A Breath of Snow and Ashes - Diana Gabaldon [499]
“Either the real father is someone she doesn’t want to marry—for whatever reason—or she’s decided to try to get hold of your father’s money or property, by getting him to settle a sum on her or, failing that, on the child.”
“Or both. I mean, she doesn’t want to marry whoever it is, and wants Da’s money—not that he has any.”
“Or both,” he agreed.
They ate in silence for a few minutes, forks scraping on the wooden plates, each absorbed in thought. Jem had spent the night at the Big House; in the wake of Lizzie’s marriage, Roger had suggested that Amy McCallum take over Lizzie’s work as housemaid, and since she and Aidan had moved in, Jem spent even more time over there, finding solace for the loss of Germain in Aidan’s companionship.
“It isn’t true,” she repeated stubbornly. “Da simply wouldn’t . . .” But he saw the faint doubt at the back of her eyes—and a slight glaze of panic at the thought.
“No, he wouldn’t,” he said firmly. “Brianna—you can’t possibly think there’s any truth to it?”
“No, of course not!” But she spoke too loudly, too definitely. He laid down his fork and looked at her levelly.
“What’s the matter? Do ye know something?”
“Nothing.” She chased the last bite of pancake round her plate, speared and ate it.
He made a skeptical sound, and she frowned at the sticky puddle left on her plate. She always poured too much honey or syrup; he, more sparing, always ended with a clean plate.
“I don’t,” she said. She bit her lower lip, though, and put the tip of her finger into the puddle of syrup. “It’s only . . .”
“What?”
“Not Da,” she said slowly. She put the tip of her finger in her mouth and sucked the syrup off. “And I don’t know for sure about Daddy. It’s only—looking back at things I didn’t understand at the time—now I see—” She stopped abruptly, and closed her eyes, then opened them, fixing him directly.
“I was looking through his wallet one day. Not snooping, just having fun, taking all the cards and things out and putting them back. There was a note tucked away, between the dollar bills. It was asking him to meet somebody for lunch—”
“Innocent enough.”
“It started out with Darling—, and it wasn’t my mother’s handwriting,” she said tersely.
“Ah,” he said, and after a moment, “how old were you?”
“Eleven.” She drew small patterns on the plate with the tip of her finger. “I just put the note back and kind of blotted it out of my mind. I didn’t want to think about it—and I don’t think I ever did, from that day to this. There were a few other things, things I saw and didn’t understand—it was mostly the way things were between them, my parents . . . Every now and then, something would happen, and I never knew what, but I always knew something was really wrong.”
She trailed off, sighed deeply, and wiped her finger on her napkin.
“Bree,” he said gently. “Jamie’s an honorable man, and he loves your mother deeply.”
“Well, see, that’s the thing,” she said softly. “I would have sworn Daddy was, too. And did.”
IT WASN’T IMPOSSIBLE. The thought kept returning, to niggle Roger uncomfortably, like a pebble in his shoe. Jamie Fraser was an honorable man, he was deeply uxorious—and he had been in the depths of despair and exhaustion during Claire’s illness. Roger had feared for him nearly as much as for Claire; he’d gone hollow-eyed and grim-jawed through the hot, endless days of reeking death, not eating, not sleeping, held together by nothing more than will.
Roger had tried to speak to him then, of God and eternity, reconcile him with what seemed the inevitable, only to be repulsed with a hot-eyed fury at the mere idea that God might think to take his wife—this followed by complete despair as Claire lapsed into a stupor near death. It wasn’t impossible that the offer of a moment’s physical comfort, made in that void of desolation, had gone further than either party intended.
But it was early May now, and Malva