Peter May - Entry Island

Her face clouded. ‘You’ve left school already?’

‘Three years ago.’

Now she was astonished. ‘But you couldn’t have been any more than...’ She searched my face, trying to guess my age.

I helped her out. ‘Twelve at that time.’

‘That’s far too young to be leaving school. I’ll be tutored until I’m eighteen.’

‘I was needed to work on the croft.’

‘What kind of work?’

‘Well, right now I’m drystane dyking.’

She laughed. ‘Are you still speaking English, or what?’

I smiled back at her, enjoying the laughter in her eyes. ‘It means I’m building stone walls without mortar. Right now, a sheep fank up on the hill above Baile Mhanais. That’s the village where—’

She cut me off. ‘I know where you live.’

‘Do you?’ I was surprised.

She nodded. ‘I came once and stood on the hill and looked down at it. I was pretty sure I saw you on the shore. It looked as if you were gathering seaweed.’

I was excited by the thought that she had taken the trouble to come and see where I lived, but tried to hide it. ‘That’s quite possible.’

She cocked her head and looked at me curiously. ‘Why would you gather seaweed?’

‘It’s good fertiliser. We spread it on the lazy beds.’ I could see from her expression that she had no idea what I was talking about, and I didn’t want to seem like some peasant boy, so I changed the subject. ‘A tutor’s a teacher, right?’

‘A private teacher, yes.’

‘So do you go somewhere to be tutored?’

‘No, I’m tutored at the castle. My tutor has a room there.’

A group of boys pushing a cart at the gallop almost knocked us over, shouting at us to get out of the way, and we started walking along the seafront. ‘It must be amazing to live in a castle,’ I said.

But she didn’t seem impressed. ‘You live in one of those squat little stone houses with straw roofs,’ she said.

‘A blackhouse, aye.’

She shuddered. ‘I would hate that.’

Which made me laugh. ‘They’re not so little. There’s plenty of room inside for folk in one end and cows at the other.’ I knew this would get a reaction and it did.

There was horror on her face. ‘You have cows living in your house?’

‘It keeps us warm,’ I said. ‘And there’s always fresh milk on tap.’

She shuddered. ‘It sounds medieval.’

‘Not the same as living in a castle, I imagine, but I like it well enough.’

We walked on in silence for a short time and I stole a glance at her. She was quite tall. Past my shoulder, anyway, and there was a light in her smile that gave me butterflies in my tummy. She caught me looking at her and her face coloured a little, eyes dipping, a tiny smile turning up the corners of her mouth.

She said, ‘What are you doing in Stornoway?’

‘I came with my father to get provisions for the winter. He’s just back from the fishing on the mainland, so we have some money.’

‘Don’t you make money from your croft?’

I laughed at her innocence. ‘The croft barely feeds us.’

She looked at me, consternation in her voice. ‘Well, where do you get your clothes?’

‘We spin wool from the sheep and weave it into cloth for my mother to make into clothes.’ And I had that feeling of self-consciousness again as she looked me up and down, her eyes coming to rest on my bare feet.

‘Don’t you have any shoes?’

‘Oh, yes. But we have to buy them, and they wear out pretty fast. So we keep them for going to church on Sundays.’

I saw in her eyes that she could not even begin to understand how we lived.

‘What are you doing in town?’ I asked.

‘My father brought us. Some friends who are staying at the castle wanted to do some shopping. We’ll be lunching at the new Royal Hotel in Cromwell Street. And we’re staying over there tonight.’ She seemed excited by the idea.

I didn’t tell her that my father and I wouldn’t be lunching at all. We would eat the last of the black pudding my mother had made and spend the night in our cart, hoping that it wouldn’t rain. We stopped and gazed out at the water washing in along the shore, and I saw a tall ship in full sail tacking carefully into the comparative shelter of the harbour through the narrow channel between the rocks.

‘I asked the staff at the castle, but no one seemed to know your name.’ She glanced up at me. ‘Except that you were a Mackenzie.’

I flushed with pleasure at her interest. ‘Sime,’ I said.

‘Sheem?’ She frowned. ‘What kind of name’s that?’

‘It’s the Gaelic for Simon.’

‘Well, it’s a silly name. I will just call you Simon.’

‘Oh will you?’ I raised an eyebrow.

She nodded quite definitely. ‘I will.’

‘In that case, I’ll just call you Ciorstaidh.’

She frowned. ‘Why? It doesn’t sound that different.’

‘Because it’s the Gaelic for Kirsty, and I’ll see it differently.’

She looked at me with such penetration in those blue eyes that it set my butterflies going again. ‘You remember my name, then?’

Caught in that gaze of hers I felt my mouth go dry and I could hardly find my voice. ‘I remember every little thing about you.’

‘Hey! What do you think you’re playing at?’

The voice shouting so close startled me, and I turned to find myself facing a teenage boy, perhaps a year or two older than me. He had a thick head of gingery hair and was tall, a well-built lad wearing fine clothes and a pair of shiny black boots. A slightly smaller boy with short black hair stood at his shoulder. The bigger boy pushed me in the chest and I staggered back, taken by surprise.

‘George!’ Kirsty shouted at him, but he ignored her, angry green eyes fixed on me.

‘What the hell do you think you’re doing talking to my sister?’

‘It’s none of your business, George,’ Kirsty said.

‘Any cotter boy talking to my sister is my business.’ He shoved the flat of his hand once more into my chest. Though this time I stood my ground.

Kirsty stepped between us. ‘This is Simon. He’s the boy who saved my life the day the trap went into the ditch and Mr Cumming was killed.’

He pushed her out of the way, puffing up his chest and moving close so that his face was just inches from mine. ‘Well, if you think that gives you any rights, then you can think again.’

‘We were just talking,’ I said.

‘Well, I don’t want you talking to my sister. We don’t associate with tenants.’ He said the word tenants as if it made a bad taste in his mouth.

‘Oh, don’t be such an ass, George!’ Kirsty tried to insinuate her way between us again, but he held her at bay.

He never took his eyes off me. ‘If I ever see you with my sister again, I’ll give you such a hiding you’ll remember it the rest of your days.’

I felt my honour at stake now, and I lifted my jaw and said, ‘You and who else?’

He laughed in my face, and I recoiled a little from his bad breath. ‘Hah! I don’t need an army to deal with the likes of you.’ And from nowhere a big fist swung into my peripheral vision catching me square on the side of my face. Pain and light exploded in my head and my knees buckled under me.

The next thing I knew, the smaller boy was leaning over me, taking one of my hands in his and helping me back to my feet. I was groggy and still a little in shock, and so quite unprepared for the boy suddenly stepping behind me to pull both my arms up my back. George’s pale, freckled face ballooned into view, leering at me, and I was helplessly exposed to the fists he pummelled into my stomach. The other boy let me go and I doubled over on my knees, retching.

I could hear Kirsty screaming at them to stop, but her protests were ignored. George lowered his face to mine. ‘Just stay away,’ he hissed, then turned and, grabbing his sister by the arm, dragged her off protesting, the other boy trailing after them and grinning at me over his shoulder.