Outlander Book Club: Drums of Autumn Chapter 41 breakdown

Just the Outlander chapter

It’s the morning after everything with Roger. Lizzie has washed and dried all of Brianna’s clothes, although it’s led to another malaria attack. All Lizzie wants is to get to her father, but it looks like so much is working against her.

She ends up meeting Bonnet, seeing that Bonnet has her mother’s ring from Frank. She knows it from the engraving on the inside of the ring. We don’t get to know what happens in full until later, but Brianna manages to get the ring back.

The focus is put on meeting Jamie. He’s in the same tavern, just gone out back. Brianna quickly goes to see him, which is when he suspects that she wants to sleep with him. It’s only until he gets a better look at her and she starts speaking that he realizes she’s his daughter, the daughter he never expected to see.

Before they can head anywhere, Jamie needs to go to Fergus’s trial. He’s accused of attacking a man, and Fergus explains that the man had claimed he owned taxes and took the horse and cart Marsali had to pay those taxes. Fortunately, Jamie was able to get the deeds to the land that proved Fergus didn’t owe any taxes at all.

But what about the battery? It couldn’t have possibly been Fergus. The man’s injury is to the right side of his face, which means Fergus would have had to punch him with his left hand. That’s the hand with the hook. Fergus is acquitted of all charges.

Marsali later explains that she was the one to attack the man, kicking him in the face. It was only because the man took baby Germaine that she jumped off the horse, and that’s when the man took everything. Fergus simply took his property back.

Jamie knows that it was Sergeant Murchinson who arranged all this to make life harder for him. Young Ian had managed to ride quickly to New Bern to get the deed from Governor Tryon to prove Fergus’s word. Had that not been possible, they would have needed to appeal, which would have cost a lot more money and time. Murchinson knew that.

Jamie gets everyone back to Jocasta’s plantation, which is where Lizzie is to stay until she’s better. Jamie takes Brianna to Fraser’s Ridge to see Claire.

Naturally, Claire, who is trying to grow penicillin, is shocked to see Brianna in the past. She never thought she’d see Brianna again. It’s a happy reunion.