A Breath of Autumn Read online

  ‘Will you not do that, surely?’ Enac’s tone expressed her disappointment. ‘I got it from a good baker,’ she insisted. ‘I thought it would do as a kind of wedding cake.’

  ‘Well then, if the three of you will join me,’ Kirsty yielded, relieved that she had decided not to put out the celebration cake she had made for the occasion. Taking a sharp knife from the table drawer she cut four thick slices. The loaf felt hard and the crust was black. She was glad there was plenty of butter on the table.

  When, in her teens, she had first been given city bread Kirsty had thought it tasted like cake, and had declared she would be happy to make a meal of it. The daily visit to the bakery with its racks of fresh-smelling, crusty bread had become for her one of the small delights of the city, though it had not lessened her appetite for the girdle-baked scones and bannocks which had been her childhood fare. Since she had lived on Westisle the smell and taste of city bread had, of necessity, become a remembered experience. Now, biting into her lavishly buttered slice she was more than disillusioned.

  ‘It’s got a bit stale, hasn’t it?’ observed Enac apologetically. ‘I got it only the day before the Sabbath thinking since we were to be leaving early on the Monday morning I might not be able to catch the baker.’

  ‘It’s still good,’ championed Euan Ally with his mouth stuffed so full the butter was oozing down his chin. ‘Would you not say so Jamie?’

  ‘It’s no bad,’ Jamie mumbled thickly, after taking a gulp of tea. A comment of ‘no bad’ from Jamie could be interpreted as high praise or polite disapproval. He rarely committed himself. Kirsty nodded prudently as she chewed her last mouthful. She estimated from Enac’s account that the loaf was likely to be at least five days old and, reckoning she could safely secrete the rest of the loaf in the hens’ mash bucket the next morning, she rose and began to clear the table.

  ‘We started the potato planting today,’ Jamie told Euan Ally.

  ‘You did? With the cas chrom?’

  ‘Aye, we did so.’

  ‘The land’s right enough for the cas chrom then?’ Euan Ally sounded a trifle unsure.

  ‘It’s right enough. We plan to finish tomorrow if the rain will stay away,’ said Jamie.

  ‘I’ll give you a turn with the cas chrom then, and maybe we’ll start planting my own potatoes before the end of the week,’ Euan Ally proposed. ‘Enac will give us a hand, if she’s a mind.’

  ‘I don’t see why not,’ agreed Jamie. He nodded in Kirsty’s direction. ‘No doubt herself wouldn’t say no to you giving her a spell or two.’

  ‘I’m ready to give you more than a spell,’ Enac volunteered eagerly. She turned to smile fondly at Euan Ally. ‘Did we not say we would wish to be married before the time for the potato planting?’

  ‘We did indeed,’ he confirmed. ‘And there’ll be much to do still. We’ve to get the peats cut and carried without wasting any more time. We’ve brought a peat iron with us so we’ll be kept busy enough. We can be ready to start working at the peats once we’ve got the potatoes in the ground.’

  ‘I’ll be more than ready,’ Enac told him.

  ‘And we’ll need to have The Two Ruaris ready for sea by the spring tide,’ Jamie reminded them.

  ‘And the fo’ csle dried out ready for when my uncle comes,’ added Euan Ally. ‘My, but the days could do with stretching into weeks for the work we need to get done.’

  ‘You’re keen enough to start?’ Jamie eyed him sharply as if uncertain of his willingness to resume fishing now that he had a wife.

  ‘Amn’t I keen,’ responded Euan Ally fervently. ‘The fish have had a long enough rest.’ He yawned loudly and, standing up, looked at Kirsty with arch enquiry.

  ‘Everything is in order for you,’ she assured him, nodding briefly in the direction of the passageway.

  ‘Then come you along to our bed,’ he urged, pulling an unresisting Enac up from her chair and shepherding her in front of him. ‘Oidhche mhath.’ There were giggles as the door closed behind them.

  The morning dawned quiet, still shrouded in mist, but mist could not be allowed to delay the potato planting and, as soon as they had taken their porridge, all four of them were ready to start work. Euan Ally said, ‘Seem’ there’s four of us we would be the better for two cas chroms would we not?’

  ‘There’s never been more than one cas chrom on the island,’ Kirsty told him. ‘Not that I’ve ever seen.’

  ‘Surely there’s no need for the four of us then,’ he pointed out. ‘If Jamie will plough the first of the furrows, I will plant and manure behind him and Enac can follow me and turn the turves. I will then take a turn at ploughing a furrow and Jamie will see to the planting. Will that not be the best way of it? We could be finished before midday likely?’

  ‘Likely enough,’ Jamie acknowledged with a nod.

  ‘And will Enac be keen enough to kick back all the turves herself?’ queried Kirsty, unwilling to accept that she was in effect being dismissed from doing what she regarded as her rightful share of the labours.

  ‘Surely,’ countered Enac with a broad smile. ‘Have I not been given that task since my legs were strong enough to kick?’

  ‘If that’s to be the way of it then I’ll away back to the house and maybe do a little flannel washing,’ Kirsty submitted. Enac shot her a cryptic glance. The lassie’s probably never heard of ‘doing a little flannel washing’, Kirsty excused her, recalling Mrs Ross, her erstwhile employer at the boarding house, telling her that, in her experience, ladies interviewing girls for prospective servants always made a point of asking, ‘And can you do a little flannel washing my dear?’ The question had struck them both as being somewhat quaint and subsequently whenever there might be a slight gap in the day’s programme the expression ‘I can always do a little flannel washing’ had been exchanged between them. I’ll have to explain to Enac sometime, Kirsty thought, that in those days it was customary for ladies to wear flannel petticoats.

  When she got back to the house she decided it would be a good idea to do some washing despite there being little prospect of drying anything while the mist stayed as low as it was. She got out the washboard, ran hot water from the range boiler into the tub and began to scrub some towels. When she took them to lay out on the dyke to dry she saw the mist was already being routed by a brisk wind, which was also bringing the sounds of frivolous banter and laughter from the direction of the potato plot. A feeling of disquiet affected her momentarily.

  ‘They think I’m too old to join in their fun,’ she told herself, ‘and maybe they’re right at that. I’m near thirty years past their age and no doubt they will have seen changes and read things in newspapers and magazines that I would never have set eyes on.’ Yet she didn’t feel old enough to accept being thought of as getting old, she encouraged herself. She was still fit and strong. ‘I’ll have to try and learn the new ways just,’ she thought.

  There came a shout and looking up she realised they had seen her and were calling to her to, ‘put the kettle on the fire for a strupak, seeing we’re near finished.’ Raising one of the towels she waved an acknowledgement and made her way quickly back to the house. By the time they were stamping their muddy boots outside the door she had fresh scones and oatcakes ready for them.

  The following day they ploughed and planted Euan Ally’s potato plot.

  ‘Will the weather be fit to get across for Wee Ruari tomorrow, you reckon?’ Kirsty asked, anxiously appraising the portents of the skeletal fingers of white cloud that were stretching across the sky. She’d become much more studious of weather prospects since her son had been going to school and though she had, from earliest childhood, imbibed sky-watching and weather lore as naturally as she had imbibed all other learning, her years in the confines of the city, where one rarely glimpsed more than a segment of sky, had dulled her awareness.

  ‘I doubt there’s likely to be any wind to speak of,’ soothed Jamie after a brief glance. ‘Me and Euan Ally are aiming to get across in Katy at first light
, since he’s keen to talk to his uncle about coming across to start work on his house. We’ll keep an eye on the weather and if there starts to be a wild look about it we’ll go to the schoolhouse and see will the dominie let Wee Ruari come before the end of his day’s schooling?’

  She nodded her agreement. The dominie was known to be strict about school hours, but his own good reports on her son’s scholastic progress coupled with his understanding of the uncertainty of getting him home at weekends would, she had little doubt, urge him to consent. Probably he would salve any scruples of conscience he might have by giving Wee Ruari an extra lesson or two to do at home she surmised.

  As planned, Jamie and Euan Ally and Enac were away in Katy shortly after first light the next morning. A lisping wind was bringing rain so fine as to be almost imperceptible; as the boat left the shore the constant ripples of the Sound, though lively enough, were in no way menacing. Kirsty relaxed, quietly confident of seeing her son that evening. She resolved that when she returned from the milking she would set about loosening the winter-packed earth in the small garden at the sheltered end of the house where in previous years she had experimented with growing a few vegetables such as turnips and carrots; crops sturdy enough to withstand the ravages of the summer gales which, though not as annihilating as the autumn and winter gales, could frequently be merciless to anything that could be classed as being the least bit tender. She had once or twice tried to grow cabbages, only to see them being shrivelled or torn bodily out of the ground by the wind when they’d been barely more than tiny rosettes of green. She’d fancied growing flowers such as those she had in the past seen in city parks and suburban gardens. She’d even ordered from a catalogue packets of seed which were described as being ‘hardy’, but up to date her only reward had been to witness an all too brief blooming of a few flowers that might have born a slight resemblance to the marigolds depicted on one of the packets, before the wind had reduced them to almost leafless and disabled stems. Even that modicum of success had heartened her and she’d rushed outside to gather the tattered remnants of gold that were still visible. Taking them into the kitchen she’d put them into an old tin measure of water, retrieved the paint box and brushes which the English couple had sent Wee Ruari for his birthday and had set to work. She had no skill at painting but the rough outcome had given her a transient satisfaction, if not pleasure. Apart from herself, no one but Wee Ruari had been allowed to see her effort, or so she had believed until the day she had sorted the books in the chest in her late husband’s bedroom and the painting had fallen from between the pages of his Gaelic Bible. For a few moments she had been transfixed by the discovery, her breath quickening as she tried to quell the rising torment of her thoughts. How had it come to be there …? And why …? why …? She’d made herself assume that her son, perhaps being childishly proud of her work, had covertly extracted the painting from its hideaway in her drawer; had shown it to his uncle and had then promptly forgotten its existence. Why it had now come to light between the pages of her husband’s much revered bible had not been so easy to guess. Fearful of slipping back into the all too easy habit of heartache she had resisted further conjecture, and with tremulous fingers had reinserted the picture, not knowing why she did so. With a corner of her apron she’d wiped away the tears that had filled her eyes and, closing the Bible firmly had replaced it on the chest.

  She recalled now as she turned the earth with her graip that there’d been a letter from the English couple in the last post she’d received and, as always, there’d been a postscript plea to allow them to do her a small favour by letting them know of any small items she might be unable to get and might like them to send by post. Up to now she’d baulked at becoming what she thought of as ‘too beholden’, and pride had made her too reluctant to admit there might be things she would like but which were too difficult to obtain. Resolving that pride must be overcome she determined to add a little postscript to her own letter asking if they would kindly get her a packet of marigold seeds. It would give the young couple so much pleasure to comply with her request, she excused herself as she put the graip back in the shed, and it would cost them very little.

  Chapter Nine

  It was late afternoon and the wind was beginning to strengthen with the rising tide; the ripples of the Sound were growing increasingly skittish, showing occasional glimpses of white foam. Kirsty, edgily watching for the return of the Katy, was at length rewarded by the sight of a spray-screened shape heading purposefully towards the island. Less than half an hour later her son, his satchel of books swinging from one arm, was racing up from the shore. She always liked to get back to the house before he arrived so that he should not suspect her of watching too keenly for his return. Her anxiety would have embarrassed him.

  She was in the kitchen when he burst in; his sou’wester had been blown or pushed back over his shoulder; his hair was tight curled by spray and his face looked in imminent danger of igniting.

  ‘Jamie’s brought you something,’ he announced, flinging his satchel onto the bench.

  ‘What sort of something?’ It was the reply he was expecting.

  ‘You’ll need to wait and see what.’ His smile was impish.

  ‘I’ll do that.’ She pulled a towel down from the rack and handed it to him to wipe his face and hair. ‘You’ve brought the sea into the house with you,’ she accused him lightly. ‘It was kind of coarse?’

  After a cursory rub of his head he threw the towel down on top of the satchel, his eyes focusing expectantly on the pile of scones she was buttering. ‘It was a bit rockly,’ he admitted loftily. ‘But that’s the way me and Jamie and Ally like it best.’ Wee Ruari liked to believe he was already an intrepid mariner.

  She pushed a buttered scone along the table towards him.

  ‘Jamie let me take the tiller for a whiley an’ we hit a good few lumps before Enac started gurning.’ There came the sound of voices from outside and he whispered, ‘I reckon Enac’s not so good in a boat as she likes to make out.’

  Kirsty gave him a sternly reproving glance as Enac came into the kitchen. Her face was fiery but she was flapping her arms to keep warm. ‘Oh for a good hot strupak,’ she cried as she divested herself of an old oilskin which she had been wearing over her own waterproof.

  Kirsty poured her a mug of tea. ‘A bumpy crossing was it?’ she enquired.

  ‘Bumpy enough, but it’s my poor feets that took the cold while I was waiting for Ally to get away from his uncle.’ She took a scone and sat down at the bench. ‘That old Bheinn Martin saw I was waiting and came over to make me listen to how her cow died at the back end of the year from a spell an old witch had put on it. I’ve heard the story plenty times before but she went on and on girnin’ about losing the best cow she’d ever had that gave milk that was as creamy as butter. She was crouched there on the dyke and she’d taken off her own boots because her corns was killin’ her feets, she says, and there she was moanin’ about the old witch and her old corns and not seeming put out by the cold. I swear my own feets were that wet just, they got colder and colder hearing her.’

  Kirsty smiled. ‘Aye, I believe Bheinn Martin makes a right comic of herself once she can find a listener,’ she sympathised.

  Jamie, coming in, dumped a large cloth-wrapped bundle on the table. ‘That’s from the wife of Euan Ally’s uncle,’ he explained. ‘She was saying it will help feed him when he gets here and Euan Ally himself is bringing a fine salmon that his uncle landed only last evening.’

  ‘Poached of course,’ Kirsty murmured, more by way of an observation than a question.

  ‘Aye, right enough. Over at the Struan. What would you expect?’

  At that moment Euan Ally came into the kitchen. He appeared to be struggling to retrieve a large salmon from beneath his rather tight jersey. ‘God! You’d think the beast still had life in him,’ he exulted, laying the fish proudly on the table. ‘Now is anyone going to say that’s not a right royal fish?’ he demanded and waited impatiently for t
he expected commendations.

  Enac looked at him approvingly. ‘But Ally, you didn’t say a word to me that you got a salmon from your uncle as well as a haunch of venison from your aunt!’ she reproached him saucily.

  ‘No, I did not then,’ taunted Euan Ally. ‘Why would I be for telling you that one of my family helps himself to the laird’s stock whenever he gets the chance? That was always kept a secret.’

  ‘But there’s never been a secret about your Uncle Lachy being the best poacher in Clachan and beyond as well as being the best precentor in these parts. Venison, salmon, trout, whatever; there’s said never to be a want of such in your uncle’s house. I’ve known that since I was a wee lassie.’ Her tone was edged with reverence.

  ‘I believe that’s true,’ admitted Euan Ally complacently.

  ‘And yet your aunt is so much in fear of the Devil and the missionary, she’s dead scared of allowing her man to even put his eyes on a tool hours before the Sabbath let alone on the Sabbath itself,’ interjected Kirsty with spurious condemnation. ‘Folk respect her for being Godfearing and pious yet you are saying she doesn’t care that her man’s a regular poacher?’

  ‘No, indeed she doesn’t,’ Euan Ally affirmed bluntly. ‘I believe she’s more proud of his poaching than she is of his precenting or anything else he gets up to.’

  Euan Ally’s admission came as no surprise to Kirsty. A child of the islands, she was not unaware of the anomalies of the religion. There would, of course, be an explanation. She waited while Euan Ally took several gulps of tea. ‘See now, this is the way of it,’ he proceeded to enlighten her. ‘My aunt reckons it’s there in the Good Book that the Lord gives to every man five talents and he’ll get a greater reward in Heaven if he makes use of every single one of them the best way he can. She reckons if one of her man’s talents is to be a good poacher then seein’ it’s a God-given gift it would be a kind of sin to waste it.’