Lightly Poached Read online

  After lunch I started to make bread and teacakes and the kitchen was full of the yeasty, floury smell of bread baking when the door banged open to admit Morag. She pushed the door closed with a practised shoulder and let down the latch.

  ‘My, but it’s a coarse wind you catch here,’ she informed me as she slid out of the top layer of coats she was wearing. ‘I thought my own house was the bad one for the wind but I’m thinkin’ your own is worse.’

  ‘It depends on the direction,’ I reminded her. ‘Yours gets the north-easterly pretty badly but this one is the wind I’m most exposed to. It has one advantage, though.’ I nodded at the wire tray where the bread was cooling. ‘My oven is always much hotter when the wind is from this direction.’

  ‘Aye, an’ you make good use of it, mo ghaoil. Indeed, there’s nobody like the English for bakin’ in an oven,’ she told me.

  I split and buttered some teacakes and we ate them while they were warm and doughy and swimming in butter. Morag was just helping herself to her third piece when the door opened again but with more violence this time and Erchy came in.

  ‘I was just down seein’ if there was anythin’ worth while comin’ ashore,’ he announced in reply to our enquiring looks. ‘We got a letter a night or two ago from my cousin that’s workin’ on a timber boat. He reckoned they’d be passin’ through the channel out there yesterday an’ he always tries to throw some good planks over the side thinkin’ they might wash ashore here.’

  Bruach had its share of beachcombers, ranging from the regulars who went daily to search for anything that might conceivably be of use, to the dilettantes like myself who went only when the weather was fine enough, but during gales when the men of the village could find little else to do they rushed down to appropriate for themselves stretches of shore, just as fishermen select stretches of a river, and there they crouched in the indifferent protection of a boulder, straining to be the first to spot any loot the sea might bring in. The most dedicated—some said the greediest—stayed out all night, the rest stayed for perhaps four or five hours before they gave in and returned to their own or someone else’s home where they could be sure of a hot drink and a bite to eat.

  ‘An’ did you get anythin’ for your trouble?’ asked Morag.

  ‘Only a couple of trawl bobbins an’ a few fish boxes,’ confessed Erchy. ‘But there’s time enough. Maybe I’ll get down in the mornin’ at first light an’ get a hold of somethin’ good.’

  ‘You didn’t by any chance get any of those glass net floats?’ I asked. I was collecting the coloured glass floats to edge a border in my flower garden.

  ‘Aye. I got two,’ Erchy replied. ‘They’re outside.’ He eyed the teacakes. ‘You’ll get them for a couple of those scones you have there.’

  I laughed and started to split and butter more teacakes.

  ‘Eating them hot like this is probably going to give you terrible indigestion,’ I warned. ‘But I don’t suppose that will put you off, will it?’

  He winked. ‘Indeed I wouldn’t be put off supposin’ you told me they’d give me the terrible plague,’ he assured me and clamping the two halves together he disposed of the first teacake in two bites. I continued splitting and buttering.

  ‘I hear you’re away to the roup next week,’ he observed, halfway through his second teacake.

  ‘Am I?’ I asked.

  ‘Behag’s expectin’ you to go,’ put in Morag. ‘She’s after makin’ all her plans.’

  ‘I didn’t say I’d go,’ I repudiated and chided myself for having forgotten that in Bruach anything less than an emphatic refusal was taken as acquiescence. ‘I don’t know if I can get away,’ I went on. ‘I’ve still to find someone to see to Bonny and the hens and with the day being so wild and wet I haven’t got round to asking anyone yet.’

  ‘An’ do you need to ask?’ Morag reproached me. ‘Can I no’ see to your cow for you the same as I have many a time before now.’

  ‘But Behag will be away too,’ I reminded her ‘Otherwise I should have come straight to you.’

  ‘An’ when would Behag be any use milkin’ a cow?’ she demanded scornfully.

  ‘I was just thinking of all the extra work for you,’ I pointed out.

  ‘But isn’t my cousin comin’ tomorrow on the bus to stay with me from Glasgow,’ she told me.

  ‘Which one’s that?’ asked Erchy.

  ‘The one that was in hospital a while back,’ replied Morag.

  ‘Is she better, then?’

  ‘She’s better,’ acknowledged Morag. ‘Though I believe they were still givin’ her egyptians for the pain for a week or two after she came out.’

  ‘Well, she’s not going to be of any help to you, is she?’ I argued. ‘Surely having a convalescent on your hands is going to make even more work for you?’

  ‘Not at all,’ denied Morag. ‘She can see to the boilin’ of the potatoes an’ she can feed the hens an’ she’ll be glad to do it.’

  ‘But if she’s not well,’ I began.

  ‘Indeed there’s nothin’ wrong with her at all,’ refuted Morag, who, possibly because of her experience with Hector, was disinclined to believe reports of ill health from any other of her relatives. ‘Nothin’ that a month or two in Bruach won’t cure.’ She put down her empty cup. ‘I’ll milk your cow for you an’ willingly,’ she repeated. ‘An’ seein’ my own cow’s startin’ to go dry I’ll be well pleased to get the extra milk for a whiley.’

  I thanked her and pointed out that I still had to get someone to come and feed my poultry. Even had Morag offered I could not have allowed her to take on this extra task. The milking was not so demanding since she would be going out to the moors to milk her own cow but feeding the hens would entail her coming down to my croft in the early morning and again in the evening.

  Erchy said: ‘I’d feed your hens for you if I’m about but if the weather clears I’ll be at the lobsters the best part of the day.’ He looked slightly distressed. ‘I couldn’t promise,’ he added.

  ‘If the weather clears I ought not to be away from home anyway,’ I told him. ‘Not with all that hay out in cocks.’

  ‘They’re sayin’ this rain’s on for a week or more,’ asserted Morag. ‘They’re expectin’ the wind to drop shortly but without the wind they say there’ll be nothin’ but rain an’ mist an’ rain again till the moon changes an’ that’s ten days away yet.’

  ‘They’ were the elders of the village. The pipe-smoking, pontificating old men whose weather predictions were at least as reliable as more official ones.

  ‘That’s some consolation, anyway,’ I said. ‘I shan’t feel too guilty about the hay.’

  ‘There’s no need to feel guilty about anythin’,’ comforted Morag. ‘Sheena was savin’ she’d be pleased enough to come an’ feed your hens for you if she’d get the eggs. She has her brother an’ his family with her an’ she’s girnin’ that they swallow eggs as fast as gulls swallow fish guts.’

  ‘That’s splendid!’ I said. ‘My hens are laying well just now so I shan’t be ashamed to go and ask her.’

  ‘I don’t believe there’s any need to ask her,’ Morag informed me. ‘I believe she’s made up her mind to it already.’ She got up and started to put on her coat. ‘Will I tell Behag you’ll be goin’, then?’ she asked, adding in a lower voice, ‘If the Lord spares you.’

  ‘Yes,’ I replied. ‘I’ll be going.’

  As soon as word got around that Behag and I were going to drive in my car to the roup first Tearlaich and then Angy announced they would be bestowing their company on us.

  ‘There won’t be much room,’ I told them. ‘And it’s a long drive.’

  ‘Ach, we’d sooner be uncomfortable than lonely,’ they replied and so it was arranged we should all cram into ‘Joanna’ and leave first thing on the following Tuesday morning.

  As the old men had forecast the rain had continued and though the wind had dropped it was still harrying the sea enough to throw clouds of spray over the ferry as we
crossed to the mainland. It poured over the car roof and coursed down the windscreen.

  ‘If we’d gone by train, now, we wouldn’t have the car to give us shelter,’ Behag commented, indicating the two or three foot passengers who were seeking shelter behind the car.

  ‘Poor things,’ I said. ‘I hope they’re not going on the train. If they are they’ll stay wet until lunchtime at least.’

  ‘Ach, they won’t mind,’ retorted Tearlaich. ‘On this ferry they don’t take your fare if you get wet.’

  We bounced off the ferry, up the mainland slip and drove for a couple of hours without seeing another moving thing. Occasionally we glimpsed a burn in spate tumbling and foaming under the bridge over which we were driving; occasionally there was a straggle of stunted trees, occasionally a dwelling of some sort but most of the time the rain enclosed us, taxing the efficiency of the windscreen-wipers. The car grew so stuffy that Behag had continually to wipe the windscreen clear of mist.

  ‘Anyone know where we might get a bite to eat?’ I asked.

  Tearlaich responded immediately. ‘I know a hotel not far from here. I used to knew one of the waitresses.’ There could hardly have been a hotel in the whole of the Highlands where Tearlaich did not claim to know one of the waitresses, and admittedly his knowledge appeared to serve him well. He frequently told tales of how he had got himself stranded at various times, ‘and if it hadn’t been for this waitress I knew I would have had to spend the night out on the hill and without a bite to eat’.

  ‘It’s a wonder these waitresses don’t get into trouble sometimes the way they look after you,’ observed Behag and added hurriedly, ‘I mean, from their bosses.’

  ‘Ach, I’m always away before the bosses appear in the morning,’ replied Tearlaich. ‘Except for once when I had to sleep under the table in the kitchen.’

  ‘How was that?’ asked Angy.

  ‘This hotel had gone kind of swanky and they’d got in one of these foreigners to manage it. Well, he comes down in the night to get something from the kitchen an’ he finds me there …’

  ‘By yourself?’ interrupted Angy incredulously.

  ‘I was by that time,’ acknowledged Tearlaich with a wink. ‘Anyway,’ he continued, ‘in this fellow comes. “You get out!” he orders, only his language was a lot worse than that and when I didn’t offer to get out he started screaming at me: “Bugger off, you.” “Take it easy,” I told him. “I’m doin’ nobody any harm here and I’ll be away at first light.” But no, he wasn’t going to have me stay and he went off out of the kitchen swearin’ to bring down the owner to turn me out. Well, I knew the owner had no reason to like me seeing he was a Campbell and me a MacDonald so I got out.’ He chortled. ‘All the same, I got my own back on that foreigner fellow, I can tell you.’

  ‘How?’ I asked.

  ‘Well, d’you see there was this big pan of porridge at the side of the stove all ready for warming up for the guests’ breakfasts and the other side of the stove there was a big baking dish full of raw eggs all taken from their shells and set ready to go straight into the oven. I lifted the tray of eggs and tipped half of them into the pan of porridge and stirred it all up so that it looked O.K. Then I buggered off like I was told to.’

  ‘It must have been damty queer porridge they got for their breakfasts,’ said Angy.

  ‘Did you ever hear what happened?’ Behag asked.

  ‘No, I never did. Ach, I knew fine I’d best not go back that way again for a while so I didn’t think about the waitress any more.’

  ‘Whereabouts was this hotel?’ I enquired.

  ‘Well, now,’ said Tearlaich, ‘it’ll be only just about a mile along the road now. Like I was sayin’, I know this waitress so if she’s still there she’ll see we get a good meal.’

  ‘Tearlaich!’ I exclaimed. ‘Do you mean you’re taking us to the hotel where you spoiled the porridge?’ In the mirror I saw his uncontrite expression. ‘Oh, no,’ I told him. ‘I’m not going there in your company.’

  ‘Ach, it’s all right now,’ he soothed. ‘I know for a fact the foreigner’s been gone over a year so I don’t need to bother any more.’

  ‘Isn’t there anywhere else we can get a meal?’ I pleaded.

  ‘Not that I know of,’ returned Tearlaich. ‘Not for another ten miles anyway.’ He rustled a paper bag. ‘Here, take a mint,’ he invited. ‘It’ll stop you getting indigestion.’

  ‘Tearlaich’s a right joker,’ enthused Angy when everyone was steadily sucking.

  ‘Indeed if it’s jokers we’re speaking of then there’s the biggest one of them sitting right beside me at this minute,’ retaliated Tearlaich.

  ‘Angy?’ asked Behag.

  ‘Aye. Why only the week before he came back to Bruach didn’t he and his pais kidnap a bride and groom the night before they was to get married.’

  ‘That’s not so unusual,’ I reminded Tearlaich. I had heard of bawdy escapades sometimes taking place the night before a weddding though I had never been aware of such a happening in Bruach.

  ‘No, but this was one of the best,’ Tearlaich continued fervently. ‘They got a hold of this lorry and an old lavatory from the builder’s yard and they stuck this lavatory on the ‘lorry and tied the bride sitting down on it with a po on her head. Then they drove round and round the place till folks was near sick with laughing.’

  ‘Oh, my,’ commented Behag.

  ‘We got the groom, too, don’t forget,’ Angy reminded him.

  ‘Aye, so they did and seeing they was friendly with one or two of the night nurses up at the hospital they carted him up there, tied him down on the table and gave him an enema.’

  ‘Really!’ I was horrified.

  ‘Honest to God, they did,’ averred Tearlaich. He turned to Angy. ‘I believe the groom wasn’t too pleased about it, was he?’

  ‘I should think not,’ I told him.

  ‘Aye, well it wasn’t so much what we did to him he minded but he was wearin’ his weddin’ trousers when we got a hold of him an’ they got a bit torn.’ Angy explained. ‘He said we was to get him a new pair but ach! where would we get new trousers till the tinkers come round?’

  ‘You certainly carry your jokes to the limit,’ I remarked.

  ‘The limit indeed,’ confirmed Tearlaich. ‘He’s lucky he hasn’t been banned from one or two of the pubs on the mainland for some of the tricks he’s got up to.’

  ‘Such as …’ I encouraged.

  ‘Such as,’ he began, winding down his window to throw out a cigarette butt. A small wedge of coolness probed down the back of my neck before the window was closed again tightly. ‘By God! There’s still some rain out there,’ he observed superfluously.

  ‘You were going to tell us about another of Angy’s tricks,’ I reminded him.

  ‘Aye, well there was the moocher, wasn’t there, Angy?’

  ‘Oh, him,’ muttered Angy with a show of reticence. ‘He deserved all he got.’

  ‘What happened to him?’ I enquired.

  ‘D’you know what a “moocher” is, for a start?’ asked Tearlaich.

  I’ve always taken it to be a lazy, good-for-nothing sort of fellow,’ I answered.

  ‘No, well to us a “moocher” is one of them fellows that if you leave your drink for a minute in the pub he nips in while your back’s turned and drains the glass. That’s right, isn’t it, Angy?’

  Angy’s smiling face was reflected in the driving mirror. ‘So Angy decides to teach him a lesson,’ resumed Tearlaich ‘And he goes to the chemist’s and buys a box of worm pills.’

  ‘For dogs?’ interrupted Angy.

  ‘Aye, for dogs,’ agreed Tearlaich. ‘Now go on,’ he urged Angy. ‘Tell her yourself what you did.’

  Angy took up the story. ‘The instructions on the box said one pill for small dogs, two for medium and three for large dogs.’ He smiled, ‘Well, I reckoned the moocher was twice as big as a large dog so the next time he was in the pub before I left my pint of beer I slipped six of the pills
into it. Sure enough when I got back my glass was empty and the moocher was gone.’

  ‘Oh, here,’ remonstrated Behag. ‘It’s a wonder you didn’t poison the man.’

  ‘Poison, hell!’ scoffed Angy. ‘No, but he was off work for three weeks afterwards with what the doctor said was a bad dose of dysentery,’ he added with deep satisfaction.

  ‘Here’s the hotel,’ proclaimed Tearlaich as a long low building loomed up out of the rain. I pulled ‘Joanna’ off the road and we went inside. Like most Highland hotels it was clean and cold and a little intimidating. Tearlaich disappeared muttering something about arranging for food and Angy led us unerringly to a small bar where he first rapped, then thumped and eventually yelled for service. His summons brought a tartan-kilted, sporraned and tweed-jacketed man who gave us a greeting that was as cheerless as the day itself and served us our drinks with an air that conveyed that bar service was not his normal occupation and that we were not the class of customer the hotel normally catered for. Once we had our drinks he disappeared again.

  ‘He’s a snooty one,’ I commented.

  ‘Snooty?’ echoed Angy. ‘No, it’s not that what’s wrong with him. It’s just he hasn’t learned yet how to behave right. He’s learned himself to dress like a toff but it’ll take him a long time to learn the rest, for when I first knew him his head was that empty his cap used to rattle when he talked.’

  ‘I was thinkin’ I’d seen him before,’ said Behag.

  ‘An’ so you have,’ Angy assured her. ‘The last time I saw that man he had a broken-down old fish van takin’ seconds kippers round the villages. He wasn’t wearin’ any of his fancy clothes then, he couldn’t afford them, an’ his hands was that black with engine grease he left thumbprints on every kipper like they say St Peter left on the haddocks.’

  Tearlaich came back looking mightily pleased with himself. ‘They say we can take our soup right away if we’ve a mind,’ he informed us.

  ‘I’ve a mind,’ I replied.

  ‘An’ so have I,’ said Angy, tossing down the last of his drink. ‘Lead the way, boy,’ he instructed and we followed Tearlaich through to the dining room of which we were the sole occupants.