Dragonfly in Amber - Diana Gabaldon [40]
“That’s quite a coincidence,” Roger said. His eyes were alert, fixed on mine.
“Well, it was and it wasn’t,” I told him, wrenching my eyes with an effort from the stack of books. “You know he was Frank’s ancestor. All the men in that family have a strong family resemblance—physically, at least,” I added, thinking of the rather striking nonphysical differences.
“What—what was he like?” Brianna seemed to be coming out of her stupor, at least slightly.
“He was a bloody filthy pervert,” I said. Two pairs of eyes snapped open wide and turned to each other with an identical look of consternation.
“You needn’t look like that,” I said. “They had perversion in the eighteenth century; it isn’t anything new, you know. Only it was worse then, maybe, since no one really cared, so long as things were kept quiet and decent on the surface. And Black Jack Randall was a soldier; he captained a garrison in the Highlands, charged with keeping the clans under control—he had considerable scope for his activities, all officially sanctioned.” I took a restorative gulp from the whisky glass I still held.
“He liked to hurt people,” I said. “He liked it a lot.”
“Did he…hurt you?” Roger put the question with some delicacy, after a rather noticeable pause. Bree seemed to be drawing into herself, the skin tightening across her cheekbones.
“Not directly. Or not much, at least.” I shook my head. I could feel a cold spot in the pit of my stomach, which the whisky was doing little to thaw. Jack Randall had hit me there, once. I felt it in memory, like the ache of a long-healed wound.
“He had fairly eclectic tastes. But it was Jamie that he.…wanted.” Under no circumstances would I have used the word “loved.” My throat felt thick, and I swallowed the last drops of whisky. Roger held up the decanter, one brow raised questioningly, and I nodded and held out my glass.
“Jamie. That’s Jamie Fraser? And he was…”
“He was my husband,” I said.
Brianna shook her head like a horse driving off flies.
“But you had a husband,” she said. “You couldn’t…even if…I mean…you couldn’t.”
“I had to,” I said flatly. “I didn’t do it on purpose, after all.”
“Mother, you can’t get married accidentally!” Brianna was losing her kindly-nurse-with-mental-patient attitude. I thought this was probably a good thing, even if the alternative was anger.
“Well, it wasn’t precisely an accident,” I said. “It was the best alternative to being handed over to Jack Randall, though. Jamie married me to protect me—and bloody generous of him, too,” I finished, glaring at Bree over my glass. “He didn’t have to do it, but he did.”
I fought back the memory of our wedding night. He was a virgin; his hands had trembled when he touched me. I had been afraid too—with better reason. And then in the dawn he had held me, naked back against bare chest, his thighs warm and strong behind my own, murmuring into the clouds of my hair, “Dinna be afraid. There’s the two of us now.”
“See,” I turned to Roger again, “I couldn’t get back. I was running away from Captain Randall when the Scots found me. A party of cattle-raiders. Jamie was with them, they were his mother’s people, the MacKenzies of Leoch. They didn’t know what to make of me, but they took me with them as a captive. And I couldn’t get away again.”
I remembered my abortive efforts to escape from Castle Leoch. And then the day when I had told Jamie the truth, and he—not believing, any more than Frank had, but at least willing to act as though he did—had taken me back to the hill and the stones.
“He thought I was a witch, perhaps,” I said, eyes closed, smiling just a bit at the thought. “Now they think you’re mad; then they thought you were a witch. Cultural mores,” I explained, opening my eyes. “Psychology is just what they call it these days instead of magic. Not the hell of a lot of difference.” Roger nodded, seeming a little stunned.
“They tried me for witchcraft,” I said. “In the village of Cranesmuir,