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“Aye, of course.” A small frown formed between Fiona’s dark brows. “What … sorts of things?”
“It’s—” Bria
“I’m going to visit Jock MacLeod in hospital. He’s the night watchman who found Jem at the dam. He might know the man who hit him and tried to take Jem. And he does know Rob Cameron. He can maybe tell me who Cameron’s mates are outside of work or in lodge.”
She rubbed a hand down over her face, thinking.
“After that … I’ll talk to Rob’s sister and his nephew. If she’s not involved in whatever he’s up to, she’ll be worried. And if she is involved—then I need to know that.”
“D’ye think ye’ll be able to tell?” Fiona’s frown had eased a bit, but she still looked worried.
“Oh, yes,” Bria
Fiona made a small noise that could best be spelled as “eeengh,” indicating deep concern.
Bria
“And then,” she said, “I’m going back to Lallybroch to meet a locksmith and have him change all the locks and install burglar alarms on the lower windows.” She looked questioningly at Fiona. “I don’t know how long it might take… .”
“Aye, that’s why ye brought the kids’ nighties. Nay problem, hen.” She chewed her lower lip, eyeing Bria
Bree knew what she was thinking, debating whether to ask or not, and saved her the trouble.
“I don’t know what I’m going to do about Roger,” she said steadily.
“He’ll come back, surely,” Fiona began, but Bree shook her head. Horrifying Realization Number 3 couldn’t be denied any longer.
“I don’t think so,” she said, though she bit her lip as if to keep the words from escaping. “He—he can’t know that Jem isn’t there. And he’d never ab-abandon him.”
Fiona was clasping Bria
“No, no, of course he wouldna do that. But if he and the other fellow go on searching and find no trace … eventually, surely he’d think …” Her voice died away as she tried to imagine what Roger might think under those circumstances.
“Oh, he’ll be thinking, all right,” Bree said, and managed a small, shaky laugh. The thought of Roger’s determination, the growing sense of fear and desperation that must inevitably eat away at it, his fight to keep going—because he would; he’d never give up and come back to tell her Jem was lost for good. For if he didn’t find any trace of Jem, what could he think? That Cameron had maybe killed Jem, hidden his body, and gone to America in search of the gold? Or that they had both been lost in that horrifying space between one time and another, never to be found?
“Well, and he’ll be praying, too,” Fiona said with a brisk squeeze of Bree’s hand. “I can help wi’ that.”
That made tears well, and she blinked hard, scrubbing at her eyes with a paper napkin.
“I can’t cry now,” she said, in a choked voice. “I can’t. I haven’t got time.” She stood up suddenly, pulling her hand free. She sniffed, blew her nose hard on the napkin, and sniffed again.
“Fiona … I—I know you haven’t told anybody about … us,” she began, and even she could hear the doubt in her own voice.
Fiona snorted.
“I have not,” she said. “I’d be taken off to the booby hatch, and what would Ernie do wi’ the girls and all? Why?” she added, giving Bria
“Well … the women who—who dance at Craigh na Dun. Do you think any of them know what it is?”
Fiona sucked in one cheek, thinking.
“One or two o’ the older ones might have an idea,” she said slowly. “We’ve been callin’ down the sun on Beltane there for as far back as anyone knows. And some things do get passed down, ken. Be strange if nobody ever wondered. But even if someone kent for sure what happens there, they’d not speak—no more than I would.”
“Right. I just wondered—could you maybe find out, quietly, if any of the women have ties to Rob Cameron? Or maybe … to the Orkneys?”
“To what?” Fiona’s eyes went round. “Why the Orkneys?”
“Because Rob Cameron went on archaeological digs there. And I think that’s what made him interested in stone circles to start with. I know one man named Callahan, a friend of Roger’s—who worked up there with him, and I’ll talk to him, too—maybe tomorrow; I don’t think I’ll have time today. But if there’s anyone else who might be co
“I’ll call round,” Fiona said thoughtfully. “And speak of calling—telephone me if ye’re not coming back tonight, aye? Just so as I know ye’re safe.”
Bree nodded, her throat tight, and hugged Fiona, taking one more moment’s strength from her friend.
Fiona saw her down the hall to the front door, pausing at the foot of the stair, and glanced toward the chatter coming from above. Did Bree want to say goodbye to Jem and Mandy? Wordless, Bria
“That shotgun—” Fiona began behind her, and stopped. Bria
“They ca

AN GEARASDAN
THEY REACHED Fort William in early afternoon of the second day’s travel.
“How large is the garrison?” Roger asked, eyeing the stone walls of the fort. It was modest, as forts went, with only a few buildings and a drill yard within the surrounding walls.
“Maybe forty men, I’d say,” Brian replied, turning sideways to allow a pair of redcoated guards carrying muskets to pass him in the narrow entry passage. “Fort Augustus is the only garrison north of it, and that’s got maybe a hundred.”
That was surprising—or maybe not. If Roger was right about the date, it would be another three years before there was much talk of Jacobites in the Highlands—let alone enough of it to alarm the English crown into sending troops en masse to keep a lid on the situation.
The fort was open, and any number of civilians appeared to have business with the army, judging from the small crowd near one building. Fraser steered him toward another, smaller one with a tilt of his head, though.
“We’ll see the commander, I think.”
“You know him?” A worm of curiosity tickled his spine. Surely it was too early for—
“I’ve met him the once. Buncombe, he’s called. Seems a decent fellow, for a Sassenach.” Fraser gave his name to a clerk in the outer room, and within a moment they were ushered into the commander’s office.
“Oh …” A small, middle-aged man in uniform with tired eyes behind a pair of half spectacles half-rose, half-bowed, and dropped back into his seat as though the effort of recognition had exhausted him. “Broch Tuarach. Your servant, sir.”
Perhaps it had, Roger thought. The man’s face was gaunt and lined, and his breath whistled audibly in his lungs. Claire might have known specifically what was up with Captain Buncombe, but it didn’t take a doctor to know that something was physically amiss.
Still, Buncombe listened civilly to his story, called in the clerk to make a careful note of Cameron’s description and Jem’s, and promised that these would be circulated to the garrison and that any patrols or messengers would be advised to ask after the fugitives.
Brian had thoughtfully brought along a couple of bottles in his saddlebags and now produced one, which he set on the desk with a gurgling thump of enticement.