Outlander aka Cross Stitch Read online

  “Lobsterbacks. Flogged me twice, in the space of a week. They’d ha’ done it twice the same day, I expect, were they not afraid of killing me. No joy in flogging a dead man.”

  I tried to keep my voice steady while I sponged. “I shouldn’t think anyone would do such a thing for joy.”

  “No? You should ha’ seen him.”

  “Who?”

  “The redcoat captain that skinned my back for me. If he was not precisely joyous, he was at least verra pleased with himself. More nor I was,” he added wryly. “Randall was the name.”

  “Randall!” I couldn’t keep the shock from my voice. Cold blue eyes fixed on mine.

  “You’re familiar with the man?” The voice was suddenly suspicious.

  “No, no! I used to know a family of that name, a long time, uh, a long time ago.” In my nervousness, I dropped the sponge cloth.

  “Drat, now that will have to be boiled again.” I scooped it off the floor and bustled to the fireplace, trying to hide my confusion in busyness. Could this Captain Randall possibly be Frank’s ancestor, the soldier with the sterling record, gallant on the field of battle, recipient of commendations from dukes? And if so, could someone related to my sweet gentle Frank possibly be capable of inflicting the horrifying marks on this lad’s back?

  I busied myself at the fire, dropping in a few more handfuls of witch hazel and garlic, setting more cloths to soak. When I thought I could control my voice and face, I came back to Jamie, sponge in hand.

  “Why were you flogged?” I asked abruptly.

  It was hardly tactful, but I badly wanted to know, and was too tired to phrase it more gently.

  He sighed, moving his shoulder uneasily under my ministrations. He was tired, too, and I was undoubtedly hurting him, gentle as I tried to be.

  “The first time was escape, and the second was theft – or at least that’s what the charge-sheet read.”

  “What were you escaping from?”

  “The English,” he said, with an ironic lift of his brow. “If ye mean where, Fort William.”

  “I gathered it was the English,” I said, matching the dryness of his tone. “What were you doing in Fort William in the first place?”

  He rubbed his brow with his free hand. “Oh, that. I think that was obstruction.”

  “Obstruction, escape, and theft. You sound a right dangerous character,” I said lightly, hoping to distract him from what I was doing.

  It worked at least slightly; one corner of the wide mouth turned up, and one dark blue eye glinted back over his shoulder at me.

  “Oh, I am that,” he said. “A wonder you think yourself safe in the same room wi’ me, and you an English lassie.”

  “Well, you look harmless enough at the moment.” This was entirely untrue; shirtless, scarred and blood-smeared, with stubbled cheeks and reddened eyelids from the long night ride, he looked thoroughly disreputable. And tired or not, he looked entirely capable of further mayhem, should the need arise.

  He laughed, a surprisingly deep, infectious sound.

  “Harmless as a setting dove,” he agreed. “I’m too hungry to be a threat to anything but breakfast. Let a stray bannock come within reach, though, and I’ll no answer for the consequences. Ooh!”

  “Sorry,” I muttered. “The stab wound’s deep, and it’s dirty.”

  “It’s all right.” But he had gone pale beneath the coppery stubble of his beard. I tried to lead him back into conversation.

  “What exactly is obstruction?” I asked casually. “I must say it doesn’t sound a major crime.”

  He took a deep breath, fixing his eyes resolutely on the carved bedpost as I swabbed deeper.

  “Ah. Well, I suppose it’s whatever the English say it is. In my case, it meant defending my family and my property, and getting myself half killed in the process.” He pressed his lips together, as if to say no more, but after a moment went on, as though seeking to focus his attention on anything other than his shoulder.

  “It was near to four years ago. There was a levy put on the manors near Fort William – food for the garrison, horses for transport, and suchlike. I wouldna say many liked it, but most would yield what they had to. Small parties of soldiers would go round with an officer and a wagon or two, collecting the bits of food and things. And one day in October, yon Captain Randall came along to L-” he caught himself quickly, with a glance at me, “to our place.”

  I nodded encouragingly, eyes on my work.

  “We’d thought they’d not come so far; the place is a good distance from the fort, and not easy to get to. But they did.”

  He closed his eyes briefly. “My father was away – gone to a funeral at the next farm. And I was up in the fields wi’ most of the men, for it was close to harvest, and a lot to be done. So my sister was alone in the house, except for two or three of the women servants, and they all rushed upstairs to hide their heads under the bedclothes when they saw the red coats. Thought the soldiers were sent by the devil – and I’ll no just say they were wrong.”

  I laid down my cloth. The nasty part was done; now all we needed was a poultice of some kind – lacking iodine or penicillin, it was the best I could do for infection – and a good tight dressing. Eyes still closed, the young man did not appear to notice.

  “I came down toward the house from behind, meaning to fetch a piece of harness from the barn, and heard the shouting and my sister screaming inside the house.”

  “Oh?” I tried to make my voice as quiet and unintrusive as I could. I wanted very much to know about this Captain Randall; so far, this story had done little to dispel my original impression of him.

  “I went in through the kitchen and found two of ’em riflin’ the pantry, stuffin’ their sacks wi’ flour and bacon. I punched one of them in the head, and threw the other out the window, sack and all. Then I burst into the parlor, where I found two of the redcoats with my sister, Jenny. Her dress was torn a bit, and one of them had a scratched face.”

  He opened his eyes and smiled, a bit grimly. “I didna stop to ask questions. We were going round and about, and I wasna doing too poorly, for all there were two of them, when Randall came in.”

  Randall had stopped the fight by the simple expedient of holding a pistol to Jenny’s head. Forced to surrender, Jamie had quickly been seized and bound by the two soldiers. Randall had smiled charmingly at his captive and said, “Well, well. Two spitfire scratchcats here, have we? A taste of hard labor’ll cure your temper, I trow, and if it doesn’t, well, there’s another cat you’ll meet, name of nine-tails. But there’s other cures for other cats, aren’t there, my sweet pussy?”

  Jamie stopped for a moment, jaw working. “He was holdin’ Jenny’s arm behind her back, but he let go then, to bring his hand round and put it down her dress, round her breast, like.” Remembering the scene, he smiled unexpectedly. “So,” he resumed, “Jenny stamped down on his foot and gave him her elbow deep in the belly. And as he was bent over choking, she whirled round and gave him a good root in the stones wi’ her knee.” He snorted briefly with amusement.

  “Weel, at that he dropped the pistol, and she went for it, but one of the dragoons holding me got to it first.”

  I had finished the bandaging and stood quiet behind him, a hand resting on his good shoulder. It seemed important he should tell me everything, but I was afraid he would stop if he were reminded of my presence.

  “When he’d got back enough breath to talk with, Randall had his men haul us both outside. They stripped off my shirt, bound me to the wagon tongue, and Randall beat me across the back with the flat of his saber. He was in a black fury, but a wee bit the worse for wear, ye might say. It stung me a bit, but he couldna keep it up for long.”

  The brief spurt of amusement had vanished now, and the shoulder under my hand was hard with tension. “When he stopped, he turned to Jenny – one of the dragoons had hold of her – and asked her did she want to see more, or would she rather go into the house with him, and offer him better entertain
ment?” The shoulder twitched uneasily.

  “I couldna move much, but I shouted to her that I wasna hurt – and I wasn’t, too much – and that she was not to go with him, not if they cut my throat before her eyes.”

  “They were holding her behind me, so I couldna see, but from the sound of it, she spat in his face. She must have done, because next thing I knew, he’d grabbed a handful of my hair, pulled my head back, and set his knife against my throat.”

  “I’ve a mind to take you at your suggestion,” Randall had said through his teeth, and dug the point just beneath the skin, far enough to draw blood.

  “I could see the dagger close to my face,” Jamie said, “and the pattern of spots my blood was making in the dust under the wagon.” His tone was almost dreamy, and I realized that, from fatigue and pain, he had lapsed into something like a hypnotic state. He might not even remember that I was there.

  “I made to call out to my sister, to tell her that I’d much prefer to die than have her dishonor herself wi’ such scum. Randall took the dagger from my throat, though, and thrust the blade betwixt my teeth, so I couldna call out.” He rubbed at his mouth, as though still tasting bitter steel. He stopped talking, staring straight ahead.

  “But what happened then?” I shouldn’t have spoken, but I had to know.

  He shook himself, like a man rousing from sleep, and rubbed a large hand tiredly across the back of his neck.

  “She went with him,” he said abruptly. “She thought he would kill me, and perhaps she was right. After that, I dinna ken what happened. One of the dragoons hit me in the head wi’ the stock of his musket. When I woke, I was trussed up in the wagon wi’ the chickens, jolting down the road toward Fort William.”

  “I see,” I said quietly. “I’m sorry. It must have been terrible for you.”

  He smiled suddenly, the haze of fatigue gone. “Oh, aye. Chickens are verra poor company, especially on a long journey.” Realizing that the dressing was completed, he hunched the shoulder experimentally, wincing as he did so.

  “Don’t do that!” I said in alarm. “You really mustn’t move it. In fact,” I glanced at the table, to be sure there were some strips of dry fabric left. “I’m going to strap that arm to your side. Hold still.”

  He didn’t speak further, but relaxed a bit under my hands when he realized that it wasn’t going to hurt. I felt an odd sense of intimacy with this young Scottish stranger, due in part, I thought, to the dreadful story he had just told me, and in part to our long ride through the dark, pressed together in drowsy silence. I had not slept with many men other than my husband, but I had noticed before that to sleep, actually sleep with someone did give this sense of intimacy, as though your dreams had flowed out of you to mingle with his and fold you both in a blanket of unconscious knowing. A throwback of some kind, I thought. In older, more primitive times (like these? asked another part of my mind), it was an act of trust to sleep in the presence of another person. If the trust was mutual, simple sleep could bring you closer together than the joining of bodies.

  The strapping finished, I helped him on with the rough linen shirt, easing it over the bad shoulder. He stood up to tuck it one-handed into his kilt, and smiled down at me.

  “I thank ye, Claire. You’ve a good touch.” His hand reached out as though to touch my face, but he seemed to think better of it; the hand wavered and dropped to his side. Apparently he had felt that odd surge of intimacy too. I looked hastily away, flipping a hand in a think-nothing-of-it gesture.

  My gaze traveled around the room, taking in the smoke-blacked fireplace, the narrow, unglazed windows, and the solid oak furnishings. No electrical fittings. No carpeting. No shiny brass knobs on the bedstead.

  It looked, in fact, like an eighteenth-century castle. But what about Frank? The man I had met in the wood looked disturbingly like him, but Jamie’s description of Captain Randall was completely foreign to everything I knew about my gentle, peace-loving husband. But then, if it were true – and I was beginning to admit, even to myself, that it might be – then he could in fact be almost anything. A man I knew only from a genealogical chart was not necessarily bound to resemble his descendants in conduct.

  But it was Frank himself I was concerned with at the moment. If I was, in fact, in the eighteenth century, where was he? What would he do when I failed to return to Mrs. Baird’s? Would I ever see him again? Thinking about Frank was the last straw. Since the moment I stepped into the rock and ordinary life ceased to exist, I had been assaulted, threatened, kidnapped and jostled. I had not eaten or slept properly for more than twenty-four hours. I tried to control myself, but my lip wobbled and my eyes filled in spite of myself.

  I turned to the fire to hide my face, but too late. Jamie took my hand, asking in a gentle voice what was wrong. The firelight glinted on my gold wedding band, and I began to sniffle in earnest.

  “Oh, I’ll… I’ll be all right, it’s all right, really, it’s… just my… my husband… I don’t-”

  “Ah lass, are ye widowed, then?” His voice was so full of sympathetic concern that I lost control entirely.

  “No… yes… I mean, I don’t… yes, I suppose I am!” Overcome with emotion and tiredness, I collapsed against him, sobbing hysterically.

  The lad had nice feelings. Instead of calling for help or retreating in confusion, he sat down, gathered me firmly onto his lap with his good arm and sat rocking me gently, muttering soft Gaelic in my ear and smoothing my hair with one hand. I wept bitterly, surrendering momentarily to my fear and heartbroken confusion, but slowly I began to quiet a bit, as Jamie stroked my neck and back, offering me the comfort of his broad, warm chest. My sobs lessened and I began to calm myself, leaning tiredly into the curve of his shoulder. No wonder he was so good with horses, I thought blearily, feeling his fingers rubbing gently behind my ears, listening to the soothing, incomprehensible speech. If I were a horse, I’d let him ride me anywhere.

  This absurd thought coincided unfortunately with my dawning realization that the young man was not completely exhausted after all. In fact, it was becoming embarrassingly obvious to both of us. I coughed and cleared my throat, wiping my eyes with my sleeve as I slid off his lap.

  “I’m so sorry… that is, I mean, thank you for… but I…” I was babbling, backing away from him with my face flaming. He was a bit flushed, too, but not disconcerted. He reached for my hand and pulled me back. Careful not to touch me otherwise, he put a hand under my chin and forced my head up to face him.

  “Ye need not be scairt of me,” he said softly. “Nor of anyone here, so long as I’m with ye.” He let go and turned to the fire.

  “You need somethin’ hot, lass,” he said matter-of-factly, “and a bit to eat as well. Something in your belly will help more than anything.” I laughed shakily at his attempts to pour broth one-handed, and went to help. He was right; food did help. We sipped broth and ate bread in a companionable silence, sharing the growing comfort of warmth and fullness.

  Finally, he stood up, picking up the fallen quilt from the floor. He dropped it back on the bed, and motioned me toward it. “Do ye sleep a bit, Claire. You’re worn out, and likely someone will want to talk wi’ ye before too long.”

  This was a sinister reminder of my precarious position, but I was too exhausted to care much. I uttered no more than a pro forma protest at taking the bed; I had never seen anything so enticing. Jamie assured me that he could find a bed elsewhere. I fell headfirst into the pile of quilts and was asleep before he reached the door.

  Chapter 5. THE MACKENZIE

  I woke in a state of complete confusion. I vaguely remembered that something was very wrong, but couldn’t remember what. In fact, I had been sleeping so soundly that I couldn’t remember for a moment who I was, much less where. I was warm, and the surrounding room was piercingly cold. I tried to burrow back into my cocoon of quilts, but the voice that had wakened me was still nagging.

  “Come then, lass! Come now, ye must get up!” The voice was deep and genial
ly hectoring, like the barking of a sheepdog. I pried one reluctant eye open far enough to see the mountain of brown homespun.

  Mistress FitzGibbons! The sight of her shocked me back to full consciousness, and memory returned. It was still true, then.

  Wrapping a blanket about me against the chill, I staggered out of bed and headed for the fire as fast as possible. Mistress FitzGibbons had a cup of hot broth waiting; I sipped it, feeling like the survivor of some major bombing raid, as she laid out a pile of garments on the bed. There was a long yellowish linen chemise, with a thin edging of lace, a petticoat of fine cotton, two overskirts in shades of brown, and a pale lemon-yellow bodice. Brown-striped stockings of wool and a pair of yellow slippers completed the ensemble.

  Brooking no protests, the dame bustled me out of my inadequate garments and oversaw my dressing from the skin out. She stood back, surveying her handiwork with satisfaction.

  “The yellow suits ye, lass; I thought it would. Goes well wi’ that brown hair, and it brings out the gold in your eyes. Stay, though, ye’ll need a wee bit o’ ribbon.” Turning out a pocket like a gunnysack, she produced a handful of ribbons and bits of jewelry.

  Too stunned to resist, I allowed her to dress my hair, tying back the sidelocks with primrose ribbon, clucking over the unfeminine unbecomingness of my shoulder-length bob.

  “Goodness, me dear, whatever were ye thinkin’, to cut your hair so short? Were ye in disguise, like? I’ve heard o’ some lasses doin’ so, to hide their sex when travelin’, same as to be safe from they dratted redcoats. ’Tis a fine day, says I, when leddies canna travel the roads in safety.” She ran on, patting me here and there, tucking in a curl or arranging a fold. Finally I was arrayed to her satisfaction.

  “Weel now, that’s verra gude. Now, ye’ve just time for a wee bite, then I must take you to himself.”

  “Himself?” I said. I didn’t care for the sound of this. Whoever Himself was, he was likely to ask difficult questions.

  “Why, the MacKenzie to be sure. Whoever else?”