An Echo in the Bone (Outlander, #7)

by Diana Gabaldon

“My grandda says the King can kiss his arse,” the boy replied matter-of-factly. “JEMMY!” Mr. MacKenzie clapped a hand over his outspoken offspring’s mouth. “You know your grandda didn’t say that!” Mrs. MacKenzie said. The little boy nodded agreeably, and his father removed the muffling hand. “No. Grannie did, though.” “Well, that’s somewhat more likely,” Mr. MacKenzie murmured, obviously trying not to laugh.

He had some dim recollection that Mr. Fraser had taken him fishing and been kind to him. “Yes,” his father said, with a sidelong smile. “I’m touched, Willie. I should have thought you might recall that visit more because of your own misadventure than mine.” “Mis—” Memory rushed over him, succeeded by a flood of heat, hotter than the humid summer air. “Thanks very much! I’d managed to expunge that from my memory, until you mentioned it!” His father was laughing, and making no attempt to hide it. In fact, he was convulsed. “I’m sorry, Willie,” he said, gasping and wiping his eyes with a corner of his handkerchief. “I can’t help it; it was the most—the most—oh, God, I’ll never forget what you looked like when we pulled you out of that privy!” “You know it was an accident,” William said stiffly. His cheeks burned with remembered mortification. At least Fraser’s daughter hadn’t been present to witness his humiliation at the time.

“It fits my hand,” I said, looking down and stroking the small groove that fit my thumb. “How did you know to make it so exactly?” He laughed at that. “I’ve had your hand round my cock often enough to know the measure of your grip, Sassenach,” he assured me.

At the door, though, Hermione turned, and hitching up her baggy-seated breeches, fixed him with a glare and pointed a long, skinny finger of accusation at him. “If we turns out to be whores after all, you fucker, I’m gonna hunt you down, cut your balls off, and stuff ’em up your arse.” He took his leave with what dignity he could, the peals of Mrs. Sylvie’s laughter ringing in his ears.

“If it does,” he said evenly, “I won’t come back with a shotgun—but I will come back with the sheriff. And a newspaper photographer, to document Miss Glendenning being taken off in handcuffs.” Menzies blinked once and put his spectacles back on. “You’re sure ye wouldn’t rather send your wife round with the family shotgun?” he asked wistfully, and Roger laughed, despite himself.

“Time flies when you’re having fun. Do you think he’s still alive—Mr. Willoughby?” He considered that, sipping. “Aye, I do. A man who escaped from a Chinese emperor and sailed halfway round the world to keep his balls is one wi’ a good deal of determination.”

“It’s no but another five or six miles,” he assured William, who hadn’t asked. “Oh, good,” William said, with what vigor he could muster. “It’s not hell after all, then—only purgatory. What’s another thousand years?”

“How did you know who I was?” His smile deepened as he glanced at my head. “The lieutenant said you’d be the curly-wig giving orders like a sergeant-major.”

“I’m looking for a printer named Fergus Fraser.” Grey blinked at that; he hadn’t been expecting any concrete answer. “Who is …?” Percy held up a hand, folding down the fingers as he spoke. “He is, first, the son of one James Fraser, a notable ex-Jacobite and current rebel. He is, secondly, a printer, as indicated—and, I suspect, a rebel like his father. And, thirdly, I strongly suspect that he is the son of Amelie Beauchamp.”

“Amelie was, as I said, Claude’s older sister. In her teens she was seduced by a much older man, a married nobleman, and got with child. The normal thing would have been for her simply to be married hastily off to a complaisant husband, but the nobleman’s wife died quite suddenly, and Amelie made a fuss, insisting that since he was now free, he must marry her.” “He was not so inclined?” “No. Claude’s father was, though. I suppose he thought such a marriage would improve the family fortunes; the comte was a very wealthy man, and while not political, did have a certain

“And you think she somehow ended in a Paris brothel?” Grey said incredulously. “How? And if so, how did you discover this?” “I found her marriage lines.” “What?” “A contract of marriage, between Amélie Élise LeVigne Beauchamp and Robert-François Quesnay de St. Germain. Signed by both parties. And a priest. It was in the library at Trois Flèches, inside the family Bible. Claude and Cecile are not very religiously inclined, I’m afraid,” Percy said, shaking his head.

Not for the first time, he missed Brianna. He could say anything to her, and she to him—more, he thought, than she could sometimes say to Roger Mac.

All these wonderings were only means to keep him from thinking what he’d say when he saw her, and that was pointless. He wanted only to say one thing to her, and that was the one thing he couldn’t say, ever.

I lifted the glass of brandy and took a sip, then raised it and looked critically through it. “No, it’s just brandy,” I said. “Not opium.” “I beg your pardon?” He looked involuntarily into his own glass, just in case, and I laughed. “I mean,” I clarified, “that good as it is, it’s not nearly good enough to make me believe a story like that.”

“Have you ever seen an ostrich?” he asked, and, without inquiring, poured more brandy into my glass. “Yes. Why?” “You must admit that ostriches are frankly implausible,” he said. “But clearly not impossible.” “One to you,” I conceded. “But I do think that Fergus being the lost heir to the Comte St. Germain’s fortune is slightly more implausible than an ostrich. Particularly if you consider the part about the marriage license. I mean … a lost legitimate heir? It is France we’re talking about, isn’t it?”

“Well, ye might get a wife yourself one of these days. Is Rollo going to sleep with the both of ye when ye do?” Jamie inquired. “Mmphm,” Ian said, and pulled the blanket down over his face, shivering.

“Are you implying that I look like a witch?” “Well, not sae much just this minute,” he said, narrowing one eye judiciously. “First thing in the morning, maybe—aye, that’s a more fearsome prospect.”

“Well, do give her my very best regards, then, won’t you?” “Why, ye vengeful wee creature. I’d never ha’ thought it of ye!” “Wouldn’t you, indeed?” she said, dry as toast. He smiled down at her and ran a thumb gently down the side of her cheek. “No,” he said. “I wouldn’t. Ye’re no one to hold a grudge, Sassenach; ye never have been.” “Well, I’m not a Scot,” she observed, smoothing back her hair.

“One thing,” she said, lifting a finger at him. “Aye?” “If you find out who she’s sleeping with and don’t tell me, I will kill you.”

Then he shook himself in irritation, ashamed of his thought. What was it about him that a hapless woman such as Laoghaire MacKenzie should bring out every wicked, shameful trait he possessed? Not that his sister couldn’t do it, too, he reflected ruefully. But Jenny would evoke some bit of bad temper or hasty language from him, fan the flames ’til he was roaring, and then extinguish him neatly with a word, as though she’d doused him with cold water.

“He says that it’s my duty to stay to hame and tend to my aged mother.” “Who’s swiving Joey the hired man in the goat shed,” Jamie added helpfully. “Ye ken that, I suppose?” From the corner of his eye, he saw Claire’s face, which entertained him so much that he was obliged to turn away and not look at her. He lifted a hand behind his back, indicating that he’d tell her later.

“And, um, what is it that you’d like Jamie to do about it?” Claire inquired, coming round to stand by him. “Kill Joey?” She shot Jamie a sidelong yellow-eyed glance, full of wicked enjoyment at his discomfiture. He gave her a narrow look, and she grinned at him.

It was sometime in the first weeks of their marriage, when he’d been digging new beds in the garden. Laoghaire had brought him out a mug of cool beer and stood while he drank it, then thanked him for the digging. He’d been surprised and laughed, saying why should she think to thank him for that? “Because ye take care for my place,” she’d said simply, “but ye don’t try to take it from me.” Then she’d taken the empty mug from him and gone back to the house.

And she’d sighed a little, pulled the quilt up to her chin, and said, “It’s the first place I’ve felt safe.” She wouldn’t say more when he asked her, but only turned over and pretended to fall asleep.

“My finger,” Jamie said. “I—well … I wondered whether ye’d maybe not mind to have it buried with ye.” Ian looked at him for a moment. Then his shoulders started to shake. “God, don’t laugh!” Jamie said, alarmed. “I didna mean to make ye laugh! Christ, Jenny will kill me if ye cough up a lung and die out here!” Ian was coughing, fits of it interspersed with long-drawn-out wheezes of laughter. Tears of mirth stood in his eyes, and he pressed both fists into his chest, struggling to breathe. At last, though, he left off and straightened slowly up, making a sound like a bellows. He sniffed deep and casually spat a glob of horrifying scarlet into the rocks. “I’d rather die out here laughin’ at you than in my bed wi’ six priests say-in’ prayers,” he said. “Doubt I’ll get the chance, though.” He put out a hand, palm up. “Aye, give it here.”

“Where d’ye think he is now?” Jenny said suddenly. “Ian, I mean.” He glanced at the house, then at the new grave waiting, but of course that wasn’t Ian anymore. He was panicked for a moment, his earlier emptiness returning—but then it came to him, and, without surprise, he knew what it was Ian had said to him. “On your right, man.” On his right. Guarding his weak side. “He’s just here,” he said to Jenny, nodding to the spot between them. “Where he belongs.”

“Does thee think he knows?” she asked abruptly. “Friend William?” “Does he know what?” “His very striking resemblance to James Fraser,” she said, letting the curtain fall. “Surely thee does not think this coincidence?” “I think it is not our business.” Denny resumed scratching with his quill.

Yet surely no two men could look so alike who did not share blood in some close degree. She had seen James Fraser many times and admired him for his tall, straight dignity, thrilling a bit at the fierceness in his face, always feeling that niggle of recognition when she saw him—but it wasn’t until William suddenly stepped out before her at the camp that she realized why.

“Thee is thinking of Ian Murray again,” her brother observed, not looking up from his paper. He sounded resigned. “I thought thee abjured witchcraft,” she said tartly. “Or does thee not include mind reading among the arts of divination?” “I notice thee does not deny it.” He looked up then, pushing his spectacles up his nose with a finger, the better to look through them at her. “No, I don’t deny it,” she said, lifting her chin at him. “How did thee know, then?” “Thee looked at the dog and sighed in a manner betokening an emotion not usually shared between a woman and a dog.”

Denny’s mouth fell open, greatly entertaining Rachel, who was seldom able to dumbfound her brother but was beginning to enjoy seeing Dorothea do it.

“This certainly isn’t the first time you’ve slept—I do mean slept with—a woman, is it?” I asked. He had been married, though I seemed to recall that he had spent much of his married life living separately from his wife. He pursed his lips thoughtfully, as though trying to recall. “Well, no. I do think it may be the first time I’ve done it entirely voluntarily, though.” “Oh, I am flattered!” He glanced at me, smiling slightly. “So you should be,” he said quietly.

Then I kissed his forehead gently, thinking—with the same wrench of the heart with which I had kissed his sister at the same age—God, you are so like him.

“Mother Claire!” I had been feeling pleasantly invisible and, startled out of this delusion, now glanced across the room to see Willie, his disheveled head sticking out from the red-crossed tabard of a Knight Templar, waving enthusiastically. “I do wish you could think of something else to call me,” I said, reaching his side. “I feel as though I ought to be swishing round in a habit with a rosary at my waist.”

Willie’s mouth worked, soundless with shock. He looked wildly at me, back at Jamie, back at me—and saw the truth in my face. “Who are you?” he said hoarsely, wheeling on Jamie. I saw Jamie draw himself slowly upright, ignoring the noise below. “James Fraser,” he said. His eyes were fixed on William with a burning intensity, as though to absorb every vestige of a sight he would not see again. “Ye kent me once as Alex MacKenzie. At Helwater.” William blinked, blinked again, and his gaze shifted momentarily to John. “And who—who the bloody hell am I?” he demanded, the end of the question rising in a squeak. John opened his mouth, but it was Jamie who answered. “You are a stinking Papist,” he said, very precisely, “and your baptismal name is James.” The ghost of regret crossed his face and then was gone. “It was the only name I had a right to give ye,” he said quietly, eyes on his son. “I’m sorry.”

His hands were shaking so badly that he couldn’t manage buttons; he simply seized the fabric and ripped open his shirt, reached in and fumbled for something. He pulled it over his head and, in the same motion, hurled the object at Jamie. Jamie’s reflexes brought his hand up automatically, and the wooden rosary smacked into it, the beads swinging, tangled in his fingers. “God damn you, sir,” Willie said, voice trembling. “God damn you to hell!” He half-turned blindly, then spun on his heel to face John.

“William,” I began. “Believe me—” “I do,” he said. “Don’t bloody tell me any more. God damn it!” And, whirling on his heel, he drove his fist through the paneling with a thud that shook the room, wrenched his hand out of the hole he’d made, and stormed out. I heard crunching and rending as he paused to kick out several of the balusters on the landing and rip a length of the stair railing off, and I made it to the door in time to see him draw back a four-foot chunk of wood over his shoulder, swing, and strike the crystal chandelier that hung over the stairwell in an explosion of shattering glass. For a moment, he teetered on the open edge of the landing and I thought he would fall, or hurl himself off, but he staggered back from the edge and threw the chunk of wood like a javelin at the remnant of the chandelier with a burst of breath that might have been a grunt or a sob. Then he rushed headlong down the stairs, thumping his wounded fist at intervals against the wall, where it left bloody smudges. He hit the front door with his shoulder, rebounded, jerked it open, and went out like a locomotive. I stood frozen on the landing in the midst of chaos and destruction, gripping the edge of the broken balustrade. Tiny rainbows danced on walls and ceiling like multicolored dragonflies sprung out of the shattered crystal that littered the floor. Something moved; a shadow fell across the floor of the hall below. A small, dark figure walked slowly in through the open doorway. Putting...