IT WAS NEARLY midnight before we reached our bed. I could still hear the celebrations going on in the distance, though by now the random gunfire had ceased and it was just singing—of a very non-religious nature—with a single fiddle dodging in and out among the voices.

I was nearly dead with fatigue and the aftermath of strong emotion; I couldn’t imagine how Brianna, let alone Roger, was still on her feet, but I’d seen them on my way back to the house, wrapped in each other’s arms and kissing in the shadow of a big black walnut. I wondered vaguely whether the profound emotion of ordination normally turned into sexual desire, if the legitimate object of it was at hand … and what young, new Catholic priests might do to express their own elation?

I shed my clothes and pulled a clean night rail over my head, sighing in quiet ecstasy at having nothing but air on my corset-constricted body. My head popped out and I saw Jamie, lying on the bed in his own shirt. His head was cocked toward the window and he looked rather wistful; I wondered whether he’d rather be down there dancing—but I couldn’t imagine why he wouldn’t be there, if that was the case.

“What are you thinking?”

He looked up and smiled at me. He’d undone his formal queue and his hair lay over his shoulders, sparking in the candlelight.

“Och … I was just wondering whether I shall ever hear Mass said again.”

“Oh.” I tried to think. “When was the last time? At Jocasta’s wedding?”

“Aye, I think so.”

Catholicism was prohibited in most of the colonies, bar Maryland, which had been founded specifically as a Catholic colony. Even there, the Anglican Church was the official Church, and Catholic priests were few and far between in the southern colonies.

“It won’t always be like this,” I said, and began to massage his shoulders, slowly. “Brianna’s told you about the Constitution, hasn’t she? It will guarantee freedom of religion—among other things.”

“She recited the beginning of it to me.” He sighed and bent his head, inviting me to rub the long, tight muscles of his neck. “‘We, the people …’ Brawly written. I hope to meet Mr. Jefferson someday, though I think he might have stolen the odd phrase here and there, and some of his ideas have a familiar ring to them.”

“Montesquieu might have had some minor influence,” I said, amused. “And I believe I’ve heard John Locke spoken of as well.”

He glanced over his shoulder at me, one brow raised.

“Aye, that’s it. I shouldna have thought ye’d read either one, Sassenach.”

“Well, I haven’t,” I admitted. “But I didn’t go to school in America; only medical school, and they don’t teach you history there, bar the history of medicine, where they point out horrible examples of benighted thinking and horrific practices—virtually all of which I’ve actually used now and then, bar blowing tobacco smoke up someone’s bottom. Can’t think how I’ve missed that one …” I coughed. “But Bree learned all about American history in the fifth and sixth grades, and more in high school. She’s the one who told me about Mr. Jefferson’s light-fingered ways with words.