The Fiery Cross - Diana Gabaldon [100]
“I baptize thee, Joan Laoghaire Claire Fraser,” he said, following Marsali’s lead, and I glanced at Marsali, startled. I knew she was called Joan for Marsali’s younger sister, but I hadn’t known what the baby’s other names would be. I felt a small lump in my throat, watching Marsali’s shawled head bent over the child. Both her sister and her mother, Laoghaire, were in Scotland; the chances of either ever seeing this tiny namesake were vanishingly small.
Suddenly, Joan’s slanted eyes popped wide open and so did her mouth. She let out a piercing shriek, and everyone started as though a bomb had exploded in our midst.
“Go in peace, to serve the Lord! And go fast!” Father Kenneth said, his fingers already nimbly corking up bottle and flask, frantically whisking away all traces of the ceremony. Down the path, I could hear voices raised in puzzled question.
Marsali was out the tent flap in a flash, the squalling Joan against her breast, a protesting Germain clutched by the hand. Bree paused just long enough to put a hand behind Father Kenneth’s head and kiss him on the forehead.
“Thank you, Father,” she whispered, and was gone in a flurry of skirts and petticoats.
Jamie had me by the arm and was hustling me out of the tent as well, but stopped for a half-second at the door, turning back.
“Father?” he called in a whisper. “Pax vobiscum!”
Father Kenneth had already seated himself behind the table, hands folded, the accusing sheets of blank paper spread out once more before him. He looked up, smiling slightly, and his face was perfectly at peace in the lamplight, black eye and all.
“Et cum spiritu tuo, man,” he said, and raised three fingers in parting benediction.
“WHAT ON EARTH did you do that for?” Brianna’s whisper floated back to me, loud with annoyance. She and Marsali were only a few feet in front of us, going slowly because of the children, but close as they were, the girls’ shawled and bunchy shapes were scarcely distinguishable from the bushes overgrowing the path.
“Do what? Leave that, Germain; let’s find Papa, shall we? No, don’t put it in your mouth!”
“You pinched Joanie—I saw you! You could have got us all caught!”
“But I had to!” Marsali sounded surprised at the accusation. “And it wouldna have mattered, really—the christening was done by then. They couldna make Father Kenneth take it back, now, could they?” She giggled slightly at the thought, then broke off. “Germain, I said drop it!”
“What do you mean, you had to? Let go, Jem, that’s my hair! Ow! Let go, I said!”
Jemmy was evidently now wide awake, interested in the novel surroundings, and wanting to explore them, judging from his repeated exclamations of “Argl!” punctuated by the occasional curious “Gleb?”
“Why, she was asleep!” Marsali said, sounding scandalized. “She didna wake when Father Kenneth poured the water—I mean the whisky—on her head—Germain, come back here! Thig air ais a seo!—and ye ken it’s ill luck for a child not to make a wee skelloch when it’s baptized; that’s how ye ken as the original sin is leaving it! I couldna let the diabhol stay in my wee lassie. Could I, mo mhaorine?” There were small kissing noises, and a faint coo from Joanie, promptly drowned by Germain, who had started to sing again.
Bree gave a small snort of amusement, her irritation fading.
“Oh, I see. Well, as long as you had a good reason. Though I’m not so sure it worked on Jemmy and Germain. Look at the way they’re acting—I’d swear they were possessed. Ow! Don’t bite me, you little fiend, I’ll feed you in a minute!”
“Och, well, they’re boys, after all,” Marsali said tolerantly, raising her voice slightly to be heard above the racket. “Everyone kens that boys are full o’ the devil; I suppose it would take more than a bit of holy water to drown it all, even if it was ninety-proof. Germain! Where did ye hear such a filthy song, ye wee ratten?”
I smiled, and next to me, Jamie laughed quietly, listening to the girls’ conversation. We were far enough from the scene of the crime by now not to worry about being heard, among the snatches of song, fiddle