Voyager - Diana Gabaldon [42]
“I canna bear it anymore,” he said. He spoke so softly that Jenny was forced to bend her head close to hear him, like a priest receiving some penitent’s confession. “I can’t. I must go.”
They sat so close together that he could feel the rise and fall of her breast as she breathed. Then she reached out and took hold of his hand, her small firm fingers tight on his.
“Will ye try France again, then?” He had tried to escape to France twice before, thwarted each time by the tight watch the English placed on all ports. No disguise was sufficient for a man of his remarkable height and coloring.
He shook his head. “No. I shall let myself be captured.”
“Jamie!” In her agitation, Jenny allowed her voice to rise momentarily, then lowered it again in response to the warning squeeze of his hand.
“Jamie, ye canna do that!” she said, lower. “Christ, man, ye’ll be hangit!”
He kept his head bent as though in thought, but shook it, not hesitating.
“I think not.” He glanced at his sister, then quickly away. “Claire—she had the Sight.” As good an explanation as any, he thought, if not quite the real truth. “She saw what would happen at Culloden—she knew. And she told me what would come after.”
“Ah,” said Jenny softly. “I wondered. So that was why she bade me plant potatoes—and build this place.”
“Aye.” He gave his sister’s hand a small squeeze, then let go and turned slightly on the narrow seat to face her. “She told me that the Crown would go on hunting Jacobite traitors for some time—and they have,” he added wryly. “But that after the first few years, they would no longer execute the men that were captured—only imprison them.”
“Only!” his sister echoed. “If ye mun go, Jamie, take to the heather then, but to give yourself up to an English prison, whether they’ll hang ye or no—”
“Wait.” His hand on her arm stopped her. “I havena told it all to ye yet. I dinna mean just to walk up to the English and surrender. There’s a goodly price on my head, no? Be a shame to let that go to waste, d’ye not think?” He tried to force a smile in his voice; she heard it and glanced sharply up at him.
“Holy Mother,” she whispered. “So ye mean to have someone betray ye?”
“Seemingly, aye.” He had decided upon the plan, alone in the cave, but it had not seemed quite real until now. “I thought perhaps Joe Fraser would be best for it.”
Jenny rubbed her fist hard against her lips. She was quick; he knew she had grasped the plan at once—and all its implications.
“But Jamie,” she whispered. “Even if they dinna hang ye outright—and that’s the hell of a risk to take—Jamie, ye could be killed when they take ye!”
His shoulders slumped suddenly, under the weight of misery and exhaustion.
“God, Jenny,” he said, “d’ye think I care?”
There was a long silence before she answered.
“No, I don’t,” she said. “And I canna say as I blame ye, either.” She paused a moment, to steady her voice. “But I still care.” Her fingers gently touched the back of his head, stroking his hair. “So ye’ll mind yourself, won’t ye, clot-heid?”
The ventilation panel overhead darkened momentarily, and there was the tapping sound of light footsteps. One of the kitchenmaids, on her way to the pantry, perhaps. Then the dim light came back, and he could see Jenny’s face once more.
“Aye,” he whispered at last. “I’ll mind.”
* * *
It took more than two months to complete the arrangements. When at last word came, it was full spring.
He sat on his favorite rock, near the cave’s entrance, watching the evening stars come out. Even in the worst of the year after Culloden, he had always been able to find a moment of peace at this time of the day. As the daylight faded, it was as though objects became faintly lit from within, so they stood outlined against sky or ground, perfect and sharp in every detail. He could see the shape of a moth, invisible in the light, now limned in the