“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?
Likely nothing. She’d warned me, after all. And I’d warned her.