The Fiery Cross - Diana Gabaldon [407]
Husband stood panting in the middle of the floor, then picked up a dipper and drank deeply from a bucket that stood upon the hearth—the only object left in the cabin, Roger saw. Husband’s coat and hat hung neatly on a hook by the door, but bits of rubbish were scattered across the packed-earth floor. Whoever owned the cabin had evidently decamped in haste, carrying their portable belongings.
Calmed by the moment’s respite, Husband straightened his rumpled shirt and made shift to tidy his hair.
“What does thee here, friend MacKenzie?” he asked, with characteristic mildness. “Thee does not come to join the cause of Regulation, surely?”
“Indeed I do not,” Roger assured him. He cast a wary eye at the window, lest the crowd try to gain access that way, but while the rumble of voices outside continued their argument, there was no immediate sound of assault upon the building. “I have come to ask if you will go across the creek with me—under a flag of truce, your safety is assured—to speak with Jamie Fraser.”
Husband glanced at the window, too.
“I fear the time for speaking has long passed,” he said, with a wry twist of the lips. Roger was inclined to think so, too, but pressed on, determined to fulfill his commission.
“Not so far as the Governor is concerned. He has no wish to slaughter his own citizenry; if the mob could be convinced to disperse peaceably—”
“Does it seem to thee a likely prospect?” Husband waved at the window, giving him a cynical glance.
“No,” Roger was forced to admit. “Still, if you would come—if they could see that there was still some possibility of—”
“If there were possibility of reconciliation and redress, it should have been offered long since,” Husband said sharply. “Is this a token of the Governor’s sincerity, to come with troops and cannon, to send a letter that—”
“Not redress,” Roger said bluntly. “I meant the possibility of saving all your lives.”
Husband stood quite still. The ruddy color faded from his cheeks, though he looked still composed.
“Has it come to that?” he asked quietly, his eyes on Roger’s face. Roger took a deep breath and nodded.
“There is not much time. Mr. Fraser bid me tell you—if you could not come to speak with him yourself—there are two companies of artillery arrayed against you, and eight of militia, all well-armed. All lies in readiness—and the Governor will not wait past dawn of tomorrow, at the latest.”
He was aware that it was treason to give such information to the enemy—but it was what Jamie Fraser would have said, could he have come himself.
“There are near two thousand men of the Regulation here,” Husband said, as though to himself. “Two thousand! Would thee not think the sight of it would sway him? That so many would leave home and hearth and come in protest—”
“It is the Governor’s opinion that they come in rebellion, therefore in a state of war,” Roger interrupted. He glanced at the window, where the oiled parchment covering hung in tatters. “And having seen them, I must say that I think he has reasonable grounds for that opinion.”
“It is no rebellion,” Husband said stubbornly. He drew himself up, and pulled a worn black silk ribbon from his pocket, with which to tie back his hair. “But our legitimate complaints have been ignored, disregarded! We have no choice but to come as a physical body, to lay our grievances before Mr. Tryon and thus impress him with the rightness of our objection.”
“I thought I heard you speak of choice a few moments past,” Roger said dryly. “And if now is the time to choose, as you say, it would seem to me that most of the Regulators have chosen violence—judging from such remarks as I heard on my way here.”
“Perhaps,” Husband said reluctantly. “Yet we—they—are not an avenging army, not a mob . . .” And yet his unwilling glance toward the window suggested his awareness that a mob was indeed what was forming on the banks of the Alamance.
“Do they have a chosen