The Fiery Cross, Page 56

  at me. Jamie replied with a remark elegant in phraseology and extremely crude in content, blandly meeting my eye as the older man choked with laughter.

  I did in fact understand Gaelic fairly well by now, but there were moments when discretion was the better part of valor. I spread my fan wide, concealing my expression. True, it took some practice to achieve grace with a fan, but it was a useful social tool to someone cursed, as I was, with a glass face. Even fans had their limits, though.

  I turned away from the conversation, which gave every promise of degenerating ffirther, and surveyed the party for signs of the absent bridegroom. Perhaps Duncan was truly ill, and not with nerves. If so, I should have a look at him.

  "Phaedre! Have you seen Mr. Innes this morning?" Jocasta's body servant was flying past, her arms full of tablecloths, but came abruptly to a halt at my call.

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  "Ain't seen Mister Duncan since breakfast, ma'am," she said, with a shake of her neatly capped head.

  "How did he seem then? Did he eat well?" Breakfast was an ongoing affair of several hours, the resident guests serving themselves from the sideboard and eating as they chose. It was more likely nerves than food poisoning that was troubling Duncan's bowels, but some of the sausage I had seen on the sideboard struck me as highly suspect.

  "No, ma'am, nary a bite." Phaedre's smooth brow puckered; she was fond of Duncan. "Cook tried to tempt him with a nice coddled egg, but he just shook his head and looked peaked. He did take a cup of rum punch, though," she said, seeming somewhat cheered at the thought.

  "Aye, that'll settle him," Ninian remarked, overhearing. "Dinna trouble yourself, Mrs. Claire; Duncan will be well enough."

  Phaedre curtsied and made off toward the tables being set up under the trees, starched apron flapping in-the breeze. The succulent aroma of barbecuing pork wafted through the chill spring air, and fragrant clouds of hickory smoke rose from the fires near the smithy, where haunches of venison, sides of mutton, and broiled fowl in their dozens turned on spits. My stomach gurgled loudly in anticipation, despite the tight lacing of my stays.

  Neither Jamie nor Ninian appeared to notice, but I took a discreet step away, turning to survey the lawn that stretched from the terrace to the river landing. I wasn't so positive of the virtues of rum, particularly taken on an empty stomach. Granted, Duncan wouldn't be the first groom to go to the altar in an advanced state of intoxication, but still ...

  Brianna, brilliant in blue wool the color of the spring sky, was standing near one of the marble statues that graced the lawn, Jemmy balanced on her hip, deep in conversation with Gerald Forbes, the lawyer. She also had a fan, but at the moment, it was being put to better use than usual-Jernmy had got hold of it and was munching on the ivory handle, a look of fierce concentration on his small pink face.

  Of course, Brianna had less need of good fan technique than I did, she having inherited Jamie's ability to hide all thoughts behind a mask of pleasant blandness. She had the mask in place now, which gave me a good idea of her opinion of Mr. Forbes. Where was Roger? I wondered. He'd been with her earlier.

  I turned to ask Jamie what he thought of this epidemic of disappearing husbands, only to discover that he had joined it. Ninian Hamilton had turned away to talk to someone else, and the space at my side was now occupied by a pair of slaves, staggering under the weight of a fresh demijohn of brandywine as they headed for the refreshment tables. I stepped hastily out of their way, and turned to look for Jamie.

  He had vanished into the crowd like a grouse into heather. I turned slowly, surveying the terrace and lawns, but there wasn't a sign of him among the milling crowd. I frowned against the bright sunlight, shading my eyes with my hand.

  It wasn't as though he were inconspicuous, after all; a Highlander with the blood of Viking giants in his veins, he stood head and shoulders above most men, and his hair caught the sun like polished bronze. To add icing to the cake,

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  he was dressed today in his best to celebrate Jocasta's wedding-a belted plaid in crimson and black tartan, with his good gray coat and weskit, and the gaudiest pair of red-and-black Argyle stockings ever to grace a Scotsman's shins. He should have stood out like a splotch of blood on fresh linen.

  I didn't find him, but did see a familiar face. I stepped off the terrace and eeled my way through the knots of partygoers.

  "Mr. MacLennan!" He turned toward my call, looking surprised, but then a cordial smile spread across his blunt features.

  "Mrs. Fraser!"

  "How lovely to see you," I said, giving him my hand. "How are you?" He looked much better than when last seen, clean and decent in a dark suit and plain laced hat. There were hollows in his cheeks, though, and a shadow behind his eyes that remained even as he smiled at me.

  "Oh ... I'm well enough, ma'am. Quite well."

  "Are you-where are you living, these days?" That seemed a more delicate question than "Why aren't you in jail?" No fool, he answered both questions. "Och, well, your husband was sae kind as to write to Mr. Ninian there"-he

  nodded across the lawn toward the lean figure of Ninian Bell Hamilton, who was in the middle of a heated discussion of some kind-"and to tell him of my trouble. Mr. Ninian's a great friend to the Regulation, ken-and a great friend of Judge Henderson's, forbye." He shook his head, mouth pursed in puzzlement.

  "I couldna. say quite how it fell out, but Mr. Ninian came and fetched me out of the gaol, and took me into his own household. So I am there, for the present. 'Twas kind-verra kind." He spoke with evident sincerity, and yet with a certain air of abstraction. He fell silent then. He was still looking at me, but his eyes were blank. I groped for something to say, hoping to bring him back to the present, but a shout from Ninian brought him out of his trance, saving me the trouble. Abel excused himself politely to me and went to assist in the argument.

  I strolled down the lawn, nodding to acquaintances over my fan. I was glad to see Abel again, and know he was physically well, at least-but I couldn't deny that the sight of him cast a chill over my heart. I had the feeling that in fact, it made little difference to Abel MacLennan where his body resided; his heart still lay in the grave with his wife.

  Why had Ninian brought him today? I wondered. Surely a wedding could not but recall his own marriage to him; weddings did that to everyone.

  The sun had risen high enough to warm the air, but I shivered. The sight of MacLennan's grief reminded me too much of the days after Culloden, when I had gone back to my own time, knowing Jamie dead. I knew too well that deadness of heart; the sense of sleepwalking through days and lying open-eyed at night, finding no rest, knowing only emptiness that was not peace.

  Jocasta's voice floated down from the terrace, calling to Ulysses. She had lost three husbands, and now was fixed to take a fourth. Blind she might be, but there was no deadness in her eyes. Did that mean she had not cared deeply for any of her husbands? I wondered. Or only that she was a woman of great strength, capable of overcoming grief, not once, but over and again?

  I had done it once, myself-for Brianna's sake. But Jocasta had no children;

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  not now, at least. Had she once had them, and put aside the pain of a sundered heart, to live for a child?

  I shook myself, trying to dispel such melancholy thoughts, It was, after all, a festive occasion, and a day to match. The dogwoods in the grove were in bloom, and courting bluebirds and cardinals shot in and out of the greening trees like bits of confetti, crazed with lust.

  "But of course they have," a woman was saying, in an authoritative tone of voice. "My God, they've shared a house for months now!"

  "Aye, that's so," one of her companions agreed, sounding doubtful. "But ye wouldna think it from the looks of them. Why, they scarcely glance at each other! Ah ... I mean-well, of course, she canna be looking at him, blind as she is, but ye'd think. . . "

  It wasn't only the birds, I thought, amused. A certain sense of rising sap suf
fused the whole gathering. Glancing up at the terrace, I could see young women clustered, tittering and gossiping in small groups like hens, while the men strode oh-so-casually up and down in front of them, gaudy as peacocks in their party clothes. I wouldn't be surprised if at least a few engagements resulted from this celebration-and a few pregnancies as well. Sex was in the air; I could smell it, under the heady fragrances of spring flowers and cooking food.

  The sense of melancholy had quite left me, though I still had a strong urge to find Jamie. aw no sign of I had gone down one side of the lawn and up the other, but s

  him anywhere between the big plantation house and the dock, where slaves in livery were still greeting latecomers arriving by water. Among those still expected-and very late indeed-was the priest who was to perform the wedding,

  Father LeClerc was a Jesuit, bound from New Orleans to a mission near Quebec I but seduced from the strict path of duty by a substantial donation made by Jocasta to the Society of Jesus. Money might not buy happiness, I reflected, but it was a useful commodity, nonetheless.

  I glanced in the other direction and stopped dead. At one side, Ronnie Campbell caught my eye and bowed; I lifted my fan in acknowledgment, but was too distracted to speak to him. I hadn't found Jamie, but I had just spotted the likely reason for his abrupt disappearance. Ronnie's father, Farquard Campbell, was coming up the lawn from the landing, accompanied by a gentleman in the red and fawn of His Majesty's army, and another in naval uniform-Lieutenant Wolff

  The sight gave me an unpleasant shock. Lieutenant Wolff was not my favorite person. He wasn't all that popular with anyone else who knew him, either.

  I supposed it was reasonable for him to have been invited, as His Majesty's navy was the principal buyer of River Run's production of timber, tar, and turpentinc, and Lieutenant Wolff was the navy's representative in such matters. And it was possible that Jocasta had invited him for more personal reasons as well-the Lieutenant had at one point asked her to marry him. Not, as she had dryly noted, from any desire for her person, but rather to get his hands on River Run.

  Yes, I could see her enjoying the Lieutenant's presence here today. Duncan, less naturally given to ulterior motives and manipulations, might not.

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  Farquard Campbell had spotted me, and was making for me through the crowd, the armed forces in tow. I got my fan up and made the necessary facial adjustments for polite conversation, but-much to my relief-the Lieutenant spotted a servant carrying a tray of glasses across the terrace and sheared off in pursuit, abandoning his escort in favor of refreshment.

  The other military gentleman glanced after him, but dutifully followed Farquard. I squinted at him, but he was no one I'd met before, I was sure. Since the removal of the last Highland regiment in the autumn, the sight of a red coat was unusual anywhere in the colony. Who could this be?

  My features fixed in what I hoped was a pleasant smile, I sank into a formal curtsy, spreading my embroidered skirts to best advantage.

  "Mr. Campbell." I glanced covertly behind him, but Lieutenant Wolff had fortunately vanished in the pursuit of alcoholic sustenance.

  "Mrs. Fraser. Your servant, ma'am." Farquard made me a graceful leg in reply. An elderly, desiccated-looking man, Mr. Campbell was sedate as usual in black broadcloth, a small burst of ruffles at the throat being his only concession to the festivities.

  He looked over my shoulder, frowning slightly in puzzlement. "I had seenI thougbt I had seen your husband with you?"

  "Oh. Well, I think he's ... er ... gone . . ." I twiddled my fan delicately toward the trees where the necessary facilities lurked, separated from the main house by an aesthetic distance and a screen of small white pines.

  "Ah, I see. just so." Campbell cleared his throat, and gestured to the man who accompanied him. "Mrs. Fraser, may I present Major Donald MacDonald?" Major MacDonald was a rather hawk-nosed but handsome gentleman in his

  late thirties, with the weathered face and erect bearing of a career soldier, and a pleasant smile belied by a pair of sharp blue eyes, the same pale, vivid shade as Brianna's dress.

  "Your servant, ma'am." He bowed, very graceffilly, "May I say, ma'am, how particularly that color becomes you?"

  "You may," I said, relaxing a little. "Thank you."

  "The Major is but recently arrived in Cross Creek. I assured him he would find no greater opportunity to pursue acquaintance with his countrymen and familiarize himself with his surroundings." Farquard swept a hand around the terrace, encompassing the party-which did indeed comprise a Who's Who of Scottish society along the Cape Fear.

  "Indeed," the Major said politely. "I have not heard so many Scottish names since last I was in Edinburgh. Mr. Campbell gives me to understand that your husband is the nephew of Mrs. Cameron-or Mrs. Innes, perhaps I should say?"

  "Yes. Have you met Mrs.... er ... Innes yet?" I glanced toward the far end of the terrace. Still no sign of Duncan, let alone Roger or Jamie. Blast it, where was everybody? Holding summit conferences in the necessary house?

  "No, but I shall look forward to presenting my compliments. The late Mr. Cameron was by way of being an acquaintance of my father, Robert MacDonald of Stornoway." He inclined his wigged head a respectful inch in the direction of the small white marble budding at the side of the lawn-the mausoleum

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  that presently sheltered the fleshly remnants of Hector Cameron. "Has your husband any connection with the Frasers of Lovat, by chance?"

  With an internal groan, I recognized a Scottish spiderweb in the making, The meeting of any two Scots invariably began with the casting out of skeins of inquiry until enough strands of relation and acquaintanceship had stuck to form a useful network. I tended to become entangled in the sticky strands of sept and clan, myself, ending up like a fat, juicy fly, thoroughly trapped and at the mercy of my questioner.

  Jamie had survived the intrigues of French and Scottish politics for years by means of such knowledge, though-skating precariotisly along the secret strands of such webs, keeping away from the sticky snares of loyalty and be. trayal that had doomed so many others. I settled myself to pay attention, strug. gling to place this MacDonald among the thousand others of his ilk.

  MacDonald of Keppoch, MacDonald of the Isles, A4acDonald of Clan. ranald, MacDonald of Sleat. How many kinds of MacDonald were there, an. way? I wondered, a little crossly. Surely one or two should be sufficient to most purposes.

  MacDonald of the Isles, evidently; the Major's family hailed from the isle of Harris. I kept one eye out during the interrogation, but Jamie had safety gone to earth.

  Farquard Campbell-no mean player himself-seemed to be enjoying the verbal game of battlectore and shuttlecock, his dark eyes flicking back and forte between me and the Major with a look of amusement. The amusement faded into a look of surprise as I finished a rather confused analysis of Jamie's paterna] lineage, in response to the Major's expert catechism.

  "Your husband's grandfather was Simon, Lord Lovat?" Campbell said. "The Old Fox?" His voice rose slightly with incredulity.

  "Well ... yes," I said, a little uneasily. "I thought You knew that. "Indeed," said Farquard. He looked as though he had swallowed a brandied plum, noticing too late that the stone was still in it. He'd known Jamie was a pardoned Jacobite, all right, but plainly Jocasta hadn't mentioned his close connection with the Old Fox-executed as a traitor for his role in the Stuart Rising. Most of the Campbells had fought on the Government side of that par, ticular brouhaha.

  "Yes," MacDonald said, ignoring Campbell's reaction. He frowned slightly in concentration. "I have the honor to be slightly acquainted with the present Lord Lovat-the title has been restored, I collect?"

  He went on, turning to Campbell in explanation. "That would be Young, Si, mon, who raised a regiment to fight the French in . . . 'W No, '57. Yes, '57. A gallant soldier, excellent fighting man. And he would be your husband's nephew? No, uncle."

  "Half-uncle," I clarified. Old Simon
had been married three times, and made no secret of his extramarital by-blows--of which Jamie's father had been one. No need to point that out, though.

  MacDonald nodded, lean face clearing in satisfaction at having got it aH neatly sorted. Farquard's face relaxed a little, hearing that the family reputation had gone so far toward rehabilitation.

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  "Papist, of course," MacDonald added, "but an excellent soldier, nonetheless."

  "Speaking of soldiers," Campbell interrupted, "do you know. .

  I breathed a sigh of relief that made my corset strings creak, as Mr. Campbell smoothly led the Major into an analysis of some past military event. The Major, it seemed, was not on active duty, but like many, presently retired on half-pay. Unless and until the Crown found some further use for his services, he was thus left to mooch round the Colonies in search of occupation. Peace was hard on professional soldiers.

  just wait, I thought, with a small premonitory shiver. Four years, or less, and the Major would be busy enough.

  I caught a flash of tartan from the corner of my eye and turned to look, but it was neither Jamie nor Duncan. One less mystery, though; it was Roger, darkhaired and handsome in his kilt. His face lit as he spotted Brianna, and his stride lengthened. She turned her head, as though feeling his presence, and her own face brightened in answer.

  He reached her side, and without the least acknowledgment of the gentleman with her, embraced her and kissed her soundly on the mouth. As they drew apart, he held out his arms for Jemmy, and dropped another kiss on the silky red head.

  I returned to the conversation at hand, belatedly realizing that Farquard Campbell had been talking for some time without my having any notion what he had said. Seeing my bemusement, he smiled, a little wryly.

  "I must go and pay my respects elsewhere, Mrs. Fraser," he said. "If youiArill pardon me? I shall leave you to the Major's excellent company." He touched his hat courteously, and eeled off toward the house, perhaps intending to track down Lieutenant Wolff and stop him pocketing the silver.

  Thus marooned with me, the Major cast about for suitable conversation, and fell back upon the most commonly asked question between new acquaintances. "Are you and your husband long arrived in the colony, ma'am?"

  "Not long," I said, rather wary. "Three years or so. We live in a small settlement in the backcountry-" I waved my closed fan toward the invisible mountains to the west. "A place called Fraser's Ridge."

  "Ah, yes. I have heard of it." A muscle vivitched near the comer of his mouth, and I wondered uneasily just what he had heard. Jamie's still was an open secret in the backcountry, and among the Scottish settlers of the Cape Fear-in fact, several kegs of raw whisky from the still were sitting in plain sight by the stables, Jamie's wedding present to his aunt and Duncan-but I hoped the secret wasn't quite so open that an army officer newly arrived in the colony would already have heard about it.

  "Tell me, Mrs. Fraser - - ." He hesitated, then plunged ahead. "Do you encounter a great deal of ... factionalism in your area of the colony?" "Factionalism? Oh, er ... no, not a great deal." I cast a wary eye toward

  Hector Cameron's mausoleum, where Hermon Husband's dark Quaker gray showed up like a blot against the pure white marble. Factionalism was a code word for the activities of men like Husband and James Hunter-Regulators.

  The Governor's militia action in December had quashed the violent demonstrations, but the Regulation was still a simmering pot under a very tight lid.

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  Husband had been arrested and imprisoned for a short time in February on the strength of his pamphlets, but the experience had in no way softened either his disposition or his language. A boilover could happen at any time.

  "I am pleased to hear it, ma'am," Major MacDonald said. "Do you hear much news, remotely situated as you are?"

  "Not a great deal. Er ... nice day, isn't it? We've been so fortunate in the weather this year. Was it an easy journey from Charleston? So early in the yearthe mud. . ."

  "Indeed, ma'am. We had some small difficulties, but no more than. . .

  The Major was assessing me quite openly as he chatted, taking in the cut and quality of my gown, the pearls at my throat and ears-borrowed from Jocastaand the rings on my fingers. I was familiar with such a look; there was no hint of lechery or flirtation in it. He was simply judging my social standing and my husband's level of prosperity and influence.

  I took no offense. I was busy doing the same thing to him, after all. Well-educated and of good family; that much was plain from his rank alone, though the heavy gold signet on his right hand clinched the matter. Not personally well-off, though; his uniform was worn at the seams, and his boots were deeply scarred, though well-polished.

  A light Scots accent with a hint of French gutturality--experience in Continental campaigns. And very newly arrived in the colony, I thought; his face was drawn from recent illness, and the whites of his eyes bore the slight tinge of jaundice common to new arrivals, who tended to contract everything from malaria to dengue fever, when exposed to the seething germ pools of the coastal towns.

  "Tell me, Mrs. Fraser-" the Major began.

  "You insult not only me, sir, but every man of honor here present!"

  Ninian Bell Hamilton's rather high-pitched voice rang out through a lull in the general conversation, and heads turned all over the lawn.

  He was face-to-face with Robert Barlow, a man I had been introduced to earlier in the morning. A merchant of some kind, I vaguely recalled-from Edenton? Or possibly New Bern. A heavyset man with the look of one unused to contradiction, he was sneering openly at Hamilton.

  "Regulators, you call them? Gaolbirds and rioters! You suggest that such men possess a sense of honor, do you?"

  "I do not suggest it-I state it as fact, and will defend it as such!" The old gentleman drew himself upright, hand groping for a sword-hilt. Fortunately for the occasion, he wasn't wearing a sword; none of the gentlemen present were, given the congeniality of the gathering.

  Whether this fact affected Barlow's behavior, I couldn't have said, but he laughed contemptuously, and turned his back on Hamilton, to walk away. The elderly Scot, inflamed, promptly kicked Barlow in the buttocks.