Naming the Bones

by Louise Welsh

  ‘I’d thought I was Red Riding Hood, now I was Alice fallen down the white rabbit’s burrow. I wanted to ask if it was a poem, but I couldn’t because worse than the strange sounds and moving colours was the fear. It paralysed me. I tried closing my eyes, but the shapes were still there, organising themselves into patterns behind my eyes. Did you ever have a kaleidoscope as a child?’

  ‘Yes.’

  ‘I didn’t. Maybe they weren’t invented, or maybe they were too expensive in those days for the likes of us, but years later my daughter Jennifer got one in a present. I took a wee look through it and felt like I was going to be sick.’

  ‘Because it was like your bad trip?’

  ‘You don’t even need me to tell you, do you, son?’

  ‘I’ve never taken drugs myself.’ It was true, except for the occasional joint, soggy with other tokers’ saliva, passed around at parties when he was an undergraduate. ‘But I’ve read about plenty in novels. You had no idea what was happening, or what they gave you?’

  ‘No idea at all.’ Her voice softened with the awfulness of the memory. ‘I thought I was going mad. On top of the fear and the visions, I had an urge to vomit and yet I wasn’t sick until it was all over.’

  ‘Did the others notice you were having a bad time?’

  ‘They must have, because hands – I’m not sure whose they were – took hold of me. I think I struggled. I have a memory of shouting and of hitting out and of something, someone, pinning me down, but then I was drifting, I’m not sure for how long, in a kind of trance, not awake, not asleep. I prayed I wasn’t dead, because if I had been I’d have stayed in that state for all eternity.’ She stopped speaking and the only sound in the room was the wind tearing down the empty road outside and the hiss of the gas fire. ‘That was the wrong thought to have, because then all of eternity seemed to open up in my head and it was terrifying.’

  There was a bang at the window and Murray flinched.

  ‘It’s okay.’ Mrs Dunn gave him a reassuring smile. ‘That pane’s loose. I’ll need to get it seen to.’

  Murray asked, ‘Why do you think they drugged you?’

  Mrs Dunn opened her hands, revealing her empty palms.

  ‘Maybe they thought I would like it. After all, it had no bad effects on them. I suppose they were used to it. Or maybe they wanted to humiliate me.’

  The anger was sharp in Murray’s voice.

  ‘It was themselves they humiliated.’

  ‘Maybe.’ Mrs Dunn gave a sad smile. ‘There was one particular thing, though, that’s given me the shivers ever since, whenever I think on it.’

  She took a sip of her whisky and Murray said, ‘Just one thing?’

  ‘No, the whole day has the quality of a nightmare, when I remember it. That long walk in the blazing sunshine, the man falling at my feet laughing, Bobby’s scar and worst of all the colours loosening themselves from the books and floating in front of my eyes, no matter if I shut them or not.’

  He wanted to ask her to scroll back and tell him the worst part of the memory, but his interruption had distracted her and she was moving on again.

  ‘I’m not sure if I slept, but I came to sometime hours later. I was in total darkness. I sat up and hit my head on the roof of the recess and for a second I thought I’d been mistaken for dead and buried alive. I would have screamed, except that the feeling of dread was still with me, not so intense, but strong enough to make me freeze.’

  ‘You were petrified.’

  ‘Yes.’ She gave him a grateful smile. ‘That’s the word for it, petrified. But I realised that I could hear voices beyond the darkness of what I thought was my coffin and stuck my hand out. It hit wood on one side, but then I found the curtain and drew it back.

  ‘It was still bright outside, but that didn’t mean much – it was summer and this far north it can still be daylight nigh-on midnight. Christie and your Archie were sat at the table with the other two. God only knows what I looked like, but they behaved as if it were nothing unusual to see a madwoman appear from nowhere. Maybe it wasn’t.

  ‘There was a bottle of spirits on the table. Fergus offered me a drink. It was almost as strange as the trip, the way they looked at me as if nothing had happened. The night was still warm, but Christie had this muckle big coat wrapped around her.’ Mrs Dunn shook her head. ‘It looked like something you might pick up at Paddy’s Market, but she couldn’t have been more elegant if she’d been dressed from head to toe in couture. I knew then I’d been foolish ever to imagine the two of us talking about hemlines over tea and cake. Christie was one of those women who make their own style. She glanced me up and down without a flicker of emotion, and then she turned to Fergus and said, “Leave her alone. Can’t you tell she’s pregnant?”’

  Murray wondered why the landlady hadn’t mentioned it before and asked, ‘How advanced was your pregnancy?’

  ‘So early I didn’t know.’

  ‘So how could she?’

  Mrs Dunn shrugged as if it was nothing remarkable.

  ‘Some women can tell these things. But of course it gave me a shock when she said it. The one with the scar laughed and said something like, “When did that ever make a difference to him?” But by then I had come to my senses. I just wanted to be away and home.’

  ‘What did Archie do?’

  ‘Nothing. Just sat there as if it had hee-haw to do with him, which I suppose it did, except for that fact that it was his house and his guests.’

  ‘And no one went with you?’

  ‘Fergus got to his feet, but Christie told him to sit down. She said something about him having done enough damage and me knowing the way back myself. Then Bobby got up, and for one dreadful moment I thought he was going to offer to escort me, but she said “And that goes double for you.”’ They obeyed her like she was the leader of their gang. I should have been grateful, but for some reason it made me dislike her more. I’d gone all that way, full of hope, and those men had abused me.’

  It had been in his mind ever since she mentioned the rough hands and the bed recess.

  ‘Do you think they …’ Murray paused, searching for the right word and failing, ‘… when you were in your trance?’

  ‘I do remember fighting and shoving, but no. I would have known if anything more had happened. There are ways of knowing.’ Mrs Dunn put a full-stop at the end of the sentence, as if to make clear that certain things were not to be discussed outside women’s realms. Her voice regained its briskness. ‘So that’s it. Not much to do with Archie Lunan perhaps, except that was the life he was living and the people he was mixing with, when he was here.’

  ‘And he drowned soon after?’

  ‘A month later. His uncle had left a wee boat, not much more than a rowing boat with a sail stuck on it. Okay for fishing, but not big enough to risk on open water, even if the weather was fine.’

  Murray remembered the scant newspaper accounts he had photocopied in the library.

  ‘And it was wild, the night he went out.’

  Mrs Dunn nodded.

  ‘A bit like tonight. They reckon he sailed round towards the south-eastern point of the island. There’s a reason they put a lighthouse there. A wrecker’s paradise, John used to call it.’ As if on cue, the rain battered against the window, shaking the loose pane in its frame. ‘Archie won’t be having a very good night out there.’

  Murray caught his breath.

  Mrs Dunn met his eyes and said, ‘It was my eldest boy that named the cat. I never thought of him as having the same name as poor Lunan before.’

  ‘Why “poor Lunan”?’

  ‘Because he died so young.’ She gazed towards the windows and the sound of the storm. ‘And because he was with those people. Even in the state I was in, I could see he was out of his depth.’ She looked him in the eye. ‘Bobby had seemed unhinged to me. And Fergus? Well, Fergus had the kind of recklessness boys usually grow out of, if it doesn’t kill them. But Archie …’ She paused, looking up at the ceiling as if sear
ching for the right words. ‘Archie was handsome in a way the other two weren’t. He seemed separate from them too. Looking back on it, I’m not sure he knew what was going on. He only had eyes for Christie. I remember he reached across the table and took her hand. She let him, but I don’t think she looked at him once.’

  ‘Were you here the night he drowned?’

  ‘Yes, safe in bed like the rest of the island. The alarm wasn’t raised until the next day. By then his body had been taken by the currents.’

  ‘Who raised the alarm?’

  ‘I heard that it was the smooth one, Fergus, who came looking for him at the shop. God knows where Christie thought he was, but I suppose that even she didn’t think he’d go sailing on a night like that. There was a search, of course, though I think people knew it was a corpse they were looking for. Two days later Fergus and the other one left the island. I hadn’t realised it, but there had been talk about strange goings-on for a while.’ She gave him a smile. ‘The old islanders were maybe unsophisticated by my standards, but they knew a lot more than they let on, a lot more than me when it came to it. The two men were told to leave if they wanted to stay in one piece.’

  ‘And Christie?’

  ‘There were those who would have liked her to go too, but she was a different case. She had ties here, and though there were few that would speak to her at first, that never seemed to bother Christie. I dare say she could have been forced out, but she kept herself to herself, and though there was talk about midnight rambles and the amount of time she spent down by the old limekilns, people grew used to her. There were even a couple that were pleased when she published her first book.’

  Murray leaned forward.

  ‘What did you mean when you said she had ties here?’

  ‘Christie’s mother came from here. I thought you would have known that? She and Archie Lunan were cousins.’ The surprise must have shown in his face because Mrs Dunn smiled. ‘It seems strange to us, but I doubt that would have bothered the islanders if Archie and Christie had behaved. They travel far and wide, island folk. It wasn’t unusual even back then for men to have crossed the Atlantic and back several times, but there were always some who married not far from their own door.’

  ‘So the cottage where she lives now … ?’

  ‘Came to her after Lunan died. I hear she’s done a lot to it. I would hope so. But that visit was my first and last.’

  She paused and it seemed as if her story might be at a close. Murray said, ‘Mrs Dunn, you mentioned that there was something that chilled you even more than the rest of your experience. Will you share it with me?’

  She nodded and her voice took on the same clear quality he now recognised as the tone she used whenever she had something difficult to relate.

  ‘It was while I was still in the recess. I was groggy, but I could understand what they were saying. The one with the scar said, “She would do. No fuss, not much blood, a quick stab to the heart, over and out. Painless. All that energy released and the prize of a new dimension in store for her.” Fergus laughed, and told him he was talking something-I-won’t-repeat. Then he said, “Anyway, you can tell she’s not a virgin, and that’s what you’re always going on about isn’t it? Purity?” Christie snapped at them both to shut up. I was grateful to her, but I blamed her too. It might not have been logical, but it was her I had come to see.’

  ‘But she was right about what she said? You were expecting?’

  ‘Yes, I was.’ She looked back at the wedding photograph on the table by her side then said, ‘I’m afraid we lost that baby. Things just turn out that way sometimes, but I couldn’t help associating the miscarriage with what had happened and blaming them, even though I suspected it was nonsense.’

  They sat in silence for a moment, then there was the sound of a key in the lock. Mrs Dunn said, ‘That’ll be my archaeologists. Will you excuse me a moment, please, Dr Watson? They’ll be famished.’

  ‘And muddy?’

  ‘As gravediggers on nightshift.’ She put the bottle of whisky on the table. ‘Help yourself to another dram. You look like you could do with it.’

  Murray had no idea of how long he had been asleep. He picked up his phone and checked the time. Seven-fifteen. He must have been out for at least an hour. He shoved the mobile in his pocket. His mouth was dry, the dram where he had left it. He raised the glass to his lips and knocked it back, getting to his feet and banging his leg on the coffee table, almost tumbling it over. Mrs Dunn must have been listening out for him because she opened the sitting-room door.

  ‘I couldn’t bring myself to wake you. I kept you a bit of dinner back.’

  ‘That’s kind, but I have to be somewhere.’

  ‘You’re going to see her, aren’t you?’

  ‘I think I have to.’ He hesitated. ‘Did you ever talk about it with anyone else? A professional?’

  ‘Life is for getting on with, Dr Watson.’

  ‘It’s for looking back on too.’

  ‘True enough. But if you’re wise, you choose your memories. I don’t plan to think on this again, now that I’ve told you.’ She smiled. ‘You’re my sin-eater come to take it away.’ Mrs Dunn lifted a padded envelope from the hall table. ‘This came for you.’

  Murray turned it over and read Professor James’s address on the back.

  ‘Thanks. It’s a book of poetry someone thought I might enjoy.’

  ‘You say that as if you already know they’re wrong.’

  He slid the envelope unopened into his pocket. ‘I’m afraid I’m not very keen on the author.’

  ‘Oh, well.’ Mrs Dunn held the front door open for him.

  ‘You never know, they’ll maybe surprise you.’

  Murray thanked her and turned to go. He was already on the path when she called him back.

  ‘Dr Watson, Jamie the postie told me you were doing a rare tear the other day. You know, the roads here are good, as they go, but you have to take care. We had a bad crash here a few years back.’

  ‘I heard.’

  Mrs Dunn nodded her head, as if everything she needed to say had already been said.

  Chapter Twenty-Eight

  THE WIND THAT had battered against Mrs Dunn’s windows was battering against Murray now. It occurred to him that this was the kind of night when ill-prepared walkers drifted from pathways and died of hypothermia. He wondered if he should turn back, but kept trudging forth, head down against the wind, like some gothic rambler compelled to wander the world.

  Murray saw the lights of a car blinking from the distant curves and bends of the road ahead as if to emphasise how far he had left to walk. The warmth of Mrs Dunn’s living room had blown away in the wind. He started to murmur a song his father used to sing late on sleepless nights when he and Jack were boys. It was a ballad about what it was to be a cowboy; the impossibility of ever finding love and the inevitability of a lonely death. Sometimes, when he was young, it had seemed to Murray that misery was all he had. He would nurse it to himself, not daring to let it go for fear of losing himself. Murray remembered taking the point of his maths compass and twisting it slowly into his palm, digging a homemade stigmata. It was stupid. All of it. Life and what you made of it. Stupid.

  He heard the rumble of the vehicle’s engine, saw its headlights round the bend and stepped aside into the verge as a large, grey Land-Rover hove into view. The vehicle slowed to a halt beside him and the driver wound down his window.

  ‘Murray Watson?’

  ‘Yes?’

  His first thought was that something had happened to Jack and this person had been sent to find him, but the man was smiling beneath his shaggy beard.

  ‘Hop in and I’ll give you a lift.’

  ‘I’m going in the opposite direction.’

  The man grinned. His teeth shone piratical against the black of his beard and the dark of the night. He said, ‘We’re on a small island, how far can it be?’

  The wind picked up tempo, bringing a hail of rain with it. Murray jo
gged round to the passenger side, pulled open the door and climbed in. The stranger might be a descendent of Sawney Bean intent on reviving the family business, but if he was offering a lift, Murray was willing to give him the benefit of the doubt. He snapped the seatbelt home.

  ‘Good lad.’ The driver was wearing a chunky Shetland knit. His long hair was twisted into two plaits fastened with mismatched elastic bands. ‘There’s a place down here I can turn.’

  Murray thought he could smell the faint taint of marijuana beneath the pine car-freshener scent he always associated with long journeys and travel sickness. He said, ‘This is good of you.’

  The stranger reversed the Land-Rover into the entrance of a field then looked at Murray.

  ‘You don’t remember me, do you?’

  Murray stared at his face. Some memory stirred, and then slithered from his reach.

  ‘Maybe it’s the beard?’

  ‘You’re pretty beardy yourself.’ The man laughed. ‘I probably wouldn’t have clocked you if Mrs Dunn hadn’t mentioned you were on the island. She likes her academics, does our landlady.’ He stuck out his hand. ‘Jem Edwards. You used to go out with Angela Whatsit, didn’t you? I was in her year. We went for a drink a few times.’

  ‘God, yes. You were there the night we went to see The Fall.’

  ‘That was a good gig.’

  The driver held out a hand and Murray shook it. Jem looked older and broader, but he remembered him now. He’s been one of Angela’s archaeology crew. Good-natured, hard-drinking, tendency to dress like a Viking. Murray could have hugged him.

  ‘Didn’t you used to play the bagpipes?’