sitting back in his saddle, "while I go and call upon the Beardsleys alone. Will ye come with me, Sassenach, or go on AT Roger?"
"Oh, I'll come with you," I said, without hesitation. "I want to see what these Beardsleys are like."
He smiled and brushed back his hair with one hand before replacing his hat. He wore his hair loose to cover his neck and ears against the cold, and it shone like molten copper in the morning sun.
"I thought ye might. Mind your face, though," he said, in half-mocking
The Fiery Cross 277
warning. "Dinna go gape-jawed or gooseberry, and they mention their missing servant lad." '11 1 said, rather crossly. "Gooseberry, indeed. Did "Mind your own face ?11 1 wondered whether Josiah say that he and his brother were badly treated
there had been more to Josiah's leaving than the cheese incident.
Jamie shook his head. senach: would ye leave a "I didna ask, and he didna say-but ask yourself, Sas
decent home to go and live in the woods alone, to make your bed in cold leaves and eat grubs and crickets 'til ye learned to hunt meat?" et Roger, He nudged his horse into motion, and rode up the slope to me
leaving me pondering that conjecture. He returned a few moments later, and I turned my mount in beside him, another question in my mind.
"But if things were bad enough here as to force him to leave-why didn't his brother go with him?" ttle grimly.
Jamie glanced at me, surprised, but then smiled, a Ii "Keziah's deaf, Sassenach."
Not born deaf, from what Josiah had told him; his twin had lost his hearing r so. Keziah could thereas the result of an injury, occurring at the age of five o
fore speak, but not hear any but the loudest of noises; and unable to perceive the sound of rustling leaves or shuffling feet, could neither hunt nor avoid pursuit. rstands him, and doubtless he does. When we crept
"He says Keziah unde p the ladder to the loft. I into the barn, I kept watch below while the lad went u
didna hear a sound, but within a minute, both lads were down on the floor beside me, Keziah rubbing the sleep from his eyes. I hadna realized they were twins; gave me a turn to see the two of them, so like."
"I wonder why Keziah didn't bring away his breeches," I said, touching on one thing that had been puzzling me.
Jamie laughed. in off the night before, left them in the hay, "I asked. Seems he'd taken the na want to disturb her." and one o' the barn cats had kittens on them. He did
I laughed too, though with an uneasy memory of pale bare feet, blue-tinged skin showing purple in the firelight.
"Kind lad. And his shoes?"
"He hadn't any." e bottom of the slope. The horses milled for a By now we had reached th ere decided, rcnmoment, turning in a slow gyre round Jamie as directions w
dezvous appointed, farewells taken. Then Roger-with only slight evidence of self-consciousness-whistled through his teeth and waved his hat in the air in summons. I watched him ride away, and noticed him half-turn in the saddle, then turn back, looking straight ahead. Jamie said, watching. He shook his
"He's no sure they'll really follow him," anage, or not." head critically, then shrugged, dismissing it. "Aye, well- He'll in
"He'll manage," I said, thinking of the night before.
"I'm glad ye think so, Sassenach. Come on, then." He clicked his tongue and reined his horse's'head around. e you sending him on his "if you're not sure Roger can manage, why ar
own?" I inquired of his back, swaying in the saddle as we turned into the thin
278 Diana Gabaldon
copse that lay between us and the now
-invisible farm. Why not keep the men together, and take them into Brownsville yourself?"
"For one thing, he'll no learn, and I dinna give him the chance.
For another He paused, turning to look back at me. "For another, I didna want the whole boiling coming along to the Beardsleys' and maybe hearing of their missing servant. The whole camp saw Josiah last night, aye? If you've a lad missing, and hear of a lad popping up and causing a stir in the forest nearby, conclusions might be drawn, d'ye not think?-
He turned back, and I followed him through a narrow defile between the pine trees. Dew gleamed like diamonds on bark and needle, and small icy drops ell.
fell from the boughs above, startling my skin where they f
"Unless this Beardsley is old or infirm, though, won't he be joining you?" I objected. "Someone's bound to mention Josiah in his hearing sooner or later." He shook his head, not turning round.
"And tell him what, if they do? They saw the lad when we dragged him in, and they saw him run away again. For all they ken, he got clear away."
"Kenny Lindsay saw them both when you brought them back." He shrugged.
"Aye, I had a word wi' Kenny, while we were saddling the horses. He'll say nothing." He was right, I knew. Kenny was one of his Ardsmuir men; he would follow Jamie's orders without question.
"No," Jamie went on, skillfiffly reining round a large boulder, "Beardsley's not infirm; Josiah told me he's an Indian trader-taking goods across the Treaty Line to the Cherokee villages. What I don't know is if he's to home just now. If he is, though-" He drew breath and paused to cough as the cold air tickled his lungs.
"That's the other reason for sending the men ahead," he continued, wheezing slightly. "We'll not join them again until tomorrow, I think. By that time, they'll have had a night to drink and be sociable in Brownsville; they'll scarce recall the lad, and be the less likely to speak of him in Beardsley's hearing. With luck, we'll be well away before anything's said-no chance of Beardsley leaving us to pursue the lad then."
So he was counting on the Beardsleys being sufficiently hospitable as to put us up for the night, A reasonable expectation, in this neck of the woods. Listening to him cough again, I resolved to sit on his chest this evening, if necessary, and oblige him to be well-greasedAith camphor, whether he liked it or not.
We emerged from the trees, and I glanced dubiously at the farmhouse ahead. It was smaller than I had thought, and rather shabby, with a cracked step, a sagging porch, and a wide patch of shingles missing from the weathered roof. Well, I had slept in worse places, and likely would again.
The door to a stunted barn gaped open, but there was no sign of life. The whole place seemed deserted, save for the plume of smoke from the chimney.
I had meant what I said to Jamie, though I hadn't been entirely accurate. He was honest, and also law-abiding-provided that the laws were those he chose to respect. The mere fact that a law had been established by the Crown was not, I knew, sufficient to make it law in his eyes. Other laws, unwritten, he would likely die for.
Still, while the law of property meant somewhat less to an erstwhile High-
The Fiery Cross 279
land raider than it might to others, it hadn't escaped my attention-and thereill
fore certainly hadn't escaped his-that he was about to claim both hospitality and duty from a man whose property he had just helped to abscond. Jamie had no deep-seated objection to indenture as such, I knew; ordinarily, he would respect such a claim. That he hadn't meant that he perceived some higher law in operation-though whether that was friendship, pity, the claim of his earbsacbd, or something else, I didn't know. He had paused, waiting for me.
"Why did you decide to help Josiah?" I asked bluntly, as we made our way across the ragged cornfield that lay before the house. Dry stalks snapped behe litter of dead leaves.
neath the horses' feet, and ice crystals glittered on t
Jamie took off his hat, and set it on the saddle before him, as he tied back his hair in preparation for meeting company. ut if he chose "Well, I said to him that if he was set on this course, so be it. B
st rid him of the to come to the Ridge-alone or with his brother-then we mu
mark on his thumb, for it would cause talk, and word might get back to yon Beardsley, wi' the devil to pay and a' that."
He took a deep breath and let it out, the smoke of it wisping white around his head, then turned to look at me, his face serious.
"The lad didna hesitate for a moment, though he'd been branded; he knew. And I'll tell ye, Sassenach-while a man may do a desperate thing once from love or courage ... it takes something more than that, if yelve done it once already, and ye know damn well what it's going to feel like to have to do it again.l
He turned away without waiting for my response, and rode into the dooryard, scattering a flock of foraging doves. He sat his horse upright, his shoulders broad and square. There was no hint of the deep-webbed scars that lined his back beneath the homespun cloak, but I knew them well.
11 So that was it, I thought. As in waterface ans-wereth toface, so the heart of rage was the one he had lived by for the man to man. And the law of con
longest.
SEVERAL CHICKENS HUDDLED on the porch, fluffed into balls of yellow-eyed resentment. They muttered balefully among themselves as we dismounted, but were too cold to do more than shuffle away from us, reluctant to abandon their patch of sunshine. Several boards of the porch itself were broken, and scattered the yard nearby was littered with scraps of half-hcwn lumber and
nails, as though someone had meant to mend it, but had not yet found a moment to attend to the job. The procrastination had lasted for some time, I thought; the nails were rusty, and the newly cut boards had warped and split with damp. of the dooryard. "Ho! The house!" Jamie shouted, stopping in the center
This was accepted etiquette for approaching a strange house; while most people in the mountains were hospitable, there were not a few who viewed strangers warilyand were inclined to make introductions at gunpoint, until the callers' bona fides should be'established.
With this in mind, I kept a cautious distance behind Jamie, but made sure I
280 Diana Gabaldon
was visible, ostentatiously spreading my skirts and brushing them down, displaying my gender as evidence of our peaceable intent.
Damn, there was a small hole burnt through the brown wool, no doubt from a flying campfire spark. I concealed the burned spot in a fold of skirt, thinking how odd it was that everyone regarded women as inherently harmless. Had I been so inclined, I could easily have burgled houses and murdered hapless families from one end of the Ridge to the other.
Fortunately the impulse to do so hadn't struck me, though it bad dawned on me now and then that the Hippocratic Oath and its injunction to "Do no harm" might not have strictly to do with medical procedure. I'd had the impulse to dot one of my more recalcitrant patients over the head with a stick of firewood more than once, but had so far managed to keep the urge in check.
Of course, most people hadn't the advantage of a doctor's jaundiced view of humanity. And it was true that women didn't go in so much for the recreational sorts of mayhem that men enjoyed-I rarely found women beating each other into pulp for fim. Give them a good motive, though, and ...
Jamie was walking toward the barn, shouting at intervals, to no apparent effect. I glanced round, but there were no fresh tracks in the dooryard save our own. A scatter of dung balls lay near the half-hewn log, but those had plainly been left days ago; they were moist with dew, but not fresh-most had crumbled to powder.
No one had come, no one had gone, save on foot. The Beardsleys, whoever and however many of them there were, were likely still within.
Lying low, though. It was early, but not so early that farm people would not already be about their chores; I had seen someone earlier, after all. I stepped back and shaded my eyes against the rising sun, looking for any sign of life. I was more than curious about these Beardsleys-and more than slightly apprehensive about the prospects of having one or more male Beardsleys riding with us, given recent events.
I turned back to the door, and noticed an odd series of notches cut into the wood of the jamb. Each one was small, but there were a great many, running the complete length of one cloorpost, and halfivay down the other. I looked closer; they were arranged in groups of seven, a scant width of unscarred wood between the groups, as a prisoner might count, keeping track of the weeks.
Jamie emerged from the barn, followed by a faint bleating. The goats he'd mentioned, of course; I wondered whether it had been Keziah's job to milk them-if it was, his absence was going to become rapidly apparent, if it wasn't already.
Jan-tie took a few paces toward the house, cupped his hands round his mouth, and shouted again. No answer. He waited a few moments, then shrugged and strode up onto the porch, where he hammered on the door with the hilt of his dirk. It made enough noise to wake the dead, had there been any in the vicinity, and sent the chickens squawking away in a feather-scattering panic, but no one appeared in answer to the thunderous summons.
Jamie glanced back at me, one eyebrow raised. People didn't normally go off and leave their farms untended, not if they had livestock.
"Someone's here," he said, in answer to the unvoiced thought. "The goats are fresh-milked; there are drops still on their teats."
The Fiery Cross 281
"Do you think they could all be out searching for ... er ... you know who?" I murmured, moving closer to him.
"Perhaps." He moved to the side, bending to peer into a window. It had once been glassed, but most of the panes were cracked or missing, and a sheet of ratty muslin had been tacked over the opening. I saw Jamie frown at it, with the craftsman's disdain for a shoddy repair.
He turned his head suddenly, then looked at me. I'D'ye hear something, Sassenach?"
"Yes. I thought it was the goats, but
The bleat came again-this time unmistakably from the house. Jamie set his hand to the door, but it didn't budge.
"Bolted," he said briefly, and moved back to the window, where he reached carefully into the frame and pulled loose a corner of the muslin cloth.
"Phew," I said, wrinkling my nose at the air that wafted out. I was used to the odors of a winter-sealed cabin, where the scents of sweat, dirty clothes, wet feet, greasy hair, and slop jars mingled with baking bread, stewing meat, and the subtler notes of fungus and mold, but the aroma within the Beardsley residence went well beyond the norm.
"Either they're keeping the pigs in the house," I said, with a glance at the barn, "or there are ten people living in there who haven't come out since last spring."
"It's a bit ripe," Jamie agreed. He put his face into the window, grimacing at the stink, and bellowed, "Thig a mach! Come out, Beardsley, or I'm comin' in!"
I peered over his shoulder, to see whether this invitation might produce results. The room within was large, but so crowded that scarcely any of the stained wooden floor was visible through the rubble. Sniffing cautiously, I deduced that the barrels I saw contained-among other things-salt fish, tar, apples, beer, and. sauerkraut, while bundles of woolen blankets dyed with cochineal and indigo, kegs of black powder, and half-tanned hides reeking of dog turds lent their own peculiar fragrances to the unique mephitis within. Beardsley's trade goods, I supposed.
The other window had been covered as well, with a tattered wolf hide, so that the interior was dim and shadowy; with all the boxes, bundles, barrels, and bits of furniture lying in heaps, it looked like a poverty-stricken version of Ali Baba's cave.
The sound came again from the back of the house, somewhat louder; a noise midway between a squeal and a growl. I took a step back, sound and acrid smell together vividly recalling an image of dark fiir and sudden violence.
"Bears," I suggested, half-seriously. "The people are gone and there's a bear inside."
"Aye, Goldilocks," Jamie said, very dryly. "Nay doubt. Bears or not, there's something wrong. Fetch the pistols and cartridge box from my saddlebag."
I nodded and turned to go, but before I could step off the porch, a shuffling noise came^ftom inside, and I turned back sharply. Jamie had grasped his dirk, but as he saw whatever was inside, his hand relaxed on the hilt. His eyebrows also rose in surprise, and I leaned over his arm to see.
A woman peered out from between two hillocks of goods, looking round
282 Diana Gabaldon
suspiciously, like a rat peering out of a garbage dump. She was not particularly ratlike in appearance, being wavy-haired and quite stout, but she blinked at us in the calculating way of vermin, reckoning the threat.
"Go away," she said, evidently concluding that we were not the vanguard of an invading army.
"Good morning to ye, ma'am," Jamie began, "I am James Fraser, of "I don't care who you are," she replied. "Go away."
"Indeed I will not," he said firmly. "I must speak with the man o' the house."
An extraordinary expression crossed her plump face; concern, calculation, and what might have been amusement.
"Must you?" she said. She had a slight lisp; it came out as mutbt you? "And who says that you must?"
Jamie's ears were beginning to redden slightly, but he answered calmly enough.
"The Governor, madam. I am Colonel James Fraser," he said, with emphasis, "charged with the raising of militia. All able-bodied men between the ages of sixteen and sixty are called to muster. Will ye fetch Mr. Beardsley, please?"
"Mili-ish-ia, is it?" she said, handling the word with care. "Why, who will you be fighting, then?"
"With luck, no one. But the call to muster is sent out; I must answer, and so must all able-bodied men within the Treaty Line." Jamie's hand tightened on the crosspiece of the inner frame and rattled it experimentally. It was made of flimsy pine sticks, the wood shrunken and badly weathered; he could plainly rip it out of the wall and step through the opening, if he chose to do so. He met her eyes straight on, and smiled pleasantly.
She narrowed her eyes and pursed her lips, thinking.
"Able-bodied men," she said at last. "Hmp. Well, we've none of those. The bond lad's run off again, but even if he were here, he's not able; deaf as that doorpotht, and quite as dumb." She nodded toward the door in illustration. "If you care to hunt him down, you're welcome to keep him, though."
It didn't look as though there would be any hue and cry after Keziah, them I took a deep breath, in a sigh of relief, but let it out again, swiftly.
Jamie wasn't giving up easily.
"Is Mr. Beardsley in the house?" he asked. "I wish to see him." He gave an experimental tug on the frame, and the dry wood cracked with a sound like a pistol shot.
"He's thcarce fit for company," she said, and the odd note was back in her voice; wary, but at the same time, filled with something like excitement.
"Is he ill?" I asked, leaning over Jamie's shoulder. "I might be able to help; I'm a doctor."
She shuffled forward a step or two, and peered at me, f
rowning under a heavy mass of wavy brown hair. She was younger than I'd thought; seen in better fight, the heavy face showed no cobweb of age or slackening of flesh.
"A doctor?"
"My wife's well-kent as a healer," Jamie said. "The Indian folk call her White Raven."
The Fiery Cross 283
"The conjure woman?" Her eyes flew wide in alarm, and she took a step back.
Something struck me odd about the woman, and looking at her, I realized what it was. Despite the reek in the house, both the woman's person and her dress were clean, and her hair was soft and fluftV-not at all the norm at this time of year, when people generally didn't bathe for several months in the cold weather.
"Who are you?" I asked bluntly. "Are you Mrs. Beardsley? Or perhaps Miss Beardsley?"
No more than twenty-five, I thought, in spite of the bulk of her swaddled figure. Her shoulders swelled fatly under her shawl, and the width of her hips brushed the barrels she stood between. Evidently trade with the Cherokee was sufficiently profitable to keep Beardsley's family in adequate food, if not his bond servants. I eyed her with some dislike, but she met my gaze coolly enough.
"I am Mrs. Beardthley."
The alarm had faded; she pursed her lips, and pushed them in and out, regarding me with an air of calculation. Jamie flexed his arm, and the window frame cracked loudly.
"Come you in, then."
The odd tone was still in her voice; half defiance, half eagerness. Jamie caught it and frowned, but released his grip on the frame.
She moved out from between the boxes and turned toward the door. I caught no more than a glimpse of her in motion, but that was enough to see that she was