Night of the Highland Dragon (17 page)

As in any other village William had stayed in or passed through, the well-to-do citizens of Loch Arach clustered near each other, particularly when the source of their income was something other than farming and thus required neither fields nor barns. Dr. McKendry's low stone house was, therefore, only a short walk from the parsonage and the graveyard. Had Judith not assigned their tasks and given good reason for her decisions, William would have felt that chivalry bound him to protest giving her the longer journey.

He didn't think it would have done much good, but he would have had to speak.

He pushed open the gate and walked through the small garden, now bare and brown except for the solid green darkness of the hedges. Smoke rose steadily from the chimney above him. The smell was comfortingly normal in the face of his morning's activities and of what still lay ahead.

The maid who opened the door for him was named Edith, he knew now, and she smiled in recognition when she saw William. “Come along inside,” she said. “He'll be wanting to see you. They both will—but 'tis quite a morning the doctor's had.”

“So I saw,” said William.

“They're saying someone's been robbing graves.” Edith looked back over her shoulder at him, her eyes large and round, and William noticed that she was only a few years older than Claire. “Is it true?”

“Not completely. But—yes, someone's dug up a few.” She'd find out soon enough. “Only criminals so far. And only the older graves.”

That was another facet of the mystery, wasn't it? Did the hand have to be old—yet not so old as to be skeletal—or had Loch Arach simply not hung a man in a while? He paged through books in his memory, all the grimoires he
had
gotten notes from: Solomon and Abramelin, Agrippa and Parkin. They offered information, but too much of it. He would have given his
own
hand for a quick way to contact the central office and the men there, scholars rather than field agents, who knew substantially more than the quick summaries and scattered methods he'd learned.

Seated in a small, blue-papered parlor and waiting for “the gentlemen,” William kept thinking while—he hoped—his face remained outwardly serene and pleasant. Only fifty years ago, people had thought dead men's hands would cure illness or take away growths. Hamilton was a surgeon. That might not explain the livestock or the demons, but men of science did experiment on animals, and maybe Hamilton had called the creatures up to see if the spells truly worked. It wouldn't have been the first time.

Or maybe—

“Mr. Arundell,” said Dr. McKendry, coming in with a tired smile. “Michael will be down directly. He's finishing up an experiment just now, and these things are tricky business. One misstep and a week's work is ruined, or so I hear.”

“I wouldn't want to disturb that,” William said, wishing that politeness would let him say otherwise, or that he knew enough to be definitely rude. “I wanted to pass along Lady MacAlasdair's thanks for sending those young chaps up earlier, and to see if you'd had any word about Mr. Evans. I'd like to stop in and extend my sympathies.”

“Happy to do what I can, of course. Shocking business.” McKendry settled himself into a leather-covered chair and opened a cigar case, offering one first to William, who declined with a shake of his head. “As for Evans, only what I told you before. He's not likely to be up to company until tomorrow at least. Did you find anything over at the cemetery?”

“Mostly the obvious,” said William, reserving the hand and the footprints for later necessity. “The grave robber worked in the rain—an enterprising scoundrel, we have to give him that—which means he was at it around nine last night, or half past. I don't suppose either of you saw anything? You're tolerably nearby.”

Dr. McKendry shook his head. “I wish I could help you, lad,” he said, “but I was dead to the world by then. The curse of age, as you'll know in time. A troop could have marched past my window without me knowing.”

* * *

“My lady.” Gillian Gordon turned wide, surprised eyes on Judith, and Judith herself felt slightly off balance. She had expected a formal meeting, not a chance encounter outside the barn. Nonetheless, here Gillian was, a pail of milk in each hand. “Were you coming to the house?”

“Aye,” said Judith. “Not disturbing anyone, I hope.”

Gillian shook her head.

Beneath the remnants of a harvesttime tan, her face was red, especially around the eyes and the nose. Wind or weeping? Judith couldn't tell.

“No, it's always a pleasure,” Gillian said, though her voice said that the words came from politeness and not true feeling. Judith wished she
had
only come on a social call and had the luxury of taking the hint.

“Let me help you with those, at least,” she said, reaching out a hand for the milk pails. The brisk combination of speech and action had served her well as a soldier and did the same now. She had a pail in each hand before Gillian could think to object. “Your beasts are still giving well, I see. A good sign for the winter. But you should have an extra hand, so close to term.”

“Och,” Gillian said with a faint and effortful smile and a pat to her stomach, “I'm an old hand at this by now, m'lady. Besides, Ronald's taken wee Ronnie out with him—and that's half my troubles put to rest—and Mam's watching the little one. A bit of milking's restful in its way.”

“Glad you feel so,” said Judith. “Cows have never been overly fond of me. But I'd think you might find the house a bit crowded these days too. Or perhaps you've more patience with your brother than I have with mine.”

At that, Gillian flinched. “Oh,” she said quickly and too lightly, “Ross is out so often, he's never a bother. Not to say he's not attentive.”

“No, of course not,” Judith said and glanced toward the house. “But I'd imagine he wants to catch up a bit, after being gone so long. Is he in now?”

“No,” said Gillian, and the tension in her body wound tighter. “He went on a walk a wee bit ago, and he's not been back since. He—”

Judith slowed her steps, pretending to take extra care with the milk pails. “Hmm?”

“He and Mam had words.”

“Your mother's always been one for speaking her mind,” said Judith, letting herself smile a little. “And it's hard to come home again once you're grown. My father and I had some rows that practically shook the foundations.”

“Oh, there's that, but—” Gillian looked off into the distance, chewed on her lower lip briefly, and then shrugged. “I don't know. It might only be as you say, m'lady. It's just… Ross is so high-strung these days. And it's not that he misses London, I think, for he hardly ever speaks well of it—says it's a dirty place, full of horrible people.”

“Worse than I've heard of it,” said Judith, “but it's no place I'd live myself. Some of us just aren't made for life around crowds. Perhaps he's thinking of coming back.”

“It could be,” said Gillian, who apparently took no pleasure in the thought of it. She shook her head. “But I shouldn't be telling your ladyship my troubles, nor keeping you out here in the cold when you've come all this way. Let me manage the door for you, at least.”

With a milk pail in each hand, Judith assented easily, if not gladly. Nothing could have made her glad to enter the Gordons' cottage on such an errand.

* * *

“What about Mr. Hamilton?” William asked.

“He didn't mention anything,” McKendry said. The smoke from his cigar curled upward into the air of the parlor, a fragrant cloud whose swirls looked almost like oracular patterns. “But you can have a word with him on the subject yourself—just now, at that.”

The door was opening as he spoke, and Hamilton stepped in. He didn't look like a man who'd been up all night robbing graves. His eyes were bright and unshadowed, his smile was easy, and he walked with no visible sign of sore muscles. Comparative youth might have done as much, though—that and callousness.

“Good morning, Mr. Arundell. You wanted to ask me something?”

“Whether you'd seen or heard anything last night, around nine or so.”

“It's to do with the matter in the churchyard,” said McKendry, sighing. “Ghastly business, aye?”

“Aye,” said Hamilton. “And I'd be glad to tell you anything I knew about it, only there isn't anything, as I wasn't here. I'd gone down to the pub for a pint or two at half past eight, and I stayed until past eleven. It wasn't a vast throng, but three or four men there could say I'm telling the truth.”

His smile never flickered as he talked. If anything, it deepened.

McKendry, on the other hand, looked back and forth between Hamilton and William, and bristled once he realized what was happening, half rising from his chair. “Now see here—”

“It's all right, George,” said Hamilton, making settling motions with one hand. “Hazard of the profession, and has been ever since Burke and Hare made a name for themselves. But that was well in the past, Mr. Arundell,” he added. “It's been more than half a century since the dissection rooms have run short. Even the oldest of my professors couldn't call those days well to mind.”

“Oh no,” said McKendry, managing a genial little chuckle now that he didn't have to take umbrage on his friend's behalf. “The Anatomy Act was in…thirty-three? Thirty-two? Before I was even born, lad, and that's saying a good bit. And it may have its critics, but there's nobody with a need to go digging up graveyards. Besides, Hamilton's not been a student for years.”

“Ah,” said William, and he offered a sheepish smile. “Dreadfully sorry. Out of my area of expertise, I'm afraid.”

“And why wouldn't it be?” Hamilton took a cigar from his friend's case, struck a match on the bottom of his boot, and leaned back, all learned man of the world. “I was in school when the Ripper was working, and didn't we get a lot of funny looks when one of us was about after dark? Ach, we've come a good long way from Galen and Hunter”—William only dimly recognized the first name as an ancient Greek surgeon and didn't know the second at all—“but a man who works with a knife is always bound to get as much fear as glory.”

That last word poked like a pin into his mind. He'd read it in the endless notes he'd gone through at the central office—a spell from one French grimoire or other, newly come to light now that the Frenchies were inclined to be cooperative. Glorious Hand, Hand of Glory…it had been along those lines.

One took a criminal's hand and pickled it, making it into a candle or a candleholder. Then what?

“Yes,” he said, so suddenly that both of his hosts started. “Pardon me.” William got to his feet. “How does one reach the Gordons'?”

“Down the road westward,” said McKendry. He was frowning, puzzled, but the directions came off his tongue almost automatically. “Left at the fork. It'll be the last house, set back near the woods.”

“Thank you. I'm afraid I must be going. Sorry to have disturbed you.”

“Don't give it another thought,” said Hamilton. “Best of luck.”

“Are you quite well?” McKendry asked, peering up at him.

“I hope to be better soon. Thank you.”

William left McKendry's yard still not remembering what the Hand of Glory did. He knew that it was nothing good, though—and if Hamilton's alibi held, which he was sure it would, then Ross was quite probably making one.

And Judith was going to his house.

He reached the road and started to run.

* * *

“He's gotten himself into trouble, I'm sure of it,” said Mrs. MacDougal. Her face was hollow-cheeked, her lips so thin as to be nearly nonexistent. Age looked like worry, and worry like age, and in her countenance they'd merged. “He'd not tell me what sort. Said it was all for our sake—as if we'd ever asked it of him. As though his sister or I hadna' done well enough for ourselves.”

“It's no crime to want better for your family, Mum,” said Gillian mildly, after a concerned look at Judith. “And we'd not said no to any of the money he sent us, nor any of the fine things he brought back.”

“Why do you think he's in trouble?” Judith asked, letting Gillian and her mother worry over morality. “Gillian said he was high-strung—”

“Jumpy as a colt, more like,” said Mrs. MacDougal. “He couldna' hear a noise, the last few days, without flinching. 'Tis the letters that did it. He's had three of them since he came, all from London. Devil a one would he let me read, and each of them put him in a worse temper than the last. Debts, I shouldn't wonder. Or worse.”

“Could be, I'm afraid,” Judith said and meant it. Using magic to get money had never struck
her
as worth the time, but she'd never lacked for funds. A man with a little occult knowledge and a legion of creditors breathing down his neck might well try to turn lead to gold—and a man who knew of a wealthy and mysterious family might well try to discover the source of that wealth and see whether he could siphon off a bit. “I hate to ask, but do you know where he was last night?”

“No,” said Mrs. MacDougal. “He went out after dinner, and he wasna' back when I fell asleep.”

“We'd gone to bed too,” said Gillian. “It's not as if we had to stay up to let him in—the door hardly locks. I didn't think much of it.” She looked at Judith and her expression was her mother's in every particular. “He's in trouble here, if he isn't in London. Isn't that so, your ladyship?”

The door opened.

Judith started to turn and see who'd entered. Halfway through the motion, her neck froze in place, leaving her staring at the corner of the cottage. Every muscle in her body went rigid. She wasn't sure how she still lived, for the air was frozen in her lungs, but she had no sense of suffocation, only of complete and total paralysis.