“You think he’ll understand?” Young Ian looked at Jamie with eyes in which hope battled with doubt. “I—I didna think he…has my Da ever killed a man?” he asked suddenly.
Jamie blinked, taken aback by the question. “Well,” he said slowly, “I suppose—I mean, he’s fought in battle, but I—to tell ye the truth, Ian, I dinna ken.” He looked a little helplessly at his nephew.
“It’s no the sort of thing men talk much about, aye? Except sometimes soldiers, when they’re deep in drink.”
Young Ian nodded, absorbing this, and sniffed again, with a horrid gurgling noise. Jamie, groping hastily in his sleeve for a handkerchief, looked up suddenly, struck by a thought.
“That’s why ye said ye must tell me, but not your Da? Because ye knew I’ve killed men before?”
His nephew nodded, searching Jamie’s face with troubled, trusting eyes. “Aye. I thought…I thought ye’d know what to do.”
“Ah.” Jamie drew a deep breath, and exchanged a glance with me. “Well…” His shoulders braced and broadened, and I could see him accept the burden Young Ian had laid down. He sighed.
“What ye do,” he said, “is first to ask yourself if ye had a choice. You didn’t, so put your mind at ease. Then ye go to confession, if ye can; if not, say a good Act of Contrition—that’s good enough, when it’s no a mortal sin. Ye harbor no fault, mind,” he said earnestly, “but the contrition is because ye greatly regret the necessity that fell on ye. It does sometimes, and there’s no preventing it.
“And then say a prayer for the soul of the one you’ve killed,” he went on, “that he may find rest, and not haunt ye. Ye ken the prayer called Soul Peace? Use that one, if ye have leisure to think of it. In a battle, when there is no time, use Soul Leading—‘Be this soul on Thine arm, O Christ, Thou King of the City of Heaven, Amen.’”
“Be this soul on Thine arm, O Christ, Thou King of the City of Heaven, Amen,” Young Ian repeated under his breath. He nodded slowly. “Aye, all right. And then?”
Jamie reached out and touched his nephew’s cheek with great gentleness. “Then ye live with it, laddie,” he said softly. “That’s all.”
28
VIRTUE’S GUARDIAN
“You think the man Young Ian followed has something to do with Sir Percival’s warning?” I lifted a cover on the supper tray that had just been delivered and sniffed appreciatively; it seemed a very long time since Moubray’s stew.
Jamie nodded, picking up a sort of hot stuffed roll.
“I should be surprised if he had not,” he said dryly. “While there’s likely more than one man willing to do me harm, I canna think it likely that gangs o’ them are roaming about Edinburgh.” He took a bite and chewed industriously, shaking his head.
“Nay, that’s clear enough, and nothing to be greatly worrit over.”
“It’s not?” I took a small bite of my own roll, then a bigger one. “This is delicious. What is it?”
Jamie lowered the roll he had been about to take a bite of, and squinted at it. “Pigeon minced wi’ truffles,” he said, and stuffed it into his mouth whole.
“No,” he said, and paused to swallow. “No,” he said again, more clearly. “That’s likely just a matter of a rival smuggler. There are two gangs that I’ve had a wee bit of difficulty with now and then.” He waved a hand, scattering crumbs, and reached for another roll.
“The way the man behaved—smellin’ the brandy, but seldom tasting it—he may be a
Wine had come along with the supper. I poured out a glass and passed it under my own nose.
“He could track you—you, personally—through the brandy?” I asked curiously.
“More or less. You’ll remember my cousin Jared?”
“Of course I do. You mean he’s still alive?” After the slaughter of Culloden and the erosions of its aftermath, it was wonderfully heartening to hear that Jared, a wealthy Scottish émigré with a prosperous wine business in Paris, was still among the quick, and not the dead.
“I expect they’ll have to head him up in a cask and toss him into the Seine to get rid of him,” Jamie said, teeth gleaming white in his soot-stained countenance. “Aye, he’s not only alive, but enjoying it. Where d’ye think I get the French brandy I bring into Scotland?”
The obvious answer was “France,” but I refrained from saying so. “Jared, I suppose?” I said instead.
Jamie nodded, mouth full of another roll. “Hey!” He leaned forward and snatched the plate out from under the tentative reach of Young Ian’s skinny fingers. “You’re no supposed to be eating rich stuff like that when your wame’s curdled,” he said, frowning and chewing. He swallowed and licked his lips. “I’ll call for more bread and milk for ye.”
“But Uncle,” said Young Ian, looking longingly at the savory rolls. “I’m awfully hungry.” Purged by confession, the boy had recovered his spirits considerably, and evidently, his appetite as well.
