Vee: Lost and Found

by David Roberts

  The anti-aircraft guns had not managed to down any of the bombers, though some damage had been witnessed, and all four planes had made their escape to the south.

  By the time they had arrived at the main gate it was obvious the situation was very serious. An ambulance was leaving, heading for Ullapool. Since that was a journey of at least an hour and a quarter, it was clear that the injuries had to have been very serious.

  Adrian stepped out and reached into the back seat of the Rover for his bag. John made eye contact.

  “Just remember,” he said, “we can only do our best.”

  Adrian nodded and made his way quickly to the gatehouse, as John drove in to park at the main admin block- or as close as he could get. A guard in the middle of the road flagged him down.

  “Keep well back sir. The fires are still being dealt with and there may still be bombs yet to go off.”

  Up ahead, John could see the fire hoses at work on the admin block and the wooden hospital had also been hit. One end of it was still smouldering, though it looked mostly intact.

  “I’m Doctor Macleod,” he said. “They phoned me. Where should I report in?”

  The guard pointed to a collection of people gathered round some makeshift desks.

  “The bastards have bombed the hospital as well as the ships,” the corporal said, “but it will take more than that to stop us.”

  John hadn’t even reached the table when he heard a familiar voice on his right, calling him over. It was Captain Drummond, from the Medical Corps, the officer in charge of the military hospital.

  “Am I glad to see you! Fleck and Adams (two army doctors) are along there, dealing with casualties brought across from the ships that were hit.” He pointed in the direction of Aultbea. “Six fatalities as far as I know.”

  He shepherded John off the roadside to allow another ambulance to pass and head north. The driver acknowledged him.

  “That’s three ambulances we’ve sent to Ullapool. Serious surgery- internal wounds. We staunch them and pack them off. And amputations, though in theory we could do them here. We’re being swamped at the moment: serious burns and shrapnel wounds mainly. You’ll have your stuff with you? Good. There’s just me and three nurses in the hospital block. We lost one patient through smoke inhalation but the fire’s out now.”

  John looked towards the far end of the hut. It was completely burned away at one corner and there was heavy charring on the adjoining parts. Two soldiers were nailing boards to cover the hole. The hoses were now being directed on the roof, to prevent the asphalt from re-igniting.

  Inside, he could smell the acrid smoke but it was at least sheltered and the nurses (one of whom was Joan, who had helped with Mrs Simpson) were busy. He tapped Joan on the shoulder and she pointed to a sailor with a bad head wound. When that had been dealt with, and once John had checked him for other injuries, one of the nurses ushered him outside and brought in the next customer. This was a broken arm- a fracture rather than a dislocation- so a painkilling injection and a temporary splint were required. Then it was shrapnel wounds to the face; then leg injuries caused by high explosive. She was a young Wren, possibly even the one he had seen in Major Franks’ office. John thought it unlikely her foot could be saved but there was at least a chance if she went to Ullapool. When the next ambulance arrived, she would be put on it. Till then, the painkillers would have to suffice; painkillers and a tight dressing.

  By one o’clock the situation had stabilised. There had been eleven fatalities in all: three in the hospital, six from the ships and two had been killed by the bomb which had struck the admin block. John knew it could have been so much worse. During the night fewer staff were on duty. Margaret would have been at home, in all probability; that is what he hoped, at any rate.

  It was a harder day for Adrian. For a start, he had no first hand experience of serious injury, even as a witness. The sight of facial wounds and severe leg injuries came as a real shock. You heard about such things on the radio or saw them in newspaper photographs but these left you unprepared for the real thing. Also, whilst John could immerse himself in the work he was doing, as he adopted the sort of professional detachment decision-making required, Adrian could not. He felt himself to be what he actually was: a young lad out of his depth, constantly on the run backwards and forwards, from one duty to another. He could be shifting damaged roofing from the admin block or helping to load a patient into an ambulance or delivering supplies to the other doctors, Fleck and Adams, or watching the main gate.

  This was the day when Adrian saw his first dead body- the charred corpse at the far end of the hospital. The white covering sheet had been lifted by the wind, revealing part of the head and upper torso. He couldn’t bring himself even to cover it over again: someone else had to reach over from behind him and do it. Then the plywood sheets were nailed on and the hole was sealed, but the image- that stayed with him; that and a terrible knowledge of his own weakness.

  That, then, was the first of his two bad experiences; delivered to him via the bomb-doors of a Junkers 88. The second was to come through the letterbox and drop on a mat called ‘Welcome’.

  32 Gloomy Memories

  2014

  Leaving Lairg, they skirted the side of Loch Shin, retracing their steps from the day before. Then, after two or three miles, they headed into bleaker landscape to the north.

  The road itself was narrow but after the coastal routes of Aultbea and Scourie, where every twist could reveal something unexpected or dramatic, the journey to Altnaharra was a real disappointment.

  “I thought you said there were things that might interest me,” said Tom, as they headed along another straightish stretch of road in a featureless landscape.

  He reached into the glove-box and took out the “Secret Places…” He turned the pages over for a few minutes.

  “This part of Sutherland is called the Flow Country, apparently. There’s a huge amount of wetland between here and the north coast.”

  He looked back at the map. “There are dozens of tiny lochs. It must have been a cartographer’s nightmare getting them all down on paper.”

  “Big tracts of this will be completely deserted,” said Alastair. “You could wander off here and never be found. Like those poor devils in Argyll.”

  “You must think about them a lot; about who they were and what they were doing there.”

  “Sometimes I do, in places like this, but it’s in the background, not the foreground. Nobody can answer those questions so I’ve just moved on. It’s what you do…”

  They rounded a long left-hand bend and on their right lay the Altnaharra Hotel and a couple of houses. It was a lot grander than the Inn they had passed earlier. A bit further on and up the hill they reached the crossroads.

  “This is the place in the photograph,” said Alastair, as he drew the car to a halt. He reached across to the “Secret Places…” and flicked through it, the book falling open at each photograph.

  The car was a huge open-topped vehicle, probably from around 1914, going by the car itself and the fashions. It was parked at the crossroads between two huge pillars. Tom and Alastair climbed out and had a look around. It was probably the road going to Loch Eriboll rather than the Strathnaver one. The only piece of written information on the photograph was that one word ‘Altnaharra’. The people in the photograph were just passing figures, shadows on this landscape. Whoever they were, they had no significance now.

  They turned right and headed east, then north along the side of Loch Naver before following the river. The road was a little narrower and a bit twistier but neither it nor the landscape was all that different, so Tom went back to the house ads in the newspaper.

  Ullapool: two-bedroom semi detached house. Oil central heating. Near town centre. Off-street parking. Shed in garden. Energy efficient rating D.

  Really, that was about it as far as Ullapool was concerned but Ullapool remained an option just like Gairloch, Aultbea and Gruinard. He was seduced by one property- a
traditional, stone built structure described as “light and airy” and “secluded, but with commanding views of Loch Shin”. The location was given as “Grail”. The large paddock would surely be useful for something. He looked carefully at the map, going back to the task several times, widening the area of the search, going up and down the loch sides. Nothing. He looked up the index of place names at the back of the Road Atlas. No joy. He realised then that there was no Grail: it was Lairg with a typo.

  Tom flicked through the rest of the paper. He read out the headline from the council U-turn story about the public toilets and outlined the main thrust of it, though ‘thrust’ probably wasn’t the right word.

  There was a small photo of an RSPB man with a dead buzzard. The police were asking the public for information on any similar incidents of bird poisoning. Momentarily, he thought of Eleanor. Then he saw a story which made him smile.

  “What have you found?” asked Alastair. “Come on, spill. Two neighbours fighting about a hedge? A story about a missing rabbit,‘Where has Lugsy gone, asks six year old’?”

  “Not at all. It’s a human interest story. Local doctor, eighty, marries childhood sweetheart.”

  “What age is she though? She might just be after his money.”

  Tom looked over the article. “Apparently not. Retired Gairloch doctor Jamie MacLeod… then there’s a wee bit about him. Then there’s a bit about her. She’s eighty-three.”

  “You’ll like this bit. The reporter asks him about the relationship, as if it’s any of his business really, and this is what the doctor says… ‘Some may be a little surprised that it took me so long to achieve marital status, but in truth I’ve always been attracted to older women.’ Good on you, doc.”

  “Nice one,” said Alastair. “He’s obviously got the right sort of attitude. They’ve probably been widowed.”

  Tom looked back at the article.

  “Nothing here to suggest that. They’ve known each other for years, it says. She moved up from the Midlands shortly after the war. Oh, that’s interesting: she lived in Annat!”

  “What’s her name?”

  “Ellie Macleod, nee Fallows… That’s her, isn’t it? That’s the woman you visited with the book. Her photo’s here.”

  Alastair pulled into the roadside, where Tom handed him the paper. They were together, Doctor and Mrs MacLeod, holding glasses of Champagne. It was definitely her. She was about twelve years older but her eyes were the same, with a very open, friendly intelligence.

  Two miles on they reached the memorial to Donald MacLeod: a large plinth with a sloping top and a plaque showing the landscape in outline, with information about the cleared village of Rosail. On one of the sides there was also information about Donald himself, a local man who had tried, by legal means, to halt the evictions. His attempt failed because the laws were framed for the benefit of the landowners, whose agents were so powerful that they controlled the courts anyway.

  The plaque, Tom noted, also referred to MacLeod’s book ‘Gloomy Memories’ which he produced years later, long after moving to Canada. Tom looked around.

  “I’d rather live in Canada than here,” he thought, “but that isn’t the point.”

  He wandered down to the river and noticed something unusual. It was some sort of optical illusion- the river seemed to be flowing uphill. It seemed to him to capture perfectly the plight of the people who had lived there. As far as their interests were concerned, everything was flowing in the wrong direction. Geography, human affairs, history: everything had conspired against them. Tom knew about The Law; knew how even well-meaning legislation could lead to unfairnesses. With laws actually designed to be unfair, the people of Strathnaver would have had no chance.

  When he got back to the car he saw that Alastair was already back inside, looking at the paper.

  “That book ‘Gloomy Memories’, you said I could borrow it sometime. Well, I’d like to if that’s OK.”

  “Sure, but it’s hard work. Don’t expect to be entertained.” He looked down at the article once more. “I see from this that they’re not having a big foreign honeymoon.”

  “Yes, I saw that,” said Tom. “The guy from the paper was probably having a laugh when he asked about that. He’s eighty-two and she’s eighty-six, for God’s sake. Even so, it’s difficult to avoid thinking about the unthinkable.”

  “I imagine they would pick up on that and have a wee smile to themselves, not that the reporter would have noticed. He would probably just have seen them as a pair of old folk. He probably squeezed them in before the interview with Flopsy the rabbit or something.”

  “They’re going to Ullapool you know. A few days in Ullapool, then back down to the house in Gairloch.”

  “Yes, I saw that.” After a pause he added, “I thought she’d be dead, you know. When I drove through Annat and someone else was in the house I just assumed….I’ve often thought about it, you know, about what I should have done: gone up to the house and asked; or I could have asked at the shop. The postmistress would have known. But I just drove straight through.”

  “Everybody does that kind of thing. We’re making decisions all the time. Later on some of them are bound to look like bad decisions; and of course it’s only the bad ones you think about because they’re the ones that bug you.” He paused for a moment. “Try thinking about the good decisions you’ve made instead, the ones that turned out well. That’s what I try to do. Try thinking about that Australian girl: that would certainly cheer me up. God, I don’t know how you did that. I’m never that lucky. Maybe I’m trying too hard….. I think you should phone her.”

  Alastair smiled.

  They pulled up to the junction on the coastal route, the A836.

  “Well,” said Alastair, “it’s right to Bettyhill. If you fancy some chocolate or a quick visit to the museum we could go there, though I don’t know for sure that it is open.”

  “No, let’s go left, straight to Ullapool. I know what happened here was important and that we should all know about it, but I’ve seen enough.”

  “I know just how you feel. I’ve felt the same every time I’ve used this road from Lairg. Whatever the weather is like it always leaves me feeling…” he paused while he searched for the right word…. “gloomy.”

  “Why do you use it if it makes you feel this way?”

  “It’s hard to explain. I think part of me feels you can’t just do the good bits. Scotland’s got more to it than that. But a simpler answer is that you need to have driven along roads like that in order to get to places like this.” Ahead of them, they could see the River Naver widening out into the Bay of Torrisdale and beyond that the Pentland Firth. Out of sight to the North-east lay Orkney .

  The sign on the main coast road said Tongue, Durness, Scourie, Ullapool. It was going to be an interesting afternoon’s journey, with clifftop views of the coastline, and the road skirting the mountains- and all in the knowledge that there was a good room and a meal booked and ready for them in the evening. From here on, it was all about looking ahead and, for Alastair, a question that was beginning to take shape: a question whose long roots were only beginning to become exposed.

  33 The Letter on the Mat

  Gairloch 1942

  For some reason, the hens weren’t laying. That was the second time in a week. Maybe they were getting old too.

  It was seven-thirty, and Mhairi was exactly half-way through a cup of tea, when she heard the metallic ‘thunk’ of the letterbox. Wrapping her dressing gown around her a little more tightly (it was a cold morning) she made her way to the front door.

  “I’ll give Jamie another ten minutes,” she thought to herself, “and finish my tea.”

  There were three envelopes on the mat. She picked them up and looked at each in turn. One was for her: that would be Elizabeth writing back. About time. There was a letter for the surgery. Was it really quicker to type the address? There was also a letter for Adrian. The postmark was the same but it wasn’t Ellie’s handwriting. Could
be anything.

  Almost a year had passed since Adrian had moved in with them and things had gone well, by and large. He was still the shy, rather lanky lad they had taken in, but he had filled out a bit, and there was no doubt the war had changed the way he saw things. She thought back to the night of the biggest raid on the base. It had left him morose for weeks.

  Since then, though, he had brightened up. In fact they had all brightened up because the thing which took precedence over everything else: The War, now seemed to be moving in the right direction. The German and Italian armies had surrendered in North Africa. The Russians were still hanging on in Leningrad, but they had smashed a huge German army at Stalingrad. Mhairi felt a grim satisfaction that ‘their’ convoys had made a contribution to this. Who would have thought that a tiny out of the way place like Loch Ewe could have had a hand in such events?

  There were still difficulties of course: the rationing; the bombing raids; the terrible human cost which seemed to go on and on. In the Far East, the situation was unclear. You could never be sure about what you were being told, but it did seem like the Americans were beginning to overpower the Japanese. This certainly made sense to Mhairi, when she thought of all the new American lorries (‘trucks’ they called them) and jeeps, and now guns and servicemen. Nearly everything being taken on the Arctic convoys would be American-made, she thought. How could anyone stand up against that, year after year, all those tanks and guns?

  Mhairi took Adrian’s letter upstairs and left it at his door. He had been home late the previous night, so he was not due to start until two o’clock. He’d find it there all right.