“Well, I do hope not,” Brianna said dubiously. “The thing is, though, last time they just made him a Minister of the Word, and that means he was supposed to be able to christen babies and bury people—and he’s certainly been doing that. He was all set to be ordained, but then … things happened. Technically, he probably shouldn’t have been marrying people, but he did it—I mean, there was no one else to do it, and if he didn’t, they—the people who wanted to be married—would just be … er … living in sin. So he did.
“But they had sort of passed him, last time; he did qualify to be a Minister of the Word and Sacrament. It’s just that he missed being properly ordained because Stephen Bonnet kidnapped me. And he, um …” She felt an unpleasant feeling rising under her skin, something hot and cold together. Roger had told her—once—about the man he’d killed, but had never mentioned it again. Nor had she.
“I remember,” Marsali said, with sympathy. “But I dinna see how helping catch a villain like that would make Roger Mac no fit to be a minister.”
“Well, I’m sure they’ll see it that way, too.” They’d better, she thought fiercely. She had a lurking fear that a Catholic wife might prove to be a bigger impediment to Roger’s ordination than Stephen Bonnet’s affair had been. On the other hand, Roger had told the first presbytery about her, and while they’d hemmed and hawed quite a bit, they’d finally decided that being married to a Catholic was not quite as bad as having a wife who was a known murderess or a working prostitute. She smiled a little at the thought.
Their eventual acceptance had been accomplished by the persuasion of Davy Campbell, who had a certain fondness for her and Roger, he having married them, and then having taught Roger at his famous “log college,” to fill in the gaps in his classical education. But Davy was at his college in North Carolina, and thus of little use in the present situation beyond the letter of support he’d sent.
If she was honest, though, she was less worried about the elders than about her own ability to be a good wife for a minister. So far, it had been mostly all right; she could keep Roger fed, clothed, and with a roof over his head, but beyond that … what kind of help could she give him?
“Ye can stop now, a nighean.”
“What?” Absorbed in her thoughts, she’d been working the press like an automaton. Looking up, she saw the lines overhead thick with fresh pages, and Marsali smiling as she reached across the bed of the press to pull out the sticks of type.
“We’re done wi’ the first page. Why don’t ye go and see if the weans have killed each other, while I set the next one? And bring me some beer while ye’re at it, aye?”
70
A Sword in My Hand
ROGER RETURNED TO THE printshop to find both his wife and Marsali covered with ink and enmeshed in a cobweb of drying pages hung from the crisscrossing lines strung across the back of the shop. Brianna made to remove her inky apron in order to come and help him dress, but he waved her back and climbed the ladder to the loft, where he found his suit—somewhat worn at the edges and with the corner of the pocket darned, but definitely black—and a clean, starched, brand-new white neckcloth hanging from a hook under the owl-slits.
He dressed slowly and carefully, listening to the women’s talk and laughter down below, and the high-pitched echo of the three little girls, who were playing in the kitchen whilst keeping an eye on their baby brothers. It gave him a sense of warmth and tenderness, and a sudden longing for a home of their own. When we get back to the Ridge, he thought, maybe …
It had suited everyone’s convenience to live together in the New House after their return, and it was a lot easier to take care of kids when there were older children and other adults around to help—but maybe once he was ordained … And at the thought, he superstitiously crossed his fingers, then laughed to himself.
But it might be best. A large part of what he’d be doing would be talking to people, and while he still meant to go round house-visiting on the Ridge, he should have a place, maybe, with a wee room for a study, where he could talk to folk in private, and where he could keep records of births and marriages and deaths …
Thinking about the distant future lessened his apprehension of the more immediate future, and he came down the ladder briskly, just as the bell of a nearby church struck two.
“You’re early,” Brianna observed, pausing to wipe sweat from her forehead. “You look great, though!”
“Aye, ye do,” Marsali chimed in. “Just like a minister—only better-looking. All the Presbyterian ministers I know are auld and crabbit and smell like camphor.”
“They do?” Roger asked, amused. “How many do you know?”
“Well, one,” she admitted. “And he’s ninety-seven. But still—”
“Don’t get too close. You don’t have another clean shirt.” But Brianna still came within touching distance, and hands safely crossed behind her back, leaned far out to kiss him.
“Good luck,” she said, and smiled into his eyes. “It will be fine.”
“Aye. Thanks,” he said, meaning it, and smiled back. “I—think I’ll just sit outside for a bit. Gather my thoughts.”
“That’s good,” Marsali said approvingly. “If ye went walkin’ about for an hour, ye’d be wringing wet by the time ye got there.”
HE’D BEEN SITTING on one of the two benches outside—the one under the patchy shade of a palmetto—for a quarter of an hour, trying hard not to think too much, when Jem came wandering along the street, idly poking at things with the stick in his hand.
When he saw his father, though, he dropped the stick and came to sit beside him, swinging his feet. They sat together for a bit, just listening to the buzz of cicadas and the shouts of fishmongers from a distant pier.
“Dad,” Jem said, diffident.
“Aye?”
“Will you be different? After you get ordained?” Jem looked up at this, worry pinching the corners of his wide, soft mouth. God, he looks like Bree.
“No, mate,” Roger said. “I’ll always be your dad, no matter what. And I’ll still be just me,” he added, as an afterthought.
“Oh. Well, I didn’t think ye’d stop, exactly …” A smile touched Jem’s face like a stray sunbeam. “It’s only … what’s different? Because if nothing’s different—why do you want to do it? Why is it important?”
“Ah.” Roger leaned back a little, hands on his knees. The truth was that he rather expected to be different in some indefinable way, even though he also knew with certainty that he’d be the same.
“Well,” he said slowly, “part of it is that it’s formal. You ken Mairi and Archie MacLean back home at the Ridge, aye?”
“Aye.” Jem was eyeing him dubiously, wondering if this was going to make sense. Roger wondered that, too, but it was a legitimate question—and one that he thought might need answering more than once.
“Well, see, we had their wedding at Easter, but they came to it with their wee son, who was born in the autumn of last year. So they’d been living as man and wife for more than a year, even though they weren’t married.”