The Fiery Cross - Diana Gabaldon [451]
AFTER SUPPER—during which there was naturally no mention of MacQuiston, Stephen Bonnet, or anything else of an upsetting nature—I went up to check on Roger. Jamie came with me, and quietly dismissed the slave woman who sat by the window, mending. Someone had to stay with Roger at all times, to make sure the tube in his throat didn’t become clogged or dislodged, as it was still his only means of breathing. It would be several days yet before the swelling of the mangled tissues in his throat subsided enough for me to risk removing it.
Jamie waited until I had checked Roger’s pulse and breathing, then at my nod, sat down by his bedside.
“Do ye ken the names of the men who denounced ye?” he asked without preliminaries. Roger looked up at him, frowning, dark brows drawn together. Then he nodded slowly, and held up one finger.
“One of them. How many were there?”
Three fingers. That agreed with Tryon’s recollection, then.
“They were Regulators?”
A nod.
Jamie glanced at me, then back at Roger.
“It wasna Stephen Bonnet?”
Roger sat up bolt upright, mouth open. He clutched at the tube in his throat, struggling vainly to speak, and shaking his head violently.
I grabbed for his shoulder, one hand reaching for the tube; the violence of his movement had jerked it nearly out of the incision, and a trickle of blood ran down his neck where the wound had reopened. Roger himself seemed oblivious; his eyes were fixed on Jamie’s and his mouth was working urgently, asking silent questions.
“No, no. If ye didna see him, then he wasna there.” Jamie took him firmly by the other shoulder, helping me to ease him back on the pillow. “It was only that Tryon described the man who betrayed ye as a tall, fair-haired fellow. Green-eyed, maybe. We thought perhaps . . .”
Roger’s face relaxed at that. He shook his head again and sank back, mouth twisted a little. Jamie pressed on.
“Ye kent the man, though; ye’d met him before?” Roger glanced away, nodded, then shrugged. He looked both irritated and helpless; I could hear his breathing quicken, whistling through the amber tube. I cleared my throat signficantly, frowning at Jamie. Roger was out of immediate danger; that didn’t mean he was well, or anywhere near it.
Jamie ignored me. He’d picked up Bree’s sketching-box on his way upstairs; laying a sheet of paper on it, he put it on Roger’s lap, then extended one of the sticks of hardened charcoal to him.
“Will ye try again?” He had been trying to get Roger to communicate on paper ever since he had regained full consciousness, but Roger’s hands had been too swollen even to close around a pen. They were still puffed and bruised, but repeated leeching and gentle massage had improved them to the point that they did at least look vaguely like hands again.
Roger’s lips pressed together momentarily, but he wrapped his hand clumsily around the charcoal. The first two fingers on that hand were broken; the splints stuck out in a crude “V” sign—which I thought rather appropriate, under the circumstances.
Roger frowned in concentration, and began to scrawl something slowly. Jamie watched intently, holding the paper flat with both hands to keep it from sliding.
The stick of charcoal snapped in two, the fragments flying off across the floor. I went to pick them up, while Jamie leaned frowning over the smeared sheet of paper. There was a sprawling “W” and an “M,” then a space, and an awkward “MAC.”
“William?” He looked up at Roger for verification. Sweat shone on Roger’s cheekbones, but he nodded, very briefly.
“William Mac,” I said, peering over Jamie’s shoulder. “A Scotsman, then—or a Scottish name, at least?” Not that that narrowed down the possibilities a great deal: MacLeod, MacPherson, MacDonald, MacDonnel, Mac . . . Quiston?
Roger raised his hand and thumped it against his chest. He thumped it again, and mouthed a word. Recalling television shows based on charades, I was for once quicker than Jamie.
“MacKenzie?” I asked, and was rewarded with a quick flash of green eyes, and a nod.
“MacKenzie. William MacKenzie.” Jamie was frowning, obviously