The Devil's Recruit Read Online Free PDF

‘I would not like to wake up to the sight of the little wiry one brandishing an axe over me.’
    ‘No, nor I,’ agreed Jamesone. ‘He is a sullen devil. Yet Charpentier says he is the best plantsman he has ever worked with, and knows the Netherlandish bulb fields as no other. They met at the palace gardens in Brussels, and moved northwards together, until they happily chanced at Edzell, where I found them. Lady Lindsay is not best pleased that I have purloined them, as she puts it, and I doubt I shall have my commission from her now.’
    ‘You are a rogue, George, and will lose half your patrons if you steal from them their most prized workmen.’
    ‘Ach. So be it,’ he said dismissively. ‘Edzell is a wonder indeed, but it was designed long ago and its labour is one of maintenance, not creation as here. Guillaume found my proposal a challenge he could not refuse.’
    ‘And St Clair?’
    Jamesone made a gesture of indifference. ‘Who can tell? His face is as sour here as it was at Edzell. But I am not constrained to spend my time with him, and if Louis and Christiane Rolland can thole him, then so will I.’
    I peered at George’s sketch of a herb garden, and wondered how Louis Rolland would manage to explain tohim, on Charpentier’s behalf, that the designing of a garden cannot be carried out on the same principles as the planning of a painting. Even I knew that no gardener would set delicate herbs against a north-east facing wall, not half a mile from the North Sea.
    Just then, voices that were Aberdonian to their core burst in on Jamesone’s Elysian fantasy. He strode over to pull close the shutters which he had opened for better light and air. ‘God in Heaven! Have I to buy the street too, to find some peace in my own home?’
    I went with him to the window and what I saw drove all thoughts of gardens from my mind. I ran down the turnpike stairs more quickly than was safe to do, and was out on the street in less than half a minute. Being hauled down Schoolhill from the direction of Back Wynd, was Hugh Gunn, on either side of him one of the burgh’s burliest constables. The boy looked to be utterly drenched, though it had not rained since he had left the inn, and almost unable to walk by himself. He was shivering in the sharp October air, his face and hands were bruised and cut, and his long fair hair darkened and matted by water and weeds.
    I ran after the trio, who were attracting loud and uncomplimentary attention from those townsfolk out on the streets. At the foot of the Upperkirkgate I caught one of the constables by the shoulder. The fellow was about to swing a fist around at me, but saw at the last minute who I was.
    ‘We’ve found one of the devils at least, Mr Seaton. We’llhave to march the wretch to the magistrate before we can turn him over to you.’ He snapped round to the scholar on his arm, whose knees were buckling beneath him as if they could hold him no longer. ‘Stand straight, you devil, or by God, you’ll never see the Broadgate, never mind the college gates.’
    I could scarcely believe the boy I was looking at was the same young man who had been determined to sign up for a soldier only the previous night.
    ‘Hugh, what happened to you?
    No answer but a half-swallowed mumble and another buckling of the knees. I turned again to the constable. ‘Where was he found?’
    ‘Passed out in a cooper’s yard near the Green.’
    ‘Like this? Soaked?’
    ‘That is the way I came upon him. They had maybe thrown water over him, to rouse him.’
    ‘It must have been a bucket straight from the Putachie Burn by the look of him. Was there anyone with him?’
    ‘Not a soul. Whoever he was with is no doubt dead to this world in someone else’s yard or midden. Now, I’ll have to get this fellow up to the Castlegate; as if the town hadn’t delinquents enough to deal with.’
    I held up my hand. ‘Wait a moment. Hugh? Where is Seoras?’
    The boy looked at me stupidly, as if he could not