Outlander aka Cross Stitch Read online

  There was no trace of a smile now, though; MacRae’s face was suitably stern. Reasonable, I thought; no one wants to see a grinning executioner.

  The miscreant was brought to stand on the plinth in the center of the square. The lad looked pale and frightened, but did not move as Arthur Duncan, procurator fiscal for the parish of Cranesmuir, drew his plumpness up into an approximation of dignity and prepared to pronounce sentence.

  “The ninny had already confessed by the time I came in,” said a voice by my ear. Geilie peered interestedly over my shoulder. “I couldna get him freed entirely. I got him off as light as could be, though; only an hour in the pillory and one ear nailed.”

  “One ear nailed! Nailed to what?”

  “Why, the pillory, o’ course.” She shot me a curious look, but turned back to the window to watch the execution of this light sentence obtained by her merciful intercession.

  The crush of bodies around the pillory was so great that little of the miscreant could be seen, but the crowd drew back a bit to allow the locksman free movement for the ear-nailing. The lad, white-faced and small in the jaws of the pillory, had both eyes tight shut and kept them that way, shuddering with fear. He uttered a high, thin scream when the nail was driven in, audible through the closed windows, and I shuddered a bit myself.

  We returned to our work, as did most of the spectators in the square, but I could not help rising to glance out from time to time. A few idlers passing by paused to jeer at the victim and throw balls of mud, and now and then a more sober citizen was to be seen, seizing a moment from the round of daily duties to attend to the moral improvement of the delinquent by means of a few well-chosen words of reproval and advice.

  It was still an hour to the late spring sunset, and we were drinking tea below in the parlor, when a pounding at the door announced the arrival of a visitor. The day was so dark from the rain that one could hardly tell the level of the sun. The Duncans’ house, however, boasted a clock, a magnificent contrivance of walnut panels, brass pendulums, and a face decorated with quiring cherubim, and this instrument pointed to half-past six.

  The scullery maid opened the door to the parlor and unceremoniously announced, “In here.” Jamie MacTavish ducked automatically as he came through the door, bright hair darkened by the rain to the color of ancient bronze. He wore an elderly and disreputable coat against the wet, and carried a riding cloak of heavy green velvet folded under one arm.

  He nodded in acknowledgment as I rose and introduced him to Geilie.

  “Mistress Duncan, Mrs. Beauchamp.” He waved a hand toward the window. “I see ye’ve had a wee bit doing this afternoon.”

  “Is he still there?” I asked, peering out. The boy was only a dark shape, seen through the distortion of the wavering drawing-room panes. “He must be soaked through.”

  “He is.” Jamie spread the cloak and held it for me. “So you’d be as well, Colum thought. I’d business in the village, so he sent along the cloak with me for ye. You’re to ride back wi’ me.”

  “That was kind of him.” I spoke absently, for my mind was still on the tanner’s lad.

  “How long must he stay there?” I asked Geilie. “The lad in the pillory,” I added impatiently, seeing her blank look.

  “Oh, him,” she said, frowning slightly at the introduction of such an unimportant topic. “An hour, I told you. The locksman should ha’ freed him from the pillory by now.”

  “He has,” Jamie assured her. “I saw him as I was crossing the green. It’s only the lad’s not got up courage to tear the griss from his lug yet.”

  My mouth dropped open. “You mean the nail won’t be taken out of his ear? He’s to tear himself loose?”

  “Oh, aye.” Jamie was cheerfully offhand. “He’s still a bit nervous, but I imagine he’ll set his mind to it soon. It’s wet out, and growing dark as well. We must leave ourselves, or we’ll get naught but scraps to our dinner.” He bowed to Geilie and turned to go.

  “Wait a bit,” she said to me. “Since you’ve a big, strong lad like yon to see ye home, I’ve a chest of dried marsh cabbage and other simples as I’ve promised to Mrs. FitzGibbons up at the Castle. Perhaps Mr. MacTavish would be so kind?”

  Jamie assenting, she had a manservant fetch down the chest from her workroom, handing over the enormous wrought-iron key for the purpose. While the servant was gone, she busied herself for a moment at a small writing desk in the corner. By the time the chest, a sizable wooden box with brass bands, was brought in, she had finished her note. She hastily sanded it, folded and sealed it with a blob of wax from the candle, and pressed it into my hand.

  “There,” she said. “That’s the bill for it. Will ye give it to Dougal for me? It’s him that handles the payments and such. Dinna give it to anyone else, or I’ll not be paid for weeks.”

  “Yes, of course.”

  She embraced me warmly, and with admonitions about avoiding the chill, saw us to the door.

  I stood sheltering beneath the eave of the house, as Jamie tied the box to his horse’s saddle. The rain was coming down harder now, and the eaves ran with a ragged sheet of water.

  I eyed the broad back and muscular forearms as he lifted the heavy box with little apparent effort. Then I glanced at the plinth, where the tanner’s boy, in spite of encouragement from the regathered crowd, was still firmly pinioned. Granted this was not a lovely young girl with moonbeam hair, but Jamie’s earlier actions in Colum’s hall of justice made me think that he might not be unsympathetic to the youngster’s plight.

  “Er, Mr. MacTavish?” I began, hesitantly. There was no response. The comely face did not change expression; the wide mouth stayed relaxed, the blue eyes focused on the strap he was fastening.

  “Ah, Jamie?” I tried again, a little louder, and he looked up at once. So it really wasn’t MacTavish. I wondered what it was.

  “Aye?” he said.

  “You’re, er, quite sizable, aren’t you?” I said. A half-smile curved his lips and he nodded, clearly wondering what I was up to.

  “Big enough for most things,” he answered.

  I was encouraged, and moved casually closer, so as not to be overheard by any stragglers from the square.

  “And tolerably strong in the fingers?” I asked.

  He flexed one hand and the smile widened. “Aye, that’s so. Happen you’ve a few chestnuts you want cracked?” He looked down at me with a shrewd and merry glint.

  I glanced briefly past him to the knot of onlookers in the square.

  “More like one to be pulled from the fire, I think.” I looked up to meet that questioning blue gaze. “Could you do it?”

  He stood looking down at me for a moment, still smiling, then shrugged. “Aye, if the shank’s long enough to grip. Can ye draw the crowd away, though? Interference wouldna be looked on kindly, and me a stranger.”

  I had not anticipated the possibility that my request might put him in any danger, and I hesitated, but he seemed game to try, danger notwithstanding.

  “Well, if we both went over for a closer look, and then I were to faint at the sight, do you think-?”

  “You being so unused to blood and all?” One brow lifted sardonically and he grinned. “Aye, that’ll do. If ye can make shift to fall off the plinth, still better.”

  I had in fact felt a bit squeamish about looking, but it was not so daunting a sight as I had feared. The ear was pinned firmly through the upper flange, close to the edge, and a full two inches of the nail’s square, headless shank was free above the pinioned appendage. There was almost no blood, and it was clear from the boy’s face that while he was both frightened and uncomfortable, he was in no great pain. I began to think that Geilie perhaps had been right in considering this a fairly lenient sentence, given the overall state of current Scottish jurisprudence, though this didn’t alter by one whit my opinion as to the barbarity of it.

  Jamie edged casually through the fringe of lookers-on. He shook his head reprovingly at the boy.

  “Na then,
lad,” he said, clicking his tongue. “Got yourself in a rare swivet, have ye no?” He rested one large, firm hand on the wooden edge of the pillory, under pretext of looking more closely at the ear. “Och, laddie,” he said, disparaging, “yon’s no job to be making heavy weather of. A wee snatch o’ the head and it’s over. Here, shall I help ye?” He reached out as though to grasp the lad by the hair and wrench his head free. The boy yelped in fear.

  Recognizing my cue, I stepped back, taking care to tread heavily on the toes of the woman behind me, who yipped in anguish as my boot heel crushed her metatarsals.

  “I beg your pardon,” I gasped. “I’m… so dizzy! Please…” I turned away from the pillory and took two or three steps, staggering artfully and clutching at the sleeves of those nearby. The edge of the plinth was only six inches away; I took a firm hold on a slightly built girl I had marked out for the purpose and pitched headfirst over the edge, taking her with me.

  We rolled on the wet grass in a tangle of skirts and squeals. Letting go of her blouse at last, I relaxed into a dramatically spread-eagled heap, rain pattering down on my upturned face.

  I was in truth a trifle winded by the impact – the girl had fallen on top of me – and I fought for breath, listening to the babble of concerned voices gathered around me. Speculations, suggestions, and shocked interjections rained on me, thicker than the drops of water from the sky, but it was a pair of familiar arms that raised me to a sitting position, and a pair of gravely concerned blue eyes that I saw when I opened my own. A faint flicker of the eyelids told me that the mission had been accomplished, and in fact, I could see the tanner’s lad, napkin clutched to his ear, making off at speed in the direction of his loft, unnoticed by the crowd that had turned to attend to this new sensation.

  The villagers, so lately calling for the lad’s blood, were kindness itself to me. I was tenderly gathered up and carried back to the Duncans’ house, where I was plied with brandy, tea, warm blankets, and sympathy. I was only allowed to depart at last by Jamie’s stating bluntly that we must go, then lifting me bodily off the couch and heading for the door, disregarding the expostulations of my hosts.

  Mounted once more in front of him, my own horse led by the rein, I tried to thank him for his help.

  “No trouble, lass,” he said, dismissing my thanks.

  “But it was a risk to you,” I said, persisting. “I didn’t realize you’d be in danger when I asked you.”

  “Ah,” he said, noncommittally. And a moment later, with a hint of amusement, “Ye wouldna expect me to be less bold than a wee Sassenach lassie, now would ye?”

  He urged the horses into a trot as the shadows of dusk gathered by the roadside. We did not speak much on the rest of the journey home. And when we reached the castle, he left me at the gate with no more than a softly mocking, “Good’ e’en, Mistress Sassenach.” But I felt as though a friendship had been begun that ran a bit deeper than shared gossip under the apple trees.

  Chapter 10. THE OATH-TAKING

  There was a terrific stir over the next two days, with comings and goings and preparations of every sort. My medical practice dropped off sharply; the food-poisoning victims were well again, and everyone else seemed to be much too busy to fall sick. Aside from a slight rash of splinters-in-fingers among the boys hauling in wood for the fires, and a similar outbreak of scalds and burns among the busy kitchen maids, there were no accidents either.

  I was excited myself. Tonight was the night. Mrs. Fitz had told me that all the fighting men of the MacKenzie clan would be in the hall tonight, to make their oaths of allegiance to Colum. With a ceremony of this importance going on inside, no one would be watching the stables.

  During my hours helping in the kitchens and orchards, I had managed to stow away sufficient food to see me provided for several days, I thought. I had no water flask, but had contrived a substitute using one of the heavier glass jugs from the surgery. I had stout boots and a warm cloak, courtesy of Colum. I would have a decent horse; on my afternoon visit to the stables, I had marked out the one I meant to take. I had no money, but my patients had given me a handful of small trinkets, ribbons, and bits of carving or jewelry. If necessary, I might be able to use these to trade for anything else I needed.

  I felt badly about abusing Colum’s hospitality and the friendship of the castle inhabitants by leaving without a word or a note of farewell, but after all, what could I possibly say? I had pondered the problem for some time, but finally decided just to leave. For one thing, I had no writing paper, and was not willing to take the risk of visiting Colum’s quarters in search of any.

  An hour past first dark, I approached the stable cautiously, ears alert for any signs of human presence, but it seemed that everyone was up in the Hall, readying themselves for the ceremony. The door stuck, but gave with a slight push, its leather hinges letting it swing silently inward.

  The air inside was warm and alive with the faint stirrings of resting horses. It was also black as the inside of an undertaker’s hat, as Uncle Lamb used to say. Such few windows as there were for ventilation were narrow slits, too small to admit the faint starlight outside. Hands outstretched, I walked slowly into the main part of the stable, feet shuffling in the straw.

  I groped carefully in front of me, looking for the edge of a stall to guide me. My hands found only empty air, but my shins met a solid obstruction resting on the floor, and I pitched headlong with a startled cry that rang in the rafters of the old stone building.

  The obstruction rolled over with a startled oath and grasped me hard by the arms. I found myself held against the length of a sizable male body, with someone’s breath tickling my ear.

  “Who are you?” I gasped, jerking backward. “And what are you doing here?” Hearing my voice, the unseen assailant relaxed his grip.

  “I might ask the same of you, Sassenach,” said the deep soft voice of Jamie MacTavish, and I relaxed a little in relief. There was a stirring in the straw, and he sat up.

  “Though I suppose I could guess,” he added dryly. “How far d’ye think you’d get, lassie, on a dark night and a strange horse, wi’ half the MacKenzie clan after ye by morning?”

  I was ruffled, in more ways than one.

  “They wouldn’t be after me. They’re all up at the Hall, and if one in five of them is sober enough to stand by morning, let alone ride a horse, I’ll be most surprised.”

  He laughed, and standing up, reached down a hand to help me to my feet. He brushed the straw from the back of my skirt, with somewhat more force than I thought strictly necessary.

  “Well, that’s verra sound reasoning on your part, Sassenach,” he said, sounding mildly surprised that I was capable of reason. “Or would be,” he added, “did Colum not have guards posted all round the castle and scattered through the woods. He’d hardly leave the castle unprotected, and the fighting men of the whole clan inside it. Granted that stone doesna burn so well as wood…”

  I gathered he was referring to the infamous Glencoe Massacre, when one John Campbell, on government orders, had put thirty-eight members of the MacDonald clan to the sword and burned the house above them. I calculated rapidly. That would have been only fifty-some years before; recent enough to justify any defensive precautions on Colum’s part.

  “In any case, ye could scarcely have chosen a worse night to try to escape,” MacTavish went on. He seemed entirely unconcerned with the fact that I had meant to escape, only with the reasons why it wouldn’t work, which struck me as a little odd. “Besides the guards, and the fact that every good horseman for miles around is here, the way to the castle will be filled wi’ folk coming from the countryside for the tynchal and the games.”

  “Tynchal?”

  “A hunt. Usually stags, maybe a boar this time; one of the stable lads told Old Alec there’s a large one in the east wood.” He put a large hand in the center of my back and turned me toward the faint oblong of the open door.

  “Come along,” he said. “I’ll take ye back up to the
castle.”

  I pulled away from him. “Don’t bother,” I said ungraciously. “I can find my own way.”

  He took my elbow with considerable firmness. “I daresay ye can. But you’ll not want to meet any of Colum’s guards alone.”

  “And why not?” I snapped. “I’m not doing anything wrong; there’s no law against walking outside the castle, is there?”

  “No. I doubt they’d mean to do ye harm,” he said, peering thoughtfully into the shadows. “But it’s far from unusual for a man to take a flask along to keep him company when he stands guard. And the drink may be a boon companion, but it’s no a verra good adviser as to suitable behavior, when a small sweet lass comes on ye alone in the dark.”

  “I came on you in the dark, alone,” I reminded him, with some boldness. “And I’m neither particularly small, nor very sweet, at least at present.”

  “Aye, well, I was asleep, not drunk,” he responded briefly. “And questions of your temper aside, you’re a good bit smaller than most of Colum’s guards.”

  I put that aside as an unproductive line of argument, and tried another tack. “And why were you asleep in the stable?” I asked. “Haven’t you a bed somewhere?” We were in the outer reaches of the kitchen gardens by now, and I could see his face in the faint light. He was intent, checking the stone arches carefully as we went, but he glanced sharply aside at this.

  “Aye,” he said. He continued to stride forward, still gripping me by the elbow, but went on after a moment, “I thought I’d be better out of the way.”

  “Because you don’t mean to swear allegiance to Colum MacKenzie?” I guessed. “And you don’t want to stand any racket about it?”

  He glanced at me, amused at my words. “Something like that,” he admitted.

  One of the side gates had been left welcomingly ajar, and a lantern perched atop the stone ledge next to it shed a yellow glow on the path. We had almost reached this beacon when a hand suddenly descended on my mouth from behind and I was jerked abruptly off my feet.