The Fiery Cross - Diana Gabaldon [156]
Marsali gave a small pfft! of irritated amusement and slapped at his hand, and no more was said about Gerhard Mueller.
I lifted the heavy crock of headcheese and set it down by the door of the smokeshed, so as not to forget it when I went back to the house. I wondered whether Gerhard’s son Frederick had come with him—likely so; the boy was less than twenty, not an age willing to be left out of anything that promised excitement. It was Frederick’s young wife Petronella and her baby who had died—of measles, though Gerhard had thought the infection a deliberate curse put on his family by the Tuscarora.
Had Frederick found a new wife yet? I wondered. Very likely. Though if not . . . there were two teenaged girls among the new tenants. Perhaps Jamie’s plans involved finding them fast husbands? And then there was Lizzie . . .
The corncrib was more than three-quarters full, though there were worrying quantities of mouse droppings on the ground outside. Adso was growing rapidly, but perhaps not fast enough; he was just about the size of an average rat. Flour—that was a little low, only eight sacks. There might be more at the mill, though; I must ask Jamie.
Sacks of rice and dried beans, bushels of hickory nuts, butternuts, and black walnuts. Heaps of dried squash, burlap bag of oatmeal and cornmeal, and gallon upon gallon of apple cider and cider vinegar. A crock of salted butter, another of fresh, and a basket of spherical goat cheeses, for which I had traded a bushel of blackberries and another of wild currants. The rest of the berries had been carefully dried, along with the wild grapes, or made up into jam or preserve, and were presently hidden in the pantry, safe—I hoped—from childish depredations.
The honey. I stopped, pursing my lips. I had nearly twenty gallons of purified honey, and four large stone jars of honeycomb, gleaned from my hives and waiting to be rendered and made into beeswax candles. It was all kept in the walled cave that served as stable, in order to keep safe from bears. It wasn’t safe from the children who had been deputed to feed the cows and pigs in the stable, though. I hadn’t seen any telltale sticky fingers or faces yet, but it might be as well to take some preventative steps.
Between meat, grain, and the small dairy, it looked as though no one would starve this winter. My concern now was the lesser but still important threat of vitamin deficiency. I glanced at the chestnut grove, its branches now completely bare. It would be a good four months before we saw much of fresh greenery, though I did have plenty of turnips and cabbage still in the ground.
The root cellar was reassuringly well-stocked, heady with the earthy smell of potatoes, the tang of onions and garlic, and the wholesome, bland scent of turnips. Two large barrels of apples stood at the back—with the prints of several sets of childish feet leading up to them, I saw.
I glanced up. Enormous clusters of wild scuppernong grapes had been hung from the rafters, drying slowly into raisins. They were still there, but the lower, more reachable bunches had been reduced to sprays of bare stems. Perhaps I needn’t worry about outbreaks of scurvy, then.
I wandered back toward the house, trying to calculate how many provisions should be sent with Jamie and his militia, how much left for the consumption of the wives and children. Impossible to say; that would depend in part on how many men he raised, and on what they might bring with them. He was appointed Colonel, though; the responsibility of feeding the men of his regiment would be primarily his, with reimbursement—if it ever came—to be paid later by appropriation of the Assembly.
Not for the first time, I wished heartily that I knew more. How long might the Assembly be a functional body?
Brianna was out by the well, walking round and round it with a meditative look furrowing her brows.
“Pipe,” she said, without