Virgins: An Outlander Novella (Outlander #0.5)(22)
Jamie was shocked and slowed for a moment to let Ian catch him up. “Did they get the dowry money?”
“No, but they had a hard fight. Three men wounded badly enough to need a surgeon, and Paul Martan lost two fingers of his left hand. D’Eglise pulled them into La Teste-de-Buch and sent Josef to see if all was well wi’ us.”
Jamie’s heart bounced into his throat. “Jesus. Did ye tell him what happened?”
“I did not,” Ian said tersely. “I told him we’d had an accident wi’ the coach, and ye’d gone ahead with the women; I was comin’ back to fetch something left behind.”
“Aye, good.” Jamie’s heart dropped back into his chest. The last thing he wanted was to have to tell the captain that they’d lost the girl and the Torah scroll. And he’d be damned if he would.
—
They traveled fast, stopping only to ask questions now and then, and by the time they pounded into the village of Aubeterre-sur-Dronne, they were sure that their quarry lay no more than an hour ahead of them—if the women had passed on through the village.
“Oh, those two?” said a woman, pausing in the act of scrubbing her steps. She stood up slowly, stretching her back. “I saw them, yes. They rode right by me and went down the lane there.” She pointed.
“I thank you, madame,” Jamie said, in his best Parisian French. “What lies down that lane, please?”
She looked surprised that they didn’t know and frowned a little at such ignorance.
“Why, the chateau of the Vicomte Beaumont, to be sure!”
“To be sure,” Jamie repeated, smiling at her, and Ian saw a dimple appear in her cheek in reply. “Merci beaucoup, madame!”
—
“What the devil…?” Ian murmured. Jamie reined up beside him, pausing to look at the place. It was a small manor house, somewhat run down but pretty in its bones. And the last place anyone would think to look for a runaway Jewess, he’d say that for it.
“What shall we do now, d’ye think?” he asked, and Jamie shrugged and kicked his horse.
“Go knock on the door and ask, I suppose.”
Ian followed his friend up to the door, feeling intensely conscious of his grubby clothes, sprouting beard, and general state of uncouthness. Such concerns vanished, though, when Jamie’s forceful knock was answered.
“Good day, gentlemen!” said the yellow-haired bugger Ian had last seen locked in combat in the roadbed with Jamie the day before. The man smiled broadly at them, cheerful despite an obvious black eye and a freshly split lip. He was dressed in the height of fashion, in a plum velvet suit; his hair was curled and powdered, and his yellow beard was neatly trimmed. “I hoped we would see you again. Welcome to my home!” he said, stepping back and raising his hand in a gesture of invitation.
“I thank you, monsieur…?” Jamie said slowly, giving Ian a sidelong glance. Ian lifted one shoulder in the ghost of a shrug. Did they have a choice?
The yellow-haired bugger bowed. “Pierre Robert Heriveaux d’Anton, Vicomte Beaumont, by the grace of the Almighty, for one more day. And you, gentlemen?”
“James Alexander Malcolm MacKenzie Fraser,” Jamie said, with a good attempt at matching the other’s grand manner. Only Ian would have noticed the faint hesitation or the slight tremor in his voice when he added, “Laird of Broch Tuarach.”
“Ian Alastair Robert MacLeod Murray,” Ian said, with a curt nod, and straightened his shoulders. “His…er…the laird’s…tacksman.”
“Come in, please, gentlemen.” The yellow-haired bugger’s eyes shifted just a little, and Ian heard the crunch of gravel behind them, an instant before he felt the prick of a dagger in the small of his back. No, they didn’t have a choice.
Inside, they were relieved of their weapons, then escorted down a wide hallway and into a commodious parlor. The wallpaper was faded, and the furniture was good but shabby. By contrast, the big Turkey carpet on the floor glowed like it was woven from jewels. A big roundish thing in the middle was green and gold and red, and concentric circles with wiggly edges surrounded it in waves of blue and red and cream, bordered in a soft, deep red, and the whole of it so ornamented with unusual shapes it would take you a day to look at them all. He’d been so taken with it the first time he saw it, he’d spent a quarter of an hour looking at them, before Big Georges caught him at it and shouted at him to roll the thing up, they hadn’t all day.
“Where did ye get this?” Ian asked abruptly, interrupting something the vicomte was saying to the two rough-clad men who’d taken their weapons.
“What? Oh, the carpet! Yes, isn’t it wonderful?” The vicomte beamed at him, quite unself-conscious, and gestured the two roughs away toward the wall. “It’s part of my wife’s dowry.”
“Your wife,” Jamie repeated carefully. He darted a sideways glance at Ian, who took the cue.
“That would be Mademoiselle Hauberger, would it?” he asked. The vicomte blushed—actually blushed—and Ian realized that the man was no older than he and Jamie were.
“Well. It—we—we have been betrothed for some time, and in Jewish custom, that is almost like being married.”
“Betrothed,” Jamie echoed again. “Since…when, exactly?”