by Jeff Gulvin
She wrote a long letter to her mother; she wasn’t quite sure why, but all at once she needed to. They spoke on the telephone quite often, but every once in a while she felt the need to sit by the stillness of the loch and write. Taking paper and envelopes from the bureau she had kept when her aunt died, she wandered down to the shingled beach. Mid-morning, the sun stretching, no breeze at all coming in from the sea. She sat on a large flat stone, blackened at the edges by a skirt of water reed and jutting strategically from the shingle. She rested the pad of paper on her knee, barefoot, the stones not bothering her, and gazed across Loch Gael to the grey green of the hills. No movement, no sign of life, just the handful of houses and the water. Sometimes canoeists would venture this far on the twin rivers; not today, though; today there was a perfect sense of peace. And yet she felt no peace. Her peace had been invaded; the peace in her soul, which she only achieved during the solitude of her summer sojourns, had been interrupted. Yesterday—the terrible discovery on Tana Coire, Atholl McKenzie’s wanton act of destruction. She had informed Daniel Johnson as soon as she’d got home, but he told her there was little they could do about it. He would speak to the police, but without any evidence he doubted they would act. Their relationship with farmers was fractured at the best of times. They wouldn’t want to exacerbate things without concrete evidence. So the eagles were gone, and with them Imogen’s peace.
She would try to indicate her feelings to her mother in an implicit way, hoping that she might sense her disquiet from the general tone of the letter. Her aunt would have sensed it; not a word would need to be spoken. She paused, pen poised, looking at the whiteness of the page, and wondered how she could convey the sense of emptiness she felt this morning. Her mother was not the least bit intuitive, unlike her aunt, who many people believed had the second sight of the Celts. Imogen remembered how they had returned from seven years in the United States with her brother travelling in a coffin. Her mother, of course, had been on the telephone and told everyone what had happened, and that they were flying Ewan’s body back to be buried in Edinburgh. Her aunt had come down to the funeral and, arriving at the church in Corstorphine, she had taken Imogen’s hand and held it for the entire service. When Imogen looked up at her there was a light of recognition in her eyes, as if she understood things that only Imogen knew.
She laid the page aside and watched a cormorant dive into the loch. He had flown in from the sea in search of salmon. He wouldn’t find any in Loch Gael, of that she was certain. The sun warmed her face and she crossed her legs and leaned back, hands buried deep in the cooling shingle. Closing her eyes, she lifted her face to the sun and allowed it to seep into her skin. What could she tell her mother? She felt a terrible sense of loss, as if something precious had been stolen from her. But maybe that was not all; maybe it was an accentuation of a deeper, old loss, a long-term loss. Perhaps she was reminded of the something that had gone out of her when her brother had died. She didn’t know exactly what it was, but she needed to share it with somebody. The more she looked at the letter, however, the less she thought that somebody was her mother.
She finished it, though, not very hopeful that any of the vibes she wanted to impart would find their mark. She considered trying to explain her feelings in an explicit way, but ever since Ewan had died her mother had found explicit emotion of any kind too hard to handle. She had spent the rest of her emotional life skirting round difficult situations. If she felt she had happened upon something, discovered it for herself, she would dig away like a terrier at a burrow. If, on the other hand, something was laid bare before her, she shrank back from the confrontation.
Imogen addressed the envelope and drove down to the post office. Colin Patterson’s wife was serving. It was Thursday and there was a small queue for pensions; Imogen had to wait her turn. Morrisey was there, paying his electricity bill, and a couple of lads from the McClachlan Hatchery were also hanging around. They nodded to her and she nodded back, then she stood in the queue, aware of their roving eyes on her hair, her back and her legs beneath the cotton dress. Her turn came to be served and Mrs Patterson looked up, smiled, then saw who it was and glowered. Imogen flinched, recovered and considered telling her exactly what she thought of her and her husband’s pitiful, unwanted attentions. But she decided against it. Open confrontation with a middle-aged frump in a post office was not her idea of a good time. Instead, they regarded each other as if they were both experiencing the same bad taste in the mouth. Imogen smarted at the idea that this woman could conceive of her being attracted to a man like her husband, and by the time she stepped outside again the colour had risen like thunder in her face. She walked straight into Jean Law.
‘Imogen.’ Jean looked at her, head tilted to one side. ‘Do I detect a frown?’
Imogen took her by the arm and led her away from the post office. ‘Yes, Jean, you do. Let’s go and get some coffee.’
They drove to Kyle and sat in a hotel where nobody knew them, and there all of Imogen’s frustrations boiled over. ‘What is it, Jean? What’s it all about?’ She shook her head. ‘I couldn’t care less about Colin Patterson. She ought to know that. Why is it that a single woman in a small town is the butt of everyone’s imagination? What do they think I get up to, for God’s sake?’
Jean laid a hand on her arm. ‘Don’t let it bug you so much. You’re letting them win.’ Imogen exhaled harshly through her teeth. ‘They’re not winning, Jean. But I am losing.’ She sat back. This was much more than Patterson’s wife. This was the hopeless letter to a mother who could never be there for her; a mother who only had room for the son who’d died thirty years previously. This was everything she had gone through from that day to this, every tiny emotion, every failed liaison. Dealing with males like Patterson and the pathetic John MacGregor, boors like McKewan and downright bastards like Atholl McKenzie.
Losing, that was exactly how it felt, quietly, gradually losing, slipping away into some dark corner where she could sit and hug herself. She looked out of the window and Skye rose in sharp grey contours, the water choppy and broken before it. Sea and land and sky, and yet she felt as penned in as she had ever been. Jean was watching her over the rim of her cup. ‘There’s much more to this than just Patterson’s wife, lassie. What on earth is going on?’
Imogen looked at her then, and all at once she felt weary. ‘Oh, Jeanie,’ she said, ‘I wouldn’t know where to begin.’
Connla drove round the bend in the road and Eilean Donan Castle dominated the point. Built on a green isle flat against the surface of the loch, a great expanse of water before and beyond it. A single-track bridge—three arches fixed it to a point on the mainland—gave it access and a vantage point like no other. He slowed the truck and pulled into the car park, recognizing the scene from somewhere, but not remembering where. People were buying tickets for a tour, but he had never been one for tours so he just walked to the edge of the loch. Seaweed choked the shallows beyond the boulder-strewn banks and Connla stared at the castle walls reflected in the stillness. The weed gave way to more rock, and then darkness as the bank dropped away sharply. He looked at the fortress once more—grey stone bleached almost white in the sunlight.
Gaelloch, according to this map, was a little further on towards the Kyle of Lochalsh and the Skye Bridge. A right turn, then a few miles back into the hills beyond Loch Long to the smaller Loch Gael. He had no address other than the village, but it didn’t look very big on the map. It occurred to him that he had no idea who Imogen was now, or what kind of person she had become. Was she married? How many children did she have? She might not even remember him, and then all at once he wasn’t sure he wanted her to.
He spotted a white-faciaed hotel in the village, just along from a bar called McLaran’s. A young red-haired Irishman called Billy in a pale green shirt and darker green tie served him. ‘What name would it be, sir? And is it just the one night?’
‘I’m not sure about the one night,’ Connla said slowly. ‘I guess I can stay longer if I
want?’
‘Sir, you can stay as long as you like. But we are expecting a party up at the weekend.’
‘I’ll know by the weekend,’ Connla said. ‘My name’s Brady. John Brady.’ He paid for the room in cash.
Upstairs he could see the loch and, if he craned his neck, a tiny bit of the castle. He sat on the narrow single bed, gazed towards Skye and wondered at himself. Where had John Brady come from? He didn’t know anyone called Brady. Perhaps it was his own Irishness, or the evident Irishness of his host, but the name just popped into his head. All of a sudden he didn’t want to be Connla McAdam here, not yet anyway. He wasn’t sure why, and the thought of lying had no appeal, save some misguided sense of safety. Imogen Munro—after thirty long years. What could he possibly say to her?
For a long time he sat there, wondering quite why he had come. All thoughts of photography and panthers were gone. All he could see was the past and her face as an eight-year-old, with her jet-black hair and that old yellow blanket curled around her fist. It was an unnerving image. It had been then, and it was now, and yet that card in Dunkeld: it triggered other memories, not just of how things had been that day by the Salmon River, but before that, little Imogen the Twaggle Tail, who trailed after her brother and had a crush on Connla. There were two years between them, and he had felt protective over her, especially when Ewan was being his most spiteful self. She had been so bright and clear-eyed, and everyone loved her for her tumbledown hair and trailing yellow blanket. He wasn’t the slightest bit surprised that she could paint so beautifully; the Indian figure was exactly as he remembered it. The shock still set his skin tingling as he thought about it. Imogen had always had an eye for detail. He remembered the way she talked about the trees in the forest during the days before Ewan got killed. She saw things in their shapes that he had never heard anyone else talk about. There was an affinity there, the kind of affinity he imagined she had with this beautifully savage place. He longed to see her, and yet in the same breath he was full of trepidation.
He went back downstairs and ordered some lunch in the bar. A couple of locals came in for a pint. They were noisy, laughing and joking among themselves. One of them, a tall, bearded man with oily hair and bad teeth, nodded to him.
‘How you doing?’ Connla said.
The man squinted. ‘American?’
‘South Dakota.’
‘Oh aye. Over here on holiday, are you?’
Connla swallowed beer. ‘Yeah, I guess you could call it that. But I’m looking for somebody actually. An artist. Her name’s Imogen Munro.’
The man stared at him for a long moment, and there was silence from his companions. Connla got the distinct impression he had said the wrong thing. The man continued to stare and he rested one elbow on the bar. ‘You know her?’
Connla shook his head. ‘No. I saw her greetings cards in a store in Dunkeld. I thought I might buy a painting from her.’
‘So you’re not a friend then.’
Connla could see the stickiness of the ground. ‘Never met her.’
The man seemed to brighten. ‘She lives in Gaelloch.’
‘Aye, teaches school at Balmacara,’ one of the others put in. The big man stilled him with a glare and looked back at Connla. They were about the same height, but the Scot was broader, thicker set, heavier. ‘So you’re not a friend then,’ he repeated.
Connla made an open-handed gesture. ‘Like I told you just now, I never met the lady. I’m just your average Yank tourist looking to take a piece of Scotland home with me.’
They laughed then and the big man bought Connla a drink. ‘Andy McKewan,’ he said. ‘I keep a fishing boat at Kyle.’
Connla shook hands with him. ‘John Brady. I take pictures of wildlife.’
‘Well there’s plenty o’ that round here. Red deer, roe, fox, otter, badger, eagles, not to mention the ospreys.’
‘How’re the ospreys doing now? I heard they were well guarded.’
‘Och, they’re breeding fine just now.’
Connla’s food came and he moved to a table by the window to eat it. Clouds swept in from the sea and rain rattled the glass, yet he could see the sun was still shining over part of Skye. When he was finished, he ventured another question of McKewan.
‘You got any idea where I can find Mrs Munro?’
‘Miss, you mean. Well, Ms, I suppose it would be. She’s not exactly a stripling any more.’ McKewan cracked another grin. ‘She lives by Loch Gael. Cross the bridge there and take the first right, all the way back to the hills. Carry on till the road ends and you’ll not miss it. There’s only the one way in and out.’
Connla took the truck and headed towards the bridge that split the three lochs, Duich behind with the castle at the juncture with Alsh; and Loch Long, much smaller and narrower, off to the right. He could see the road snaking a path round the lip and he assumed that Gael must be further inland. He trundled across the bridge with the windscreen wipers flicking back and forth as the rain hove in from the sea. He could see the concrete arc of the Skye Bridge and made a mental note to cross to the island before he left, if only to see where Bonnie Prince Charlie had landed. It was weird, he knew the old story about the Stuart Prince and Flora McDonald, but you got the impression that the sea crossing was a hell of a voyage. Not if he went from here, it wasn’t; you could all but spit and hit Skye.
He took the road, as directed by the fisherman, and gently skirted Loch Long. It was single track with passing places, but he had to pull in only once. After seven or eight miles the mountains closed around him, then he crossed two bridges over the river. The first one was wooden, and for a moment he wondered how stable it would be. Beyond the second bridge cattle roamed loose, the black and white Friesian, not the shaggy red-haired long horns he had seen on the way up here.
Loch Gael was small even compared to Loch Long. It was wider though, and more rounded, with smoother shingle-strewn banks and flat, clear water. Gaelloch was no more than a clutch of houses, mostly white and single storey, without so much as a shop. The last house, though, whose front yard ran down to the beach was the grey-brown stone of the larger dwellings he had seen. It looked like it was a single storey, but the pitch of the roof was steep and he could see that it had been converted. Dormer-style windows faced both north and south. He pulled up, got out of the Land-Rover, scratched his head and looked for someone to ask. Then he saw a metal mailbox nailed crudely to the gatepost. Munro, it read, and he knew that he had found her.
There was no vehicle in the drive, just hens wandering loose and a big old rooster with a scarlet crown who stalked up to him; chest puffed up in challenge.
‘Hey, buddy,’ Connla cooed at him. ‘Take it easy. I just want to know if your momma’s home.’ He looked at the backyard, lawned, although pretty much unmown, with the odd shrub here and there. Wild rather than well kept. A wooden chicken coop was perched on stilts behind the house, and the drive beyond the initial gravel was hard-baked dirt, rutted here and there and runnelled by rivulets of rainwater. He rapped on the side door and waited. Nothing. He knocked again. Still nothing. She wasn’t there. Connla studied the front aspect where the loch stretched to the mountains which rose purple and blue in the gradually lowering cloud. He got the distinct impression that a storm was blowing in.
Sixteen
CONNLA DRANK IN THE pub that night and made conversation with the locals. He found out that the estate was owned by Arabs and the salmon hatcheries weren’t doing so well. There seemed to be little work, save forestry or taking to the sea, as with Andy McKewan. He and his crew were out in force again, and Connla got the impression that he was something of the big man in the community. He listened to their tales of fishing off the Rockall in weather that sent lesser mortals scurrying for the shelter of Hebridean harbours. In the morning he paid his £4.60 and crossed the bridge to Skye. Imogen rode home in the lee of the Kintail Sisters, following the River Shiel with the main road on her left. A full day out, trying to shake off the depression gene
rated by the plight of the eagles and yesterday’s events. Jean had listened while she rambled on about her life, probably making no sense as she left so much out. There were things in her past that had remained secret and would do so still. But it had been good to talk nonetheless, particularly given the impotency of her letter to her mother.
August was beginning to wane and thoughts of the September term loomed like little spectres in her mind. She had left at dawn this morning and ridden beyond the Five Sisters through the Kintail Forest. It had rained more than she would have liked, but that didn’t overly bother her, although the thought of a long hot soak in the bath had a certain appeal. She rode at a trot, Keira sensing how close her stable and a hot mash supper were. They skirted the southern edge of Loch Duich and took the Keppoch Road. At the field Keira whinnied at the black-faced sheep which had invaded her pasture yet again. The Land-Rover was backed up on the hill, so if there was a problem with the starter motor Imogen could trundle down and bump start it. The nearest house to ask for help was Patterson’s, so she made sure she never left herself with a potential problem.
She led Keira to the old stone cottage, unsaddled her and broke away caked mud from her legs with the grooming brush. Keira loved every moment and her left hind leg quivered at the steady caress of the bristles. Loosed once more she made her way up to shoo off the sheep, while Imogen drew water from the hand pump and heated it on the stove she kept in her Land-Rover.
Connla had learned, by way of gossip more than anything else, that Imogen kept a horse on the hill road overlooking Loch Duich and that right now she was away in the mountains. He didn’t ask many questions, just listened to the bar-room banter and discovered that they all thought her a bit weird, taking off as she did whenever the opportunity presented itself. She was unmarried, no children and he got the impression that every man in the bar would like to get in her knickers. On his return from Skye he had driven up the hill road until he came across a battered Land-Rover and a horsebox in an empty field with a stone cottage standing. He parked his truck and sat for a long time, glimpsing part of her life and thinking back over thirty long years. A hundred different memories crawled from the fissures of his mind.
