Dragonfly in Amber - Diana Gabaldon [362]
“English, French, Dutch, or German. It isna like to make much difference; it’ll be the lad’s liver the Old Fox will be eatin’ for breakfast, not yours.”
“What do you mean by that?” I stared at the dour little clansman, looking much like one of his own bundles, under the loose wrapping of plaid and shirt. Somehow every garment that Murtagh put on, no matter how new or how well tailored, immediately assumed the appearance of something narrowly salvaged from a rubbish heap.
“What kind of terms is Jamie on with Lord Lovat?”
I caught a sidelong glance from a small, shrewd black eye, and then his head turned toward Beaufort Castle. He shrugged, in resignation or anticipation.
“No terms at all, ’til now. The lad’s never spoken to his grandsire in his life.”
* * *
“But how do you know so much about him if you’ve never met him?”
At least I was beginning to understand Jamie’s earlier reluctance to approach his grandfather for help. Reunited with Jamie and his horse, the latter looking rather chastened, and the former irritable to a degree, Murtagh had gazed speculatively at him, and offered to ride ahead to Beaufort with the pack animal, leaving Jamie and me to enjoy lunch at the side of the road.
Over a restorative ale and oatcake, he had at length told me that his grandfather, Lord Lovat, had not approved of his son’s choice of bride, and had not seen fit either to bless the union or to communicate with his son—or his son’s children—anytime since the marriage of Brian Fraser and Ellen MacKenzie, more than thirty years before.
“I’ve heard a good bit about him, one way and another, though.” Jamie replied, chewing a bite of cheese. “He’s the sort of man that makes an impression on folk, ye ken.”
“So I gather.” The elderly Tullibardine, one of the Parisian Jacobites, had regaled me with a number of uncensored opinions regarding the leader of clan Fraser, and I thought that perhaps Brian Fraser had not been desolated at his father’s inattention. I said as much, and Jamie nodded.
“Oh, aye. I canna recall my father having much good to say of the old man, though he wouldna be disrespectful of him. He just didna speak of him often.” He rubbed at the side of his neck, where a red welt from the deerfly bite was beginning to show. The weather was freakishly warm, and he had unfolded his plaid for me to sit on. The deputation to the head of clan Fraser had been thought worth some investment in dignity, and Jamie wore a new kilt, of the buckled military cut, with the plaid a separate strip of cloth. Less enveloping for shelter from the weather than the older, belted plaid, it was a good deal more efficient to put on in a hurry.
“I wondered a bit,” he said thoughtfully, “whether my father was the sort of father he was because of the way old Simon treated him. I didna realize it at the time, of course, but it’s no so common for a man to show his feelings for his sons.”
“You’ve thought about it a lot.” I offered him another flask of ale, and he took it with a smile that lingered on me, more warming than the feeble autumn sun.
“Aye, I did. I was wondering, ye see, what sort of father I’d be to my own bairns, and looking back a bit to see, my own father being the best example I had. Yet I knew, from the bits that he said, or that Murtagh told me, that his own father was nothing like him, so I thought as how he must have made up his mind to do it all differently, once he had the chance.”
I sighed a bit, setting down my bit of cheese.
“Jamie,” I said. “Do you really think we’ll ever—”
“I do,” he said, with certainty, not letting me finish. He leaned over and kissed my forehead. “I know it, Sassenach, and so do you. You were meant to be a mother, and I surely dinna intend to let anyone else father your children.”
“Well, that’s good,” I said. “Neither do I.”
He laughed and tilted my chin up to kiss my lips. I kissed him back, then reached up to brush away a breadcrumb that clung to the stubble