Free Love Wild and Fair by Bertrice Small Page A

Abernethy, wife to the first Earl of Sithean. The cousins’ mutual great-grandmother, the legendary Janet Leslie, had felt it fitting that the house go to Fiona Abernethy’s namesake, and so Fiona Leslie had inherited it.
    It was not a large house. Built about seventy years before, it was a mellowed red brick, well covered with ivy on three sides. The basement held a good kitchen, a pantry, a still room, and a wash room with several large tubs for doing laundry. The main floor held a charming dining room, a formal parlor, a small family parlor that opened into the garden, and a full library. On the second floor were four bedrooms, each with its own dressing room. And in the attic were rooms for the maids.
    The house had a small stable where Cat housed Dearg, and the garden was filled with flowers, herbs, and fruit trees. Set off fashionable High Street, it was quiet, and little traffic passed by.
    Mrs. Kerr, a cozy, plump widow of middle years, was sympathetic. She had, she confided to Cat, once been in the same position. Her husband had been killed in a border skirmish with the English when she was six months pregnant. She had raised her boy alone, and a fine lad he’d turned out to be, too! He was apprenticed to a butcher now.
    “Did my cousin, Lady Leslie, tell ye how my husband died?” asked Cat.
    Mrs. Kerr shook her head.
    “A border skirmish also,” said Cat sadly. “In the Cheviot only two months ago.”
    “Aye,” said the other woman, nodding in sympathy. “I remember it. But they lost more lads than we did.”
    Alone once again, Cat chuckled to herself. “Kate Abernethy” would soon be established. She had recognized Mrs. Kerr as a gossip—a kindly soul, but a gossip.
    The following day, she took Fiona’s advice and visited Dr. Ramsey.
    He examined her and then advised, “Unless there’s an emergency, ye’ll not likely need me, my dear. That’s a fine, healthy laddie yer growing there, and yer Mrs. Kerr should be able to deliver him with no trouble. But if ye should need me, dinna hesitate to send around.”
    Settled into Fiona’s house now, Cat found she was enjoying herself. She was no longer sick in the mornings, and her appetite was picking up. Never in her entire life had she been so far from home. No mother. No father. No Glenkirk. No Ellen. No one to answer to except herself. Mrs. Kerr came each morning to tidy the house and see that she was properly fed, but she left before dark each evening.
    As autumn advanced, Cat walked the more respectable streets of Edinburgh, exploring the town. Her dress was simple though expensive, her pregnancy obvious, and her manner modest No one bothered her. As the days grew colder she confined her walks to the garden or to short trips to market with Mrs. Kerr.
    These outings fascinated her. At Greyhaven, food had simply been there. In accompanying her housekeeper, a whole world opened up to Cat Mrs. Kerr expanded this new world when she took Cat shopping for cloth to make garments for the baby. It was not long before Cat was saying, “Mrs. Kerr, I must go to the ribbon shop. I seem to be out of that lovely blue silk for the baby’s bonnets. Do we need anything at the butcher, since I’ll pass it on my way?”
    Mrs. Kerr did not think it strange at all that her young mistress was so innocent of everyday matters. Cat had explained to the good woman that she had been orphaned early, and raised in a country convent It was a common story.
    As the days grew shorter, Mrs. Kerr decided that young Mistress Abernethy should not be alone in the evenings. Her niece, Sally, was brought into the house to look after Cat Sally was twenty, and as plump and cheerful as her aunt Her presence made the evenings less lonely for Cat The two young women sewed, or Cat read to them before the fire. Cat liked her enough to ask her if she would stay on and help look after the baby. Sally was delighted.
    Fiona and Adam celebrated Christmas in Paris with their Leslie cousins. The New