An Island Apart (7 page)

‘My brother's name is also Ruari,' he admitted with a shy grin and in response to her quizzically raised eyebrows he explained, ‘see it was this way. My own father's favourite brother was our Uncle Ruari and when he went off to Canada my father told my mother that he wanted his first born son to be named for him. That is why my brother is Ruari. My mother's father, that is my grandfather on her side was also named Ruari and she wanted a second son to be named for him. So when I was born I was also Ruari. My brother is Ruari Mhor seeing he's the eldest and I am Ruari Beag seeing I'm the youngest. Our fishing boat is named for the two of us:
The Two Ruaris,
'

‘Of course, I'd forgotten how the old folk clung to the family names,' she observed with a wry smile.

He too smiled. ‘The cattle ferry is also named
The Two Ruaris
,' he confided, his smile widening, ‘but we have a small dinghy that has an outboard motor which is handy enough for just one of us to manage.'

‘Now you're not going to tell me that the dinghy is also named for the two of you, surely?' she teased him archly.

‘No, indeed. We named her
Katy
after our mother,' he answered gravely.

‘How frequently do you get supplies and mail?' she asked.

‘The boat calls twice a month with supplies and mails.'

‘Only twice a month?' she echoed dubiously.

‘But we don't depends on the boat just,' he hastened to tell her. ‘When we take our fish to the mainland we can collect any mails and pick up anything we might be short of. We manage well enough.'

She tried to recall shortages in her Granny's time when snow blocked roads or ferries had been harbour-bound by the weather. ‘Bread?' she asked. ‘My Granny used to think it a great treat to get city bread from time to time.'

‘Ach, we can get bread any time we're across. Not that we eat so very much of it. My brother has no liking for city bread. Since my mother learned him how to make good girdle scones and bannocks, he spurns city bread even as a treat. No, we do not miss bread.'

‘Your brother sounds a right “lad o pairts”,' Kirsty complimented him. ‘You tell me he is a good scholar and a good fisherman, a good shepherd and a good baker. Is there anything he is not good at?'

He'd rested his chin on his hand and had appeared to be considering deeply. ‘He's not so good with the cattle,' he allowed. ‘He gets mighty cross with them when they're being stupid and he miscalls them.' He glanced at her with a grin that had verged on the impish. ‘Indeed the minister wouldn't be best pleased to hear the way he miscalls them sometimes.' His glance changed suddenly to one of anxiety as if he feared he might have shocked her. She treated him to a complaisant smile.

‘It's the cattle just he miscalls,' he resumed. ‘You'd never hear a bad word from him at any other time. Mostly it's myself sees to the cattle except at sale time when it needs the two of us to round them up.' She nodded. ‘And he doesn't take much to do with the hens, so I see to those myself. But he is good with his brain and with his hands. It's himself that made much of the furniture in the house from good pieces of driftwood we have found on the shore from time to time, and didn't he repair the water tank, the one which the Laird had built beside the burn with the idea that his son would have water piped down to the house. The tank had leaked for a while and the piping was rusty and broken in places. My father had taken no heed of it, being always used to carrying water from the burn or the well but my brother wasn't finished with school before he had it sorted. My mother was never tired of praising him for that, seeing she no longer had to carry pails of water.'

‘You're saying you have water from a tap like there is in the city?' There was scepticism in her tone.

‘Indeed we have so,' he asserted and smiled at her expectantly.

She again looked at the kitchen clock before rising from her chair. ‘I must take the guests their evening tea and biscuits,' she said, knowing, and guessing that he also knew, that she was stalling for time before giving him her decision.

While she was preparing the trays and taking them into the Smoking Room her mind occupied itself with assessing what Ruari MacDonald was offering her. A good house, he'd promised, and she was prepared to believe him; regular supply of milk and eggs, of fish, of fresh water and of peats. It sounded like all the necessities for a fairly comfortable life, but if he was to be her man what else would she want of him? Could she grow fond of him? Was she willing to try? While there was nothing about him that in any way repelled her, neither was there anything that kindled more than a feeling of leniency towards him. At their age and after so short an acquaintance affection was fanciful, she told herself, but what had drawn him to her? What would he be wanting of her? Loyalty in response to his offers she would be prepared to give but would she be willing to share his bed if that was what he wanted? A tiny quiver of excitement told her she would not be too averse to the idea; she dared to let herself think it might be endurable, possibly even pleasant. She smothered the thought hastily. It must be made quite clear to him that she was almost certainly too old to bear children. But not yet, she wavered.

When she returned to the kitchen he was looking at the newspaper which Mac had left.

‘Will I make another pot of tea?' she asked him.

‘Aye,' he agreed, ‘that will be welcome.' He put away the paper and watched her while she made the tea and poured out two cups. Then with only a slight preliminary clearing of his throat he asked, ‘Will I speak to the minister here tomorrow about us?'

Kirsty knew there was one final question she must put to him before she could agree. Falteringly she asked, ‘Your brother, will he be sore at you for asking a woman to share your house?'

‘My brother will take no more to do with you than you'd wish,' he assured her.

She looked up at him critically while she again asked herself if she was being sensible; if leniency could be a substitute for affection?

‘Will I do just that?' he pressed.

Kirsty lowered her eyes. ‘You will do that,' she'd consented. He stretched out a hand but only far enough along the table to take her glass. ‘Oh, no more than a wee sippie,' she bade him and since the bottle was almost empty he found it easy enough to comply.

Standing up he raised his glass to his lips. ‘To Kirsty
mho ghaoil!
' he proclaimed.

She raised her glass similarly. ‘To Ruari Beag MacDonald!' she returned but she was too shy to add any endearment.

Thus with no more than a dram, a smile and a handshake the compact had been made.

It had been after four o'clock in the afternoon of the following day before she'd encountered Ruari MacDonald again. The house had been quiet, with Mac at work, Isabel at one of her almost daily whist drives and Meggy out on an errand to the electric shop to get the wireless accumulators recharged. None of the guests were due back until shortly before the evening meal so she'd planned to wash out a few ‘smalls', but before doing so she'd looked into the Smoking Room to check Meggy had banked up the fire ready for the evening. There she had found him sitting in an armchair near the window with the daily paper covering his lap, evidently having slipped from his hands, and his head lolling against the antimacassar which covered the chair back. She'd guessed he was snoozing and since the fire needed no attention was about to withdraw quietly when she heard him call abruptly, ‘
Tha e Fuar!
'

‘
He Fooar!
' she responded immediately, before reverting to the English, ‘Indeed it is cold. I wonder you are not sitting nearer the fire.'

‘I am meaning it is cold outside this house,' he explained. ‘It is not cold in here.' He'd seemed unsure how to continue the conversation.

‘I was just after checking to see if there was a good fire going,' she told him and after a second or two's pause asked, ‘You will be feeling like a strupak?' She hadn't really wanted to go back into the kitchen to make a strupak at this moment, having only a few minutes previously finished her own leisurely cup of tea but she'd felt a need to say something inconsequential and the traditional enquiry had shaped itself effortlessly to her tongue. He gestured grateful acceptance but as she turned to go he rose from the chair and stepped hurriedly to waylay her.

‘I have seen the minister,' he advised in a low voice. ‘He will be willing to marry us the day after tomorrow.'

‘On Thursday?' she exclaimed, her eyes widening in disbelief. ‘That isn't possible. It is much too soon!'

‘Was I not after telling you I need to be back on Westisle for the cattle sale on Thursday next,' he reminded her firmly. ‘We shall need to be away from here no later than Tuesday to be certain of reaching the Island by then.'

‘But I cannot leave here on Tuesday.' The denial escaped from her lips in a shocked whisper and, seeing his puzzled expression she added hastily, ‘You don't understand about these things. I am required to give her a week's notice before I can leave here.'

He looked at her, a little pityingly she thought, and appeared to dismiss her protest. ‘Seeing I was nearby I called in at the railway station to book for you a ticket. I myself have the other half of the return ticket which brought me here.'

She felt momentarily breathless. ‘But I shall not be able to travel with you then,' she insisted but even as she spoke she was conscious of a degree less conviction in her tone and a sudden vindictiveness darted, unbidden, into her mind. Wouldn't it serve Isabel right if she left without giving due warning? And since she was intending to cut her links with
ISLAY
sooner or later why shouldn't she cut them suddenly? Isabel deserved neither loyalty nor consideration and her own loyalty now must surely be to the man whom she was pledged to marry. And wasn't the day after tomorrow the day she was due her afternoon and evening off anyway? Apart from the rush he couldn't have fixed a more suitable time.

She felt him watching her keenly, no doubt waiting for her to reveal whatever was passing through her mind. Drawing a deep breath she looked straight at him. ‘I will be ready to go with you to Westisle on Tuesday as you wish,' she said resolutely, ‘but neither of us must say one word about the matter until that day.'

‘That will be the way of it,' he confirmed touching her shoulder lightly.

When she took his strupak into the Smoking Room she put an extra cup on the tray for herself. She could always drink a cup of tea in company no matter how many she might have drunk previously. There was still so much she wanted to find out about him and this seemed a good opportunity. After they'd been talking casually for a few minutes she said, ‘Tell me, do Island women work as hard these days as I remember my Granny working when I was a girl? I'm meaning outside work.'

‘Ach, I'd say there is not so much,' he said dismissively. ‘Maybe the hens and the milking and the calf feeding.' He paused for a second before adding, ‘But only if they have a mind that way.'

‘I should be willing to see to the hens and the milking and calf feeding since those things my Granny taught me to do and I daresay I could lend a hand at planting and harvest time, but I would not wish to be at the sheep dipping or the shearing and nor would I care to be at the calf cutting.' He seemed to realise she was voicing not a wish but a refusal.

‘That is all men's work,' he snorted. ‘I doubt you would be needed or welcome at such times. My brother and myself have always managed these things without help.'

After another short silence she said, ‘I will need to get myself a portmanteau. There is very little I would wish to take from here but there will be a few things.'

‘Just so,' he assented. ‘Will I get a portmanteau for you and keep it in my bedroom? It would not look strange for me to do that seeing I am to be leaving soon enough.'

‘That would be the best way,' she agreed, nodding her head in approval. ‘But you must promise to tell me the cost so I can give you the necessary money.'

‘Ach, there will be no need for you to do that,' he demurred.

‘But you must take the money,' she insisted proudly. She wasn't going to have him thinking she would allow him to spend money on her before they had made their marriage vows.

Immediately divining the reason for her insistence he slanted her a faintly roguish smile. ‘I will not buy the portmanteau until after we are wed,' he promised her. She treated him to a spectral nod of acceptance, feeling curiously relieved, not so much because there would be no need for her to dip into her own small savings but because his conduct had banished her uncertainty about his attitude to money. She knew Island men were as a rule sensible about money matters but she'd heard stories of the odd one or two who were so ‘money hungry' their dependents suffered miserably. Ruari MacDonald was plainly not one of them, she concluded.

She felt even more assured when the next moment he said, ‘I will need to buy a ring for you to wear, will I not? A gold wedding ring?' She looked speculatively at her bare hands resting in her lap. ‘Is that not the way of it?' She acknowledged his question with a grave smile. ‘How am I to know the thickness of your finger?' he asked. There was a hint of eagerness in his tone. ‘You will take time to meet me at the jeweller's shop?'

‘That I do not intend to do,' she told him. ‘I believe it is not the custom, but I will take the measure of my finger with a piece of wool,' she promised him. ‘I've heard tell it is the way it is done,' she added quickly in case he should think she was speaking from previous experience. As his lips shaped to ask a further question she forestalled him by saying, ‘I will leave the piece of wool on the tray on top of the dressing table in your bedroom.'