refinery above.
“Yes, sah?” A middle-aged slave woman opened the door, looking out curiously at us. She was wide-bodied, dressed in a white cotton smock, with a red turban wrapped round her head, and her skin was the deep, rich gold in the heart of the flowers on the trellis.
“Mr. and Mrs. Malcolm, to call upon Mrs. Abernathy, if ye please,” Jamie said politely. The woman looked rather taken aback, as though callers were not a common occurrence, but after a moment’s indecision, she nodded and stepped back, swinging the door wide.
“You be waitin’ in the salon, please, sah,” she said, in a soft lilt that made it “sallong.” “I be askin’ the mistress will she see you.”
It was a large room, long and graciously proportioned, lit by huge casement windows all down one side. At the far end of the room was the fireplace, an enormous structure with a stone overmantel and a hearth of polished slates that occupied nearly the whole wall. You could have roasted an ox in it without the slightest difficulty, and the presence of a large spit suggested that the owner of the house did so on occasion.
The slave had shown us to a wicker sofa and invited us to be seated. I sat, looking about, but Jamie strolled restlessly about the room, peering through the windows that gave a view of the cane fields below the house.
It was an odd room; comfortably furnished with wicker and rattan furniture, well-equipped with fat, soft cushions, but ornamented with small, uncommon curios. On one window ledge sat a row of silver handbells, graduated from small to large. Several squat figures of stone and terra-cotta sat together on the table by my elbow; some sort of primitive fetishes or idols.
All of them were in the shape of women, hugely pregnant, or with enormous, rounded breasts and exaggerated hips, and all with a vivid and mildly disturbing sexuality about them. It was not a prudish age, by any means, but I wouldn’t have expected to find such objects in a drawing room in any age.
Somewhat more orthodox were the Jacobite relics. A silver snuffbox, a glass flagon, a decorated fan, a large serving platter—even the large woven rug on the floor; all decorated with the square white rose of the Stuarts. That wasn’t so odd—a great many Jacobites who had fled Scotland after Culloden had come to the West Indies to seek the repair of their fortunes. I found the sight encouraging. A householder with Jacobite sympathies might be welcoming to a fellow Scot, and willing to oblige in the matter of Ian. If he’s here, a small voice in my head warned.
Steps sounded in the inner part of the house, and there was a flutter at the door by the hearth. Jamie made a small grunting sound, as though someone had hit him, and I looked up, to see the mistress of the house step into the room.
I rose to my feet, and the small silver cup I had picked up fell to the floor with a clank.
“Kept your girlish figure, I see, Claire.” Her head was tilted to one side, green eyes gleaming with amusement.
I was too paralyzed with surprise to respond aloud, but the thought drifted through my stunned mind that I couldn’t say the same for her.
Geillis Duncan had always had a voluptuous abundance of creamy bosom and a generous swell of rounded hip. While still creamy-skinned, she was considerably more abundant and generous, in every dimension visible. She wore a loose muslin gown, under which the soft, thick flesh wobbled and swayed as she moved. The delicate bones of her face had long since been submerged in swelling plumpness, but the brilliant green eyes were the same, filled with malice and humor.
I took a deep breath, and got my voice back.
“I trust you won’t take this the wrong way,” I said, sinking slowly back onto the wicker sofa, “but why aren’t you dead?”
She laughed, the silver in her voice as clear as a young girl’s.
“Think I should have been, do you? Well, you’re no the first—and I daresay you’ll not be the last to think so, either.”
Eyes creased to bright green triangles by amusement, she sank into her own chair, nodded casually to Jamie, and clapped her hands sharply to summon a servant. “Shall we have a dish of tea?” she asked me. “Do, and I’ll read the leaves in your cup for ye, after. I’ve a reputation as a reader, after all; a fine teller o’ the future, to be sure—and why not?” She laughed again, plump cheeks pinkening with mirth. If she had been as shocked by my appearance as I was at hers, she disguised it masterfully.
“Tea,” she said, to the black maidservant who appeared in response to the summons. “The special kind in the blue tin, aye? And the bittie cakes wi’ the nuts in, too.”
“You’ll take a bite?” she asked, turning back to me. “’Tis something of an occasion, after all. I did wonder,” she said, tilting her head to one side, like a gull judging the chances of snatching a fish, “whether our paths might cross again, after that day at Cranesmuir.”
My heart was beginning to slow, the shock overcome in a great wave of curiosity. I could feel the questions bubbling up by the dozens, and picked one off the top at random.
“Did you know me?” I asked. “When you met me in Cranesmuir?”
She shook her head, the strands of cream-white hair coming loose from their pins and sliding down her neck. She poked haphazardly at her knot, still surveying me with interest.
“Not at the first, no. Though sure and I thought there was a great strangeness about ye—not that I was the only one to think that. Ye didna come through the stones prepared, did ye? Not on purpose, I mean?”
I bit back the words, “Not that time,” and said instead, “No, it was an accident. You came on purpose, though—from 1967?”
She nodded, studying me intently. The thickened flesh between her brows was creased, and the crease deepened slightly as she looked at me.
“Aye—to help Prince Tearlach.” Her mouth twisted to one side, as though she tasted something bad, and quite suddenly, she turned her head and spat. The globule of saliva hit the polished wooden floor with an audible plop.
“An gealtaire salach Atailteach!” she said. “Filthy Italian coward!” Her eyes darkened and shone with no pleasant light. “Had I known, I should have made my way to Rome and killed him, while there was time. His brother Henry might ha’ been no better, though—a ballock-less, sniveling priest, that one. Not that it made a difference. After Culloden, any Stuart would be as useless as another.”
She sighed, and shifted her bulk, the rattan of the chair creaking beneath her. She waved a hand impatiently, dismissing the Stuarts.
“Still, that’s done with for now. Ye came by accident—walked through the stones near the date of a Fire Feast, did ye? That’s how it usually happens.”
“Yes,” I said, startled. “I came through on Beltane. But what do you mean, ‘usually happens’? Have you met a great many others—like…us?” I ended hesitantly.
She shook her head rather absently. “Not many.” She seemed to be pondering something, though perhaps it was only the absence of her refreshments; she picked up the silver bell and rang it violently.
“Damn that Clotilda! Like us?” she said, returning to the question at hand. “No, I haven’t. Only one besides you, that I ken. Ye could ha’ knocked me over wi’ a feather, when I saw the wee scar on your arm, and kent ye for one like myself.” She touched the great swell of her own upper arm, where the small vaccination scar lay hidden beneath the puff of white muslin. She tilted her head in that bird-like way again, surveying me with one bright green eye.
“No, when I said that’s how it usually happens, I meant, judging from the stories. Folk who disappear in fairy rings and the stone circles, I mean. They usually walk through near Beltane or Samhain; a few near the Sun Feasts—Midsummer’s Day or the winter solstice.”
“That’s what the list was!” I said suddenly, reminded of the gray notebook I had left with Roger Wakefield. “You had a list of dates and initials—nearly two hundred of them. I didn’t know what they were, but I saw that the dates were mostly in late April or early May, or near the end of October.”
“Aye, that’s right.” She nod
ded, eyes still fixed on me in speculation. “So ye found my wee book? Is that how ye knew to come and look for me on Craigh na Dun? It was you, no? That shouted my name, just before I stepped through the stones?”
“Gillian,” I said, and saw her pupils widen at the name that had once been hers, though her face stayed smooth. “Gillian Edgars. Yes, it was me. I didn’t know if you saw me in the dark.” I could see in memory the night-black circle of stones—and in the center, the blazing bonfire, and the figure of a slim girl standing by it, pale hair flying in the heat of the fire.
“I didn’t see ye,” she said. “’Twas only later, when I heard ye call out at the witch trial and thought I’d heard your voice before. And then, when I saw the mark on your arm…” She shrugged massively, the muslin tight across her shoulders as she settled back. “Who was with ye, that night?” she asked curiously. “There were two I saw—a bonnie dark lad, and a girl.”
She closed her eyes, concentrating, then opened them again to stare at me.
“Later on, I thought I kent her—but I couldna put a name to her, though I could swear I’d seen the face. Who was she?”
“Mistress Duncan? Or is it Mistress Abernathy, now?” Jamie interrupted, stepping forward and bowing to her formally. The first shock of her appearance was fading, but he was still pale, his cheekbones prominent under the stretched skin of his face.
She glanced at him, then looked again, as though noticing him for the first time.
“Well, and if it’s no the wee fox cub!” she said, looking amused. She looked him carefully up and down, noting every detail of his appearance with interest.
“Grown to a bonny man, have ye no?” she said. She leaned back in the chair, which creaked loudly under her weight, and squinted appraisingly at him. “You’ve the look of the MacKenzies about ye, laddie. Ye always did, but now you’re older, you’ve the look of both your uncles in your face.”
“I am sure both Dougal and Colum would be pleased ye’d remember them so well.” Jamie’s eyes were fixed on her as intently as hers on him. He had never liked her—and was unlikely to change his opinion now—but he could not afford to antagonize her; not if she had Ian here somewhere.
The arrival of the tea interrupted whatever reply she might have made. Jamie moved to my side, and sat with me on the sofa, while Geilie carefully poured the tea and handed us each a cup, behaving exactly like a conventional hostess at a tea party. As though wishing to preserve this illusion, she offered the sugar bowl and milk jug, and sat back to make light conversation.
“If ye dinna mind my asking, Mrs. Abernathy,” Jamie said, “how did ye come to this place?” Politely left unspoken was the larger question—How did you escape being burned as a witch?
She laughed, lowering her long lashes coquettishly over her eyes.
“Well, and ye’ll maybe recall I was wi’ child, back at Cranesmuir?”
“I seem to recall something of the sort.” Jamie took a sip of his tea, the tips of his ears turning slightly pink. He had cause to remember that, all right; she had torn off her clothes in the midst of the witch trial, disclosing the secret bulge that would save her life—at least temporarily.
A small pink tongue poked out and delicately skimmed the tea droplets from her upper lip.
“Have ye had children yourself?” she asked, cocking an eyebrow at me.
“I have.”
“Terrible chore, isn’t it? Dragging about like a mud-caked sow, and then being ripped apart for the sake of something looks like a drowned rat.” She shook her head, making a low noise of disgust in her throat. “The beauty o’ motherhood, is it? Still, I should not complain, I suppose-the wee ratling saved my life for me. And wretched as childbirth is, it’s better than being burnt at the stake.”
“I’d suppose so,” I said, “though not having tried the latter, I couldn’t say for sure.”
Geillis choked in her tea, spraying brown droplets over the front of her dress. She mopped at them carelessly, eyeing me with amusement.
“Well, I’ve not done it either, but I’ve seen them burn, poppet. And I think perhaps even lyin’ in a muddy hole watching your belly grow is better than that.”
“They kept you in the thieves’ hole all the time?” The silver spoon was cool in my hand, but my palm grew sweaty at the memory of the thieves’ hole in Cranesmuir. I had spent three days there with Geillis Duncan, accused as a witch. How long had she stayed there?
“Three months,” she said, staring meditatively into her tea. “Three mortal months of frozen feet and crawling vermin, stinking scraps of food and the grave-smell clinging to my skin day and night.”
She looked up then, mouth twisting in bitter amusement. “But I bore the child in style, at the end. When my pains began, they took me from the hole—little chance I’d run then, aye?—and the babe was born in my own old bedroom; in the fiscal’s house.”
Her eyes were slightly clouded, and I wondered whether the liquid in her glass was entirely tea.
“I had diamond-paned windows, do ye recall? All in shades of purple and green and white—the finest house in the village.” She smiled reminiscently. “They gave me the bairn to hold, and the green light fell over his face. He looked as though he was drowned indeed. I thought he should be cold to the touch, like a corpse, but he wasn’t; he was warm. Warm as his father’s balls.” She laughed suddenly, an ugly sound.
“Why are men such fools? Ye can lead them anywhere by the cock—for a while. Then give them a son and ye have them by the balls again. But it’s all ye are to them, whether they’re coming in or going out—a cunt.”
She was leaning back in her chair. At this, she spread her thighs wide, and hoisted her glass in ironic toast above her pubic bone, squinting down across the swelling bulge of belly.
“Well, here’s to it, I say! Most powerful thing in the world. The niggers know that, at least.” She took a deep, careless swig of her drink. “They carve wee idols, all belly and cunt and breasts. Same as men do where we came from—you and I.” She squinted at me, teeth bared in amusement. “Seen the dirty mags men buy under the counters then, aye?”
The bloodshot green eyes swiveled to Jamie. “And you’ll know the pictures and the books the men pass about among themselves in Paris now, won’t ye, fox? It’s all the same.” She waved a hand and drank again, deeply. “The only difference is the niggers have the decency to worship it.”
“Verra perceptive of them,” Jamie said calmly. He was sitting back in his chair, long legs stretched out in apparent relaxation, but I could see the tension in the fingers of the hand that gripped his own cup. “And how d’ye ken the pictures men look at in Paris, Mistress—Abernathy, is it now?”
She might be tipsy, but was by no means fuddled. She looked up sharply at the tone of his voice, and gave him a twisted smile.
“Oh, Mistress Abernathy will do well enough. When I lived in Paris, I had another name—Madame Melisande Robicheaux. Like that one? I thought it a bit grand, but your uncle Dougal gave it me, so I kept it—out of sentiment.”
My free hand curled into a fist, out of sight in the folds of my skirt. I had heard of Madame Melisande, when we lived in Paris. Not a part of society, she had had some fame as a seer of the future; ladies of the court consulted her in deepest secrecy, for advice on their love lives, their investments, and their pregnancies.
“I imagine you could have told the ladies some interesting things,” I said dryly.
Her laugh this time was truly amused. “Oh, I could, indeed! Seldom did, though. Folk don’t usually pay for the truth, ye know. Sometimes, though—did ye ken that Jean-Paul Marat’s mother meant to name her bairn Rudolphe? I told her I thought Rudolphe was ill-omened. I wondered now and then about that—would he grow up a revolutionary with a name like Rudolphe, or would he take it all out in writing poems, instead? Ever think that, fox—that a name might make a difference?” Her eyes were fixed on Jamie, green glass.
“Often,” he said, and set down his cup. “It was Doug
al got ye away from Cranesmuir, then?”
She nodded, stifling a small belch. “Aye. He came to take the babe—alone, for fear someone would find out he was the father, aye? I wouldna let it go, though. And when he came near to wrest it from me—why, I snatched the dirk from his belt and pressed it to the child’s throat.” A small smile of satisfaction at the memory curved her lovely lips.
“Told him I’d kill it, sure, unless he swore on his brother’s life and his own soul to get me safe away.”
“And he believed you?” I felt mildly ill at the thought of any mother holding a knife to the throat of her newborn child, even in pretense.
Her gaze swiveled back to me. “Oh, yes,” she said softly, and the smile widened. “He knew me, did Dougal.”
Sweating, even in the chill of December, and unable to take his eyes off the tiny face of his sleeping son, Dougal had agreed.
“When he leaned over me to take the child, I thought of plunging the dirk into his own throat instead,” she said, reminiscently. “But it would have been a good deal harder to get away by myself, so I didn’t.”
Jamie’s expression didn’t change, but he picked up his tea and took a deep swallow.
Dougal had summoned the locksman, John MacRae, and the church sexton, and by means of discreet bribery, insured that the hooded figure dragged on a hurdle to the pitch barrel next morning would not be that of Geillis Duncan.
“I thought they’d use straw, maybe,” she said, “but he was a cleverer man than that. Auld Grannie Joan MacKenzie had died three days before, and was meant to be burying that same afternoon. A few rocks in the coffin and the lid nailed down tight, and Bob’s your uncle, eh? A real body, fine for burning.” She laughed, and gulped the last swallow of her drink.
“Not everyone’s seen their own funeral; fewer still ha’ seen their own execution, aye?”
It had been the dead of winter, and the small grove of rowan trees outside the village stood bare, drifted with their own dead leaves, the dried red berries showing here and there on the ground like spots of blood.
It was a cloudy day, with the promise of sleet or snow, but the whole village turned out nonetheless; a witch-burning was not an event to be missed. The village priest, Father Bain, had died himself three months before, of fever brought on by a festering sore, but a new priest had been imported for the occasion from a village nearby. Perfuming his way with a censer held before him, the priest had come down the path to the grove, chanting the service for the dead. Behind him came the locksman and his two assistants, dragging the hurdle and its black-robed burden.
“I expect Grannie Joan would have been pleased,” Geilie said, white teeth gleaming at the vision. “She couldna have expected more nor four or five people to her burying—as it was, she had the whole village, and the incense and special prayers to boot!”
MacRae had untied the body and carried it, lolling, to the barrel of pitch ready waiting.
“The court granted me the mercy to be weirrit before the burning,” Geillis explained ironically. “So they expected the body to be dead—no difficulty there, if I was strangled already. The only thing anyone might ha’ seen was that Grannie Joan weighed half what I did, newly delivered as I was, but no one seemed to notice she was light in MacRae’s arms.”
“You were there?” I said.
She nodded smugly. “Oh, aye. Well muffled in a cloak—everyone was, because o’ the weather—but I wouldna have missed it.”
As the priest finished his last prayer against the evils of enchantment, MacRae had taken the pine torch from his assistant and stepped forward.
“God, omit not this woman from Thy covenant, and the many evils that she in the body committed,” he had said, and flung the fire into the pitch.
“It was faster than I thought it would be,” Geillis said, sounding mildly surprised. “A great whoosh! of fire—there was a blast of hot air and a cheer from the crowd, and naught to be seen but the flames, shooting up high enough to singe the rowan branches overhead.”
The fire had subsided within a minute, though, and the dark figure within was clear enough to be seen through the pale daylight flames. The hood and the hair had burned away with the first scorching rush, and the face itself was burned beyond recognition. A few moments more, and the clean dark shapes of the bones emerged from the melted flesh, an airy superstructure rising above the charring barrel.
“Only great empty holes where her eyes had been,” she said. The moss-green eyes turned toward me, clouded by memory. “I thought perhaps she was looking at me. But then the skull exploded, and it was all over, and folk began to come away—all except a few who stayed in hopes of picking up a bit of bone as a keepsake.”
She rose and went unsteadily to the small table near the window. She picked up the silver bell and rang it, hard.
“Aye,” she said, her back turned to us. “Childbirth is maybe easier.”
“So Dougal got ye away to France,” Jamie said. The fingers of his right hand twitched slightly. “How came ye here to the West Indies?”
“Oh, that was later,” she said carelessly. “After Culloden.” She turned then, and smiled from Jamie to me.
“And what might bring the two of ye here to this place? Surely not the pleasure of my company?”
I glanced at Jamie, seeing the slight tensing of his back as he sat up straighter. His face stayed calm, though, only his eyes bright with wariness.
“We’ve come to seek a young kinsman of mine,” he said. “My nephew, Ian Murray. We’ve some reason to think he is indentured here.”
Geilie’s pale brows rose high, making soft ridges in her forehead.
“Ian Murray?” she said, and shook her head in puzzlement. “I’ve no indentured whites at all, here. No whites, come to that. The only free man on the place is the overseer, and he’s what they call a griffone; one-quarter black.”
Unlike me, Geillis Duncan was a very good liar. Impossible to tell, from her expression of mild interest, whether she had ever heard the name Ian Murray before. But lying she was, and I knew it.
Jamie knew it, too; the expression that flashed through his eyes was not disappointment, but fury, quickly suppressed.
“Indeed?” he said politely. “And are ye not fearful, then, alone wi’ your slaves here, so far from town?”
“Oh, no. Not at all.”
She smiled broadly at him, then lifted her double chin and waggled it gently in the direction of the terrace behind him. I turned my head, and saw that the French door was filled from jamb to doorpost with an immense black man, several inches taller than Jamie, from whose rolled-up shirt sleeves protruded arms like tree trunks, knotted with muscle.
“Meet Hercules,” Geilie said, with a tiny laugh. “He has a twin brother, too.”
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