The Low Road (20 page)

That night we shared his makeshift bed, glad of each other's warmth and the fullness in our bellies. Morgan was aroused again, and lay back with his arms behind his head while I slowly sucked and wanked him and then, when the stiff heat of his cock became too much for me, climbed over him and steered it up my arse. He lay there, smiling, half asleep, as I writhed and bounced on top of him, then, extending one massive arm, he gripped me and tossed me off until I spewed all over his belly. He came deep inside me, and we slept for a while.

When we woke, it was still dark, but Morgan set about clearing out all signs of our occupation, stamping the ashes of the fire into the sandy floor of the cave, throwing the clam shells out on to the rocks where they would soon be carried away by the gulls.

I dressed quickly and stood shivering in the cold air.

‘We must move quickly, Charlie. I've been here too long.'

‘Do you have a boat?'

He laughed quietly. ‘No, you fool. Come on, look lively. Here, finish the water.'

‘Where are we going?'

‘I don't know about you, Charlie. I'm going home.'

‘I must find Lebecque. Won't you help me?'

‘I fear you may be too late, Charlie.'

‘Why?'

‘They took him away from Fort William.'

My heart sank. ‘Why? Where?'

‘I don't know. But you'll find him. I know you will. Just be careful. Keep eyes and ears open. Disguise yourself. Become a spy. Do all that is necessary. I know that you will find him.'

‘How do you know?'

‘Because you love him.'

I was glad it was still so dark; Morgan would not see my blushes.

‘And he loves you, Charlie.'

‘What do you mean?'

‘We spoke of you in prison. He loves you, boy. He and I were... together, on occasion, in the same way that you and I have been. We were close, Charlie, close friends. And he trusted me. So that is why I know you'll find him, just as I know that I will find my Margaret. Come on, now. It's time to go.'

We emerged from the cave and walked down to the eastern-most point of the island. And there, to my utter astonishment, where yesterday was just the grey, crashing expanse of the sea, now stretched a long, broad causeway of wet sand. I stood amazed.

‘It's only open for a few hours. We must start now.'

Morgan grabbed me by the hand and we ran from the island.

The time had come to face up to my responsibilities in a more adult manner. I was no longer the silly child who had waltzed out of Gordon Hall with his nose in the air and a head full of glorious adventures gleaned from the pages of novels. Only a few months had passed since I left home, but I had grown up. I had learned to trust nobody, to consider the consequences of every action, to keep my own counsel. I had learned to think, as well as to fuck, like a man.

For the first week after my delivery from the island I travelled north with Morgan, glad of his protection as we proceeded with caution from Barrow-in-Furness (where we struck the mainland) through the Lake District. We slept mostly under the stars, shunning human company; Morgan, as an escaped convict, had more reason than me for keeping a low profile. Sometimes, in our makeshift beds of leaves and furs, we rekindled the flame that Morgan had lit in the cold waters of the island; more often, though, we huddled together for warmth and companionship, too tired from our day's march to do anything more than sleep.

After Carlisle, our ways diverged; Morgan judged it safe to return to Edinburgh, where his Margaret was waiting for him. I was headed north-west, to Glasgow and ultimately Fort William. Perhaps Lebecque was no longer there - but someone, somewhere
along the road, would know his whereabouts. If nothing else, I would join the English regiment at Glasgow and perhaps, by keeping my eyes and ears open, find out what I needed to know. It was a vague plan, but the best available to me. Morgan's counsel - disguise yourself, become a spy, do all that is necessary - seemed to me the only course of action.

So, travelling under the name Edward Nicholls (my mother's maiden name; how pleased she would have been by my discretion!), I made slow progress through the Borders, forced to earn my crust with casual work (scarce enough at the turn of the year) and by honest begging. If I had avoided the cities altogether I would have starved, but I stayed long enough in each place only to earn sufficient coin to convert into bread to sustain me for the next leg of my journey. In Dumfries I struck gold; a wealthy merchant spied me pissing in the privy at the back of an inn, liked what he saw and offered me a good rate for the use thereof. I spent a weekend working hard satisfying the old man's depraved appetites, and by the Monday morning had spent so much energy that I felt weak and debilitated, my cock sore from its heroic efforts. The old man, who had grown accustomed to the taste of my come, offered me a ridiculous sum to stay with him as his ‘secretary', but I was firm, took the money that we had originally agreed on (and he was grudging enough when it came to handing it over) and left Dumfries for good. Nothing, this time, was going to stand between me and my quest. I regretted the loss of soft beds, hot baths and clean clothes - but it felt good to be back on the road, however hard the conditions. Now I could exchange coin for food at the farmhouses and inns along the way, and I proceeded with a lighter heart.

Another week saw me crossing the Lowther Hills and well on my way towards Glasgow, thanks to a kind carter who wanted nothing more than my company on the road from Moffat to Lanark. Along the way we ran across a huge convoy of redcoats
escorting supplies, as I took it, south towards Carlisle. We were stopped and searched but no harm was done, apart from the insults to our national pride that were heaped upon us. The carter was patient, however, and we went on our way.

It was in Lanark that my plans misfired. I fell in with a group of English soldiers at an inn; mindful of my experiences at the hands of the mercenaries at Auchindarroch I was a little more chary of my companionship. These, however, seemed to be regular soldiers, well disciplined even when they were off duty, offering no immediate threat to my person. And so I allowed myself to be drawn into conversation, sticking carefully to the story that I was Edward Nicholls, an itinerant tutor travelling to the house of a family in Hamilton, evincing an almost cretinous naivety about the political situation in Scotland. I was taciturn, a little shy, peppering my few sentences with classical tags - persuading the soldiers that I was a feckless scholar who could pose no possible threat to security.

Behind the mask, however, I was taking in every shred of information I could possibly glean. The company was bound for Glasgow, where they were to ‘deliver' something to General Wilmott, controller of all the English forces in the area, a man of ‘extraordinary intelligence' according to Sergeant Blair, a tall, slim blond soldier, who seemed to enjoy chaffing me for my ignorance about military affairs.

‘The ancient generals,' I said, with a scholarly air, ‘were the greatest tacticians. Look at Alcibiades, if you will, who, according to Xenophon—'

‘Ah, but General Wilmott has spies in every town, in every prison, even in every regiment.' The blond soldier winked. ‘And so, you see, nothing can happen in Scotland without him knowing about it.'

This was my first important discovery. The second, although less immediately useful, seemed to hold the key to my success. I
had noticed as soon as I joined the company that one of their number held himself apart. While the rest of the seven-strong band enjoyed their meat and their ale around the fire, boasting and singing like any group of well-tempered soldiers, the eighth sat in the corner looking on, lit fitfully by the flames, drinking nothing and eating only the barest minimum. He did not appear to be a prisoner; on one occasion, he left the room to relieve himself, and returned to his place without exciting suspicion. And yet he was not of the band. The other soldiers looked slightly askance at him; once or twice I observed them making whispered comments to each other, nodding towards the corner of the room and laughing raucously. Nobody addressed him directly, but he watched all.

He was younger than the rest of the soldiers: about my own age, I would guess. But where I had the pale, open face and ginger hair of a typical Scot, the other was dark, spoilt-looking, his large mouth fixed in a permanent pout that sometimes seemed on the verge of a smile. His hair was cut short, and he wore civilian clothes-a clean white shirt, a brown leather tunic, trousers of a fine, expensive wool. He kept about him at all times a large purse of thick brown leather, which he wore slung about his neck on a sturdy strap and fingered idly. When Blair had made reference to spies in the camp, I thought I detected a faint nod towards the silent boy in the corner. This, then, was one of General Wilmott's all-seeing, all-knowing band of informers. If anyone would know where Lebecque was, this, I guessed, was he.

The evening wore on, and I enjoyed a modest meal and some agreeable conversation with the soldiers. Sergeant Blair had generously offered me a bed for the night ‘if you don't mind bunking down with a rough and ready soldier'. The accompanying wink led me to suspect that there was more behind the offer than just a bed, and I was sorely tempted: not only by the prospect of missing out on another night under a cold hedgerow, but also by the juicy-looking
bulge at the front of Blair's tight buff trousers. It was now some time since I had enjoyed another man and, despite my resolve to conduct myself more seriously, I was hungry for some loving. The merchant in Dumfries had exercised my cock but not my imagination, beyond the self-regarding thrill of being treated as a sex-object. Blair, however, was a much tastier proposition.

But first there was business to attend to. I felt certain that the boy in the corner held the key to my quest, and if I could only pump him for information I could continue my journey with fresh purpose, perhaps even rewarding myself with a night spent swinging on the sergeant's cock into the bargain. By eleven o'clock, after the ale had been flowing liberally for some hours, the party was almost ready to break up. Blair had become quite demonstrative, and had manoeuvred me to a dark corner behind the bar where he was whispering the most obscene suggestions in my ear, kissing me on the neck and scratching me with his stubble, a sensation which always has an instant effect on my groin. I was trying to keep my eyes on the boy in the corner during all of this, but it was becoming difficult to concentrate; Blair, when he felt that I had become erect, was grinding our groins together and mauling my backside, telling me in explicit detail just exactly what delights awaited me if I'd only come upstairs with him.

The dark boy in the corner took all this in; not for nothing was he a professional informer. While Blair buried his face in my neck, I looked over his shoulder to see those deep, sparkling eyes glancing over at me with a mixture of contempt and amusement, the full, sulky lips parting for a moment to reveal a pink tip of tongue. I was surprised to see that none of the soldiers tried to engage the boy in the way that Blair was engaging me; in their shoes, I would have thought him a very agreeable bedmate. But they restricted themselves to a few ribald remarks, and left the boy alone.

When I saw him rise to his feet and slip out of the bar, I knew I had to make my move. Screwing up my resolve, I attempted to
break away from Blair's embrace, but it was not so easily done. By now he had one hand down the back of my trousers, and was kneading my buttocks with a will. When I tried to move, he impaled me on his middle finger and started stirring my guts around. My cock was all in favour of retiring to his room and letting him have his wicked way; my head, however, was telling me otherwise. Remembering Morgan's advice, I realised I would have to dissemble.

‘Oh God, what are you doing?' I whispered in his ear, resuming my role of the naive scholar.

‘Doesn't that feel good?' he murmured, his voice thick with lust.

‘I don't know... I've never had anyone touch me there before...' My cynical plan worked; Blair was so excited by the idea of taking my virginity that he became even more frantic.

‘Just you wait, boy, until I get this up there...' Never taking his mouth from my neck, he fumbled around in his groin and pulled his cock out, placing my hand around it. It was certainly a handsome piece, and ready to go off.

‘It's so big and hard,' I whispered, staring into his eyes and licking my lips. ‘How are you going to get that into my little arse? It's far too tight. You'd have to push really hard.' My charade was having the desired effect; Blair's eyes seemed to be filming over, and he was breathing through his mouth. I started moving my hand up and down his shaft, playing him like an instrument.