Chapter 36

 

She had stayed too long at the bagnio after Robert Catto had left. Sitting there looking at the sketch she had made of him, remembering how he had played the fool as she was doing it. While she jokingly told him off.

‘You don’t want me to look happy? Because I am, you know.’

‘You can look happy. I’d rather you didn’t cross your eyes at me, though.’

She had asked him to lie on his side facing her, propped up with one arm thrown over the pillows, the chestnut brown silk of his hair tumbling over one shoulder. She was sitting beside the bed on the high stool, knees drawn up to serve as a platform for her sketch book.

‘Maybe I’ll cross my legs rather than my eyes. Preserve my modesty.’

She made a rude noise. ‘Don’t you dare. Hold that pose, if you please.’

‘For how long?’

‘Until I’m finished.’

‘If I’m naked, shouldn’t you be naked too?’

‘I’m not wearing much,’ she said, concentrating on her drawing. ‘Only my wrapper.’

‘Pull the fronts back a bit. Fair’s fair, Miss Rankeillor.’

He was such a complex man. The formidable Captain of the Town Guard had been comfortably naked in front of her, laughing and relaxed despite their looming separation. Two weeks seemed like an eternity: and she would not think of the much longer – or even permanent – separation which might be heading towards them. Rushing in like a stormy sea.

She pushed those crashing waves back by revelling in the memory of their lovemaking. Still feeling the sensations, of how he had used his hands and his mouth to give her pleasure. Startling her by where those hands and that mouth had chosen to go. Hearing herself moan in pleasure, her body melting under his touch. Remembering how she had shyly begun to offer him her caresses in return.

Somewhere outside, a clock struck the quarter hour. Fifteen minutes to twelve. Although she really wasn’t sure her father had been listening to her when she had taken her leave of him yesterday, she had told Mary to expect her home before midday and to let Betty know that too. Swinging her cloak over her shoulders, she tucked her sketchbook into her basket and left the bagnio, closing and locking the double doors and the wrought-iron gate behind her.

She decided not to take the long way home. Instead, she set off through the narrow close which led to the courtyard of the hospital. At this hour everyone would still be busy on the ward round. She was halfway through when she felt a prickle at the back of her neck. For a moment she froze to the spot, before whirling round to look back along the narrow passageway. Nothing and nobody.

 

The ward round was over. It had finished a little early this morning. Agnes Moncur had seen Professor Monro to the front doors of the hospital before returning to her own room. Sitting down at her desk, she lifted her head to gaze out of the window at the rooftops and spires of Edinburgh. Her dilemma of last night had been very real but this morning she had made up her mind.

Edinburgh Royal Infirmary and the Cause, those were the two guiding lights of her life. Attachments to other people, like Professor Rankeillor and his daughter, could not be allowed to stand in the way of her loyalty to the House of Stuart.

There was a knock at her door. She called out the instruction to come in and saw one of the hospital’s porters standing there. She beckoned him into the room. The information he gave her had her standing up and snapping into action.

 

Silently telling herself to stay calm, Christian reached the courtyard and made her way round the edge of it. The open space bounded on three sides by the Infirmary, with its two projecting wings, was deserted. The grand entrance doors were open, as they usually were during the day, come rain, snow or shine. She became aware that she was walking too fast, her shoes beating out a rapid tattoo on the paving stones beneath her feet. Someone standing inside the hospital’s cavernous entrance hall might hear her and look out.

Despite her urge to put the courtyard and the hospital behind her as quickly as possible, she slowed down. With the pang she knew she would always feel when she thought of Jamie Buchan, she remembered the advice he had given her when she had been taking food and medical aid to Mr Fox while that gentleman had been hidden in the cells at the back of the Infirmary.

Look confident. Look as though you have every right to be there. If anyone does challenge you, be ready with a good reason for why you are there.

She could manage the first bit. Maybe. It might help if she switched the focus of her thoughts. Like an arrow flying towards its target, they went to Robert Catto. Right now he would still be riding down to Leith. Soon he would be striding up the gangway of the ship bound for London. She imagined the Lord President was sending him there with an important dispatch, one requiring a special envoy to give its delivery due weight.

Wondering what could be so important, she felt a rush of excitement and stopped dead for the second time. Oh dear God, it couldn’t be. Could it? Maybe the dispatch Robert Catto was delivering to London was news the rising was about to start. In Scotland rather than London?

Behind her, she heard someone call her name. Agnes Moncur. Christian put a smile on her face and turned around. Pity she didn’t have that good reason for why she was here.

 

Catto dismounted at the change house in Leith and tossed the reins to the stable boy he recognized from the last time he’d been here.

‘You’ll ride him back up to The White Horse?’ The two inns, like many others, had a reciprocal agreement.

‘As soon as I’ve fed and watered him, sir. Then I can walk back down here while it’s still daylight.’

Catto nodded, dug into his pocket, pushed open the strings of his purse and brought out a silver coin. ‘For your trouble.’

The lad grinned and sketched him a cheerful salute. Watching as he led Tam back to the stables, listening to the clip-clop of the hooves on the cobblestones, Catto felt an odd chill run through him. A shiver of fear. With Kirsty Rankeillor at its centre. A feeling she was in danger.

He stood for a moment, applying his rational brain to this almost overwhelming sensation. She was in danger, although not any more today than she had been yesterday. He was loath to leave her here in Edinburgh but she had people she could go to for help if she needed it. Added to which, it wasn’t his place to question the Lord President’s decision to send him on this mission. His place and his duty was to carry it out.

He still had to force himself to walk onto the quay at The Shore and find the London-bound packet.

 

‘Kirsty,’ Agnes said. ‘Not coming in to see us?’

‘I’m afraid not.’ Panic put more words into her mouth. ‘I’ve been taking some physic to a patient who’s not well enough to come and see us at the shop.’

Agnes threw a glance over her shoulder. The narrow close only really led to the bagnio. If you were going to any of the houses some distance beyond it, you would take a different route. Turning, she looked back at Christian. ‘Might I have a word with you?’

‘Betty will be expecting me for our midday meal.’

‘She can surely wait a few moments.’

Christian refreshed her false smile. Her face was beginning to hurt from the strain of it. ‘Of course. How can I help you, Agnes?’

The other woman look tired. Maybe something else was bothering her.

Or maybe I’m clutching at straws. Because I am beginning to feel scared.

‘Not here. It’s too public.’

‘Your room, then.’

Agnes gave her no reply. By the time Christian realized they were bypassing her room and heading for the cells in the back corridor, the lady governess had already unlocked the big oak door separating those from the rest of the hospital and ushered her in. Christian whirled round when she heard the sound of the key turning for a second time. Locking them both in. She had walked into a trap.

‘Third cell on the right, Kirsty.’

‘Agnes, what’s going on?’

‘I think you know, Kirsty. Third cell on the right,’ she said again. ‘On you go.’

Where Mr Fox had stayed. Where Robert Catto had been waiting for her when she had tried and failed to post a warning letter to her father while he had been through in Glasgow before Christmas. Someone else was waiting for her there today.

Arthur Menzies of Edmonstone.