I knew that in the fullness of time, potatoes would become an important staple of life in the Highlands, less susceptible to blight and failure than the crops of oats and barley. Knowing that from a paragraph read in a geography book long ago was a far cry from deliberately taking responsibility for the lives of the people who would eat the crop.

I wondered if the taking of risks for other people got easier with practice. Jamie did it routinely, managing the affairs of the estate and the tenants as though he had been born to it. But, of course, hehad been born to it.

“Is the cellar nearly ready?” I asked.

“Oh, aye. Ian’s got the doors built, and the pit’s nearly dug. It’s only there’s a soft bit of earth near the back, and his peg gets stuck in when he stands there.” While Ian managed very well on the wooden peg he wore in substitute for his lower right leg, there were the occasional awkwardnesses such as this.

Jamie glanced thoughtfully up the hill behind us. “We’ll need the cellar finished and covered by tonight; it’s going to rain again before dawn.”

I turned to look in the direction of his gaze. Nothing showed on the slope but grass and heather, a few trees, and the rocky seams of granite that poked bony ridges through the scruffy overgrowth.

“How in hell can you tell that?”

He smiled, pointing uphill with his chin. “See the small oak tree? And the ash nearby?”

I glanced at the trees, baffled. “Yes. What about them?”

“The leaves, Sassenach. See how both trees look lighter than usual? When there’s damp in the air, the leaves of an oak or an ash will turn, so ye see the underside. The whole tree looks several shades lighter.”

“I suppose it does,” I agreed doubtfully. “If you happen to know what color the tree is normally.”

Jamie laughed and took my arm. “I may not have an ear for music, Sassenach, but I’ve eyes in my head. And I’ve seen those trees maybe ten thousand times, in every weather there is.”

It was some way from the field to the farmhouse, and we walked in silence for the most part, enjoying the brief warmth of the afternoon sun on our backs. I sniffed the air, and thought that Jamie was probably right about the coming rain; all the normal autumn smells seemed intensified, from the sharp pine resins to the dusty smell of ripe grain. I thought that I must be learning, myself; becoming attuned to the rhythms and sights and smells of Lallybroch. Maybe in time, I would come to know it as well as Jamie did. I squeezed his arm briefly, and felt the pressure of his hand on mine in response.

“D’ye miss France, Sassenach?” he said suddenly.

“No,” I said, startled. “Why?”

He shrugged, not looking at me. “Well, it’s only I was thinking, seeing ye come down the hill wi’ the basket on your arm, how bonny ye looked wi’ the sun on your brown hair. I thought you looked as though ye grew there, like one of the saplings – like ye’d always been a part of this place. And then it struck me, that to you, Lallybroch’s maybe a poor wee spot. There’s no grand life, like there was in France; not even interesting work, as ye had at the Hopital.” He glanced down at me shyly.

“I suppose I worry you’ll grow bored wi’ it here – in time.”

I paused before answering, though it wasn’t something I hadn’t thought about.

“In time,” I said carefully. “Jamie – I’ve seen a lot of things in my life, and been in a lot of places. Where I came from – there were things there that I miss sometimes. I’d like to ride a London omnibus again, or pick up a telephone and talk to someone far away. I’d like to turn a tap, and have hot water, not carry it from the well and heat it in a cauldron. I’d like all that – but I don’t need it. As for a grand life, I didn’t want it when I had it. Nice clothes are all very well, but if gossip and scheming and worry and silly parties and tiny rules of etiquette go with them… no. I’d as soon live in my shift and say what I like.”

He laughed at that, and I squeezed his arm once more.

“As for the work… there’s work for me here.” I glanced down into the basket of herbs and medicines on my arm. “I can be useful. And if I miss Mother Hildegarde, or my other friends – well, it isn’t as fast as a telephone, but there are always letters.”

I stopped, holding his arm, and looked up at him. The sun was setting, and the light gilded one side of his face, throwing the strong bones into relief.

“Jamie… I only want to be where you are. Nothing else.”

He stood still for a moment, then leaned forward and kissed me very gently on the forehead.

“It’s funny,” I said as we came over the crest of the last small hill that led down to the house. “I had just been wondering the same kinds of things about you. Whether you’d be happy here, after the things you did in France.”

He smiled, half-ruefully, and looked toward the house, its three stories of white-harled stone glowing gold and umber in the sunset.

“Well, it’s home, Sassenach. It’s my place.”

I touched him gently on the arm. “And you were born to it, you mean?”

He drew a deep breath, and reached out to rest a hand on the wooden fence-rail that separated this lower field from the grounds near the house.

“Well, in fact I wasna born to it, Sassenach. By rights, it should have been Willie was lairdie here. Had he lived, I expect I would have been a soldier – or maybe a merchant, like Jared.”

Willie, Jamie’s elder brother, had died of the smallpox at the age of eleven, leaving his small brother, aged six, as the heir to Lallybroch.

He made an odd half-shrugging gesture, as though seeking to ease the pressure of his shirt across his shoulders. It was something he did when feeling awkward or unsure; I hadn’t seen him do it in months.

“But Willie died. And so I am laird.” He glanced at me, a little shyly, then reached into his sporran and pulled something out. A little cherrywood snake that Willie had carved for him as a birthday gift lay on his palm, head twisted as though surprised to see the tail following it.

Jamie stroked the little snake gently; the wood was shiny and seasoned with handling, the curves of the body gleaming like scales in early twilight.

“I talk to Willie, sometimes, in my mind,” Jamie said. He tilted the snake on his palm. “If you’d lived, Brother, if ye’d been laird as you were meant to be, would ye do what I’ve done? or would ye find a better way?” He glanced down at me, flushing slightly. “Does that sound daft?”

“No.” I touched the snake’s smooth head with a fingertip. The high clear call of a meadowlark came from the far field, thin as crystal in the evening air.

“I do the same,” I said softly, after a moment. “With Uncle Lamb. And my parents. My mother especially. I – I didn’t think of her often, when I was young, just every now and then I’d dream about someone soft and warm, with a lovely singing voice. But when I was sick, after… Faith – sometimes I imagined she was there. With me.” A sudden wave of grief swept over me, remembrance of losses recent and long past.

Jamie touched my face gently, wiping away the tear that had formed at the corner of one eye but not quite fallen.

“I think sometimes the dead cherish us, as we do them,” he said softly. “Come on, Sassenach. Let’s walk a bit; there’s time before dinner.”

He linked my arm in his, tight against his side, and we turned along the fence, walking slowly, the dry grass rustling against my skirt.

“I ken what ye mean, Sassenach,” Jamie said. “I hear my father’s voice sometimes, in the barn, or in the field. When I’m not even thinkin’ of him, usually. But all at once I’ll turn my head, as though I’d just heard him outside, laughing wi’ one of the tenants, or behind me, gentling a horse.”

He laughed suddenly, and nodded toward a corner of the pasture before us.