Free The Piper's Tune by Jessica Stirling

thought you might be the best person to ask.’
    â€˜Ah! Yes. Well, neither of us is of an age to draw profits. We’ll have to wait until we’re twenty-one before we receive our dues.’
    â€˜Jesus!’ Forbes let the word slip with a vicious little hiss. Lindsay found the blasphemy shocking. He wriggled, uncrossed his legs, sat forward and clasped her arm. ‘Twenty-one, twenty-one? That’s almost four years away.’
    â€˜Meanwhile,’ Lindsay said, ‘our profits will be placed in a fund.’
    â€˜Who looks after the fund?’
    â€˜Mr Harrington.’
    â€˜Who’s he?’
    â€˜The family’s solicitor.’
    Forbes tightened his grip. ‘Are you happy with that arrangement?’
    â€˜Apparently it’s required by law where juveniles are concerned.’
    â€˜Juveniles! God, is that how they think of us?’ Forbes glanced at the door then put an arm about her. ‘At least we’re both in it together.’
    â€˜Yes,’ Lindsay said. ‘I would be obliged if you would take your arm…’
    â€˜What? Yes. Sorry.’
    He swung his arm away and casually continued the conversation.
    Lindsay wondered where Miss Runciman had got to with the coffee. She considered the possibility that the housekeeper was deliberately allowing her time alone with her handsome Irish cousin. She was tempted to leap to her feet, stalk out into the hall and declare her lack of enthusiasm for spending any time alone with Owen Forbes McCulloch. But the truth was that she didn’t lack enthusiasm, didn’t lack interest in this odd young man who could be so naive one minute, so sly and worldly the next.
    â€˜Have you got money?’ Forbes said. ‘Income of your own, I mean?’
    â€˜Papa gives me a small allowance.’
    â€˜How much?’
    â€˜For heaven’s sake, Forbes!’
    The rebuff was obviously expected and he rattled on without a blush. ‘Four years is a long time to wait.’
    â€˜Doesn’t your father give you an allowance?’
    â€˜Not him. Mean bastard!’
    â€˜Oh, come along. I don’t believe he doesn’t give you something.’
    â€˜If it wasn’t for Mam I don’t know what I’d do.’
    â€˜Don’t you receive a wage from Beardmore’s?’
    â€˜I’m an apprentice, a bloody apprentice, no better than a bloody slave. ’
    A discreet knock upon the drawing-room door: feeling decidedly foolish, Lindsay said, ‘Enter.’ Miss Runciman brought in a tray weighted with Georgian silver and the monogrammed English coffee service. She placed the tray on the sofa table and dropped a curtsey.
    â€˜Shall I serve, Miss Lindsay, or will the young gentleman help himself?’
    â€˜The young gentleman will help himself.’
    â€˜Will that be all, Miss Lindsay?’
    â€˜Yes, Miss Runciman. That will be all.’
    The housekeeper’s matt brown eyes were fiercely appraising. She sized up the Irish cousin and lingered long enough to receive a beaming smile and a soft, almost feminine flutter of Forbes’s dark lashes. ‘Thank you,’ he said, his irritation replaced by something that Lindsay could only define as charm. It was a selfish, narcissistic performance, but she, like Miss Runciman, so wanted to believe that it was sincere that she, like Miss Runciman, could do nothing but respond to it. When the housekeeper finally left the room, Lindsay got to her feet and fussed with cups and coffee pot while her cousin hoisted himself from the sofa, wandered to the window and stared out over Brunswick Park.
    â€˜It’s certainly a grand place to live,’ he said.
    Lindsay said, ‘Nicer than Dublin? Surely not.’
    â€˜Well, Dublin’s my home town and will always be close to my heart.’ He returned to the sofa and accepted a coffee cup and saucer. ‘But it’s here on the Clyde that I’ll make my mark.’
    He