Sunday, May 11, 2025
A very Happy Mother’s Day, to all mothers, be they biological mothers, step-mothers, adoptive mothers, foster mothers, or informal mothers who love the children they care for.
To celebrate the occasion, here’s an excerpt from A BLESSING FROM A WARRIOR GOING OUT— (and at the bottom, you’ll find a link to Karen Henry’s “Outlandish Observations” fan website, where she’s curated a selection of motherly excerpts from the OUTLANDER series—thank you, Karen!
-Diana
[Excerpt in honor of Mother’s Day, from A BLESSING FOR A WARRIOR GOING OUT, Copyright © 2025 Diana Gabaldon]
When William stepped into the little aspen grove where the Murrays’ cabin stood, he saw Rachel at once, sitting in a rocking-chair on the porch in her shift with a shawl across her lap. She heard his footsteps and looked up, her face lighting. Then she saw who it was, and while the light didn’t go from her eyes, her smile changed completely, and she reached for the trailing ends of the shawl.
“William!” she said, and half-rose, the shawl held to her bosom. “Where on earth has thee come from?” The smile was warm and genuine—but he knew he wasn’t the man she had expected.
“Mrs. Murray,” he said, and bowed, smiling back. “Your servant, ma’am.”
She laughed.
“No man is servant to another, William, and I know thee is aware of that.”
“I’m aware that Friends believe that, yes. But surely you won’t deprive me of the pleasure of offering my meager services to you—as a friend?” He glanced round for something to do; his heart had jumped when he saw her, and hadn’t quite returned to its business. A basket of freshly-picked green pea-pods stood by her rocking chair, along with a yellow pottery bowl, half-filled with shelled peas.
“Sit down,” he said, nodding at the rocking-chair. “I’ll do that.”
He sat down by her, legs dangling over the edge of the porch, and pulled the basket toward himself.
He was aware of a good many things at the moment, all of them concerning Rachel. Her dark hair was loose, somewhat disheveled, and her long legs bare and sun-browned below the hem of her shift. She crossed her—very fine—ankles when she saw his glance, and he averted his gaze, not wanting to embarrass her, though he still wanted to look.
She was alone; the cabin’s door was open and there were no sounds of anyone inside.
On the long climb to the cabin, he hadn’t admitted to himself that he hoped to find her alone… but he had. When he’d met her on the road to Philadelphia, she’d slapped his face, kicked him in the shin and thrown her cap at him. The next time, there hadn’t been time for conversation, given the presence of an axe-wielding maniac, and at their most recent meeting she’d called him a rooster. She’d claimed it was a compliment, but he wasn’t so sure.
Still, that had been nearly three years ago, and she seemed well-enough disposed to him at the moment… and she was safely married now.
“My apologies,” he said. “I should have thought to bring you something from the feast—there’s a vast quantity of food; enough to keep the whole of the Ridge from starvation for three months, at least. Scores of fried chickens, pies of all descriptions, something I was told was corn fufu—and as it was my sister who told me, I’m inclined to believe her—sweet potatoes with apples and onions, and a monstrous great hog. They said it roasted underground for days, until the flesh began to drop from the bone—the smell of it covers the entire hillside and the remains of the carcass would feed—”
Rachel stood up suddenly, clutched the post that held up the roof of the cabin and vomited off the side of the porch.
“Miss Hunter! I mean… Mrs… Mrs…” In the stress of the moment, her married name had vanished. “Rachel!” He’d scrambled up when she rose, and now seized her elbow to save her falling off the porch.
She made an inarticulate sound, waving a hand to keep him off, and then threw up again, more profusely. She seemed very wobbly, even though she was clinging to the post with both hands now, and he put an arm about her waist to steady her.
“Oh, Jesus!” he said, at once relieved and appalled by the turgid round swelling that he’d touched beneath her shift. “You’re pregnant!”
Despite her clear disfirmity, she gave him a look that fortunately wasn’t translated into English.
“Forgive me, madam,” he said, gingerly removing his hand from her midriff.
She flapped a hand and stepped back, collapsing into the chair with a force that made it rock briefly to and fro. Her eyes were closed, her face shiny with sweat and she’d gone the color of curdled milk.
“Is there… anything…?” he said, though the situation seemed entirely beyond his capacities.
Her long, soft throat moved as she swallowed, and she grimaced.
“Pickle,” she said. “Pickles. Butter… milk.” She waved a limp hand toward the open door.
The suggestion of pickles with buttermilk made him feel somewhat queasy, but he went immediately inside and rummaged the food-safe, which yielded a small crock of infant cucumbers that, from the smell, had been pickled in vinegar, dill, garlic and black pepper. They hardly seemed appropriate to someone with a deranged digestion, but Amaranthus had told him once the sorts of things she had found comestible while pregnant, all much worse than garlic-scented cucumbers. And dilled pickles did work for sea-sickness…
The buttermilk was in a pitcher on the table, a weighted cloth covering it. He briefly debated bringing the whole thing, but then shook his head and found a cup. He did bring the crock of pickles, though, uncertain how many might be required.
She plucked one of the pungent pickles from the crock before he could even set it down, and thrust it into her mouth, sucking fiercely on it, in the manner of a gentleman trying to get a cigar to draw.
Not knowing what else to do, he folded the fingers of her free hand around the cup of buttermilk, and sat down cautiously beside her.
“I’m not leaving until you’re either well enough to tell me to go, or tucked up in your bed,” he said, conversationally. “You’re actually intending to—oh, my God.” She’d taken a large bite of the pickle, chewed it briskly and gulped buttermilk to wash it down.
“Yes, I am,” she mumbled, and took another crunching bite and more buttermilk.
“I’ll fetch the pitcher,” he said, getting his feet under him, but she waved a hand in negation, then swallowed.
“No. I thank thee. It’s—it’s passing.”
“You’re sure of that?”
She swallowed, breathed deeply, and shook her head.
“The only thing I’m sure of is that I am indeed with child. If I weren’t convinced of that, I should think I was mortally ill with collywobbles or hockle-grockle. This didn’t happen when I— when I had Hunter.”
“What are collywobbles?” he asked, diverted. “I’ve heard of hockle-grockle, though I’m afraid I can’t describe its symptoms. Pickles are supposed to help, though.”
“Hockle-grockle is something from which sailors suffer, or so I was told. Collywobbles is a general term for violent internal convulsions.” She had been looking a trifle better, but the thought of violent internal convulsions evidently caused one to happen, for she closed her eyes and clung to the arms of the rocking chair as though it was a small boat in a buffeting sea.
William eyed her, but unless she wanted another pickle… “Well, I believe that hockles—on a ship—are something to do with chains,” he said, in hopes of offering distraction. “Grockle… isn’t that some sort of bird?”
She breathed through her nose for a moment, but then cautiously opened her eyes, and reached gingerly for another pickle.
“Possibly. Might we talk of something other than the state of my insides?”
“Of course,” William said heartily. “Did you have a particular topic of conversation in mind?”
“Well, to begin with—what is thee doing here?”
And here’s Karen’s wonderful collection of quotes! (Will open in a new browser window):
https://www.outlandishobservations.com/2025/05/mothers-day-quotes-from-outlander-books.html
Return to my official webpage for A BLESSING FOR A WARRIOR GOING OUT (Book Ten of my Outlander series of major novels) to access more excerpts from this book, and information about it.
Thanks to Antonio Cavallo for his image of dill pickles (shown above); he released this work to the public domain on Wikipedia Commons on July 20, 2008.
Please do not copy and paste the text of this excerpt (in whole or in part) and post it elsewhere or use it in any other way without my express permission because it is copyrighted material. Please share the link (URL) to this webpage instead. Thank you.
An earlier, shorter version of this excerpt with the temporary title of “Dill Pickles and Buttermilk” was posted on September 17, 2022.
This excerpt was also posted on my official Facebook page on Sunday, May 11, 2025. This page was last updated on Sunday, May 18, 2025 at 12:35 a.m. by me, Diana Gabaldon, or my Webmistress.