Dragonfly in Amber - Diana Gabaldon [349]
“Christ! I forgot all about the dispatches. Wait, I’ll take them to Cameron myself.” Jamie began to struggle up in bed, a process that brought his nose close to the site of my recent endeavors.
“Phew!” He flapped the nightshirt in an effort to dispel the penetrating aroma, and glared accusingly at me. “How am I to get this reek off me? D’ye expect me to go out in company smellin’ like a dead goose, Sassenach?”
“No, I don’t,” I said. “I expect you to lie quietly in bed and rest, or you’ll be a dead goose.” I uncorked a fairly high-caliber glare of my own.
“I can carry the package, milord,” Fergus was assuring him.
“You will do nothing of the kind,” I said, noting the boy’s flushed cheeks and overbright eyes. I put a hand to his forehead.
“Don’t tell me,” said Jamie sarcastically. “He’s got a fever?”
“Yes, he has.”
“Ha,” he said to Fergus with gloomy satisfaction. “Now you’re for it. See how you like bein’ basted.”
A short period of intense effort saw Fergus tucked up in his pallet by the fire, goose grease and medicinal hot tea administered lavishly all round, and a clean handkerchief deposited beneath the chin of each sufferer.
“There,” I said, fastidiously rinsing my hands in the basin. “Now, I will take this precious packet of dispatches across to Mr. Cameron. You will both rest, drink hot tea, rest, blow your nose, and rest, in that order. Got it, troops?”
The tip of a long, reddened nose was barely visible above the bedclothes. It oscillated slowly back and forth as Jamie shook his head.
“Drunk wi’ power,” he remarked disapprovingly to the ceiling. “Verra unwomanly attitude, that.”
I dropped a kiss on his hot forehead and swung my cloak down from its hook.
“How little you know of women, my love,” I said.
* * *
Ewan Cameron was in charge of what passed for intelligence operations at Holyrood. His quarters were at the end of the west wing, tucked away near the kitchens. On purpose, I suspected, having witnessed the man’s appetite in action. Possibly a tapeworm, I thought, viewing the officer’s cadaverous countenance as he opened the packet and scanned the dispatches.
“All in order?” I asked after a moment. I had to repress the automatic urge to add “sir.”
Startled from his train of thought, he jerked his head up from the dispatches and blinked at me.
“Um? Oh!” Recalled to himself, he smiled and hastened to make apologies.
“I’m sorry, Mistress Fraser. How impolite of me to forget myself and leave you standing there. Yes, everything appears to be in order—most interesting,” he murmured to himself. Then, snapping back to an awareness of me, “Would you be so kind as to tell your husband that I wish to discuss these with him as soon as possible? I understand that he is unwell,” he added delicately, carefully avoiding my eye. Apparently it hadn’t taken Aeneas MacDonald long to relay an account of my interview with the Prince.
“He is,” I said unhelpfully. The last thing I wanted was Jamie leaving his bed and sitting up poring over intelligence dispatches all night with Cameron and Lochiel. That would be nearly as bad as staying up dancing all night with the ladies of Edinburgh. Well, possibly not quite as bad, I amended to myself, recalling the three Misses Williams.
“I’m sure he will attend upon you as soon as he’s able,” I said, pulling the edges of the cloak together. “I’ll tell him.” And I would—tomorrow. Or possibly the next day. Wherever the English forces presently were, I was positive they weren’t within a hundred miles of Edinburgh.
* * *
A quick peek into the bedroom upon my return showed two lumps, immobile beneath the bedclothes, and the sounds of breathing—slow and regular, if a trifle congested—filled the room. Reassured, I removed my cloak and sat down in the sitting room with a preventative cup of hot tea, to which I had added a fair dollop of medicinal brandy.
Sipping slowly, I felt the liquid heat flow down the center of my chest, spread comfortably through