her old contradictory way. She fussed and bustled and tutted and grumbled until the house had been restored to some kind of order, the fire was lit, the children had gone whining to bed, and Andrew had been suckled and laid for the night in his cradle.
But when we were in bed and I was sinking into the sleep of complete exhaustion, in spite of the hunger gnawing at me, I heard her weeping softly behind the wooden partition that separated her bed from ours.
Chapter 24
Of all the people at Ladymuir, I think I was best able to cope with the sudden, total poverty in which we had been plunged. Before I'd come to Kilmacolm, I'd lived on the edge of hunger all my life. On the many, many days when there had been no food in the cottage at Scalpsie Bay, I'd scavenged for limpets on the rocks by the sea, gathered berries or nuts in the autumn, and picked edible leaves and flowers wherever I could find them. But the spring, I knew, was the worst time for famine. Everyone's winter supplies were low, there were no wild fruits to gather, and the crops were a long way from harvest.
I did what I could, stinging my hands raw and red with nettles to make soup and hunting for birds' eggs on the moss. Aunt Blair wrinkled her nose at my offerings but used them all the same. She was more grateful for the stream of gifts of oatmeal and barley and even valuable cheeses from those kind neighbors whose stores had not been raided, and I saw more than ever how greatly Granny had caused us to suffer by her endless quarreling with our neighbors.
The officers from Paisley came a few days after Uncle Blair had been arrested in order to collect the fine for nonattendance at the kirk. Although we'd been expecting them, we'd hoped somehow that my uncle's arrest would have spared us, and the shock of the sum they demanded was a final blow.
They were decent men, I suppose, not like Lieutenant Dundas's dragoons. They counted out the silver pieces so carefully put by in the strongbox, piled them neatly on the table, and gave my aunt a written receipt.
"There's another two pounds owing," the older man said, almost regretfully. "Do you not have it, Mistress Blair?"
My aunt's eyes filled with tears. She shook her head.
"You've taken every penny we have. It's all there, in front of you. How am I to feed my children?"
"You should have thought of that before you broke the law," the other man said. "What harm would it have done, to sit through a sermon or two? You needn't have listened, after all." The older one frowned him to silence.
"There's nothing I can do. I'm just carrying out my orders. I'm sorry for your trouble. These are bad times for everyone. There's not a household hereabouts that isn't suffering. The jails in Paisley and Glasgow are so full of Covenant men—and women, come to that—that they've had to send some of them on to the tolbooth in Edinburgh."
"What?" Aunt Blair cried. "What about my husband? I was told he was in Glasgow. Is he one of them? Why would they send him all the way to Edinburgh? Oh, they're going to hang him! There'll be a trial and the next thing we know ... Lord, have mercy on us!"
"Hold on, mistress. I don't know if your husband's one of them. It's no use asking me. I'm just telling you what I heard. Some have been hanged already, but you'd have heard if your husband was one of them. Some are to be kept in Glasgow, and some are sent on to Edinburgh."
Aunt Blair collapsed onto her stool and looked so dreadful that I thought she would faint. The officers clearly thought so too. They exchanged quick, embarrassed nods, slipped the silver pieces into leather pouches, and almost tiptoed to the door.
"We'll not bother you for the rest of the money now," the older one said, as if conferring a great concession. "But we'll have to come back for it, mistress. The fine must be paid in full, as you well know."
At that point Ritchie, who had been out since dawn doing the work of two men on the farm, came into the yard, and the officers scuttled away.
***
I have always been amazed by how fast news travels from one end of Scotland to the other, reaching remote farms and hamlets,