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“That what happened today?” He’d looked Jem over briefly when he sat down, and gave him a closer look now. Jem seemed undamaged, but when he turned his head away, Roger could see that something had happened to his ear. It was a deep crimson, the lobe of it nearly purple. He suppressed an exclamation at sight of it and merely repeated, “What happened?” “Jacky McEnroe said if ye heard I’d got the strap, ye’d give me another whipping when I got home.” Jem swallowed, but now looked at his father directly. “Will you?” “I don’t know. I hope I won’t have to.” He’d tawsed Jemmy once—he’d had to—and
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when Jimmy Glasscock said Mam and me and Mandy were all goin’ to burn in hell.”
“Well, ye know what to do about that, though, don’t you?” Jem had heard similar sentiments expressed on the Ridge—though generally more quietly, Jamie Fraser being who he was. Still, they’d
“Oh, aye.” Jem shrugged, looking down at his shoes again. “Just say, ‘Aye, fine, I’ll see ye there, then.’ I did.”
“I said it in the Gàidhlig.”
“And Miss Glendenning grabbed me by the ear and like to tore it off.” A flush was rising in Jemmy’s cheeks at the memory. “She shook me, Da!” “By the ear?” Roger felt an answering flush in his own cheeks. “Yes!” Tears of humiliation and anger were welling in Jem’s eyes,
“She said, ‘We—do—not—speak—like—THAT! We—speak—ENGLISH!’ ” His voice was some octaves higher than the redoubtable Miss Glendenning’s, but his mimicry made the ferocity of her attack more than evident.
“No,” he said. “That was Mr. Menzies.” “What? Why? Here.”
CONVERSATION WITH A HEADMASTER
“Oh, aye, of course. I rather thought I might see you or your wife, when Jem didn’t turn up at school this morning.” Menzies leaned back a little, folding his hands. “Before we go very far … could I just ask exactly what Jem told ye about what happened?” Roger’s opinion of the man rose a grudging notch. “He said that his teacher heard him say something to another lad in the Gaelic, whereupon she grabbed him by the ear and shook him. That made him mad and he called her names—also in Gaelic—for which you belted him.” He’d spotted the strap itself, hung up inconspicuously—but still quite
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“It’s been on the decline for a number of years. Much more so for the last ten, fifteen years. The Highlands are suddenly part of the UK—or at least the rest of the UK says so—in a way they’ve never been before, and keeping a separate language is seen as not only old-fashioned but outright destructive. “It’s no what you’d call a written policy, to stamp it out, but the use of Gaelic is strongly … discouraged … in schools. Mind”—he raised a hand to forestall Roger’s response—“they couldn’t get away with that if the parents protested, but they don’t. Most of them are eager for their kids to be
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“Teuchters?” “Teuchter” was a Lowland Scots term for someone in the Gaeltacht, the Gaelic-speaking Highlands, and in cultural terms the general equivalent of “hillbilly” or “trailer trash.” “Oh, ye do know, then.”
“Regardless, Mr. Menzies,” he said, coming down a bit on the “Mr.,” “I object very much to my son’s teacher not only disciplining him for speaking Gaelic but actually assaulting him for doing so.”
“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.
“Well, he needn’t worry about his reception. Since the Gaelic-speaking kids did tell their friends what it was he said, and he took his belting without a squeak,
If Jamie’s son William finds out that he’s not a blue blooded Lord and the internal struggle of identity subsequent to that knowledge.
Surgery on child Henri Christian with Claire as surgeon and using ether to sedate him.
Assisting Rachel Hunter brother to surgeon Denzel Hunter.
Prelude to surgery on Henry Gray, Lord John’s nephew who was shot in the belly and still has pieces of bullet shards in his guts, from a battle the year before.
He is now dying from complications of that encounter.
Jamie Fraser returns! William gets a shock when he sees his resemblance to Jamie!
