Drums of Autumn - Diana Gabaldon [367]
“But no such a surprise as you, lassie!” And a laugh of deep joy that seemed to echo in her bones.
A long ride down dusty roads, and sleeping with her head on her father’s shoulder, his free arm around her as he drove, breathing the unfamiliar scent of his skin, his strange long hair brushing her face when he turned his head.
Then the cool luxury of the big, breezy house, filled with the scent of beeswax and flowers. A tall woman with white hair and Brianna’s face, and a blue-eyed gaze that looked disconcertingly beyond her. Long cool hands that touched her face and stroked her hair with abstract curiosity.
“Lizzie,” she said, and a pretty woman bent over Lizzie, murmuring, “Jesuit bark,” her black hands beautiful against the yellow porcelain of Lizzie’s face.
Hands—so many hands. Everything was done as if by magic, with soft murmurs as they passed her from hand to hand. She was stripped and bathed before she could protest, scented water poured over her, firm, gentle fingers that massaged her scalp as lavender soap was sluiced from her hair. Linen towels and a small black girl who dried her feet and sprinkled them with rice powder.
A fresh cotton gown and floating barefoot over polished floors, to see her father’s eyes light at sight of her. Food—cakes and trifles and jellies and scones—and hot, sweet tea that seemed to replace the blood in her veins.
A pretty blond girl with a frown on her face, who seemed peculiarly familiar; her father called her Marsali. Lizzie, washed and wrapped in a blanket, both frail hands round a mug of pungent liquid, looking like a steppedon flower newly watered.
Talk, and people coming, and more talk, with only the occasional phrase penetrating through her growing fog.
“… Farquard Campbell has more sense …”
“Fergus, Da, did ye see him? Is he all right?”
Da? she thought, half puzzled, faintly indignant that someone else should call him that, because … because …
Her aunt’s voice, coming from a great distance, saying, “The poor child is asleep where she sits; I can hear her snoring. Ulysses, take her up to bed.”
And then strong arms that lifted her with no sense of strain, but not the candlewax smell of the black butler; the sawdust and linen scent of her father. She gave up the struggle and fell asleep, her head on his chest.
Fergus Fraser might sound like a Scottish clansman; he looked like a French noble. A French noble on his way to the guillotine, Brianna silently amended her first impression.
Handsomely dark, slightly built, and not very tall, he sauntered into the dock, and turned to face the room, long nose lifted an inch above the usual. The shabby clothes, the unshaven jaw, and the large purple bruise over one eye subtracted nothing from his air of aristocratic disdain. Even the curved metal hook that he wore in replacement of a missing hand only added to his impression of disreputable glamour.
Marsali gave a small sigh at sight of him, and her lips grew tight. She leaned across to Brianna to whisper to Jamie.
“What have they done to him, the bastards?”
“Nothing that matters.” He made a small motion, gesturing her back, and she subsided into her seat, glowering at bailiff and sheriff in turn.
They had been lucky to procure seats; every space in the small building was filled, and people were jostling and muttering at the back of the room, kept in order only by the presence of the red-coated soldiers who guarded the doors. Two more soldiers stood to attention at the front of the room, beside the Justice’s bench, an officer of some sort lurking in the corner behind them.
Brianna saw the officer catch Jamie Fraser’s eye, and a look of malign satisfaction crept over the man’s broad features, a look almost of gloating. It made the small hairs rise on the back of her neck, but her father met the man’s gaze squarely, then turned away, indifferent.
The Justice arrived and took