The Fiery Cross - Diana Gabaldon [658]
Kenny Lindsay had asked Roger to chant the caithris for Rosamund; the formal Gaelic lament for the dead. “She wasna Scots,” Kenny had said, wiping eyes bleared from tears and a long night’s watching. “Nor even God-fearin’. But she was that fond o’ singin’, and she fair admired your way o’ it, MacKenzie.”
Roger had never done a caithris before; I knew he had never heard one. “Dinna fash,” Jamie had murmured to him, hand on his arm, “all ye need to be is loud.” Roger had bent his head gravely in acquiescence, and went with Jamie and Kenneth, to drink whisky by the malting floor and learn what he could of Rosamund’s life, the better to lament her passing.
The hoarse chant vanished; the wind had shifted. It was a freak of the storm that we had heard them so soon—they would be headed down the Ridge now, to collect mourners from the outlying cabins, and then to lead them all in procession back up to the house, for the feasting and singing and storytelling that would go on all night.
I yawned involuntarily, my jaw cracking at the thought of it. I’d never last, I thought in dismay. I had had a few hours’ sleep in the morning, but not enough to sustain me through a full-blown Gaelic wake and funeral. The floors would be thick with bodies by dawn, all of them smelling of whisky and wet clothes.
I yawned again, then blinked, my eyes swimming as I shook my head to clear it. Every bone in my body ached with fatigue, and I wanted nothing more than to go to bed for several days.
Deep in thought, I hadn’t noticed Brianna coming to stand behind me. Her hands came down on my shoulders, and she moved closer, so I felt the warmth of her touching me. Marsali had gone; we were alone. She began to massage my shoulders, long thumbs moving slowly up the cords of my neck.
“Tired?” she asked.
“Mm. I’ll do,” I said. I closed the book, and leaned back, relaxing momentarily in the sheer relief of her touch. I hadn’t realized I was strung so tightly.
THE BIG ROOM was quiet and orderly, ready for the wake. Mrs. Bug was tending the barbecue. The girls had lit a pair of candles, one at each end of the laden table, and shadows flickered over the whitewashed walls, the quiet coffin, as the candle flames bent in a sudden draft.
“I think I killed her,” I said suddenly, not meaning to say it at all. “It was the penicillin that killed her.”
The long fingers didn’t stop their soothing movement.
“Was it?” she murmured. “You couldn’t have done any differently, though, could you?”
“No.”
A small shudder of relief went over me, as much from the bald confession as from the gradual release of the painful tightness in my neck and shoulders.
“It’s okay,” she said softly, rubbing, stroking. “She would have died anyway, wouldn’t she? It’s sad, but you didn’t do wrong. You know that.”
“I know that.” To my surprise, a single tear slid down my cheek and dropped on the page, puckering the paper. I blinked hard, struggling for control. I didn’t want to distress Brianna.
She wasn’t distressed. Her hands left my shoulders, and I heard the scraping of stool legs. Then her arms came around me, and I let her draw me back, my head resting just under her chin. She simply held me, letting the rise and fall of her breathing calm me.
“I went to dinner with Uncle Joe once, just after he’d lost a patient,” she said finally. “He told me about it.”
“Did he?” I was a little surprised; I wouldn’t have thought Joe would talk about such things with her.
“He didn’t mean to. I could see something was bothering him, though, so I asked. And—he needed to talk, and I was there. Afterward, he said it was almost like having you there. I didn’t know he called you Lady Jane.”
“Yes,” I said. “Because of the way I talk, he said.” I felt a breath of laughter against my ear, and smiled slightly in response. I closed my eyes, and could see my friend, gesturing in passionate conversation, face alight with