by Laura Marney
‘We don’t have an Aunt Cestor,’ said Rachel, ‘we’ve only got an Aunt Pauline.’
‘No,’ explained Michael, ‘ancestors; like grannies.’
‘Not our granny,’ shrugged Rachel, ‘she lives in Tenerife.’
Walter sighed. I thought he had given up, finally defeated by their indefatigable carelessness but still he carried on.
‘Not your immediate granny but her granny and her granny before her, and many more beyond …’
‘So how many grannies ago?’ said Rachel.
‘Well …’ said Walter.
Energised by the question, he was now striding ahead. Curious to know the answer, we trotted along behind.
‘Let’s say twenty years per generation, five grannies per century, that would roughly mean that the villagers are your granny’s granny’s granny’s granny’s granny’s granny’s granny’s granny’s …’
The kids fastened to the hypnotic sing-song of the two-syllable chant and we marched back into Inverfaughie beating out the rhythm of ‘… granny’s granny’s granny’s granny’s granny’s granny’s granny’s …’
Chapter 26
The place was hoaching with strangers. Even the machair, usually a desolate place, was busy. As I drove past there was a crowd standing at the gate. The same builder’s truck that had fenced off the property next door to Harrosie was waiting to go through, loaded with long wooden poles. Not another fence. Another beautiful view spoilt. Less Highland idyll, more Russian gulag. People were talking to the driver. I recognised some of the farmers, and in the midst of them, Jackie. I pulled over and parked.
This was too good an opportunity to miss. Jackie always did his utmost to avoid me in the village, even changing direction when he saw me coming, so I rarely had the chance to observe him up close these days.
For those brief golden months while he’d been my gardener I’d had good reason to look at him: I was entitled to supervise his work, and I took full advantage, sneaking peeks at the muscles on his shirtless back as he leaned into the digging.
I thought back to what my first impression of Jackie had been: he was breathtakingly beautiful. I think I’d actually gasped at how handsome he was. He certainly didn’t look like a gardener, more like a hunky fireman or a guy from a diet coke ad. Not far off six feet and broad as a house. Not fat, muscley: down and dirty. Manly.
I shivered. It gave me the creeps to remember how I’d lusted after him.
Now, at this distance, it was fascinating to see how he behaved when he didn’t know I was watching. He was talking passionately to the people standing next to him, his face fizzing: eyes burning, teeth flashing – but not with his lady-killer smile; he didn’t look happy at all.
For the first time I noticed how old Jackie was beginning to look. Because of his good looks it was easy to forget that he was sixteen years older than me, and I was no spring chicken. What was he doing here at the machair? Surely he wasn’t working as an extra? Operating his boat tours and all the gardening and odd-job work he took, he was already working too hard for a man in his fifties. I felt a slight panic at the idea of Jackie ageing, becoming a pathetic old man, but that’s what would inevitably happen. The cords in his neck stood out and his coat drooped forwards off his shoulders. He looked tired, beat; like a boxer losing his last ever humiliating bout. Maybe it was only when he knew someone was watching that he sucked in his gut and set his face to handsome. I put the car in gear and drove away hoping he hadn’t spotted me.
*
‘It’s all kicking off now,’ said Jenny.
This as I entered the shop.
‘What is?’
‘Everything. It’s a scandal.’
Before I had the chance for further questions her mobile began to ring. To halt me she showed me the underside of her index finger, holding it in front of my face in the annoying schoolteacherish way she had.
By the terse ‘uh huh’s and ‘right’s she was barking into her phone I could tell this call was scandal related. Everything was kicking off. I felt a delicious ripple of anticipation. Pure uncut scandal would very soon be flooding my system, my whole body tingling, the pleasure centres in my brain going off like roman candles. Jenny was my dealer in this town, my gossip orgasmatron. I only had to wait until she got off the phone. I cast around the shop looking for something to distract me. A filum.
In the last few weeks the stock in Jenny’s shop had changed radically. Until recently she’d stocked such exotic fare as pickled onions and mayonnaise on her ‘world foods’ shelf. Now she had all manner of organically certified wholefoods. The packaging was a uniform dreich brown paper, but despite this the products were three times the price. I wasn’t complaining – overall it was an improvement. In the past the chill cabinet had been full of brick-sized bargain-brand cheese wrapped in cling film. Reading the label I discovered it wasn’t even technically cheese. It was legally required to be called ‘cheese food’ and looked and tasted more like plastic explosives than actual cheese. Now at least she had some quality local cheese and, to go with the new food, she’d introduced a line of kitchen gadgets. You could now purchase a fish kettle or a pasta maker if you were so inclined.
Jenny had also revamped her DVD rental section. Until a few weeks ago the rack had only Hollywood blockbusters. Now it was full of films where nothing happened, usually in Russian or Japanese, in black and white, and where characters often unaccountably took their clothes off. That must be why they were called movie buffs. Why anyone would want to watch naked foreign people not doing anything was beyond me. Jenny said it was kinky and I readily agreed.
‘Not kinky!’ Jenny had laughed, ‘although some of those filums are a bit raunchy, I grant you. No, I mean KINKIE: Keep It Niche, Keep It Expensive. It’s a good business model when your customer base shifts to the chattering classes. Och, shut your gub, Trixie, you’ll catch a fly.’
Kinkie, indeed. Jenny could make even a business acronym sound daring. This was going to be great. Finally she got off the phone. My scalp tingled as I felt the anticipation rise.
‘Do you not read your emails?’ she snipped.
‘Aye.’ I hesitated. ‘Well, not today, not yet.’
‘They’ve locked us out of the machair.’
I was still on the backfoot about the email so I didn’t react with the level of shock to this news that Jenny was obviously expecting.
‘G.I. have locked everyone out,’ she reiterated.
‘I didn’t know they were filming there just now.’
‘They’re not,’ she said, ‘they’re putting in a perimeter fence to stop us getting access. The farmers can’t graze their cattle.’
‘But why?’
Jenny lifted her shoulders and opened her hands in a gesture of bewilderment. I finally caught up with her indignation and managed to muster some of my own.
‘That’s not on,’ I asserted. ‘The deal was that everyone could use the machair except when they’re actually filming. I remember Betty Robertson saying that.’
Jenny nodded. That was obviously the way she remembered it too.
‘We’ve called a public meeting; this concerns us all. Seven o’clock tonight. We’ve requested that G.I. send a representative to explain this outrageous behaviour. That wee Miss Yip would be the one I’d expect. We need a full turn-out tonight,’ she continued, ‘a show of strength, show them they can’t mess with us. I emailed you asking you to put the word out but I think between Walter and Jackie they’ve covered everybody.’
As a rule, Jenny never mentioned Jackie’s name to me, she seemed to sense how raw it was, and she was always careful not to stir up any resentment. But as she was the one who’d mentioned him, I took my opportunity to find out more.
‘I just passed Jackie there.’ I omitted to mention that I’d parked and watched him. ‘He’s standing at the machair gates with a crowd of other people.’
‘Pickets. They’re trying to persuade the G.I. staff not to cross the picket line, but they’ve had no
luck so far.’
I wanted to talk a bit more about Jackie. Why was it so difficult? I’d love to be able to casually mention him in conversation, ask after his health, the way normal people did. But Jenny had already moved on.
‘There are other things we can do. If G.I. want to play dirty we can do the same. For example, we could stop offering them accommodation. How would they make their filum if they had nowhere to sleep?’
I bristled involuntarily at this but quickly covered it by pretending to feel cold. If I lost my B&B income now I’d never be able to buy my flat in Glasgow. I’d never get out of Inverfaughie.
‘Och, it’ll probably blow over,’ I said. ‘You know what they’re like, always having equipment breakdowns; they’ve no doubt shut the machair because of some technical problem. It’ll only be for a couple of hours.’
‘I don’t care why they’ve shut it, or for how long,’ said Jenny, leaning over the counter. ‘They don’t have the authority. Our farmers are being denied their grazing rights. G.I. have used their money and power to take whatever they want without our permission, but we run this village, not G.I. We need to show them that.’
‘I don’t think we need to throw them out on the street just yet, Jenny. We don’t want to do anything rash.’
‘For the good of the village we have to pull together or they’ll win. They’ll try to play us off against each other, divide and conquer by buying some of us off with their pathetic windfall. We have to be strategic and political; this isn’t the time for self-interest.’
I took a step back at the sheer brass neck of the woman. Self-in-terest? She was a fine one to talk. She was in this to enhance her career prospects as M.S.P. and increase her votes. She had bent over backwards to accommodate G.I., not out of kindness or good old-fashioned Highland hospitality, but for her own kinkie profit. She was making a fortune out of this hand-knitted wholefood malarkey. This shop was full of Jenny’s organically certified self-interest.
‘But if some lost their B&B income while others continued to profit that might divide the village even more.’
‘You mean me, don’t you? Well, I’ll have to think about that but I’m only suggesting a possible strategy. That’s what the meeting’s for, but meanwhile I’m not going to show the enemy my hand, am I?’
‘Oh, are G.I. the enemy now? Last week they were the best thing that ever happened to Inverfaughie.’
‘God love you, Trixie,’ said Jenny, as she expertly slashed open a crisp box with a Stanley knife, ‘you’ve got a lot to learn about politics.’
Chapter 27
It was all about percentages. G.I. had paid me 30 per cent of the contract up front – 100 per cent of the contract, plus 100 per cent of what I earned feeding the Claymores, might, if I was very lucky, amount to a 10 per cent deposit on a flat in Glasgow, but if I didn’t get paid I’d be stuck forever in Inverfaughie, 100 per cent miserable. If Jenny was going to make this radical proposal I’d have to vote against it. Thank god I was a council member with full voting rights.
As I drove past the helipad there was a row of six black Land Rovers parked nose to tail. The smoked glass windows made it impossible to see anything, but whoever was inside must be important. Maybe the American president had come to Inverfaughie. That’s what it looked like: one of those convoys of armoured vehicles I’d seen on telly, where the American Secret Service jog alongside wearing suits and sunglasses and talking into their sleeve.
When I got back to Harrosie there was a visitor waiting for me.
I walked in to find Steven wrestling with Bouncer. When they saw me they both exploded in enthusiastic greeting. Steven pulled me into a bone-crushing hug – he even kissed me, mushing his lips on my cheek till it was painful.
‘Steven! Nice to see you too,’ I said, struggling to break free. It was lovely that he was being so affectionate, lovely but weird. ‘How did you get here?’
‘Train to The Sneck and then hitched.’
‘The Sneck?’
‘The Sneck, Inversnechty, that’s what us locals call Inverness, surely you knew that Mum. How long have you lived here?’
Mum.
Hugs and kisses and Inversnechty and actually being called Mum. It was all a bit overwhelming. I hadn’t even seen Steven for such a long time without his conjoined pal Gerry.
‘No Gerry?’
‘Gerry’s working.’
‘I didn’t know he had a job.’
‘He does now. I got Gary to give him mine. Everybody’s happy.’
‘You gave up your job at the warehouse? Nettie won’t be best pleased at that. You did tell her, didn’t you? Your Auntie Nettie knows you’ve chucked your job?’
Steven gave an exasperated, ‘Yes.’
‘And your dad?’
‘You don’t seem very pleased to see me, Mum. I thought you wanted me to come up here for the summer, spend some “family time”.’
‘I did. I do. Honestly, this is brilliant,’ I said, as I collapsed yawning into the sofa, ‘I’m overjoyed.’
We both laughed.
‘Sorry, I was up all night. Not what you think. Don’t worry, I’m still on the wagon.’
The relief on his face told me that was exactly what he’d been thinking.
‘I worked last night on the film.’
‘Really? You’re in the movie? Quality!’
‘Och, believe you me, it’s not as glamorous as it sounds, I’m knackered.’
‘D’you think I can be in it?’
‘I don’t see why not, they’re always looking for extras.’
I hoped this machair spat wouldn’t stop Steven getting work.
‘Are those weapons in the shed from the movie?’
‘Don’t you touch those weapons. They’re not toys. They don’t belong to you and they’re dangerous.’
‘They’re not dangerous,’ he scoffed, ‘they’re for dummy fighting, all the blades are blunt.’
‘It doesn’t matter. If you drop one of those things you’ll lose a toe. Please Steven, promise me you’ll stay away from those weapons, they’re scary.’
‘Keep your wig on, Trixie, I was only looking at them.’
And with that he stormed off to his room.
So I was back to being Trixie. Mum didn’t last long.
It was probably my fault, these things usually were. I might have been a bit short with him but I was worried about being paid and the meeting and getting dinner ready for the Claymores. I didn’t really have time to run up to Steven’s room with a conciliatory cup of tea and a flapjack. I’d done enough of that the last time. He’d have to understand that he couldn’t just pitch up here any time he wanted stealing other people’s boats and historical weaponry. As his mother it was my job to make him understand that. But of course Steven had me over a barrel. He knew I’d have to introduce him to the Claymores and that I’d want to play happy families. It would be too embarrassing not to.
I had missed my son so much I’d forgotten what living with him was actually like: the constant boundary testing, brinksmanship, power plays, the hard-fought negotiations – bickering, reasoning, begging. With a heavy heart I took a tray up.
He was, as I’d guessed he would be, open to arbitration but exploitative. Steven graciously accepted the tea and flapjacks and, after he outlined my heinous crime: doing my usual of treating him like a baby, he heard my confession and my tight-jawed apology. As the balance of power currently stood, if he’d wanted me to apologise for global warming I would have had to. What else could I do? In exchange he agreed not to touch the Claymores’ equipment without their knowledge and approval. This meant I’d have to do a bit of double dealing with Rudi – get him to promise not to let Steven near the weapons – but in the end a deal was done. When I asked him to come down to dinner and meet everyone he nodded beneficently. I knew he was gagging to meet them but we both kept up the charade that he was doing me a big favour.
When I took him into the dining room the Claymores gave Steven a warm welco
me. Following Rudi’s lead they all shook his hand and introduced themselves before sitting down to dinner. As they sat round the table talking about football and discussing the new signings for Celtic they included Steven in their silly jokes and listened respectfully to his comments. Once dinner was on the table the football chat died away as everyone concentrated on eating. I scoured my mind for a topic that might be of interest. I wanted Steven to see how well I got on with the Claymores, and not just because I was their landlady. The lads treated me with respect and affection, like a big sister.
In my eagerness to stimulate conversation I very nearly blurted the gossip: the machair being closed and the public meeting Jenny had called to protest. Just in time, I remembered that the Claymores worked for ‘the enemy’, as Jenny had put it; best to keep my mouth shut, loose lips and all that.
‘Did anyone see the big black cars at the helipad?’ I asked.
‘I saw them,’ said Danny. ‘I ran past them.’
‘How fast were you running?’ joked Dave. ‘The limit’s only 30 in a built-up area. You know his nickname’s Insane Bolt, don’t you, Trixie?’
‘I made a speed camera go off but I was only jogging. You cannae touch me for it,’ Danny quipped.
‘Where did the cars go?’ I persisted.
‘They seemed to be heading round the loch to the big house.’
‘I know the woman who owns that big house,’ I told them. ‘Dinah, she’s a friend of mine.’
‘Well, she won’t own it much longer,’ said Rudi. ‘It’s up for sale. There’s talk of it being turned into a hotel; they’re planning to build polo fields on the lochside. That’s what the papers are saying anyway. And guess who’s in town to make an offer? That guy, you know, the billionaire businessman Knox MacIntyre.’
So Dinah had found a buyer. Lucky dog. The sour taint of jealousy had stolen my appetite.
Chapter 28
I cleared the plates and stayed in the kitchen tidying up. I could hear sporadic bursts of laughter from the dining room. It was great that Steven was getting on so well with the lads. With a bit of luck they would set up the table for one of their regular poker nights and invite him to play. Then I could sneak out to the meeting.
