A Small Death in the Great Glen

by A. D. Scott

  Three bridesmaids to each side supported Chiara’s train. The long trailing ends of white velvet cloak were trimmed with white fur and much admired by the ladies of the parish. Two pageboys followed. Joanne knew one of the pageboys and two of the bridesmaids. They were wee horrors. But not today, today they were angelic. Annie was paired with an Italian girl of similar age and height. They had overcome their communication problems—the girl’s Glasgow accent was unintelligible to Annie—by nudging each other or hissing “stop” or “go,” loving every moment of the long slow walk down the aisle. Annie smiled at her grandad and sister as they passed. Bianca and another cousin followed last and this time it was Rob’s turn for a big smile.

  The procession reached the altar without mishap. Chiara still looked solemn; this was her wedding day, and, as she confessed to Joanne later, she was freezing cold and terrified she would trip and scared the pageboys would have bubble gum or peashooters or somehow manage to mangle up the wedding train. It wasn’t that I was feeling serious, it was a good old-fashioned dose of stage fright, she joked when it was all over. When the bride reached the altar, there was Peter, waiting and smiling and holding out his hand. Then everything around her dissolved and she was aware of nothing except her husband.

  The ceremony went perfectly. The couple was married. Joanne cried. So did many of the guests, men as well as women.

  The slow walk back up the aisle became a joyful laughing noisy boisterous affair, with the congregation stepping out of the pews to hug and smile and clap before joining the procession behind the family. Outside on the steps the bridal couple stood for the photographs, with onlookers cheering and laughing.

  Gino had one more surprise. Right on cue, the church bells ringing out, a coach and four horses all decorated with green, red and white ribbons pulled up by the riverside, ready to collect the bride and her new husband. Where he found them was a topic of discussion for many a month, and Jenny McPhee knew how to keep a secret.

  Gino threw handfuls of coins to the children, who scrabbled for them on the pavement and in the gutters. They expected pennies and halfpennies and threepences and a few shiny sixpences but all the coins were silver. Chiara finally made it to the open door of the coach waving at the crowd of friends, looking for one person in particular. Finding her, she threw hard and accurately and Ann McPherson had no choice but to catch the bridal bouquet. She was standing at Karl’s side as she caught it. That raised a huge cheer.

  As the coach and four clopped briskly up the street, guests scattered. Joanne was joining the family party for lunch; the other guests went to rest before the evening’s dinner and dance, some left to see to children or catch up with old friends. Wee Jean dawdled with her mother, waiting for Grandad as he chatted with old cronies.

  “Aunty Chiara looked like a princess.”

  Joanne agreed. For this Italian princess, having made a journey through heaven knows what in the aftermath of war and a devastated Europe, to end up in the faraway Scottish Highlands, there to find the man of her dreams, who had also come through heaven knows what—well, it goes to show there’s hope for us all, Joanne decided.

  She also realized that the sheer theatricality of it all, the amazing extravagance of the wedding, was not something ever seen among the Scots; their plain churches, their restraint, their respectability were diametrically opposite to everything her friends the Corellis had shown her. Joanne felt that this wedding was not just the marriage of Chiara and Peter; it was a celebration of hope, a celebration of the future and a celebration for all who had survived the dark days of war and internment, and for those who had endured the prejudice and the ostracism of a people who were first enemies, then allies. Now, like everyone else, they were praying for a brighter, better second half to the century.

  “Are you coming back tonight, Mum?”

  “You and Annie will sleep at Granny and Grandad’s house and I’ll see you in the morning. There’s still snow on the hills, maybe we’ll go sledging.”

  In a rush of happiness, she picked up her little girl under the oxters, swinging her around and around. Like a joyous shaft of sun breaking through the winter bleak, she had a sudden, joyous inspiration that everything would turn out fine. She put her little girl down and crouched beside her and whispered in her ear.

  “I’ve a surprise for you, a very special present for being such a good girl.”

  “Really? What is it? Can I have it now?”

  “Later. When I come over to say night-night.”

  When Joanne arrived to say goodnight to Wee Jean, Granny Ross opened the door. “How was the wedding?”

  “Grand. It was just perfect.”

  “You missed Bill, he was looking for you.”

  “He was invited too.”

  “Aye, well, he said he’d see you at the reception. He’s no big on the church.” She gave a smothered snort and muttered, “Heathens,” under her breath but Joanne knew that no matter how much she hated Catholics, she held a sneaking respect for the Corelli family.

  Joanne held out the basket. Granny and Grandad Ross were in on the surprise. They watched the child as she peered into the folds of blanket.

  “It’s white fluffy wool, Granny.” Then it moved. She gave a little yelp. The fluff ball yawned. “A kitten,” Wee Jean whispered. She looked again to make sure. “A wee kitten.”

  “She’s your wee kitten,” Joanne told her.

  Not daring to speak, Jean slowly reached her hand into the basket to touch the tiny creature. The kitten stirred, yawned again and then went straight back to sleep.

  “Can I keep it?”

  “Of course, she’s yours.” Joanne smiled, kissing her daughter’s head.

  “I have to go now. I’m off to Uncle Rob’s house to get ready for the dance. Be good for Granny and Grandad.” She bent down to hug her little girl. “You’ll have to think of a name for your kitten.”

  “But Dad said we can’t have a cat. He hates cats.”

  “Don’t worry about that. This is your wee kitten, to keep forever.”

  She gave her daughter a final hug before buttoning her coat to leave the warmth of the house.

  “Thanks, Mum. I’ll see you later, Dad.”

  “I’ll collect Annie at nine o’clock, right?”

  “Right you are. And thanks again for coming to fetch her. See you all in the morning.”

  Joanne smiled at the older woman, at the picture she made, sitting by the fire with her knitting, her granddaughter and the sleeping kitten. Her mother-in-law rose from the armchair and gave Joanne a pat on the arm.

  “Good night, dear. Have a lovely time. You deserve it.”

  Joanne walked quickly toward the McLean house. There was no moon but every star in the sky and a luminous Milky Way lit the way. She took the gesture from Granny Ross in the spirit in which it was meant and fairly danced along the pavement.

  “Wonders will never cease.”

  Then she slowed to a walk as the realization hit her. Nine and a half years, that’s what it has taken for my mother-in-law to accept me. And I am now contemplating a rift that will never be healed. Head down, hands in her pockets, she strode up the street toward the lights of her friends’ home.

  “May I have this waltz, Mrs. Ross?” McAllister mumbled. His stomach was also mumbling. There had been little to eat at the wedding feast for a man with a cracked jaw, and all the liquid on offer was alcoholic.

  “Your husband appears to be celebrating.” He nodded toward the bar.

  “He’s sorted out his business problems.”

  McAllister was wise enough to make no comment.

  “So why so sad?” he whispered into Joanne’s hair as they sedately circumnavigated the ballroom. Joanne held herself tightly, careful not to dance too close. The happiness surrounding her had set her off, reminding her of her own failure. Joanne ached from the loss of her dreams, her ambitions, and the end of her marriage. The music stopped.

  “Sorry, I have to find Annie, she’s going home with
her grandad.”

  “I do believe you’re avoiding me, Mrs. Ross.” He hoped his smile was in his voice.

  “There’s really not much I can say to that”—she touched a small unbandaged area of his cheek—“but I owe you a big thanks. The job on the Gazette is my lifeline.”

  He watched her weave her way through the crowd, now swirling at a sedate flow, more Blue Danube than the Spey in spate.

  “I’ve not given you the job as a favor.” He was muttering to no one but himself.

  He found an empty table as far from the dance floor as possible and, cigarette in one hand, whisky in the other, he lapsed into his favorite sport, imagining the lives of passing strangers. McAllister saw before him what he knew to be true but had never articulated. These were his people; the Highlanders, Lowlanders, the Scots. And the Italians, the Poles, the English; strangers diluting the bloodlines of this austere land of mountain and kirk, they were part of the community now, remaking its future.

  These are the people who read the Gazette. The thought pleased him. They deserve better from their local newspaper.

  “Is this seat taken?” Joanne reappeared from behind. “Now, where were we? Right.” She reached for a glass of Babycham from the passing waitress. “A wedding. So, it will soon be New Year, it’s the second half of the twentieth century and I’m going to be in it. I know it will be hard, children, a full-time job, not to mention the gossip about being a working woman …” Maybe no husband, but she couldn’t tell him that, she still hadn’t made the final final decision, the thought of the harm she would do to her girls all that was keeping her bound to a sham marriage. “Also, I have funny foreign friends, even a male unmarried friend.” He rolled his eyes in mock horror. “Actually I have three single male friends.” Rob waltzed by with Bianca in a tight clinch. “Make that two, but I’m going to do this, I’m going to make a life for myself, I want to use my brain, I want to learn, and I want you to teach me.”

  “You need a brain on the Gazette?” he managed to mumble. As she laughed, he was startled by a fleeting thought: Is there any place for me in her new life?

  The microphone screeched. Peter the groom stood center stage, a guitar in hand.

  “In response to many requests, especially from the bride,” he announced to cheers and whistles as Chiara curtsied to her husband, “we now have, for your entertainment and delight—”

  “Get on with it!” Chiara shouted.

  “The Meltdown Boys!”

  Peter struck the first chord; Rob stepped forward swinging the microphone stand.

  “One, two, three o’clock, four o’clock rock …”

  Joanne clapped her hands and was up and off, throwing herself into the jiggling throng. The Meltdown Boys were off again, with the same tunes, the same three chords.

  McAllister stood. He too was off, but in the opposite direction. Out in the foyer, the noise was mercifully muffled. He fetched his coat, his hat, pulled on his gloves and walked down the broad flight of steps into the street. The music was now a distant rumble.

  “I’m all for a bright new world, but if this is the music, God help us!”

  TWENTY-THREE

  The night of the wedding had been well below zero. The guests leaving the party had not noticed. Next morning the children woke first, delighted at their luck; a weekend and the hills above the town were still covered with a frost-crisp covering of snow perfect for sledging. Amongst the vegetables and fruit bushes and in corners of the lawn, the Ross garden was pockmarked with patches of dirty snowmelt. The snowman too had melted slightly but overnight had frozen again, leaving a ghostly ice-sheen carapace with what seemed a sinister female presence trapped inside. Brown Owl in ice, was Annie’s instant thought as she stared at their deformed creation. She also noted that the carrot nose was gone, no doubt stolen by a passing crow.

  Grandad Ross put a hand to his brow to ward off the dazzle and scoured the hills. Seeing the snow dotted like holes in a colander with distant figures, he called the girls.

  “Let’s go sledging now before the snow disappears.”

  “Really? Now? Great! What about Mum?” They danced around their grandfather.

  “We’ll call into your house on the way. Go and ask your granny to put some cocoa in a flask for after, and hurry up, we’ve a hard hill to climb.”

  “Mum, Mum, come on. We’re going sledging.”

  The girls clattered in the back door, the happy shrieks cheering Joanne immensely. She had slept in till ten and, waking to the clear magic snow light, had made tea, singing to herself, “We’re gonna rock around the clock tonight,” and had taken a mug up to Bill.

  “What time is it?”

  “Twenty past ten.”

  She left the tea on the bedside table, then crossed the room and swept back the curtains.

  “Dah-da. Look at that; snow on the hills, a clear sky, a beautiful day.”

  “Shut the curtains, you stupid bitch!”

  He jerked the eiderdown up over his head, sending the cup flying over the linoleum. She fled, abandoning the puddle of tea and her hungover husband, repeating over and over, “I will not let him get to me, I will not cry.”

  Grandad was waiting outside, the children having run ahead to join a group of friends making their way toward the canal crossing and the hills beyond. Pulling on her hat and coat and scarf and gloves, she escaped down the path.

  “Bill no coming?”

  “Having a lie-in. We were late back.”

  Joanne’s eyes were pink. Grandad noticed but didn’t say a word. She was silently kicking herself: I wish I’d never helped Bill out with his problems.

  “He’ll have a hangover when he wakes up.” Annie had popped up at Joanne’s side as she inevitably did when a subject she was not meant to hear was being mentioned.

  “Where on earth did you get that expression from?”

  “Well it’s true,” Annie informed her mother. “Sheila Murchison told me. Her mother says my dad’s an alkie.” Annie saw the reaction from the adults. What had she said wrong this time? It was true. Everyone knew.

  Grandad came to the rescue.

  “Would you look at the sun. It’s getting low already and it’ll be dark afore you know it. March on, ma lasses, hep, one two three.”

  Crossing over the canal locks Joanne hoped no one would mention the boy. She scanned the skyline. The dense pine forest that hid an ancient vitrified fort dominated the northeastern end. The pines on the northwestern end gathered in ranks around the asylum, now spotlighted in a biblical ray of light. Joanne loved her adopted town.

  “Mum, Mum, over here!” Annie rolled off the sledge and with excellent last-minute timing let it career on into the dyke.

  “My turn.” Joanne grabbed Annie’s snow-crusted mitten in one hand, the sledge rope in the other.

  “Wee Jean’s a fearty-cat,” Annie informed her.

  “She’s only little. I’ll take her down with me.”

  “It’s a’right. She’s with Uncle Rob. He’s got a great sledge.”

  Wistfully, she looked across the slope. A terrified and delighted Wee Jean, enveloped by a figure in a postbox-red ski jacket, went hurtling down the hill, then veered sharply to the left in a perfect racing turn, stopping just before the drystane dyke. The resultant shriek rattled Rob’s eyeballs, switching his hangover back on.

  “Rob! Over here!” Joanne shouted and waved.

  “How do all girls do that shriek?” he asked Joanne. “It’s a killer.”

  “Our secret weapon.” She took in the green tinge that a combination of high speed and aching eardrums had resurrected. “Grandad brought a flask of tea and cocoa for the girls.” She took it out of her bag, then laid a tartan rug on the wall. “Want some?”

  “Absolutely! I’m knackered as well as hungover.”

  “You’re not allowed to say that. Hangover is a rude word,” Annie told him sharply.

  Rob raised an eyebrow at Joanne. She lifted her eyes to the heavens.

  “L
isten, why don’t you two go and find Grandad?”

  “There he is, over there.” Rob waved at the distant figure stamping his feet at the edge of a huddle of grandads on sledging duty. “You can do me a favor. Look after my sledge, eh? You can have a shot, if you like.”

  Annie grabbed the rope with one hand and wee Jean with the other, off before Uncle Rob changed his mind.

  “Great wedding.” Rob perched beside Joanne on the wall and they shared the tea.

  “It was fabulous. It felt like a Highland coronation.”

  “And you chief lady-in-waiting. I’m glad McAllister could make it.” He glanced at her and wondered, not for the first time, if she fancied the editor. Naw, he thought, he’s too old. They drank their tea, laughing at Rob’s chatter; the convoy, the wedding, the dancing, all safe subjects for a bright winter’s day. Not once did Rob ask what was wrong.

  “Come on, let’s get the girls, poor Mr. Ross looks half-frozen. One last go and then home for me. I’m exhausted.”

  He held out his hand to help her down off the dyke, then couldn’t resist.

  “Race you!”

  Laughing and pushing, they stumbled and tumbled across the field to join her family for the long walk back. Halfway home, tired and strangely calm given the start to the day, Joanne, giving Jean a piggyback, lagged behind. She nodded and waved at neighbors, acquaintances, all tired and exhilarated by an afternoon in the snow. This is happiness—she smiled to herself—and I like it. A turning point had been reached but she was yet to acknowledge it.

  Rob, carrying the sledge over one shoulder, walked ahead with Annie.

  “You can borrow the sledge any time there’s snow.” Annie gave him a Brownie salute to seal the deal. “And, I’ll let you in on a wee secret; the hoodie crow—he’s gone, flown away. Father Morrison will not be coming back.”