Chapter 20 #2
“The fault is mine,” he said.
She turned and looked at him. “Is it?”
“Only mine. Riona is not to blame for what happened.”
“Is it honor that makes you say that, James, or guilt?”
“Perhaps a measure of both,” he said honestly.
“I know my daughter, James MacRae. No one could have coerced her to such affection. What she did was willingly done.”
“I still hold myself responsible.”
She regarded him levelly. “This is an untenable situation, James. I am sorry for it. I was wrong to ask you to stay. Forgive me.”
“The fault is not yours.”
She stared at the far wall and sighed deeply. “At least we’ve rid ourselves of Mrs. Parker.” She studied him once more, smiling this time. “It’s already been pointed out to me that I’m lacking wisdom where you’re concerned.” A surprising comment, but she didn’t elaborate.
“I wish Riona had never seen Edinburgh,” she said fiercely, and left him, leaving him staring after her.
At first Rory thought he’d died, but the pain was so great that he was certain he hadn’t.
There was something on his chest, and something else was pressing against his ear and his neck.
He brushed at it or tried to. His arm wouldn’t work, and a streak of pain traveled from his wrist to his shoulder, answering that question for once and all.
He wouldn’t be hurting so badly if he were dead.
He moved his other hand from half beneath him.
He was buried alive. A surge of panic made him want to scream, but there was dirt in his mouth.
He tried to call out, the sound emerging as a garbled cry.
One by one, he picked the bricks off his chest, until he could breathe easier.
His arms were next. When he felt upward he finally encountered no obstruction.
It took him nearly an hour, or what he thought was an hour, to emerge from beneath the bricks and crawl a short distance away. He began to shout then, as loud as he was able.
“James!”
He half turned, holding up his hand so that the other men would halt for a moment. The sound of the saws and axes nearly drowned out her voice.
Abigail was running toward him, her skirts held at one side, her hair askew and her cap missing.
“It’s Rory!” she shouted. “He’s been hurt.”
“Where?”
“The barn.”
He’d thought Rory was working with one of the teams of men throughout Tyemorn last night. They’d first set up a brigade to extinguish the fire, and then to surround the farm with lookouts. Twice he’d asked about Rory, and twice someone had said that he’d been spotted patrolling one of the pastures.
James should have sought the boy out himself.
He began to run, reaching the site of the burned-out building. He hadn’t missed Rory, but he should have. He and the other men had worked through the night, ensuring that the fire was out.
At dawn, he and Ned had set up gangs of men to begin the work necessary to rebuild the structure. The barn was too valuable to do without for more than a few days.
The sagging west wall had collapsed, now nothing more than a pile of rubble. Rory lay atop it, his young body looking broken and burned. Abigail stood near him, crying softly into the hem of her apron.
James felt a surge of guilt as he knelt at his side. He should have noticed Rory’s absence.
Rory turned his head weakly. “Drummond’s still out there, sir.”
“Did he do this to you?”
Rory nodded. “The lantern exploded. I didn’t expect that. Am I burned all over?”
James did a quick appraisal. “One leg, Rory, but it doesn’t look that bad.”
The young man sighed in relief, looking beyond to where Abigail now stood. “I hurt all over, James.” He looked scared and too young. James hastened to reassure him.
“You were buried by the wall,” James said, “you’re full of bruises. But the bricks probably kept you safe from the rest of the fire.”
Susanna moved into James’s sight. “We’ll take care of him,” she said, Riona at her side. Behind her stood Maureen. All three women wore looks of worry overlaid with calm resolve. James realized how much they had come to care for Rory, just as he cared for all of them.
A landlocked home was a strange place for a former cabin boy.
They devised a litter for Rory, carrying him back to the house. Several times during the journey he lost consciousness. Yet every time he opened his eyes, Abigail was at his side, brushing her fingers over his hand.
Without knowing it, the young maid had made a friend. James smiled at her as she hesitated at the door.
“I think he’d like you with him,” he said when she glanced back at him. Abigail nodded and followed the stretcher inside.
“I’ll go in search of Drummond, then,” he said.
Riona remained between her sister and mother, but the look of concern on her face was reserved for him.
“I’ll be careful,” he said, in response to her unspoken words.
Ned and a few other men accompanied him on his search for Drummond, a task that James expected to take all day. This time, he vowed to go from door to door in Ayleshire to find the man, if need be. But they discovered him before an hour had passed.
Drummond lay on the path near a copse of trees, not far from where a pack horse stood, its reins tied to a sapling. He was beyond any mortal justice.
James knelt at his side, turning the body over slowly. The dead man’s face was long and thin, his ears too large for his head. His mouth hung open, revealing sharpened brown teeth.
“Do you recognize him?” Ned asked.
“Yes,” he said finally. “Thomas Drummond.” He told Ned the story of the last battle fought between the two clans at Gilmuir. “We turned the prisoners over to the captain of an English merchant ship. He was one of them.”
“Reason enough to hate you,” Ned said, flinging back the man’s leather jerkin. “Pity he didn’t care for that cut of his.”
A large yellowish stain marred the front of Drummond’s shirt, and the stench of a suppurating wound tinged the air.
“A terrible way to die,” Ned said. “And a foolish one.”
“Hatred killed him as much as his wound,” James said.
Ned only nodded.