how crowded they were with furniture (bedsteads, bureaus, sofas, tables and chairs of all description, tall mirrors, desks, and so on), piles of clothing and bedding seemingly beyond numbering, along with a staggering array of wooden boxes, crates, and trunks. As she went downstairs she bypassed the nursery (too soon, too soon), and found herself in the long gallery whose walls were filled with portraits.
She paced slowly along, studying them. Before her was plainly evidence of a long and noble heritage dating back hundreds of years. Here was a little girl from James the Fourth’s time, dressed like a small adult in her quaint gable hood and heavy, mulberry-colored brocade gown with its wide fur-trimmed sleeves. Here was a medieval prince (with dark red hair!), very arrogant in his fine silk-trimmed tunic and cross-gartered leggings that displayed sturdy, muscular calves and thighs. Here was a beautiful middle-aged woman of the previous century in her lavishly pleated robe à la française; her face was white with powder, her lips deep red, and on her right cheek had been placed a tiny fashionable patch.
Fiona came to a large painting with a more modern look, and paused. Two boys, one about five, the other a few years older. The smaller one with red hair and brilliant amber eyes, the taller one blond, with eyes of dark brown, and very handsome. They were in a sunlit glen, with thickly clustered woods in the background, and a shimmering blue loch in the far distance —surely, Fiona thought, the same one which lay beyond the castle. The two boys stood side by side, not touching, and each with a dog at his feet. The little red-haired one was looking at his wolfhound puppy, and on his countenance the painter had captured a charming expression suggestive of fun and mischief. The taller blond boy stared directly at the viewer, giving a distinct impression of proud authority, and paying no attention to the handsome sable and white Collie which sat gazing adoringly up at him.
The red-haired boy had to be a young Alasdair. But who was the older boy? They shared some physical similarities in the shape of their heads, the lines of their jaws, even to the curve of dark eyebrows.
It had to be his brother. Or perhaps a cousin?
As she stood there, puzzled, Fiona realized just how little she knew about her new husband.
Oh well, what did it matter.
He didn’t like her, and she didn’t like him.
Still, it could have been worse. She could’ve married Niall Birk. Ugh. And spent her life making sure he wasn’t creeping up behind her to shove her down the stairs. Or she might have been wed to the extremely stupid Walraig Tevis, or the spindly knife-wielding Ross Stratton who, now that she thought of it, reminded her in a very nasty way of a rat.
Instead, she had married Alasdair Penhallow, who wasn’t stupid, who didn’t remind her of a rat, and who, she was sure, wasn’t going to shove her down the stairs.
They just didn’t like each other, that’s all.
She wished these prudent reflections would make her feel more cheerful, but there was no use in wringing one’s hands and bemoaning the state of things. She hated when people did that. Besides, to complain about her lot would be like feeling sorry for yourself when you’d been given a perfectly practical and serviceable pair of stockings for your birthday—and pining in a very immature way for, say, the moon. Luckily, there was always so much to do. Right now, for example, there was still time before dinner to ask Lister about the leak in a big copper tub one of the laundresses had mentioned, and to send a message to Dr. Colquhoun, asking him to check on a footman with a sprained ankle. If she hurried, she could go to the library and find a new book to read for later.
Fiona turned away, and as she did she noticed that on the walls in this section of the gallery, there were very faint discolorations, nearly invisible to the casual eye of a passerby. She paused again.
It seemed that the portraits had been rearranged.
Yes, for now that she noticed it, the paintings here weren’t as densely set together as in other areas of the gallery.