Hugo and the Maiden

but somehow he had the most compelling face she had ever seen; it was difficult to pull one’s eyes away from him.
At least it was difficult for Martha.
His squinty gaze slid from the steaming bowl in her hands to her face and narrowed with suspicion. “What is it?”
“Does it really matter?”
He cocked his head to the side and pressed his expressive lips into a prim line—an imitation of her expression, Martha surmised. “Oooh, look who isn’t in a good mood this morning.”
Martha ignored his taunt and set the bowl down on the bench not far from his head with a loud thunk. She went back to her serving area and picked up the jug of milk. The other men were digging into their bowls like they’d never seen food before and had eaten at least half before she could offer them some milk.
“It’s sweetened with honey,” she said to Albert Franks.
“Yes, please, Miss Pringle—thank you so much, this is manna from heaven.”
Mr. Franks’s shocking red hair and pale freckled skin made Martha smile. “You are welcome.”
She moved along to the next man, whose name she could not recall. Like two of the others, the man was young, skinny, and didn’t want to meet her eyes. Interestingly, only Mr. Franks and Hugo behaved like they were not guilty. She suspected Mr. Franks might actually be innocent, but Hugo, on the other hand?
Martha snorted.
“What are they getting?” The peevish voice interrupted her musing, but Martha ignored him, making her way to the last two men before going to where Hugo sat away from everyone else, as if he were special.
Small Cailean certainly thought he was. The big lad was gazing down at him with the same expression Lily was giving him: one of rapt adoration. Who knew what the sweet giant saw in the unpleasant man?
Hugo had not yet touched his food. Instead, he was giving her small serving station an enquiring look, his beak of a nose twitching. “No coffee?”
“I’m afraid not.”
He gave a pained groan. “Why did I have to wash up on the only rock in Britain too savage to have coffee?”
“You didn’t wash up, Small Cailean rescued you. And we do have coffee, but we save it for special occasions.”
“Special occasions? I’d say today is a bloody special occasion since I’m still alive.”
Martha turned on her heel at the foul word and handed the pitcher to Small Cailean. “I shall leave him in your hands.”
“Wait, where are you going?”
Hugo sounded pleading and pitiful, but Martha was not drawn in. She slammed the door behind her and headed back to the cottage, where she put on her bonnet and changed into the nicer of the two cloaks she owned. Although it was only early fall on Stroma the mornings were cool.
Martha found her father in the box room they’d converted into a tiny study. “I’m going down to see what news there is, Papa.”
He glanced up, his mind slow to follow his vision. “Ah, Martha. What’s that you say?”
“I’m going to the inn.” Martha avoiding using the pub’s name—the Greedy Vicar—which she knew pained her father, even after all these years.
He gave her an absentminded smile. “Very good. And, er, the gentlemen in the hall?”
“I’ve given them breakfast and Small Cailean is in with them.”
“Ah, yes, he’s such a good lad. So gentle. Um …” He paused and she knew he’d lost the thread of his thought. Fear slithered down her spine. He’d become so vague lately.
He pushed up his spectacles and that is when she noticed his hands.
“Father.” He jolted at her sharp tone and she softened her voice. “Let me see your hands.”
He offered them to her, as trusting as a child. Ink stained his thumb and two fingers of his right hand, but all ten digits were a disturbing shade of blue.
“You are freezing, Father.”
“No, no. It’s quite pleasant in here.”
The sun shone through the east-facing window, turning the air shimmery with heat; it was warm. Martha held his frozen fingers for a moment between both of her hands, trying to chafe some warmth into them.
His crystalline blue eyes sharpened, and his face creased into a smile, changing in an instant from a confused, vague stranger to the father she knew and loved. “Don’t you worry, Martha. It’s just a bit of sluggish circulation that will be fine when I get moving.” He squeezed her hands.
Martha wasn’t so sure, but what could she say? He was quite an old man for anywhere in Britain, but especially for Stroma, where the harsh climate aged people and took most before their time.
“I will be back in plenty of time to make the noonday meal.” Whose ingredients she would need to beg Joe Campbell to give her on account as their monthly budget was not sufficient to feed seven people, or eight if Small Cailean chose to stay.
“Very well. I shall see you when …” But his gaze wandered back to his book before he finished.
The Greedy Vicar was the social center of Stroma. Of the almost four hundred people who lived on the island perhaps one hundred lived in or near Uppertown. Another fifty or so lived in Nethertown, at the other end of the island, and the rest lived on the area known as The Mains—the agricultural center of the island.
As Martha walked toward Uppertown, she looked out over the Pentland Firth; the water between Stroma and the mainland was as smooth as proverbial glass, although she knew that could change without warning if the wind picked up.
The tiny inn/taproom/store was crowded when she entered.
“Miss Pringle!” a half-dozen voices called out.
Martha was busy greeting several of her father’s parishioners when Mr. Clark approached her. For once, he was not smiling.
“Do you have a moment, Miss Pringle? Joe said we can use the small parlor.”
Martha followed him into the Greedy Vicar’s only parlor, small or otherwise. She pulled off her ancient leather gloves and then untied her bonnet.
“I’m afraid I have some bad news, Miss Pringle.”
“Oh?”
“A handful of