“You’re no lad, but still, how would I survive without you?”
She looked up, and despite the cut in her father’s words, she found a rare smile on his face. Tenderness seized her heart. Her parents had been long married before they’d been blessed with their only child. When her mother died in childbirth, she’d left her newborn babe with a man old enough to be a grandfather. A man who’d wished for a son but gotten Elspeth instead.
Her father waited expectantly for a reply. His frizz of gray hair erupted from his head like a halo, or a misshapen bird’s nest.
No, he couldn’t survive without her. Nor would she want him to.
“Good thing it shan’t come to that,” she said. The words pricked her, and she forced a smile. She’d spoken the truth: living without her would never be in question. Any dowry there’d been in linens and woolen goods had been sold off long ago. And what coin there’d been for making Elspeth’s plain features more attractive to a prospective husband had gone to the beasts instead.
“Here’s your things, then.” He pulled her wee worktable by the fire. It bore a sheaf of papers and her precious quill, and the sight of it automatically switched her mind to the business at hand.
“Thank you,” she said, already engrossed in her work. She fished out that month’s tally, squinting to focus.
With a tsk, he rose to stoke the fire higher. “Stubborn lass. I wish you’d allow yourself a reading glass. I’ve heard talk of a man in Aberdeen who fashions spectacles. They even have a wee ribbon that holds them to the head.”
She tilted her chin to bring the numbers into focus, skimming her eyes over the lines. They’d had this argument before. “You know we haven’t the money.”
“But we’ve spent less this month. Or it should read so in that book of yours.” He came and hovered over her, and she shifted so as not to lose the light.
“How is that possible?” She scanned the rows, and one number caught her eye. Growing stern, she put her finger to mark her place. “Da, how is it we have more left over this month, and yet we’re making less than ever?”
She craned her neck to stare a challenge at him. He’d sold personal items off before, and Elspeth wouldn’t put it past him to do something foolish like sell off her mother’s wedding band. She frowned, for it wasn’t as though she’d ever have call to wear anyone’s ring.
“I’ve begun to trade. With Angus.” He paused, letting the farmer’s name hang.
“Angus.” Shaking her head, she looked back down. Her father dreamed of marrying her off to the man. “Not that again.”
Though Angus Gunn was kind enough, and his neighboring farm profitable, he didn’t make her swoon like all the great heroines swooned. And if Elspeth couldn’t have a great love like those she read about in her novels, then she’d rather skip the whole enterprise entirely.
Besides, she knew of another woman who’d stolen Angus’s heart long ago.
Elspeth shut her eyes, pinching the bridge of her nose. “What, pray, have we to trade with Angus?”
“Our sheep’s milk for his oats.”
Her eyes flew open. “Raw oats? However will we mill them?”
“They’re to feed the sheep.”
She bit her lips to halt the first words that came to her tongue. She’d simply have to talk to Angus herself. Perhaps arrange to trade for milled oats so they could fill their bellies instead of just the sheep’s. “Very well, Father.”
There was a knock at the door, and he bolted up, a wide grin on his face. “Talk of him, and he doth appear.”
Elspeth rolled her eyes. When would her father get it through his thick skull that she neither wanted Angus nor he her?
The farmer stood in the doorway and gave her father a stoic nod. He was so tall and so broad, he had to hunch to fit. “I put the oats by the barn.”
He shooed Angus in. “Come in, come in. Say hello to Elspeth.” He swept an arm in her direction. “Doesn’t she look lovely by the firelight?”
“Oh, Da,” she muttered under her breath. Little did he know that what men likely saw was a shy spinster, with plain features adorning a too-thin frame.
Spotting her, Angus slipped his bonnet from his head, crumpling it in his hands. “Good day, Miss Elspeth.”
She put her papers down and gave him a warm smile. She didn’t have feelings for the farmer—he’d been besotted with her best friend, after all. But that didn’t mean she didn’t think him a kind and dependable soul. “Good day, Angus.”
An awkward silence filled the room.
“Very good, very good,” her father said, looking from one to the other.