Chapter One
Muirford, Scotland
1878
"All I am saying, Cleo, is that if you don't show a proper
decorum I will quite simply die!"
"She means she wont find a beau," Pia translated Annie's
concern.
"Which is infinitely worse,"' Annie said to Pia, turning
to the fourteen-year-old who sat in a huge wingback
leather chair. "You're too young to understand. And Cleo's
too old andโ"
"Dried up?" Pia teased.
She had a wicked, quick wit, did Pia, and a penchant for
telling too much truth. Cleo, unstung by anything either
girl said, watched Annie's cheeks go bright pink with
embarrassment. Cleo and Annie were blond and fair skinned,
while Pia had milky skin and dark hair and uptilted green
eyes. She was quite the fairy child. Though sometimes
demon seemed more appropriate.
"Cleo is uninterested in anyone who hasn't been dead at
least a thousand years," Annie hastened to explain. She
turned to face her oldest sister, who sat behind huge
piles of papers at the desk. "Cleo, I don't think that
you're a dull old spinster or anything, but, well, you
are, and..." Annie Fraser waved her hands dramatically,
encompassing the library and all the boxes of books and
artifacts yet to be unpacked. "I care nothing for all
this. Scholarship isn't for a proper woman. I wantโ"
"A husband and children and a nice house with a rose
garden," Cleo defined her middle sister's longings.
Wanting anything was dangerous, as she well knew, but she
had been sixteen once herself. Fortunately, Annie's wants
were more modest and mundane than hers had been. Annie
would also be seventeen in a few days. Seventeen was not a
bad age to begin thinkingof home and hearth, and a husband
to provide them. "It would be nice if you met someone this
summer."
just as long as you have a long courtship and an even
longer engagement, my girl. She wanted her sisters to know
and trust the men they fell in love with. She glanced past
Annie to Pia, who was still too enamored of dogs, horses,
and kittens to care about the male of her own species.
Cleo smiled to herself as she looked back at Annie, and
she made a mental note not to use words like species or
bring up Darwinism in company. She was sure Annie could
come up with a huge list for her of subjects that ladies
shouldn't discuss.
"You do realize, I hope," Cleo said to her nearly-
seventeen-year-old sister, "that any eligible young man
you are likely to meet here in Muirford will either be
teaching at the university or be studying at it."
"No man I marry is going to end up a professor, I assure
you," Annie proclaimed. "We've already had way too much of
that in the family. Young men are trainable."
Cleo had not found that to be true, though Annie sounded
very certain of her ability to manage a man. Perhaps she
should have a heart-to-heart talk with her sister about
the realities of life. Or perhaps Annie could teach her a
thing or two about feminine wiles. It really wasn't
something Cleo had made a study of. Right now, however,
she had no wish to dampen Annie's enthusiasm at the
prospect of going out into society.
"You'll have to concentrate your husband hunt away from
the history department, then, if you don't want a dusty
professor for your mate," she told Annie.
"Mother didn't mind a dusty professor," Pia spoke up. Then
she giggled. "But Father doesn't count, I suppose. He's
never stayed in one place long enough to get dusty."
"Until now." Annie sighed with relief. "And he is the
grandson of an earl. Mother married quality as well as
brains. I'm so glad he's taken the appointment here in
Scotland, where the Fraser name has some cachet. I'm sure
to find a beau among the young men who are going to attend
Muirford."
"Fortunately for you, Sir Edward intends Muirford
University to turn out engineers and other such fine,
practical professional men," Cleo said. "I'm sure they'll
strike a nice balance between dusty and socially
presentable for you."
Sir Edward Muir, newly knighted and rolling in money
earned with the sweat of his factory workers' brows, was
endowing this new university in the highland village of
his birth. He'd bought the estate where the Muir family
had toiled for generations as tenant farmers, and put in a
railway line to reach the remote town. Beautiful stone-and-
brick buildings were going up. A fine teaching staff had
been hired. There was even going to be a...
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