The Scottish Prisoner - Diana Gabaldon [40]
And it was somewhat reassuring to realize that Fraser would be as uncomfortable as himself. No doubt that discomfort would prevent anything awkward being said.
He thought the philosophical frame of mind was coming along fairly well but might be further assisted by food; agitated by his conversation with Hal, he’d missed his tea and was feeling the effects of brandy on an empty stomach. Glancing at himself in the looking glass to be sure he’d got all the manure flakes out of his still-damp hair, he twitched the ill-fitting gray coat into better adjustment and made his way downstairs.
It was early evening, and the Beefsteak was quiet. Supper was not being served quite yet; there was no one in the smoking room and only one member in the library, sprawled asleep in a chair with a newspaper over his face.
Someone was in the writing room, though, shoulders hunched in thought, quill twiddling in one hand in search of inspiration.
To Grey’s surprise, the hunched back proved to belong to Harry Quarry, senior colonel of the 46th. Quarry, straightening up with an unfocused look in his eye, suddenly caught sight of Grey in the corridor and, alarmed, hastily slapped a sheet of blotting paper over the paper on the desk before him.
“A new poem, Harry?” Grey asked pleasantly, stepping into the writing room.
“What?” Harry tried—and failed utterly—to look innocently bewildered. “Poetry? Me? Letter to a lady.”
“Oh, yes?”
Grey made as though to lift the blotting paper, and Quarry snatched both sheets away, pressing them to his chest.
“How dare you, sir?” he said, with what dignity he could muster. “A man’s private correspondence is sacred!”
“Nothing is sacred to a man who would rhyme ‘sanguineous’ and ‘cunnilingus,’ I assure you.”
He likely wouldn’t have said it had the brandy warming his blood not loosened his tongue, as well. Seeing Harry’s eyes bulge, though, he wanted to laugh, in spite of his regret.
Harry leapt to his feet and, going to the door, glanced wildly up and down the corridor, before turning to glare at Grey.
“I should like to see you do better. Who the devil told you?”
“How many people know?” Grey countered. “I guessed. You gave me that book for Diderot, after all.” He hadn’t guessed but didn’t want to reveal the source of his information, that being his mother.
“You read it?” The color was beginning to come back into Harry’s normally florid face.
“Well, no,” Grey admitted. “Monsieur Diderot read a number of selections from it aloud, though.” He grinned involuntarily at the recollection of M. Diderot—very intoxicated—declaiming poetry from Harry’s anonymously published Certain Verses Upon the Subject of Eros while urinating behind a screen in Lady Jonas’s salon.
Harry was examining him, narrow-eyed.
“Hmmph,” he said. “You wouldn’t know a dactyl from your left thumb. Benedicta told you.”
Grey’s eyebrows shot up. Not in offense at Harry’s impugning of his literary judgment—which was more or less true—but in surprise. For Harry to have referred to Grey’s mother by her Christian name—while revealing that she knew about the poetry—was a shocking revelation as to the intimacy of their acquaintance.
He had wondered how his mother had come to know that Harry wrote erotic poetry. He returned the narrow look, with interest.
Harry, belatedly realizing what he’d given away, looked as innocent as it was possible for a thirty-eight-year-old colonel of expansive habit, lecherous appetite, and considerable experience to look. Grey debated briefly whether to make something of that look, but, after all, his mother was safely married now to General Stanley, and neither she nor the general would thank him for causing scandal—and he really didn’t want to call Harry out, anyway.
He settled for saying repressively, “The lady is my mother, sir,” and Harry had the grace to look abashed.
Before more could be said, though, the front door opened and a cold draft swirled down the hall, lifting the papers on the desk and scattering them at Grey’s feet. He stooped