Page 10 of Provoked
“Let’s sit down, and you can tell me.”
They retreated to the bench Euan had been occupying when David had first come into the hall. Euan sat heavily and rested his elbows on his knees, his hat dangling from his fingertips, his gaze fixed forward, not looking at David, who settled beside him and waited for him to speak.
“I’ve been looking for the Englishman,” Euan said at last.
“The Englishman?”
“Robert Lees.”
David sat back, surprised. Lees had been a shadowy figure in the trial of James Baird and Andrew Hardie. The mysterious Englishman was believed by the weavers, whose ranks he’d joined, to be one of a number of government agents sent to Scotland with orders to stir up the brief summer uprising and flush out troublemakers. The efforts of Lees and his fellow agents had resulted in dozens of men being transported, and three—Hardie and Baird included—being executed.
And now Euan MacLennan was looking for the man? A trained agent who had already shown himself capable of the worst sort of deceit?
A lamb may as well go looking for a wolf.
“That does not sound wise,” David said. “Why are you looking for him?”
Euan frowned at the wooden floor for several long moments. “I want to confront him,” he said at last. “He’s the reason Peter’s rotting in gaol, the reason he’s going to be thrown onto a transport ship in chains. The least he can do is look me in the eye and, and—” He broke off, a muscle jerking in his cheek.
“And what?”
Euan turned his head and looked at David, grief stricken. “Tell me why he did it.”
Why.
It was an entirely pointless question, and yet David understood how it would torment the lad. He thought of himself all those years ago, writing letter after letter to Will Lennox asking why he’d broken off their friendship so irrevocably. Will had never answered a single one of those letters.
It took time for the burning desire for an answer to fade away, but fade it did, once you accepted you’d never know.
“Davy, please, I need your help,” Euan was saying now, his tone driven. “I know you care—more than any of the others. When you first came to speak to us, I saw you were different. Like us. You learned our names, and you gave us your own. And when they handed down the verdicts, I saw your face, Davy. You felt as sick as I did.”
“Of course I care,” David replied sincerely. “But I don’t understand what you think I can do for you.”
“I’ve got a lead on Lees. I think he might be here in Edinburgh, circulating in your world.”
“My world?” David shook his head. “If you imagine I can introduce you to someone who has dealings with government agents, you are very much mistaken. I have entry only to the very outermost circles of the legal world—not to the corridors of political power.”
“I know that,” Euan said. “Just hear me out, all right?”
“All right,” David sighed. “Go on.”
Euan took a deep breath and began again. “There was an occasion, weeks before the uprising, when Lees got drunk with Peter and told him about a woman—a woman he said he loved. Isabella is her name. She lives here in Edinburgh, and Lees told Peter her father is an advocate by profession—an advocate, like you, Davy! Lees said he was going to go and see her father in person to persuade him to let Lees marry the girl.”
David watched the younger man, observing his excitement and how he tried to hide it behind a calm, measured mask.
“So you see, Lees might be in Edinburgh right now. And even if he is not, if you help me find out who this Isabella is, I might be able to find out where he has gone. There cannot be too many advocates with daughters called Isabella, can there?” He finished his speech all in a rush, gabbling it out on a single breath, his voice closing up as he reached the end of his question.
The lad’s desperation was awful. This was not a lead, David thought. It was a fantasy. A delusion. It didn’t seem conceivable that a government agent would spill out secrets about his romantic passions to one of the men he was deceiving. And even if he had let something slip, he surely wouldn’t be stupid enough to go and act on it later?
“You should forget this,” David said quietly, “and go back to your studies. That is what your brother would want.”
“I can’t. I have to do this.”
“It won’t help Peter.”
“I know,” Euan said. “Nevertheless, I have to.”
“You won’t find this man, and your studies will falter—and what would Peter think of that? He would be devastated.”