The Scottish Prisoner - Diana Gabaldon [111]
Siverly had disappeared into the house. Grey continued to sit for a little, thinking, but could come to no firm conclusions. Obviously, Siverly wasn’t going to tell him anything about the paymaster’s chest. Perhaps it would be worth riding over to Brampton Court—that’s where the butler had said Twelvetrees was staying—and trying to inveigle information out of the other conspirator. At least he was reasonably sure that Twelvetrees wouldn’t try to kill him out of hand. Though it might be as well to bring his dagger.
Just as Grey rose to his feet, Twelvetrees himself came out of the house and, looking out across the lawn, saw Grey at the summerhouse. He lowered his head and came down, looking bitter and determined.
Grey waited.
Twelvetrees was slightly flushed when he arrived but had himself well in hand. None of Siverly’s volcanic passion showed in that lean, long-nosed face. There was hostility, to be sure, and considerable dislike.
“You should leave, Colonel Grey,” he said without preamble. “And do not come back. I tell you this for your own good; there is no profit in pestering Major Siverly, no matter what your motive—and I confess I cannot make that out. No, don’t tell me—” He held up a minatory hand. “I don’t care. Neither do you need to know what my motives are. Suffice it to say that you meddle in matters that you do not understand, and if you continue to do so, you will regret it.”
He made to turn on his heel, but Grey, moved by impulse, put out a hand and grasped his sleeve.
“A moment, Captain, if you please.” He groped with his free hand for his waistcoat pocket and pulled out another sheet of paper—one of the copies of the Wild Hunt verse. “Look at this.”
Twelvetrees looked as though he meant to jerk away, but instead seized the paper impatiently and opened it.
He didn’t even read it but turned pale at sight of the words.
“Where did you get this?” he said, his voice nearly a whisper.
“From Charlie Carruthers,” Grey said. “I see you recognize it. Do you—”
He never got to complete the sentence. Twelvetrees shoved the paper into his chest so hard that he took a step backward to avoid falling. He caught his balance, but Twelvetrees was already striding away across the little flagstone walk. Grey caught sight of a snail on the stone. Twelvetrees’s shoe came down upon the animal with an audible crunch. He paid no attention but forged blindly on, leaving a small, wet stain glimmering on the flags.
23
Plan B
THE NEXT DAY DAWNED SULLEN AND OVERCAST BUT NOT actually raining. Yet. Grey dressed carefully in his uniform, Tom Byrd assisting him with the same sense of solemn ceremony as though preparing Grey for battle. Leather stock, gorget, polished boots … Grey hesitated for a moment over wearing his dagger, but in the end, thinking of Siverly’s attack on Jamie Fraser, put it in his belt.
Fraser leaned against the window frame, half-sitting on the sill, watching the preparations with a small frown. He’d offered to go with Grey, but John had declined, thinking that his presence could not but inflame Siverly. It was going to be a sufficiently sticky interview without introducing further complications.
“If I don’t come back,” he told Fraser at the door, “you have my explicit permission to do whatever you like to Siverly.” He’d meant it as a joke, but the Scotsman nodded soberly.
“I’ll take your body home to your brother.”
Tom Byrd made a horrified noise, but Grey smiled, affecting to think this a witty riposte to his own feeble jest.
“Yes, you do that,” he said, and went downstairs, bootheels thumping.
The butler at Glastuig opened the door to him, eyes wide at seeing him in his uniform.
“I will see your master, if you please,” Grey informed him, stepping inside without invitation. “Where is he?”
The butler gave way, flustered.
“The master’s not in the house, sir!”
“Where is he, then?”
The man’s mouth worked for a moment and he glanced from side to side, looking for a suitable answer, but he was too