Текст книги "Written in My Own Heart's Blood"

Автор книги: Diana Gabaldon

Соавторы: Diana Gabaldon
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Текущая страница: 22 (всего у книги 74 страниц)

“Maybe,” said Buck’s voice, gruff and reluctant. “Maybe no. I fell asleep whilst he was tapping on my chest like a yaffle after tree grubs. Why?”

“Did you understand what it was he said to ye? When he touched you?” Buck had been a lawyer in his own time; he must have studied Latin.

“Did you?” A slight creak of wood and a rustling of cloth.

“I did. And I said it back to him, just before he left.”

“I was asleep,” Buck repeated doggedly. Clearly he didn’t want to talk about the healer, but he wasn’t going to have a choice about that, Roger thought grimly.

“Come out of there, will ye? The MacLarens are all out in the dooryard, crossing their legs.” He glanced over his shoulder and was surprised to see that in fact the MacLarens were out in the dooryard.

Not all of them—it was only Angus and a tall boy, plainly a MacLaren, too, from the shape of him. He seemed familiar—had he been at the house the evening before? They were bent close together, talking in evident excitement, and the boy was pointing off toward the distant road.

“Come out,” Roger repeated, sudden urgency in his voice. “Someone’s coming. I hear horses.”

The privy door flew open and Buck sprang out like a jack-in-the-box, stuffing his shirt into his breeks. His hair was matted and dirty, but his eyes were alert, and he looked entirely capable; that was reassuring.

The horses had come up over the brow of the hill now—six of them: four of the shaggy Highland ponies called garrons, one indifferent rangy bay, and a startlingly fine chestnut with a black mane. Buck seized Roger’s arm with a grip like a horse’s bite.

“A Dhia,” Buck said, half under his breath. “Who’s that?”



ANGELS UNAWARE

ROGER HAD NO IDEA who the tall man with the good horse was, but it was crystal clear what he was, both from the deferential manner of the MacLarens and from the way in which his companions fell naturally into place a step behind him. The man in charge.

A tacksman of the MacKenzies? he wondered. Most of the men wore a hunting tartan with a sett in green, brown, and white, but Roger wasn’t yet familiar enough with the local patterns as to tell whether they came from somewhere close by or not.

The tall man glanced over his shoulder at MacLaren’s nod, and his eyes rested on Roger and Buck with an air of casual interest. There was nothing threatening in his manner, but Roger felt himself draw up to his own full height and wished for an instant that he wasn’t barefoot and unshaven, breeks flapping unbuckled at his knees.

At least he did have someone at his own back: Buck had fallen a step behind him. He hadn’t time to be surprised at that before he came within the stranger’s ken.

The man was an inch or two shorter than himself and close to his own age, dark and good-looking in a faintly familiar sort of …

“Good morn to ye, sir,” the dark man said, with a courteous inclination of the head. “My name is Dougal MacKenzie, of Castle Leoch. And … who might you be?”

Dear Jesus bloody hell, he thought. The shock rippled through him, and he hoped it didn’t show on his face. He shook hands firmly.

“I am Roger Jeremiah MacKenzie, of Kyle of Lochalsh,” he said, keeping his voice mild and—he hoped—assured, as some compensation for his shabby appearance. His voice sounded nearly normal this morning; if he didn’t force it, with luck it wouldn’t crack or gurgle.

“Your servant, sir,” MacKenzie said with a slight bow, surprising Roger with his elegant manners. He had deep-set hazel eyes, which looked Roger over with frank interest—and a faint touch of what appeared to be amusement—before shifting to Buck.

“My kinsman,” Roger said hastily. “William Bu—William MacKenzie.” When? he thought in agitation. Was Buck born yet? Would Dougal recognize the name William Buccleigh MacKenzie? But, no, he can’t be born yet; you can’t exist twice in the same time—can you?!?

A question from Dougal MacKenzie interrupted this stream of confusion, though Roger missed hearing it. Buck answered, though.

“My kinsman’s son was taken,” he said, looking Dougal over with exactly—oh, Jesus, exactly—the same attitude of insouciant confidence that the other MacKenzie carried. “About a week past, abducted by a man named Cameron. Robert Cameron. Will ye maybe ken such a man?”

Dougal of course did not—not surprising, as Cameron hadn’t existed here until a week ago. But he conferred with his men, asked intelligent questions, and expressed an open sympathy and concern that at once comforted Roger and made him feel as though he was about to vomit.

To this point, Dougal MacKenzie had been no more than a name on the historical page, momentarily, if vividly, illustrated by Claire’s disjunct memories. Now he sat solid in the early-morning sun beside Roger on the bench outside the MacLarens’ cottage, his plaid rough and smelling faintly of piss and heather, two days’ stubble rasping as he scratched his jaw in thought.

I like him, God help me. And, God help me, I know what’s going to happen to him… .

His eyes fixed in helpless fascination on the hollow of Dougal’s throat, sun-brown and strong, framed in the open collar of his crumpled shirt. Roger jerked his eyes away, glancing instead at the russet hairs on Dougal’s wrist, these catching the sunlight as he motioned toward the east, talking of his brother, chieftain of the clan MacKenzie.

“Colum doesna travel, himself, but he’d be glad to welcome the two of ye, should you find yourselves near Leoch in your search.” He smiled at Roger, who smiled back, warmed by it. “Where d’ye mean to go now?”

Roger took a deep breath. Where, indeed?

“South, I think. William found no trace of Cameron in Inverness, so I’m thinking that he might be headed toward Edinburgh, meaning to take ship there.”

Dougal pursed his lips, nodding in thought.

“Well, then.” He turned to his men, who had sat down on the rocks that lined the path, and called to them. “Geordie, Thomas—we’ll lend your beasts to these men; get your bags. Ye’d have little chance of catching up to the villain on foot,” he said, turning back to Roger. “He must be mounted himself, and moving fast, or ye’d have found some trace of him.”

“I—thank you,” Roger managed. He felt a deep chill, in spite of the sun on his face. “You must—I mean—that’s very kind. We’ll bring them back as soon as we can—or send them, if—if we should be detained anywhere.”

“Moran taing,” Buck murmured, nodding to Geordie and Thomas, who nodded back, looking dour but philosophical at the prospect of walking back to wherever they’d come from.

Where have they come from? Apparently, Angus MacLaren had sent his son off last night before supper, to summon Dougal to come and have a look at his alarming guests. But Dougal and his men had to have been somewhere close at hand …

The chink of metal as Jock dumped an obviously heavy bag on the ground beside Dougal gave him a clue. Quarter Day. Dougal was collecting the rents for his brother—and likely on his way back to Leoch. A lot of the rents would have been paid in kind—hams, chickens, wool, salt fish—probably Dougal’s party was accompanied by one or more wagons, which they’d left behind wherever they’d stayed last night.

Angus MacLaren and his oldest son stood a little to the side, eyes fixed suspiciously on Roger as though he might sprout wings and fly away. Dougal turned to Angus with a smile and said in Gàidhlig, “Don’t trouble, friend; they’re nay more ghosts than the lads and I are.”

“Do not forget to entertain strangers,” Buck said in the same language, “for thereby some have entertained angels unawares.”

There was a startled pause at that, everyone staring at him. Then Dougal laughed, and his men followed him. Angus merely made a polite noise in his throat but shifted his weight and visibly relaxed. As though this had been a signal—and perhaps it was—the door opened, and Mrs. MacLaren and Allie came out, with a stack of wooden bowls and a steaming pot of parritch. One of the smaller MacLarens came after, carefully bearing a saltcellar in both hands.

In the general hubbub of serving and eating—the women had oversalted his porridge, though not badly—Roger said quietly to Dougal, “Did MacLaren actually send to have you come and see whether I was a ghost?”

Dougal looked surprised but then smiled, one side of his mouth turning up. It was the way Brianna smiled when she wanted to acknowledge a joke she didn’t think was funny—or when she saw something funny that she didn’t mean to share with the company. A searing pang followed the jolt of recognition, and Roger was obliged to look down for a moment and clear his throat in order to get control of his voice.

“No, man,” Dougal said casually, also looking down as he wiped his bowl with a bit of hard journeycake taken from his saddlebag. “He thought I might be of help to ye in your search.” He looked up then, straight at Roger’s neck, and raised one dark, heavy brow. “Not that the presence of a half-hangit man at your door doesna raise questions, ken?”

“At least a half-hangit man can answer the questions,” Buck put in. “Not like him from the croft above, aye?”

That startled Dougal, who put down his spoon and stared at Buck. Who stared back, one fair brow raised.

Holy Lord … do they see it? Either of them? It wasn’t warm, despite the sun, but Roger felt sweat begin to trickle down his spine. It was more a matter of posture and expression than of feature—and yet the echo of similarity between the two faces was plain as the … well, as the long, straight nose on both faces.

Roger could see the thoughts flickering across Dougal’s face: surprise, curiosity, suspicion.

“And what have ye to do with him above?” he asked, with a slight lift of his chin in the direction of the burnt-out croft.

“Not a thing, so far as I ken,” Buck answered, with a brief shrug. “Only meaning as how if ye want to know what happened to my kinsman, ye can ask him. We’ve nothing to hide.”

Thanks a lot, Roger thought, with a sideways look at his ancestor, who smiled blandly back at him and resumed gingerly eating his salty parritch. Why the bloody hell did you say that, of all things?

“I was hanged in mistake for another man,” he said, as casually as possible, but he heard the voice grate in his throat, tightening, and had to stop to clear it. “In America.”

“America,” Dougal repeated, in open astonishment. All of them were staring at him now, men-at-arms and MacLarens both. “What took ye to America—and what brought ye back, come to that?”

“My wife has kin there,” Roger replied, wondering what the devil Buck was up to. “In North Carolina, on the Cape Fear River.” He very nearly named Hector and Jocasta Cameron, before remembering that Jocasta was Dougal’s sister. Also that it was Culloden that had sent them to America—and Culloden hadn’t happened yet.

And he won’t live to see it, he thought, watching Dougal’s face as he spoke, feeling a state of bemused horror. Dougal would die, hours before the battle, in the attics of Culloden House near Inverness, with Jamie Fraser’s dirk sunk in the hollow of his throat.

He told the story of his hanging and rescue briefly, leaving out the context of the War of the Regulation—and leaving out Buck’s role in getting him hanged, too. He could feel Buck there beside him, leaning forward, intent, but didn’t look at him. Couldn’t look at him without wanting to strangle him. Wanted to strangle him anyway.

He could barely speak by the time he finished, and his heart was thumping in his ears with suppressed rage. Everyone was looking at him, with a range of emotions from awe to sympathy. Allie MacLaren was openly sniffing, her apron hem at her nose, and even her mother looked as though she somewhat regretted the salt. Angus coughed and handed him a stone bottle of what turned out to be beer, and a very grateful beverage it was, too. He muttered thanks and gulped it, avoiding all eyes.

Dougal nodded soberly, then turned to Angus.

“Tell me about the man above,” he said. “When did that happen—and what d’ye ken about it?”

MacLaren’s face lost a little of its natural high color, and he looked as though he wanted his beer back.

“Six days past, a ghoistidh.” He gave a brief, and much less atmospheric, account than he had the night before—but it was the same story.

Dougal looked thoughtful, tapping his fingers gently on his knee.

“The woman,” he said. “D’ye ken where she’s gone?”

“I … uh … heard as how she’d gone to Cranesmuir, sir.” MacLaren’s color had all come back, with interest, and he carefully avoided his wife’s hard eye.

“Cranesmuir,” Dougal repeated. “Aye, well. Perhaps I’ll seek her out, then, and just have a word. What’s her name?”

“Isbister,” MacLaren blurted. “Geillis Isbister.”

Roger didn’t actually feel the earth shake under his feet but was surprised that it hadn’t.

“Isbister?” Dougal’s brows went up. “From the northern isles, is she?”

MacLaren shrugged in elaborate pantomime of ignorance—and unconcern. He looked as though someone had made a serious attempt to boil his head, and Roger saw Dougal’s mouth twitch again.

“Aye,” he said dryly. “Well, an Orkneywoman maybe won’t be hard to find, then, in a place the size of Cranesmuir.” He lifted his chin in the direction of his men, and they all rose as one when he stood. So did Roger and Buck.

“Godspeed to ye, gentlemen,” he said, bowing to them. “I’ll have word put about regarding your wee lad. If I hear anything, where shall I send?”

Roger exchanged glances with Buck, nonplussed. He couldn’t ask for word to be sent to Lallybroch, knowing what he knew of the relations between Brian Fraser and his brothers-in-law.

“Do ye ken a place called Sheriffmuir?” he asked, groping for some other place he knew that existed at the present time. “There’s a fine coaching inn there—though not much else.”

Dougal looked surprised but nodded.

“I do, sir. I fought at Sheriffmuir with the Earl of Mar, and we supped there with him one night, my father and brother and I. Aye, I’ll send word there, if there is any.”

“Thank you.” The words came half choked but clear enough. Dougal gave him a sympathetic nod, then turned to take leave of the MacLarens. Stopped by a sudden thought, though, he turned back.

“I dinna suppose ye really are an angel, are ye?” he asked, quite seriously.

“No,” Roger said, smiling as best he could, despite the coldness in his belly. And it isn’t you that’s talking to a ghost.

He stood with Buck, watching the MacKenzies depart, Geordie and Thomas keeping up with little effort, as the horses went slowly on the steep, rocky path.

The phrase “Blessed are those who have not seen but have believed” floated through his head. It was maybe not the believing that was the blessing; it was the not having to look. Seeing, sometimes, was bloody awful.



ROGER DELAYED their own departure as long as he decently could, hoping for the return of Dr. McEwan, but as the sun rose high in the sky, it was plain that the MacLarens wanted them gone—and Buck wanted to go.

“I’m fine,” he said crossly, and thumped his chest with a fist. “Sound as a drum.”

Roger made a skeptical noise in his throat—and was surprised. It hadn’t hurt. He stopped himself putting a hand to his own throat; no need to draw attention to it, even if they were leaving.

“Aye, all right.” He turned to Angus MacLaren and Stuart, who’d helpfully filled Roger’s canteen in the hope of hurrying them on their way and was standing with it dripping in his hands. “I thank ye for your hospitality, sir, and your kindness to my kinsman.”

“Och,” said MacLaren, a distinct look of relief coming over his face at what was plainly farewell. “That’s fine. Nay bother.”

“If—if the healer should come along, would ye thank him for us? And say I’ll try to come and see him on our way back.”

“On your way back,” MacLaren repeated, with less enthusiasm.

“Aye. We’re bound into Lochaber, to the Cameron lands. If we find nay trace of my son there, though, we’ll likely come back this way—perhaps we’ll call at Castle Leoch for news.”

MacLaren’s face cleared at that.

“Och, aye,” he said heartily. “Good thought. Godspeed!”



IN WHICH THINGS CONVERGE

“NOW, IT’S NOT that I dinna want to be helping your mam,” Mr. Buchan said, for the third time. “But I canna be having ructions going on in my house, and criminals coming and goin,’ not with my girls there, now, can I?”

Jem shook his head obediently, though Mr. Buchan wasn’t looking at him; he was peering into his rearview mirror and looking over his shoulder now and then, like he thought somebody might be following them. It made Jem want to look, too, but he couldn’t see behind without getting up on his knees and turning round, and Mandy was passed out asleep, half on his lap.

It was late, and he yawned, forgetting to cover his mouth. He thought of saying, “Excuse me,” but he didn’t think Mr. Buchan had noticed. He felt a burp coming and did cover his mouth this time, tasting vinegar from the fish and chips. Mr. Buchan had bought an extra fish supper for Mam; it was in a brown-paper bag on the floor by Jem’s feet, so as not to get grease on the seat.

“Ken when your da’s expected back?” Mr. Buchan asked abruptly, glancing down at him. Jem shook his head, feeling the fish and chips rise up in a queasy ball.

Mr. Buchan’s mouth pressed tight, like he wanted to say something he thought he shouldn’t.

“Daddy …” Mandy murmured, then pushed her head into his ribs, snorted, and went back to sleep. He felt terrible. Mandy didn’t even know where Da was; she probably thought he was just at lodge or something.

Mam said Da would come back, as soon as he figured out that Jem wasn’t there with Grandda. But how? he thought, and had to bite his lip hard not to cry. How would he know? It was dark, but there was a glow from the dashboard. If he cried, Mr. Buchan would maybe see.

Headlights flashed in the rearview mirror and he looked up, brushing his sleeve furtively under his nose. He could see a white panel truck coming up behind them. Mr. Buchan said something under his breath and stepped on the gas pedal harder.



BRIANNA HAD SETTLED into the hunter’s wait: a state of physical detachment and mental abeyance, mind and body each minding its own business but able to spring into unified action the moment something worth eating showed up. Her mind was on the Ridge, reliving a possum hunt with her cousin Ian. The pungent stickiness and eye-watering smoke of pine-knot torches, a glimpse of glowing eyes in a tree, and a sudden bristling possum like a nightmare in the branches, needle-toothed and gaping threats, hissing and growling like a flatulent motorboat …

And then the phone rang. In an instant she was standing, gun in hand, every sense trained on the house. It came again, the short double brr! muffled by distance but unmistakable. It was the phone in Roger’s study, and even as she thought this, she saw the brief glow of a light inside as the study door was opened, and the ringing phone abruptly stopped.

Her scalp contracted, and she felt a brief kinship with the treed possum. But the possum hadn’t had a shotgun.

Her immediate impulse was to go and flush out whoever was in her house and demand to know the meaning of this. Her money was on Rob Cameron, and the thought of flushing him like a grouse and marching him out at the point of a gun made her hand tighten on said gun with anticipation. She had Jem back; Cameron would know she didn’t need to keep him alive.

But. She hesitated in the door of the broch, looking down.

But whoever was in the house had answered the phone. If I was a burglar, I wouldn’t be answering the phone in the house I was burgling. Not unless I thought it would wake up the people inside.

Whoever was in her house already knew no one was home.

“Quod erat demonstrandum,” her father’s voice said in her mind, with a grim satisfaction. Someone in the house was expecting a call.

She stepped outside, with a deep breath of the fresh cold scent of gorse replacing the dank musk of the broch, her heart beating fast and her mind working faster. Who would be calling him—them? To say what?

Maybe someone had been watching earlier, seen her coming down the forestry road. Maybe they were calling to tell Rob she was outside, in the broch. No, that didn’t make sense. Whoever was in the house, they’d been in there when she arrived. If someone had seen her come, they’d have called the house then.

“Ita sequitur …” she murmured. Thus it follows: if the call wasn’t about her, it must be either a warning that someone—the police, and why?—was coming toward Lallybroch—or news that whoever was on the outside had found the kids.

The metal of the barrel was slick under her sweating palm, and it took a noticeable effort to keep a firm grip on the gun. Even more of an effort not to run toward the house.

Aggravating as it was, she had to wait. If someone had found the kids, she couldn’t reach Fiona’s house in time to protect them; she’d have to depend on Fiona and Ernie and the City of Inverness police. But if that was the case, whoever was in the house would surely be coming out right away. Unless that bastard Rob means to hang around in hopes of catching me unawares, and … Despite the gun in her hand, that thought gave her an unpleasant squirm deep inside—one she recognized as the ghostly touch of Stephen Bonnet’s penis.

“I killed you, Stephen,” she said under her breath. “And I’m glad you’re dead. You may have company in hell pretty soon. Make sure the fire’s lit for him, okay?”

That restored her nerve, and dropping to her haunches, she duckwalked through the gorse, coming down the hillside at an angle that would bring her out near the kailyard, not by the path, which was visible from the house. Even in the dark, she was taking no chances; there was a rising half-moon, though it showed erratically through scudding cloud.

The sound of a car coming made her lift her head, peering over a tuft of dry broom. She put a hand in her pocket, thumbing through the loose shotgun shells. Fourteen. That should be enough.

Fiona’s remark about ballistics flitted through her mind, along with a faint reminder of the possibility of going to prison for wholesale manslaughter. She might risk it, for the satisfaction of killing Rob Cameron—but the unwelcome thought occurred to her that while she didn’t need him to locate Jem anymore, she did need to find out what the hell was going on. And while the police might track down the man from the dam, if there was some sort of gang involved, Rob was likely the only way of finding out who the others were—and what they wanted.

The headlights jounced down the lane and into the dooryard, and she stood up abruptly. The motion-detecting light had come on, showing her Ernie’s white panel truck, unmistakable, with BUCHAN ELECTRICS/FOR ALL YOUR CURRENT NEEDS, CALL 01463 775 4432 on the side, with a drawing of a severed cable, spitting sparks.

“Bloody hell,” she said. “Bloody, bloody hell!”

The truck’s door opened and Jem tumbled out, then turned round to help Mandy, who was no more than a short dark blot in the recesses of the truck.

“GET BACK IN THE TRUCK!” Brianna bellowed, leaping down the slope, skittering on rolling stones and bending her ankles in spongy patches of heather. “JEMMY! GET BACK!”

She saw Jem turn, his face white in the glare of the light, but it was too late. The front door flew open and two dark figures rushed out, running for the truck.

She wasted no more breath but ran for all she was worth. A shotgun was useless at any distance—or maybe not. She skidded to a halt, shouldered the gun, and fired. Buckshot flew into the gorse with a whizzing sound like tiny arrows, but the bang had halted the intruders in their tracks.

“BACK IN THE TRUCK!” she roared, and fired again. The intruders galloped toward the house, and Jem, bless his heart, leapt into the truck like a startled frog and slammed the door. Ernie, who had just got out, stood for a moment gawking up the slope, but then, realizing what had happened, came suddenly to life and dived for his own door.

She reloaded in the glow of the spotlight. How long would the light stay on with no one moving in its range? She racked a fresh shell and ran for Ernie’s truck. More headlights jerked her attention toward the lane. Holy Mary, Mother of God, who was this? Please, God, let it be the police …

The light winked out, then on again almost at once, as the second vehicle roared into the dooryard, moving fast. The people inside the house were hanging out of the drawing room casement, yelling something at the new truck—yes, it was another panel truck, much like Ernie’s, save that it said POULTNEY’S, PURVEYOR OF FINE GAME and had a picture of a wild boar.

“Holy Mary, Mother of God, pray for us sinners now and at the hour of our death …” She had to get to Ernie’s truck before—too late. The FINE GAME truck revved up and rammed Ernie’s truck in the side, shunting it several yards. She could hear Mandy’s scream above everything, sharp as an augur through her heart.

“Bloody Mother of … Jesus H. Roosevelt Christ!” She couldn’t take time to circle the dooryard. She ran straight across it, took close aim, and shredded the front tire of the FINE GAME truck with a blast of buckshot.

“STAY IN THE TRUCK!” she shouted, chambering the second shell and pointing the gun at the windshield in the same motion. A blur of white as at least two people ducked down out of sight below the dash.

The men—yes, both men—inside the house were yelling at each other, and at the people in the truck, and at her. Useless adjurations and insults, mostly, but one of them was now pointing out to the others that her weapon was a shotgun. Useless except at short range, and only two shots.

“You can’t cover us all, hen!”

That was Rob Cameron, shouting from the Poultney’s truck. She didn’t bother replying but ran to get in range of the house, and the drawing room window dissolved in a shower of glass.

Sweat was running down her sides, tickling. She broke the gun and thumbed two more shells into place. She felt as though she were moving in slow motion—but the rest of the world was moving slower. With no sense of hurry, she walked to Ernie’s truck and put her back against the door behind which Jem and Mandy were sheltering. A strong waft of fish and malt vinegar floated out as the window cranked down a few inches.

“Mam—”

“Mummy! Mummy!”

“Bloody hell, Brianna! What’s going on?”

“A bunch of nutters are trying to kill me and take my kids, Ernie,” she said, raising her voice over Mandy’s wailing. “What does it look like? How about you start the engine, hmm?”

The other truck was out of effective shotgun range from here, and she could see only one side of it. She heard its door open on the other side and saw a flicker of movement inside the shattered window of the house.

“Now would be a good time, Ernie.” She wasn’t forgetting that one of the bastards had her rifle. She could only hope they didn’t know how to use it.

Ernie was frantically turning the key and stomping the gas. She could hear him praying under his breath, but he’d flooded the engine; the starter whirred uselessly. Lower lip tucked under her teeth, she strode round the front of the truck in time to catch one of the people from the FINE GAME truck—to her surprise, this one was a woman, a short, dumpy shape in a balaclava and an old Barbour. She raised the shotgun to her shoulder, and the woman tried to run backward, tripped, and fell on her backside with an audible “Oof!”

She wanted to laugh but then saw Cameron climbing out of the truck, her rifle in hand, and the urge left her.

“Drop it!” She strode toward him, gun at her shoulder. He didn’t know how to use the rifle; he glanced wildly from her to the gun, as though hoping it would aim itself, then changed his mind and dropped it.

The front door of the house slammed open, and she heard running feet coming fast. She whirled on her heel and ran, too, reaching Ernie’s truck barely in time to hold off the two men from the house. One immediately began to sidle round, clearly meaning to circle the other truck and collect his idiot comrades. Rob Cameron was now advancing on her slowly, hands held up to show his non-offensive—ha—intent.

“Look, Brianna, we don’t mean ye any harm,” he said.

She racked a fresh shell in answer to that, and he took a step back.

“I mean it,” he said, an edge in his voice. “We want to talk to you, is all.”

“Aye, pull the other one,” she said, “it’s got bells on. Ernie?”

“Mam—”

“Don’t you dare open that door until I say so, Jemmy!”

“Mam!”

“Get down on the floor, Jem, right now! Take Mandy!” One of the men from the house and the dumpy woman were moving again; she could hear them. And the second man from the house had disappeared into the dark outside the circle of light. “ERNIE!”

“But, Mam, somebody’s coming!”

Everyone froze for an instant, and the sound of an engine advancing down the farm track came clearly through the night. She turned and grabbed the door handle, jerking it open just as Ernie’s engine finally coughed into full-throated life. She hurled herself into the seat, her feet narrowly missing Jem’s head as he peered up from the footwell, eyes huge in the dim light.

“Let’s go, Ernie,” she said, very calmly under the circumstance. “Kids, you stay down there.”

A rifle butt struck the window near Ernie’s head, starring the glass, and he yelped but didn’t, God bless him, flood the engine again. Another blow and the glass broke in a cascade of glittering fragments. Brianna dropped her own gun and lunged across Ernie, reaching for the rifle. She got a hand on it, but the man holding it wrenched it free. Grabbing wildly, she scrabbled at the balaclava’d shape, and the woolly helmet came off in her hand, leaving the man beneath openmouthed with shock.

The spotlight went off, plunging the yard into darkness, and bright spots danced in front of her eyes. It popped back on again as the new vehicle roared into the yard, horn blaring. Brianna lifted herself out of Ernie’s lap, trying to see out through the windshield, then flung herself toward the other side of the truck.

It was an ordinary car, a dark-blue Fiat, looking like a toy as it circled the yard, horn blatting like a sow in heat.