I went round the desk and pulled up the visitor’s chair for her, and she sank into it, her deep-set eyes still fixed on Jamie.
“I want Agnes,” she said, without preamble.
Jamie blinked, sat down, blinked again, and leaned back, relaxing a little.
“What d’ye want her for?” he asked warily.
“Perhaps I should have said I’ve come to speir for her,” she said, with a trace of a smile. “If that’s the correct term?”
“Only if ye want to marry her,” Jamie said. “Which I suppose is what ye mean. Which one o’ the lieutenants did ye have in mind, and what does Agnes have to say about it?”
Elspeth sighed and unfolded her hands to accept the cup of whisky I offered her.
“At the moment, it’s six of one and half a dozen of the other,” she admitted. “The silly creature can’t make up her mind between them, and as I’ve told her that there’s no way of knowing which of them fathered her child, neither has more of a factual claim upon her affections than the other.”
“I suppose you could wait ’til the child’s born and see who it looks like,” I suggested. I could—within fairly broad limits—discern blood types. That might help, but I thought I wouldn’t suggest it right this moment.
Just as well, since both of them ignored me.
“That’s why I said I want Agnes,” she said. “I’ve decided that I must accept your offer to provide transport for my son and his household. When he heard of your banishing the men who … followed him … he declared that he could no longer remain here, without supporters and at your … mercy.”
“My mercy,” Jamie muttered, drumming his fingers briefly on the table. “Hmmphm. Evidently I’ve an endless store o’ that. So?”
“Gilbert and Oliver will of course accompany us,” she went on, ignoring this. “They naturally do not wish to abandon Agnes …”
“Agnes has a home,” Jamie broke in impatiently. “Here. Abandon her, forbye!”
“Surely you will admit that they have a responsibility to the girl,” Elspeth said, lowering her strong gray brows at him in a way that made her look like a very stern owl.
“I will,” he said. “But I’ll not see her taken from her home unless she wants to go and I’m assured of her future welfare. I can find her a good husband here, ken?”
“I am offering you exactly such an assurance,” she snapped. “Do you dare to imply that I would see her abused in any way?”
“Ye’re an auld woman,” Jamie pointed out, rather brusquely. “What if ye die on the way to wherever ye’re takin’ your son?”
“Er … where are you taking him?” I interjected, more in hopes of stopping the conversation going straight off the rails than because I wanted to know.
“Would you die, if you knew someone was completely dependent upon you?” she shot back, ignoring me.
He paused for a moment and took a breath before replying evenly.
“Ye havena always got a choice about it, Elspeth.”
Elspeth’s nostrils flared as she inhaled, but she replied calmly.
“Yes,” she said, “you do. Barring being shot through the heart or struck by lightning,” she added, as one obliged to honesty. “But one of the few advantages to being an old woman is that no one shoots them. As for the lightning, I shall leave that to God, but my trust in Him is considerable.
“As to our destination,” she said, turning to me as though Jamie had ceased to exist, “Charles Town. There are navy warships there, and a large number of smaller frigates and army transports. Charles has written to Sir Henry Clinton, asking the favor of transport back to England aboard one of these. Sir Henry has known our family for many years and will certainly grant us the courtesy. Now, as to Agnes—” She switched her focus back to Jamie. “I will admit that my desire to take her with us is not solely for her benefit; plainly, I need her.”
There was a long moment of silence, with that simple declaration hanging in the air.
She did. The two young lieutenants would manage the physical difficulties of travel and provide protection for her and Charles. But she would need help, in caring both for her son’s demanding physical needs and for her own. Granted, she could easily engage a maidservant, but given Agnes’s delicate situation …
No one had mentioned the other aspect of that situation aloud, but Elspeth was more than perceptive enough to have grasped the fact that—everything else quite aside—she was an answer to prayer for Jamie.
I estimated the pregnancy at roughly three months, and it was a matter of weeks, if not days, before Agnes’s situation was known all over the Ridge. And it was, naturally, Jamie’s responsibility as her employer to resolve the situation in some publicly satisfactory manner. Finding the young man responsible and obliging him to marry Agnes would be the usual thing, but under the circumstances … To have your unmarried maidservant growing visibly pregnant in your house—or hastily married off to someone who was patently not the father—was to invite speculation that you had had something to do with her condition. And we’d both been there before …. I shivered, the echo of Malva’s denunciation, “It was him!” ringing in my ears.
“Speaking as Agnes’s … er, other loco parentis …” I said. Jamie and Elspeth both smiled, involuntarily, but I ignored them and pushed on. “I have a small condition to suggest. I’ll help you to persuade Agnes, because I think it’s really the best way of handling her predicament. But if she decides to go with you, I want an assurance that you’ll provide her with an education …”
“Agnes?” Both of them had spoken together, and while Jamie’s intonation indicated doubt and Elspeth’s, amusement, their unanimity did give me a moment’s pause.
“Education to do what, Sassenach?” Jamie asked. “Fanny’s taught her to read, and she can write her name and count to a hundred. What else d’ye think she’d find useful?”
“Well …” It was true that while Agnes was pretty, amiable, kind, and willing, and had a certain shrewd perception born of experience, she wasn’t a natural student. Still, there was no telling what might happen to her, and I wanted her to be … safe.
“She should know enough arithmetic to be able to handle money,” I said, finally. “And she should have a little money to handle. Of her own.”
“Done,” Elspeth said quietly. “My son will settle a modest amount on her, independent of her husband—whoever that turns out to be,” she added, a little bleakly. “And I’ll see to her education myself.”
No one spoke for a moment, and I began to hear the normal sounds of the house, the clumps and squeaks and rattling and barking, and the sound of distant conversation that the tension of our discussion had blocked out.
Footsteps crossed the ceiling over our heads, quick and light, and I caught a murmur and the giggle of young girls, amused. I relaxed a little. Fanny would miss Agnes cruelly, but at least she would have the Hardman girls for company.
“I’ll go and talk to Agnes now,” I said.