A Breath of Snow and Ashes - Diana Gabaldon [287]
I nodded, still feeling stunned.
“It was close enough to carry the carcass to the house without help, so I brought it down to the smoke shed and hung it. There was no one about—I found out later the children had all gone to the market in Broch Mhorda, and the servants with them. So I thought the house was empty altogether, and stepped into the kitchen to find a bite and a cup of buttermilk before I left.”
Thinking the house empty, he had been startled by noises in the bedchamber overhead.
“What sort of noises?” I asked, fascinated.
“Well . . . shrieks,” he said, shrugging. “And giggling. A bit of shoving and banging, with a stool or some such falling over. If it weren’t for the yaffling, I should have thought there were thieves in the house. But I kent it was Jenny’s voice, and Ian’s, and—” He broke off, his ears going pink at the memory.
“So then . . . there was a bit more—raised voices, like—and then the crack of a belt on a bum, and the sort of skelloch ye could hear across six fields.”
He took a deep breath, shrugging.
“Well, I was taken back a bit, and couldna think what to do at once.”
I nodded, understanding that, at least.
“I expect it would be a bit of an awkward situation, yes. It . . . er . . . went on, though?”
He nodded. His ears were a deep red by now, and his face flushed, though that might only be from heat.
“Aye, it did.” He glanced at me. “Mind, Sassenach, if I’d thought he meant harm to her, I should have been up the stairs in an instant. But . . .” He brushed away an inquisitive bee, shaking his head. “There was—it felt—I canna even think how to say it. It wasna really that Jenny kept laughing, because she didna—but that I felt she wanted to. And Ian . . . well, Ian was laughing. Not out loud, I dinna mean; it was just . . . in his voice.”
He blew out his breath, and swiped his knuckles along his jaw, wiping sweat.
“I stayed quite frozen there, wi’ a bit of pie in my hand, listening. I came to myself only when the flies started lighting in my open mouth, and by that time, they’d . . . ah . . . they were . . . mmphm.” He hunched his shoulders, as though his shirt were too tight.
“Making it up, were they?” I asked very dryly.
“I expect so,” he replied, rather primly. “I left. Walked all the way to Foyne, and stayed the night with Grannie MacNab.” Foyne was a tiny hamlet, some fifteen miles from Lallybroch.
“Why?” I asked.
“Well, I had to,” he said logically. “I couldna ignore it, after all. It was either walk about and think of things, or else give in and abuse myself, and I couldna verra well do that—it was my own sister, after all.”
“You mean to say you can’t think and engage in sexual activity at the same time?” I asked, laughing.
“Of course not,” he said—thus confirming a long-held private opinion of mine—and gave me a look as though I were crazy. “Can you?”
“I can, yes.”
He raised one eyebrow, plainly unconvinced.
“Well, I’m not saying I do, always,” I admitted, “but it’s possible. Women are used to doing more than one thing at once—they have to, because of the children. Anyway, go back to Jenny and Ian. Why on earth—”
“Well, I did walk about and think of it,” Jamie admitted. “I couldna seem to stop thinking of it, to be honest. Grannie MacNab could see I’d something on my mind, and pestered me over the supper until . . . ah . . . well, until I told her about it.”
“Really. What did she say?” I asked, fascinated. I’d known Grannie MacNab, a sprightly old person with a highly forthright manner—and a lot of experience with human weakness.
“She cackled like thorns under a pot,” he said, one side of his mouth turning up. “I thought she’d fall into the fire wi’ merriment.”
Recovered to some extent, though, the old lady had wiped her eyes and explained matters to him, kindly, as though addressing a simpleton.
“She said it was because of Ian’s leg,” Jamie said, glancing at me to see