For Faughie's Sake

by Laura Marney

  The footage exploded into full colour with a 1979 TV news item on how remote Highland villages were coping during the Winter of Discontent. Not well, as far as I could see: it looked cold and miserable. Considering we’d soon be heading into a Highland winter and might be cut off from the national grid, I was suddenly grateful for Mag and his wacky renewable schemes.

  Squeals of pleasure burst from tables as people recognised themselves or family members from 1979, jumping up and pointing at the screen, ridiculing their long hair and loon pants. This dissolved into contemporary shots all around the village and people cheered when they saw their own house.

  The stunning views of the yellow broom, green fields, purple mountains and mist rolling across the loch painted an idyllic picture of Inverfaughie. I caught Jenny’s eye and gave her a wee reassuring wink. The documentary wasn’t the hatchet job some people had feared after all. Until recently, Inverfaughie had rarely been on the news. Now they were making documentaries about us and everybody was a celebrity.

  But even before they went to the first advert break the documentary had begun hinting at a more sinister side to life here. They showed committee members caught on camera entering or leaving Jenny’s shop. It must have been shot secretly; there was the sound of the camera shutter whirring and then a blurry freeze frame with the person’s name stamped on it as if from a top secret dossier. Most damning of all was Walter’s shifty expression as he checked the coast was clear before slipping into the shop. I felt like I was attending an espionage briefing on an undercover gang.

  During the first ad break, I saw Jackie go across the room seeking out Steven as avidly as he’d avoided me. Of course, I was glad that Steven and Jackie got on so well, but it wasn’t fair. When Jackie found him he squatted down at his seat and the two of them went into a huddle. Nodding their heads, they had a handshake and a manly hug, before moving swiftly into a hetero backslap. What was this all about? I’d investigate after the film. Jackie better not be involving my son in any of his illegal activities.

  During the adverts and while the pies were being passed round, Jenny shifted in her seat and tutted a fair bit.

  Walter leaned across me to whisper to her.

  ‘Will you relax woman?’

  She shook her head. No, she couldn’t relax.

  And then the adverts were over and we began to see the story the documentary really wanted to tell. The celebration of Inverfaughie’s pastoral joy quickly turned sour and became more like a Hogarth painting with drunkenness and violence everywhere.

  This was hardly an accurate representation. Yes, there had been drunkenness and violence, but not from Faughians. There simply weren’t enough young people in the village to make that much trouble. These were tourists who’d come for the unlicensed drinking and party atmosphere; a cheap out-of-season debauched Spring Break.

  And to be fair, it hadn’t lasted long. The mayhem on the streets had been a brief but regrettable period while Faughie businesses adjusted to the huge influx of visitors and increased demand. Due to Walter’s sobering influence it wasn’t like that anymore, but the documentary made out that this once unspoilt village was now being exploited by greedy tax dodgers. As everyone in the room began to understand how they were being stitched up, the cheering turned to boos.

  Having established that Inverfaughie had now become a modern-day Sodom and Gomorrah, the documentary’s focus now turned to the evil committee members, and especially the committee’s evil Interim Leader, Jenny Haddock Robertson. There was footage, again secretly shot, of Jenny selling a bottle of whisky to someone in the shop: shoogly close-ups on her smiling face, the exchange of bottle for cash, cash going into the till. This overlaid with a cynical kerrching sound effect. It was so obvious it was laughable. There was a dizzying sequence of drunks being sick, Jenny smiling, taking cash, kerrching, drunks having sex, Jenny smiling, taking cash, kerrching, drunks starting fights, Jenny smiling, taking cash, kerrching, pitched battles by gangs of youths in the car park, not one of them from around here but waving Faughie flags, each of them clearly displaying their Faughie rosettes, kerrching, kerrching, kerrching.

  The voiceover asked the question, ‘Who is Jenny Haddock Robertson?’ And this was where the hatchet job really kicked in: how she’d lived in London mixing with rock stars – it was true, she actually had met Jimi Hendrix! There was a picture of them at a club called The Scotch of St James. Admittedly it was primarily of him, stiffly posed with other rock icons, but Jenny’s cheeky young face gate-crashed the photo, muscling in and making a V-sign above their heads. Jackie and a few of his pals old enough to remember who Jimi Hendrix was whistled their respect.

  How she’d dabbled in drugs – a series of photos, presumably taken at a party, of Jenny with a dodgy-looking perm, lingering on a photo of her with a giant spliff in her hand. Predictably there were catcalls, some good natured, but there were loud tuts from random oldsters and all of the No tables.

  Dave from the Claymores shouted, ‘Busted! Somebody call the cops!’

  Some people, but by no means everybody, laughed.

  ‘You look baked in that one,’ I whispered to her, ‘although, to be fair, it’s hard to tell if it’s the effect of the perm lotion or the mareewhaana.’

  But nothing would cheer Jenny up. She must have sensed what was coming next, and she didn’t have long to wait.

  The story of how her fiancé had died in mysterious circumstances was illustrated with newspaper clippings from the Inverfaughie Chanter and national press showing a photo of the war hero Bernard. How they had argued and he had drowned, how there were no witnesses. How she had left town under a dark cloud of suspicion. How his mother had always accused Jenny of his murder.

  ‘It’s a damned lie!’

  Walter had pulled himself to his feet and yelled, spittle flying from his mouth.

  No one whistled or laughed or shouted anything.

  Then the adverts came on. A cliffhanger break in the documentary. There was a noticeably more muted atmosphere during this ad break.

  ‘We’ll sue,’ said Walter, ‘this is a clear case of defamation, they won’t get away with this.’

  Jenny kept her head down and shook her head.

  ‘Excuse me please, Trixie,’ said Walter, as he reached under the table and across my lap.

  There was a moment of unsavoury groping under the table until Walter’s hand re-emerged, now grasping Jenny’s, refusing to let her go.

  As everyone went to the loo, got the drinks in or finished their pies, Jenny silently struggled to break free. I would have liked to have stood up and moved away but both Jenny and Walter had gripped the arms of my chair, anchoring their weight with their free hand, effectively holding me prisoner. I could only watch helplessly as they put their all into this wrestling contest, their flabby old cheeks wobbling with the strain, until finally Jenny succumbed and her arm went limp.

  She put her head down but allowed Walter to lovingly entwine his hand in hers. Their relationship, no longer repressed, was now on top of the table for everyone to see. It was wonderfully romantic. Or it would have been if I hadn’t been stuck between them like a forty-year-old gooseberry.

  When the lights went down for the final time Jenny tried to pull her hand away from Walter but he held on tight. The last section of the documentary was no kinder or more truthful. It showed Betty’s Robertson’s play-acting charade during the propaganda food drop, to wild applause from the No tables. It suggested that the committee had links to terrorist organisations, citing a radical book shop that sold pro-IRA pamphlets and T-shirts from which Walter had ordered books. It showed messages of support sent from separatist groups around the world, including some with a history of violence like ETA. It even showed footage of Walter’s ‘there will be no bevvying’ speech and used cutaway shots to make it look like people were scared of him. As if. It was so ridiculous: first Jenny as a murdering drug addict and now Walter as a feared despot.

  As the credits rolled some people his
sed and booed and before anyone had time to leave, Jackie walked quickly to our table. Steven suddenly materialised beside me as well. What was going on?

  ‘We’ve talked about it and we think now’s the time. I’m going to make a statement,’ Jackie whispered sternly in my ear, ‘but only if you’re ok with it. Stevo said you would be.’

  I looked to Steven who nodded and made a reassuring face. I nodded.

  ‘Sure?’

  I looked at Steven and nodded again.

  ‘Ok, let’s stand together then.’

  Jackie took my arm as I got to my feet and Steven stood on the other side of me.

  ‘Please friends, before you go, I’d like to make a wee announcement.’

  This stopped everyone in their tracks.

  ‘There’s been a lot of unpleasant accusations made in that programme. We all know what gossip is like in this wee village and how quickly nasty rumours fly around. Lots of things are said, and maybe a lot more should be said.’

  Jackie looked quite pointedly at me when he said this.

  ‘But we can’t let our community be divided. We must stand together. So we, and when I say we, I mean me and my family: my daughter Trixie and my grandson Steven …’

  After all these months under his nose my dad had finally acknowledged me. I may have gasped, but if I did I was the only one – everyone else seemed to be aware of our family ties.

  ‘… my family stands here by our friends Jenny and Walter, who we know to be honourable people. And I hope you’ll all join us in celebrating them as a couple.’

  Again, no surprise. Most people stood and clapped, there were no more jokes or banter, no more whistles or catcalls, just supportive applause.

  Jenny seemed almost overwhelmed. She looked like she might cry. I must have been close to tears myself because she gave me a secret wink and I took a big breath.

  The evening had suddenly taken a tremendous turn for the better. Everyone in Inverfaughie now officially knew that I was Jackie’s daughter. It didn’t seem that big a deal. I never imagined this – if I had, I’d probably have thought I’d feel euphoric. What I felt instead was calm; a quiet satisfaction that something had finally clicked into place.

  It was a big night too for Walter and Jenny: they were finally out of the closet and Jackie’s endorsement had turned the documentary’s hatchet job into a victory rally.

  But of course there were no cameras there to record it. I remembered what Rudi had said: the whole world would have been watching telly. The problem was that they didn’t know Jenny, or Walter. The rest of the world didn’t know that film for a damned lie.

  Chapter 65

  The following Tuesday Jan asked me out. It wasn’t a date as such – technically he merely invited me to attend a public meeting, so I suppose, in one sense, he asked everyone in the village out – but I went anyway. If I’m honest, I wondered if this informal ‘date’ might lead to something else, a right good soaping, for instance.

  Jan and Mag were giving a talk on Faughie council’s newly adopted policy of renewable energy. Energy was a hot topic in the village now. Since the checkpoint had been established there had been a ‘problem’ with fuel deliveries. Without diesel to operate their generators, the TV news’s massive OB unit trucks lay like beached whales by the side of the roads.

  Mag’s part of the talk was complicated and boring but the good thing was that when it was Jan’s turn to talk, it was perfectly permissible to stare at him; in fact, it was the polite thing to do. He began, in his mesmerising Dutch/Scottish accent, by talking about a time, two and half million years ago, when humans first started using tools. Jan held us spellbound as he acted it out: the first man to tentatively smash something with a rock, to use the flint edge to cut.

  ‘That first man changed our future.’ said Jan. ‘He could not know it then, but from a modern perspective we can appreciate that this was a huge step in human evolution.’

  I certainly could.

  ‘That primitive man believed he was only bashing something with a stone, but if he could see what this would eventually lead to: the iron age, the wheel, electricity, space exploration, the digital age; if he’d understood the significance of that first small action, you can imagine how excited he would have been.’

  I could; I was very excited.

  ‘You and I are the descendants of that primitive man. And, credit where credit’s due, we learned fast. Let’s face it: who dares wins, right? We were resourceful. We were the smartest, the fastest. We carved out empires showing the rest of the world how to use the technology we’d created. Yes! Finally the chance to make some real money! And we’ve been making it ever since. We’ve fished, and farmed, chopped wood, mined coal, drilled for oil. We’ve been bringing home the bacon, earning an honest buck, we’ve used it up and thrown it away, we’ve even polluted the air we breathe, but we’ve created huge wealth. Huge! Multimillion-pound wealth. Billionaire wealth.

  ‘For whom? Are you wealthy? I’m not. Nearly every penny of mine that comes in goes straight back out again on petrol, electricity, the supermarket. Somebody somewhere is making money, but it certainly isn’t me. And now I no longer have the forests, I don’t have healthy rivers and seas, I don’t even have clean air to breathe any more.

  ‘I’ve been ripped off. And now everything is wasted, rubbish.

  ‘But you know what? It isn’t. This planet is just like us. We get ill but then, if we rest up and take care of ourselves, we get better again. That’s what the Earth does. We’ve learned that we don’t need to chop down trees, we can pollard; prune the trees and still have all the wood we need. We can fish so long as we throw the wee ones back. We can grow food and, if we manage it well, it’ll keep on growing and providing for us. We’ve already got everything we need to make all the energy we want and more, ten times, a hundred times more. Sunshine, water, wind – these things never run out.

  ‘So now we’re at the next big step in human evolution. Now we realise that we can’t keep using everything up and throwing it away any more. We know it’s possible to work with the planet. We have the technology, not to make more money for global corporations and billionaires, but to secure the future for our children. Ladies and gentlemen, we’re all still that man with that rock; the difference is that this time we have the experience, knowledge and technology to understand its significance. Pioneering renewable energy here in Faughie, leading from the front, shining a renewable beam to light the way for others to follow, isn’t that exciting?’

  I kicked off the applause. Who knew renewables could be this thrilling?

  I wasn’t the only one. Jan was asking for scrap metal donations and volunteers to help install the wind and water turbines, and, in a heightened barn-raising atmosphere, all the men were putting their hands up. I put it down to Jan’s charisma and the blitz spirit provoked by that awful documentary. There was a newfound sense of community in Faughie or maybe it was only me who was newly finding it. I probably had Jan to thank for that as well. While Jan continued to captivate his audience, I suddenly saw Steven squeezing past the people in my row to get to me. As he slowly made his way towards me, he frequently apologised for bumping people and, once, for standing on Moira Henderson’s foot. He looked mortified. I was surprised: Steven never drew attention to himself like this, but I was delighted that he was so keen to sit with me.

  ‘Thanks for coming,’ I whispered, ‘I think you’ve missed the best bit though.’

  ‘Did you not see me?’ Steven asked, not taking the trouble to lower his voice.

  ‘Shhh! See you where?’

  Steven could barely restrain himself. ‘I’ve been standing at that side door waving for the last ten minutes!’

  I was baffled. I hadn’t seen him, but not only that: why was he waving? He handed me a note. It simply said: ‘Urgent – meet at my house. Tell no one. J.’ I laughed. Jenny’s message was all very cloak and dagger and quite unnecessary, probably. It was so cryptic I wondered if the note would self-destruct in
the next five seconds.

  ‘Can I at least stay till the end and say goodbye?’ I asked. ‘Jan asked me to come; I don’t want to be rude.’

  Since it had first been suggested I couldn’t stop imagining the soaping up.

  ‘Up to you,’ said Steven huffily.

  Right, so, it was up to me. I’d stay to the end. I turned my attention back to Jan’s lovely talk. It had to be something pretty serious for Jenny to summon me like this, she’d never done that before.

  ‘But it does say urgent. If you want to risk the security of Faughie that’s up to …’

  ‘Oh for god’s sake, let’s go then!’ I hissed, and then we began squeezing past everyone in the row.

  ‘Sorry. Excuse me. Sorry. Oh, I’m so sorry,’ I said, much too loud.

  I’d stood on Moira Henderson’s other foot.

  *

  Steven escorted me as far as Jenny’s house and then doubled back to the meeting. It was Brenda who opened the door.

  ‘How was Mag’s presentation?’ she asked me.

  ‘Terrific.’

  Whatever this emergency was, it must be serious. She was an incredibly supportive mum; I’d never known Brenda to miss any of Mag’s events.

  ‘I couldn’t get away. We’ve just been working flat out,’ she explained in an apologetic tone.

  I nodded my understanding.

  ‘Affairs of state,’ she muttered, lifting her eyebrows.

  Brenda led me into the living room where Jenny sat at the dining table, still with the Faughie flag draped across it, punching numbers into a pensioner’s supersized calculator.

  ‘If we take off what she’d pay the UK in stamp duty and inheritance tax I can get the asking price down by nearly 37 per cent,’ said Jenny without looking up.