Drums of Autumn - Diana Gabaldon [248]
“It was my fault,” he said, nobly squaring his shoulders, the better to accept blame. “I said as how I’d thought to shoot it earlier, but we didna want to waste the powder. And so his Lordship said as how he would fetch his papa’s pistol from the saddlebag and deal with the thing at once. And so—”
“Ian,” said Jamie between his teeth. “Stop blethering this instant and tell me straight what ye’ve done wi’ the lad. Ye’ve not shot him by mistake, I hope?”
Ian looked offended at this slur upon his marksmanship.
“Of course not!” he said.
Lord John coughed politely, forestalling further recriminations.
“Perhaps you would be good enough to tell me the whereabouts of my son at this moment?”
Ian took a deep breath and visibly commended his soul to God.
“He’s in the bottom of the privy,” he said. “Have ye got a bit o’ rope, Uncle Jamie?”
With an admirable economy of both words and motion, Jamie reached the door in two strides and disappeared, closely followed by Lord John.
“Is he in there with the snake?” I asked, hastily scrabbling through the washbasket for something to use as a tourniquet, just in case.
“Oh, no, Auntie,” Ian assured me. “Ye dinna think I’d have left him, and the serpent was still there? Maybe I’d best go help,” he added, and disappeared as well.
I hurried after him, to find Jamie and Lord John standing shoulder to shoulder in the doorway of the privy, conversing with the depths. Standing on tiptoe to peer over Lord John’s shoulder, I saw the torn butt end of a long, slender hickory branch protruding a few inches above the edge of the oblong hole. I held my breath; Lord Ellesmere’s struggles had stirred up the contents of the privy, and the reek was enough to sear the cilia off my nasal membranes.
“He says he’s not hurt,” Jamie assured me, turning away from the hole and unlimbering a coil of rope from his shoulder.
“Good,” I said. “Where’s the snake, though?” I peeked nervously into the outhouse, but couldn’t see anything beyond the silvery cedar boards and the dark recesses of the pit.
“It went that way,” Ian said, gesturing vaguely down the path by which I had come. “The laddie couldna quite get a clear shot, so I gave the thing a wee snoove wi’ the stick, and damned if the bugger didna turn and come at me, right up the branch! It scairt me so I let out a skelloch and let go, and I bumped the lad, and—well, that’s how it happened,” he ended lamely.
Trying to avoid Jamie’s eye, he sidled toward the pit and, leaning over, yelled awkwardly, “Hey! I’m glad ye didna break your neck!”
Jamie gave him a look that said rather plainly that if necks were to be broken … but forbore further remarks in the interests of extracting William promptly from his oubliette. This procedure was carried out without further incident, and the would-be marksman was lifted out, clinging to the rope like a caterpillar on a string.
There had luckily been enough sewage in the bottom of the pit to break his fall. From appearances, the ninth Earl of Ellesmere had landed facedown. Lord John stood for a moment on the path, wiping his hands on his breeches and surveying the encrusted object before him. He rubbed the back of a hand over his mouth, trying either to hide a smile or to stifle his sense of smell.
Then his shoulders started to shake.
“What news from the Underworld, Persephone?” he said, unable to keep the quaver of laughter out of his voice.
A pair of slanted eyes looked blue murder out of the mask of filth obscuring his Lordship’s features. It was a thoroughly Fraser expression, and I felt a qualm go through me at the sight. By my side, Ian gave a sudden start. He glanced quickly from the Earl to Jamie and back, then he caught my eye and his own face went perfectly and unnaturally blank.
Jamie was saying something in Greek, to which Lord John replied in the same language, whereupon both men laughed like loons. Trying to ignore Ian, I bent an eye in Jamie