Outlander [08] Written in My Own Heart's Blood

by Diana Gabaldon

  It had happened so fast, it scarcely seemed real, despite the warm-cold feel of the blood soaking into his stockings and the thick smell of it. There was a tick hanging just under the deer’s glazing eye, round as a tiny muscat grape. Would it let go at once, he wondered? Or would there be enough blood left for it to go on feeding for some time?

  The deer shuddered violently, shoving its antlers hard into his chest, bunched its legs convulsively as though about to make one final leap, and died.

  He held it for a few moments, the shredded velvet still on the antlers like rough suede under his sweating palm, the weight of the coarse-haired shoulders growing heavy on his knee.

  “Thank you,” he whispered, and let go. He remembered that it had been Mac the groom who’d told him that you always thanked a creature that gave you its life—and that it had been James Fraser, some years later, who had killed a huge wapiti in front of him and spoken what he said was a “gralloch prayer” in Gaelic before butchering the beast. But with the deer’s blood on his skin and the breeze moving in the wood around him, for once he didn’t push those memories away.

  He went to check the mare, who was fortunately close to where he’d left her, having merely moved a few yards in order to crop weeds, and who looked at him with tranquil eyes, yellow wildflowers dangling from the corners of her mouth, as though gunshots and the smell of blood were commonplace in her life. Perhaps they were, he thought, and slapped her shoulder companionably.

  Here’s for you, Ben, he thought a few minutes later, slitting the belly skin. His cousin, nearly six years older than himself, had taken him hunting now and then in the forest near Earlingden, with Viscount Almerding, a friend of Ben’s whose preserve it was.

  He’d tried not to think of his cousin too much as he’d made his preparations. The greater part of him truly believed that Ben was dead. Gaol fever, according to what Richardson had told his uncle. Not an unusual thing to happen to a prisoner, by any means. And while he was convinced—reluctantly, for it made him burn with shame to have been such a flat as to have been gulled by the man—that Richardson was probably a villain, that didn’t necessarily mean that every word from the man’s mouth was a lie. Granted, he’d found no other trace of Ben in several weeks of searching.

  But there was the small part of his heart that wouldn’t give up. And a larger part that would do anything he could to ease the grief of his uncle and father, whatever the truth might prove to be.

  “And if you bloody come down to it, what the hell else is there for me to do?” he muttered, reaching into the steaming heat of the body and groping for the heart.

  At least he’d be welcome when he walked into Middlebrook Encampment, as they called it. A man bearing fresh meat was always welcome.

  A half hour later, he’d gutted the carcass and wrapped his canvas bed sack around it to keep off flies. The horse flared her nostrils and snorted in disgust at the smell, but made no great objection when he wrestled it onto her back.

  It was late in the afternoon, but this late in the summer it would stay light for some time. Better, he thought, to make his first approach at suppertime. Chances were good that he’d be invited to sit down with someone, and conversation was much easier over food and drink.

  He’d gone up to the rocky summit in order to survey the terrain and had to admit that Washington and his engineers had chosen well. From the top of First Watchung Mountain, which he was standing on, the plains before New Brunswick lay clear below. The Continentals could easily keep a beady eye on the British army from their aerie and swoop down to interfere with their movements—and had.

  The armies were gone now, though: both of them. The British to New York, Washington’s troops to … well, wherever they might be at the moment. They weren’t here, and that was all to the good. But there were people, still, who lived near the encampment.

  Ben had been—was, he corrected himself fiercely—an officer; an infantry captain, like himself. And captured officers were often billeted upon local householders, under parole. That was the place to begin his inquiries.

  “Come on, then, lass,” he said to the mare, untying the reins from the sapling he’d wrapped them round. “Let’s go and make ourselves welcome.”

  INTO THE BRIAR PATCH

  September 16, 1778

  Philadelphia

  WE’D JUST FINISHED supper and I was wiping Henri-Christian’s face with the hem of my apron, when a knock came at the alley door. Jenny, sitting next to me with Félicité on her lap, gave me a quick glance, brows raised. Was this cause for alarm?

  I hadn’t time to shrug or shake my head; all conversation had ceased on the instant, the children’s chatter quelled as though someone had dropped a candle snuffer over them. It was first dark and the door was bolted. Fergus and Jamie exchanged looks and, without a word, both of them rose.

  Jamie stood to one side, hand on his dirk—I hadn’t realized until this moment that he wore it all the time now, even at table. I heard the shuffle of feet in the alley. There was more than one man out there, and the hair stirred on my nape. Jamie stood relaxed but watchful, weight on his back foot, ready as Fergus lifted the bar.

  “Bonsoir,” Fergus said calmly, with an interrogative lift at the end of the phrase. A face hovered pale in the dark, not close enough to recognize.

  “Bonsoir, Monsieur Fraser.” I blinked in surprise; I knew the voice, but had never heard Benedict Arnold speak French. But of course he could, I thought, recovering. He’d led more than one campaign in Quebec. It was a soldier’s French he spoke: rough but serviceable.

  “Madame Fraser est ici, monsieur?” he said. “Votre mère?”

  Fergus glanced reflexively over his shoulder at Jenny, astonished. I coughed and eased Henri-Christian off my lap, smoothing his rumpled hair.

  “I rather think the governor means me,” I said. The governor turned aside and murmured something to his aide, who nodded and retired into the shadows.

  “Mrs. Fraser,” Arnold said, sounding relieved. Fergus stood aside, and the governor came in, bowing to Marsali and Jenny, nodding to Jamie, before fixing his attention on me. “Yes, I do mean you, ma’am. I beg pardon for my untimely intrusion, sir,” he added, turning to Fergus. “I wasn’t sure where Mrs. Fraser was residing and was obliged to make inquiries.”

  I saw Jamie’s mouth tighten briefly at this galling reference to our homelessness, but he bowed courteously.

  “And I daresay the matter is urgent, sir, since ye come to make your inquiries in person?”

  “It is, rather.” The governor turned to me. “I come to beg a favor of you, ma’am, on behalf of a friend.” He looked a little better than he had the last time I’d seen him; he’d gained a bit of weight and his color was better, but the lines and smudges of strain and fatigue were still plain in his face. The eyes, though, were as alert as ever.

  “This would be a sick friend?” I asked, already glancing toward the ladder that led to the loft where we slept—and where the box holding my modest pharmacopeia was kept when I wasn’t holding regular surgery hours.

  “A matter of injury, ma’am, rather than illness,” Arnold said, and his mouth tightened involuntarily. “Severe injury.”

  “Oh? Well, then, I’d better—”

  Jamie stopped me, a hand on my arm and his eyes on Arnold.

  “A moment, Sassenach,” he said quietly. “Before I let ye go, I want to know the nature of the injury and the name of the injured man. And I also want to ken why the governor comes to ye under cover of night and hides his intent from his own aide.”

  The color rose in Arnold’s cheeks, but he nodded.

  “Fair enough, Mr. Fraser. Do you know a man called Shippen?”

  Jamie looked blank and shook his head, but Fergus chimed in.

  “I do,” he said, looking thoughtfully at Arnold. “He is a wealthy man, and a well-known Loyalist—one of those who chose not to leave the city when the British army withdrew.”

  “I know one of the Shippen girls,” I
said, with a vague memory of General Howe’s lavish leaving party in May—God, could that possibly be only three months past? “I don’t think I’ve met the father, though. Is he the injured party?”

  “No, but he is the friend on whose behalf I ask your help, ma’am.” Arnold drew a deep, unhappy breath. “Mr. Shippen’s young cousin, a man named Tench Bledsoe, was set upon last night by the Sons of Liberty. They tarred and feathered him, ma’am, and left him on the docks in front of Mr. Shippen’s warehouse. He rolled off the dock into the river and by a mercy didn’t drown, but crept up the bank and lay in the muddy shallows until a slave hunting crabs found him and ran for help.”

  “Help,” Jamie repeated carefully.

  Arnold met his eye and nodded. “Just so, Mr. Fraser,” he said bleakly. “The Shippens live within two streets of Dr. Benjamin Rush, but under the circumstances …”

  The circumstances being that Benjamin Rush was a very visible and outspoken Rebel, active in the Sons of Liberty, and would certainly be familiar with everyone in Philadelphia who held similar sentiments—very likely including the men who had attacked Tench Bledsoe.

  “Sit down, Sassenach,” Jamie said, gesturing to my stool. I didn’t, and he gave me a brief, dark look.

  “I dinna mean to stop ye going,” he said, a distinct edge in his voice. “I ken well enough that ye will. I just mean to make sure ye come back. Aye?”

  “Er … yes,” I said, and coughed. “I’ll just—go and get my things together, then.” I sidled through the clump of staring children to the ladder and went up as quickly as I could, hearing Jamie’s stern inquisition of Governor Arnold begin behind me.

  Severe burns—and the attendant difficulties of hardened tar—and very likely fever and infection already started, after a night lying in river mud. This was going to be messy—and possibly worse. There was no telling how badly the young man had been burned; if we were lucky, it might be only splashes of tar that had reached his skin. If we weren’t lucky …

  I set my jaw and began packing. Linen bandages, a scalpel and small paring knife for debridement … leeches? Perhaps; there would certainly be bruising involved—no one submitted meekly to being tarred and feathered. I tied a hasty bandage around the leech jar to keep the lid from coming off in transit. Definitely a jar of honey … I held it up to the flicker of light from below: half full, a clouded gold that caught the light through brown glass like candle glow. Fergus kept a tin of turpentine in the shed for cleaning type; I should borrow that, as well.

  I didn’t worry overmuch about the political delicacies that had made Arnold come to me so surreptitiously. Jamie would take what precautions were possible, I knew. Philadelphia lay in Rebel hands, but it was by no means a safe place—for anyone.

  Not for the first time—or the last, I was sure—I was glad that at least my own path lay clear before me. The door below opened and closed with a thump; the governor was gone.

  I LOOKED AT the rather grubby sedan chair, inhaled the scent of several dozen previous users, and took a firmer grip on my cane.

  “I can walk,” I said. “It’s not that far.”

  “Ye’re not walking,” Jamie replied equably.

  “Surely you don’t intend to stop me?”

  “Aye, I do,” he said, still mildly. “I canna stop ye going—and I wouldna try—but I can, by God, make sure ye dinna fall on your face in the street on your way. Get in, Sassenach. Go slow,” he added to the chairmen, as he opened the door of the sedan and gestured to me. “I’m coming, and I dinna want to gallop so soon after supper.”

  There being no reasonable alternative, I gathered the remnants of my dignity and got in. And with my basket of supplies settled at my feet and the window slid open as far as it would go—the memories of my last claustrophobic ride in a sedan chair were as vivid as the smell of this one—we set off at a stately jog through the quiet nighttime streets of Philadelphia.

  The curfew had been eased of late, owing to protests from tavern owners—and, likely, their patrons—but the overall sense of the city was still edgy, and there were no respectable women on the street, no gangs of rowdy apprentices, or any of the slaves who worked for their masters but lived on their own. I saw one whore, standing by the mouth of an alley; she whistled at Jamie and called out an invitation, but halfheartedly.

  “Her pimp’ll be a-hiding … in the alley with a cosh … lay you three to one,” the chairman behind me remarked, his remarks punctuated by his breathing. “Ain’t as safe … as when the army was here.”

  “Think not?” His partner grunted, then found breath to reply. “Army was here … when that officer got his … throat cut in a whorehouse. Reckon ’s why that … drab’s out here in her shift.” He gulped air and went on. “How you mean … to settle the bet, then? Go with her yourself?”

  “May be as this gentleman’d do us the service,” the other said with a brief, gasping laugh.

  “It may be that he won’t,” I said, sticking my head out the window. “But I’ll go and look, if you like.”

  Jamie and the forward man laughed, the other grunted, and we jolted gently round the corner and down the street to where the Shippen house stood, gracious in its own grounds, on a small rise near the edge of town. There was a lighted lantern by the gate, another by the door. I wondered whether that meant we were expected; I hadn’t thought to ask Governor Arnold if he had sent word ahead of us. If he hadn’t, the next few minutes might be interesting.

  “Any notion how long we might be, Sassenach?” Jamie inquired, taking out his purse to pay the chairmen.

  “If he’s already dead, it won’t take long,” I replied, shaking my skirts into order. “If he’s not, it could well take all night.”

  “Aye. Wait a bit, then,” Jamie told the chairmen, who were staring at me, mouths agape. “If I havena come out in ten minutes, ye’re free to go.”

  Such was his force of personality, they didn’t observe that they were quite free to go at once if they wanted, and merely nodded meekly as he took my arm and escorted me up the steps.

  We were expected; the door swung wide as Jamie’s boots scuffed the scrubbed stone of the stoop, and a young woman peered out, alarm and interest showing in equal measure on her face. Evidently Mr. Bledsoe wasn’t dead, then.

  “Mrs. Fraser?” She blinked slightly, looking at me sideways. “Er … I mean … it is Mrs. Fraser? Governor Arnold said—”

  “It is Mrs. Fraser,” Jamie said, a slight edge in his voice. “And I assure ye, young woman, I’m in a position to know.”

  “This would be Mr. Fraser,” I informed the young lady, who was looking up at him, clearly bewildered. “I was probably Lady John Grey last time you saw me,” I added, trying for a nonchalant matter-of-factness. “But, yes, I’m Claire Fraser. Er … still. I mean—again. I understand that your cousin …?”

  “Oh, yes! Please—come this way.” She stepped back, gesturing toward the rear of the house, and I saw that she was accompanied by a servant, a middle-aged black man, who bowed when I met his gaze and then led the way through a long hallway to the back stair and thence upward.

  On the way, our hostess introduced herself belatedly as Margaret Shippen and apologized prettily for the absence of her parents. Her father—she said—was called away on business.

  I hadn’t been formally introduced to Peggy Shippen before, but I had seen her and knew a bit about her; she’d been one of the organizing lights of the Mischianza, and while her father had prevented her actually attending the ball, all her friends had talked about her at length—and I’d glimpsed her, lavishly dressed, once or twice at other functions I’d attended with John.

  Called away on business, was it? I caught Jamie’s eye when she’d said that, and he’d raised one shoulder in the briefest of shrugs. More than likely, Edward Shippen wanted to avoid any public linkage with his nephew’s misfortune—and, so far as possible, keep talk about the incident to a minimum. It wasn’t a safe time or place to make a point of Loyalist leanings in the fam
ily.

  Miss Shippen led us to a small bedroom on the third floor, where a blackened, man-shaped object lay on the bed. The smell of tar was thick in the air, along with a distinct smell of blood and a sort of constant low moaning noise. This must be Tench Bledsoe—and wherever had he got a name like that? I wondered, gingerly approaching him. So far as I knew, a tench was a rather undistinguished-looking sort of carp.

  “Mr. Bledsoe?” I said quietly, setting down my basket on a small table. There was a candlestick on the table, and by the light of the single flame, I could make out his face—or half of it. The other half was obscured by tar, as was a good bit of his head and neck. The clean half was that of a somewhat plain young man with a large, beaky nose, his features contorted in agony, but not at all fish-looking.

  “Yes,” he gasped, and pressed his lips tight together, as though even the escape of a single word jeopardized the tenuous grip he had on himself.

  “I’m Mrs. Fraser,” I said, and laid a hand on his shoulder. A fine shudder was running through him like current through a wire. “I’ve come to help.”

  He heard me and nodded jerkily. They’d given him brandy; I could smell it under the aromatic reek of pine tar, and a half-full decanter stood on the table.

  “Have you any laudanum in the house?” I asked, turning to Peggy. It wouldn’t help that much in the long run, but a large dose might get us through the worst of the preliminaries.

  She was quite young—no more than eighteen, I thought—but alert and self-possessed, as well as very pretty. She nodded and disappeared, with a murmured word to the servant. Of course, I thought, seeing her skirts whisk out of sight. She couldn’t send him for it. The laudanum would be with the other household simples, in a closet under lock and key.

  “What can I do, Sassenach?” Jamie said softly, as though afraid to break the injured man’s concentration on his pain.

  “Help me undress him.” Whoever had attacked him hadn’t stripped him; that was lucky. And most of the tar probably hadn’t been boiling hot when it was applied; I smelled burnt hair, but not the sickening stench of cooked flesh. Pine tar wasn’t like the asphalt road tar of later centuries; it was a byproduct of turpentine distillation, and might be soft enough to be daubed without needing to be boiled first.