An echo in the bone - Gabaldon Diana (читать книги TXT) 📗

“Ah,” Hickman said shortly, seeing us. “Glad to see you’ve not departed this life yet, ma’am. Be a sad loss to your husband, such a devoted woman.” There was a sarcastic intonation to this last that made me wonder uncomfortably just how many times I’d told Ian to relay my love to Jamie and just how many people had heard me doing it, but Jamie simply ignored the comment, showing me to a seat on the captain’s unmade bed before turning to deal with the man himself.

“I’m told that the Teal is firing at us,” he observed mildly. “Does this occasion ye no concern, sir?”

“Not yet it doesn’t.” Hickman spared a negligent glance at his stern windows, half of them covered with deadlights, presumably because of broken glass; a good many of the panes were shattered. “He’s just firing in hopes of a lucky shot. We’ve got the weather gauge on him, and will likely keep it for the next couple of hours.”

“I see,” said Jamie, with a convincing attitude of knowing what this meant.

“Captain Hickman is debating in his mind whether to engage the Teal in action, Uncle,” Ian put in tactfully, “or whether to run. Having the weather gauge is a matter of maneuverability, and thus gives him somewhat more latitude in the matter than the Teal has presently, I think.”

“Heard the one about He who fights and runs away, lives to fight another day?” Hickman said, giving Ian a glare. “If I can sink him, I will. If I can shoot him on his own quarterdeck and take the ship, I’ll like that better, but I’ll settle for sending him to the bottom if I have to. But I won’t let him sink me, not today.”

“Why not today?” I asked. “Rather than any other day, I mean?”

Hickman looked surprised; he had obviously assumed I was purely ornamental.

“Because I have an important cargo to deliver, ma’am. One that I daren’t risk. Not unless I could get my hands on that rat Stebbings without taking any great chances,” he added broodingly.

“I gather that your assumption that Captain Stebbings was aboard accounts for your most determined attempt to sink the Pitt?” Jamie asked. The ceiling of the cabin was so low that he, Ian, and Hickman were all obliged to converse in a crouching position, like a convention of chimpanzees. There was really nowhere to sit other than the bed, and kneeling on the floor would of course lack the requisite dignity for a meeting of gentlemen.

“It was, sir, and I’m obliged to you for stopping me in time. Perhaps we may share a jar, when there’s more leisure, and you can tell me what happened to your back.”

“Perhaps not,” Jamie said politely. “I gather further that we are under sail. Where is the Pitt presently?”

“Adrift, about two miles off the larboard quarter. If I can deal with Stebbings,” and Hickman’s eyes fairly glowed red at the prospect, “I’ll come back and take her, too.”

“If there’s anyone left alive on board to sail her,” Ian said. “There was a fair-sized riot on her deck, when last I saw it. What might predispose ye to take on the Teal, sir?” he asked, raising his voice. “My uncle and I can give ye information regarding her guns and crew—and even if Stebbings has taken the ship, I doubt but he’ll have a job to fight her. He’s got no more than ten men of his own, and Captain Roberts and his crew will want nay part of an engagement, I’m sure.”

Jamie gave Ian a narrow look.

“Ye ken they’ve likely killed him already.”

Ian didn’t resemble Jamie at all, but the look of implacable stubbornness on his face was one I knew intimately.

“Aye, maybe. Would ye leave me behind, if ye only thought I might be dead?”

I could see Jamie open his mouth to say, “He’s a dog.” But he didn’t. He closed his eyes and sighed, obviously contemplating the prospect of instigating a sea battle—and incidentally risking all of our lives six ways from Sunday, to say nothing of the lives of the men aboard the Teal—for the sake of an aging dog, who might be already dead, if not devoured by a shark. Then he opened them and nodded.

“Aye, all right.” He straightened, as much as was possible in the cramped cabin, and turned to Hickman. “My nephew’s particular friend is aboard the Teal and likely in danger. I ken that’s no concern of yours, but it explains our own interest. As for yours… in addition to Captain Stebbings, there is a cargo aboard the Teal in which ye may have an interest, as well—six cases of rifles.”

Ian and I both gasped. Hickman straightened up abruptly, cracking his head on a timber.

“Ow! Holy Moses. You’re sure of that?”

“I am. And I imagine the Continental army might make use of them?”

I thought that was treading on dangerous ground; after all, the fact that Hickman had a strong animus toward Captain Stebbings didn’t necessarily mean he was an American patriot. From the little I’d seen of him, Captain Stebbings looked entirely capable of inspiring purely personal animus, quite separate from any political considerations.

But Hickman made no denial; in fact, he’d barely noticed Jamie’s remark, inflamed by mention of the rifles. Was it true? I wondered. But Jamie had spoken with complete certainty. I cast my mind back over the contents of the Teal’s hold, looking for anything…

“Jesus H. Roosevelt Christ,” I said. “The boxes bound for New Haven?” I barely kept myself from blurting out Hannah Arnold’s name, realizing just in time that if Hickman was indeed a patriot—for it did occur to me that he might merely be a businessman, as willing to sell to either side—he might well recognize the name and realize that these rifles were almost certainly already intended to reach the Continentals via Colonel Arnold.

Jamie nodded, watching Hickman, who was gazing at a small barometer on the wall as though it were a crystal ball. Whatever it told him seemed to be favorable, for Hickman nodded once, then dashed out of the cabin as though his breeches were on fire.

“Where’s he gone?” Ian demanded, staring after him.

“To check the wind, I imagine,” I said, proud of knowing something. “To make certain he still has the weather gauge.”

Jamie was rifling Hickman’s desk, and emerged at this point with a rather wizened apple, which he tossed into my lap. “Eat that, Sassenach. What the devil is a weather gauge?”

“Ah. Well, there you have me,” I admitted. “But it has to do with wind, and it seems to be important.” I sniffed the apple; it had plainly seen better days, but still held a faint, sweet smell that suddenly raised the ghost of my vanished appetite. I took a cautious bite and felt saliva flood my mouth. I ate it in two more bites, ravenous.

Captain Hickman’s high nasal voice came piercingly from the deck. I couldn’t hear what he said, but the response was immediate; feet thumped to and fro on deck, and the ship shifted suddenly, turning as her sails were adjusted. The chime and grunt of shot being lifted and the rumble of gun carriages echoed through the ship. Apparently, the weather gauge was still ours.

I could see a fierce excitement light Ian’s face and rejoiced to see it, but couldn’t help voicing a qualm or two.

“You haven’t any hesitation about this?” I said to Jamie. “I mean—after all, he is a dog.”

He gave me an eye and a moody shrug.

“Aye, well. I’ve known battles fought for worse reasons. And since this time yesterday, I’ve committed piracy, mutiny, and murder. I may as well add treason and make a day of it.”

“Besides, Auntie,” Ian said reprovingly, “he’s a good dog.”

WEATHER GAUGE OR NO, it took an endless time of cautious maneuvering before the ships drew within what seemed a dangerous distance of each other. The sun was no more than a handsbreadth above the horizon by now, the sails were beginning to glow a baleful red, and my chastely pristine dawn looked like ending in a wallowing sea of blood.

The Teal was cruising gently, no more than half her canvas set, less than half a mile away. Captain Hickman stood on the Asp’s deck, hands clenched on the rail as though it were Stebbings’s throat, wearing the look of a greyhound just before the rabbit is released.