The Scottish Prisoner

Isobel said not a word on the way back to Helwater.

JOHN GREY WAS LYING in his bed, contentedly reading Mrs. Hagwood’s Love in Excess; or, The Fatal Enquiry, when he heard a great rustling and bumping in the corridor outside. Tom had gone to bed long since in the servants’ attic, so Grey flung back the covers, reaching for his banyan. He had barely got this on when there was a brief, imperative thump at his door that shivered its boards, as though someone had kicked it.

Someone had.

He wrenched the door open and Jamie Fraser walked in, dripping wet carrying someone wrapped in a blanket. Breathing heavily, he crossed the room and deposited his burden on Grey’s rumpled bed with a grunt. The burden let out a small squeak and clutched the blanket round itself.

“Isobel?” Grey glanced wildly at Fraser. “What’s happened? Is she hurt?”

“You need to soothe her and put her back where she belongs,” Fraser said, in very decent German. This startled Grey nearly as much as the intrusion, though an instant’s thought supplied the explanation—Isobel spoke French but not German.

“Jawohl,”he replied, giving Fraser a sideways look. He hadn’t known Fraser spoke German, and a brief thought of Stephan von Namtzen flashed through his mind. Christ, what might they have said to each other in Fraser’s hearing? That didn’t matter now, though.

“What’s happened, my dear?”

Isobel was hunched on the edge of the bed, snuffling and hiccuping. Her face was bloated and red, her blond hair loose, damp and tangled about her shoulders. Grey sat down gingerly beside her and rubbed her back gently.

“I’b ad idiot,” Isobel said thickly, and buried her face in her hands.

“She tried to elope with the lawyer—Wilberforce,” Jamie said in English. “Her maid came and got me and I went after them.” Jamie returned to German and acquainted Grey with the situation in a few blunt sentences, including his intelligence regarding Wilberforce’s wife and the precise situation in which he had found the lawyer and Isobel.

“The schwanzlutscherhadn’t penetrated her, but it was close enough to give her a shock,” he said, looking down dispassionately on Isobel, who was slumping with exhaustion, her head leaning on Grey’s shoulder as he put his arm about her.

“Bastard,” Grey said. It was the same word in English and German, and Isobel shuddered convulsively. “You’re safe, sweetheart,” he murmured to her. “Don’t worry. Everything will be all right.” The wet blanket had slipped off her shoulders and puddled round her, and he saw with a pang that she was wearing a nightdress of sheer lawn, with broderie Anglaiseinserts and pale pink ribbon at the neck. She’d gone prepared for her wedding night—only she hadn’t been prepared at all, poor little creature.

“What did you do to the lawyer?” he asked Jamie in German. “You didn’t kill him, did you?” It was pouring outside; he hoped he wouldn’t have to go and hide Wilberforce’s body.

“Nein.”Fraser didn’t elaborate, but squatted in front of Isobel.

“No one knows,” he said to her softly, eyes intent on her face. “No one needs to know. Ever.”

She didn’t want to look at him; Grey could feel her resistance. But after a moment she lifted her head and nodded, her mouth compressed to stop it trembling.

“I—thank you,” she blurted. Tears ran down her cheeks, but she wasn’t sobbing or shivering anymore, and her body had begun to relax.

“It’s all right, lass,” Fraser said to her, still softly. He rose then and went to the door, hesitating there. Grey patted Isobel’s hand and, leaving her, came across to see Fraser out.

“If you can get her back to her room without being seen, Betty will take care of her,” Jamie said to Grey in a low voice. And then in German, “When she’s calm, tell her to forget it. She won’t, but I don’t want her to feel that she is in my debt. It would be awkward for us both.”

“She is, nonetheless. And she is an honorable woman. She’ll want to repay you in some way. Let me think how best to handle it.”

“I am obliged.” Fraser spoke abstractedly, though, and his eyes were still on Isobel. “There is … if she …” His gaze switched suddenly to Grey’s face.

Jamie’s own face was rough with red stubble and lined with tiredness, his eyes dark and bloodshot. Grey could see that the knuckles of his left hand were swollen and the skin was broken; he’d likely punched Wilberforce in the mouth.

“There is a thing I want,” Fraser said, very low-voiced, still in German. “But it ca

“I see your opinion of my diplomacy has improved. What is it that you want?”

A brief smile touched Fraser’s face, though it vanished almost at once.

“The wee lad,” he said. “They make him wear a corset. I would like to see him free of it.”

Grey was extremely surprised, but merely nodded.

“All right. I’ll see about it.”

“Not tonight,” Fraser said hastily. Isobel had collapsed with a little sigh, her head on Grey’s pillow, feet trailing on the floor.

“No,” he agreed. “Not tonight.”

He closed the door quietly behind Fraser and went to deal with the girl in his bed.

42

Point of Departure

TOM HAD THE LUGGAGE LOADED ONTO THE MULE, AND THE horses were waiting. Lord John embraced Lady Dunsany and—very gently—Isobel and shook hands with Lord Dunsany in farewell. The old man’s hands were cold, and the bones as fragile in his grasp as dried twigs. He felt a pang, wondering if he would see Dunsany alive the next time he came—and a deeper pang of concern, realizing what the old man’s death might mean to him, beyond the loss of a dear old friend.

Well … he’d cross that bridge when he came to it, and God send he wasn’t coming to it just yet.

Outside, the weather was lowering, the first drops of rain already making wet spots on the flags. The horses’ ears twitched and turned to and fro; they didn’t mind rain and were fresh and eager to be off.

Jamie was holding Grey’s gelding. He inclined his head respectfully and stood back to allow Grey to mount by himself. As Grey put his hand on the pommel, he heard a low Scots voice murmur in his ear:

“Queen’s rook to king eight. Check.”

Grey laughed out loud, a burst of exhilaration pushing aside his disquiet.

“Ha,” he said, though without raising his voice. “Queen’s bishop to knight four. Check. Andmate, Mr … MacKenzie.”

JAMIE COULDN’T ENLIST Keren’s help this time. Instead, when Peggy the nursemaid came to fetch Willie back to the nursery for his tea, he asked her to take a note from him to Betty. Peggy couldn’t read, and while she might tell someone he was meeting Betty, she couldn’t know where. He particularly didn’t wish to be overheard.

Betty was waiting for him behind the hay shed, fastidiously eyeing the immense manure pile with a curled lip. She switched the expression to him, raising one brow in inquiry.

“I’ve a wee thing for ye, Mrs. Betty,” he said without preliminary.

“About time,” she said, the curl melting into a coquettish smile. “Though not so wee as all that, I hope. And I also hope you have a better place than this for it, too,” she added, with a glance at the manure. It was too late in the season for flies, and Jamie personally found the smell rather pleasant, but he could see she didn’t share this opinion.

“The place will do well enough,” he said. “Give me your hand, lass.”