Kilgannon by Kathleen Givens

Author:Kathleen Givens [Givens, Kathleen]
Language: eng
Format: epub, mobi
Tags: Historical, Scotland - Social Life and Customs - 18th Century, Scotland - History - 1689-1745, Scotland, General, Romance, Historical Fiction, England - Social Life and Customs - 18th Century, Fiction, Love Stories
ISBN: 9780440235675
Google: np-nSZ_LJq4C
Amazon: 0440235677
Publisher: Dell
Published: 1999-10-12T04:00:00+00:00

LATE SPRING WAS A BLAZE OF BLOSSOMS, THE HEATHER alive with blues and purples that I could not have imagined. The glen was overflowing with flowers, the trees in light-green leaves that darkened with every day. I was beginning to feel more at home. My Gaelic was stronger now and I was able to talk with many of the clansmen. I still missed London and my family, but Louisa wrote often, her letters full of news and gossip. She promised a visit in the fall. And Will wrote as well, telling me of Betty and our friends and Mountgarden. I wrote to them of my life here and tried to make it all sound wonderful. It was wonderful. But there were days, when Alex was gone, when I wondered what I was doing here at the end of the earth with these strange people. Ellen was a breath of home each day, but she was changing as well as I, and she spent more and more time with the boys or the other young women. Or with wee Donald, who had been enraptured with her since he'd escorted her to Bristol.

The boys helped as well. We had a tradition now—the story at bedtime. I would sit in their room making up silly and fantastic tales, their father often with us, or they would join us in the library. How I loved that room, my favorite in the castle. Alex's grandmother Diana had designed the library as well as the rest of the house, and this room was her most successful. Tall shuttered windows that looked out to the orchard stretched from deep window seats to the ceiling, enclosed by shelf after shelf of books. The wood of the walls and shelves glowed with a deep red gleam. The huge fireplace dominated one wall, chairs pulled up to it in comfortable disarray. Alex's grandfather's desk filled the other end of the room, and it was here that I would sit after the boys went to bed, or on a cold afternoon or quiet morning, and work on the Kilgannon accounts. I was surprised at how quickly that had come about, but I was very pleased. The factor, Thomas MacNeill, was efficient at managing all the details and the people who ran Kilgannon smoothly, but Thomas liked the tallying no more than Alex, and it had been neglected. When I complained to Alex that he would be gone all day and then spend the evening at the desk, he showed me what he was doing. He explained and I asked questions.

"Ye could do it better, couldn't ye, lass? Will told me ye managed the accounts at yer parents' estate for years." He sighed and looked at the papers strewn across the desk. "Would ye consider doing it, Mary? I ken ye've done it before, and ye can ask me or Thomas for any help ye need. Mary, truly, if I never had to do this again I'd be grateful." I considered. Deirdre

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