"When he had the news from the village, he had the gates closed at once, and forbade anyone from the Castle to go down, for fear of being caught up in the moil." He leaned further back, eyeing me speculatively.
"Mrs. Fitz thought to find ye, the second day. She said that she asked all the maids if they'd laid eyes on ye. No one had, but one of the girls said she thought perhaps ye'd gone to the village—maybe you'd taken shelter in a house there." One of the girls, I thought cynically. The one that knew bloody well where I was.
He belched softly, not bothering to stifle the sound.
"I heard Mrs. Fitz turned the Castle upside down, then, and made Colum send down a man to the village, once she was sure ye werena to be found. And when they learned what had happened…" A faint look of amusement lighted the dark face.
"She didna tell me everything, but I gathered she made himself's life more of a misery to him than it usually is, naggin' at him to send down and free ye by force of arms—and not the least bit of use, him arguin' that it had gone well beyond the point where he could do that, and now it was in the hands o' the examiners, and one thing and another. It must ha' been something to see," he said reflectively, "twa wills like that, set one against the other."
And in the end, it seemed, neither had either triumphed nor given way. Ned Gowan, with his lawyer's gift for compromise, had found the way between them, by offering to go himself to the trial, not as representative of the laird, but as an independent advocate.
"Did she think I might be a witch?" I asked curiously. Murtagh snorted briefly.
"I've yet to see the auld woman believes in witches, nor the young one, neither. It's men think there must be ill-wishes and magic in women, when it's only the natural way of the creatures."
"I begin to see why you've never married," I said.
"Do ye, then?" He pushed back his chair abruptly and rose, pulling the plaid forward over his shoulders.
"I'll be off. Gie my respects to the laird," he said to Jenny, who reappeared from the front hall, where she had been greeting tenants. "He'll be busy, I've nae doubt."
Jenny handed him a large cloth sack, tied in a knot at the mouth, and plainly holding enough provisions for a week.
"A wee bite for the journey home," she said, dimpling at him. "Might last ye at least out of sight o' the house."
He tucked the knot of the sack snugly into his belt and nodded briefly, turning toward the door.
"Aye," he said, "and if not, ye'll see the corbies gatherin' just beyond the rise, come to pick my bones."
"A lot of good they'd get from it," she answered cynically, eyeing his scrawny frame. "I've seen more sound flesh on a broomstick."
Murtagh's dour face remained unchanged, but a faint gleam showed in his eye, nonetheless.
"Oh, aye?" he said. "Weel, I'll tell ye, lass…" The voices passed down the hall, mingling in amiable insult and argument, vanishing at last in the echoes of the front hall.
I sat at the table for a moment longer, idly caressing the warm ivory of Ellen MacKenzie's bracelets. At the far-off slam of the door, I shook myself and stood up to take my place as the Lady of Lallybroch.
Usually a busy place, on Quarter Day the manor house simply bristled with activity. Tenants came and went all day. Many came only long enough to pay their rents; some stayed all day, wandering about the estate, visiting with friends, taking refreshment in the parlor. Jenny, blooming in blue silk, and Mrs. Crook, starched in white linen, flitted back and forth between kitchen and parlor, overseeing the two maidservants, who staggered to and fro under enormous platters of oatcake, fruitcake, "crumbly," and other sweets.
Jamie, having introduced me with ceremony to the tenants present in dining room and parlor, then retired into his study with Ian, to receive the tenants singly, to confer with them over the needs of the spring planting, to consult over the sale of wool and grain, to note the activities of the estate, and to set things in order for the next quarter of the year.
I puttered cheerfully about the place, visiting with tenants, lending a hand with the refreshments when needed, sometimes just drifting into the background to watch the comings and goings.
Recalling Jamie's promise to the old woman by the millpond, I waited with some curiosity for the arrival of Ronald MacNab.
He came shortly past noon, riding a tall, slip-jointed mule, with a small boy clinging to his belt behind. I viewed them covertly from the parlor door, wondering just how accurate his mother's assessment had been.