Dragonfly in Amber - Diana Gabaldon [261]
“Jenny’s gone daft wi’ cleaning and cooking,” he said, still smiling at me. “You’ll be lucky to have a bed to sleep in tonight; she’s got all the mattresses outside, being beaten.”
“After three nights in the heather, I wouldn’t mind sleeping on the floor,” I assured him. “Are Jenny and the children all well?”
“Oh, aye. She’s breeding again,” he added. “Due in February.”
“Again?” Jamie and I spoke together, and a rich blush rose in Ian’s lean cheeks.
“God, man, wee Maggie’s less than a year old,” Jamie said, with a censorious cock of one brow. “Have ye no sense of restraint?”
“Me?” Ian said indignantly. “Ye think I had anything to do with it?”
“Well, if ye didn’t, I should think ye’d be interested in who did,” Jamie said, the corner of his mouth twitching.
The blush deepened to a rich rose color, contrasting nicely with Ian’s smooth brown hair. “Ye know damn well what I mean,” he said. “I slept on the trundle bed wi’ Young Jamie for two months, but then Jenny…”
“Oh, you’re saying my sister’s a wanton, eh?”
“I’m saying she’s as stubborn as her brother when it comes to getting what she wants,” Ian said. He feinted to one side, dodged neatly back and landed a blow in the pit of Jamie’s stomach. Jamie doubled over, laughing.
“Just as well I’ve come home, then,” he said. “I’ll help ye keep her under control.”
“Oh, aye?” Ian said skeptically. “I’ll call all the tenants to watch.”
“Lost a few sheep, have ye?” Jamie changed the subject with a gesture that took in the dogs and Ian’s long crook, dropped in the dust of the roadway.
“Fifteen yows and a ram,” Ian said, nodding. “Jenny’s own flock of merinos, that she keeps for the special wool. The ram’s a right bastard; broke down the gate. I thought they might have been in the grain up here, but nay sign o’ them.”
“We didn’t see them up above,” I said.
“Oh, they wouldna be up there,” Ian said, waving a dismissive hand. “None o’ the beasts will go past the cottage.”
“Cottage?” Fergus, growing impatient with this exchange of civilities, had kicked his mount up alongside mine. “I saw no cottage, milord. Only a pile of stones.”
“That’s all that’s left of MacNab’s cottage, laddie,” said Ian. He squinted up at Fergus, silhouetted against the late afternoon sun. “And ye’d be well-advised to keep away from there yourself.”
The hair prickled on the back of my neck, despite the heat of the day. Ronald MacNab was the tenant who had betrayed Jamie to the men of the Watch a year before, the man who had died for his treachery within a day of its being found out. Died, I remembered, among the ashes of his home, burned over his head by the men of Lallybroch. The pile of chimneystones, so innocent when we had passed them a moment ago, had now the grim look of a cairn. I swallowed, forcing back the bitter taste that rose at the back of my throat.
“MacNab?” Jamie said softly. His expression was at once alert. “Ronnie MacNab?”
I had told Jamie of MacNab’s betrayal, and his death, but I hadn’t told him the means of it.
Ian nodded. “Aye. He died there, the night the English took ye, Jamie. The thatch must ha’ caught from a spark, and him too far gone in drink to get out in time.” He met Jamie’s eyes straight on, all teasing gone.
“Ah? And his wife and child?” Jamie’s look was the same as Ian’s; cool and inscrutable.
“Safe. Mary MacNab’s kitchen-maid at the house, and Rabbie works in the stables.” Ian glanced involuntarily over his shoulder in the direction of the ruined cottage. “Mary comes up here now and again; she’s the only one on the place will go there.”
“Was she fond of him, then?” Jamie had turned to look in the direction of the cottage, so his face was hidden from me, but there was tension in the line of his back.
Ian shrugged. “I shouldna think so. A drunkard, and vicious with it, was Ronnie; not even his auld mother had much use for him. No, I think Mary feels it her duty to pray for his soul—much good it’ll do him,” he added.
“Ah.” Jamie paused a moment as though