Dragonfly in Amber - Diana Gabaldon [367]
He swallowed hard; I could see the ripple in his throat.
“I should ha’ told ye before,” he said stiffly. “I’m sorry.”
I reached out to touch his arm; it was hard as iron.
“It doesn’t matter, Jamie,” I said, knowing even as I spoke that nothing I said could make a difference. “I don’t mind in the slightest.”
“Aye?” he said at last, still staring straight ahead. “Well…I do.”
* * *
The steadily freshening wind off Moray Firth rustled its way through a hillside of dark pines. The country here was an odd combination of mountain slope and seashore. Thick growth of alders, larch, and birch blanketed the ground on both sides of the narrow track we followed, but as we approached the dark bulk of Beaufort Castle, over everything floated the effluvium of mud flats and kelp.
We were in fact expected; the kilted, ax-armed sentries at the gate made no challenge as we rode through. They looked at us curiously enough, but seemingly without enmity. Jamie sat straight as a king in his saddle. He nodded once to the man on his side, and received a similar nod in return. I had the distinct feeling that we entered the castle flying a white flag of truce; how long that state would last was anyone’s guess.
We rode unchallenged into the courtyard of Beaufort Castle, a small edifice as castles went, but sufficiently imposing, for all that, built of the native stone. Not so heavily fortified as some of the castles I had seen to the south, it looked still capable of withstanding a certain amount of abrasion. Wide-mouthed gun-holes gaped at intervals along the base of the outer walls, and the keep still boasted a stable opening onto the courtyard.
Several of the small Highland ponies were housed in this, heads poking over the wooden half-door to whicker in welcome to our own mounts. Near the wall lay a number of packs, recently unloaded from the ponies in the stable.
“Lovat’s summoned a few men to meet us,” Jamie observed grimly, noting the packs. “Relatives, I expect.” He shrugged. “At least they’ll be friendly enough to start with.”
“How do you know?”
He slid to the ground and reached up to help me down.
“They’ve left the broadswords wi’ the luggage.”
Jamie handed over the reins to an ostler who came out of the stables to meet us, dusting his hands on his breeks.
“Er, now what?” I murmured to Jamie under my breath. There was no sign of chatelaine or majordomo; nothing like the cheery, authoritative figure of Mrs. FitzGibbons that had welcomed us to Castle Leoch two years before.
The few ostlers and stable-lads about glanced at us now and then, but continued about their tasks, as did the servants who crossed the courtyard, lugging baskets of laundry, bundles of peat, and all the other cumbrous paraphernalia that living in a stone castle demanded. I looked approvingly after a burly manservant sweating under the burden of two five-gallon copper cans of water. Whatever its shortcomings in the hospitality department, Beaufort Castle at least boasted a bathtub somewhere.
Jamie stood in the center of the courtyard, arms crossed, surveying the place like a prospective buyer of real estate who harbors black doubts about the drains.
“Now we wait, Sassenach,” he said. “The sentries will ha’ sent word that we’re here. Either someone will come down to us…or they won’t.”
“Um,” I said. “Well, I hope they make up their minds about it soon; I’m hungry, and I could do with a wash.”
“Aye, ye could,” Jamie agreed, with a brief smile as he looked me over. “You’ve a smut on your nose, and there’s teasel-heads caught in your hair. No, leave them,” he added, as my hand went to my head in dismay. “It looks bonny, did ye do it on purpose or no.”
Definitely no, but I left them. Still, I sidled over to a nearby watering trough, to inspect my appearance and remedy it so far as was possible using nothing but cold water.
It was something of a delicate situation, so far as old Simon Fraser was concerned, I thought, bending over the trough and trying to make out which blotches on my reflected complexion were actual smudges