The Scottish Prisoner - Diana Gabaldon [13]
“Ye have seen the English army …” Jamie began, but he might as well have tried to stop the tide coming into the River Ness.
“And that’s where you come in!” Quinn let go of his arm at last, but only in order to prod him enthusiastically in the chest.
Jamie recoiled slightly. “Me?”
“See, the thing is, we’ve found the Cupán—lost for two hundred years it’s been, and legends saying the faeries took it, the Druids reclaimed it, all manner of tosh, but we—well, I myself, in fact”—here he tried to look modest, with indifferent results—“discovered it, in the hands of the monks at the monastery of Inchcleraun.”
“But—”
“Now, the monks are keepin’ the precious thing close and quiet, to be sure. But the thing is, the abbot at Inchcleraun is one Michael FitzGibbons.” He stood back a bit, looking expectant.
Jamie raised the brow again. Quinn sighed at such obtuseness but obliged with more information.
“Mi-chael Fitz-Gib-bons,” he repeated, prodding Jamie’s chest anew with each syllable. Jamie moved back out of reach.
“FitzGibbons,” Quinn repeated, “and the man first cousin to your godfather, Murtagh FitzGibbons Fraser, is he not? To say nothing of having grown up in the house of your uncle Alexander Fraser, and the two of them thick as thieves? Though perhaps that’s not quite the figure of speech to be using for a pair of priests, but what I mean to say is, they might be brothers, so close as they are, and the two writing back and forth from month to month. So—”
Finally, Quinn was obliged to draw breath, giving Jamie the chance to stick a word in edgewise.
“No,” he said definitely. “Not for all the tea in China.”
Quinn’s long face creased in puzzlement. “China? What’s China got to do with it, for all love?”
Ah. Another of Claire’s sayings, then. He tried again. “I mean I will not try to persuade my uncle Alexander to pry this thing out of FitzGibbons’s hands.”
“Oh, no, that’s not what I had in mind, at all.”
“Good, because—”
“I want ye to go to Inchcleraun yourself. Oh, now, there’s that look on your face again!” Quinn laughed in amusement, rocking back, then planted his hands on his knees and leaned forward.
Jamie leaned forward, too, to forestall him.
“Quinn, I’m a prisoner of war. I’ve given my parole. Surely to goodness Betty told ye as much?”
“Sure and I didn’t think ye were here for your health,” Quinn said, with a glance round at the bleak fells and the desolate ruins of the shepherd’s hut. “But that’s of no moment.”
“It’s not?”
Quinn waved this aside as a mere quibble.
“No. It’s got to be someone Father Michael trusts and at the same time someone known to be at the right hand o’ the Stuarts, who can swear that the Cupán won’t be misused but put to its right and sacred purpose in restoring a Catholic monarch to the throne of Ireland. And a man who can raise and lead an army. People trust you, ye know,” he said earnestly, tilting his head up and examining Jamie’s face. “They listen when ye speak, and men will follow ye without question. It’s known of ye.”
“No longer,” Jamie said, and found he was clenching his fists; his throat was dried by the wind, so the words came hoarse. “No. No longer.”
Quinn’s fizzy manner had calmed somewhat. He clasped Jamie’s hand in both his own.
“Man, dear,” he said, almost gently. “Kings have their destiny about them—but so do those who serve them. This is yours. God’s chosen ye for the task.”
Jamie closed his eyes briefly, drew a deep breath, and pulled his hand free.
“I think God had best look elsewhere, Quinn,” he said. “The blessing of Bride and Michael be on you. Goodbye.”
He turned and walked away, finding Augustus where he’d been left, peacefully cropping the tufts of wiry grass that grew between the rocks. He removed the hobbles, swung up into the saddle, and turned the horse’s head toward the trail. He hadn’t meant to look back but at the last minute glanced down toward the shepherd’s hut.
Quinn stood there in dark silhouette against the late-afternoon sun, a stick-jointed marionette with a nimbus of curls. He lifted a long-fingered hand and waved in farewell.