Go Tell the Bees That I Am Gone
- Автор: Гэблдон Диана
- Серия: Outlander #9
- Год: 2021
- Язык: английский
- Год: Delacorte Press
- ISBN: 978-1-473-51900-8
- Жанр: Исторические приключения
Электронная книга - «Go Tell the Bees That I Am Gone». Краткое содержание книги:
The past may seem the safest place to be . . . but it is the most dangerous time to be alive. . . .
Jamie Fraser and Claire Randall were torn apart by the Jacobite Rising in 1746, and it took them twenty years to find each other again. Now the American Revolution threatens to do the same. It is 1779 and Claire and Jamie are at last reunited with their daughter, Brianna, her husband, Roger, and their children on Fraser’s Ridge. Having the family together is a dream the Frasers had thought impossible. Yet even in the North Carolina backcountry, the effects of war are being felt. Tensions in the Colonies are great and local feelings run hot enough to boil Hell’s teakettle. Jamie knows loyalties among his tenants are split and it won’t be long until the war is on his doorstep. Brianna and Roger have their own worry: that the dangers that provoked their escape from the twentieth century might catch up to them. Sometimes they question whether risking the perils of the 1700s—among them disease, starvation, and an impending war—was indeed the safer choice for their family. Not so far away, young William Ransom is still coming to terms with the discovery of his true father’s identity—and thus his own—and Lord John Grey has reconciliations to make, and dangers to meet . . . on his son’s behalf, and his own. Meanwhile, the Revolutionary War creeps ever closer to Fraser’s Ridge. And with the family finally together, Jamie and Claire have more at stake than ever before.
“That’ll do, lass,” he said to her, and with a gentle shake let her go. “Your pardon, gentlemen.”
Mr. Partland had drawn back when Bluebell menaced them, and had a hand on his pocket in a way suggesting that he might have a small pistol therein. He didn’t take his eyes off the dog, even when Fanny came out, summoned by Jamie, and coaxed her back into the house.
Mr. Granger, though, had no eyes for dogs. He was staring at Jamie. Jamie noticed this, and offered his hand with a slight bow.
“James Fraser, your servant, sir.”
“I—that is—” Mr. Granger shook his head rapidly and took Jamie’s hand. “Mr. Adam Granger, sir. Are you—are you not General Fraser?”
“I was,” Jamie said briefly. “And you, sir?” He turned to Partland, who was now also examining him as he might a horse he meant to buy.
“Nicodemus Partland, your most obedient, sir,” Partland said, smiling, but with a tone that suggested obedience was the last thing he intended. Or respect, for that matter.
“Your, um”—Mr. Granger, belatedly recalling my presence, turned to look at me—“woman suggested that we might find shelter from the storm here. But if our presence is inconvenient …”
“Not at all.” Jamie’s mouth twitched slightly as he looked me over. “Allow me to introduce my wife, sir—Mrs. General Fraser.”
FANNY APPEARED IN the doorway, coming to see what Bluebell was barking about now, with Brianna behind her. Jamie made the introductions, then motioned the visitors into the house and raised a brow at Bree, who nodded obligingly.
“My daughter will see to your needs, gentlemen. I’ll join ye shortly.”
He waited just long enough for them to go inside before turning to me.
“What the devil have ye been doing, Sassenach?” he hissed.
“Delivering pigs,” I said succinctly, and handed him the bundle of wet clothing, from which the unmistakable scent of porcine excrement still oozed, bearing witness to my story.
“Christ,” he said, holding the bundle out at arm’s length. “Frances, lass, take this, will ye? Soak it in something—or must it be burnt?” he asked, turning back to me.
“Soak them in cold water with soft soap and vinegar,” I said. “We’ll boil them later. And thank you, Fanny.”
She nodded and took the bundle, nose wrinkled.
“Who are these men?” Jamie asked, jerking his chin toward the door where Partland and Granger had disappeared. “And how the devil did ye come to be in their company in nothing but your shift?”
“I was washing in the creek when they turned up,” I said, rather irritated. “I didn’t invite them to join me.”
“No, of course not.” He took a breath and began to calm down. “I just didna like the way the younger one was looking at ye.”
“Neither did I. As for who they are—” I began, but was interrupted by Fanny, who was headed for the side yard and the laundry tub with Bluebell, but turned round at this.
“The young one is an officer,” she said, and nodded in affirmation of her observations. “They always think they can do anything they want.”
I stared after her, nonplussed, as she vanished.
“They don’t look like soldiers,” I said, with a shrug. “The older one called me ‘my good woman,’ though. They probably thought I was your skivvy.”
“My what?” He looked startled, and then offended.
“Oh—it just means a cleaning woman,” I said, realizing that he’d leapt to a not-unreasonable eighteenth-century interpretation of the meaning of “skivvy.” “Anyway, they said they were looking for Captain Cunningham. And as it was about to rain …”
It was. The wind was moving through the grass and through leaves and needles and twigs; the whole forest was breathing and the clouds had covered more than half the sky, big, black, and dangerous with flickering lightning.
Brianna came out, holding a towel, and offered it to me.
“I put those men in your study, Da,” she said. “Is that all right?”
“Aye, fine,” he assured her.
“Wait, Bree,” I said, emerging from the towel as she turned to go. “Would you and Fanny go down to the root cellar and fetch up some vegetables and maybe … I don’t know, something sweet—jam, raisins … We’ll have to feed them, whoever they are.”
“Sure,” she said. “You don’t know who they are?”
“Fanny says the young one is an officer,” Jamie said. “Beyond that—we’ll see. Come along in, Sassenach,” he said, putting an arm about me to shepherd me inside. “Ye need to get dry—”
“And clothed.”
“Aye, that, too.”
THE ROOT CELLAR wasn’t a long walk from the smoke shed, but it was on the other side of the big clearing, and the wind, unobstructed by trees or buildings, rushed them from behind, blowing their skirts out before them and whipping Fanny’s cap off her head.
Brianna got a hand up and snatched the scrap of muslin as it whirled past. Her own hair, unbound, was flailing round her face, and so was Fanny’s. They looked at each other, half-blinded, and laughed. Then the first drops of rain began to fall, and they ran, gasping and shrieking for the shelter of the root cellar.
It was dug into the side of a hill, a rough wooden door framed in with stacked stone on either side. The door stuck in its jamb, but Bree freed it with a mighty jerk and they fell inside, damp-spotted but safe from the downpour that now commenced outside.
“Here.” Still breathless, Brianna gave the cap to Fanny. “I don’t think it’ll keep the rain out, though.”
Fanny shook her head, sneezed, giggled, and sneezed again.
“Where’s yours?” she asked, sniffing as she tucked her windblown curls back under the cap.
“I don’t like caps much,” Bree said, and smiled when Fanny blinked. “But I might wear one for cooking or doing something splashy. I wear a slouch hat for hunting, sometimes, but otherwise I just tie my hair back.”
“Oh,” Fanny said uncertainly. “I gueth—guess that’s why Mrs. Fraser—your mother, I mean—why she doesn’t wear them, either?”
“Well, it’s a little different with Mama,” Bree said, running her fingers through her own long red hair to untangle it. “It’s part of her war with”—she paused for a moment, wondering how much to say, but after all, if Fanny was now part of the family, she’d learn such things sooner or later—“with people who think they have a right to tell her how to do things.”
Fanny’s eyes went round.
“Don’t they?”
“I’d like to see anybody try,” Bree said dryly, and, having twisted her hair into an untidy bun, turned to survey the contents of the cellar.
She felt a rush of relief and reassurance, seeing at once that a good three-quarters of the shallow shelves were filled: potatoes, turnips, apples, yams, and the bright-green ovoids of slowly ripening pawpaws. Two large, lumpy burlap bags stood against the far wall, probably full of nuts of some kind (though surely local nuts hadn’t ripened yet? Perhaps her parents had traded for them …), and the cellar was filled with the sweet-wine scent of drying muscats, hung in clusters from the low ceiling to crinkle into raisins.
“Mama’s been busy,” she said, automatically turning the potatoes on one shelf as she selected a dozen to take. “I suppose you have, too,” she added, smiling at Fanny. “You helped gather all of this, I’m sure.”
Fanny looked down modestly but glowed a little.
“I dug up the turnips and some of the potatoes,” she said. “There were a lot growing in that place they call Old Garden. Under the weeds.”
“Old Garden,” Bree repeated. “Yes, I suppose so.” A shiver that had nothing to do with the chill of the root cellar rose up her neck and contracted her scalp. She’d heard about Malva Christie’s death in the garden. And the death of her unborn child. Under the weeds, indeed.