I could not hold back a smile at his tone. “Much better than you thought I would?”
“I did not say that.”
“No. You did not.”
Helen laughed, and said to Gilroy, “You see now, you’re a simple man to read.”
He left the window, crossing to the table to return his papers to their former order. “Am I?”
“Yes,” she told him. “And I do apologize for teasing you, but it is far too easy. You will stay to supper?”
“No. I thank you, but I am expected elsewhere.”
She accepted this with, “Then we’ll see you tomorrow.”
“About that.” I aimed this at Gilroy, who looked at me.
“Yes?”
“Forgive me, for I have not your experience with matters such as this…”
Helen defended me. “You owe yourself more credit. I am sure my husband could himself have done no better. He’ll be very grateful, as am I.”
I thanked her. “But,” I said, to Gilroy, “you’ve invited Mrs. Graeme back tomorrow, and I cannot see what we have left to talk about.”
He had a way of smiling that could not entirely be called a smile, as though he held some knowledge closely and in private, as a sharper holds his cards. He said, “She was mistaken on one point. Her husband’s cousin, Robert Moray—she did call him Robin—is no longer on the Continent. He returned home to Scotland in April of this year.”
Helen asked, “Does he live nearby?”
“His home’s near Stirling, at Murrayshall.”
“That’s not so far,” she said.
Close enough, I thought, for an express to reach him, and return. “You mean to ask him if her husband told him of their marriage?”
Gilroy said, “And to verify our Mrs. Graeme is actually Lilias Aitcheson, or at least the proper Lilias Aitcheson. Only a person who knew her and James Graeme both could confirm that. We cannot rely on her word alone.”
I’d not considered this, although I knew he was right—anybody could claim to be somebody else. But I did not like the thought of walking Mrs. Graeme into what amounted to an ambush. “People do change in appearance,” I warned him, “as they grow from children to adults.”
He glanced at me drily. “I’ll warrant that someone who knew you when you were a lad would find something to recognize.”
Helen said, “Then you asked Mrs. Graeme to return tomorrow because you intend to write express to Mr. Moray and invite him to come here, so they can meet?”
Gilroy confirmed he had hopes of arranging a meeting. “Though that may be difficult, and having Moray come here,” he said, “would be impossible.”
It was his habit, I thought, to tell less than he knew, but it did try my patience. I asked, “Why is that?”
“Because this Saturday last past,” he told us, “Robert Moray was brought in by night and under close guard to the castle, and is held there now a prisoner.”
Chapter 4
Tuesday, 23 September, 1707
I felt cold passing under the portcullis gate.
Mrs. Graeme, I think, felt it, too, and her steps faltered slightly, although she recovered her pace so adroitly that none would have thought it was anything but the unevenness of the old cobblestones under her feet that had given her trouble.
The great castle of Edinburgh had been designed to have that effect—built to appear it had grown somehow out of the living rock, solid and strong and unyielding. An army approaching it might as well turn and go home, for they’d never defeat it. A prisoner finding himself locked inside might as well give up hope, for he’d never escape it. And we three who passed underneath the great iron portcullis gate might as well thank the good fortune that put us in neither position, and put ourselves into the hands of the guard who was leading us.
Lord Grange’s name had unlocked opportunities. Gilroy had sent a request to the castle’s deputy governor, stressing our urgency, and the reply had been quick.
Mrs. Graeme had offered no protest to our change in venue, and if her pale features were wrapped now in worry, it might be put down to the fact she had just learned her childhood friend was in prison.
They were keeping Robert Moray, we were told, in the same tower chamber where they once had held the Earl of Argyll before he’d been taken to his execution.
Not a thing that would inspire confidence, but I suspected confidence was not what they intended to inspire within the hearts and souls of prisoners.
Our guard carried no candle down the winding turnpike stair, and so we followed him with caution in our single file, our footsteps ringing loudly on the stone.