Thunder Bay

by Douglas Skelton

  ‘So what turned my father against them? Against Stoirm?’

  Fiona looked down at the untouched chocolate cake as if it was the answer. ‘There’s an old joke about the kirk. Why does it not approve of having sex standing up? Because it may lead to dancing.’ Fiona didn’t smile. Neither did Rebecca. She wasn’t sure she would again. ‘Morality, Rebecca. You must know that for centuries women weren’t allowed to do many things. Up until the late 1960s I couldn’t have been ordained as a minister for word and sacrament. Women were oppressed for many, many generations and I’m ashamed to say that the kirk was in the forefront of that oppression. There was an old law, centuries ago, in the seventeenth century, against Concealment of Pregnancy, and it remained in force for decades. Basically, if a woman hid the fact that she was pregnant and the child was stillborn, or died at childbirth, the woman would be held guilty of murder. The father, if he knew, was blameless. It was only the woman who was responsible. I suppose it was an anti-abortion law but like many laws it was open to abuse. If the woman was married, then there was no need to conceal the pregnancy but if she was unmarried? There was huge shame to illegitimacy then. If the woman revealed it, she was liable to all kinds of public rebuke, especially at the hands of the Church. She could be shunned, ridiculed, cast out. To an extent, a little of that attitude still exists here on Stoirm.’

  Rebecca thought of Mhairi Sinclair. I know what they think of her, her mother had said, that she was a whore. She’d had one child to one man, and feared she was pregnant to another, while living with a third.

  ‘The law changed, of course, but the shame was still there. Abortion wasn’t as freely available. And the flesh is what the flesh is, so there were still unwanted pregnancies. Certainly, arrangements could be made. The woman could go into hiding until the pregnancy reached term and the child taken away for adoption. We have no idea how many such cases there were. Sometimes they would go to the mainland and a trip to a back street abortionist. The woman didn’t always return.’

  ‘Fiona, what has this got to do with my father?’

  ‘The Connolly clan weren’t immune from illegitimacy.’

  ‘So, was my father illegitimate, is that it? Is that the big secret?’

  ‘No, your grandparents were legally wed and he was born two years after.’

  ‘Then what?’

  Fiona breathed in deeply. ‘There’s a saying here on the island: They should’ve been taken up into the hills at birth. It means that someone should never have been allowed to live.’

  Carl Marsh had said that twice about Roddie Drummond. It had registered with her but she hadn’t given it too much thought.

  ‘Your great-great-grandmother, Roberta Connolly, was a strong, highly motivated woman. She was strong in her faith, strong in her views and strong in her convictions. To her, a child born outwith wedlock was an abomination, a thing of the devil. They say she fell pregnant herself when she was seventeen to an islander. No one knows what happened to the child, or even if it’s true. But whenever any of the clan fell pregnant out of wedlock and a marriage wasn’t on the table, it was her they turned to.’

  Rebecca felt something cold grasp at her stomach. ‘What was she, an abortionist?’

  Fiona shook her head. ‘No. Well, not quite. I’m not going to debate the morality of abortion, I’ll have my view, you’ll have yours, we may agree, we may not. But what Roberta did? Well, perhaps it was worse. The pregnant woman went to live with her in what remained of the clachan. We’re talking early twentieth century here, the clan had dispersed even further, the Blood of Christ was all but a memory. Those confined women would remain with her until they gave birth.’

  Fiona stopped speaking. Outside the wind threw itself against a window somewhere, rattling it like a demand for entry. The ice in Rebecca’s belly was solid and she recognised it for what it was. Dread. Her mind had jumped ahead of Fiona’s words. When they came, they came with a whisper, as if Fiona didn’t want the elements to hear. ‘They say that Roberta took the new born babies and . . . disposed of them.’

  Fiona’s eyes began to fill with tears. Rebecca could tell this was painful for her, even though it had happened more than a hundred years earlier and she didn’t know any of the people personally. Rebecca already knew the answer to her next question, but she needed to ask. She had come this far. The dread could not stop her.

  ‘I take it you don’t mean she put them up for adoption?’

  Fiona took a long time to answer and all Rebecca could hear was the wind whirling and the rain tapping its bony fingers on the window. The clock on the mantelpiece, always the clock.

  Tick

  Tick

  Tick

  ‘No,’ Fiona said finally. ‘Roberta had a more direct way of dealing with the girls’ shame. They say when she helped deliver the child, she had a bucket filled with water at her feet. It didn’t take a lot of water, not for a newborn. It would’ve been so very easily done. Seconds, really.’

  Seconds. Like the clock. Like the ticking of the clock. All done. A life over before it had begun.

  Rebecca soaked this in. In her mind she saw a bare little room and a table. She had no idea what Roberta Connolly looked like but she saw a big woman, severe, standing between the opened legs of a young girl on a tabletop. A metal bucket at her feet, waiting.

  She thought of her own unborn child. That had been a twist of fate, a fault in chromosomes. This was purposeful. This was cold and calculated. The horror of it tingled at her spine. Something else. Shame. It was her ancestor who had done it, her blood. In that moment she knew something of how her father felt.

  ‘And the islanders knew this was going on?’ she asked.

  ‘They knew, but they didn’t talk about or acknowledge it in any way. This island has its secrets, Rebecca, and the people keep them. Only the older folk know of it now, people my age and upwards, and it’s never, ever spoken about. The past haunts the present on Stoirm, but it must never taint it. To talk of it gives it life. By not talking about it, the shame of it will die. But back then it was accepted. And even condoned.’

  ‘And my father found out about it?’

  Fiona gave her a slight nod. ‘Yes, he did.’

  ‘How? If no one talked about it, how did he find out all that time afterwards?’

  Fiona hesitated before she answered. ‘Roberta kept a journal. He found it.’

  Rebecca’s eyes flicked to the spine of the leather book wedged between Fiona and the arm of the chair. ‘Is that it?’

  Fiona’s breath escaped in a long sigh as she retrieved the book and held it in both hands, as if she was afraid it would get away from her. ‘I don’t know why she kept a record of sorts. She doesn’t go into great detail but it’s clear from the language what she was doing. Perhaps it was her way of expunging her guilt. Perhaps she thought it important that these small deaths, these little lives with no names, be recorded. Perhaps she was proud of it. I really don’t know. Anyway, your father found it among some old things and he read it. He was, what? Seventeen, eighteen? But he was so disgusted with what his family had done, what they had known about, what the whole island seemed to have known about, that he left. He told me he couldn’t live here any more, knowing what had gone on back then, what had been allowed to go on. He gave it to me the day he left. Now it’s yours.’ She held the book out to Rebecca. ‘If you want it.’

  Rebecca stared at the dark leather volume. She knew why her father had refused to even talk about Stoirm, but there would be more detail in the book. She could learn about her family, where she had come from. She saw herself reach out to take the book, felt its coolness on her fingertips, saw herself opening the cover and carefully turning the yellowing pages, deciphering a spidery hand filled with dates and names and religious indignation and horrible, spiteful, bitter thoughts. She saw all that without ever actually taking the book from Fiona’s hands.

  She didn’t need the book to tell her where she came from. She already knew. She wasn’t a Connolly
from Stoirm. Her life began with John and Val. Mum and dad. She was a product of their love and their care. She was a part of them and they were part of her. It was also true that whoever had gone before also lived within her. All his adult life her father had carried guilt that was not his to carry. She knew part of that guilt would now remain with her. It would join her own. Those little lost souls would be with her forever. She didn’t need a tangible reminder.

  Tick

  Tick

  Tick

  ‘Burn it,’ she said.

  Fiona seemed satisfied and immediately threw the book into the fire. They both watched in silence as the flames began to singe the old paper and curl the edges of the cover. The paper erupted into flame and smoke but the leather merely blackened. Within a few minutes the words written down so long ago were at one with the smoke. There seemed nothing more to be said, so Rebecca stood up to leave.

  ‘Your father was a good man,’ Fiona said as she rose.

  ‘He was,’ said Rebecca.

  ‘He tried all his life to make up for what Roberta did.’

  ‘I see that now.’

  ‘I think he more than made up for it, don’t you?’ The minister stared directly into Rebecca’s eyes, as if she had divined her earlier thoughts. ‘It wasn’t his debt but he repaid it, in full and with interest. You owe nothing, Rebecca. You are not Roberta. The book is gone, the slate is clean. Understand?’

  Rebecca nodded and said her goodbyes. They hugged. In another world Fiona might’ve been her mother. In another world that book and what it recorded would never have existed. But in this world Fiona was just her father’s old girlfriend and that book was now ash and blackened leather. The words were gone and the smoke was gone, but what they recorded was still there, hanging in the air around her. And within her.

  On the roadway back to Portnaseil, the wind whipping at her coat, she stopped and stared across the island to the hills in the west. Somewhere up there, hidden in the wet mist and standing firm against the storm, was what was left of the clachan. Somewhere up there, perhaps, was a table with old, forgotten dark stains upon it. And perhaps a rusting metal bucket lying on its side in a corner.

  A noise drifted towards her through the wind and the rain that beat on her face and her hair. A little cry, something pitiful, something alone out there in the open land. It could have been a sheep or a bird. But to Rebecca it sounded like something else.

  A child’s cry.

  A child not meant to live, its single, heartrending wail the first and last it ever made.

  A cry that would be carried by the wind and echo forever around the island.

  The cold feeling in her gut erupted and she bent double, her retching joined by deep, shuddering sobs.

  40

  The girl standing in the reception area fidgeting and pacing like a bird trapped in a windowless room was familiar but not because Rebecca had met her before. She had seen photographs of someone who looked like her. Right away she knew the girl was Sonya Kerr. Even with the dark smudges under her eyes, her hair flat and lifeless and her skin pallid, Rebecca could see Mhairi’s features come to life.

  ‘Someone to see you, Miss Connolly,’ said Ash from behind the desk, darting a finger towards Sonya, who stopped pacing to give Rebecca a stare that was a mixture of curiosity and defiance.

  ‘Sonya?’ said Rebecca and saw the look turn to surprise.

  ‘You know me?’

  ‘No, but I know who you are. You look like . . .’

  ‘My mother? I know. They all say that.’

  The girl not only looked but also sounded worn out. Rebecca could sympathise. She felt like someone had pulled out a stopper somewhere and drained her. ‘What can I do for you?’

  ‘It’s Donnie . . . my dad.’

  Rebecca closed her eyes briefly. Don’t let him be dead, she thought.

  ‘He’s conscious now,’ said Sonya, sending a wave of relief washing through Rebecca’s weary body. ‘He wants to see you.’

  Rebecca was glad Donnie was back in the land of the living, but she was done. ‘Sonya, I’m tired and I’m wet and I’m sure you know last night was—’ She sought the correct word. ‘Difficult. For everyone. All I want to do is have a hot bath and put on some dry clothes and sleep for a few hours, hopefully get off this island soon.’

  ‘He’s got something to tell you. About my mother. About the night she died.’

  Rebecca told herself she didn’t care, that she couldn’t take any more of Stoirm and its secrets.

  ‘Please,’ said Sonya, a note of desperation creeping in. ‘He really wants to talk to you and I promised I’d bring you. I’ve got a friend outside with a car, we’ll take you right now.’

  Rebecca told herself that as far as she was concerned all of this was over.

  Sonya’s eyes hardened. ‘You caused all this. You came here and caused all this. The least you can do is hear what my dad has to say. He’s in that hospital bed because of you.’

  That’s not true, Rebecca wanted to say, but she was too exhausted to debate the point. All she could say was, ‘Okay.’

  She was at the exit to the small car park before Sonya realised she’d won the argument. Gus was sitting in a beat-up old Vauxhall Vectra and he gave her a shame-faced look as she climbed in the back. Sonya climbed in the passenger side. ‘This is my friend Gus,’ she said.

  ‘Pleased to meet you,’ said Rebecca.

  Gus didn’t say anything. She hadn’t told the police it was Gus who had made the visit the previous night. He had been stirred up by the moron squad, most of whom were now safely tucked up in the police cells for what they had done to Chaz and Alan, although Ash told her one was proving elusive—He’s taken to the heather, was how he put it. On another day that phrase would have made Rebecca smile, but not that day. Some of the island’s limited police manpower was beating that heather in the south of the island. He had nowhere to go and they’d flush him out sooner or later.

  Nothing further was said during the short drive to the hospital. The rain, propelled by the wind, splattered the windshield and hit the roof with such force it sounded like someone was playing a drum. Rebecca found herself looking across the moorland, staring at the hills, greyed and smudged by the rain, and thinking about Roberta Connolly and what she had done. Sonya had her face turned towards the window, as if she was staring at the hills too. Did she know about the Connolly clan? Fiona had said only the older generations knew, but had Molly told her? Probably not. It was something the islanders wanted to die and, as Fiona said, talking about it just gave it life.

  Gus brought the pick-up to a halt outside the double glass-doors of the small hospital. ‘I’ll take you to him,’ he said.

  ‘You’re not coming?’ Rebecca asked Sonya.

  The girl shook her head. ‘He told me and my grandparents already. He wants you to know, too.’

  Rebecca searched her face for some kind of hint but saw nothing. Sadness, maybe, but at what she didn’t know. ‘You’re wrong, you know,’ Rebecca said.

  ‘About what?’

  ‘About me causing all this. This would’ve happened whether I came to the island or not.’

  Sonya looked away again. She didn’t accept what Rebecca had said. She had to blame somebody and Rebecca was the easiest target. And Roddie Drummond. But Rebecca would bet a year’s salary that the girl had never met him.

  Gus held the door open for her, polite compared to their last encounter, and then veered to the right. ‘I take it Sonya doesn’t know about last night?’ Rebecca asked.

  He shook his head. ‘It was my idea. I told you. And I’d do it again.’

  ‘Good to know,’ she said.

  Another few paces, then he said, ‘She wanted something done but Donnie, her dad, had some kind of seizure and they almost lost him. At least that’s what she thought. She blamed herself for thinking about doing something about you, for saying it out loud. She thought that he’d heard her. So I did it without her knowing.’ He stopped at a set of do
uble doors. ‘He’s in the second room on the right.’ Rebecca thanked him and pushed the nearest door open, but stopped when he spoke again. ‘Why didn’t you tell the police about me?’

  ‘How do you know I didn’t?’

  ‘Because I’d be in the cells with the other guys.’

  ‘Well,’ said Rebecca, stepping through the doorway, ‘the day’s not over yet.’

  * * *

  Bill Sawyer was in a chair beside Donnie’s bed, a pair of crutches propped against the arm. His right arm was in a sling, his right leg, poking through a blue dressing gown, was bandaged from ankle to thigh.

  ‘Should you be up on that?’ Rebecca asked.

  ‘It’s not that bad,’ he said.

  ‘I heard you broke it.’

  ‘You heard right. Not got far to travel anyway.’ He jutted his chin towards the other bed in the room.

  Rebecca looked at Donnie, still hooked up to machines but relatively bright-eyed, despite the bandages around his head. His face was mottled by bruising, and what skin she could see was wax. When he spoke his voice was rough, as if someone had taken a cheese grater to his vocal cords.

  ‘Thanks for coming,’ he said.

  She kept her voice as light as possible, although she didn’t feel that way. ‘Who could resist the invitation of a man who came back from the dead.’

  He gave her a smile, which was on the weak side of wan, but it was Sawyer who spoke. ‘You might as well know that I’ve advised Donnie not to speak to you.’

  ‘There’s a surprise,’ she said, pulling a plastic chair from behind the door closer to the bed. ‘Did you see who jumped you? Was it Roddie?’

  Donnie gave a very slight shake of the head, movement still being painful. ‘It wasn’t Roddie. He was around, but he didn’t do it. It was one of Carl Marsh’s boys . . .’

  ‘I’ve brought Donnie up to speed on everything that’s happened,’ said Sawyer. ‘Terrible shame about that young lad. I’m glad he’s all right, that could’ve ended very badly.’

  Rebecca said nothing as she concentrated on dousing the tears burning at her eyes. She wouldn’t cry, not in front of Sawyer. ‘Why did you want to see me, Donnie?’