An Island Apart (11 page)

She held out her hand. ‘Goodbye then, Isabel. Let there be no more recriminations.'

Isabel looked disdainfully at Kirsty's proffered hand. ‘If you are holding out that hand for wages,' she said, her eyes narrowing spitefully, ‘you're not getting any.' Kirsty winced as she swiftly withdrew her hand. With a haughty rasp of dismissal Isabel rushed into the kitchen and slammed the door.

At that moment Ruari came to bring down her portmanteau and take it into the vestibule. Kirsty watched him silently and then, with a sigh of relief that the confrontation with Isabel had been less wounding than she had prepared herself for, she gave one fleeting glance around
ISLAY
's so familiar hallway before going confidently to the waiting taxi to join her husband for the first stage of their journey to Westisle.

Their train was not scheduled to leave for another hour, but they were told that it was already waiting at the station. The ticket collector advised them to take their seats as soon as possible, to make sure they would be comfortable so, finding a compartment in which two window seats were unoccupied they settled themselves for the journey. Ruari had bought a newspaper and Kirsty had bought a woman's magazine, more because she thought it looked the right thing to do rather than expecting it to provide a source of interest for the journey. While the train remained stationary she perused the magazine abstractly, but with the first puff of the engine as it steamed out of the station excitement began to throb through her. She put the magazine in her handbag.

Nearly thirty years had passed since she had made that first train journey from her Granny's home to the city, and then she'd been too stunned by the eventualities that had brought such an abrupt change in her young life, and too overawed at finding herself actually travelling in anything so spellbindingly improbable as a train that she had retained only the sketchiest memories of the journey.

Now, since Ruari had discarded his paper and seemed inclined to sleep while the rest of the passengers were happy to ignore her she willingly allowed herself to be captivated, during the remaining hours of daylight, by the ever-changing scenery through which the train raced, and when night fell there was hardly less enjoyment in glimpsing the lights of distant towns and cities which emerged from the darkness only to be speedily enfolded by it. She was so absorbed by all there was to see that she hardly noticed the discomfort of sitting upright all night but she became aware of her cramped limbs when, shortly after a laggard dawn, they had to scurry through heavy rain to change to another train.

They were fortunate enough to have a compartment to themselves on the second train and since they were able to make themselves more comfortable Kirsty was unduly dismayed that the rain obscured the scenery. She closed her eyes and it seemed no time at all before the train was slowing and with a long piercing whistle, announcing its impending arrival at their station. She roused Ruari and made herself ready to leave the train. ‘This will be our station, will it not?' she enquired.

He nodded affirmatively and lifted their luggage down from the rack. ‘I'm thinking the weather is looking kind of coarse,' he said, wiping the window and peering through the rain.

‘The day doesn't seem to have got any lighter,' she commented.

The train jolted to a stop at a windblown platform where a solitary porter stared at it sourly as if resenting its presence there. Ruari unloaded the cases and carried them to an ancient-looking conveyance which he referred to as ‘the bus'. Kirsty stepped down on to the platform to face a biting wind that brought the sharp fresh, instantly remembered smell of the sea. She wanted to inhale deeply but the wind was too chilly. She looked at Ruari. ‘What now?' she enquired.

‘Ach, we have a wee way to go on the bus just,' he explained.

There were only two other passengers and they dismounted after a couple of miles. Buffeted by wind and lashed by the heavy rain the bus juddered its way along a deviating track across the rapidly darkening moors. It eventually pulled to a stop beside an entrance to a crofthouse which Ruari described as the Post Office. Here Ruari and the bus driver began a discussion in Gaelic from which Kirsty was able to gather that the weather was too wild for a boat to cross to Westisle that night. Her heart sank. She was cold and she was tired and she was hungry, despite the hard-boiled eggs and scones they had consumed on the journey. Forlornly she looked out but it was too dark now to see the sea, let alone the Island which was to be her home. Turning away from the driver Ruari spoke to her.

‘I will go now and have a word with Mairi Jane,' he said. ‘She will know what to do.'

Making for the door of the crofthouse he opened it, and after shouting an enquiry disappeared into the lamplit interior. A few minutes later he reappeared followed by a small woman who was carrying a hurricane lamp and talking animatedly. The woman whom Kirsty guessed was Mairi Jane climbed on the bus.

‘Well,
mho ghaoil, Ciamera a Tha
,' she greeted Kirsty. ‘This is indeed a surprise for us, is it not? But many a welcome you'll have. It is good to hear that Ruari has taken a wife.' Her welcome was warm yet not effusive; her broad smile was genuine and her handshake firm. Kirsty immediately took a liking to her,

Mairi Jane turned to the bus driver. ‘And what have you to say to Ruari's new wife?' she asked him.

The man who was in the act of taking a dram from the bottle of whisky Ruari had offered him, wiped the back of his hand across his mouth before shaking Kirsty's hand. ‘It is good to welcome a new face,' he said and added uncertainly, ‘Surely Westisle will be the better of a woman.'

‘And she has the Gaelic!' Mairi Jane announced, much in the same way a chorus girl might announce she was to marry a millionaire. The bus driver smiled his approval.

Ruari interposed, ‘Mairi Jane has kindly said she will give you a bed for the night until the storm quietens. I myself will go and have a word on Padruig and see what he thinks of the weather. He is a good judge and he is a good boat man.'

‘Is it kind?' chuckled Mairi Jane. ‘Surely I will give you a bed for the night and be glad of your company. Indeed, it's welcome you'll be to my house.' She turned to Ruari. ‘You will take your luggage into the house now and Kirsty your wife will come with me, seeing I have the lamp,' she directed.

Kirsty, feeling she had been temporarily assigned to Mairi Jane, murmured grateful acknowledgements and followed her into the house where there was an ample peat fire above which a large black kettle swung. Waiting snugly on the hob stood a shiny brown teapot. It all looked so familiar she could almost imagine her Granny occupying the empty chair beside the range.

‘Now, Bheinn Ruari, we will take a lamp to the bedroom up the stairs and then you will see if it pleases you,' Mairi Jane said. Lighting another lamp she led the way up a short flight of narrow stairs and, opening the door of a bedroom placed the lamp on a table beside the already made-up bed. ‘There now!' she said, stepping aside to await Kirsty's comments.

To Kirsty the room seemed to have a ‘ready and waiting' air about it. The bed appeared invitingly cosy; the sheepskin on the floor looked freshly washed and combed; the chest of drawers and the mirrored dressing table were surprisingly modern for a crofthouse and the lamplight reflected the care which had been patently lavished on it.

‘My, but it surely invites one to sleep in it,' Kirsty exclaimed heartily. ‘I believe I could throw myself into the bed and not wake until the day after tomorrow'

‘Then if you are satisfied I will take this hot water bottle out of the bed,' Mairi Jane reached under the bedcoverings and drew out a hot water bottle, ‘and I will hot it up ready for when you wish to go to bed. It will keep you warm maybe until your man gets back to warm you.'

She slanted a waggish glance at Kirsty before going on. ‘See I reckon to have the room ready for any passing visitor who's in need of a bed and a bite to eat, so I put in a hot water bottle every day to keep the bed sweet and dry. It is a good step either way to a hotel,' she explained. Closing the bedroom door, she said, ‘Come now and you will surely be glad of a warm drink and a bite to eat. Ruari will no doubt be taking a strupak with Padruig.'

While she enjoyed the hot tea and scones and slices of dumpling that were offered, Kirsty tried to probe Mairi Jane's opinions of the two Ruaris and about the style of life she must expect on Westisle.

‘It is a bonny Island right enough,' Mairi Jane said, ‘but an Island life is not what I would wish for myself. Even with three or four families as there once were on Westisle the women had found it lonely. They had no school for the bairns and only a wee shed for them to gather on the Sabbath.' Mairi Jane shook her head sadly. ‘Not one of the women cared to go back, not even for a gift of three cows and twenty sheep would they consider it.'

‘From what I've learned the two brothers are happy enough there.'

‘Happy enough certainly, I'd say. They're good fishermen and good workers both and neither of them wanting in sense. Whether Ruari Mhor will be the happier for having a woman in the house I wouldn't know. He's a dour man and will not be easily parted from his work or from his books. But folks speak well of him as they do Ruari Beag. You couldn't wish for a better husband and you will be sure of having a good home.'

‘Well, hopefully this storm will be quieter by morning and I shall be able to cross and see my new home for myself.'

‘Surely the storm will have quietened,' Mairi Jane comforted her. ‘And surely that cattle man will be here ready for the sale.' Her voice was tinged with disdain. Kirsty looked at her with raised eyebrows.

‘Is he not one for giving fair prices for your cattle?' she asked.

‘There's some say he does and some say fee doesn't,' Mairi Jane told her. ‘I myself cannot say since I no longer have cattle.'

‘He has favourites?' Kirsty thought it might prove useful to gather the information.

‘He has plenty of money for favourites,' said Mairi Jane. ‘And he doesn't come over here – a big man and all acock – with a voice that near deafens the head off one and he has his wee clerk beside him carrying a poc stuffed tight with notes. And I'm after hearing that any woman who has a beast or two for sale, poor as they may look, she'll likely get a good price for them from him. Maybe not at the sale but afterwards, when there's no menfolk around. And it's not unknown for him to give her a calf to rear for him, promising he'll pay her a good price for it at the next sale.' Mairi Jane sniffed. ‘More fools them,' she disparaged, ‘seeing the calves he leaves may not have the right number of legs.'

Kirsty stifled a yawn. ‘I think I'll not wait up for Ruari,' she said. ‘If you don't mind I'll take my hot water bottle and go to my bed.'

‘Indeed,' Mairi Jane agreed. ‘It's likely to be an early start for you in the morning if the sea settles itself for a whiley.'

It was barely daylight when Kirsty heard Ruari calling her to make herself ready for the boat. She rose and dressed quickly and found him waiting impatiently in the kitchen. ‘My brother is here with the boat,' he told her, ‘and he is anxious to go back and collect the cattle and ferry them across here for the sale while the tide is right and the sea is calm. It's more than likely it will blow up again by the evening.'

Mairi Jane appeared, hastily pushing her hair beneath an old black beret. ‘My! Are you for away?' she exclaimed.

‘We are so, and no time to spare,' Ruari responded.

‘Ach, and here's my thinking I would have a good breakfast ready for you before you left,' she lamented. ‘Can you not wait to take a wee cup in you hand just,' she pressed.

‘No, no,' Ruari refused, brusquely picking up the two portmanteaux and striding in the direction of a rough slipway where a small boat was moored.

Kirsty had time only to say a hasty farewell to Mairi Jane before hurrying after her husband. She could see there were two men standing on the slip beside the boat and she wondered which of them was her brother-in-law. She peered at them, trying to detect some likeness but the damp wind filmed her eyes and made her peering useless.

As Ruari approached the boat one of the men leapt down ready to take the cases. The second man remained where he was and watched. He paid no attention to Kirsty and for a moment or two she was uncertain of what to do. In the city she'd grown used to ignoring strangers but now she was back in the Islands she must shed city ways. She managed an irresolute smile as she called out ‘
Tha e Breagha!
'

In acknowledgement the man grunted a barely audible ‘
He Breeah!
' at the same time indicating that she should get aboard and seat herself on the middle thwart. He offered no help as she gingerly lowered herself over the gunwale and sat on the middle-thwart facing the bow.

As soon as the cases were satisfactorily stowed Ruari started to root in the cubbyhole and produced an old oilskin which he tied over them. His companion stepped quickly over the thwarts to reach the stern and after a shouted leave-taking the man on the slip untied the mooring rope and threw it to Ruari: the next moment the boat was chugging towards a lone wedge-shaped Island which, with a gesture, Ruari pointed out as Westisle. She tried to hold Ruari's eye but he turned again to the bow. She guessed he would prefer to occupy himself there, no matter how unimportant the task, rather than come and sit beside her and since she wanted him to confirm only that it was his brother Ruari Mhor in the stern she chose not to embarrass him. It hadn't surprised Kirsty that he had not attempted to introduce her. She was well accustomed to being disregarded and in any case, a small boat riding a choppy sea was hardly the place to exchange handshakes, she told herself.