One side of John’s mouth turned up a little.
“Do you think I’ve come to fight you for the favors of this lady? Or to seduce her from your side?”
Jamie didn’t laugh, but the line between his brows smoothed out.
“I don’t,” he said dryly. “And as ye dinna seem to be much damaged, I doubt ye’ve come to be doctored.”
John gave an amiable bob of the head, indicating that this line of reasoning was correct.
“And I doubt, as well,” Jamie continued, an edge creeping into his voice, “that ye’ve come to continue our previous discussion.”
John inhaled slowly, and exhaled even slower, regarding Jamie with a level gaze. “Is it your opinion that anything remains to be said, regarding any part of that discussion?”
There was a marked silence. I glanced from one to the other, Jamie’s eyes narrowed and John’s eyes wide, both with fixed blue stares. All it lacked was growling and the slow lashing of tails.
“Are you armed, John?” I inquired pleasantly.
He glanced at me, startled. “No.”
“Good,” I said, grunting slightly as I struggled to sit up. “Then you obviously aren’t going to kill him”—I nodded at Jamie, standing over me with fists half curled—“and if he didn’t break your neck the first time, he isn’t going to do it now. Are you?” I inquired, arching a brow at Jamie.
He looked down his nose at me, but I saw the slight relaxation of his mouth. And his hands. “Probably not.”
“Well, then.” I brushed the hair back from my face. “No point in hitting each other. And harsh language would detract from the pleasant nature of this visit, wouldn’t it?”
Neither of them chose to answer this.
“That was not actually a rhetorical question,” I said. “But let that go.” I turned to John, folding my hands in my lap. “Flattered as I am by the attention, I don’t think you came solely to inquire after my well-being. So if you’ll pardon my vulgar curiosity … why are you here?”
He finally relaxed and, at my nod, took the stool, linking his fingers round his knee.
“I’ve come to ask your help,” he said directly to Jamie. “But also”—it was slight, but I noticed the hesitation—“to make you an offer. Not as quid pro quo,” he added. “The offer is not contingent on your assistance.”
Jamie made a Scottish noise indicating deep skepticism but willingness to listen.
John nodded and took a breath before continuing. “You once mentioned to me, my dear, that—”
“Dinna be calling her that.”
“Mrs. Fraser,” John amended, and, with a polite bow to me, turned his attention to Jamie, “once mentioned that she—and you, I would imagine—had some acquaintance with General Arnold.”
Jamie and I exchanged puzzled looks. He shrugged and folded his arms.
“Aye, we do.”
“Good. What I—and my brother”—I felt, rather than saw, Jamie’s start at mention of Hal—“would ask of you is a note of introduction to Arnold, with your personal request that the general allow us official entrance into the city—and whatever aid he might find it convenient to give us—for the purpose of making a search for my son.”
John let out the rest of his breath and sat, head down, not moving. Nobody moved.
At last, Jamie let out a long sigh and sat down on the room’s other stool.
“Tell me,” he said, resigned. “What’s the wee bastard done now?”
THE STORY FINISHED, John inhaled, made to rub his bad eye, and luckily stopped in time.
“I’ll put a bit more honey in that before you leave,” I told him. “It will ease the grittiness.” This non sequitur helped to bridge the awkward gap in the conversation left by Jamie’s being struck momentarily speechless.
“Jesus,” he said, and rubbed a hand hard over his face. He was still wearing the bloodstained shirt and breeches in which he’d fought; he hadn’t shaved in three days, had barely slept or eaten, and looked like something you wouldn’t want to meet in broad daylight, let alone a dark alley. He took a deep breath and shook his head like a dog shedding water.
“So ye think the two of them have gone to Philadelphia—William and this Richardson?”
“Probably not together—or at least not to begin with,” John said. “William’s groom said he left to find a couple of … er … girls who had gone from the camp. But we strongly suspect that this was a ploy by Richardson, to decoy William out of camp and intercept him on the road.”
Jamie made an irascible noise.
“I should like to think the lad’s no such a fat-heided gomerel as to go off wi’ this Richardson. Not after the man sent him into the Great Dismal last year and nearly killed him.”
“He told you that?”
“Oh. He didna tell ye that?” Jamie’s voice might possibly have held a shade of scorn, had one been listening closely.
“I’m damned sure he didn’t tell you anything,” John replied, with an edge. “He hadn’t seen you for years before he met you at Chestnut Street, I’d bet money he hasn’t seen you since, and I’m reasonably sure I would have noticed had he mentioned Richardson in the hallway there.”
“No,” Jamie said briefly. “He told my nephew, Ian Murray. Or at least,” he amended, “Ian got it from what he said, raving wi’ fever when Ian got him out of the swamp. Richardson sent him wi’ a message for some men in Dismal Town—men he said were Loyalists. But half the men in Dismal Town are named Washington.”
John’s appearance of pugnacity had vanished. He looked pale, and the fading bruises stood out like leprosy against his skin. He took a deep breath, glanced round the room, and, seeing a half-empty bottle of claret on the table, picked it up and drank a quarter of it without stopping.
He set it down, stifled a belch, rose with a brief nod and a “wait a moment,” and went out, leaving Jamie and me staring at each other in bafflement.
This was not significantly assuaged by the reappearance of John, followed by the Duke of Pardloe. Jamie said something remarkably creative in Gàidhlig, and I gave him a look of startled appreciation.
“And a good day to you, too, General Fraser,” Hal said, with a correct bow. Like John, he was dressed in civvies, though with a rather loud mulberry striped waistcoat, and I did wonder where he’d got it from.
“I have resigned my commission,” Jamie said coldly. “ ‘Mr. Fraser’ will do. May I ask to what we owe the honor of your presence, Your Grace?”
Hal’s lips pressed tight together, but, with a glance at his brother, he obliged with a brief précis of his personal concern with Captain Richardson.
“And I do, of course, wish to retrieve my nephew, William—should he in fact be with Richardson. My brother informs me that you have doubts as to the probability of this being the case?”
“I do,” Jamie said shortly. “My son is not a fool, nor a weakling.” I caught the faint emphasis on “my son,” and so did both Greys, who stiffened slightly. “He wouldna go off on some feeble pretext, nor would he allow someone of whom he was suspicious to take him captive.”
“You have a bloody lot of faith in a boy you haven’t seen since he was six,” Hal observed conversationally.
Jamie smiled, with considerable rue.
“I had the making of him until he was six,” he said, and turned his gaze on John. “I ken what he’s made of. And I ken who shaped him after that. Tell me I’m wrong, my lord.”
There was a marked silence, broken only by Lieutenant Macken’s voice below, calling plaintively to his wife about the location of his clean stockings.
“Well, then,” Hal said with a sigh. “Where do you think William’s gone, if he’s not with Richardson?”
“He’s gone after the girls he spoke of,” Jamie said, lifting one shoulder in a shrug. “He told his groom so, did he not? D’ye ken who these lassies are?”
The Greys exchanged looks of muted chagrin, and I coughed, very carefully, holding a pillow to my stomach.
�
�If that’s the case,” I said, “then presumably he’ll come back, once he’s either found them or given up looking for them. Wouldn’t he? Would he go AWOL over them—er … absent without leave, I mean?”
“He wouldn’t have to risk that,” Hal said. “He’s been relieved of duty.”
“What?” John exclaimed, rounding on his brother. “What the devil for?”
Hal sighed, exasperated. “Leaving camp when he was ordered to stay there in the middle of a battle, what else? Getting into a fight with another officer, ending up at the bottom of a ravine with a dent in his skull through being in the wrong place at the wrong time, and in general being a bloody nuisance.”
“You’re right, he is your son,” I said to Jamie, amused. He snorted, but didn’t look altogether displeased.
“Speaking of nephews,” Jamie said to Hal, “ye seem remarkably well informed, Your Grace. Might ye know anything of an Indian scout named Ian Murray?”
Hal looked blank, but John’s head turned quickly in Jamie’s direction.
“Yes,” he said. “I do. He was taken prisoner late on the day of battle and walked with me into camp, whereupon he killed another scout with a tomahawk and walked out again.”
“Blood will tell,” I murmured, though privately both shocked and worried. “Er … was he injured?”
“Aye, he was,” Jamie answered brusquely. “He’d been shot wi’ an arrow, in the shoulder. I couldna pull it, but I broke the shaft for him.”
“And … no one’s seen him since the night of the battle?” I asked, striving to keep my voice steady. The men exchanged glances, but none of them would meet my eyes.
“I, um, did give him a canteen of water mixed with brandy,” John said, a little diffidently. “He wouldn’t take a horse.”
“Rachel will find him,” Jamie said, as firmly as he could. “And I’ve asked Ian Mòr to watch out for the lad. He’ll be all right.”
“I trust your faith in your blood will be justified, sir,” Hal said with a sigh, evidently meaning it. “But as we can do nothing about Murray, and the question of William’s whereabouts is apparently moot for the moment … I hesitate to intrude my concerns regarding my blood, but I have stringent reasons for finding Captain Richardson, quite apart from anything he may have done or not done with William. And to that end …”
“Aye,” Jamie said, and the tension in his shoulders relaxed. “Aye, of course, Your Grace. Sassenach, will ye have the goodness not to die whilst I go and ask Mrs. Macken for paper and ink?”
“We have some,” John said, reaching into the leather pouch he’d been carrying under his arm. “Allow me.” And proceeded to lay out paper, an inkhorn, a small bundle of quills, and a stub of red sealing wax.
Everyone watched as Jamie mixed the ink, trimmed a quill, and began. Knowing how laborious writing was for him and how much he’d hate being watched, I pushed myself up a little more, stifling a groan, and turned to Hal.
“John mentioned that you wanted to make us an offer,” I said. “Of course we’re happy to help, regardless. But out of curiosity—”
“Oh.” Hal blinked but changed gears rapidly, fixing his gaze on me. “Yes. The offer I had in mind has nothing to do with Mr. Fraser’s kind accommodation,” he said. “John suggested it, as a matter of convenience for all concerned.” He turned to his brother, who smiled at me.
“My house on Chestnut Street,” John said. “Plainly I shan’t be living there for the foreseeable future. And I understand that you had taken refuge with the printer’s family in Philadelphia. Given your present fragile state of health”—he nodded delicately at the small heap of bloody dressings in the corner—“clearly it would be more comfortable for you to resume residence at my house. You—”
A deep Scottish noise interrupted him, and he looked up at Jamie, startled.
“The last time I was compelled to accept assistance from your brother, my lord,” Jamie said precisely, staring at John, “I was your prisoner and incapable of caring for my own family. Now I am no man’s prisoner, nor ever will be again. I shall make provision for my wife.”
In dead silence, with all eyes fixed on him, he bent his head to the paper and slowly signed his name.
ONE DAY, COCK OF THE WALK—NEXT DAY, A FEATHER DUSTER
HE’D GONE BY INSTINCT to fetch Madras, but paused to think on the way. If he found the girls, he couldn’t bring them both back with him on the horse. He changed direction and plunged into the teamsters’ park, emerging a brief time later with an ammunition cart, now sans ammunition, pulled by a large, rugged gray mule with half of one ear missing.
The mule was disinclined to move fast, but still made better time than two girls on foot might. How long a head start did they have? Maybe an hour, from what Zebedee had said, maybe longer.
“Heya!” he shouted, and snapped the whip over the mule’s rump. The animal was surly, but not a fool, and lurched into a faster pace—though William suspected that this effort might be as much to outrun the swarming flies as in response to his own urging.
Once solidly in motion, though, the mule seemed able to keep it up without noticeable effort, and they trotted down the road at a tooth-rattling pace, easily passing farm carts, foragers, and a couple of scouting parties. Surely he would catch the girls up in no time.
He didn’t. He drove nearly ten miles, by his estimation, before concluding that there was no way the girls could possibly have outrun him, and he turned back, searching carefully along the few farm roads that led off into fields. To and fro he went, inquiring of everyone he saw, growing hotter and more irritated by the moment.
Midway through the afternoon, the army caught up with him, marching columns overtaking the mule, which had slowed to a walk by now. Reluctantly, he turned about and continued with the army to camp. Perhaps Colenso had been wrong; maybe the girls hadn’t left at all. In which case, he’d find them once the camp settled for the night.
He did not. He did find Zeb, though, and Colenso with him. Both were adamant that the girls were indeed gone—and William found no trace of them, though he made stubborn inquiries among the laundresses and cooks.
At last, he trudged through the camp in search of either Papa or Uncle Hal. Not that he expected either man to have any notion regarding the girls—but he somehow felt that he could not abandon his search without at least soliciting their help in putting out word of the girls. Two half-grown girls couldn’t possibly outstrip an army, and—
He stopped dead in the middle of camp, letting men on their way to supper flow around him.
“Bloody hell,” he said, too hot and tired even to make it an exclamation. “Colenso, you left-handed little bugger.” And barely containing his exasperation—with himself as much as with his groom—he set off grimly to find Colenso Baragwanath.
Because Colenso was a left-handed little bugger. William had noticed that immediately, as he suffered from the same affliction himself. Unlike Colenso, though, William could tell the difference between his right hand and his left—and had a sense of direction. Colenso … didn’t, and William wanted to kick himself for not remembering that.
“You bloody idiot,” he muttered, wiping a sleeve across his sweating, dusty face. “Why didn’t you think of that?”
Because it made little sense—once he paused to think about it—for the girls to have run off ahead of the army. Even if they were afraid of someone in the army, and even if they meant to reach New York, they would have been better served to have gone the other way, at least temporarily. Let the army march on well ahead, and then make their way wherever they meant to go.
He glanced at the sun, just barely still above the horizon, and heaved a deep, exasperated breath. Whatever else she might be, Jane wasn’t a fool. First he’d find some supper, and then Colenso—but he’d give good odds that the morrow would find him on the road back toward Middletown.
HE FOUND THEM, just before noon. They saw him coming, but he’d seen them first: the two of them walking down the side of the road,
each with a bundle in either hand. They glanced over their shoulders at the sound of his wheels, saw nothing alarming, turned back—and then Jane whirled round again, her face aghast as she realized who she’d just seen.
She dropped one of her bundles, clutched her younger sister by the wrist, and jerked her off the road. The road led through farmland here, with open fields on either side—but there was a sizable chestnut grove a few hundred yards ahead, and, despite William’s shout, the girls ran for this as though the devil himself were after them.
Muttering under his breath, he pulled up, dropped the reins, and leapt out. Long-legged as he was, he failed to catch them before they reached the edge of the wood.
“Stop, for God’s sake!” he bellowed. “I’m not going to hurt you!”
Fanny, hearing this, seemed disposed to stop, but Jane yanked her urgently on and they vanished among the rustling leaves.
William snorted and slowed down. Jane could make up her own mind—if she had one, which he was strongly inclined to doubt at the moment—but she hadn’t any business to be dragging her little sister off through land that had been a battlefield only two days ago.
Broken trails and big crushed patches marred the fields, from soldiers running or artillery being dragged through it. He could smell death when he drew a deep breath; it made him uneasy. The stink of uncollected corpses swelling in the sun, bursting open, weltering with flies and maggots … On the one hand, he hoped the girls wouldn’t stumble over such a sight. On the other, if they did, they’d likely come haring back out into his arms, screaming.
And corpses might not be the only things hiding in the folds and furrows of the countryside. His hand went automatically to his waist, groping for the hilt of his knife—which, of course, wasn’t there.
“Fucking buggering shit-fucking hell!”
As though this had been a signal, a sudden racket broke out in the trees. Not a corpse; he could hear male voices, cursing, cajoling, and high-pitched shrieks. He snatched up a fallen branch and charged into the grove, shouting at the top of his lungs. He could hear them; they could certainly hear him, and the tone of the shouting changed. The girls were still shrieking, but less frantically, and the men—yes, more than one … two, three? Not more—were arguing, agitated, fearful. Not English … not speaking English …
Outlander [08] Written in My Own Heart's Blood Page 76
