“ ’Til I what?” I asked, fascinated by his description of the evening’s program.
“ ’Til ye burst into flame and take me with ye, I suppose,” he said, and stooping, swooped me up into his arms and carried me across the darkened threshold.
112
OATHBREAKER
February 2, 1776
He called them all together, and they came. The Jacobites of Ardsmuir, the fishermen from Thurso, the outcasts and opportunists who had come to settle on the Ridge over the last six years. He had called for the men, and most came alone, making their way through the dripping woods, slipping on mossy rocks and muddy trails. Some of the wives came, as well, though, curious, wary, though they hung modestly back and allowed Claire to shepherd them into the house one by one.
The men stood in the dooryard, and he regretted that; the memory of the last time they had gathered here was much too fresh in everyone’s mind. But there was no choice about it; there were too many to fit in the house. And it was broad day, now, not night—though he saw more than one man turn his head sharply to glance at the chestnut trees, as though he saw the ghost of Thomas Christie there, poised once more to walk through the crowd.
He crossed himself, and said a hasty prayer, as he always did when he thought of Tom Christie, then stepped out on the porch. They had been talking together—awkwardly, but with a fair assumption of ease—but the talk died abruptly when he appeared.
“I have received word summoning me to Wilmington,” he said to them without preamble. “I go to join the militias there, and I will take with me such men as will come willingly.”
They gaped at him like sheep disturbed at grazing. He had a moment’s unsettling impulse to laugh, but it passed at once.
“We will go as militia, but I do not command your service.” Privately, he doubted that he could command more than a handful of them now, but as well to put a good face on it.
Most were still blinking at him, but one or two had got a grip on themselves.
“You declare yourself a rebel, Mac Dubh?” That was Murdo, bless him. Loyal as a dog, but slow of thought. He needed things to be put in the simplest of terms, but once grasped, he would deal with them tenaciously.
“Aye, Murdo, I do. I am a rebel. So will any man be who marches with me.”
That caused a fair degree of murmuring, glances of doubt. Here and there in the crowd, he heard the word “oath,” and steeled himself for the obvious question.
He was taken aback by the man who asked it, though. Arch Bug drew himself up, tall and stern.
“Ye swore an oath to the King, Seaumais mac Brian,” he said, his voice unexpectedly sharp. “So did we all.”
There was a murmur of agreement at this, and faces turned to him, frowning, uneasy. He took a deep breath, and felt his stomach knot. Even now, knowing what he knew, and knowing too the immorality of a forced oath, to break his sworn word openly made him feel that he had stepped on a step that wasn’t there.
“So did we all,” he agreed. “But it was an oath forced upon us as captives, not one given as men of honor.”
This was patently true; still, it was an oath, and Highlanders did not take any oath lightly. May I die and be buried far from my kin … Oath or no, he thought grimly, that fate would likely be theirs.
“But an oath nonetheless, sir,” said Hiram Crombie, lips drawn tight. “We have sworn before God. Do you ask us to put aside such a thing?” Several of the Presbyterians murmured acquiescence, drawing closer to Crombie in show of support.
He took another deep breath, feeling his belly tighten.
“I ask nothing.” And knowing full well what he did, despising himself in a way for doing it—he fell back upon the ancient weapons of rhetoric and idealism.
“I said that the oath of loyalty to the King was an oath extorted, not given. Such an oath is without power, for no man swears freely, save he is free himself.”
No one shouted disagreement, so he went on, voice pitched to carry, but not shouting.
“Ye’ll ken the Declaration of Arbroath, will ye? Four hundred years since, it was our sires, our grandsires, who put their hands to these words: … for as long as but a hundred of us remain alive, never will we on any conditions be brought under English rule.” He stopped to steady his voice, then went on. “It is in truth not for glory, nor riches, nor honours that we are fighting, but for freedom—for that alone, which no honest man gives up but with life itself.”
He stopped dead then. Not for its effect on the men to whom he spoke, but because of the words themselves—for in speaking them, he had found himself unexpectedly face to face with his own conscience.
To this point, he had been dubious about the justifications of the revolution, and more so of its ends; he had been compelled to the rebel stand because of what Claire, Brianna, and Roger Mac had told him. But in the speaking of the ancient words, he found the conviction he thought he pretended—and was stricken by the thought that he did indeed go to fight for something more than the welfare of his own people.
And ye’ll end up just as dead in the end, he thought, resigned. I dinna expect it hurts less, to ken it’s for good cause—but maybe so.
“I shall leave in a week,” he said quietly, and left them staring after him.
He had expected his Ardsmuir men to come: the three Lindsay brothers, Hugh Abernathy, Padraic MacNeill, and the rest. Not expected, but gladly welcomed, were Robin McGillivray and his son, Manfred.
Ute McGillivray had forgiven him, he saw, with a certain sense of amusement. Besides Robin and Freddie, fifteen men from near Salem had come, all relatives of the redoubtable frau.
A great surprise, though, was Hiram Crombie, who alone of the fisher-folk had decided to join him.
“I have prayed on the matter,” Hiram informed him, managing to look more piously sour than usual, “and I believe ye’re right about the oath. I expect ye’ll have us all hangit and burned oot of our homes—but I’ll come, nonetheless.”
The rest—with great mutterings and agitated debate—had not. He didn’t blame them. Having survived the aftermath of Culloden, the perilous voyage to the colonies, and the hardship of exile, the very last thing a sensible person could wish was to take up arms against the King.
The greatest surprise, though, awaited him as his small company rode out of Cooperville and turned into the road that led south.
A company of men, some forty strong, was waiting at the crossroad. He drew near warily, and a single man spurred out of the crowd and drew up with him—Richard Brown, pale-faced and grim.
“I hear you go to Wilmington,” Brown said without preamble. “If so be as it’s agreeable, my men and I will ride with you.” He coughed, and added, “Under your command, to be sure.”
Behind him, he heard a small “hmph!” from Claire, and suppressed a smile. He was quite aware of the phalanx of narrowed eyes at his back. He caught Roger Mac’s eye, and his son-in-law gave a small nod. War made strange bedfellows; Roger Mac knew that as well as he did—and for himself, he had fought with worse than Brown, during the Rising.
“Be welcome, then,” he said, and bowed from his saddle. “You and your men.”
We met another militia company near a place called Moore’s Creek, and camped with them under the longleaf pines. There had been a bad ice storm the day before, and the ground was thick with fallen branches, some as large around as my waist. It made the going more difficult, but had its advantages, so far as making campfires went.
I was throwing a hastily assembled bucket of ingredients into the kettle for stew—scraps of ham, with bones, beans, rice, onions, carrots, crumbled stale biscuit—and listening to the other militia commander, Robert Borthy, who was telling Jamie—with considerable levity—about the state of the Emigrant Highland Regiment, as our opponents were formally known.
“There can’t be more than five or six hundred, all told,” he was saying with amused derision. “Old MacDonald and his aides have been tryin’ to scoop ’em up from the countryside for
months, and I gather the effort has been akin to scoopin’ water with a sieve.”
On one occasion, Alexander McLean, one of the general’s aides, had set up a rendezvous point, calling upon all the Highlanders and Scotch–Irish in the neighborhood to assemble—cannily providing a hogshead of liquor as inducement. Some five hundred men had in fact shown up—but as soon as the liquor was drunk, they had melted away again, leaving McLean alone, and completely lost.
“The poor man wandered about for nearly two days, lookin’ for the road, before someone took pity on him and led him back to civilization.” Borthy, a hearty backwoods soul with a thick brown beard, grinned widely at the tale, and accepted a cup of ale with due thanks before going on.
“God knows where the rest of ’em are now. I hear tell that what troops Old MacDonald has are mostly brand-new emigrants—the Governor made ’em swear to take up arms to defend the colony before he’d grant them land. Most of them poor sods are fresh off the boat from Scotland—they don’t know north from south, let alone just where they are.”
“Oh, I ken where they are, even if they don’t.” Ian came into the firelight, grubby but cheerful. He had been riding dispatches back and forth among the various militia companies converging on Wilmington, and his statement caused a rush of general interest.
“Where?” Richard Brown leaned forward into the firelight, narrow face keen and foxy.
“They’re comin’ down Negro Head Point Road, marching like a proper regiment,” Ian said, sinking onto a hastily offered log with a small groan. “Is there anything hot to drink, Auntie? I’m frozen and parched, both.”
There was a nasty sort of dark liquid, called “coffee” for courtesy’s sake, and made from boiling burned acorns. I rather dubiously poured him a cup, but he consumed it with every evidence of enjoyment, meanwhile recounting the results of his expeditions.
“They meant to circle round to the west, but Colonel Howe’s men got there first, and cut them off. So then they went across, meaning to take the ford—but Colonel Moore put his men to the quick-step and marched all night to forestall them.”
“They made no move to engage either Howe or Moore?” Jamie asked, frowning. Ian shook his head, and gulped the rest of his acorn coffee.
“Wouldna come close. Colonel Moore says they dinna mean to engage until they reach Wilmington—they’re expecting reinforcement there.”
I exchanged a glance with Jamie. The expected reinforcement was presumably the British regular troops, promised by General Gage. But a rider from Brunswick we had met the day before had told us that no ships had arrived when he left the coast, four days before. If there was reinforcement awaiting them, it would have to come from the local Loyalists—and from the various rumors and reports we’d heard so far, the local Loyalists were a weak reed on which to lean.
“Well, so. They’re cut off on either side, aye? Straight down the road is where they’re headed—they might reach the bridge late tomorrow.”
“How far is it, Ian?” Jamie asked, squinting through the vista of longleaf pines. The trees were very tall, and the grassland under them wide open—very reasonable for riding.
“Maybe half a day on horseback.”
“Aye, then.” Jamie relaxed a little, and reached for his own cup of the vile brew. “We’ve time to sleep first, then.”
We reached the bridge at Moore’s Creek by midday the next day, and joined the company commanded by Richard Caswell, who greeted Jamie with pleasure.
The Highland regiment was nowhere in sight—but dispatch riders arrived regularly, reporting their steady movement down Negro Head Point Road—a wide wagon thoroughfare that led directly to the solid plank bridge that crossed the Widow Moore’s Creek.
Jamie, Caswell, and several of the other commanders were walking up and down the bank, pointing at the bridge and up and down the shore. The creek ran through a stretch of treacherous, swampy ground, with cypress trees stretching up from water and mud. The creek itself deepened as it narrowed, though—a plumb line that some curious soul dropped into the water off the bridge said it was fifteen feet deep at that point—and the bridge was the only feasible place for an army of any size to cross.
Which did a great deal to explain Jamie’s silence over supper. He had helped to throw up a small earthwork on the far side of the creek, and his hands were smeared with dirt—and grease.
“They’ve cannon,” he said quietly, seeing me eye the smudges on his hands. He wiped them absently on his breeks, much the worse for wear. “Two small guns from the town—but cannon, nonetheless.” He looked toward the bridge, and grimaced slightly.
I knew what he was thinking—and why.
Ye were behind the cannon at Culloden, Donald, he had said to the Major. I was in front of them. With a sword in my hand. Swords were the Highlanders’ natural weapons—and for most, likely their only weapons. From all we had heard, General MacDonald had managed to assemble only a small quantity of muskets and powder; most of his troops were armed with broadswords and targes. And they were marching straight into ambush.
“Oh, Christ,” Jamie said, so softly I could barely hear him. “The poor wee fools. The poor gallant wee fools.”
Matters became still worse—or much better, depending on your viewpoint—as dusk fell. The temperature had risen since the ice storm, but the ground was sodden; moisture rose from it during the day, but then as night came on, condensed into a fog so thick that even the campfires were barely visible, each one glowing like a sullen coal in the mist.
Excitement was passing through the militia like a mosquito-borne fever, as the new conditions gave rise to new plans.
“Now,” Ian said softly, appearing like a ghost out of the fog beside Jamie. “Caswell’s ready.”
Such supplies as we had were already packed; carrying guns, powder, and food, eight hundred men, together with an uncounted quantity of camp-followers like myself, stole quietly through the mist toward the bridge, leaving the campfires burning behind us.
I wasn’t sure exactly where MacDonald’s troops were just now—they might be still on the wagon road, or might have cautiously detoured, coming down to the edge of the swamp to reconnoiter. Good luck to them in that case, I thought. My own insides were tight with tension as I stepped carefully across the bridge; it was silly to tiptoe, but I felt a reluctance to put my feet down firmly—the fog and silence compelled a sense of secrecy and furtiveness.
I stubbed a toe against an uneven plank and lurched forward, but Roger, walking beside me, caught me by the arm and set me upright. I squeezed his arm, and he smiled a little, his face barely visible through the mist, though he was no more than a foot away.
He knew quite as well as Jamie and the rest did what was coming. Nonetheless, I sensed a strong excitement in him, mingled with dread. It was, after all, to be his first battle.
On the other side, we dispersed to make fresh camps on the hill above the circular earthwork the men had thrown up a hundred yards from the creek. I passed close enough to the guns to see their elongated snouts, poking inquisitively through the mist: Mother Covington and her daughter, the men called the two cannon—I wondered idly which was which, and who the original Mother Covington might have been. A redoubtable lady, I assumed—or possibly the proprietor of the local brothel.
Firewood was easy to find; the ice storm had extended to the pines near the creek, too. It was, however, bloody damp, and damned if I was going to spend an hour on my knees with a tinderbox. Luckily, no one could see what I was doing in this pea-soup fog, and I stealthily removed a small tin of Brianna’s matches from my pocket.
As I was blowing on the kindling, I heard a series of odd, rending screeches from the direction of the bridge, and knelt upright, staring down the hill. I couldn’t see anything, of course, but realized almost at once that it was the sound of nails giving way as planks were pried up—they were dismantling the bridge.
It seemed a long time before Jamie came to find me. He refused food, but sat against a tree
and beckoned to me. I sat down between his knees and leaned back against him, grateful for his warmth; the night was cold, with a damp that crept into every crevice and chilled the marrow.
“Surely they’ll see that the bridge is out?” I said, after a long silence filled with the myriad noises of the men working below.
“Not if the fog lasts ’til morning—and it will.” Jamie sounded resigned, but he seemed more peaceful than he had earlier. We sat quietly together for some time, watching the play of flames on the fog—an eerie sight, as the fire seemed to shimmer and merge with the mist, the flames stretching strangely up and up, disappearing into the swirl of white.
“D’ye believe in ghosts, Sassenach?” Jamie asked suddenly.
“Er … well, not to put too fine a point on it, yes,” I said. He knew I did, because I’d told him about my meeting with the Indian whose face was painted black. I knew he did, too—he was a Highlander. “Why, have you seen one?”
He shook his head, wrapping his arms more securely around me.
“Not to say ‘seen,’ ” he said, sounding thoughtful. “But I will be damned if he’s no there.”
“Who?” I said, rather startled at this.
“Murtagh,” he said, surprising me further. He shifted more comfortably, resettling me against him. “Ever since the fog came in, I’ve had the most peculiar sense of him, just by me.”
“Really?” This was fascinating, but made me thoroughly uneasy. Murtagh, Jamie’s godfather, had died at Culloden, and—so far as I knew—hadn’t been going about manifesting himself since. I didn’t doubt his presence; Murtagh’s had been an extremely strong—if dour—personality, and if Jamie said he was there, he very likely was. What made me uneasy was the contemplation of just why he might be there.
I concentrated for a time, but got no sense of the tough little Scotsman myself. Evidently, he was only interested in Jamie. That frightened me.
While the conclusion of the morrow’s battle was a foregone one, a battle was a battle, and men might be killed on the winning side, as well. Murtagh had been Jamie’s godfather, and took his duty to Jamie seriously. I sincerely hoped he hadn’t had word that Jamie was about to be killed, and shown up to conduct him to heaven—visions on the eve of battle were a fairly common occurrence in Highland lore, but Jamie did say he hadn’t seen Murtagh. That was something, I supposed.
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