Jennie About to Be (35 page)

“A man in Glen Bneithe fell like a tree and has not spoken since, and his face is twisted.”

“I hope he isn't one of lain Innes's brothers,” Jennie said.

“He is not. . . . A woman at Coire na Broc had terrible pains in her heart and couldn't walk, but she was alive last night. Och, they are all living with hearts shattered from one thing or another.”

“Tell me about Morag, please!”

“Morag is strong and good, like her mother and father. They help the rest with their courage.”

“What about the people at Roseholm?” she asked. “How long can they stay there?”

“Some of the younger ones are going on to Fort William in the hopes of emigrating, if they can find work to pay their passage. But the others can stay. They will work for him, still grieving for their homes, but they can grow old and die in decency. Rose's factor is a good man, and Rose lives like a chief of old. He stands godfather to the children and gives away widows' daughters at their weddings. If he approves of the young men,” he added dryly.

“This is what I expected to find in the Highlands,” said Jennie. “I'm glad it exists somewhere, if not at Linnmore. What about the little boys I found?”

“When I last saw them yesterday, the minister's housekeeper was coming out to the wood bringing a strupach to all the children, and those two were not being shy.”

She smiled, but sadly. “I hope they live to grow up. They felt like little birds in my arms.”

“They will perhaps survive to be coal miners for short lives, or fishermen to be swept up by the English Navy. Or they will drown in the ocean on the way to America some day. I must apologize, Mrs. Gilchrist. I am not always being so gloomy. You may find this hard to believe.”

“There's not much to sing about,” said Jennie, “unless you're a lark.” The desert dust was clogging her throat again. She knelt by the brook and cupped her hands in the icy water and drank from them. When she straightened up, he was watching her. He looked less haggard now.

“What will
you
do?” she asked.

“By my grandfather's will, my line is always to have a home here. I have twenty pounds each quarter, through a lawyer in Dornoch.”

“But in your heart do you
want
to stay?” she asked. “To marry and raise your children here when it is all turned over to sheep, and knowing you have such enemies at Linnmore House? Not to mention Patrick MacSween and his men.”

He seemed faintly amused by her intensity; there was a creasing around his eyes and a lift to one corner of his mouth, the embryo of a smile.

“Would
you
emigrate?” she persisted. “Many Scots do well in England, if they're not anxious to cross the ocean.”

“I am not a Scot,” he said evenly. “I am a descendant of Picts. Our blood was shed here to hold the land, and it was ours long before Kenneth MacAlpin of the Scots had himself crowned king of everything north of the Forth. If I am forced out, there is no other place for me in Scotland, and I will not live with Sassenachs. So I will have to cross the sea, but not until I know it is a life and death choice, because I am sure it will be my death.”

She was impressed by a dignity that neither Archie nor Nigel had ever shown, and she was very relieved, too. “I'll be glad if you stay,” she said fervently. “Will you tell me whenever you have news of Morag and her people? Perhaps I can send them a little money sometimes. A little is all I have. I never wished before that I was rich, but I do now.”

“Whatever you ask, I will do.”

“Thank you. Now I'll give you what I brought.” She turned her back to him and took out the velvet bag. She did up her buttons again and went back and emptied the bag on the flat top of the stone where she'd been sitting. The gold coins caught the sun in a small blazing fire.

“Take what you think is best,” she said.

He took five and put them in a pocket inside his coat. “Hamish will use it where it's needed. Thank you.”

“My father died a poor man,” she said as she scooped the sovereigns into the purse, “but he left my sisters and me each thirty sovereigns, not to be wasted on foolishness. I think he'd be pleased by this, but sad for the necessity.” She walked up toward the small dark entrance to the Pict's House, tucked the purse back into her bosom, and knotted the scarf. Then she took her handkerchief from her sleeve and blew her nose.
No more tears
. Life was going to be difficult from now on, but at least she had a roof, and food, and the possibility of children whom she could love. Tears were a disgusting indulgence, the easy, self-pitying solace of cowards.

There was a loud snort and a jingle of harness, and Dora whickered excitedly. Jennie swung around and saw Nigel on the gray between the two jagged outcroppings through which she had come. He was bareheaded, and an errant scud of wind ruffled his yellow hair and the horse's mane.

J
ENNIE'S
first reaction was a jolt of purely sensual joy as her body remembered him in its most intimate places; almost instantly that was killed by the new response that had become hideously familiar in the last forty-eight hours. Her heart began to beat in a jumpy, irregular rhythm, causing nausea and breathlessness; the symptoms were stronger now than ever, and she wondered with a resigned acceptance if she were about to drop dead.

She did not. Nigel rode down the small slope, and Dora welcomed Adam again, while the garron watched with good-humored curiosity. Alick sat motionless. Coming to the bum, the gray wanted to drink, and Nigel allowed it. All the while he kept his eyes on Jennie. His face was very flushed again.

“You lied to me,” he said loudly.

“I didn't lie.” Her answer was quiet; considering the way she felt, it couldn't be otherwise. “I told you I was not going
there
, and I didn't.”

“You will oblige me by returning home at once.”

“I am not in the mood for obliging you, Nigel,” she said equably. “When I am ready, I shall go back.”

The flush darkened. “You will mount now and ride with me.”

It was dreadful, a boy's pompous imitation of an autocrat. She felt an exasperated pity, which annoyed her as much as he did. “When I ride back to that house, I will ride alone. Don't command me, Nigel. I shall follow you in good time.”

“Have you an assignation with this man?” he shouted, and stabbed his crop toward Alick like a sword. Alick observed him without moving.

“Oh, Nigel!” Jennie exclaimed. “That's too much, even from you!”

“Too much, after your shameless behavior the day before yesterday? Going to this man's
house
?” His voice climbed, and broke like an adolescent's. He made an effort to calm himself. “That episode can be overlooked; none of us have been quite ourselves for several days. But today there is no excuse for
this
.” Again the thrust with the crop.

“We have all been very much ourselves, I think. The last two days have knocked down all the pretty illusions.”

“You natter on like a damned bluestocking, but I can put up with that.” He forced a hearty laugh. “Come along now! We forget the past and go forward. We get on with life.” He jerked his head sidewise toward Alick. “Bring the mare here.”

Alick didn't get up. “Even if I were your ghillie, that tone would not put the leap on me,” he said.

Nigel's mouth worked as if he were cursing in whispers; he dismounted, threw the reins over the gray's head, and walked through the heather toward the mare. She tossed her head coquettishly and stepped out of reach behind the garron, which didn't move but gave him a long, mild look. Nigel swore aloud and cut at the pony with his crop.

“If you please,” Alick said courteously, standing up, “do not be striking my garron.”

Nigel whirled to face him, the crop raised. “I'll strike you, then! There are ways of ridding this place of you. If one doesn't work, another will. Do you know what the penalty is for seduction?”

“Nigel,” Jennie said, “go home before you disgrace yourself.” Walking toward him, she smelled the wine; he must have begun to drink as soon as she'd left him.

“I'm already disgraced.
You've
disgraced me! I will swear to seduction if I have to. It's a gentleman's word over the rabble, every time.”

“And will the lady's word be no good at all?” she asked. She felt as if she were taking part in a dream.

“
Lady!
” He spewed the word at her like vomit. “A slut who runs with the lowest of the low! Like calls to like. Secret meetings. Conspiring with this—this—”

“Cousin?” Alick suggested softly. “Though I have no great pride in the connection.”

Nigel looked wounded and confused. Jennie said, “I'll ride with you, Nigel. We'll go now. Come, Dora, love.”

She took a step to go past him to the mare, and he swung out a long arm and swept her out of the way and off her feet as he had struck Morag. He brought the crop down across Alick's face, threw it from him, and seized the smaller man by the throat with both hands and began to throttle him.

Jennie had fallen backward and sprawled full length. She scrambled up, tangling in her skirts, fought free of them, and grabbed Nigel's arm with both hands. She shook it with all her strength, but he was strong, his muscles iron-hard, and he was possessed with a lunatic fury. Alick's face was growing blue. She snatched up the crop and began beating Nigel around the head and shoulders.

“You'll hang, you fool!” she shouted at him. “Gentleman or not!”

With a sudden whooping intake of breath he released Alick and bent double, moaning, his arms folded over his lower belly. Alick staggered backward, his hands to his throat. As the pounding slowed in her head, she heard Nigel's groans. Then Alick dropped his right hand, and with a surge that seemed to come from his toes he struck Nigel on the jaw with an undercut, Nigel's head snapped up and back and he dropped.

“There,” Alick said. His voice was strained, hardly more than a whisper. “He'll sleep for a bit and be all the better for it.” He was rubbing his throat. The mark of the crop showed in a raised red welt across one cheek and the bridge of his nose.

“You can get yourself quickly home now. That was a dirty trick to do to a man, but he was killing me.” He swallowed, and it was obviously painful. “He may have to walk it and be slow at that. But it will do him no harm. He will be quiet when he comes home, and clearer in the head, to be sure.”

Nigel's face, tilted blindly to the light, was vacant.
Unlived-in
was the phrase that sprang to mind. And he had never looked so young to her before. He seemed as defenseless as a sleeping child, yet he had come within a breath of being a murderer.

“I brought this on you both,” she said in a stammering rush. “I—I am truly sorry.” It sounded inane enough to make her blush. “If he b-brings charges, I will testify that he attacked you.”

“He will not bring charges.” Alick kept looking at Nigel while still rubbing his throat. “No man likes to admit that this was done to him, what I did.”

“But your life can be made miserable.” She was more composed now, dealing with bleak truth.

Alick made a dismissive gesture and went after the mare. The disturbed animals had run off a little way. She watched him anxiously. Without going to court, without the matter's ever passing the borders of the estate, Nigel could harass Alick in every way possible; knowing what he and the gamekeeper and their men were capable of, she could visualize murder made to appear an accident or the work of tinkers or gypsies. They might even produce a man to hang for it.

It was her fault, and she would watch, and know, and be powerless. The garron had intercepted Alick and was affectionately bumping his forehead against the man's shoulder. Perhaps she could make a sort of peace with Nigel as a bribe for his leaving Alick alone. It would give her present life some useful purpose and assuage the guilt that was scalding her now.

She looked over at Nigel again, already planning to bathe his head with cold water from the burn, letting him wake up to her concern. And
remorse
? She set her teeth on that one, then thought:
I do feel remorse, but he needn't know for just what. I am truly sorry to see him hurt, but sorrier for the reasons
.

“Alick,” she said. The sound of his first name from her mouth startled him into looking around. “Ride back to your house, and put compresses on your throat. I don't know if they should be hot or cold,” she said. “Whatever feels best.” Pain in her fingers told her she was wringing her hands; she stopped that. “I'll stay with him and see him home. Are you sure he'll be able to walk?”

“Och, yes,” Alick said. “But I will wait a wee bit with you.” He glanced down the slope at Nigel and, like Jennie earlier, seemed hardly able to look away. He took off his bonnet and wiped his forehead with his sleeve, still watching Nigel.

The defenseless, empty face. The arms flung wide, the hands lying loose, open, palms upward. Legs sprawling, booted feet oddly awkward, as if they had never walked or fitted in stirrups. The only moving thing about him was a lock of his hair, stirring slightly in a little breeze that came down into the hollow.

Sweat was pouring down her back. She blurted out, “He looks—” Sunlight burned her eyes, and blackness flickered and menaced around the arc of her vision. She blinked frantically, but still the dark came on, until she remembered to bend over double and let the blood go to her head. She straightened up, feeling sick, but the blackness was gone. She went and knelt beside Nigel and lifted one of the flaccid hands, but the only pulse she could feel was her own; her whole body beat with it.

A shadow moved across her, and she looked up. Alick was black against the blue and white sky like a burn mark on pastel silk. He knelt opposite her and put his fingers on the side of Nigel's throat. His hand was shaking; she saw his dark skin take on an ugly pallor, and the crop mark stood out like a bloody wound. He had to make several attempts to speak.