On the headland before Aultbea, Alec pulled off the road and cut the engine, rolling down the window to let the sea air fill the car. In the sudden stillness, the four of them sat in silence, listening to the sound of the water’s quiet surge and the cries of the seabirds. For a few moments no one spoke. Diana tapped a manicured fingernail impatiently against the crocodile-skin handbag cradled on her lap.
Flora glanced across at her brother’s profile. The breadth of his shoulders was emphasised by the wide collar of his naval tunic and beneath his cap his sandy hair was cut short, making a stranger of him as he sat watching the distant bustle of activity in the loch.
She switched her gaze to Alec’s back. His shoulders were equally broad, but his cap lay on the back seat beside her and his straight black hair was ruffled by the breeze. The thought of them boarding their ships and facing the dangers out there on the cruel, unforgiving sea filled her with fear. She swallowed to try to relieve the tightness of her throat as she pictured them leaving the safe embrace of the hills surrounding Loch Ewe and heading northwards into the swell of the open sea. Blinking to clear the tears, she caught sight of the reflection of Alec’s smile in the car’s rear-view mirror. He was watching her watching them, his eyes still those of the childhood friend who had always been her champion and protector.
He turned to face her, resting his arm along the back of the driving seat. ‘How’s your father?’ he asked.
In the early years of his youth, Alec had spent more time with the keeper of the estate than he had with his own father. Sir Charles was only ever interested in shooting and fishing with the friends he invited up from London when he came north, and was very often absent from Ardtuath on business in England, leaving Lady Helen and his son to their own devices.
‘He’s well.’ Flora smiled back at him, suddenly conscious of the bagginess of the woollen gansey and the unruly, wind-blown strands of hair that had escaped from her braid. She tucked a wayward lock behind her ear. ‘Busy, now he’s doing the factor’s work, too, but he enjoys having charge of the estate, I think.’
When Sir Charles’s manager had left to join up a few weeks ago, Ruaridh and Flora’s father had quietly stepped in to keep everything running smoothly for Lady Helen in her husband’s absence.
Alec nodded. ‘Ma said he’s doing a great job. My father will be up again soon. Ma’s trying to persuade him to spend more time at Ardtuath. She worries for his safety down in London.’
A blast from a ship’s horn across the water made him turn to face straight ahead again.
‘Time we got going, I think,’ Diana said, pointing at the slim gold watch encircling her wrist.
With a nod, Alec turned the key in the ignition and reversed the car. They drove the final stretch to the jetty in silence and then Alec drew up alongside a pile of creels to let the Gordons out. He shook hands again with Ruaridh. ‘Be seeing you at the other end, then. It’ll be good knowing you’re not far off.’ At the same time, he turned and reached his left hand back towards Flora, mooring the three of them together for a moment. He gave her fingers a reassuring squeeze. ‘Keep safe. And knit me one of those scarves, if you have the time. It’ll certainly be welcome up there on the northern seas.’ With a salute, he turned the car and drove away, leaving Flora and Ruaridh to say their own goodbyes.
After she’d waved her brother off, Flora watched from the jetty until the launch had heaved-to alongside the Ordie, and then she turned away. The breeze had stiffened with the chill of evening and she hugged the folds of her jumper around her as she walked back in the direction of Keeper’s Cottage. At the little cemetery, she pushed open the wishing gate and went in, past the wind-sculpted yew tree, picking her way through the clusters of granite gravestones to one that stood a short way up the hill.
She knelt among the tufts of cotton grass that bowed their soft white heads over the mossy blanket covering the grave.
‘Hello, Mum,’ she said. ‘Ruaridh came home today. He’s looking well. He’s off tonight on one of those ships out there, headed north.’ She cleared a wisp of moss away from the headstone, tracing with the tips of her fingers the incised letters spelling out her mother’s name and the name of the baby sister she’d never known, who had died together when Flora was two years old.
‘Alec came back, too.’ She paused, adrift in her thoughts.
Then, just before she turned to go, she whispered, ‘Keep them safe.’ And the wind snatched up her words, casting them out on to the darkening waters of the sea.
Lexie, 1978
Daisy loves the graveyard. The moss is soft beneath her hands and knees as she crawls through the grass, chuckling at the tufts of bog cotton that tickle her nose and make her sneeze. I’m trying to have a serious conversation with the stonemason about what to put on Mum’s headstone. ‘Just Flora Gordon and the dates, I think.’
‘Ach, d’you no want some sort of a message? In loving memory of a beloved mother and grandmother, maybe? Gone but never forgotten, that sort of thing?’
I can scarcely afford the bare minimum and he charges by the letter, so I politely decline. The undertakers have already arranged for the urn containing the ashes to be buried alongside the grave where Mum’s parents lie. Her stone will be set next to the one with the three names – Seonaig and Isla and Iain – commemorating my grandparents and an aunt who died before she was as old as Daisy is now, a thought that unsettles me to the very core of my being.
He shows me some samples of lettering and I choose the one that’s closest to that on my grandparents’ stone. Then he gets me to write down Mum’s name and the dates in a notebook before he leaves, with a cheery wave to Daisy who ignores him as she tries to pull herself up to standing using the granite headstone for leverage. Her legs wobble and she collapses with a bump, her nappy cushioning her fall, then mutters softly to herself as she crawls off to explore further afield.
I walk across to scoop her up from the damp ground. She’s sitting gazing up at an elaborately carved stone angel that stands guard over the family memorial of the Mackenzie-Grants.
‘That’s your grandpa’s name there, see?’ I tell her.
I trace the lettering of my dad’s name – his and mine so alike – with my fingertips. And I remember how, on summer Sundays when I was little, Mum and I used to come to lay posies of wildflowers by our own family stone and how she would always take one flower – a harebell or a tuft of sea pink or a white ox-eye daisy – and lay it at the feet of the angel.
It’s a bright, breezy day at last, and a relief to be outdoors again. Daisy and I are both suffering from a severe dose of cabin fever after almost a solid week of rain, which has assailed the windows of Keeper’s Cottage from every angle. I’ve used the days to get things sorted in the house. I’ve brought the cot down from the loft and set it up so that we can both get a little more sleep, and I’ve wrapped most of Mum’s ornaments in newspaper and packed them away in boxes, safely out of the way of inquisitive little fingers. I’ve also managed to sort and stash away many of my own belongings so that the cottage doesn’t feel so cluttered. The attic is crammed full, but at least the boxes are out of sight. The sorting, unpacking and repacking and wrestling of boxes into the loft has made me feel as stale and dusty as the boards of the attic floor. I’m still stiff, the aftermath of the long drive as well as from ferrying everything in from the car and climbing up and down the ladder. But my physical aches and pains are nothing compared with the ache of the emptiness I feel, which seems to have embedded itself in my very bones.