What on earth am I going to do now!?
As she moved out of the churchyard, she turned and started heading back toward the market.
“I need something to drink,” she muttered as Erskine walked at her side.
“Aye, I daenae blame ye,” Erskine agreed.
As they neared the edge of the road, Laura’s feet came to a sudden halt. Milling through the market and now walking down the road were English soldiers, dressed in their identifiable redcoats.
“English soldiers?” she asked, turning to Erskine. “Why are they in Scotland?”
“Hardly a rare occurrence these days,” Erskine winced. “I ken ye are English, Billie, but after the last Jacobite battle and the bloodshed, the English soldiers arenae always the most welcome here.”
“Butwhyare they here?”
“Nay idea,” Erskine shook his head, seeming unconcerned by it. “They appear to be lookin’ for somethin’.”
Laura realized he was right. She was reminded of the moment back on the road where such an English soldier, dressed in the same redcoat, had approached Erskine, asking for information onher.The young runaway, Miss Laura Hamilton.
Her eyes drifted down to what was in the soldiers’ hands: they were all carrying parchments, not dissimilar to what they had given Erskine that bore a description of her and a reward. Nearest to them, there was a soldier holding the parchment up to a young Scottish woman. Upon the parchment this time, she could see there was a sketch that had been copied by a printing press.
She took a step back. Even at this distance, she realized what sketch it was. It had been taken from a preparatory drawing made of her for a painting just a couple of years ago. Her father had hated the painting, complaining she had looked too much like her mother.
Laura’s head started to flick back and forth as the soldiers moved down the road, asking more and more strangers if they had seen the woman in the sketch. Laura knew with horror that her previous problem now paled in comparison to the challenge now presented before her.
I am about to be discovered!
She was agitated, turning around in a quick circle and adjusting the hat she wore low over her face, fearful that any second one of the soldiers would look up and recognize her from the sketch.
“Billie, is somethin’ wrong?” Erskine’s voice made her turn back to him.
“No!” she said quickly, then realized how loud her voice was as his green eyes widened. “I just…” she looked behind her toward the churchyard, trying to think of a way to escape the road before anyone recognized her. The elderly man who had given her directions to the church had been right. On the other side of the church was woodland. “I just have to take a privy break,” she whispered quickly to him.
“Now?” He looked startled. “Do ye nae think we should discuss —”
“I’ll only be a minute,” she said quickly, already backing away and pulling her hat even lower. “I will catch up with you in the market.”
She turned and ran then, leaping back over the churchyard wall and hurrying toward the opposite wall that backed onto the woodland. As she reached the line of trees, she ran at full sprint, desperate to put as much distance between her and the well-drawn sketch on the parchments.
* * *
Erskine watched Billie run with confusion.
What just happened?
He understood hearing of the death was a shock, but nothing about what had just happened made sense…Billie only started acting strangely when he saw the soldiers. The sight of them in Scottish land was always enough to upset Erskine. He had fought enough Jacobite battles to resent their presence, even if he now had to accept that Scotland and England were no longer at war. It didn’t mean he had to forgive every English soldier for the wounds and deaths inflicted on his soldiers in battle, but none of that should have been on Billie’s mind.
No, there had to be a reason why Billie would run like that. It was most certainly not a sudden need for a privy break!
Erskine now turned his attention to the soldiers, away from the woodland where Billie had disappeared. There were lots of them, all holding parchment in their hands.
“Ye there!” Erskine called to the closest one and hurried to his side. “What is it ye are all lookin’ for?”
“A young woman,” the soldier explained quickly and passed the parchment into his hands. “Have ye heard of the runaway from London, Miss Laura Hamilton?”
“Aye, someone mentioned it on the road,” Erskine said, recalling the strange meeting he had endured with the English soldier and discussing the woman who had not only escaped her father but marriage to Earl Moore.
“They have reason to believe she may come to Inverness,” the soldier said easily.
