Drums of Autumn - Diana Gabaldon [345]
It might have taken Brianna anything from two days to two weeks to make her way from Charleston to Wilmington—assuming that she was indeed headed there.
“She’s here,” he muttered. “Damn it, I know she’s here!” Whether this conviction was the result of deduction, intuition, hope, or merely stubbornness, he clung to it like a drowning sailor to a spar.
He had managed the journey from Edenton to Wilmington with a fair amount of ease, himself. Put to work unloading cargo from the Gloriana’s hold, he had carried a chest of tea into a warehouse, set it down, walked back to the door, and busied himself in retying the sweat-soaked kerchief round his head. As soon as the next man had passed him, he stepped out onto the dock, turned right instead of left, and within seconds was headed up the narrow cobbled lane that led from docks to town. By the next morning he’d found a berth as loader on a small cargo boat, transporting naval stores from Edenton to the main depot at Wilmington, there to be transferred to a larger ship for transport to England.
He jumped ship again in Wilmington, without a moment’s compunction. He hadn’t time to waste; there was Brianna to be found.
He knew she was here. Fraser’s Ridge was in the mountains; she’d need a guide, and Wilmington was the most likely port in which to find one. And if she was here, someone would have noticed her; he’d bet money on that. He could only hope the wrong sort of person hadn’t noticed her already.
A quick reconnoiter of the main street and the harbor gave him a count of twenty-three taverns. Christ, these people drank like fish! There was the chance she’d taken a room in a private house, but the taverns were the place to start.
By evening he’d covered ten of the taverns, slowed by the necessity of avoiding any of his erstwhile shipmates. Being in the presence of so much drink, and he without an extra penny to spend, had given him a raging thirst. He hadn’t eaten all day, either, which didn’t help matters.
At the same time, he scarcely noticed the physical discomfort. A man in the fifth tavern had seen her, so had a woman in the seventh. “A tall man wi’ red hair,” the man had said, but “A great huge girl, dressed in men’s breeches,” the woman had said, clicking her tongue in shock. “Walkin’ down the street, plain as you please, with her coat over her arm and her backside in view of everyone!”
Let Roger get that particular backside in his view, he thought with some grimness, and he’d know what to do with it. He begged a cup of water from a kindhearted landlady, and set off with renewed determination.
By the time it was full dark, he had covered another five taverns. The taprooms were full now, and he discovered that the tall redheaded girl in men’s clothing had been causing public comment for nearly a week. The quality of some of this comment caused the blood to throb in his cheeks with outrage, and only the fear of being arrested kept him from outright assault.
As it was, he left the fifteenth tavern after an ugly exchange of words with two drunkards, boiling with fury. Christ, had the woman no sense at all? Did she have no notion what men were capable of?
He stopped in the street and wiped a sleeve across his sweating face. He breathed heavily, wondering what to do next. Keep on, he supposed, though if he didn’t find something to eat soon, he was going to fall flat on his face in the road.
The Blue Bull, he decided. He’d glanced into the shed there as he passed earlier, and seen a good pile of clean straw. He’d spend a penny or two for dinner, and perhaps the owner would let him sleep in the stable for the sake of Christian kindness.
Turning, his eye caught sight of a sign on the house across the road.
WILMINGTON GAZETTEER, JNO. GILLETTE. PROP., it read. Wilmington’s newspaper; one of few in the Colony of North Carolina. One too many, if you asked Roger. He fought the urge to pick up a rock and hurl it through Jno. Gillette