Outlander 03 - Voyager полностью

Jamie closed the window with a snap, then bent and picked me up like a rag doll. He lowered me into the berth, and pulled the quilt up over me.

“How is your arm?” he said.

“What arm?” I murmured drowsily. I felt as though I had been melted and poured into a mold to set.

“Good,” he said, a smile in his voice. “Can ye stand up?”

“Not for all the tea in China.”

“I’ll tell Murphy ye liked the soup.” His hand rested for a moment on my cool forehead, passed down the curve of my cheek in a light caress, and then was gone. I didn’t hear him leave.

57

PROMISED LAND

“It’s persecution!” Jamie said indignantly. He stood behind me, looking over the rail of the Artemis. Kingston Harbor stretched to our left, glowing like liquid sapphires in the morning light, the town above half-sunk in jungle green, cubes of yellowed ivory and pink rose-quartz in a lush setting of emerald and malachite. And on the cerulean bosom of the water below floated the majestic sight of a great three-masted ship, furled canvas white as gull wings, gun decks proud and brass gleaming in the sun. His Majesty’s man-of-war Porpoise.

“The filthy boat’s pursuing me,” he said, glaring at it as we sailed past at a discreet distance, well outside the harbor mouth. “Everywhere I go, there it is again!”

I laughed, though in truth, the sight of the Porpoise made me slightly nervous, too.

“I don’t suppose it’s personal,” I told him. “Captain Leonard did say they were bound for Jamaica.”

“Aye, but why would they no head straight to Antigua, where the naval barracks and the navy shipyards are, and them in such straits as ye left them?” He shaded his eyes, peering at the Porpoise. Even at this distance, small figures were visible in the rigging, making repairs.

“They had to come here first,” I explained. “They were carrying a new governor for the colony.” I felt an absurd urge to duck below the rail, though I knew that even Jamie’s red hair would be indistinguishable at this distance.

“Aye? I wonder who’s that?” Jamie spoke absently; we were no more than an hour away from arrival at Jared’s plantation on Sugar Bay, and I knew his mind was busy with plans for finding Young Ian.

“A chap named Grey,” I said, turning away from the rail. “Nice man; I met him on the ship, just briefly.”

“Grey?” Startled, Jamie looked down at me. “Not Lord John Grey, by chance?”

“Yes, that was his name? Why?” I glanced up at him, curious. He was staring at the Porpoise with renewed interest.

“Why?” He heard me when I repeated the question a second time, and glanced down at me, smiling. “Oh. It’s only that I ken Lord John; he’s a friend of mine.”

“Really?” I was no more than mildly surprised. Jamie’s friends had once included the French minister of finance and Charles Stuart, as well as Scottish beggars and French pickpockets. I supposed it was not remarkable that he should now count English aristocrats among his acquaintance, as well as Highland smugglers and Irish seacooks.

“Well, that’s luck,” I said. “Or at least I suppose it is. Where do you know Lord John from?”

“He was the Governor of Ardsmuir prison,” he replied, surprising me after all. His eyes were still fixed on the Porpoise, narrowed in speculation.

“And he’s a friend of yours?” I shook my head. “I’ll never understand men.”

He turned and smiled at me, taking his attention at last from the English ship.

“Well, friends are where ye find them, Sassenach,” he said. He squinted toward the shore, shading his eyes with his hand. “Let us hope this Mrs. Abernathy proves to be one.”

As we rounded the tip of the headland, a lithe black figure materialized next to the rail. Now clothed in spare seaman’s clothes, with his scars hidden, Ishmael looked less like a slave and a good deal more like a pirate. Not for the first time, I wondered just how much of what he had told us was the truth.

“I be leavin’ now,” he announced abruptly.

Jamie lifted one eyebrow and glanced over the rail, into the soft blue depths.

“Dinna let me prevent ye,” he said politely. “But would ye not rather have a boat?”

Something that might have been humor flickered briefly in the black man’s eyes, but didn’t disturb the severe outlines of his face.

“You say you put me ashore where I want, I be tellin’ you ’bout those boys,” he said. He nodded toward the island, where a riotous growth of jungle spilled down the slope of a hill to meet its own green shadow in the shallow water. “That be where I want.”

Jamie looked thoughtfully from the uninhabited shore to Ishmael, and then nodded.

“I’ll have a boat lowered.” He turned to go to the cabin. “I promised ye gold as well, no?”

“Don’t be wantin’ gold, mon.” Ishmael’s tone, as well as his words, stopped Jamie in his tracks. He looked at the black man with interest, mingled with a certain reserve.

“Ye’ll have something else in mind?”

Ishmael jerked his head in a short nod. He didn’t seem outwardly nervous, but I noticed the faint gleam of sweat on his temples, despite the mild noon breeze.