agreed, remembering. “He did not say anything, Ivor. That was when you demanded to know what his intentions were toward me.”
“I did, lass, aye,” he said. “Sithee, you or, more accurately, Rothesay had put Fin in an untenable position. He could not honestly say that he had no interest if he does. But I’ll admit I just said the first thing that came into my head, hoping to give Fin more time to think. It was, however, not the wisest thing I might have said.”
“That,” James said, “is perfectly true. It may even be what put the notion into Catriona’s head to say what she did.”
Giving him a quelling look, Ivor went on, “When I said that Fin should have sought permission from Father, I expected Fin to reply that he would discuss any such intent with him. But before he could, you blurted your declaration of love and did it within earshot of God knows how many people, each of whom has doubtless told others. Sithee, lass, you tossed Fin into the devil’s own fire with those words.”
“But how?”
“Do you imagine that Fin is across the way now, declaring to our father that you are a liar, Catriona?”
“Mercy, sir, Fin makes such a thing of his honor that I assumed he would tell Father the truth. He must know that I spoke up when I did to stop Rothesay and get away from him without causing more of a disturbance than we had already caused.”
“Whatever he tells Father, you’ve put Fin in a damnable position.”
She had known when Shaw had forbidden her to be present while he and Fin talked that she had put Fin in an unfair position, but she had hoped that by declaring as much to her father, she had at least done something to help. Clearly, she had not.
“Sakes,” she said, “I’ll tell Father the whole truth, myself.”
“Much good that will do either of you now,” James said, shaking his head.
“I don’t understand you, James. Prithee, say what you mean.”
“He must not, Cat, for we’ve come to the gist of it,” Ivor said gently. “In troth, Father would think that we had already said more than we should.”
Looking from one to the other, she wondered what on earth she had done.
Following Shaw into a comfortable-looking chamber of a size that nearly matched the ladies’ solar below them, Fin shut the door without waiting to be asked. The chamber’s warmth was welcome, even soothing, because in the long minutes that it had taken to cross the great hall and follow Shaw up the main stairway to the muniments room, his thoughts had whirled like waterspouts on a windy loch.
Inhaling deeply and letting it out, just as he would before taking on an opponent in a tiltyard, he watched Shaw kneel to stir embers to life on the hearth.
Then Shaw stood and looked at him for a long moment before he said, “Ye should know, lad, afore we start this conversation, that my good-father thinks ye’d make a good husband for our Catriona. I’m not so sure I agree with him. Not yet.”
Everything that Fin had considered saying vanished from his mind. With nothing else to say, he kept silent.
“Sithee, ye ken fine that he told us who ye be. Likewise, Ivor told us about your part in the battle at Perth, including that he urged ye into the river so that someone from your side would live to tell the tale. Have ye told it yet?”
“Only to Catriona, sir. I’ve not been home since then to see the others of my clan.” That fact alone had not seemed distasteful to him when compared with his flight and his father’s bequest. But it did now when he admitted it to Shaw.
“So although ye’ve not told your own folk, ye did tell our Catriona, did ye?”
“I did, aye,” Fin said. “She had befriended me—mayhap even saved my life. I thought that she deserved to know.”
“And did ye tell her likewise that ye be brother to a Cameron chieftain?”
“I did.”
“And that ye were born at Tor Castle, a place over which our two clans had long fought until the battle at Perth, and over which we still share much tension?”
Quietly, Fin said, “I did not tell her that.”
“Doubtless the opportunity did not arise,” Shaw said almost amiably.
“We did talk of Tor Castle,” Fin admitted, feeling as if he were nearing a precipice… or a gallows. “She asked if I knew of it and said that the Mackintosh goes there