The Scottish Prisoner - Diana Gabaldon [167]
They were more than late for supper.
“You’d best send for a tray,” Grey said, as they climbed the marble steps. “I’ll have to tell Hal what Bowles said, but there’s no need for you to be involved any further. In any of this.”
“Is there not?” Fraser looked at him, serious in the light of the lantern that hung by the door. “Ye’ll be going to speak wi’ Reginald Twelvetrees, will ye not?”
“Oh, yes.” The thought of that necessity had been pushed to the back of his mind during the recent conversation but had not left him; it hung like a weight suspended by a spider’s thread; Damocles’ sword. “Tomorrow.”
“I’ll go with ye.” The Scotsman’s voice was quiet but firm.
Grey heaved a deep sigh and shook his head.
“No. I thank you … Mr. Fraser,” he said, and tried to smile at the formality. “My brother will second me.”
36
Teind
THE GREY BROTHERS WENT THE NEXT MORNING TO PAY their call on Reginald Twelvetrees. They left, grim and silent, and came back the same way, Grey going out to the conservatory, Hal to his den of papers, speaking to no one.
Jamie had some sympathy for the Greys—and for the Twelvetrees brothers, come to that—and, finding his favorite chair in the library, took out his rosary and said a few decades for the eventual peace of all souls concerned. There were, after all, many situations that simply had to be handed over to God, as no human agency was capable of dealing with them.
He found himself losing his place, though, distracted by his memory of the Greys going off together, shoulder-to-shoulder, to face what must be faced. And the thought of Reginald Twelvetrees, privately mourning two lost brothers.
He had lost his own brother very young; Willie had been eleven when he died of the smallpox—Jamie, six. He didn’t think of Willie much, but the ache of his absence was always there, along with the other scars on his heart left when someone was torn away. He envied the Greys their possession of each other.
Thought of Willie, though, reminded him of another William, and his heart lifted a little with the thought. If life stole dear ones from you, sometimes it gave you others. Ian Murray had become his blood brother after Willie died; sometime he would see Ian again, and meanwhile the knowledge of his presence in the world—looking after things at Lallybroch—was a true comfort. And his son …
When this was over—and pray God it would be soon—he would see William again. Be with him. He might—
“Sir.”
At first, he didn’t realize that it was himself the butler meant. But Nasonby repeated, “Sir,” more insistently, and when he looked up, the butler presented his silver tray, upon which reposed a sheet of rough paper sealed with a daub of candle wax and marked with the print of a broad thumb.
He took it with a nod of thanks and, putting his rosary away, brought the letter upstairs to his room. By the rainy light from the window, he opened it and found a note penned with a careful elegance, much at odds with its crude materials.
Shéamais Mac Bhrian, the salutation read. The rest was in the Irish, too, but was simple enough for him to understand:
For the love of God and Mary and Patrick, come to me now.
Tobias Mac Gréagair,
of the Quinns of Portkerry
At the bottom of the page was drawn a neat line with several boxes perched atop it, and below it written “Civet Cat Alley.” One of the boxes had an “X” marked through it.
An extraordinary feeling ran through him, a cold grue that fell over him like an icy blanket. This wasn’t merely Quinn’s usual drama—still less the intended mischief of his note denouncing Grey as a murderer. The simplicity of it, plus the fact that Quinn had signed it with his formal name, carried an undeniable urgency.
He was halfway down the stairs when he met Lord John, coming up.
“Where is Civet Cat Alley?” he asked abruptly. Grey blinked, glanced at the paper in Jamie’s hand for an instant, then said, “In the Rookery—the Irish quarter. I’ve been there. Shall