“I’m sure ye won’t,” he said gravely. In fact, the little girls had a wiry strength that belied their fragile appearance, and he found their presence an actual help, as they provided something for him to hold on to for balance when it was necessary to stop—as it was every few feet.

“Tell me about the wagons that go into Philadelphia,” he said at one such stop, as much to make conversation as because he required the information. “Do they come only in the early morning?”

“Mostly,” Patience said. “They go back empty an hour or two before sunset.” She set her feet wider, bracing herself. “It’s all right,” she assured him. “Lean on me. Thee seems summat shaky.”

He squeezed her shoulder gently in thanks and let her take a very little of his weight. Shaky, indeed. It was more than half a mile to the main road; it would take over an hour to totter that far, even with the girls’ assistance, and the likelihood of his back freezing again and stranding him midway was yet too high to risk it. To say nothing of the risk of arriving in Philadelphia completely unable to move. By tomorrow, though …

“And did ye see soldiers on the road?” he asked, essaying a ginger step that shot pain from hip to foot. “Ow!”

“We did,” Patience said, taking a tighter grip on his elbow. “Courage, Friend. Thee will prevail. We saw two companies of militia, and one Continental officer on a mule.”

“We saw some British solders, too, though,” Prudence put in, eager not to be overlooked. “They were with a train of carts, going in the other direction.”

“The other—away from Philadelphia?” Jamie asked, his heart jumping. Was the evacuation of the British army already begun? “Could you see what was in the carts?”

Prudence shrugged. “Furniture. Trunks and baskets. There were ladies riding atop some of the carts, though mostly they walked alongside. No room,” she clarified. “Guard thy shirttail, Friend, or thy modesty will be at risk.” The morning was cool and breezy, and an errant gust of wind had risen up, bellying his shirt—wonderful on his sweating body, but definitely a risk to maiden eyes.

“Shall I knot the tails between thy legs?” Patience inquired. “I can tie a granny knot, an overhand knot, or a square knot. My daddy taught me!”

“Don’t be silly, Patience,” her sister said crossly. “If thee knots his shirt, how will he lift it to shit? No one can untie her knots,” she confided to Jamie. “She always makes them too tight.”

“Oh, I do not, liar!”

“Fie upon thee, sister! I’ll tell Mummy what thee said!”

“Where is your father?” Jamie interrupted, wanting to stop the acrimony before they began pulling each other’s hair. They did stop and glanced at each other for a moment before replying.

“We don’t know,” Prudence said, her voice small and sad. “He went a-hunting one day a year ago and didn’t come back.”

“It might be that Indians took him,” Patience said, trying to sound hopeful. “If so, may be that he’ll escape one day and come home.”

Prudence sighed.

“Maybe,” she said flatly. “Mummy thinks the militia shot him.”

“Why?” Jamie asked, looking down at her. “Why would they shoot him?”

“For being a Friend,” Patience explained. “He wouldn’t fight, and so they said he was a Loyalist.”

“I see. Was—er, I mean—is he?”

Prudence looked at him, grateful for the “is.”

“I don’t think so. But Mummy says Philadelphia yearly meeting told everyone that all Friends should be for the King, as the King would keep peace and the Rebels seek to break it. So”—she shrugged—“people think all Friends are Loyalists.”

“Daddy wasn’t—isn’t,” Patience put in. “He used to say all kinds of things about the King, and Mummy would get worried and beg him to hold his tongue. Here’s the privy,” she announced unnecessarily, letting go of Jamie’s elbow in order to open the door. “Don’t wipe thyself with the towel; it’s for hands. There are corncobs in the basket.”



JOHN GREY WOKE feverish and heavy-limbed, with a pounding headache, and a stabbing pain in his left eye when he tried to open it. Both his eyes were crusted and gummy. He’d been dreaming in vivid, fractured swaths, a confusion of images, voices, emotions … Jamie Fraser had been shouting at him, face dark with passion, but then something changed, some sort of pursuit began, and he fell back into queasy nightmare. They were running together through a bog, a sucking quagmire that pulled at his steps, and Fraser was struggling just ahead of him, trapped, shouting at him to go back, but he couldn’t, his feet were mired fast and he was sinking, flailing madly but unable to get a purchase on anything …

“Gaah!” A hand shook him by the shoulder, startling him out of the morass. He pried his good eye open and saw the wavering form of a neat young man in a dark coat and spectacles, peering down at him in an oddly familiar way.

“John Grey?” said the young man.

“I am,” he said. He swallowed painfully. “Have I—the honor of your acquaintance, sir?”

The young man flushed a bit.

“Thee has, Friend Grey,” he said, low-voiced. “I am—”

“Oh!” Grey said, sitting up in a rush. “Of course, you—oh. Oh, Jesus.” His head, disturbed by the abrupt change of posture, had apparently decided to fly off his shoulders and thump into the nearest wall. The young man … Hunter, he thought, finding the name turn up with an odd neatness among the chaos inside his skull. Dr. Hunter. Dottie’s Quaker.

“I think thee had best lie down, Friend.”

“I think I had best vomit first.”

Hunter snatched the pot out from under the cot just in time. By the time he had administered water—“Drink slowly, Friend, if thee wishes to keep it”—and eased Grey back down on the cot, Colonel Smith was looming up behind him.

“What do you say, Doctor?” Smith was frowning and seemed worried. “Is he in his right mind? He was singing last night, now he’s been moaning and saying odd things, and the look of him …” Smith grimaced in a fashion that made Grey wonder what the devil he did look like.

“He’s badly fevered,” Hunter said, with a piercing look through his spectacles as he bent to take hold of Grey’s wrist. “And thee sees the condition of his eye. It would be dangerous to move him. A further extravasation of blood into the brain …”

Smith made a discontented noise and compressed his lips. He nudged Hunter aside and bent over Grey.

“Can you hear me, Colonel?” he asked, speaking in the slow, distinct manner one used with idiots and foreigners.

“Ich bin ein Fisch …” Grey murmured beatifically, and closed his eyes.

“His pulse is much disordered,” Hunter said warningly, his thumb pressing Grey’s wrist. His hand was cool and firm; Grey found the touch comforting. “I really cannot answer for the consequences should he be moved abruptly.”

“I see.” Smith stood still for a moment; Grey could hear his heavy breathing but forbore opening his eyes. “Very well, then.” He gave a short, humorless laugh. “If Mohammed cannot go to the mountain, then the mountain will jolly well have to come here. I’ll send a note to General Wayne. Do what you can, please, to see that he’s coherent, Doctor?”



HE COULD SEE Denzell Hunter out of his damaged eye; that was reassuring: he wasn’t blind. Yet. Hunter had removed his spectacles in order to peer more closely into the injured organ; he had very nice eyes himself, Grey thought—the iris just the light-brown color of the flesh of a ripe olive, with tiny streaks of deep green.

“Look up, please,” Hunter murmured.

Grey tried to oblige.

“Ow!”

“No? Look down.” This attempt was no more successful, nor could he move the eye to the right or left. It seemed to have solidified in its socket, like a hard-boiled egg. He put this theory to Hunter, who smiled, though in a rather worried way.

“There is a great deal of swelling, to be sure. Whatever struck thee did so with a good deal of force.” Hunter’s fingers moved gently over Grey’s face, prodding here and there in a questioning manner. “Does this—”