Drums of Autumn - Diana Gabaldon [413]
“Why a double door?” she had asked. It seemed excessive labor; an unnecessary refinement for such a crude structure.
“Ye must give the beasts a place to look out,” her father had explained, showing her where to smooth the leather strap hinges tight around the curve of the wood. He picked up the hammer to tack down the leather and smiled at her, kneeling over the half-made gate. “Keeps them happy, aye?”
She didn’t know if the animals were happy in the stable, but she was; cool and shadowy, smelling pungently of cut straw and the droppings of grass-fed animals, it was a peaceful refuge during the day, when its inhabitants were out grazing in the meadow. In bad weather or at night, the little stockade was a pocket of coziness; once she had passed near enough after dark to see the soft, misty exhalations of the animals drifting through the gap between wood and rock, as though the earth itself were breathing through pursed lips, warmly asleep in the autumn cold.
It was cold tonight, the stars sharp as needle points in the hard, clear air. It was only five minutes’ walk from the house, but Brianna was shivering under her cloak by the time she reached the stable. The light spilling out came not only from a hanging lantern, she saw, but also from a small makeshift brazier in the corner, providing heat and light for the vigil within.
Her father lay curled up on a bed of straw, his plaid drawn over him, within arm’s reach of the small brindled cow. The heifer lay on her chest, feet tucked to the side, grunting now and then, a look of mild concentration on her broad white face.
His head lifted abruptly at the sound of her step on the gravel, and his hand went by reflex to his belt, under his plaid.
“It’s me,” she said, and saw him relax as she came into the light. He swung his feet to the side and sat up, rubbing a hand over his face as she came in, carefully latching the lower gate behind her.
“Your mother’s not back yet?” She was clearly alone, but he glanced briefly over her shoulder as though hoping to see Claire materialize out of the darkness.
Brianna shook her head. Claire had gone with Lizzie as escort to attend a birth at one of the farms at the far side of the cove; if the child hadn’t arrived before sunset, they would stay the night at the Lachlans’.
“No. She said if she wasn’t back, I was to bring you up some supper, though.” She knelt and began to unpack the small basket she had brought, laying out small loaves of bread stuffed with cheese and tomato-pickle, a dried-apple tart, and two stone bottles—one of hot vegetable broth, the other of cider.
“That’s kind, lassie.” He smiled at her and picked up one of the bottles. “Will ye have eaten yet, yourself?”
“Oh, yes,” she assured him. “Plenty.” She had eaten, but couldn’t resist a quick look of longing at the fresh rolls; the early faint sense of malaise had left her, replaced by an appetite mildly alarming in its intensity.
He saw her glance, and with a smile, drew his dirk and sliced one of the rolls in half, handing her the bigger piece.
They munched companionably for a few moments, sitting side by side on the straw, the silence broken only by soft snuffles and grunts from the stable’s other inhabitants. The far end of the stable was fenced off to provide a pen for the gigantic sow and her new brood of piglets; Brianna could just make them out in the gloom—a row of plump bodies packed in the straw, prophetically sausage-shaped.
The rest of the small space was divided into three rough stalls. One belonged to the red cow, Magdalen, who lay in the straw peacefully chewing her cud, her month-old calf curled in sleep against her massive chest. The second stall was empty, filled with fresh straw, ready for the brindled cow and her tardy calf. The third stall held Ian’s mare, sides glossy and bulging with the weight