The Flight of Gemma Hardy (26 page)

“We're quite safe,” he said. “It struck something, but not the house.”

The thunder growled, circling the chimney pots, but his arms were around me, and neither god nor electrical storm could separate us. Briefly I wondered if the storm had woken Nell; if so, I knew she would lie there, counting the intervals between lightning and thunder with keen satisfaction. The next peal was farther away, and the next still farther. At last we stood up and went over to the window.

“What's that?” said Hugh.

The flames I had seen earlier, reflected in the windows of the house, were flickering high up in the garden. After a few seconds we both understood. The green beech tree, the one that had survived the gale unscathed, had been struck.

“We have to save it,” I said, heading for the door.

But Hugh stopped me. “Gemma, there's nothing to be done. The fire is too high up. If the tree is damaged we'll plant another. In fact, whatever happens, we should plant a tree to mark our marriage.”

“A silver birch,” I suggested, and he agreed.

T
he next morning I did not open the curtains on that side of my room; I preferred not to see the wounded tree, the second wounded tree, on my wedding day. I had breakfast with Nell in the kitchen, a hasty bowl of cornflakes, and then took her upstairs to braid her hair and help her dress. Once she was ready she sat cross-legged on my bed to watch my own preparations. When I pulled on the dress, she gasped and said I looked like a princess. It was true; in the mirror I barely recognised myself. The dress made me seem taller, and more graceful. I remembered how my uncle had described my mother on her wedding day: radiant. I put on my raincoat. Downstairs Vicky, in a purple tweed suit, was waiting for Nell, and Hugh, in a pinstriped suit, for me. He had a white rose in his buttonhole, and I wished I had thought to pick some flowers to carry, but it was too late now. The red sky of the previous evening had lied; rain was streaming down. Hugh held an umbrella over me as we walked to the car. Seamus's Land Rover was, as usual, parked alongside the tractor shed.

On the way to Kirkwall, above the beat of the windscreen wipers, and the noise of the engine, I asked what would happen at the registry office. I was suddenly worried that we should have rehearsed.

“It can't be too complicated,” said Hugh. He was driving fast, leaning forward occasionally to wipe the windscreen. “Look at all the people who are married. I thought we'd have lobster for supper. Do you like lobster? And of course champagne?”

“I've never tried either.”

“Oh, Gemma, there are so many things I want to introduce you to. Tonight we'll have a bottle of the best champagne.”

The registry office was in an old building off the high street, behind a jeweller's shop. The vestibule smelled of the electric fire that glowed beside the secretary's desk. She greeted us pleasantly and said she would let Mr. Muir, the registrar, know we were here. A moment later a man of about Hugh's age emerged from the inner office. His upright bearing and triangular moustache made me wonder if he too had fought in the war. He wished us good morning and shook Hugh's hand, then mine.

“Do you have any witnesses?” he asked. “Guests?”

“Could you provide witnesses? In this weather our guests could be another half-hour.”

“No,” I exclaimed. “Nell would never forgive us if she missed our wedding.” Turning to Mr. Muir, I asked if we could wait a few minutes.

“Of course,” he said. “We've no one else coming, and it's a dreich day.”

He retreated to his office, the secretary returned to her typing, and Hugh began to measure out the small hall with his impatient stride. “The old women of Hoy say it's bad luck to delay a wedding,” he said. “Please, Gemma, let's go ahead.”

For five more minutes I stood firm. Then, reluctantly, I took off my coat, and we summoned Mr. Muir; the secretary and a woman from the next office would be our witnesses. Mr. Muir had just begun to speak—“Good morning. We are gathered here”—when the door opened. Seamus barged into the room, followed by Vicky and Nell. I turned to give Nell a quick smile. When I turned back, Seamus, in his battered jacket and muddy trousers, was standing in front of us, beside Mr. Muir. Like Miriam's father years ago he carried with him the smell of the farmyard.

“If I can't have what I want,” he said, his eyes fixed on Mr. Sinclair, “I don't see why you should have what you want.”

I felt Mr. Sinclair—the name “Hugh” had fled—grip my hand. “Keep going,” he said to Mr. Muir.

Seamus turned his metallic eyes on me. “Do you know who you're marrying?”

“Hugh Sinclair of Blackbird Hall.”

Seamus put his hand on his chest and gave a little bow. “At your service. It suits him now to be laird of the manor, but there was a time when it didn't, and I was the one who answered to the name Hugh Sinclair.”

I knew I shouldn't ask and also that not asking would make no difference. Seamus was the giant striding towards us now. “What do you mean?”

“Gemma, I'll explain everything later. Keep going.”

He might not have spoken; Seamus stared at me steadily. Vicky cleared her throat. From her raised eyebrows and parted lips I guessed that she was not entirely surprised at the turn events had taken. All along she had harboured some secret dread about our marriage, beyond mere disapproval of the differences in age and class. I let go of Mr. Sinclair's arm and stepped back so that I could study the two men, him in his suit and Seamus in his farming clothes, side by side. I saw then what should have been obvious from my second meeting with Mr. Sinclair. Seamus was a little heavier, his hair was lighter and finer, but especially now that Mr. Sinclair was tanned from the harvesting, their colouring was very similar. They were of an age and a height, they had the same square shoulders, the same low foreheads; they were distant cousins, but they might have been brothers.

“Keep going,” Mr. Sinclair said again to Mr. Muir.

But before the registrar could answer I spoke up. “If we can be married today,” I said, “then we can be married tomorrow. Tell me what he means.”

“This is most irregular,” said Mr. Muir. “Mr. Sinclair, with all due respect, I think we should reschedule. Please consult me when you're ready.”

Without further ado, he turned on his heel and retreated to his inner office. The secretary, who had come out from behind her desk to be our witness, returned to her seat and lit a cigarette.

“Are you married?” Nell asked. “Does this mean you're married?”

In the vestibule, awkwardly crowded by our little party, Seamus and Mr. Sinclair faced each other, each in the grip of emotions that had existed long before my arrival at Blackbird Hall but that my presence there had sharply exacerbated.

“Will you tell her,” Seamus said, “or will I?”

Mr. Sinclair flung down his own gauntlet. “Where were you the night Alison died?”

At the end of weddings in my uncle's church the organist had played “Here Comes the Bride,” and the church bells had pealed joyfully. Now from a nearby church came a single melancholy stroke. Mr. Sinclair kept tight hold of my hand.

Seamus closed his eyes. “I was waiting outside her flat,” he said. “We'd quarrelled the night before, and I was hoping she'd step out to buy wine, or cigarettes. You know what she was like when she argued; she'd hurl any stone that came to hand. I'd hurled a few myself.” He opened his eyes but not to look at us. “I was going to tell her I was ready to give up the farm, and move to Glasgow. I could work as a builder, or a joiner. The streetlights had just come on when at last she appeared, in her red jacket, and turned towards the river. We'd often walked that way together.”

And now he turned to Mr. Sinclair, his gaze no longer fierce but stricken. “I've thought ten thousand times about what happened next. We were passing a pub and I stopped for a quick dram. I hoped the whisky would help me mind my tongue. I was less than five minutes, I swear, but by the time I reached the river she was already rolling down her sleeve—”

I pulled free of Mr. Sinclair, reached for Nell's hand and, before she could hear more about her mother, led her out into the rain. Neither of us had an umbrella, but at least she still had her coat. In an instant my new dress and shoes were soaked.

“Where are we going?” said Nell. “It's pouring.”

I spotted a newsagent across the road and we ran towards it. Inside, the small shop smelled of paraffin. I bought us each a Mars bar and asked the woman behind the counter if we could wait there for the rain to pass.

“You'll be here all day,” she said, “but be my guests.”

“I didn't see you get married,” Nell said.

“We decided to wait for a few days. Did you understand what Seamus was saying about your mum?”

She took a bite of her Mars bar and looked up at me with her small brown eyes. “Sort of.”

“Your mother made a mistake—she took too much medicine—but she never meant to leave you.”

Nell took another bite. In my haste that morning I had braided her hair too loosely; already one plait was unravelling. “You don't know what you're talking about,” she said. “You can't even get married.”

Her fist landed in my stomach with surprising force. I was doubled over when the shop bell clanged behind her.

By the time I had straightened up, retrieved her Mars bar from the floor, and told the shopkeeper I was fine, Nell had found Vicky on the other side of the road. From the doorway I watched the two of them hurrying along beneath a black umbrella.

Mr. Sinclair's car was still outside the registry office. I walked over, not bothering to hurry, opened the door, and got in. I sat Claypoole fashion with my hands folded in my lap, my feet, icy in my wet shoes, neatly together. Not everyone who was fond of me died, but everyone came to harm. The door opened. He handed me my coat, then he walked around the car, got in, and closed the door. Awkwardly, in the confined space, I pulled on the coat. We sat not talking, not looking at each other, while the windows misted up around us. I had no idea what he was thinking, or even what I was.

Finally he let out a deep sigh. “I want to show you something,” he said. “Then we'll talk. Will you do this for me, Gemma?”

I must have said yes.

We drove north, the way we had come, and then turned onto the road to Stromness. Cursed, cursed, said the windscreen wipers. In the middle of nowhere, he pulled into a lay-by and turned off the engine. The rain pinged on the roof. He came around to my door with the umbrella. We followed a path across a field to a large grassy mound. He had brought me to Maes Howe, the chambered tomb that Mr. Johnson had mentioned on the ferry and that the island history described as a major Neolithic monument. A pathway led between the remains of the ramparts. At the foot of the mound a stone doorway, maybe four feet high, opened into a stone passage.

“Why are we here?” I said.

“To show you something.”

“I don't like small spaces, especially small dark spaces.”

“Nor do I.” He guided my hand inside his jacket. Through his shirt I felt his heart knocking against his ribs. I had not looked at him directly since Seamus spoke; now I saw how pale he was beneath his harvest tan.

“Come,” he said. “Let two scared people enter the tomb.”

Slowly, stooping, he led the way along the passage. I followed, keeping my head down, counting each step until, at the twenty-fourth, the low roof disappeared and I straightened. I began to make out that I was in a room, roughly square, large enough to hold a couple of dozen people. Three of the walls had windowlike openings into further darkness. The only light came down the passage, and the ceiling rose, bowl-shaped. Mr. Sinclair led the way to a block of stone beside one of the openings. Not taking my eyes off the passageway, I sat down. He sat down a few yards away on another block of stone. If someone closed the door we would be buried alive.

“If there is any hope of your understanding what I am about to tell you,” he said, “then it's in this place.”

He did not ask if there was any hope, and I could not have answered.

“One day the autumn I was ten,” he went on, “Seamus and another boy and I cycled here. My history teacher had asked me to copy the runes carved on the corner-stones”—he gestured in the gloom—“and while I was writing them in my notebook Seamus and Ted blocked the passage with hay bales. Afterwards they swore they'd only meant to leave me for five minutes, but a neighbour offered them a lift home on his tractor and they lost track of the time. I had no food or water; no way to budge the bales. I called for help until I was hoarse. I was sure I was going to die but that first I would go mad. Finally I passed out.”

I had not thought of the sewing-room in years; now I saw the towering shelves of linen, the black gremlin of the sewing-machine. Had anyone come to him in the darkness? I wondered. Then sympathy was swept away by anger. What did this story of thirty years ago have to do with anything?

“Seamus and Ted were punished—they had to muck out the byre for a month—but for them it was just a joke gone awry. For me, it was the day that changed my life. I had discovered what I most feared. And my father had discovered I was a coward. He was the one to drag the bales away. When I came round he was standing over me saying, ‘You've got no backbone, Hugh.' ”

I heard his raincoat rustle, the fabric shifting as he moved.

“The war was my chance to prove him wrong. I spent the last four years of school imagining myself following Roy into the RAF, saving London, fighting off the Huns. At last I was eighteen. Seamus's birthday was the week before mine, and we went together to Kirkwall to enlist and have our medical exams. A fortnight later I met the postman in the village and he handed me an envelope. I'd been chosen by lottery to be a Bevin Boy.”