Of course, I had not counted on the complicating factor of the woman to my left.

She took in what I’d said, and nodded, and she waited, and we all four sat at the table for a moment in our places as though playing at a game of cards, with no one keen to let the others see their hand. And finally it was left to me to say, “We have a problem.”

In the silence that came after, Gilroy said, to clarify, “The marriage was irregular.”

By which he meant they’d not been married in the Kirk, and by the parish minister, but in a more clandestine way. The minister they’d chosen was not even Presbyterian. I recognized him by his name as one of those devout Episcopalians who, at the Revolution, had been stripped of their own parishes and had since, with the others of their outcast faith, been barred from leading any form of worship, or from baptizing a newborn bairn—or celebrating marriages.

She touched the edge of the certificate with something like defiance. “An irregular marriage is still a legal marriage.”

Gilroy allowed this. “Only this one was never judicially acknowledged.” As though realizing his language might be overly technical, he patiently explained, “You never went before the Kirk to confess it, so that you could be rebuked and pay the fine and have the marriage properly entered in their records.”

Her nod was cool, as was her tone. “It was a failing of my husband’s that he died before we could confess our marriage to the Kirk.”

“But then it must be proved,” said Gilroy. “I’m afraid the minister who married you is long since dead. Which normally would leave us with the witnesses, but my initial inquiries would indicate that they, too, are deceased.”

“Again our failing, I suppose, to not choose people who’d outlive us, and to lack the foresight to have filled the room with guests.”

I leaned forward slightly, taking up the space between them in the way one does when sensing friends are in a mood to fight. “With your permission, Mrs. Graeme, that is why we’re here. To seek another means of proof.”

She collected her emotions with an effort betrayed only by the slightest setting of her shoulders—something that she likely didn’t even know she did, when pressed. But it had the desired effect, for when she spoke, her voice had lost its edge.

“Pray, Sergeant Williamson, if this certificate and my own word are insufficient, then what proof will satisfy the men of your commission?”

“Have you any other documents that bear your husband’s signature and name you as his wife? A deed, or back bond, or—”

“We owned no land.”

“His final will and testament?”

“He did not leave one. If he had, I surely would have brought it with me, would I not?”

“A letter, then.” I grasped at any document I could. “You must have letters that he wrote to you, which might help to establish your relationship.”