50

IN WHICH ALL IS REVEALED

By late November, the days as well as the nights were cold, and the rain clouds began to hang lower on the slopes above us. The weather unfortunately had no dampening effect on people’s tempers; everyone was increasingly edgy, and for obvious reason: There was still no word of Roger Wakefield.

Brianna was still silent about the cause of their argument; in fact, she almost never referred to Roger anymore. She had made her decision; there was nothing to do but to wait, and let Roger make his—if he hadn’t already. Still, I could see fear warring with anger when she left her face unguarded—and doubt hung over everyone like the clouds over the mountains.

Where was he? And what would happen when—or if—he finally appeared?

I took some respite from the prevailing mood of edginess by taking stock of the pantry. Winter was nearly here; the foraging was over, the garden harvested, the preserving done. The pantry shelves bulged with sacks of nuts, heaps of squash, rows of potatoes, jars of dried tomatoes, peaches, and apricots, bowls of dried mushrooms, wheels of cheese, and baskets of apples. Braids of onions and garlic and strings of dried fish hung from the ceiling; bags of flour and beans, barrels of salt beef and salt fish, and stone jars of sauerkraut stood on the floor.

I counted over my hoard like a squirrel reckoning nuts, and felt soothed by our abundance. No matter what else happened, we would neither starve nor go hungry.

Emerging from the pantry with a wedge of cheese in one hand and a bowl of dry beans in the other, I heard a tap on the door. Before I could call out, it opened and Ian’s head poked in, cautiously surveying the room.

“Brianna’s no here?” he asked. As she clearly wasn’t, he didn’t wait for an answer but stepped in, trying to smooth back his hair.

“Have ye a bit o’ looking glass, Auntie?” he asked. “And maybe a comb?”

“Yes, of course,” I said. I set down the food, got my small mirror and the tortoiseshell comb from the drawer of the sideboy and handed them to him, peering upward at his gangling form.

His face seemed abnormally shiny, his lean cheeks blotched with red, as though he had not only shaved but had scrubbed the skin to the point of rawness. His hair, normally a thick, stubborn sheaf of soft brown, was now slicked straight back on the sides of his head with some kind of grease. Liberally pomaded with the same substance, it erupted in an untidy quiff over his forehead, making him look like a deranged porcupine.

“What have you got on your hair, Ian?” I asked. I sniffed at him and recoiled slightly at the result.

“Bear fat,” he said. “But it stank a bit, so I mixed in a wee scoop of incense soap to make it smell better.” He peered critically at himself in the mirror and made small jabs at his coiffure with the comb, which seemed pitifully inadequate to the task.

He was wearing his good coat, with a clean shirt and—unheard of touch for a workday—a clean, starched stock wrapped about his throat, looking tight enough to strangle him.

“You look very nice, Ian,” I said, biting the inside of my cheek. “Um … are you going somewhere special?”

“Aye, well,” he said awkwardly. “It’s just if I’m meant to be courting, like, I thought I must try to look decent.”

Courting? I wondered at his haste. While he was certainly interested in girls—and there were a few girls in the district who made no secret of returning his interest—he was barely seventeen. Men did marry that young, of course, and Ian had both his own land and a share in the whisky making, but I hadn’t thought his affections so strongly engaged yet.

“I see,” I said. “Ah … is the young lady anyone I know?” He rubbed at his jaw, raising a red flush along the bone.

“Aye, well. It’s—it’s Brianna.” He wouldn’t meet my eyes, but the flush rose slowly over his face.

“What?” I said incredulously. I set down the slice of bread I was holding and stared at him. “Did you say Brianna?”

His eyes were fixed on the floor, but his jaw was set stubbornly.

“Brianna,” he repeated. “I’ve come to make her a proposal of marriage.”

“Ian, you can’t possibly mean that.”

“I do,” he said, sticking out his long, square chin in a determined manner. He glanced toward the window, and shuffled his feet. “Will she—is she comin’ in soon, d’ye think?”

The sharp scent of nervous perspiration reached me, mingled with soap and bear fat, and I saw that his hands were clenched in fists, tight enough to make the knobby knuckles stand out white against his tanned skin.

“Ian,” I said, torn between exasperation and tenderness, “are you doing this because of Brianna’s baby?”

The whites of his eyes flashed as he glanced at me, startled. He nodded, shifting his shoulders uncomfortably inside the stiff coat.

“Aye, of course,” he said, as though surprised that I should ask.

“Then you’re not in love with her?” I knew the answer quite well, but thought we had better have it all out.

“Well … no,” he said, the painful blush renewing itself. “But I’m no promised to anyone else,” he hastened to add. “So that’s all right.”

“It is not all right,” I said firmly. “Ian, that’s a very, very kind notion of yours, but—”

“Oh, it’s not mine,” he interrupted, looking surprised. “Uncle Jamie thought of it.”

“He what?” A loud, incredulous voice spoke behind me, and I whirled to find Brianna standing in the doorway, staring at Ian. She advanced slowly into the room, hands fisted at her sides. Just as slowly, Ian retreated, fetching up with a bump against the table.

“Cousin,” he said, with a bob of his head that dislodged a spike of greased hair. He brushed at it, but it stuck out, hanging disreputably over one eye. “I … ah … I …” He saw the look on Brianna’s face and promptly shut his eyes.

“I-have-come-to-express-my-desire-to-ask-for-your-hand-in-the-blessed-sacrament-of-matrimony,” he said in one breath. He took in another, with an audible gasp. “I—”

“Shut up!”

Ian, his mouth opened to continue, immediately shut it. He opened one eye in a cautious slit, like one viewing a bomb momentarily expected to go off.

Bree glared from Ian to me. Even in the dim room, I could see the tight look of her mouth and the crimson rising in her cheeks. The tip of her nose was red, whether from the nippy air outside or from annoyance, I couldn’t tell.

“Did you know about this?” she demanded of me.

“Of course not!” I said. “For heaven’s sake, Bree—” Before I could finish, she had whirled on her heel and run out of the door. I could see the quick flash of her rusty skirts as she hurried up the slope leading to the stable.

I pulled off my apron and flung it hastily over the chair. “I’d better go after her.”

“I’ll go, too,” Ian offered, and I didn’t stop him. Reinforcements might be needed.

“What do you think she’ll do?” he asked, panting in my wake as I hastened up the steep slope.

“God knows,” I said. “But I’m afraid we’re going to find out.” I was entirely too familiar with the look of a Fraser roused to fury. Neither Bree nor Jamie lost their temper easily, but when they did, they lost it thoroughly.

“I’m glad she didna strike me,” Ian said thankfully. “I thought for a moment she was going to.” He pulled even with me, his long legs outstripping mine, hurrying though I was. I could hear uplifted voices from the open half-door of the stable.

“Why on earth would you put poor little Ian up to such a thing?” Brianna was saying, her voice high with indignation. “I’ve never heard of such a high-handed, arrogant—”

“Poor little Ian?” Ian said, vastly affronted. “What does she—”

“Oh, high-handed, am I?” Jamie’s voice interrupted. He sounded both impatient and irritable, though not yet angry. Perhaps I was in time to avert full-scale hostilities. I peeked through the stable door, to see them face-to-face, glaring at each other over a large pile of half-dried manure.

“And what better choice could I make, will ye tell me that?” he demanded. “Let me tell ye, lassie, I thought of every bachelor in fifty miles before I settled on Ian. I wouldna have ye wed to a cruel man or a drunkard, nor yet a poor man—nor one auld enough to be your grandsire, either.”

He shoved a hand through his hair, sure sign of mental agitation, but made a masterful effort to calm himself. He lowered his voice a bit, trying to be conciliatory.

“Why, I even put aside Tammas McDonald, for while he’s a fine stretch of land and a good temper, and he’s an age for you, he’s a bittie wee fellow forbye, and I thought ye wouldna care to stand up side by side with him before a priest. Believe me, Brianna, I’ve done my best to see ye well wed.”

Bree wasn’t having any; her own hair had come loose during her dash up the hill, and was floating round her face like the flames of a vengeful archangel.

“And what makes you think I want to be married to anybody at all?”

His mouth dropped open.

“Want?” he said incredulously. “And what has want to do with it?”

“Everything!” She stamped her foot.

“Now there you’re wrong, lassie,” he advised her, turning to pick up his fork. He eyed her stomach with a nod. “You’ve a bairn coming, who needs a name. Your time to be choosy is long since past, aye?”

He dug his fork into the pile of manure and heaved the load into the waiting barrow, then dug again, with a smooth economy of motion born of years of labor.

“Now, Ian’s a sweet-tempered lad, and a hard worker,” he said, eyes on his task. “He’s got his own land; he’ll have mine, too, in time, and that will—”

“I am not going to marry anybody!” Brianna drew herself up to her full height, fists balled at her sides, and spoke in a voice loud enough to disturb the bats in the corners of the ceiling. One small dark form detached itself from the shadows and flittered out into the gathering dusk, ignored by the combatants underneath.

“Well, then, make your own choice,” Jamie said shortly. “And I wish ye well of it!”

“You … are … not … listening!” Brianna said, grinding each word between her teeth. “I’ve made my choice. I said I won’t … marry … anyone!” She punctuated this with another stamp of her foot.

Jamie thrust the fork into the pile with a thump. He straightened up and eyed Brianna, rubbing his fist across his jaw.

“Aye, well. I seem to recall hearin’ a verra similar opinion expressed by your mother—the night before our wedding. I havena asked her lately does she regret bein’ forced to wed me or not, but I flatter myself she’s maybe not been miserable altogether. Perhaps ye should go and have a word wi’ her?”

“It’s not the same thing at all!” Brianna snapped.

“No, it’s not,” Jamie agreed, keeping a firm grip on his temper. The sun was low behind the hills, flooding the stable with a golden light in which the creeping tide of red in his skin was nonetheless quite visible. Still, he was making every attempt to be reasonable.

“Your mother wed me to save her life—and mine. It was a brave thing she did, and generous, too. I’ll grant it’s no a matter of life or death, but—have ye no idea what it is to live branded as a wanton—or as a fatherless bastard, come to that?”

Seeing her expression falter slightly at this, he pressed his advantage, stretching out a hand to her and speaking kindly.

“Come, lassie. Can ye not bring yourself to do it for the bairn’s sake?”

Her face tightened again and she stepped back.

“No,” she said, sounding strangled. “No. I can’t.”

He dropped his hand. I could see them both, despite the fading light, and saw the danger signs all too clearly, in the narrowing of his eyes and the set of his shoulders, squared for battle. “Is that how Frank Randall raised ye, lass, to have no regard for what’s right or wrong?”

Brianna was trembling all over, like a horse that’s run too far.

“My father always did what was right for me! And he would never have tried to pull something like this!” she said. “Never! He cared about me!”

At this, Jamie finally lost his temper, which went off with a bang.

“And I don’t?” he said. “I am not trying my best to do what’s right for ye? In spite of your being—”

“Jamie—” I turned toward him, saw his eyes gone black with anger, and turned toward her. “Bree—I know he didn’t—you have to understand—”

“Of all the reckless, thoughtless, selfish ways in which to behave!”

“You self-righteous, insensitive bastard!”

“Bastard! Ye’ll call me a bastard, and your belly swellin’ like a pumpkin with a child that ye mean to doom to finger-pointing and calumny for all its days, and—”

“Anybody points a finger at my child, and I’ll break it off and stuff it down their throat!”

“Ye senseless wee besom! Have ye no the faintest notion o’ how things are? Ye’ll be a scandal and a hissing! Folk will call ye whore to your face!”

“Let them try it!”

“Oh, let them try it? And ye mean me to stand by and listen, I suppose?”

“It’s not your job to defend me!”

He was so furious that his face went white as fresh-bleached muslin.

“Not my job to defend you? For Christ’s sake, woman, who else is meant to do it?”

Ian tugged gently on my arm, drawing me back.

“Ye’ve only the twa choices now, Auntie,” he murmured in my ear. “Douse them both wi’ a pan o’ cold water, or come away with me and leave them to it. I’ve seen Uncle Jamie and my Mam go at it before. Believe me, ye dinna want to step between two Frasers wi’ their dander up. My Da said he’s tried once or twice, and got the scars to prove it.”

I took a final glance at the situation and gave up. He was right; they were nose to nose, red hair bristling and eyes slitted like a couple of bobcats, circling, spitting and snarling. I could have set the hay on fire, and neither one would have spared an instant’s notice.

It seemed remarkably quiet and peaceful outside. A whippoorwill sang in the aspen grove, and the wind was in the east, carrying the faint sounds of the waterfall to us. By the time we reached the dooryard, we couldn’t hear the shouting anymore.

“Dinna be worrit, Auntie,” Ian said comfortingly. “They’ll get hungry, sooner or later.”

---

In the event, it was unnecessary to starve them out; Jamie stamped down the hill a few minutes later and without a word, fetched his horse from the paddock, bridled him, mounted, and rode bareback at a gallop down the track toward Fergus’s cabin. As I watched his departing form, Brianna stalked out of the stable, puffing like a steam engine, and made for the house.

“What does nighean na galladh mean?” she demanded, seeing me at the door.

“I don’t know,” I said. I did, but thought it much more prudent not to say. “I’m sure he didn’t mean it,” I added. “Er … whatever it means.”

“Ha,” she said, and with an angry snort, stomped into the house, reappearing moments later with the egg basket over her arm. Without a word, she disappeared into the bushes, making a rustling noise like a hurricane.

I took several deep breaths and went in to start supper, cursing Roger Wakefield.

Physical exertion seemed to have dissipated at least some of the negative energy in the household. Brianna spent an hour in the bushes, and returned with sixteen eggs and a calmer face. There were leaves and stickers in her hair, and from the look of her shoes, she had been kicking trees.

I didn’t know what Jamie had been doing, but he returned at suppertime, sweaty and windblown but outwardly calm. They pointedly ignored each other, a reasonably difficult feat for two large persons confined in a twenty-foot-square log cabin. I glanced at Ian, who rolled his eyes skyward and came to help carry the big serving bowl to the table.

Conversation over supper was limited to requests to pass the salt, and afterward, Brianna cleared the dishes, then went to sit at the spinning wheel, working the foot treadle with unnecessary emphasis.

Jamie gave her back a glare, then jerked his head at me and went out. He was waiting on the path to the privy when I followed him a moment later.

“What am I to do?” he demanded, without preamble.

“Apologize,” I said.

“Apologize?” His hair seemed to be standing on end, though it was likely only the effects of the wind. “But I havena done anything wrong!”

“Well, what difference does that make?” I said, exasperated. “You asked me what you should do, and I told you.”

He exhaled strongly through his nose, hesitated a moment, then turned and stalked back into the house, shoulders set for martyrdom or battle.

“I apologize,” he said, looming up in front of her.

Surprised, she nearly dropped the yarn, but caught it adeptly.

“Oh,” she said, and flushed. She took her foot off the treadle, and the great wheel creaked and slowed.

“I was wrong,” he said, with a quick look at me. I nodded encouragingly, and he cleared his throat. “I shouldna have—”

“It’s all right.” She spoke quickly, eager to meet him. “You didn’t—I mean, you were only trying to help.” She looked down at the thread, slowing as it ran through her fingers. “I’m sorry too—I shouldn’t have been mad at you.”

He closed his eyes briefly and sighed, then opened them and lifted one eyebrow at me. I smiled faintly and turned back to my work, pounding fennel seeds in the mortar.

He pulled up a stool and sat down beside her, and she turned toward him, putting one hand on the wheel to stop it.

“I know you meant well,” she said. “You and Ian both. But don’t you see, Da? I have to wait for Roger.”

“But if something has happened to the man—if he’s met with an accident of some kind …”

“He isn’t dead. I know he isn’t.” She spoke with the fervency of someone who means to bend reality to her will. “He’ll come back. And how would it be if he did, and found me married to Ian?”

Ian looked up, hearing his name. He sat on the floor by the fire, Rollo’s great head resting on his knee, his yellow wolf-eyes mere slits of pleasure as Ian methodically combed through the thick pelt, pulling out ticks and burs as he found them.

Jamie ran his fingers through his hair in a gesture of frustration.

“I have had word out since ye told me of him, a nighean. I sent Ian to Cross Creek to leave word at River Run, and with Captain Freeman to pass to the other rivermen. I’ve sent Duncan wi’ word, all through the Cape Fear valley and as far north as Edenton and New Bern, and wi’ the packet boats that run from Virginia to Charleston.”

He looked at me, pleading for understanding. “What more can I do? The man is nowhere to be found. If I thought there were the slightest chance—” He stopped, teeth set in his lip.

Brianna dropped her gaze to the yarn in her hand, and with a quick, sharp gesture, snapped it. Leaving the loose end to flap from the spindle, she got up and crossed the room, sitting down at the table with her back to us.

“I’m sorry, lass,” Jamie said, more quietly. He reached out and laid a hand on her shoulder, gingerly, as though she might bite him.

She stiffened slightly, but didn’t pull away. After a moment, she reached up and took his hand, squeezing it lightly, then putting it aside.

“I see,” she said. “Thank you, Da.” She sat, eyes fixed on the flames, her face and figure utterly still, but managing to radiate complete desolation. I put my hands on her shoulders, rubbing gently, but she felt like a wax manikin under my fingers—not resisting but not acknowledging the touch.

Jamie studied her for a moment, frowning, and glanced at me. Then, with an air of decision, he got up, reached to the shelf, brought down his inkhorn and quill jar, and set them on the table with a clank.

“Here’s a thought,” he said firmly. “Let us draw up a broadsheet, here, and I will take it to Gillette in Wilmington. He can print it up, and Ian and the Lindsey lads will take the copies up and down the coast, from Charleston to Jamestown. It may be that someone’s not kent Wakefield, not hearing his name, but they’ll maybe know him by his looks.”

He shook ink powder made of iron and oak gall into the stained half-gourd he used as a well, and poured a little water from the pitcher, using the shaft of a quill to stir the ink. He smiled at Brianna, and took a sheet of paper from the drawer.

“Now, then, lass, how is this man of yours to look at?”

The suggestion of action had brought a spark of life back to Brianna’s face. She sat up straighter, and a current of energy flowed up her spine, into my fingers.

“Tall,” she said. “Nearly as tall as you, Da. People would notice; they always look at you. He has black hair, and green eyes—bright green; it’s one of the first things you notice about him, isn’t it, Mama?”

Ian gave a small start, and looked up from his grooming.

“Yes,” I said, sitting down on the bench next to Brianna. “But you can maybe do better than just the written description. Bree’s a good hand with a likeness,” I explained to Jamie. “Can you draw Roger from memory, do you think, Bree?”

“Yes!” She reached for the quill, eager to try. “Yes, I’m sure I can—I’ve drawn him before.”

Jamie surrendered the quill and paper, the vertical lines between his brows showing in a slight frown.

“Can the printer work from an ink sketch?” I asked, seeing it.

“Oh—aye, I expect so. It’s no great matter to make a woodblock, if the lines are clear.” He spoke abstractedly, eyes fixed on the paper in front of Brianna.

Ian pushed Rollo’s head off his knee and came to stand by the table, looking over Bree’s shoulder in what seemed a rather exaggerated curiosity.

Lower lip fixed between her teeth, she drew clean and swiftly. High forehead, with a thick lock of black hair that rose from an invisible cowlick, then dipped almost to the strongly marked black brows. She drew him in profile; a bold nose, not quite beaky, a clean-lined, sensitive mouth and a wide, slanted jaw. Thick-lashed eyes, deepset, with lines of good humor marking a strong, appealing face. She added a neat, flat ear, then turned her attention to the elegant curve of the skull, drawing thick, wavy dark hair pulled back in a short tail.

Ian made a small, strangled noise in his throat.

“Are you all right, Ian?” I looked up at him, but he wasn’t looking at the drawing—he was looking across the table, at Jamie. He was wearing a glazed sort of expression, like a pig on a spit.

I turned, to find precisely the same expression on Jamie’s face.

“What on earth is the matter?” I asked.

“Oh … nothing.” The muscles of his throat moved in a convulsive swallow. The corner of his mouth twitched, and twitched again, as though he couldn’t control it.

“Like hell it is!” Alarmed, I leaned across the table, seizing his wrist and groping for his pulse. “Jamie, what is it? Are you having chest pains? Do you feel ill?”

“I do.” Ian was leaning over the table, looking as though he might be going to throw up any minute. “Coz—d’ye mean honestly to tell me that … this”—he gestured feebly at the sketch—“is Roger Wakefield?”

“Yes,” she said, looking up at him in puzzlement. “Ian, are you all right? Did you eat something funny?”

He didn’t answer, but dropped heavily onto the bench beside her, put his head in his hands, and groaned.

Jamie gently detached his hand from my grip. Even in the red of the firelight, I could see that he was white and strained. The hand on the table curled around the quill jar, as though seeking support.

“Mr. Wakefield,” he said carefully to Brianna. “Has he by any chance … another name?”

“Yes,” Brianna and I said in unison. I stopped and let her explain as I rose and went hurriedly to fetch a bottle of brandy from the pantry. I didn’t know what was going on, but had the horrible feeling that it was about to be called for.

“—adopted. MacKenzie was his own family name,” she was saying as I emerged with the bottle in hand. She glanced from father to cousin, frowning. “Why? You haven’t heard of a Roger MacKenzie, have you?”

Jamie and Ian exchanged an appalled glance. Ian cleared his throat. So did Jamie.

“What?” Brianna demanded, leaning forward, glancing anxiously from one to the other. “What is it? Have you seen him? Where?”

I saw Jamie’s jaw tighten as he summoned up words.

“Aye,” he said carefully. “We have. On the mountain.”

“What—here? On this mountain?” She stood up, pushing back the bench. Alarm and excitement played over her face like flames. “Where is he? What happened?”

“Well,” Ian said defensively, “he did say as he’d taken your maidenheid, after all.”

“He WHAT?” Brianna’s eyes sprang open so far that a rim of white showed all around the iris.

“Well, your Da asked him, just to be sure, and he admitted that he’d—”

“You what?” Brianna rounded on Jamie, clenched fists on the table.

“Aye, well. It—was a mistake,” Jamie said. He looked utterly wretched.

“You bet it was! What in the name of—what have you done?” Her own cheeks had blanched, and blue sparks glinted in her eyes, hot as the heart of a flame.

Jamie took a deep breath. He looked up, straight into her face, and set his jaw.

“The wee lassie,” he said. “Lizzie. She told me that ye were with child, and that the man who’d got it on ye was a wicked brute called MacKenzie.”

Brianna’s mouth opened and shut, but no words came out. Jamie looked at her steadily.

“Ye did say to me that ye’d been violated, did ye no?”

She nodded, jerky as a badly sprung puppet.

“So, then. Ian and the lassie were at the mill, when MacKenzie came askin’ for ye. They rode to fetch me, and Ian and I met him in the clearing just above the green spring.”

Brianna had got her voice working, though only barely.

“What did you do to him?” she asked hoarsely. “What?”

“It was a fair fight,” Ian said, still defensive. “I wanted to shoot him on sight, but Uncle Jamie said no, he meant to have his hands on the—the man.”

“You hit him?”

“Aye, I did!” Jamie said, stung at last. “For God’s sake, woman, what would ye have me do to the man who’d used ye that way? It was you wanting to do murder, aye?”

“Besides, he hit Uncle Jamie, too,” Ian put in helpfully. “It was a fair fight. I said.”

“Be quiet, Ian, there’s a good lad,” I said. I poured two fingers, neat, and pushed the cup in front of Jamie.

“But it was—he wasn’t—” Brianna was sputtering, like a firecracker with a short fuse lit. Then she caught fire, and slammed one fist on the table, going off like a rocket.

“WHAT HAVE YOU DONE WITH HIM?” she screamed.

Jamie blinked and Ian flinched. They exchanged haunted glances.

I put a hand on Jamie’s arm, squeezing tight. I couldn’t keep the quaver out of my own voice as I asked the necessary question.

“Jamie—did you kill him?”

He glanced at me, and the tension in his face relaxed, if only marginally.

“Ah … no,” he said. “I gave him to the Iroquois.”

---

“Och, now, Coz, it could have been worse.” Ian patted Brianna tentatively on the back. “We didna kill him, after all.”

Brianna made a small choking sound, and pulled her head up off her knees. Her face was white and damp as the inside of an oyster shell, her hair in a tangle round it. She hadn’t vomited or fainted, but looked as though she still might do either.

“We did mean to,” Ian went on, looking at her a little nervously. “I’d my pistol pressed behind his ear, but then I thought it was really Uncle Jamie’s right to blow his brains out, but then he—”

Brianna choked again, and I hastily placed an ashet on the table in front of her, just in case.

“Ian, I really think she doesn’t need to hear this just now,” I said, narrowing my eyes at him.

“Yes, I do.” Brianna pushed herself upright, hands gripping the edge of the table. “I have to hear it all, I have to.” She turned her head slowly, as though her neck was stiff, toward Jamie.

“Why?” she said. “WHY?”

He was as white and ill-looking as she was. He had pushed away from the table and gone to the chimney corner, as though trying to get as far away as possible from the drawing, with its damning likeness of Roger MacKenzie Wakefield.

He looked as though he would have done anything rather than answer, but answer he did, his eyes steady on hers.

“I meant to kill him. I stopped Ian because shooting the prick seemed too easy a death—too quick for what he’d done.” He took a deep breath, and I could see that the hand gripping his writing shelf was clenched so tight that the knuckles stood out white against his skin.

“I stopped to think, how it should be; what I must do. I left Ian with him, and I walked away.” He swallowed; I could see the muscles move in his throat, but he didn’t look away.

“I walked into the forest a wee way, and leaned my back against a tree to let my heart slow. It seemed best he should be awake, to know—but I didna think I could bear to hear him speak again. He’d said too much already. But then I began to hear it, over again, what he’d said.”

“What? What did he say?” Even her lips were white.

So were Jamie’s.

“He said … that ye’d asked him to your bed. That you—” He stopped and bit his lip, savagely.

“He said ye wanted him; that ye’d asked him to take your maidenheid,” Ian said. He spoke coolly, his eyes on Brianna.

She drew in breath with a ragged sound, like paper being torn.

“I did.”

I glanced involuntarily at Jamie. His eyes were closed, his teeth fixed in his lip.

Ian made a shocked sound, and Brianna drew back a hand like lightning and slapped him across the face.

He jerked back, lost his balance, and half fell off the bench. He grabbed the edge of the table and staggered to his feet.

“How?” he shouted, his face contorted in sudden anger. “How could ye do such a thing? I told Uncle Jamie that ye’d never play the whore, never! But it’s true, isn’t it?”

She was on her feet like a leopard, her cheeks gone from white to blazing fury in a second.

“Well, damn you for a self-righteous prig, Ian! Who gave you the right to call me a whore?”

“Right?” He sputtered for a moment, at a loss for words. “I—you—he—”

Before I could intervene, she drew back a fist and punched him hard in the pit of the stomach. With a look of intense surprise, he sat down hard on the floor, mouth open like a suckling pig.

I moved, but Jamie was faster. In less than a second he was beside her, gripping her arm. She whirled, meaning to hit him, too, I think, but then froze. Her mouth was working soundlessly, tears of shock and fury running down her cheeks.

“Be still,” he said, and his voice was very cold. I saw his fingers dig into her flesh, and I made a small sound of protest. He paid no attention, too intent on Brianna.

“I didna want to believe it,” he said, in a voice like ice. “I told myself he was only saying so to save himself, it wasna true. But if it was—” He seemed to become aware at last that he was hurting her. He let go of her arm.

“I couldna take the man’s life, without being sure,” he said, and paused, his eyes searching her face. For regret? I wondered. Or remorse? Whatever he might be looking for, all he found was a smoldering rage. Her face was the echo of his own, her blue eyes hot as his.

His own face changed, and he looked away.

“I did regret it,” he said, very quietly. “When I came that night, and saw ye, I was sorry then that I hadna killed him. I held ye in my arms—and I felt my heart go sma’ wi’ shame, that I should doubt my daughter’s virtue.” He looked down, and I could see the mark where he had bitten his lip.

“Now my heart is shrunk altogether. Not only that ye should be impure but that ye should lie to me.”

“Lie to you?” Her voice was no more than whisper. “Lie to you?”

“Aye, lie to me!” With sudden violence, he turned back to her. “That ye should bed a man from lust, and cry rape when ye find ye’re with child! Do ye not realize that it’s only chance I have not the sin of murder on my soul, and you the cause of it?”

She was too furious to speak; I saw her throat swell with words, and knew I had to do something, at once, before either of them had the opportunity to say more.

I couldn’t speak, either. Blindly, I fumbled in the pocket of my gown, feeling for the ring. I found it, pulled it out, and dropped it on the table. It chimed against the wood; spun, and rattled to a stop, the gold of the tiny circlet gleaming red in the firelight.

From F. to C. with love. Always.

Jamie looked at it, his face gone completely blank. Brianna drew in her breath with a sob.

“That’s your ring, Auntie,” Ian said. He sounded dazed, and bent close to look, as though he couldn’t believe his eyes. “Your gold ring. The one that Bonnet took from ye, on the river.”

“Yes,” I said. My knees felt weak. I sat down at the table, and laid my hand over the telltale ring as though to take it back, deny its presence.

Jamie took my wrist and lifted it. Like a man handling a dangerous insect, he picked the ring up gingerly between thumb and forefinger.

“Where did ye get this?” he asked, his voice almost casual. He looked at me, and a bolt of terror shot through me at the look in his eyes.

“I brought it to her.” Brianna’s tears had dried, evaporated by the heat of her fury. She stood behind me and gripped me by the shoulders. “Don’t you look at her that way, don’t you dare!”

He shifted the look to her, but she didn’t flinch; only held on to me harder, her fingers digging into my shoulders.

“Where did ye get it?” he asked again, his voice no more than a whisper. “Where?”

“From him. From Stephen Bonnet.” Her voice was shaking, but from rage, not fear. “When … he … raped … me.”

Jamie’s face cracked suddenly, as though some explosion had burst him from within. I made an incoherent sound of distress, and reached out for him, but he whirled away and stood rigid, back turned to us, in the middle of the room.

I felt Brianna draw herself upright, heard Ian say, rather stupidly, “Bonnet?” I heard the ticking of the clock on the sideboard, felt the draft from the door. I was dimly aware of all these things, but had no eyes for anything but Jamie.

I pushed back the bench, stumbled to my feet. He stood as though rooted into the floor, fists clenched into his belly like a man gut-shot, trying to hold back the inevitable fatal spill of his insides.

I should be able to do something, to say something. I should be able to help them, to take care of them. But I could do nothing. I could not help one without betraying the other—had already betrayed them both. I had sold Jamie’s honor to keep him safe, and the doing of it had taken Roger and destroyed Bree’s happiness.

I could go to neither of them now. All I could do was to stand there, feeling my heart crumble into small, jagged chunks.

Bree left me, and walked quietly around the table, across the room, around Jamie. She stood in front of him, looking up into his face, her own set like marble, cold as a saint’s.

“Damn you,” she said, scarcely audible. “Damn you very much, you bastard. I’m sorry I ever saw you.”