“A nice bit of work there, man,” he said to Jamie, nodding approvingly at Rosy and her calf, the latter looking round-eyed and bewildered, its hair swirled in all directions. “Near as good as your wife’s.”
“Taing,” Jamie said, and bent to pick up the grimy linen towel, wiping his face as he stood. “What brings ye to us at this time o’ the night, Mr. Cloudtree?”
“I come earlier, but you was at table,” Cloudtree said, shrugging. “You had the old witch there; I couldn’t’ve spoke before her.”
Jamie glanced at me and settled himself, slowly wiping his hands.
“Speak now,” he said.
“The old witch’s son, Cunningham. You know he’s been trading, down to the Cherokee villages, just the other side o’ the Line?”
Jamie nodded, eyes fixed on Cloudtree’s face. He was mixed blood, a handsome man with silky long brown hair, though with a petulant curve to his mouth.
“Not everybody listens to him,” Cloudtree assured him. “But he’s got some few men down there, maybe twenty, will follow him. He calls ’em his militia, but he ain’t fought Indians before or he’d know better. They take his guns, his powder, and his medals, though, and they’d likely do what he asked—for a while.”
“What is it that he’s asking?” Jamie had stopped wiping his hands and now held the towel twisted between them.
“I ain’t heard this from him,” Cloudtree said, leaning in and lowering his voice, “but I heard it from two o’ the men in Keowee, ones he paid. There’s a redcoat officer named Ferguson, set to go to and fro in the mountains, raising Loyalist militias and arresting rebels, hangin’ men and burning houses. Cunningham’s wrote Ferguson a letter, naming your name and saying he ought to come here with his troops, ’cuz you a king beaver ’mongst the rebels and your pelt would be worth the trouble to take it.”
All the air seemed to have been sucked out of the byre. After a moment, though, Jamie took a long breath and let it out slowly.
“Do you know when?” he asked calmly.
Cloudtree shrugged.
“I don’t know ’bout Ferguson. Seems he’s got plenty to keep him busy where he is. But Cunningham’s got tired o’ waitin’ for an answer. The men I talked to say he means to arrest you himself and take you to Ferguson—so’s Ferguson can hang you for show, I mean. They say”—he looked at his hands and folded down the fingers, counting—“eight days from yesterday. Cunningham’s waitin’ on a fellow name of Partland, who’s comin’ from Ninety-Six with some more men.”
Jamie’s eyes met mine, and I knew we were thinking the same thing: Seven nights from now was Lodge night. If they were coming for Jamie, that would be the logical time to do it. It was a good two hundred miles from the settlement of Ninety-Six to the Ridge, but Partland and friends might well make it.
“That bloody snake!” I said. I was alarmed and angry, but anger was definitely on top. “How dare he?”
“Well, I did take their guns away, Sassenach,” Jamie said mildly. “I told ye they’d resent it.”
He looked thoughtfully at Aaron and absently wiped the back of his hand across his mouth. He grimaced, rubbed the hand on his breeches, and spat into the straw.
“Aye,” he said. “Ye’ve done me a service, Mr. Cloudtree, and I will remember it. Tell me—d’ye ken a man named Scotchee Cameron?”
Aaron had been looking around the byre, interested, but came to attention at that name.
“Everybody does,” he said, switching the interest to Jamie. “Indian superintendent, ain’t he? Friend of yours?”
“We’ve shared a pipe now and then. I was an Indian agent, for a time.”
I glanced at Jamie. I knew he’d smoked with the Cherokee when he visited with them, but I’d never asked him what sort of conversation this involved. I’d likewise never met Alexander Cameron, but like everybody else, knew of him. A Scotsman, he’d married and chosen to live among the Indians, hunting and trading. He’d become an Indian superintendent after Jamie’s resignation, though, and as it was now widely known that Jamie was a rebel, he had therefore courteously not sought Scotchee out when he traded in the Cherokee lands. Cameron was still respected, though, Jamie said, trusted and known everywhere.
“Do you ken where he is just now?” Jamie asked.
Aaron pursed his lips, thinking. Is he thinking where Cameron is? I wondered. Or wondering what he can make out of the situation?
“Yes,” he said, though with a tinge of doubt in his voice. He scratched his head to assist thought.
“He lives with the Overhill people, but he was in Nensanyi last week, so he’s likely come to Keowee by now. That’s where we live,” he said, turning to me. “Susannah and the young’uns and me.” He seemed to want to justify himself to me, possibly remembering—as I certainly did—his slapping Agnes on the night her mother gave birth. And he might be afraid of what Agnes had told me about him.
“I’m glad to hear that you have a place,” I said, smiling a little stiffly at him. “Do please give my regards to Susannah and tell her that if she should ever need a doctor again, please send to me and I’ll come.”
His expression lightened and he nodded to me.
“That’s real good of you, Missus. Ah … d’you want me to find Scotchee and tell him ’bout this trouble o’ yours … sir?” he added to Jamie, looking uncertain. “Might be as he could talk sense to any of the Cherokee that have dealings with Loyalists.”
“I do,” Jamie said. He gave the cows a quick look-over, but the new calf had staggered to its feet, shaking its head. He nodded to himself, then bent and picked up the filthy towel he’d been using.
“Come down to the house, will ye, Mr. Cloudtree? My wife will find ye something to eat while I write a wee word for Scotchee. We can find a bed for ye, too, if ye like?”
Cloudtree shook his head.
“I like to walk in the night,” he said simply. “It talks to me. But I wouldn’t say no to a sup and a bite, Missus.”
I HAD COME up to our bedroom—after providing Jamie and Mr. Cloudtree with a plate of rolls stuffed with cheese and my backwoods version of Branston pickle—but I was in no mood for sleep. My backbone had gone cold at Aaron’s story and hadn’t thawed a bit, though my innards were pulsing with an angry heat.
I’d been trying to distract my mind by reading The Two Towers, which Jamie had left by the bed, but kept imagining Captain Cunningham as Shelob in a gold-laced hat and wondering whether I might nickname my syringe Sting.
“Jesus H. Roosevelt Christ,” I muttered, putting the book aside and flouncing out of bed. The floor was cold underfoot, but I didn’t care. I paced round the room like a dog in a kennel, fuming. I did realize that I was stoking my anger in order not to be overwhelmed by fright, but it was a losing battle. How the bloody hell was I going to look Elspeth Cunningham in the face? I was bound to see her on Sunday, if not before. Bunking off church wouldn’t help; if she thought I was ill, she’d be round promptly to dose me.
Did she know what the captain was up to? I wondered, stepping over Adso, who was stretched out on his side on the rag rug in front of the hearth, flattened in sleep. If she did—what might she do?