Drums of Autumn - Diana Gabaldon [253]
I knew it didn’t matter who it was—there were several of them. The only important thing was that She was not me. And I would lie awake and clench my fists, the marks of my nails a small crucifixion.
The murmur of conversation by the fire had mostly ceased; the only sound the small click of the chessmen as they moved.
“Do you feel yourself content?” Lord John asked suddenly.
Jamie paused for a moment.
“I have all that man could want,” he said quietly. “A place, and honorable work. My wife at my side. The knowledge that my son is safe and well cared for.” He looked up then, at Grey. “And a good friend.” He reached over, clasped Lord John’s hand, and let it go. “I want no more.”
I shut my eyes resolutely, and began to count sheep.
I was awakened just before dawn by Ian, crouching by my bedside.
“Auntie,” he said softly, a hand on my shoulder. “Best ye come; the man in the corncrib’s verra poorly.”
I was on my feet by reflex, wrapped in my cloak and moving bare-footed after Ian before my mind had even begun to function consciously. Not that any great diagnostic skill was needed; I could hear the deep, rattling respirations from ten feet away.
The Earl hovered by the doorway, his thin face pale and scared in the gray light.
“Go away,” I told him sharply. “You mustn’t be near him; nor you, Ian—the two of you go to the house, fetch me hot water from the cauldron, my box, and clean rags.”
Willie moved at once, eager to be away from the frightening sounds coming from the shed. Ian lingered, though, his face troubled.
“I dinna think ye can help him, Auntie,” he said quietly. His eyes met mine straight on, with an adult depth of understanding.
“Very likely not,” I said, answering him in the same terms. “But I can’t do nothing.”
He took a deep breath, nodded.
“Aye. But I think …” He hesitated, then went on as I nodded, “I think ye shouldna torment him wi’ medicine. He’s fixed to die, Auntie; we heard an owl in the night—he will have heard it, too. It is a sign of death to them.”
I glanced at the dark oblong of the door, biting my lip. The breaths were shallow and wheezing, with alarmingly long pauses between them. I looked back at Ian.
“What do the Indians do, when someone is dying? Do you know?”
“Sing,” he said promptly. “The shaman puts paint upon her face, and sings the soul away to safety, so the demons dinna take it.”
I hesitated, my instincts to do something at war with my conviction that action would be futile. Had I any right to deprive this man of peace in his dying? Worse, to alarm him into fear that his soul would be lost by my interference?
Ian hadn’t waited for the results of my dithering. He stooped and scraped up a small clot of earth, spat in it and stirred it to mud. Without comment, he dipped his forefinger into the puddle, and drew a line from my forehead down the bridge of my nose.
“Ian!”
“Shh,” he murmured, frowning in concentration. “Like this, I think.” He added two lines across each cheekbone, and a rough zigzag down the left side of my jawbone. “That’s as near as I remember the proper way of it. I’ve only seen it the once, and from a distance.”
“Ian, this isn’t—”
“Shhh,” he said again, laying a hand on my arm to quell protest. “Go to him, Auntie. Ye willna frighten him; he’s accustomed to ye, no?”
I rubbed away a drip from the end of my nose, feeling thoroughly idiotic. There was no time to argue, though. Ian gave me a small push, and I turned to the door. I stepped into the darkness of the corncrib, bent and laid a hand on the man. His skin was hot and dry, his hand limp as worn leather.
“Ian, can you talk to him? Say his name, tell him it’s all right?”
“Ye must not say his name, Auntie; it will call demons.”
Ian cleared his throat, and said a few words in soft clicking gutterals. The hand in mine twitched slightly. My eyes had adjusted now, I could see the man’s face, marked with a faint look of surprise as