Peter May - The Lewis Man

She stopped about a yard from him, and they stood looking at each other for a moment. Then she said, ‘I didn’t know you were coming.’

‘I didn’t decide until a couple of days ago. After the divorce came through.’

She pulled her waterproof jacket around her as if cold, folding her arms across the front of it to keep it closed. ‘Are you staying?’

‘I don’t know yet. I’m going to do some work on the house, and then we’ll see.’

‘What about your work?’

‘I quit the force.’

She seemed surprised. ‘What will you do?’

‘I don’t know.’

She smiled, that old sardonic smile that he had known so well. ‘Here lies Fin Macleod,’ she said. ‘He didn’t know.’

He returned her smile. ‘I have my degree in computer studies.’

She raised an eyebrow. ‘Oh? That’ll get you far in Crobost.’

This time he laughed. ‘Yes.’ She had always been able to make him laugh. ‘Well, we’ll see. Maybe I’ll end up working at Arnish, like my dad, or Artair.’

At the mention of Artair her face clouded. ‘You’ll never do that, Fin.’ Somehow it had always been the last resort of island men who couldn’t get a job on a fishing boat, or escape to university on the mainland. Even although it paid well.

‘No.’

‘So don’t talk shit. You did enough of that to last a lifetime when we were young.’

He grinned. ‘I guess I did.’ He nodded towards the Vauxhall. ‘Who’s in the car?’

‘My dad.’ Her voice sounded brittle.

‘Oh. How is he?’ It was an innocent enough question, but when he looked back at her he saw that it had provoked a disturbing response. Her eyes had filled. He was shocked. ‘What’s wrong?’

But she kept her lips pressed firmly together, as if not trusting herself to speak. Before finally she said, ‘My mum’s kicked him out. Says she can’t take it any more. That he’s my responsibility now.’

Fin frowned his confusion. ‘Why?’

‘It’s his dementia, Fin. He wasn’t so bad last time you saw him. But he’s gone downhill rapidly. There’s almost a daily deterioration.’ She glanced back towards the car, and her tears flowed freely now. ‘But I can’t look after him. I can’t ! I just got my life back after twenty years of Artair. And his mother. I have more exams coming up, Fionnlagh’s future to think about …’ She turned desperate eyes back on Fin. ‘That sounds terrible, doesn’t it? Selfish.’

He wanted to take her in his arms and hold her, but it had been too long. ‘Of course not,’ was all he could say.

‘He’s my dad !’ Her pain and her guilt were all too clear.

‘I’m sure the social services will be able to find something for him, at least temporarily. What about a nursing home?’

‘We can’t afford that. The farm wasn’t ours. Just rented.’ She wiped her cheeks with the flats of her hands and made a determined effort to take back control. ‘I phoned the social from my mum’s. I explained it all, but they said I had to come in and talk to them. I’m just going to drop him off at daycare to give myself time to think.’ She shook her head, on the verge of losing it again. ‘I just don’t know what to do.’

Fin said, ‘I’ll get changed and come into town with you. We’ll take your dad for a pub lunch then drop him at daycare while we go and talk to the social work.’

She looked at him with searching, watery blue eyes. ‘Why would you do that, Fin?’

Fin grinned. ‘Cos I need a break, and I could do with a pint.’

The Crown Hotel sat up on the spit of land called South Beach that separated the inner and outer harbours of Stornoway. The lounge bar was on the first floor, and from up here there were views of both. The fishing fleet was in, at anchor in the inner harbour, rising and falling gently on the incoming tide, rusting trawlers and raddled crabbers, painted over in primary colours like elderly ladies vainly trying to hide the ravages of time.

Tormod was confused. At first he didn’t appear to know Fin at all. Until Fin spoke to him about his childhood, when he had visited Marsaili at the farm, already smitten, as if future pain had been predestined. Tormod’s face had lit up with recognition then. He had a clear recollection, it seemed, of the young Fin.

‘You’ve grown fast, boy,’ he said, and ruffled his hair as if he were still a five-year-old. ‘How are your folks?’

Marsaili glanced, embarrassed, at Fin, and said in a low voice, ‘Dad, Fin’s folks were killed in a car crash more than thirty years ago.’

Tormod’s face was washed by sadness. From behind round, silver-framed spectacles, he turned moist blue eyes on Fin, and for a moment Fin saw his daughter in them, and her son. Three generations lost in his confusion. ‘I’m sorry to hear that, son.’

Fin sat them at a table by the window and went to the bar to get menus and order them drinks. When he got back to the table Tormod was struggling to take something out from his trouser pocket. He twisted and wriggled in his chair. ‘Damn, dammit,’ he said.

Fin glanced at Marsaili. ‘What’s he doing?’

She shook her head despondently. ‘He’s started smoking again. After giving up more than twenty years ago! He’s got a pack of cigarettes in his pocket, but he can’t seem to get them out.’

‘Mr Macdonald, you can’t smoke in here,’ Fin told him. ‘You have to go outside if you want to smoke.’

‘It’s raining,’ the old man said.

‘No,’ Fin corrected him gently. ‘It’s still dry. If you want a cigarette I’ll stand outside with you.’

‘Can’t get the damn things out of my pocket!’ Tormod’s voice was raised now. Almost shouting. The bar was filling up with townsfolk and tourists in for lunch, and heads turned in their direction.

Marsaili’s voice was a stage whisper. ‘Dad, there’s no need to shout. Here, let me get them for you.’

‘I’m perfectly capable of doing it myself!’ More heads turned.

The barman arrived with their drinks. A young man in his early twenties with a Polish accent.

Tormod looked up at him and said, ‘Get a life!’

‘I think he means a light,’ Marsaili said by way of apology. She turned to Fin. ‘He’ll want matches. My mother’s been hiding them from him.’

The barman just smiled and left their drinks on the table.

Tormod was still struggling with his hand in his pocket. ‘It’s there. I can feel it. But it won’t come out.’

There was some muted laughter from nearby tables. Fin said, ‘Let me give you a hand, Mr Macdonald.’ And while he wouldn’t accept Marsaili’s offer of help, Tormod was quite happy to let Fin try. Fin flicked her a glance of apology. He knelt down beside her father, aware of heads in the bar turned in their direction, and slipped his hand into Tormod’s pocket. He could feel the packet of cigarettes there right enough, but like Tormod he couldn’t seem to take it out. It was as if the cigarettes were beneath the pocket rather than in it. But Fin couldn’t figure out how that was possible. He lifted the old man’s pullover to check the waistband for some hidden pocket, and what he saw made him smile, in spite of himself. He looked up. ‘Mr Macdonald, you’re wearing two pairs of trousers.’ Which elicited a ripple of laughter from those at the closest tables who could hear.

Tormod frowned. ‘Am I?’

Fin looked up at Marsaili. ‘The cigarettes are in the pocket of the pair underneath. I’d better take him to the loo and get one of them off him.’

In the toilet Fin steered Tormod into a cubicle. He managed with difficulty to remove the top pair of trousers after persuading him to take off his shoes. Then once he had the shoes back on, Fin made him sit on the pedestal while he kneeled to retie the laces. He folded the trousers and got Tormod to his feet again.