“It’s all right,” I said.
Elspeth looked at me sharply. “Patrice MacDonald told me your third floor was unfinished. Her husband was intending to come and work on it this Friday.”
“True.”
“That noise didn’t come from the second floor. I’m sure of it.”
“No,” I agreed. “It didn’t.”
She stared at me, eyes narrowed. I sighed, wishing that I had coffee.
“All houses make sounds, Elspeth—especially big houses. My daughter could undoubtedly tell you why—I can’t, though I can guess now and then. All I can tell you is that when the wind’s in the east, we often hear that particular noise from the third floor.”
“Oh.” She relaxed a little, and took another sip of whisky. “Why do you not just leave that door shut, then?”
“There aren’t any doors on the third floor,” I said. “Yet.” I took a sip of my own. The whisky wasn’t Jamie’s special, but it wasn’t at all bad. I could feel it spreading through my middle in a soft cloud of warmth.
“Are you telling me,” Elspeth said, a few moments later, “that you consider an unfinished floor in a new house to be haunted?”
I laughed.
“No, I’m not. I don’t know what does make that noise, but I’m sure it isn’t a ghostly door of some kind. Really,” I added, seeing her still dubious. “Dozens of people have worked up there over the last couple of months, and none of them have died there—nor did any of them ever see or hear anything odd. And you know that’s true,” I finished, pointing my little finger at her, “because if anyone had, the whole Ridge would know about it by now.”
She’d been on the Ridge long enough to realize the truth of this and nodded, relaxing enough to resume drinking whisky. The tension in the room began to ebb, disappearing up the chimney in a wavering white stream of hickory smoke.
“The attic,” she said, after a few minutes of silence. “Why? It’s a remarkably large house, without adding a third floor.”
“Jamie insisted on it,” I said, with a one-shouldered shrug.
She made a noncommittal noise of acknowledgment and went on sipping. But her sparse gray brows were drawn together, and I knew she wouldn’t stop thinking about it.
“My husband is the Fraser of Fraser’s Ridge,” I said. “If there should ever be … an emergency of some kind that compelled some of the tenants to leave their homes, they could take temporary refuge here. I’ve had that happen before,” I added. “Had refugees in my kitchen—in the old house, I mean—for months. Worse than cockroaches.”
Elspeth laughed politely at that, but she wasn’t troubling to hide her thoughts, and I knew that she appreciated exactly what sort of emergency I had in mind.
“Your son,” I said, feeling that I might as well be blunt. “You believe him?”
She swallowed slowly and leaned back, seeming to look at me from a great distance, as one might regard a bear on a mountaintop: interesting, but no great threat.
“You mean, of course, what he told his congregation, about his son’s death. Yes, I believe him. It is a comfort,” she added softly.
I nodded, accepting this. The story had been a comfort to many more people than her—including me, I realized, with a small sense of surprise. But that wasn’t what I was getting at.
“I was thinking specifically of what his son said to him, that he—your son, I mean—would see him again in seven years’ time. Do you believe that? Or rather—does your son believe that?”
Because a man who believed beyond doubt that he would die on a certain date might just feel himself able to take risks before that date.
Elspeth made no bones about understanding what I meant. She sat silently looking at me, rolling the empty cup slowly between the palms of her hands, the air between us thick with the ghosts of barleycorn and burning wood. At last she sighed and, leaning forward, gingerly, put the cup on the table.
“Yes. He does. He’s adjusted his will so that I will be taken care of—should I outlive him, which I actually don’t plan to.”
I waited, silent. She must of course know that Jamie—and thus I—knew about the captain’s attempts to raise a militia unit of Loyalists. I didn’t think the captain could have hidden the gunrunning incident from her.
“Jamie won’t let him do it,” I said, and she glanced sharply up at me.
“Perhaps not,” she said, over-enunciating in the way that people do when slightly drunk. “But it won’t be up to your husband, in the end.” A small, lady-like belch interrupted her, but she ignored it. “General Cornwallis is sending an officer—a very effective officer, supported by the power of the Crown—to raise Loyalist regiments of militia throughout the Carolinas. To suppress local rebellion.”
I didn’t reply to this, but added an inch of whisky to both our cups, and raised mine to my lips. It seemed to pass straight through my tissues and into my dissolving core.
“Who?” I asked.
She shook her head slowly, and tossed off her whisky.
“And the devil that deceived them was cast into the lake of fire and brimstone, where are the beast and the false prophet, and shall be tormented day and night for ever and ever.”
“Indeed,” I said, as dryly as possible for someone marinated in single-malt Scotch. I wasn’t sure whether the devil she had in mind was Jamie, George Washington, or the Continental Congress, but it probably didn’t matter.
“Upon this rock I will build my church; and the gates of hell shall not prevail against it,” I said, and ceremoniously threw the last few drops from my cup into the fire, which sizzled and spat blue for an instant.
“You know, I really think we should go to bed, Elspeth. You need your rest.”
64
Ten Loaves of Sugar, Three Casks of Gunpowder, and Two Needles for Sewing Flesh
Salisbury
AT EIGHT O’CLOCK THE next morning, the Great Wagon Road lay before them, a broad stretch of trampled red dirt, spotted with dung and bits of rubbish, but empty of travelers for the moment.
“Here.” Jamie pulled one of the pistols from his belt and handed it to his sister. Who—to Rachel’s surprise—merely nodded and pointed it at a broken wagon wheel left at the side of the road, checking the sight.
“Powder?” Jenny asked, sliding the pistol into her belt.
“Here.” Jamie took a cartridge box off his neck and swung the strap of it carefully over Jenny’s white cap. “Ye’ve enough powder and shot to kill a dozen men, and six fresh-made cartridges to give ye a head start.”
Jenny caught sight of Rachel’s face at “kill a dozen men” and smiled slightly. Rachel wasn’t reassured.
“Dinna fash, a nighean,” Jenny said, and patted her arm before settling the cartridge box into place. “I willna shoot anyone unless they mean us harm.”
“I—would greatly prefer that thee didn’t shoot anyone in any circumstances,” Rachel said carefully. She hadn’t eaten much for breakfast, but her stomach felt tight. “Not on—on our behalf, certainly.” But she’d cupped Oggy’s bonneted head at the thought, pressing him close.