The Crofter's Daughter

by Eileen Ramsay

  I had been sorry not to have rote before but I was woonded and in the hospital in Rooong thats in France, 25 Stayshonary. Your father was my sargint the best ever and I’m here becos he got killt for me. I wantit to say thanks but also to tell his son that the sarge was riting till him when he got it. I give him my unvilope and he was saying as how his boy was the best and he loved him and ment to say and he was proud that his boy was rite all the time and the grenade came and he yelled not him, you bastard, xcuse my french, and flung hissel on me and sometimes I wundered maybe he dun it for his boy too.

  Anyways, hope this finds you well and I will never forget the sarge and my mam too.

  Chay Maxwell

  ‘No more bad news, lassie?’ The old postman was looking at her and she became aware that tears were streaming down her cheeks.

  She smiled at him, a glorious, glowing smile. ‘Wonderful news, Davie. I knew this was going to be a very special day. Here, read it. It’s from the boy my father saved when he won his Victoria Cross.’

  Davie solemnly put down his bap, took out his glasses and fixed them on his nose before he took the sheet of paper. He struggled to decipher it. ‘Well, he never spent much time at the school, did he?’

  ‘Who cares? I’ll write to him. No, I won’t. I’ll go into Arbroath and take him and his mam my best boiling fowl. This will mean more to Ian than all his valuable wedding presents put together.’

  She would go in the afternoon when all her chores were done until it was time to feed the animals in the evening. First she would wring the hen’s neck and the carcass could cool while she was working. She gave Davie another bap and a second cup of tea and tried not to be impatient while he sat savouring them. He was, after all, her life-line to the outside world.

  But, at last he was gone, freewheeling as usual down the hill beyond the house to gather strength for the steep hill that led to the main road, and she put on her apron and went out to the coop to choose the hen.

  No matter how often she had had to do this unpleasant task, it got no easier. But, people had to eat, and a nice plump hen would be an excellent gift for Chay Maxwell and his mother. She wanted desperately to see the boy for whom her father had given up his life.

  She did what had to be done and left the rest of the relieved chickens to commiserate with one another and took the unfortunate hen back to the kitchen. The postman was out of sight but someone else was on the farm road, someone walking.

  ‘Good gracious, another visitor. Who can it be today?’

  She looked again at the small dark dot on the hill. Was there something familiar? No, she was desperately trying to find something recognisable but she thrust the wish away. It was a salesman, merely a salesman. But he was so thin, tall, not so tall as Ian but thinner, so much thinner even than someone who had spent over a year in a prison camp. She stood, the dead hen in her hand, and refused to hope, but she could not move from the path.

  The dark speck came nearer and got larger. Dark longish hair flopping over a too-pale face. He had seen her. He stopped. He looked and then he began to walk again, a gait she recognised, a stride that she had followed from the time, oh so long ago, when she had begun to follow her beloved brother and his friend, his friend.

  ‘Robin,’ she called and then she began to run and to cry at one and the same time and he began to run and when she reached him and was gathered up into his arms she had time to notice that he was crying too, before he bent to kiss her.

  He pushed her away, his face flushing with embarrassment. ‘I’m sorry,’ he said and his voice was hesitant and unsure. ‘I have no right . . .’

  She put her fingers up to his lips. ‘Oh, Robin,’ she began.

  ‘Let me speak, Mairi; for so long I have been unable to tell you. I was terrified, you see. Everything had been so clear when we were small. I was clever. I would go to the university, get a good degree, become a teacher, the seasons, everything in its place, following one another as the moon follows the sun. And you? You were just wee Mairi, an infernal nuisance, to be tolerated because of Ian. And then you stopped being a pest.’ He was looking away from her towards the sea as if the story was written there on the waves for him to read. ‘Then the war came and that was easy too, Mairi. I had to do my duty but Ian spoiled it because, next to my parents, I respected him most, loved him most, and he wouldn’t fight and I knew he could lick us all. So the questions started and I went to the Front and I shot people, Mairi, I know I did, day after day, but it was my duty, wasn’t it? And it was madness but you were there and I knew you were important to me, to my sanity, but that went too. Everything was so muddled, mixed up, like wire fencing that’s got all tangled. The noise, that unbelievable, insupportable noise, never stopped. Even when I was in the hospital or here in my bed at the schoolhouse, I could hear the noise and so I could hear nothing else, not Dad’s voice or yours or the doctors’. I had dreams.’ He looked away from her again, ashamed of his nightmares. ‘The dreams made me afraid and I’m afraid again, Mairi, that it took too long. I wasted time when we were young, so much wasted time.’ He looked down at her. How long had he known that he loved her? How long had he loved her? All his life? Since the dance at the kirk hall? What did it matter? She was so beautiful. Surely someone who was not afraid had come during those wasted years to tell her what a treasure she was.

  Mairi put her hands up and touched his shoulders. She looked into his face, so brown from his months in the sun. His body felt strong, although it was still too thin.

  ‘What is time, Robin? I read one of your books, one the Dominie loaned Ian. It’s still here. “We live . . . in feelings, not in figures on a dial. We should count time by heart throbs . . .” A nice poem, don’t you think?’

  He did not move. She kept her hands where they rested but looked deep into his troubled eyes and at last he spoke.

  ‘I know my feelings, Mairi, but I have no right to hope I know yours. I gave you nothing . . .’

  ‘You give me everything, Robin,’ she said and kissed him gently on his dry lips.

  And then he moved. His arms imprisoned her and he bent his head to kiss her more deeply.

  Still he could not allow the exultation to flow like warm wine through his blood. ‘Mairi? I can’t believe . . . surely . . .’

  This time her lips and not her fingers stopped his words. ‘Well?’ she asked when at last they drew apart. ‘Does that answer your question, Robin Morrison?’

  The tears started in his eyes and, embarrassed, he dashed them away. ‘I hoped, I prayed, but, heavens, Mairi, are all the men in Forfarshire blind?’

  ‘Could I see anyone else with my heart full of you?’ she said and kissed him again.

  ‘My dinner?’ he asked when they stopped for breath, glancing then at the poor old hen lying abandoned on the grass and they laughed again as she explained about the letter.

  They were walking now back to the farmhouse and her hand was in his, naturally, happily, where it had always belonged.

  ‘I still owe it to you to tell you everything, Mairi. Perhaps I should have written but I didn’t because I had to test myself, not my love for you. That has been strong and secure for a long time now, but my self, my head, I suppose. At Easter I went back to Rome and I got a job in the school where I taught before. They’ve asked me to sign a contract.’

  He turned to her and the delight on his face sent a chill of fear through her. He was so happy. He was well and he was wanted by people whom he respected.

  ‘That’s wonderful, Robin,’ she said and tried with all her heart to sound excited and happy for him.

  ‘It is, isn’t it? I’m well, Mairi. Now I can come to you with something to offer.’ He took the hen which she was still holding and this time it was he who laid it on the grass. ‘We’ll take that into Arbroath later. Right now . . . Oh, Mairi, I do love you so.’ And he kissed her again and this time as she responded she knew that she was offering him her heart, her future to do with as he chose. He understoo
d and exulted.

  ‘What would the village say?’ he asked laughingly. ‘What a hoyden that Mairi McGloughlin turned out to be. Come on, let’s get this poor old hen – hasn’t it gone through enough this morning – to its new home and then we’ll write to Ian and tell him we’re going to be married. You will marry me, Mairi, won’t you?’

  Mairi looked at the little house where she had grown up. She saw the roses clambering over the doorway, the old dog asleep in the sun. She saw the fields and she photographed them in their summer dresses onto her heart and she said goodbye. For Robin she would go anywhere.

  ‘Yes,’ she said simply.

  He turned to the hedgerow where the wild roses were blooming and he broke off one perfect little white briar rose.

  ‘Roses, Mairi. I promised you roses, and maybe for a year or two wild roses are all there will be. Schoolmasters don’t make a great deal of money. You won’t have a home like the magnificent one Ian now owns.’

  She put her hand to his lips and stopped him. ‘I won’t mind where we live, just as long as we are together. I’m sure I’ll like Italy.’

  ‘Italy? Well, it would be nice for a honeymoon, but I have no money left. We’d have to wait until next year and I want us to be well married by then; we’ve wasted so much time, Mairi, too much time.’

  ‘But of course, Robin. We’ll marry as soon as Ian gets back, before the harvest, so that you can be back in Italy by the start of the new term.’

  He looked at her and then realization dawned and he hugged her to him and laughed and kissed her and kissed her and laughed again.

  ‘What a brave woman! You thought I took the job in Italy? No, no, Mairi mine. I like Italy but I love you and . . . Mairi, I’ve taken a job teaching Latin and Greek in Dundee. We could live at the schoolhouse with my father but, oh, Mairi, couldn’t we live here?’

  Live here? To live on the farm with its memories of Colin and Ian, the child Mairi, Milly, Angus, Jean, and even Bert. With a husband she could become a tenant. And Robin had loved occasional days of harvest; he had loved lambs and calves and, most of all, he had loved sitting under trees with Ian while they read, or wrote, poetry. He had grown flowers to help him in his therapy; she could teach him how to grow other things. A farm would be a grand place for a teacher to relax, a grand place to bring up children, a grand place for a poet and his wife to bring their children. She looked at her rose, already drooping. She would take it home and press it between the pages of Ian’s first pamphlet of war poems, maybe between the pages with the poems called ‘Friend’ and ‘Mairi’.

  ‘This poor hen,’ she said, holding it up for inspection.

  ‘Let’s take it down to Arbroath,’ said Robin. ‘And then we’ll come back and we’ll talk, Mairi McGloughlin, about changing your name.’

  ACKNOWLEDGEMENTS

  Thank you to my nephew Eli Colner and his friend David Schertzer who rescued this story from the depths of Eli’s father’s computer – and never once laughed.

  ABOUT THE AUTHOR

  Eileen Ramsay grew up in Dumfriesshire. After graduation she went to Washington D.C. where she taught in private schools for some years before moving to California with her Scottish husband. There, she raised two sons, finished her Masters Degree, fell in love with Mexico, and published her first short stories and a Regency novel. The family returned to Scotland, where Eileen continued to teach and write and to serve – at different times – on the committees of the Society of Authors in Scotland, the Scottish Association of Writers and the Romantic Novelists’ Association. In 2004, her novel Someday, Somewhere was shortlisted for the Romantic Novel of the Year award.

  For more information, visit www.eileenramsay.co.uk

  Also in the Flowers of Scotland series by Eileen Ramsay

  Rich Girl, Poor Girl (previously published as

  Butterflies in December)

  A Pinch of Salt (previously published as

  The Broken Gate)

  The Farm Girl’s Dream (previously published as

  Walnut Shell Days)

  The Convent Girl (previously published as

  The Quality of Mercy)

  Welcome to the world of Eileen Ramsay!

  Keep reading for more from Eileen Ramsay, to discover a recipe that features in this novel and a sneak peak at Eileen’s next book . . .

  We’d also like to introduce you to MEMORY LANE, our special community for the very best of saga writing from authors you know and love and new ones we simply can’t wait for you to meet. Read on and join our club!

  www.MemoryLane.club

  Dear Readers,

  Why did I write The Crofter’s Daughter? So many reasons. The story deals with farming, education and war.

  I live in a house that is in the midst of beautiful farmland – not ours – although we do get great pleasure in studying it in every season.

  As for education, I have been both student and teacher on both sides of the Atlantic and education is very important to me. I want a good education for everyone. I have two school day memories that marked my life. One was when a young maths teacher, thinking that I was never going to understand what he was attempting to teach me, said condescendingly, ‘It doesn’t matter, you don’t need to bother your pretty little head about it.’ ‘Whoopee!’ said my teenage self. I even heard the door close in my brain. But my adult self is still angry that a teacher would say such a thing.

  The second remark was much later when we were waiting for exam results. The teacher separated the girls and the boys and told each group what the future might hold. Later the boys told us about marvellous possibilities, airline pilots, astronauts, engineers, lawyers, surgeons . . . the exciting list went on.

  Breathless with anticipation, the girls heard: ‘Well, you can always be nurses or teachers.’ Poor patients if I were the nurse! I became a teacher and I loved it, though when we were given the news we thought it a very narrow choice. Thankfully, when we moved on to secondary schools and met languages, sciences, history, geography, music and art, a new world opened.

  As a teacher, wherever I was in the world, I taught the prescribed curriculum, but I also introduced young children to opera and classical music, and I hope they still enjoy it.

  So that’s farming and education. War? Before his twenty-first birthday, our older son became an army officer and went immediately on active service and for some years was very active.

  At the time I had been asked to write another book and so I decided to set it in the Angus countryside. But, as my patient agent says, ‘What’s the plot?’

  My answer: a war to end all wars and two talented young men of high principles and very different plans for their futures, a girl who loves them both and who will stay behind to care for the farm and to take in the harvests. On Flanders’ bloody fields and on the beautiful fertile fields of Angus, our protagonists discover that in life and perhaps death, there is more than wheat to be harvested and treasured, much more.

  And mathematics and Eileen Ramsay? One summer, my husband coached me to a pass in a very important maths exam while sitting in a park, but it’s still not my favourite subject.

  Sincerely,

  Eileen Ramsay

  Mairi’s Shepherd’s Pie

  Shepherd’s pie is a traditional and hearty meal, originating from Scotland in the mid-nineteenth century. Mairi makes it for her father and brother in Chapter One, and serves it with Brussel sprouts.

  You will need:

  1 tbsp vegetable oil

  1 large onion, diced

  1 leek, sliced finely and rinsed

  3 medium carrots, diced

  500g lean lamb mince

  3 tbsp tomato purée

  3 tbsp Worcestershire sauce

  500ml beef stock

  900g potato, peeled and chopped

  100g butter

  2 tbsp milk

  1 tbsp cream (or, alternatively, milk)

  salt and pepper, to season

  Method:

  1. Pr
eheat the oven to 180oC (fan)/160oC/gas mark 4.

  2. Boil the potatoes until tender.

  3. Heat the oil and cook the onion, leek and carrots until soft.

  4. Turn up the heat and add the mince. Brown, then drain any fat.

  5. Mash the potato, adding the butter, milk and cream. Season to taste.

  6. Add the tomato purée, Worcestershire sauce and beef stock.

  7. Simmer for 45 minutes, removing the saucepan lid after 35 minutes. Season to taste.

  8. Place the mince in an ovenproof dish and cover with the mashed potato, using fork to texture the surface.

  9. Bake for 30 minutes or until the top is golden.

  10. Enjoy!

  If you enjoyed The Crofter’s Daughter, you’ll love this sneak peak of Eileen Ramsay’s next book, The Convent Girl.

  Prologue

  1933, Edinburgh

  BLAIR KNEW IT was not going to work. Ferelith could exert herself until she was blue in the face. Mother had set her mind, and more importantly her heart, against her. Grimly he kept smiling while his heart crumbled into little bits inside him. What could he do? He loved his mother who, since his father’s tragic early death in the Great War, had devoted her whole life to him. And yet, at the same time, and with an even fiercer passion, he loved the girl who was so bravely fighting a losing battle against the tide of inexplicable antagonism that flowed across the room towards her from the tiny, but oh-so-elegant, figure of his mother.

  Ferelith soldiered on. He knew her so well: he could see how near to tears she was and her soft west-coast accent got stronger and stronger as she struggled against the clipped vowels of the older woman.

  ‘Do you know, Mother?’ Blair was determined to help. ‘One of our professors says he wouldn’t doubt that one day Ferelith might well be Lord Chancellor.’