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

Автор книги: Diana Gabaldon

Соавторы: Diana Gabaldon
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Pregnant, she said, by a Jacobite Highlander from 1743 named James Fraser. I won’t go into all that was said between us; it was a long time ago and it doesn’t matter—save for the fact that IF your mother was telling the truth, and did indeed travel back in time, then you may have the ability to do it, too. I hope you don’t. But if you should—Lord, I can’t believe I’m writing this in all seriousness. But I look at you, darling, with the sun on your ruddy hair, and I see him. I can’t deny that.

Well. It took a long time. A very long time. But your mother never changed her story, and though we didn’t speak about it after a while, it became obvious that she wasn’t mentally deranged (which I had rather naturally assumed to be the case, initially). And I began … to look for him.

Now I must digress for a moment; forgive me. I think you won’t have heard of the Brahan Seer. Colorful as he was—if, in fact, he existed—he’s not really known much beyond those circles with a taste for the more outlandish aspects of Scottish history. Reggie, though, is a man of immense curiosity, as well as immense learning, and was fascinated by the Seer—one Kenneth MacKenzie, who lived in the seventeenth century (maybe), and who made a great number of prophecies about this and that, sometimes at the behest of the Earl of Seaforth.

Naturally, the only prophecies mentioned in connection with this man are the ones that appeared to come true: he predicted, for instance, that when there were five bridges over the River Ness, the world would fall into chaos. In August 1939 the fifth bridge over the Ness was opened, and in September, Hitler invaded Poland. Quite enough chaos for anyone.

The Seer came to a sticky end, as prophets often do (do please remember that, darling, will you?), burnt to death in a spiked barrel of tar at the instigation of Lady Seaforth—to whom he had unwisely prophesied that her husband was having affairs with various ladies while away in Paris. (That one was likely true, in my opinion.)

Amongst his lesser-known prophecies, though, was one called the Fraser Prophecy. There isn’t a great deal known about this, and what there is is rambling and vague, as prophecies usually are, the Old Testament notwithstanding. The only relevant bit, I think, is this: “The last of Lovat’s line will rule Scotland.”

Pause if you will, now, dear, and look at the paper I am enclosing with this letter.

Fumbling and clumsy with shock, she dropped the sheets altogether and had to retrieve them from the floor. It was easy to tell which paper he meant; the paper was flimsier, a photocopy of a handwritten chart—some sort of family tree—the writing not her father’s.

Yes. Well. This bit of disturbing information came into my hands from Reggie, who’d had it from the wife of a fellow named Stuart Lachlan. Lachlan had died suddenly, and as his widow was clearing out his desk, she found this and decided to pass it on to Reggie, knowing that he and Lachlan had shared an interest in history and in the Lovat family, they being local to Inverness; the clan seat is in Beauly. Reggie, of course, recognized the names.

You likely know nothing about the Scottish aristocracy, but I knew Simon Lovat, Lord Lovat that is, in the war—he was Commandos, then Special Forces. We weren’t close friends but knew each other casually, in the way of business, you might say.

“Whose business?” she said aloud, suspicious. “His, or yours?” She could just see her father’s face, with the hidden smile in the corner of his mouth, keeping something back but letting you know it was there.

The Frasers of Lovat have a fairly straightforward line of descent, until we come to Old Simon—well, they’re all called Simon—the one they call the Old Fox, who was executed for treason after the Jacobite Rebellion—the ’45, they call it. (There’s quite a bit about him in my book on the Jacobites; don’t know if you’ll ever read that, but it’s there, should you feel curious.)

“Should I feel curious,” she muttered. “Ha.” Brianna sensed a definite, if muted, note of accusation there and pressed her lips together, as much annoyed at herself for not having read her father’s books yet as at him for mentioning it.

Simon was one of the more colorful Frasers, in assorted ways. He had three wives but was not famous for fidelity. He did have a few legitimate children, and God knows how many illegitimate ones (though two illegitimate sons were acknowledged), but his heir was Young Simon, known as the Young Fox. Young Simon survived the Rising, though attainted and stripped of his property. He eventually got most of it back through the courts, but the struggle took him most of a long life, and while he married, he did so at a very advanced age and had no children. His younger brother, Archibald, inherited, but then died childless, as well.

So Archibald was the “last of Lovat’s line”—there’s a direct line of descent between him and the Fraser of Lovat who would have been concurrent with the Brahan Seer—but clearly he wasn’t the Scottish ruler foreseen.

You see the chart, though. Whoever made it has listed the two illegitimate sons, as well as Young Simon and his brother. Alexander and Brian, born to different mothers. Alexander entered the priesthood and became the abbot of a monastery in France. No known children. But Brian—

She tasted bile and thought she might throw up. But Brian—She closed her eyes in reflex, but it didn’t matter. The chart was burned on the inside of her eyelids.



She stood up, pushing back the chair with a screak, and lurched out into the hallway, heart thundering in her ears. Swallowing repeatedly, she went to the lobby and got the shotgun from its place behind the coat rack. She felt a little better with it in hand.

“It isn’t right.” She hadn’t realized that she’d spoken aloud; her own voice startled her. “It’s not right,” she repeated, in a low, fierce voice. “They left people out. What about Aunt Jenny? She had six kids! What about them?”

She was stomping down the hallway, gun in hand, swinging the barrel from side to side as though she expected Rob Cameron—or somebody, and the thought made her shudder—to jump out of the parlor or the kitchen or come sliding down the banister. That thought made her look up the stairs—she’d left all the lights on when she came down from tucking in the kids—but the landing was empty and no noise came from above.

A little calmer, she searched the ground floor carefully, testing every door and window. And the priest’s hole, whose empty blackness gaped mockingly up at her.

Jem and Mandy were all right. She knew they were. But she still went upstairs, soft-footed, and stood by their beds for a long time, watching the pale glow of the Snow White night-light on their faces.

The longcase clock in the hall below struck the hour, and then a single bong! She drew a deep breath and went down to finish reading her father’s letter.

The current line of Fraser of Lovat is descended from a collateral branch; presumably the Fraser Prophecy isn’t referring to one of them—though there are plenty of heirs in that line.

I don’t know who drew this chart, but I do intend to find out. This letter is in case I don’t. In case of a number of things.

One of those things being the possibility that your mother’s story is true—I still have difficulty believing it, when I wake in the morning beside her and everything is so normal. But late at night, when I’m alone with the documents … Well, why not admit it? I found the record of their marriage. James Alexander Malcolm MacKenzie Fraser and Claire Elizabeth Beauchamp. I’m not sure whether to be grateful or outraged that she didn’t marry him using my name.

Forgive me, I’m rambling. It’s hard to keep emotion out of it, but I’ll try. The essence of what I’m saying is this: if you can indeed go back in time (and possibly return), you are a person of very great interest to a number of people, for assorted reasons. Should anyone in the more shadowed realm of government be halfway convinced that you are what you may be, you would be watched. Possibly approached. (In earlier centuries, the British government pressed men into service. They still do, if less obviously.)

That’s a very remote contingency, but it is a real one; I must mention it.

There are private parties who would also have a deep interest in you for this reason—and evidently there is someone who has spotted you and is watching. The chart showing your line of descent, with dates, indicates that much. It also suggests that this person’s or persons’ interest may be a concern with the Fraser Prophecy. What could be more intriguing to that sort of person than the prospect of someone who is “the last of Lovat’s line” and is also a time traveler? These sorts of people—I know them well—invariably believe in mystic powers of all sorts—nothing would draw them more powerfully than the conviction that you hold such power.

Such people are usually harmless. But they can be very dangerous indeed.

If I find whoever drew this chart, I will question them and do my best to neutralize any possible threat to you. But as I say—I know the look of a conspiracy. Nutters of this sort thrive in company. I might miss one.

“Neutralize them,” she murmured, the chill in her hands spreading through her arms and chest, crystallizing around her heart. She had no doubt at all what he’d meant by that, the bland matter-of-factness of the term notwithstanding. And had he found him—them?

Don’t—I repeat, don’t—go anywhere near the Service or anyone connected with it. At best, they’d think you insane. But if you are indeed what you may be, the last people who should ever know it are the funny buggers, as we used to be known during the war.

And if worse should come to worst—and you can do it—then the past may be your best avenue of escape. I have no idea how it works; neither does your mother, or at least she says so. I hope I may have given you a few tools to help, if that should be necessary.

And … there’s him. Your mother said that Fraser sent her back to me, knowing that I would protect her—and you. She thought that he died immediately afterward. He did not. I looked for him, and I found him. And, like him, perhaps I send you back, knowing—as he knew of me—that he will protect you with his life.

I will love you forever, Brianna. And I know whose child you truly are.

With all my love,

Dad



APPARITION

THE LOCHABER DISTRICT, according to the North of Scotland Hydro Electric Board (as interpreted by Brianna), is a “high glaciated landscape.”

“That means it goes up and down a lot,” Roger explained to Buck, as they fought their way through what he thought was part of the Locheil Forest, looking for the edge of Loch Lochy.

“Ye don’t say?” Buck glanced bleakly over his shoulder at the distant hump of Ben Nevis, then back at Roger. “I’d not noticed.”

“Cheer up, it’s all downhill for a bit now. And the midgies are all dead wi’ the cold. Count your blessings.” Roger felt unaccountably cheerful this morning—perhaps only because the walking was downhill, after a strenuous week of combing the Cameron clan lands, a bewildering network of corries, tarns, moraines, and Munros, those deceptive summits with their gently rounded tops and their unspeakable slopes. Thank God no one lived on top of them.

Perhaps also because, while they hadn’t found Jem or any trace of him, it was progress, of a sort. The Camerons on the whole had been hospitable, after the initial surprise, and they’d had the luck to find a tacksman of Lochiel, the clan chieftain, who’d sent a man to Tor Castle for them. Word had come back a day later: no word of a stranger matching Rob Cameron’s description—though, in fact, Rob looked like half the people Roger had met in the last few days—or Jem’s, he being a lot more noticeable.

They’d worked their way back along the shores of Loch Arkaig—the fastest way for someone to travel from the Great Glen, if heading for the ocean. But no word of a boat stolen or hired, and Roger began to feel that Cameron had not, after all, sought refuge or help among his ancient clan—a relief, on the whole.

“Blessings, is it?” Buck rubbed a hand over his face. Neither of them had shaved in a week, and he looked as red-eyed and grubby as Roger felt. He scratched his jaw consideringly. “Aye, well. A fox took a shit next to me last night, but I didna step in it this morning. I suppose that’ll do, for a start.”

The next day and night dampened Roger’s mood of optimism somewhat: it rained incessantly, and they spent the night under heaps of half-dry bracken on the edge of a black tarn, emerging at dawn chilled and frowsty, to the shrieks of plovers and killdeer.

He hesitated momentarily as they rode past the place where they might turn toward Cranesmuir; he wanted badly to talk again with Dr. McEwan. His hand found his throat, thumb stroking the scar. “Maybe,” the healer had said. “Just maybe.” But McEwan couldn’t aid them in looking for Jem; that visit would have to wait.

Still, he felt his heart rise as they came over the pass and saw Lallybroch below. It was bittersweet, coming home to a home that was not his and might never be again. But it promised refuge and succor, if only temporarily—and it promised hope, at least in these last few minutes before they reached the door.

“Och, it’s you!” It was Jenny Fraser who opened the door, her look of wariness changing to one of pleased welcome. Roger heard Buck behind him making a small humming noise of approval at sight of her, and, despite his determination not to hope too much, Roger felt his own spirits rise.

“And this will be your kinsman?” She curtsied to Buck. “Welcome to ye, sir. Come ben; I’ll call Taggie to mind the horses.” She turned in a flicker of white apron and petticoats, beckoning them to follow. “Da’s in the speak-a-word,” she called over her shoulder as she headed for the kitchen. “He’s something for you!”

“Mr. MacKenzie and … this would be also Mr. MacKenzie, aye?” Brian Fraser came out of the study, smiling, and offered Buck his hand. Roger could see him looking Buck over with close attention, a slight frown between his dark brows. Not disapproval—puzzlement, as though he knew Buck from somewhere and was trying to think where.

Roger knew exactly where and felt again that peculiar quiver he’d felt on meeting Dougal MacKenzie. The resemblance between father and son was by no means instantly striking—their coloring was very different, and Roger thought most of Buck’s features came from his mother—but there was a fugitive similarity, nonetheless, something in their manner. Men cocksure of their charm—and no less charming for knowing it.

Buck was smiling, making commonplace courtesies, complimenting the house and its estate… . The puzzlement faded from Brian’s eyes, and he invited them to sit, calling down the hall to the kitchen for someone to bring them a bite and a dram.

“Well, then,” Brian said, pulling out the chair from behind his desk in order to sit with them. “As ye havena got the lad with ye, I see he’s not found yet. Have ye heard any news of him, though?” He looked from Buck to Roger, worried but hopeful.

“No,” Roger said, and cleared his throat. “Not a word. But—your daughter said that you … might have heard something?”

Fraser’s face changed at once, lighting a little.

“Well, it’s nay so much heard anything, but …” He rose and went to rummage in the desk, still talking.

“A captain from the garrison came by here twa, three days ago, wi’ a small party of soldiers. The new man in charge—what was his name, Jenny?” For Jenny had come in with a tray, this holding a teapot, cups, a small bottle of whisky, and a plate of cake. The smell made Roger’s stomach rumble.

“Who? Oh, the new redcoat captain? Randall, he said. Jonathan Randall.” Her color rose a little, and her father smiled to see it. Roger felt the smile freeze on his own face.

“Aye, he took to you, lass. Wouldna be surprised if he came back one of these days.”

“Precious little good it will do him if he does,” Jenny snapped. “Have ye lost that thing, an athair?”

“No, no, I’m sure I put …” Brian’s voice trailed off as he scrabbled in the drawer. “Oh. Erm, aye.” He coughed, hand in the drawer, and, through his shock, Roger realized what the trouble was. The desk had a secret compartment. Evidently Brian had put the “thing,” whatever it was, in the hiding place and was now wondering how to get it out again without revealing the secret to his visitors.

Roger rose to his feet.

“Will ye pardon me, mistress?” he asked, bowing to Jenny. “I’d forgot something in my saddlebag. Come with me, aye?” he added to Buck. “It’s maybe in with your things.”

Jenny looked surprised but nodded, and Roger blundered out, Buck making little grunts of annoyance at his heels.

“What the devil’s wrong wi’ you?” Buck said, the minute they were out the door. “Ye went white as a sheet in there, and ye still look like a fish that’s been dead a week.”

“I feel like one,” Roger said tersely. “I know Captain Randall—or, rather, I know a lot of things about him. Leave it that he’s the last person I’d want to have any knowledge of Jem.”

“Oh.” Buck’s face went blank, then firmed. “Aye, well. We’ll see what it is he brought, and then we’ll go and have it out with him if we think he might have the lad.”

What it is he brought. Roger fought back all the horrible things that phrase conjured—Jem’s ear, a finger, a lock of his hair—because if it had been anything like that, surely the Frasers wouldn’t be calm about it. But if Randall had brought some hideous token in a box?

“Why, though?” Buck was frowning, plainly trying to read Roger’s expression, which, judging from Buck’s own, must be appalling. “Why would this man mean you and the lad ill? He’s never met ye, has he?”

“That,” Roger said, choking down his feelings, “is an excellent question. But the man is a—do you know what a sadist is?”

“No, but it’s plainly something ye dinna want close to your wean. Here, sir! We’ll be taking those in, thank ye kindly.” They’d come right round the house by now, and McTaggart the hired man was coming down the path from the stable, their saddlebags in either hand.

McTaggart looked surprised but surrendered the heavy bags gladly and went back to his work.

“I ken ye just wanted to get us out of there so to give your man a bit of privacy to work the secret drawer,” Buck remarked. “And he kens that fine. Do we need to take in something, though?”

“How do you know about—” Buck grinned at him, and Roger dismissed the question with an irritable gesture. “Yes. We’ll give Miss Fraser the cheese I bought yesterday.”

“Ah, Mrs. Jenny.” Buck made the humming noise again. “I wouldna blame Captain Randall. That skin! And those bubs, come to that—”

“Shut up right this minute!”

Buck did, shocked out of his jocularity.

“What?” he said, in quite a different tone. “What is it?”

Roger unclenched his fist, with an effort.

“It’s a bloody long story; I haven’t time to tell it to ye now. But it’s—something I know from the other end. From my time. In a year or so, Randall’s coming back here. And he’s going to do something terrible. And, God help me, I don’t think I can stop it.”

“Something terrible,” Buck repeated slowly. His eyes were boring into Roger’s own, dark as serpentine. “To that bonnie wee lass? And ye think ye can’t stop it? Why, man, how can ye—”

“Just shut up,” Roger repeated doggedly. “We’ll talk about it later, aye?”

Buck puffed out his cheeks, still staring at Roger, then blew out his breath with a sound of disgust and shook his head, but he picked up his saddlebag and followed without further argument.

The cheese—a thing the size of Roger’s outstretched hand, wrapped in fading leaves—was received with pleasure and taken off to the kitchen, leaving Roger and Buck alone once more with Brian Fraser. Fraser had regained his own composure and, picking up a tiny cloth-wrapped parcel from his desk, put it gently in Roger’s hand.

Too light to be a finger …

“Captain Randall said that Captain Buncombe sent word out wi’ all the patrols, and one of them came across this wee bawbee and sent it back to Fort William. None of them ever saw such a thing before, but because of the name, they were thinking it might have to do wi’ your lad.”

“The name?” Roger untied the cord and the cloth fell open. For an instant, he didn’t know what the hell he was seeing. He picked it up; it was light as a feather, dangling from his fingers.

Two disks, made of something like pressed cardboard, threaded onto a bit of light woven cord. One round, colored red—the other was green and octagonal.

“Oh, Jesus,” he said. “Oh, Christ Jesus.”

J. W. MacKenzie was printed on both disks, along with a number and two letters. He turned the red disk gently over with a shaking fingertip and read what he already knew was stamped there.

RAF

He was holding the dog tags of a Royal Air Force flier. Circa World War II.



AMPHISBAENA

“YE CANNA BE SURE those things name your father.” Buck nodded at the dog tags, their cord still wrapped round Roger’s hand, the tiny disks themselves folded tight in his palm. “How many MacKenzies are there, for God’s sake?”

“Lots.” Roger sat down on a big lichen-covered boulder. They were at the top of the hill that rose behind Lallybroch; the broch itself stood on the slope just below them, its conical roof a broad black whorl of slates. “But not so bloody many who flew for the Royal Air Force in World War Two. And even fewer who disappeared without a trace. As for those who might be time travelers …”

Roger couldn’t remember what he’d said when he saw the dog tags or what Brian Fraser had said to him. When he’d started to notice things again, he was sitting in Brian’s big wheel-backed chair with a stoneware mug of hot tea cupped between his hands and the entire household crammed into the doorway, regarding him with looks ranging from compassion to curiosity. Buck was squatting in front of him, frowning in what might have been concern or simply curiosity.

“Sorry,” Roger had said, cleared his throat, and set the tea undrunk on the desk. His hands throbbed from the heat of the cup. “Rather a shock. I—thank you.”

“Is it something to do wi’ your wee boy, then?” Jenny Fraser had asked, deep-blue eyes dark with concern.

“I think so, yes.” He’d got his wits back now and rose stiffly, nodding to Brian. “Thank ye, sir. I canna thank ye enough for all ye’ve done for me—for us. I … need to think a bit what’s to do now. If ye’ll excuse me, Mistress Fraser?”

Jenny nodded, not taking her eyes from his face but shooing the maids and the cook away from the door so he could pass through it. Buck had followed him, murmuring reassuring things to the multitude, and come along with him, not speaking until they reached the solitude of the craggy hilltop. Where Roger had explained just what the dog tags were and to whom they had belonged.

“Why two?” Buck asked, reaching out a tentative finger to touch the tags. “And why are they different colors?”

“Two in case one was destroyed by whatever killed you,” Roger said, taking a deep breath. “The colors—they’re made of pressed cardboard treated with different chemicals—substances, I mean. One resists water and the other resists fire, but I couldn’t tell ye which is which.”

Speaking of technicalities made it just barely possible to speak. Buck, with unaccustomed delicacy, was waiting for Roger to bring up the unspeakable.

How did the tags turn up here? And when—and under what circumstances—had they become detached from J(eremiah) W(alter)MacKenzie, Roman Catholic, serial number 448397651, RAF?

“Claire—my motherin-law—I told ye about her, did I not?”

“A bit, aye. A seer, was she?”

Roger laughed shortly. “Aye, like I am. Like you are. Easy to be a seer if what you see has already happened.”

What’s already happened …

“Oh, God,” he said out loud, and curled over, pressing the fist that held the dog tags hard against his forehead.

“All right, there?” Buck asked after a moment. Roger straightened up with a deep breath.

“Know the expression ‘damned if ye do, damned if ye don’t’?”

“No, though I wouldna think it was one a minister would use.” Buck’s mouth twitched into a half smile. “Are ye not dedicated to the notion that there’s always one sure way out o’ damnation?”

“A minister. Aye.” Roger breathed deep again. There was a lot of oxygen on a Scottish hilltop, but somehow there didn’t seem quite enough just this minute. “I’m not sure that religion was constructed with time travelers in mind.”

Buck’s brows rose at that.

“Constructed?” he echoed, surprised. “Who builds God?”

That actually made Roger laugh, which made him feel a little better, if only momentarily.

“We all do,” he said dryly. “If God makes man in His image, we all return the favor.”

“Mmphm.” Buck thought that one over, then nodded slowly. “Wouldna just say ye’re wrong about that. But God’s there, nonetheless, whether we ken quite what He is or not. Isn’t He?”

“Yeah.” Roger wiped his knuckles under his nose, which had begun to run with the cold wind. “Ever hear of Saint Teresa of Avila?”

“No.” Buck gave him a look. “Nor have I heard of a Protestant minister who has to do wi’ saints.”

“I take advice where I can get it. But St. Teresa once remarked to God, ‘If this is how you treat your friends, no wonder you have so few of them.’ God’s got his own ways.”

Buck smiled; it was one of his rare, unwary smiles, and it heartened Roger enough to try to come to grips with the situation.

“Well, Claire—my motherin-law—she told Brianna and me a good bit. About the things that happened when she went through the stones in 1743, and about things that had happened before that. Things about Captain Randall.” And in sentences as brief and unemotional as he could make them, he told the story: Randall’s raid on Lallybroch while Brian Fraser was away, his attack on Jenny Murray, and how Jamie Fraser—newly returned from Paris and wondering what to do with his life—had fought for his home and his sister’s honor, been arrested and taken to Fort William, where he had been flogged nearly to death.

“Twice,” Roger said, pausing for air. He swallowed. “The second time … Brian was there. He thought Jamie was dead, and he had a stroke—an apoplexy—on the spot. He … died.” He swallowed again. “Will die.”

“Jesus, Mary, and Bride.” Buck crossed himself. His face had gone pale. “Your man in the house? He’ll be dead in a year or two?”

“Yes.” Roger looked down at Lallybroch, pale and peaceful as the sheep that browsed its pastures. “And … there’s more. What happened later, just before the Rising.”

Buck raised a hand.

“I say that’s more than enough. I say we go down to Fort William and do for the wicked bugger now. Preemptive action, ye might say. That’s a legal term,” he explained, with an air of kindly condescension.

“An appealing notion,” Roger said dryly. “But if we did—what would happen four years from now?”

Buck frowned, not comprehending.

“When Claire came through the stones in 1743, she met—will meet—Jamie Fraser, an outlaw with a price on his head, coming home from France. But if what happened with Captain Randall doesn’t happen—Jamie won’t be there. And if he isn’t … ?”

“Oh.” The frown grew deeper, comprehension dawning. “Oh, aye. I see. No Jamie, no Brianna …”

“No Jem or Mandy,” Roger finished. “Exactly.”

“Oh, God.” Buck bent his head and massaged the flesh between his brows with two fingers. “Damned if ye do, damned if ye don’t, did ye say? Enough to make your head spin like a top.”

“Yes, it is. But I have to do something, nonetheless.” He rubbed a thumb gently over the dog tags’ surfaces. “I’m going down to Fort William to talk to Captain Randall. I have to know where these came from.”



BUCK LOOKED squiggle-eyed at the tags, lips pressed together, then switched the look to Roger.

“D’ye think your lad’s with your father, somehow?”

“No.” That particular thought hadn’t occurred to Roger, and it shook him for a moment. He shrugged it away, though.

“No,” he repeated more firmly. “I’m beginning to think that maybe … maybe Jem’s not here at all.” The statement hung there in the air, revolving slowly. He glanced at Buck, who seemed to be glowering at it.

“Why not?” his kinsman asked abruptly.

“A, because we’ve found no hint of him. And B, because now there’s these.” He raised the tags, the light cardboard disks lifting in the breeze.

“Ye sound like your wife,” Buck said, half amused. “She does that, aye? Layin’ things out, A, B, C, and all.”

“That’s how Brianna’s mind works,” Roger said, feeling a brief surge of affection for her. “She’s very logical.”

And if I’m right, and Jem’s not here—where is he? Has he gone to another time—or did he not travel at all? As though the word “logical” had triggered it, a whole array of horrifying possibilities opened out before him.

“What I’m thinking—we were both concentrating on the name ‘Jeremiah’ when we came through, aye?”

“Aye, we were.”

“Well …” He twirled the cord between his fingers, making the disks spin slowly. “What if we got the wrong Jeremiah? That was my father’s name, too. And—and if Rob Cameron didn’t take Jem through the stones—”

“Why would he not?” Buck interrupted sharply. He transferred the glower to Roger. “His truck was there at Craigh na Dun. He wasn’t.”

“Plainly he wanted us to think he’d gone through. As to why—” He choked on the thought. Before he could clear his throat, Buck finished it for him.

“To get us away, so he’d have your missus to himself.” His face darkened with anger—part of it aimed at Roger. “I told her yon man had a hot eye for her.”

“Maybe he does,” he said shortly. “But think, aye? Beyond whatever he may have had in mind with regard to Brianna—” The mere words conjured up pictures that made the blood shoot up into his head. “Whatever he had in mind,” he repeated, as calmly as he could, “he likely also wanted to see whether it was true. About the stones. About whether we—or anyone—really could go through. Seeing’s believing, after all.”

Buck blew out his cheeks, considering.

“Ye think he was there, maybe? Watching to see if we disappeared?”