The Fiery Cross - Diana Gabaldon [403]
“I wouldna wait to see, myself,” he said. “If anyone runs toward ye with a gun, fire, and hope for the best.”
A few men seated around the fire nearby sniggered at this, but Jamie ignored them. He reached for a stick and pulled three roasting yams out of the coals, so they lay side by side, black and steaming in the cool evening air. He kicked one gently, sending it rolling back into the ashes.
“That’s us,” he explained. He kicked the next yam. “That’s Colonel Leech’s company, and that”—he booted the third, which rolled erratically after its fellows—“is Colonel Ashe’s. D’ye see?” He cocked an eyebrow at Roger.
“Each company will go forward in its own path, so ye’re no likely to see any other militia, at least to begin with. Anyone coming toward us is most probably the enemy.” Then his long mouth curled up a bit, as he gestured toward the men all round them, busy with their suppers.
“Ye ken every man here well enough? Well, dinna shoot any of them, and ye’ll be fine, aye?”
Roger smiled ruefully to himself as he made his way carefully down a slope covered with tiny yellow-flowered plants. It was sound advice; he was much less concerned with the possibility of being shot than with the fear of accidentally harming someone himself—including the not-inconsiderable worry of blowing off a few of his own fingers.
Privately, he was resolved not to fire at anyone, regardless either of circumstance or of the possibility of his hitting them. He’d heard enough of the Regulators’ stories—Abel MacLennan, Hermon Husband. Even allowing for the natural hyperbole of Husband’s style, his pamphlets burned with a sense of injustice that was inescapable. How could Roger look to kill a man or maim him, only for protesting against abuses and corruption so blatant that they must offend any just-minded person?
A trained historian, he’d seen enough of present circumstances to understand just how widespread the problems were, how they’d come about—and he understood well enough the difficulties of correcting them. He sympathized with Tryon’s position—to a point—but his sympathy stopped a good way short of rendering him a willing soldier in the cause of upholding the Crown’s authority—still less, the cause of preserving William Tryon’s reputation and personal fortune.
He stopped for a moment, hearing voices, and stepped softly behind the trunk of a large poplar.
Three men came in sight a moment later, talking casually amongst themselves. All three had guns and bullet-boxes, but the impression they gave was of three friends on their way to hunt rabbits, rather than grim troopers on the eve of battle.
In fact, this appeared to be exactly what they were—foragers. One had a cluster of furry bodies slung from his belt, and another carried a muslin bag stained with something that might have been fresh blood. As Roger watched from the shelter of the poplar, one man stopped, hand out to check his comrades, who both stiffened like hounds, noses pointing toward a clump of trees some sixty yards distant.
Even knowing something was there, it took a moment before Roger spotted the small deer, standing still against a grove of saplings, a veil of dappled light through the spring leaves overhead masking it almost perfectly from view.
The first man swung his gun stealthily down from his shoulder, reaching for rod and cartridge, but one of the others stopped him with a hand on his arm.
“Hold there, Abram,” said the second man, speaking softly but clearly. “You don’t want to be firing so close to the crick. You heard what the Colonel said—Regulators are drawn right up to the bank near that point.” He nodded toward the heavy growth of alder and willow that marked the edge of the invisible creek, no more than a hundred yards distant. “You don’t want to be provokin’ them, not just now.”
Abram nodded reluctantly, and put up his gun again.
“Aye, I suppose. Will it be today, do you think?”
Roger glanced back at the sapling grove,