Dragonfly in Amber - Diana Gabaldon [347]
Despite the prevalence of red noses and white faces, parties were held at the palace several nights a week, as the noblesse of Edinburgh welcomed their Prince with enthusiasm. Another two hours, and the lanterns of servants accompanying ball-goers would start to flicker in the High Street.
I sighed at the thought of another ball, attended by sneezing gallants, paying compliments in phlegm-thickened voices. Perhaps I’d better add some garlic to the list; worn in a silver pomander-locket about the neck, it was supposed to ward off disease. What it actually did do, I supposed, was to keep disease-ridden companions at a safe distance—equally satisfactory, from my point of view.
The city was occupied by Charles’s troops, and the English, while not besieged, were at least sequestered in the Castle above. Still, news—of dubious veracity—tended to leak in both directions. According to Mr. Haugh, the most recent rumor held that the Duke of Cumberland was gathering troops south of Perth, with the intent of marching north almost immediately. I hadn’t any idea whether this was true; I doubted it, in fact, recalling no mention of Cumberland’s activities much before the spring of 1746, which hadn’t arrived. Still, I could hardly ignore the rumor.
The sentry at the gate nodded me in, coughing. The sound was taken up by the guards stationed down the hallways and on the landings. Resisting the impulse to wave my basket of garlic at them like a censer as I passed, I made my way upstairs to the afternoon drawing room, where I was admitted without question.
I found His Highness with Jamie, Aeneas MacDonald, O’Sullivan, His Highness’s secretary, and a saturnine man named Francis Townsend, who was lately much in His Highness’s good graces. Most of them were red-nosed and sneezing, and splattered phlegm smeared the hearth before the gracious mantel. I cast a sharp look at Jamie, who was slumped wearily in his chair, whitefaced and drooping.
Accustomed to my forays into the city, and eager for any intelligence regarding the English movements, the men heard me out with great attention.
“We are indebted greatly to you for your news, Mistress Fraser,” said His Highness, with a gracious bow and a smile. “You must tell me if there some way in which I might repay your generous service.”
“There is,” I said, seizing the opportunity. “I want to take my husband home to bed. Now.”
The Prince’s eyes bulged slightly, but he recovered himself quickly. Not so restrained, Aeneas MacDonald broke out into a fit of suspiciously strangled coughing. Jamie’s white face blazed suddenly crimson. He sneezed, and buried his countenance in a handkerchief, blue eyes shooting sparks at me over its folds.
“Ah…your husband,” said Charles, rallying gallantly to the challenge. “Um…” A soft pink blush began to tint his cheeks.
“He’s ill,” I said, with some asperity. “Surely you can see that? I want him to go to bed and rest.”
“Oh, rest,” murmured MacDonald, as though to himself.
I searched for some sufficiently courtly words.
“I should be sorry to deprive Your Highness temporarily of my husband’s attendance, but if he isn’t allowed to take sufficient rest, he isn’t likely to go on attending you much longer.”
Charles, recovered from his momentary discomposure, seemed now to be finding Jamie’s patent discomfiture entertaining.
“To be sure,” he said, eyeing Jamie, whose complexion had faded now into a sort of mottled pallor. “We should dislike exceedingly the contemplation of such a prospect as you wish, Madam.” He inclined his head in my direction. “It shall be as you wish, Madam. Cher James is excused from attendance upon our person until he shall be recovering. By all means, take your husband to your rooms at once, and, er…undertake what cure seems…ah…fitting.” The corner of the Prince’s mouth twitched suddenly, and pulling a large handkerchief from his pocket, he followed Jamie’s example and