Outlander - Diana Gabaldon [203]
Jamie snorted briefly. “Well, ye dinna flatter me overmuch,” he said, “but I canna fault your observations.” He took a deep breath and leaned back, unclenching his hands. He stretched his fingers deliberately, then laid his hands flat on his knees and looked directly at me.
“What is it, then? Why are ye doing this? The girl? I’ve told ye the plain truth there. But it’s not a matter for proof. It’s a question of whether ye believe me or no. Do ye believe me?”
“Yes, I believe you,” I admitted grudgingly. “But that’s not it. Or not all of it,” I added, in an attempt at honesty. “It’s…I think it’s finding that you married me for the money you’d get.” I looked down, tracing the pattern of the quilt with my finger. “I know I’ve no right to complain—I married you for selfish reasons, too, but”—I bit my lip and swallowed to steady my voice—“but I have a small bit of pride, too, you know.”
I stole a glance at him, and found him staring at me with an expression of complete dumbfoundedness.
“Money?” he said blankly.
“Yes, money!” I blazed, angered at his pretense of ignorance. “When we came back, you couldn’t wait to tell Colum you were married and collect your share of the MacKenzie rents!”
He stared at me for a moment longer, mouth opening gradually as though to say something. Instead, he began to shake his head slowly back and forth, and then began to laugh. He threw his head back and roared, in fact, then sank his head between his hands, still laughing hysterically. I flung myself back on the pillows in indignation. Funny, was it?
Still shaking his head and wheezing intermittently, he stood up and set hands to the buckle of his belt. I flinched involuntarily as he did so, and he saw it.
Face still flushed with a mixture of anger and laughter, he looked down at me in total exasperation. “No,” he said dryly, “I dinna mean to beat you. I gave ye my word I’d not do so again—though I didna think I’d regret it quite so soon.” He laid the belt aside, groping in the sporran attached to it.
“My share of the MacKenzie rents comes to about twenty pounds a quarter, Sassenach,” he said, digging through the oddments inside the badgerskin. “And that’s Scots, not sterling. About the price of half a cow.”
“That’s…that’s all?” I said stupidly. “But—”
“That’s all,” he confirmed. “And all I ever will have from the MacKenzies. Ye’ll have noticed Dougal’s a thrifty man, and Colum’s twice as tight-fisted wi’ his coin. But even the princely sum of twenty pound a quarter is hardly worth marrying to get, I should think,” he added sarcastically, eyeing me.
“I wouldna have asked for it straight away, at that,” he added, bringing out a small paper-wrapped parcel, “but there was something I wanted to buy with it. That’s where my errand took me; meeting Laoghaire was an accident.”
“And what did you want to buy so much?” I asked suspiciously.
He sighed and hesitated for a moment, then tossed the small package lightly into my lap.
“A wedding ring, Sassenach,” he said. “I got it from Ewen the armorer; he makes such things in his own time.”
“Oh,” I said in a small voice.
“Go ahead,” he said, a moment later. “Open it. It’s yours.”
The outlines of the little package blurred under my fingers. I blinked and sniffed, but made no move to open it. “I’m sorry,” I said.
“Well, so ye should be, Sassenach,” he said, but his voice was no longer angry. Reaching, he took the package from my lap and tore away the wrapping, revealing a wide silver band, decorated in the Highland interlace style, a small and delicate Jacobean thistle bloom carved in the center of each link.
So much I saw, and then my eyes blurred again.
I found a handkerchief thrust into my hand, and did my best to stanch the flow with it. “It’s…beautiful,” I said, clearing my throat and dabbling at my eyes.
“Will ye wear it, Claire?” His voice was gentle now, and his use of my name, mostly reserved for occasions of formality or tenderness, nearly