Outlander Book Club: Drums of Autumn Chapter 39 breakdown

Just the Outlander chapter

Roger spends time on the ship getting food and water for Marag. She remains below deck and in hiding to protect her son while he gets through this stage of teething. Roger does feel for a fever noting that Jem is nothing like the other baby that was thrown overboard. He’s done the right thing.

When he comes back up deck when there’s a whale sighting, Bonnet is right there. Bonnet knows what Roger is up to. He’s the captain of the ship. Of course he knows what’s going on.

You know, I can’t fault Bonnet here. This is his ship. He needs to make sure his crew remain as healthy as possible. Well, to be honest, it’s not the crew. He’ll want to avoid smallpox to protect his cargo, so he’s going to keep an eye on everything that’s happening on the ship like a good captain would.

It just works against Roger who has been protecting Morag and Jeremiah. At first, Bonnet accuses Roger of having an affair with a married woman. However, Roger quickly admits the truth about the baby.

After flipping a coin for the baby’s life, Bonnet tells Roger his story. He used to work in construction and was like Roger is on the ship—the one the other works didn’t speak much to. Bonnet was only young, and it was superstition at the time to bury a person in the base of a house. Bonnet was going to be that someone.

There was a homeless man there too, though. So, Bonnet’s life is placed on a coin. Fortunately for Bonnet, it lands the way that saves him and the homeless man is killed and buried in the base of the house.

Now, Bonnet wants to flip for Roger’s life. Again, like with the baby and with Bonnet, Roger is lucky. The coin lands the right way.

And that’s where we leave Roger’s story for now. He’s kept his life. The baby gets to keep his life. Now Roger just needs to focus on getting to Brianna.