Suddenly furious with himself—and with Malva Christie, the malicious little chit—he picked up a stone from the trail and flung it down the mountain, into the stream. It struck another in the water, bounced twice, and vanished into the rushing gurgle.

His visits to the McCallums had to stop, at once. He saw that clearly. Another way would have to be found for them … but he had to come once more, to explain. Amy would understand, he thought—but how to explain to Aidan what reputation was, and why gossip was a deadly sin, and why Roger couldn’t come anymore to fish or show him how to build things… .

Cursing steadily under his breath, he made the last short, steep ascent and came into the ragged, overgrown little dooryard. Before he could call out to announce his presence, though, the door flew open.

“Roger Mac!” Amy McCallum half-fell down the step and into his arms, gasping and weeping. “Oh, you came, you came! I prayed for someone to come, but I didna think anyone would, in time, and he’d die, but ye’ve come, God be thankit!”

“What is it? What’s wrong? Is wee Orrie taken sick?” He got hold of her arms, steadying her, and she shook her head, so violently that her cap slid half off.

“Aidan,” she gasped. “It’s Aidan.”



AIDAN MCCALLUM lay doubled up on my surgery table, white as a sheet, making little gasping groans. My first hope—green apples or gooseberries—vanished with a closer look at him. I was fairly sure what I had here, but appendicitis shares symptoms with a number of other conditions. A classic case does, however, have one striking aspect.

“Can you unfold him, just for a moment?” I looked at his mother, hovering over him on the verge of tears, but it was Roger who nodded and came to put his hands on Aidan’s knees and shoulders, gently persuading him to lie flat.

I put a thumb in his navel, my little finger on his right hipbone, and pressed his abdomen sharply with my middle finger, wondering for a second as I did so whether McBurney had yet discovered and named this diagnostic spot. Pain in McBurney’s Spot was a specific diagnostic symptom for acute appendicitis. I pressed Aidan’s stomach there, then I released the pressure, he screamed, arched up off the table, and doubled up like a jackknife.

A hot appendix for sure. I’d known I’d encounter one sometime. And with a mixed sense of dismay and excitement, I realized that the time had come for me finally to use the ether. No doubt about it, and no choice; if the appendix wasn’t removed, it would rupture.

I glanced up; Roger was supporting little Mrs. McCallum with a hand under her elbow; she clutched the baby close to her chest, wrapped in its bundle. She’d need to stay; Aidan would need her.

“Roger—get Lizzie to come mind the baby, will you? And then run as fast as you can to the Christies’; I’ll need Malva to come and help.”

The most extraordinary expression flitted across his face; I couldn’t interpret it, but it was gone in an instant, and I didn’t have time to worry about it. He nodded and left without a word, and I turned my attention to Mrs. McCallum, asking her the questions I needed answered before I cut into her small son’s belly.



IT WAS ALLAN CHRISTIE who opened the door to Roger’s brusque knock. A darker, leaner version of his owl-faced father, he blinked slowly at the question as to Malva’s whereabouts.

“Why … she’s gone to the stream,” he said. “Gathering rushes, she said.” He frowned. “Why do ye want her?”

“Mrs. Fraser needs her to come and help with—with something.” Something moved inside; the back door opening. Tom Christie came in, a book in his hand, the page he’d been reading caught between two fingers.

“MacKenzie,” he said, with a short jerk of the head in acknowledgment. “Did ye say Mrs. Fraser is wanting Malva? Why?” He frowned as well, the two Christies looking exactly like a pair of barn owls contemplating a questionable mouse. “Only that wee Aidan McCallum’s taken badly, and she’d be glad of Malva’s help. I’ll go and find her.”

Christie’s frown deepened, and he opened his mouth to speak, but Roger had already turned, hurrying into the trees before either of them could stop him.

He found her fairly quickly, though every moment spent searching seemed an eternity. How long did it take an appendix to burst? She was knee-deep in the stream, skirts kirtled high and her rush basket floating beside her, tethered by an apron string. She didn’t hear him at first, deafened by the flow of the water. When he called her name more loudly, her head jerked up in alarm, and she raised the rush knife, gripped tightly in her hand.

The look of alarm faded when she saw who it was, though she kept a wary eye on him—and a good grip on the knife, he saw. His summons was received with a flash of interest.

“The ether? Really, she’s going to cut him?” she asked eagerly, wading toward him.

“Yes. Come on; I’ve already told your father Mrs. Fraser needs you. We needn’t stop.”

Her face changed at that.

“Ye told him?” Her brow creased for a moment. Then she bit her lip and shook her head.

“I can’t,” she said, raising her voice above the sound of the stream.

“Yes, ye can,” he said, as encouragingly as possible, and stretched out a hand to help her. “Come on; I’ll give ye a hand with your things.”

She shook her head more decidedly, pink lower lip poking out a bit.

“No. My father—he’ll no have it.” She glanced in the direction of the cabin, and he turned to look, but it was all right; neither Allan nor Tom had followed him. Yet.

He kicked off his shoes and stepped into the icy creek, the stones rolling, hard and slippery under his feet. Malva’s eyes widened and her mouth fell open as he bent and grabbed her basket, ripped it from her apron string, and tossed it onto the bank. Then he took the knife from her hand, thrust it through his belt, grabbed her round the waist, and picking her up, splashed ashore with her, disregarding the kicking and squealing.

“You’re coming with me,” he said, grunting as he set her down. “Ye want to walk, or do I carry you?”

He thought she seemed more intrigued than horrified at this proposal, but she shook her head again, backing away from him.

“I can’t—truly! He’ll—he’ll beat me if he finds out I’ve been meddling wi’ the ether.”

That checked him momentarily. Would he? Perhaps. But Aidan’s life was at stake.

“He won’t find out, then,” he said. “Or if he does, I’ll see to it that he does ye no harm. Come, for God’s sake—there’s no time to be wasting!”

Her small pink mouth compressed itself in stubbornness. No time for scruples, then. He leaned down to bring his face close to hers and stared her in the eye.

“You’ll come,” he said, fists curling, “or I tell your father and your brother about you and Bobby Higgins. Say what ye like about me—I don’t care. But if ye think your father would beat you for helping Mrs. Fraser, what’s he likely to do if he hears ye’ve been snogging Bobby?”

He didn’t know what the eighteenth-century equivalent of snogging was, but plainly she understood him. And if she’d been anywhere near his own size, she would have knocked him down, if he read the dangerous light in those big gray eyes correctly.

But she wasn’t, and after an instant’s consideration, she bent, dried her legs on her skirts, and shuffled hurriedly into her sandals.

“Leave it,” she said briefly, seeing him stoop for the basket. “And give me back my knife.”

It might have been simply an urge to keep some influence over her until she was safely in the surgery—surely he wasn’t afraid of her. He put a hand to the knife at his belt, though, and said, “Later. When it’s done.”

She didn’t bother arguing, but scampered up the bank ahead of him and headed for the Big House, the soles of her sandals flapping against her bare heels.



I HAD MY FINGERS on the brachial pulse in Aidan’s armpit, counting. His skin was very hot to the touch, maybe a temperature of 101, 102. The pulse was strong, though rapid … slowing as he went further under. I could feel Malva counting under her breath, so many drops of ether, so long a pause before the next … I lost my own count of the pulse, but it didn’t matter; I was taking it into myself, feeling my own pulse begin to beat in the same rhythm, and it was normal, steady.