“Gu math agus a leithid dhut fhein,” Jamie said, nodding to him. Well, and the same to you.
“Will I have a word with you, after?” Hiram asked, still in the Gaelic.
“Aye, of course.” Jamie answered him in the same tongue, and saw a couple of the non-Gaelic-speaking tenants glance at them—with a touch of suspicion? he wondered.
“Will it be to do with your wee brother, then?” he asked, changing to English, and was pleased to see that hearing the Tall Tree referred to as his wee brother made the corner of Hiram’s mouth quiver.
“Aye.”
“Fine, then,” Jamie said pleasantly, trying to ignore the beating of his heart. “But ken, a charaid, I’ve said I willna let Frances be married before she’s sixteen—and not then, if she doesna choose to.”
Crombie shook his head briefly.
“It’s naught to do wi’ the lassie,” he said, and went into the Meeting House, followed by his kin and nearby friends.
And here the man himself came with his two young lieutenants, them in half-dress uniform and himself in pale linen breeches and a light-gray cloak, with a slouch hat against the rain. Plain, by his lights. Jamie caught the movement as Kenny Lindsay ducked his head to hide a smirk, but Jamie wasn’t so sure. Aye, it was possible that a sailor wouldn’t think what sort of target he’d make in the dark—but it was also possible either that Cunningham hadn’t thought that he might be a target, or that Cloudtree’s news was wrong, and the ambush—if there was meant to be one—wasn’t meant to be tonight.
Then Cunningham emerged into the fall of light from the open door, saw Jamie, and bowed to him.
“Worshipful Master,” he said.
“Captain,” Jamie replied, and his heart thumped hard in his ears as he bowed, because Cunningham was no card player and the truth was written in the narrowing of his eyes and the hardness of his mouth.
A formal occasion, then, is it? He had a sudden mental picture of them squaring up to fight a duel, in kilt, cocked hat, and their Masonic aprons. What would be the weapons? he wondered. Cutlasses?
“Dèan ullachadh, mo charaidean,” he said casually to the men who stood with him. Stand ready.
The meeting went well enough—outwardly. The ritual, the words of brotherhood, fellowship, idealism. But he thought the words rang hollow, with a sense of ice among the men, covering their hearts, separating one from another, leaving all in the cold.
Things felt easier when it came to Business: the small things they did as a matter of community. A widow unable to deal with her late husband’s stock; a man who’d fallen through his own roof whilst repairing his chimney and broken both an arm and a leg; an auld quarrel betwixt the MacDonalds and the MacQuarries that had broken out in a fistfight at market day in Salisbury and had come home with them, still trailing clouds of ill will.
Things that were not really the business of the Lodge but that should be brought up: talk that Howard Nettles was having to do with a woman who kept shop at Beardsley’s Trading Post, whose husband was a bargeman and spent weeks away from home.
“Is there anyone here who kens Nettles well enough to drop a word in his ear?” Jamie asked. “If it’s Mrs. Appleton that’s bein’ talked about, I’ve seen her husband and he’d make two of Howard.”
A small murmur of humor ran through the room, and Geordie MacNeil said he didna ken Howard well enough to say what he needed to hear, but he did ken Howard’s cousin, who lived in a wee settlement near the Blowing Rock, and he could have a word next time he passed that way.
“Aye, well enough,” Jamie said, thinking that Claire’s bees would enjoy hearing about this. “And we’ll hope it’s soon enough to save Howard’s neck. Thank ye, Geordie. Anything else before we start the beer?” From the corner of his eye, he saw Cunningham move suddenly but then catch himself and subside.
It’ll be outside, then. He took a deep breath and felt a distant bodhran start to beat in his blood.
Hiram Crombie had brought the beer tonight, it being his turn. Skinflint he might be—all the fisher-folk were, having lived in stark poverty all their lives—but he kent what was right, and the beer was good. Jamie wondered what was ado with wee Cyrus, but it didn’t look urgent …
On the far side of the room, Cunningham was talking. About loyalty. About his service in the Royal Navy. About loyalty to the King.
Jamie slowly got his feet under him. All right, there was nothing that prevented men talking of politics or religion outside of Lodge, but this was not quite far enough outside, and everyone knew it. Silence spread from the men who surrounded Cunningham—Jamie took note of their faces—and a coldness ran through the room like spreading frost as the others began to listen and hear what was being said.