Finding Fraser(99)

Morag barked a laugh and pulled a teacup out of the dish drainer. She slid it toward me along the scrubbed-smooth top of the wooden table.

“Scotch makes anythin’ better,” she said, “but only a clot-heid would put it in the butter.”

She poured the cream from her pitcher into the ceramic jar and screwed the lid on tight. “Now take this and gi’ it a wee shake, will ye?”

The jar was about the size of a large travel mug. Morag turned it on its side and showed me how to roll it back and forth on the table. Then she poured a finger of scotch into the teacup and slid it back in front of me. She collected another cup from the dish drainer—a much larger coffee cup—and poured two fingerfuls for herself.

“Ye can sip it, or ye can slug it back,” she said. “Your choice entirely.”

“What do you do?” I asked, eyeing the amber liquid doubtfully.

She blinked her eyes at me, and her cup was empty. I let go of the butter jar to pick up my teacup.

Morag gazed at me sternly. “Ye mustn’t stop wi’ the shakin’ or t’ butter won’t be as sweet.”

I hastily resumed rolling. She took the opportunity to pour herself another scotch, clinked my teacup with her own and downed it.

“Sláinte,” she said, and seized the butter jar from me. The ridges on the outside of the jar rumbled like thunder against the wooden tabletop.

“Yeh need ta put some energy in,” she said sternly. “Now. Abou’ this Hamish.”

I swallowed the contents of my teacup.

“He’s a good man,” she said, eyeing the scotch bottle while she rolled her butter.

I poured her another and she beamed at me.

“A bit of an inclination toward the ladies, I’ll admit, but ’e’s nobbut a lad yet. On’y ta be expected.”

I wasn’t sure I agreed. “Katy thinks he’s dumped me for someone else. And maybe that’s not such a bad thing. When we were together, all he would talk about was moving to the US, and how I needed to get into bikini shape for California.”

One side of Morag’s mouth twisted upward. “Bikini shape, eh? Mebbe he jes’ likes who ye are an’ where ye come from?”

I toyed with my teacup. “Right—that’s what I said. But, I can’t help thinking he seems to have some odd …ideas about America. Or his concept of America—and—and what Americans should look like.”

Morag snorted. “Far as I can tell, ye look jes’ like Scots. P’raps a wee bit less pale. And I’d be hard-pressed to choose which is the fatter, wi’ all them fried Mars bars we Scots have taken to these days. Present company excepted, of course.”

“Oh, well you know Hamish. He’s pretty fit, right? He seems to think that’s a part of the American dream, or something. I’m not quite clear on it …”

Morag rolled the jar back and forth, back and forth. “He’s never been to the States, I’m fair certain,” she said, and neatly managed to pour us both another drink without missing a beat on the butter. “Picked up all his views from the telly, like the rest of us.”

I finished my drink and then had to take my eyes off her mini butter churn for a bit, because the rocking was starting to make my head feel funny. “Have you noticed anything a little—odd—about the way he sings all the time?” I said, enunciating carefully. “About how he seems sort of influenced by American music?”

“Ah, American music,” said Morag, sighing rapturously as she rocked her butter. “We could have had it a-a-alll, Rollin’ in the De-ee-eep!”

She had an amazingly rich contralto, and dipped her head in a little bow when I told her so. I didn’t tell her she was singing a song by a British artist, however. It wasn’t the time to spoil her moment.

We sat in silence, but for the rocking of the butter jar, until Morag cleared her throat at last.

“Speakin’ of having it all, my dear, I reckon you need to decide what it is you really want. If this young man is it, go after him.” She leaned back, tilting up onto the rear legs of her chair. “I remember back in ‘85, I had a wee flutter for a fella by the name of Willie MacBride.”

She licked the rim of her coffee cup contemplatively, her eyes distant. “Ach, the boy was well-named. He had a cock on ’im ten inches long and thick as a baby’s arm.”

There was a long moment of silence, as her last sentence had rendered me entirely speechless, and Morag was clearly lost in thought.

“We had some good times, me and Willie,” she said at last, closing her eyes and smiling.

I set my teacup carefully on the table.