I breathed, and felt the tightness in my chest and throat ease. Amanda was not the only one who might benefit from modern surgery, I thought. I couldn’t tell what might be done for Roger’s vocal cords, but maybe … and yet, his voice now was good. Full and resonant, if rough. Perhaps he would choose to keep it as it was—he’d fought for it, and earned it.

The tree I leaned against was a pine; the needles swayed softly above me, then settled, as though in agreement. I had to go; it was late in the day and the air was growing colder.

Wiping my eyes, I settled the hood of my cloak and went on. It was a long walk from the Abernathys’—I should really have ridden Clarence, but he’d come up lame the day before, and I’d let him rest. I’d have to hurry, though, if I was to reach home before dark.

I cast a wary eye upward, judging the clouds, which had that soft, uniform gray of coming snow. The air was cold and thick with moisture; when the temperature dropped at nightfall, snow would fall.

The sky was still light, but only just, as I came down past the springhouse and into the backyard. Light enough to tell me that something was wrong, though—the back door stood open.

That set off alarm bells, and I turned to run back into the woods. I turned, and ran smack into a man who had come out of the trees behind me.

“Who the hell are you?” I demanded, stepping hastily back.

“Don’t worry about that, Mrs.,” he said, and grabbing me by the arm, yelled toward the house, “Hey, Donner! I got her!”



WHATEVER WENDIGO DONNER been doing for the last year, it hadn’t been profitable, by the looks of him. Never a natty dresser at the best of times, he was now so ragged that his coat was literally falling apart, and a slice of stringy buttock showed through a rent in his breeches. His mane of hair was greasy and matted, and he stank.

“Where are they?” he demanded hoarsely.

“Where are what?” I swung round to face his companion, who seemed in slightly better condition. “And where are my housemaid and her sons?” We were standing in the kitchen, and the hearth fire was out; Mrs. Bug hadn’t come that morning, and wherever Amy and the boys were, they’d been gone for some time.

“Dunno.” The man shrugged, indifferent. “Wasn’t nobody to home when we came.”

“Where are the jewels?” Donner grabbed at my arm, jerking me round to face him. His eyes were sunk in his head, and his grip was hot; he was burning with fever.

“I haven’t got any,” I said shortly. “You’re ill. You should—”

“You do! I know you do! Everybody knows!”

That gave me momentary pause. Gossip being what it was, everybody likely thought they knew that Jamie had a small cache of jewels. Small wonder if word of this hypothetical treasure had reached Donner—and little likelihood that I could convince him otherwise. I had no choice but to try, though.

“They’re gone,” I said simply.

Something flickered in his eyes at that.

“How?” he said.

I raised an eyebrow in the direction of his accomplice. Did he want the man to know?

“Go find Richie and Jed,” Donner said briefly to the thug, who shrugged and went out. Richie and Jed? How on earth many people had he brought? Past the first shock of seeing him, I now became aware that there were thumping feet upstairs, and the sound of cupboard doors being banged impatiently down the hall.

“My surgery! Get them out of there!” I dove for the door to the hallway, intending to perform this office myself, but Donner grabbed at my cloak to stop me.

I was bloody tired of being manhandled, and I wasn’t afraid of this miserable excuse for a human being.

“Let go!” I snapped, and kicked him briskly in the kneecap to emphasize the point. He yelped, but let go; I could hear him cursing behind me as I rushed through the door and down the hall.

Papers and books had been flung out into the hallway from Jamie’s office, and a puddle of ink had been poured over them. The explanation of the ink was apparent when I saw the thug rifling my surgery—he had a big blot of ink on the front of his shirt, where he had apparently sequestered the stolen pewter inkwell.

“What are you doing, you nitwit?” I said. The thug, a boy of sixteen or so, blinked at me, mouth open. He had one of Mr. Blogweather’s perfect glass globes in his hand; at this, he grinned maliciously and let it drop to the floor, where it shattered into a spray of fragments. One of the flying shards lanced through his cheek, slicing it open; he didn’t feel it, until the blood began to well. Then he put a hand to the wound, frowning in puzzlement, and bellowed in fright at the blood on his hand.

“Crap,” said Donner, behind me. He put his arms around me, and dragged me after him back to the kitchen.

“Look,” he said urgently, releasing me. “All I want is two. You can keep the rest. I gotta have one to pay these guys, and one to—to travel with.”

“But it’s true,” I insisted, knowing that he wouldn’t believe me. “We haven’t got any. My daughter and her family—they’ve gone. Gone back. They used all we had. There aren’t any more.”

He stared at me, disbelief plain in his burning eyes.

“Yes, there are,” he said positively. “There have to be. I gotta get out of here!”

“Why?”

“Never you mind. I gotta go, and quick.” He swallowed, eyes darting around the kitchen, as though the gems might be sitting casually on the sideboard. “Where are they?”

A hideous crash from the surgery, followed by an outbreak of shouted curses, prevented any reply I might have made. I moved by reflex toward the door, but Donner moved in front of me.

I was infuriated at this invasion, and beginning to be alarmed. While I’d never seen any indication of violence from Donner, I wasn’t so sure about the men he’d brought with him. They might eventually give up and leave, when it became apparent that there were in fact no gems on the premises—or they might try to beat the location of said gems out of me.

I pulled my cloak more tightly around myself and sat down on a bench, trying to think calmly.

“Look,” I said to Donner. “You’ve taken the house apart—” A crash from upstairs shook the house, and I jumped. My God, it sounded as though they’d tipped over the wardrobe. “You’ve taken the house apart,” I repeated, through gritted teeth, “and you haven’t found anything. Wouldn’t I give them to you, if I had any, to save you wrecking the place?”

“No, I don’t reckon you would. I wouldn’t, if I was you.” He rubbed a hand across his mouth. “You know what’s going on—the war and all.” He shook his head in confusion. “I didn’t know it would be this way. Swear to God, half the people I meet don’t know which way is up anymore. I thought it’d be like, you know, redcoats and all, and you just keep away from anybody in a uniform, keep away from the battles, and it’d be fine. But I haven’t seen a redcoat anywhere, and people—you know, just plain old people—they’re shooting each other and running around burning up each other’s houses… .”

He closed his eyes for a minute. His cheeks went from red one moment to white the next; I could see he was very ill. I could hear him, too; the breath rattled wetly in his chest, and he wheezed faintly. If he fainted, how would I get rid of his companions?

“Anyway,” he said, opening his eyes. “I’m going. Going back. I don’t care what things are like then; it’s a hell of a lot better’n here.”

“What about the Indians?” I inquired, with no more than a touch of sarcasm. “Leaving them to their own devices, are you?”

“Yeah,” he said, missing the sarcasm. “Tell you the truth, I’m not so keen on Indians anymore, either.” He rubbed absently at his upper chest, and I saw a large, puckered scar through a rent in his shirt.

“Man,” he said, longing clear in his voice, “what I wouldn’t give for a cold Bud and a baseball game on TV.” Then his wandering attention snapped back to me. “So,” he said in a halfway reasonable tone, “I need those diamonds. Or whatever. Hand ’em over and we’ll leave.”