A Breath of Snow and Ashes - Diana Gabaldon [648]
“Sorry,” he said.
“I’m sorry, too,” she said softly. They stood close together, fingers knotted, watching the tide recede across the narrow beach, a fraction of an inch uncovered with each lap of the tiny waves.
The flats were gray and bleak in the evening light, pebble-strewn and rust-stained from the peaty waters of the river. With the tide going out, the harbor water was brown and feculent, the stain reaching past the ships at anchor, nearly to the open sea. When it turned, the clear gray water of the ocean would flow in, sweeping up the Cape Fear, obliterating the mudflats and everything on them.
“Over there,” she said, still softly, though there was no one near enough to hear them. She tilted her head, indicating a group of weathered mooring posts driven deep into the mud. A skiff was tied to one; two of the pirettas, the four-oared “dragonflies” that plied the harbor, to another.
“You’re sure?” He shifted his weight, glancing up and down the shore.
The narrow beach fell away into cold pebbles, exposed and gleaming with the leaving of the tide. Small crabs skittered hastily among them, not to waste a moment’s gleaning.
“I’m sure. People in the Blue Boar were talking about it. A traveler asked where, and Mrs. Smoots said it was the old mooring posts, near the warehouses.” A torn flounder lay dead among the rocks, white flesh washed clean and bloodless. The small busy claws picked and shredded, tiny maws gaped and gulped, pinching at morsels. She felt her gorge rise at the sight, and swallowed hard. It wouldn’t matter what came after; she knew that. But still . . .
Roger nodded absently. His eyes narrowed against the harbor wind, calculating distances.
“There’ll be quite a crowd, I expect.”
There already was one; the turn of the tide wouldn’t be for an hour or more, but people were drifting down to the harbor in twos and threes and fours, standing in the lee of the chandlery to smoke their pipes, sitting on the barrels of salt fish to talk and gesture. Mrs. Smoots had been right; several were pointing out the mooring posts to their less knowledgeable companions.
Roger shook his head.
“It’ll have to be from that side; the best view is from there.” He nodded across the inner arc of the harbor toward the three ships that rocked at the main quay. “From one of the ships? What do you think?”
Brianna fumbled in the pocket tied at her waist, and pulled out her small brass telescope. She frowned in concentration, lips pursed as she surveyed the ships—a fishing ketch, Mr. Chester’s brig, and a larger ship, part of the British fleet, that had come in in the early afternoon.
“Whoa, Nellie,” she murmured, arresting the sweep of her gaze as the pale blotch of a head filled the lens. “Is that who I think . . . hot dog, it is!” A tiny flame of delight flared in her bosom, warming her.
“Is who?” Roger squinted, straining to see unaided.
“It’s John! Lord John!”
“Lord John Grey? You’re sure?”
“Yes! On the brig—he must have come down from Virginia. Woops, he’s gone now—but he’s there, I saw him!” She turned to Roger, excited, folding her telescope as she gripped him by the arm.
“Come on! Let’s go and find him. He’ll help.”
Roger followed, though with considerably less enthusiasm.
“You’re going to tell him? Do you think that’s wise?”
“No, but it doesn’t matter. He knows me.”
Roger looked sharply at her, but the dark look on his face thawed into a reluctant smile.
“You mean he knows better than to try stopping you doing whatever you’ve made up your bloody-minded mind to do?”
She smiled back at him, thanking him with her eyes. He didn’t like it—in fact, he hated it, and she didn’t blame him—but he wouldn’t try to stop her, either. He knew her, too.
“Yes. Come on, before he disappears!”
It was a slow slog round the curve of the harbor, pushing through the knots of gathering sightseers. Outside The Breakers, the crowd grew abruptly thicker. A cluster of red-coated soldiers stood and sat in disarray on the pavement, seabags and