“That’s good, Sassenach,” he said, nodding at the tray. “Ye’ll make a decent cook yet.” He grinned at me, took Mandy by the hand, and headed for the door.
Lacking anything like a cookie jar—could I make one? I wondered. Doubtless Brianna could, once she’d resurrected her kiln—I shoveled the fresh cookies into the smaller kettle and put a large plate on top, then picked up two of the big river stones we kept by the hearth to use as bed warmers when the truly cold weather came and put them on top of the plate. It wouldn’t deter the boys, but it would keep insects and—maybe—marauding raccoons out. The kitchen walls were sound, but there was no glass in most of the windows as yet.
I gazed thoughtfully at the kettle for a bit, envisioning the possibilities, and then lugged it down the hall to the surgery, where I shut it up in the cupboard where I kept distilled spirits, bottles of saline solution, and other items unlikely to attract anyone’s interest. I heard Jamie and Mandy out on the front porch, talking, and went to the front door to see what they were up to.
Jamie was on his knees, scraping the wood of what was clearly meant to be a toilet seat—Mandy-sized. “Try that,” he said, sitting back on his heels. “Sit on it, I mean.”
Mandy giggled, but did.
“Whatsis for, Grampa?”
“Ken the wee mouse that got into your room last week?”
“Jes. You caughts it in your hand. Did it bites you, Grampa?” she asked with sympathy.
“Nay, a leannan, it ran up my sleeve and jumped out my collar and made off across the landing and into our room and hid under your grannie’s good shoes. D’ye no remember that?”
Her small brow furrowed in concentration.
“Jes. You scweamed.”
“Aye. Well, now and again we have wee mice—and other wee beasties—who run to hide in the privy, if something’s frightened them outside. Now, such things mostly willna hurt ye”—he raised a finger at her—“but they might give ye a start. And if one does, I dinna want ye to loose your hold and fall down through the hole into the privy.”
“Eeeeyewww!” Mandy said, giggling.
“Dinna laugh,” Jamie said, smiling. “Your uncle William fell into a privy some years ago, and wasna best pleased about it.”
“Who’s Unca Willam?”
“Your mam’s brother. Ye’ve no met him yet.”
Mandy’s small black brows drew together in a frown.
He glanced briefly up at me and lifted a shoulder in a half shrug. “Nay point in not talkin’ about him,” he said to me. “Likely we’ll see him again, before too long.”
“Sure about that, are you?” I said dubiously. True, there hadn’t been any open acrimony the last time Jamie and William had met in the flesh, but there hadn’t been any indication that William had reached a sense of resignation regarding the circumstances of his birth, either.
“I am,” Jamie said, eyes on the hole he was drilling. “He’ll come to see about Frances.”
I heard a tiny intake of breath behind me and glanced round to see Fanny, who had come down the trail from the garden, a basket full of greenery on her arm. Her lovely face had gone pale and her eyes quite round, fixed on Jamie.
“Will he—you think he’ll … come?” she said. “Here? To see me?” Her voice rose and cracked a little on the last word.
Jamie looked at her for a moment over his shoulder, then nodded.
“I’d come back, Frances,” he said simply. “So will he.”
I WENT BACK to the kitchen to check the yeast. Sure enough, there was a dirty-looking foam on the surface of the water—and the watch indicated that it had been eleven minutes. Checking the ingredients for the biscuits, though, I discovered that some miscreant had eaten all the butter from the kitchen crock and we had no lard. No one else was in the house; Jamie and Mandy were still chatting on the porch. Time enough for me to nip up to the springhouse and fetch enough cream to churn more butter while the biscuit dough was rising.
I was making my way slowly along the path from the springhouse, carrying two heavy pails of cream-laden milk, when I saw a woman approaching the house. She was tall, with a determined step, and wore a black dress with a broad-brimmed straw hat that she held with one hand to prevent it sailing away on the breeze.
Jamie had disappeared, probably to fetch a tool, but Mandy was still on the porch, sitting on her new toilet seat and singing to Esmeralda. She paid no attention to the woman—a more elderly lady than I had thought from her stick-straight posture and easy gait; closer to, I could see the lines in her face, and the gray hair showing at her temples beneath the cap she wore under her hat.
“Where is your father, child?” she demanded, stopping in front of Mandy.
“I dunno,” Mandy replied. “This is Esmeralda,” she said, holding up her doll.
“I wish to speak with your father.”
“Okay,” Mandy replied amiably, and resumed singing. “Ferra JACuh, Ferra JACuh, dormi vooo …”
“Stop that,” the woman said sharply. “Look at me.”
“Why?”
“You are a very impertinent child and your father should beat you.”
Mandy went very red in the face and scrambled to her feet, standing on her new seat.
“You go away!” she said. “I fwush you down the toilet!” She slapped her hand at the air, miming a handle. “WOOOSH!”
“What in the name of perdition do you mean by that, you wicked child?” The woman’s face was growing rather red, too. I had stopped in fascination, but now set down the buckets, feeling that I had better take a hand before things escalated. Too late.
“I put you in the toilet and I fwush you like POOP!” Mandy shouted, stamping her feet. Quick as a snake, the woman’s hand shot out and cracked against Mandy’s cheek.
There was a split second of shocked silence and then a number of things happened at once. I lunged toward the porch, tripped over one of the buckets, and fell flat on the path in a deluge of milk, Mandy let out a shriek that could have been heard as far as the wagon road, and Jamie popped out of the front door like the Demon King in a pantomime.
He grabbed Mandy up in one arm, leapt off the porch, and was nose-to-nose with the woman before I had even got to my knees.
“Leave my house,” he said, in the sort of calm voice that made it clear the only other option was instant death.
To her credit, the lady wasn’t backing down. She snatched off her broad black hat, the better to glare at him.
“The girl spoke rudely to me, sir, and I will not have it! Evidently no one has sought to discipline her properly. No wonder.” Her gaze raked him scornfully up and down. Mandy had stopped shrieking but was sobbing, her face buried in Jamie’s shirtfront.
“Well, speaking of rudeness,” I said mildly, wringing out my wet apron. “I don’t believe we have the honor of your acquaintance, do we?” I wiped a hand on the side of my skirt and extended it. “I’m Claire Fraser.”
Her face didn’t lose its expression of outrage, but it froze. She didn’t say a word but backed away from me, one step at a time. Jamie hadn’t moved, other than to pat Mandy comfortingly; his face was as fixed and stark as hers.