The Fiery Cross - Diana Gabaldon [552]
I thought Marsali must be seriously worried; she seldom mentioned her mother in my hearing, out of a natural sense of tact. For once, though, bloody Laoghaire was right; beef tea would be an excellent thing—if we happened to have any fresh beef, which we didn’t.
“Honey water,” I said briefly, shooing her out of the room. I went to fetch reinforcements from the leech department, pausing to check on Brianna’s progress through the front window.
She was out by the paddock, barefoot, skirts kilted up above the knee, shaking bits of horse dung from one foot. No luck so far, then. She saw me at the window and waved, then motioned to the ax that stood nearby, then to the edge of the wood. I nodded and waved back; a rotted log might be a possibility.
Jemmy was on the ground nearby, his leading-strings securely tied to the paddock fence. He certainly didn’t need them to help him stay upright, but they did keep him from escaping while his mother was busy. He was industriously engaged in pulling down the remains of a dried gourd-vine that had grown up over the fence, crowing with delight as bits of crumbled leaf and the dried remains of frostbitten gourds showered over his flaming hair. His round face bore a look of determined intent, as he set about the task of getting a gourd the size of his head into his mouth.
A movement caught the corner of my eye; Marsali, bringing up water from the spring, to fill the crusted cauldron. No, she wasn’t showing at all yet—Jamie was right, she was much too thin—but now that I knew, I could see the pallor in her face, and the shadows under her eyes.
Damn. Another glimpse of movement; Bree’s long pale legs, flashing under her kilted skirts in the shadow of the big blue spruce. And was she using the tansy oil? She was still nursing Jemmy, but that was no guarantee, not at his age . . .
I swung around at a sound behind me, to find Jamie climbing slowly back into his nest of quilts, looking like a great crimson sloth, my amputation saw in one hand.
“What the hell are you doing?”
He eased himself down, grimacing, and lay back on the pillow, breathing in long, deep gasps. The folded saw was clasped to his chest.
“I repeat,” I said, standing menacingly over him, hands on my hips, “what the hell . . .”
He opened his eyes and lifted the saw an inch or so.
“No,” he said positively. “I ken what ye’re thinking, Sassenach, and I willna have it.”
I took a deep breath, to keep my voice from quivering.
“You know I wouldn’t, not unless I absolutely had to.”
“No,” he said again, and gave me a familiar look of obstinacy. No surprise at all that he never wondered who Jemmy looked like, I thought with sour amusement.
“You don’t know what may happen—”
“I ken what’s happening to my leg better than you do, Sassenach,” he interrupted, then paused to breathe some more. “I dinna care.”
“Maybe you don’t, but I do!”
“I’m no going to die,” he said firmly, “and I dinna wish to live with half a leg. I’ve a horror of it.”
“Well, I’m not very keen on it myself. But if it’s a choice between your leg and your life?”
“It’s not.”
“It damn well may be!”
“It won’t.” Age made not the slightest difference, I thought. Two years or fifty, a Fraser was a Fraser, and no rock was more stubborn. I rubbed a hand through my hair.
“All. Right,” I said, between clenched teeth. “Give me the bloody thing and I’ll put it away.”
“Your word.”
“My what?” I stared at him.
“Your word,” he repeated, giving me back the stare, with interest. “I may be fevered and lose my wits. I dinna want ye to take my leg if I’m in no state to stop it.”
“If you’re in that sort of state, I’ll have no choice!”
“Perhaps ye don’t,” he said evenly, “but I do. I’ve made it. Your word, Sassenach.”
“You bloody, unspeakable, infuriating—”
His smile was startling, a white grin in the ruddy face. “If ye call me a Scot, Sassenach, then I know I’m going to live.”
A shriek from outside kept me from answering. I swung round to the window, in time to see Marsali drop two pails of water on the ground. The water geysered