Graeme Burnet - His Bloody Project

I returned to the table and laid down the letter. My father’s gaze remained fixed in front of him.

‘I have explained the contents of the letter to your father,’ said the minister, addressing me. ‘I am dumbfounded that he has allowed his affairs to fall into such disarray that these measures have been necessitated.’

‘Necessitated?’ I repeated.

The minister looked at me with a thin smile on his lips. ‘We are all responsible for the management of our affairs. The laird cannot be expected to permit tenants to exploit his land free of charge, nor to do so with such disregard for the terms of tenancy.’ He then shook his head and made a soft tutting sound behind his teeth.

I could not help but feel that he took some pleasure in our situation and saw no purpose in appealing to him to intervene on our behalf. He then stated that he had not seen my sister or I in church these last few months.

‘Perhaps if you had paid more attention to your spiritual welfare,’ he said, ‘you would not have found yourself in such circumstances.’

‘I see no relation between the two things,’ I said.

‘That is precisely my point,’ said the minister. ‘You are a great discredit to your father.’

He then informed us that he would make what enquiries he could about finding alternative accommodation. My father thanked him and he took his leave. When he was gone my father snatched the letter from the table and tore it into pieces. He pounded his fists on the table, making the scraps of paper leap into the air. I watched him as I might have watched a wounded animal struggle in a trap. The twins were woken on their bunk and Jetta went to comfort them. Father then stood up and advanced upon Jetta. He gripped her by the back of the neck, dragged her to the table and set her roughly on the bench next to me. The twins toddled after her, wailing horribly.

‘It is your wickedness that has brought us to this,’ he said quietly.

Jetta bowed her head and clasped her hands in her lap, twisting a plait of coloured threads between her fingers.

‘That is not so,’ she replied.

I did not think it wise to contradict my father when he was in such a humour, but Jetta appeared quite steadfast.

Father then got to his feet and with surprising speed, gripped Jetta roughly by the hair at the back of her head. He pulled her face close to his own.

‘You think by swaddling yourself like an old woman you can conceal your condition from me? I am not blind.’

Jetta shook her head as vigorously as his grip would allow.

‘You are a whore.’

He then brought my sister’s head down towards the table and struck it repeatedly against the surface. Jetta did not cry out. I grabbed his wrist and tried to loosen his grasp, but his fingers were tightly entwined in her hair. As I struggled with him, Jetta was buffeted between us like a fishing vessel on the swell.

‘I want to know who is responsible,’ he hissed.

Jetta kept her lips firmly closed. Her eyes streamed with tears. I implored him to let her go. Despite my efforts he then thrust Jetta’s head against the table with such force that his feet left the ground.

‘Who is responsible?’ he snarled, gobbets of spit flying from his mouth. Blood seeped into the surface of the table. Jetta indicated by a movement of her head that she would not answer. I feared for her life and blurted out, ‘It is Lachlan Broad’s doing.’

My father stared at me wildly, his little eyes darting to and fro, and I took advantage of the moment to throw myself across the table at him. I wrenched his grip from Jetta’s head, tearing out a great clump of her hair. The three of us fell together to the floor. I wrestled myself on top of him. He struggled half-heartedly for some moments, and as I lay with my arms around him, I realised he was no more than a skinful of bones. There was no strength in him and what fight he had was soon spent. Jetta ran from the house. The twins howled like dogs. Father lay on his back while I righted the table, which had been overturned in the scuffle. I picked up various items which had been strewn on the floor and set them in their proper places. Father struggled to his feet and wearily brushed the stoor from his clothing. Then he sat down in his chair and sank his head in his hands. I went out to look for Jetta.

I found her in the barn. She was sitting on the milking stool I had lately used to reach the rafter where I had built my fledgling’s nest. The hair on the left side of her head was matted with blood, her left eye bloodied and swollen. She was twisting a length of rope on her lap. She looked up when I entered, her engorged eye twitching.

‘Hello, Roddy,’ she said sadly.

‘Hello,’ I said. I could think of nothing else to say, so I went and stood by her. She put her hand to her scalp and touched it gently with the tips of her fingers. Then she examined the blood on her hand, as if it was not her own. I knelt on the floor beside her. She turned her head towards me, the movement causing her to wince.

‘Our lot in this life is not a happy one, is it, Roddy?’ she said.

‘It is not.’

‘I fear that Father will not have me back under his roof.’

‘We shall none of us be under this roof for long,’ I said.

She nodded slowly.

‘Shall you go to Toscaig?’ I asked.

‘I fear that in my current condition I would not be welcome there,’ she said.

‘Then what?’

She formed her lips into a sad smile and shook her head to indicate that she had no answer to this question. I saw for the first time that her nose was entirely flattened against her face. It pained me to see her so ruined.

‘It is all over for me,’ she said. ‘My concern is for you. You should leave this place. You must see that there is nothing here for you.’

I said nothing of my hapless excursion to the Pass, as the thought of my flight shamed me.

‘What about father?’ I said.

‘Our father is never more happy than when he is suffering,’ she said. ‘You must not tether yourself to his mast.’

‘And the twins?’

A large tear rolled down the uninjured side of Jetta’s face. ‘They will be taken care of,’ she said.

‘It is Lachlan Broad that should be taken care of,’ I said.

‘This is not Lachlan Broad’s doing,’ said Jetta, moving her hand to her broken face.

‘It is all Lachlan Broad’s doing,’ I replied. ‘I should like to be revenged on him.’ These were, for the time being, empty words, spoken in bravado. I had not thought, until that moment, of retribution and had no notion of how such a thing might be accomplished.

Jetta shook her head vigorously.

‘You must not say such things, Roddy. If you understood more about the world, you would see that Lachlan Broad is not responsible. It is providence that has brought us to this point. It is no more Lachlan Broad’s doing than yours or mine or Father’s.’

‘What if I had not killed the sheep, or if mother had not died or if the Two Iains had not sunk?’ I objected.

‘But all these things did occur.’

‘If Lachlan Broad did not exist…’ I began, with no idea of where that thought would take me.

‘But he does exist, and he no more chose to be brought into this world than you or I.’

‘Then neither will he choose the method of his leaving,’ I said.

Jetta let forth a long sigh. ‘Nothing you can do will alter anything, Roddy. In any case, you need not concern yourself with Lachlan Broad.’ She lowered her voice to a whisper. ‘He is not long for this world.’

I drew my head away from her, so as to properly see her face. She gestured with her fingers for me to come closer.

‘I have twice seen the winding sheet about him.’

I struggled for some moments to grasp the implications of my sister’s statement, and when I did so I was gripped by a feeling of elation, thinking that the departure of Lachlan Broad from this world would release us from our troubles. I expressed this thought to Jetta.