Quinn gave a cheerful wave. “And don’t forget to give me last week’s notes later for me to organize.”
Duncan had no idea why, in the middle of all his intrigues and work for the colonies, Franklin would devote half a day at a new textile mill. As their coach rattled along Old Bond Street toward the northern edge of the city, Duncan decided it might just have been a gambit for Franklin to spend a few hours with Olivia, who always seemed to become more French in his presence. Then he chided himself as he heard Olivia ask about warp threads and shuttles. She shared her brother’s insatiable curiosity and sounded as though she knew more about the production of cloth than either Duncan or Franklin.
The coach took them into a labyrinth of alleys between low sturdy buildings, most of them made of brick, then finally halted in a wide alley that ended at a simple door marked HAMPSTEAD TEXTILE WORKS. They were greeted in the entry lobby by a genteel man who introduced himself as the superintendent and then opened an inner door, releasing a rattling din caused by scores of turning shuttles as weavers bent over their looms.
“We use Mr. Kay’s new flying shuttle,” the superintendent boasted, then gestured to the nearest loom. “One weaver can do what four did before, and we can produce much wider fabric!” he declared with obvious pride. As if to explain, he approached the loom and pointed to a board under the threads that ran from side to side, creating a track to carry the shuttle and thread. Olivia exhibited great enthusiasm for the machine, which was duplicated at all the looms spread over the broad oak floor of the factory. As Franklin fired questions at the man, Duncan was reminded that the inventor was secretly helping the Covenant by finding new industry for America. On another day Duncan might have been fascinated himself, but his spirit was heavy with Robbie’s death and Ishmael’s words of the previous night. He hung back, seeing that Franklin and Olivia did not seem to notice his absence, and retreated to a water butt he had seen by the entrance. As he was dipping in the ladle for a second drink, one of the clerks he had seen in the offices burst through the door. He paused near Duncan, straining his neck as he searched the aisles before turning back toward Duncan.
“There is a disturbance outside. I am sure that the superintendent will want to know.”
“A disturbance?” Duncan asked.
“Probably some alley ruffians waiting for some coins before they move on.”
“Let’s not disturb Dr. Franklin’s visit,” Duncan said. “You and I can deal with a few ruffians.”
The clerk straightened his waistcoat with new self-importance and led Duncan out the front door.
A green enameled coach sat a dozen steps away, blocking the view down the alley. As recognition burst upon Duncan, a brocaded arm extended from the coach’s window and pointed at him. Six men darted from around the coach, each holding a drawn cavalry saber. Lieutenant Nettles appeared, leveling a cocked pistol as the others slowly converged. “The earl ordered us to take you alive, McCallum,” he declared. “But I’d be happy for the excuse to put a bullet in your knee.”
Duncan froze as Nettles lowered the pistol toward his leg. They stared in brittle silence at each other. “We have already killed you once,” Nettles reminded him with an icy smile, then nodded at someone behind Duncan. He turned barely in time to see the saber being raised, then the heavy hilt slammed into his skull.
Chapter 19
THE CEILING IRONS,” A HARSH voice growled. Duncan’s hearing was as blurred as his vision. He struggled to keep his eyes open for more than a few seconds at a time. “Dangle ’em from the arms for a few hours and they whimper like babes.”
“The major said he must keep his wits fer now,” came a gruff reply. “It’s his way. First he tortures ’em with words, then the messy stuff follows.”
“There’s King Hank’s old rack down the end of the hall,” the first man put in. “A little stretch might clear his wits fine.”
“Which I wager ain’t been used since the last century. Probably fall apart when we start the winding. And the earl says he wants to build a new one using that as a model, so we can’t be breaking it.”
“Worth a try, I’m just saying,” came the disappointed reply.
Duncan finally was able to keep his eyes open. The cell door and the wall adjoining the next cell were of rusty iron straps riveted together, which meant it was very old. He was in the first of a row of cells. What had Woolford said about the cellar of the Horse Guards Palace? It held the dungeons of the sadistic Henry the Eighth.
The realization stirred his senses, and he studied his musty surroundings. His two guards were at a table a few paces from his cell, the lantern between them the only light except for a guttering candle on an iron sconce on the wall behind them. He took advantage of the shadows, and his guards’ distraction, to touch the throbbing lump on the side of his head. Blood still seeped from it. The rest of his body seemed intact, though his ribs and thigh ached where someone, probably Nettles, had kicked him.
A smell of mildew, tobacco, and night soil hung in the dank air. Duncan recognized something else, the faint scent of stomach bile. He probed the front of this shirt and pushed his tongue around his mouth. Someone had vomited and it wasn’t him. Not wanting to draw the attention of his jailers, he stayed prone and twisted wormlike along the stone flag floor until he could see into the adjoining cell. Through the shadows he could make out the shape of another man leaning limply against the rear wall, asleep or unconscious.
Duncan twisted again to look back into the corridor that led to where the jailers sat. He had been a prisoner before, and knew that the more information he possessed the better his chances for survival. He saw now that the men wore high black boots, though they were worn and not polished to a military sheen, meaning they were probably employed as grooms or groundskeepers but that he was still in the custody of the Horse Guards.
Patrick Woolford’s offices were in the building above him. Would he be there now? Did he know of Duncan’s abduction? Duncan had no idea of the hour. His head spun. Surely by now Franklin and Olivia would know of his capture, but they were powerless to help him. How had Nettles known that Franklin was going to the textile mill, and that Duncan was with him? Ishmael would help, he told himself, then recalled that Ishmael was probably at Bedlam, and after Duncan had vowed to find accommodation elsewhere the Nipmuc would not miss him for hours, perhaps for a day or more. King Henry was known for leaving his prisoners to starve and rot. Was this forlorn hole where he would breathe his last? Would Sarah ever know of his fate? He had never finished his letter to her. He held her image in his mind as he drifted back into unconsciousness, hands around his totem pouch.
“Rise, ye worthless lump!”
Duncan sat up gasping, shaking off the water being poured over his head. As he thrust out an arm to knock away the bucket, the point of a cavalry saber pressed against his thigh.
“Like I said, McCallum,” came Lieutenant Nettles’s oily voice, “just because we have to keep you alive doesn’t mean you can’t be damaged.”
The guard with the bucket laughed and emptied the rest of its contents over Duncan.
“How did you find me?” Duncan sputtered. He knew they had not simply followed Franklin and discovered Duncan in attendance. They had sprung a carefully planned trap.
“The king knows all,” Nettles quipped, then turned. “Don’t neglect our other guest,” Nettles said to the jailer, who laughed again and retrieved another bucket by the cell door. The second prisoner woke gasping, clutching his side as the bucket was upended over him. The man turned toward Duncan, then guilt darkened his face and he looked away. It was Ensign Lewis.
Nettles edged his sword under Duncan’s chin and pushed upward, forcing him to his feet. “He’s hurt,” Duncan said.
Nettles grinned. “In another unit he would have been brought up on charges. But dear God, imagine the tedious paperwork, the military lawyers, the damned judges, the endless delays. Why put the poor ensign through all that torture over months when we can condense
it all to a few hours down here?”
“Charges for what?” Duncan asked. He glanced back at Lewis and saw that the second cell’s door was ajar. It had not been locked.
“Insubordination. Lying to an officer. Defiance of orders. Dereliction of duty. Not reporting the ghost of an enemy. Embarrassing the major and me. That one alone should be five hundred lashes. And my God, the king’s horses could have been lost. As it is, the new geldings will be skittish for weeks.”
Duncan had no idea of what Nettles spoke of but knew every minute of distraction meant delay for his own torture. “The king’s horses?”
“Tell him your shame, Ensign,” Nettles instructed Lewis.
“I was on duty at the Hyde Park paddock last night,” Lewis said in a low, fearful voice. “I allowed a building of the king to be burned to the ground.”
“The smith’s shop is gone,” Nettles snapped. “The harness shop is gone. Twenty good saddles gone!”
Nettles glared at Lewis as the words slowly sank into Duncan’s consciousness. Sinner John had left with Xander and a group of vengeful link boys, after Xander had explained that Robbie had been tortured at the Guards’ Hyde Park paddocks. “That would be the barn where you tortured and killed a nine-year-old boy,” he said to the lieutenant.
Nettles tilted his head in surprise. “No, McCallum,” he replied with a chilling grin. “He wasn’t killed until we approached the inn. Quite the little fighter. Squirmed right up to the end.”
Duncan fought the impulse to spring on the soulless lieutenant. “You put your stiletto into his heart.”
“I would have sliced his throat, but I had on my uniform. The heart is less messy.”
Duncan clenched his jaw. “You’re the one who tortured him as well?”
“My role was more in the capacity of field commander for that particular exercise. Sometimes it is more fulfilling to just watch. And do you have any idea how hard it is to remove bloodstains?”
“He did you no harm!” Duncan spat.
“We are taught to improvise, Highlander,” came a new voice from the darkness. Major Hastings stepped out of the shadows. “The boy was a weapon to use against our enemies. And the training grounds are always so convenient. Out of the way, yet only a twenty-minute trot from here. Horses at the big barn—throwing a man into a stall with an angry stallion can be most effective—and then there was always the smithy and harness shop with all those interesting tools.” Hastings spoke in a cool, disinterested tone as he lifted a pair of manacles from the guards’ table. “Hammers, nails, hoof clippers, trimming knives, leather straps, awls. The lieutenant even found a way to use an old bridle and bit last year, though it finally broke when the man was hoisted to the ceiling.” He turned to Duncan. “Did you actually set that fire?”
“Small price for the death of a young boy. His name was Robbie. He loved to sing.”
Hastings greeted the news with one of his lightless smiles. “Thank you for that. If anything runs amiss we will take that as a confession. We can always just hang you for destroying the king’s property, though sometimes we find ways for the king’s enemies to disappear, to avoid all the public fuss. If we let the king know, he might even vie with the earl over the joy of killing you.” Hastings shrugged. “But promises were already made. The earl is most adamant in his claim over you. I have never seen him so animated. I had no idea there was a history between the two of you.”
Hastings turned for a moment to speak to someone in the shadows. Duncan heard footsteps retreating, then the creak of heavy hinges down the corridor.
“Ensign?” Hastings said, and swung Lewis’s cell door open. “The cell was never locked, you know. But you were told to stay and you stayed. Bravo!”
Lewis was in obvious pain. He gazed dully at the major, then gripped his side and left the cell with small, mincing steps. Hastings offered mocking applause then gestured to the guards’ table.
“Tea! Get the ensign some hot tea. Nothing like hot tea before battle!”
Lewis spat blood on the stone flags, then with obvious pain lowered himself into one of the chairs by the table.
“For God’s sake, let me help him!” Duncan cried. “He needs a doctor.”
“Nonsense. Just part of his training.”
“Training? This is nothing but cruelty.”
Hastings produced the long dagger Duncan had first seen in Philadelphia and lifted it to sight along the blade. He cast an icy smile at Duncan, then with sudden quickness threw the knife, embedding it in the table inches from Lewis. “What an extraordinary opportunity it is, to kill someone twice,” the major declared with amusement. “Obviously we were negligent the first time.” He looked at Duncan. “So seldom do we get a second chance. So seldom do we need it. What a game we shall have. I recall reading somewhere that there are two or three organs that can be removed without causing immediate death, though I’m not sure I remember which ones,” he added, raising a laugh from Nettles.
The lieutenant moved behind Duncan and pressed the point of his saber against Duncan’s spine, pushing him out of the cell.
“Was it only yesterday we discovered McCallum was still alive, James?” Hastings asked his lieutenant, then turned back to Duncan. “I was furious at first, of course, but later quite excited about the opportunity it presented. I could hardly credit it when you were among the names the boy gave us. I even struck him for lying. Then Mr. Lewis said, ‘No, it’s true, McCallum is alive.’ ” Hastings swiveled his head toward Lewis. “Did you honestly think we would spare the boy by making that confession, Ensign? It only made me put more energy into the lessons we had to give you. How could you withhold such vital information from your cherished commander?” Hastings gave a cackling laugh. “McGowan, McCallum.” He shrugged. “I should have known that if the incognitum could resurrect itself from the ocean floor, then so too could its Scottish curator.”
As Duncan desperately tried to recall those who had known him as McGowan, Hastings stepped aside for two men carrying a heavy device. It was a wooden armchair made for torture. Thick straps lay open on the arms, the front legs, and on a panel that extended upward, apparently as a way of stabilizing the head. Hastings produced a handkerchief and carefully wiped dust from the arms. “My favorite Tudor heirloom,” he declared, then smiled at Duncan. “If at first you don’t succeed at death, try, try again, eh? You should be honored, McCallum. I believe some very prominent members of Tudor society experienced this chair before you. You are about to join the ranks of the martyrs.”
“Killing a child was not much of a challenge for a king’s warrior,” Duncan said in a seething voice. “But then, slashing Pierre Dumont’s throat in an alley wasn’t exactly up to Horse Guards standards.”
“I am proud of my Italian steel,” Hastings retorted. “One quick stroke was all that was required. ‘Mon Dieu!’ the Frenchman cried when I grabbed him, as if he were making a final discovery. That’s all, just mon Dieu. I would have thought a scholar would have offered something more eloquent for his final words. You know,” Hastings added with a sneer, “ ‘I gladly sacrifice my mortal being for the glory of the dusty incognitum,’ or such.” Nettles laughed again.
“So you admit to murdering him,” Duncan said. “Then there was killing an unarmed man in a mud pit and slaying his wife and unborn child.”
Nettles uttered a victorious cry. “A double to me!” he exclaimed to Hastings.
“So you are the one who murders innocent women and children, Lieutenant,” Duncan said, letting his anger burn away his fear. “Thank you for clarifying that.”
Hastings gave another haughty laugh. “Bravo, McCallum, living up to the Highland reputation. As dense as one of those shaggy cows. You need to grasp your situation. You did die in the Atlantic. It was in my report to the War Council, so it must be so. That makes you nothing but a piece of meat for us to carve. A practice dummy such as we use for our lances.” He gestured to the two big men who had been at the guards’ table. They seized Duncan, one on each
arm. He resisted only an instant, then Nettles’s saber pressed against his breastbone. The guards slammed him down into the chair, strapping in his legs, his arms, and his neck.
The major turned to Ensign Lewis, who now stared down at the table as if willing himself not to watch. “Ensign, congratulations. Tonight you matriculate from cleaning up horse dung to cleaning up Highland dung. Prove yourself here and you will become apprentice to the lieutenant and myself, which carries some amazing privileges.” Hastings extracted his dagger from the wood of the table and dropped its hilt into Lewis’s hand. “Where would you like to start?”
Lewis finally raised his head. “Sir?”
“Just preliminaries. To make the point, so to speak. By the end of the night we will slice his tendons so he can’t walk. Lieutenant Nettles will teach you with one foot, then you can do the second. But for now, just something simple, to get McCallum’s attention.”
Lewis’s face drained of color. “Sir, I cannot. I joined the army to meet the king’s enemies on the battlefield.”
“And Mr. McCallum is our enemy. Conspiring to gain the king’s secrets. Concealing treasures that rightfully belong to the king. Aiding and abetting the traitor Franklin and his lovely French spy.” Hastings closed Lewis’s fingers around the hilt of his blade. “By all rights McCallum’s kind should have been exterminated on the battlefield at Culloden. The Bonnie Prince was never captured, so if it makes you feel better let’s say we are still in that battle. Scratch him and you will see Jacobite venom spill out.”
“Sir, please! Let me return to the stables!”
The amusement left Hastings’s face. “Scratch him or we’ll fetch another binding chair for you!” he snapped, then seized Lewis by the collar and hauled him to his feet.
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