The Fiery Cross - Diana Gabaldon [670]
“I dinna ken, but I think it must be something of the kind. He hasna spoken of them at all—and the lad’s eyes are a great deal older than he is.”
Lizzie had appeared at the door then, with an urgent message from Mrs. Bug regarding dispositions for supper, and I had to go. Following Lizzie toward the kitchen, though, I couldn’t help wondering just what Ian’s return might mean to her—particularly if we were right in our suppositions about Ian’s Mohawk wife.
Lizzie had been half in love with Ian, before he had left, and had pined for months following his decision to stay with the Kahnyen’kehaka. But that was more than two years ago, and two years can be a very long time, especially in a young person’s life.
I knew what Jamie meant about Ian’s eyes, and knew for certain that he wasn’t the same impulsive, cheerful lad we had left with the Mohawk. Lizzie wasn’t quite the timidly adoring girl-mouse she had been, either.
What she was, though, was Manfred McGillivray’s betrothed. I could only be thankful that neither Ute McGillivray nor any of her daughters had been present at this afternoon’s quilting circle. With luck, the glamor of Ian’s return would be short-lived.
“Will you be all right down here?” I asked Ian, dubiously. I had put several quilts and a goose-down pillow on the surgery table for him, he having politely rejected Mr. Wemyss’s offer of his own bed and Mrs. Bug’s desire to make him a comfortable pallet before the kitchen hearth.
“Oh, aye, Auntie,” he said, and grinned at me. “Ye wouldna credit the places Rollo and I have been sleeping.” He stretched, yawning and blinking. “Christ—I’ve no been up past sunset anytime this month or more.”
“And up at dawn, too, I expect. That’s why I thought you might be better in here; no one will disturb you, if you’d like to sleep late in the morning.”
He laughed at that.
“Only if I leave the window open, so Rollo can come and go as he likes. Though he seems to think the huntin’ might be good enough inside.”
Rollo was seated in the middle of the floor, muzzle lifted in anticipation, his yellow wolf-eyes fixed unwaveringly on the upper cupboard door. A low rumbling noise, like water bumping in a kettle, issued from behind the door.
“I’ll gie ye odds on the cat, Ian,” Jamie observed, coming into the surgery. “He’s a verra high opinion of himself, has wee Adso. I saw him chase a fox, last week.”
“The fact that you were behind him with a gun had nothing to do with the fox’s running away, of course,” I said.
“Well, not so far as yon cheetie’s concerned,” Jamie agreed, grinning.
“Cheetie,” Ian repeated softly. “It feels . . . verra good to speak Scots again, Uncle Jamie.”
Jamie’s hand brushed Ian’s arm lightly.
“I suppose it does, a mhic a pheathar,” he said, just as softly. “Will ye have forgot all your Gaelic, then?”
“’S beag ’tha fhios aig fear a bhaile mar ’tha fear na mara bèo,” Ian replied, without hesitation. It was a well-known saying: “Little does the landsman know how the seaman lives.”
Jamie laughed in gratified surprise, and Ian grinned broadly back. His face was weathered to a deep brown, and the dotted lines of his Mohawk tattoos ran in fierce crescents from nose to cheekbones—but for a moment, I saw his hazel eyes dance with mischief, and saw again the lad we had known.
“I used to say things over in my mind,” he said, the grin fading a little. “I’d look at things, and say the words in my mind—‘Avbhar,’ ‘Coire,’ ‘Skirlie’—so as not to forget.” He glanced shyly at Jamie. “Ye did tell me to remember, Uncle.”
Jamie blinked, and cleared his throat.
“So I did, Ian,” he murmured. “I’m glad of it.” He squeezed Ian’s shoulder hard—and then they were embracing fiercely, thumping each other’s backs with wordless emotion.
By the time I had wiped my own eyes and blown my nose, they had separated and resumed an air of elaborate casualness, affecting to ignore my descent into female sentiment.
“I kept hold of the Scots and the Gaelic, Uncle,” Ian said, clearing his own throat. “The Latin was a bit beyond me, though.”
“I canna think ye’d have much