Storm Over Rhanna

by Christine Marion Fraser

  Pausing suddenly he looked around, including every last person in that one, penetrating sweep. ‘You are all, no doubt, wondering why you are here tonight. The answer to that isn’t so simple. I have been ill, I’m alright now but the question of my remaining here on Rhanna, or leaving for good, will all depend on what you think of me after I tell you – the things I must. I don’t feel very brave standing here facing you all but it has to be done – you see,’ he looked down at his hands, ‘I keep remembering what a very good friend of mine once told me, that I was a human being, not just some elusive creature shouting thunder from the pulpit, but a man who appeared to be open and honest about his weaknesses and failings.’

  At this point, Captain Mac grew somewhat red in the face and ran one big, horny finger round the rim of his collar, but no one noticed. A pin could have been heard to drop as Mark continued, ‘Well, as it happens, I have been committing my wee sins in private. To some degree we all do that or we wouldn’t be human, but my greatest offence was not only that of betraying my parishioners, it was of betraying my God – because you see, I had lost my faith in Him, myself, everything that was ever of any value in my life . . .’

  He went on to tell them everything, not sparing himself in any way, quite brutally denouncing himself before them all, never once blaming anyone or condoning himself for his sufferings of mind and spirit. No audience had ever been held more captive, or been more spellbound, and when his voice finally ceased to ring round the hall there was a total, stunned silence, during which Lachlan seized the opportunity to leap to his feet and go quickly to join Mark on the platform.

  Impatiently pushing an unruly lock from his forehead, he cried out, ‘This isn’t just a man o’ God we have heard speaking tonight, this is a man of great personal courage and character and I for one feel that he has privileged each and every one o’ us by being our minister and more, by showing himself to be the sort o’ human being we can all turn to in time o’ trouble and need. I am proud to say I know him and will never forget the lessons of humility and honesty I have learned here tonight through listening to him and knowing that his devotion to us, his parishioners, has gone far beyond the call o’ duty.’

  ‘By God, you’re right there, son, ay indeed,’ Captain Mac murmured while surreptitiously wiping his moist cheeks. From all around there were like reactions. To a man the islanders agreed with every word Lachlan spoke. If they had admired Mark James before, it paled to insignificance beside what they felt for him now. The hankies were out, furtively held to wet eyes, hastily applied to sniffing noses.

  ‘Hear, hear!’ Holy Smoke, completely carried away with the emotion of the moment, added his voice to the general murmur of approval, all the while vowing that never, never again would he pretend to the world that he was something he wasn’t and, as if to prove his new found sincerity, he withdrew a crushed Woodbine from some inner pocket, proceeding to light it and draw on it so heartily that Behag poked him in the ribs and told him, ‘no’ to display his filthy habits in public!’

  Much nodding and quiet conferring had followed Lachlan’s speech, now chairs were scraped back as everyone stood up. After a rather haphazard start the notes of ‘Amazing Grace’ rose up, powerfully, poignantly, laying to rest Mark’s fears, bring such surging hope to his breast that he felt dizzy with the strength of it.

  ‘I once was lost but now I’m found, was blind but now I see.’ He joined in the old Gaelic psalm and when it was finished he found Megan at his side, reaching up to whisper something in his ear.

  He held up his hand, arresting those in the action of resuming their seats. ‘This evening,’ he cried, ‘which began for me in uncertainty, has, thanks to all of you, ended with such happiness I feel my heart bursting with it. I want to thank my very good friend, Reverend John Grey, for looking after you all so well during my absence – and, just to complete the night, I must tell you that Megan has just asked me to marry her.’

  ‘Mark!’ she laughed, holding onto his arm and hugging him. ‘You know that’s not true. I said . . .’

  Whatever she had to say was drowned out in a great cheer that raised the rafters and made Sorcha hurriedly turn down her deaf aid.

  ‘Och my, ’tis what I aye wanted to hear, bless him, bless them both.’ Tina’s hanky was to the fore again while everyone else raised theirs like triumphant banners to wave them back and forth when the minister shouted above the noise that they were all invited to the wedding, and not to forget to be at kirk on Sunday or he would have something to say about it.

  It was Christmas Eve. Lights twinkled all over the island, the star-studded sky was like a diamond-strewn velvet cloak that happed the world in an embrace of peace. Snatches of carols drifted into the frosty air, from wireless sets, from children trying to sing themselves to sleep and from the lips of those out and about their crofts for one reason or another.

  A strange, expectant hush hung over the island, the beasts in their stalls plucked strands of hay from their mangers but kept their ears pinned back, dogs scratched at imprisoning shed doors and whimpered restlessly, even the very sheep in the fields took longer to settle themselves that night yet all around the land dreamed peacefully; the sea lapped the shores; the gulls mewed tranquilly from the beaches; owls hooted from the barn slates and seemed in no hurry to begin their nocturnal prowls.

  Not a soul was to be seen walking roads that twisted and snaked their way by shore and land . . . It happened quite gradually, first the opening of one door, then another, and yet another till little black dots were to be seen everywhere, moving without hurry, meeting up, eventually converging on the track leading to the Hillock and the kirk whose warm, soft lights spilled gently outside along with the subdued notes of ‘Away in a Manger’ which Totie was playing quietly on the organ.

  Everyone greeted everyone else as if they hadn’t seen one another for years, even though it might only have been an hour or so since the last exchange of words. But this was more than just another gathering arriving for the Watchnight service. Sunday best was still in evidence to be sure but it faded into near oblivion amongst a colourful array of frocks and suits, cheerily bedecked hats, flower-emblazoned lapels, and in a few daring cases, long, dangling earrings and – terrible just – high, spiky shoes that caught in grass and sheep sharn and proved such a nuisance altogether that their youthful owners vowed silently to send them back to the mail order catalogue from whence they had come.

  The interior of the kirk was dim and mysterious with just a few oil lamps and candles set in the windows, and the coloured lights of the Christmas tree giving off an enchanting aura that seemed magnified a thousandfold now that the eve of Christ’s birth was here.

  They were the only lights in kirk that night to use as their source of energy the small generator that Mark kept in reserve to heat the building. In the Manse itself he preferred his peat fires and his oil lamps and had to be hard pressed indeed before permitting himself the luxury of electric lights, as the generator was an old one and used more fuel than it gave off power.

  Therefore the old kirk was suffused in a romantic glow that washed over the mellow stonework and bathed the congregation in a rosy hue which softened weather-beaten skin and further enhanced the lovely pink and white complexions of every Hebridean woman present, whatever her age might be.

  The usual coughings, rustlings, whisperings and nose blowings accompanied the settling-in phase but just when it seemed that everyone had sunk into that respectful, watchful hush preceding a church service, the door opened once more and Dodie catapulted in, as if he had been pushed by a giant hand, which might not have been very far off the mark at that for Captain Mac, brushed, combed, and polished, and doing his door duty, had intercepted the old eccentric as he hung about outside, displaying his customary unwillingness to intrude himself into any sizeable gathering.

  ‘Go you away in, Dodie,’ Mac had coaxed pleasantly, but when Dodie had hummed and hawed and run through just about every excuse in his book, Mac had finally lo
st his patience, and taking Dodie literally by the hand he had led him in through the porch and from there into kirk, giving him a well meaning but none too gentle push to aid him on his way, so that he found himself quarter-way up the aisle, his new shoes, chosen from Mairi’s mail order catalogue after much deliberation, scuffing the polished wood of the floor, squeaking and squelching with every move and causing more heads to turn than any fashion model on a catwalk.

  Dodie gulped and froze, his dreamy grey-green eyes raking the pews for a space and never finding even a chink in the tightly packed gathering. He wasn’t just clean that night, he sparkled. Earlier in the evening, Mairi and Wullie had arrived at Croft Beag, the former loaded down with towels and other essential accoutrements, the latter’s arms piled high with the new clothes Dodie had sent for and which had arrived at Mairi’s house that morning.

  Between them they had bathed, powdered, and dressed the old man, Mairi supervising the filling of the tub, Wullie attending to the business side of washing Dodie which meant soaping him from head to foot so that even the very hairs in his ears received a generous dollop of soap bubbles. He had wailed, moaned, protested with all the might of his new-found strength, but to no avail. His two attendants were merciless in their administrations and now the result of their labours stood transfixed in the aisle, as smart and warm as any gentleman in the land in a well-pressed grey flannel suit and a heavy winter coat of charcoal grey tweed. On his head sat a new cap of blue and grey tweed, tilted jauntily over one eye, an angle which allowed one large shiny pink lug to stick saucily out in all its newly scrubbed glory.

  His face was plump and exceedingly healthy-looking, an impression that was doubly enhanced by the stain of red diffusing his cheekbones and flooding his ears.

  ‘My, my, does he no’ look a gentleman just?’ commented Ranald.

  ‘Ay,’ nodded Todd the Shod, himself looking very dapper in a neatly pressed suit with a red carnation in the buttonhole, ‘if it wasny for his lugs I would never have kent it was our Dodie. I can smell the soap on him from here.’

  ‘Dodie – Dodie,’ hissed Mairi, ‘in here beside Wullie and me.’

  Standing up and reaching out, she hauled the old man into her pew and glad he was too of her timely intervention. So much in a hurry was he to capture anonymity that he stamped on Merry Mary’s bunion, trod on Kate’s hammer toes, tripped over Bob the Shepherd’s crook, and landed without the least intention in Nancy’s lap. All but the last tongue-clicked and cursed. Nancy merely helped him to his feet in her good-natured way and saw him settled, or more accurately, squashed, in between her brother Wullie and her sister-in-law Mairi.

  Soon after that Captain Mac, his door duties done, slipped into his own seat kept warm by Elspeth, and the service began.

  It was beautiful, as were all the Watchnight services in the little kirk on the Hillock, but this one was special. Mark James told the time-honoured story of Christ’s birth; carols were sung; a passage was read from the bible by Lachlan in his pleasantly soothing voice. The stars winked in the windows, the lights glowed on the tree, time moved on towards midnight. Out to the front stepped ten-year-old Kyle Angus McKinnon, youngest son of Ethel and Angus McKinnon and grandson of Kate, a holy terror in the normal way of things but now resembling a golden-haired cherub minus the wings. With confidence oozing from every scrubbed pore, he waited for Totie to give him his cue. When it came, he opened his mouth wide and ‘Still the Night’ poured forth, rising, rising, pure liquid sound that blended with the ringing of the bells as they tolled forth, proclaiming that the day of Christ’s birth had arrived.

  All of Kyle’s many relatives melted with pride and forgot how often they had chased his unruly presence from their homes with the business end of a broom, everyone else stared and wondered that such a little monster could produce such sounds from a throat more given to mischievous chatter and uncherub-like oaths. Undeterred Kyle sang on, the bells kept ringing, far and wide the chimes travelled. Those that couldn’t attend the service for one reason or another but who had gathered at some communual point, listened moist-eyed and told each other, ‘Hear that, just hear that, och, it’s come, it’s here,’ whereupon they hastened to charge their glasses in order to drink a toast to the ‘Dawn of Christ’ and then ‘just a wee tate more’ to be ready when the hands of the clock reached a certain point.

  The bells stopped, their echoes died away, no one showed any inclination to leave their pews, instead a breathless hush descended over all.

  A short interval ensued during which Mark James slipped through to the vestry, reappearing a few minutes later minus his robes and now clad in a dark suit, with a red rose in the lapel. A few steps took him to the altar where he was joined by a dark-haired young man who smiled at him nervously before composing his features into their former, serious expression. The Rev. John Grey, looking very dignified in his clergy robes, arranged himself in front of the two men; Totie flexed her fingers and set them upon the keys of the harmonium, her feet went into action, pedalling energetically at the bellows; the instrument wheezed, stuttered, burst into sudden, vibrant life. Totie sent up a silent prayer of thanks, her strong fingers were sure and firm as they moved along the keyboard – the notes of the Wedding March soared up, spilled outwards.

  The door opened and in a cloud of white satin and lace Megan came in on the arm of a tall, distinguished-looking man; behind them walked a young woman dressed in blue silk. She was carrying flowers and blushing shyly.

  Megan too carried flowers. She neither blushed nor seemed unduly nervous, her radiance of face and form sprung from an inner font of pure happiness that beamed its light on the man whose arm she held: Ivor David Jenkins, her father, a Welsh surgeon with a string of letters after his name and no side at all to his nature. He smiled back at her, guided her graciously along the aisle, both of them tilting their heads in acknowledgement of friends and relatives, reserving a special smile for a vibrantly attractive woman sitting at the front, Bronwyn Alice Jenkins, Megan’s mother, who wore a white suit and matching hat with a flimsy little veil that failed completely to hide her wide, generous mouth, her lively dark eyes.

  In no time at all they were at the front, Megan’s younger sister, Morgan, relaxing a little now that the nerve-shattering experience of walking behind her sister down the aisle of a strange little church was over.

  The eyes of Mark James and Megan Margaret Jenkins met, held, their hearts beat faster than before. Love was in the kirk on the Hillock that magical Christmas morning. It breathed and lived and became one enormous heartbeat, pulsing, growing, reaching every corner. The candle flames flickered, the oil lamps glowed, the fairy lights splashed enchantment over the green needles of the tree, the spirit of Christmas shone over all.

  There was hush, expectancy, excitement, and hope, all mingling together and uniting everyone in a common bond of friendship and love. The young were silent, lost in wonder, the old were serene, safe in the knowledge that for them the storms of life were mainly over and they had come through, calm of mind and spirit. One and all recalled their own special moments, and misty-eyed they waited for the Rev. John Grey to unite their minister and their doctor in holy matrimony.

  The silence lengthened. Gareth Thomas Jenkins, Megan’s young brother, fidgeted a little and prayed the age-old prayer that he wouldn’t drop the ring when the moment of that duty befell him. Mark’s relatives by his first marriage, his clergy friends, his adopted aunts and uncles from childhood associations in Glasgow, thought about a young woman and a little girl who had died too soon and they cried inside themselves for things past but were glad that the time of sorrow was over for Mark James.

  He thought about Margaret and about Sharon and he too cried silently, but knew that if he was to live a life of meaning he had to have love in it or he might as well be dead also.

  The Rev. John Grey cleared his throat. Everyone looked at him, an old man now, with a mop of silvery hair and an aura of contentment about him that had never been there in the
days of preaching his hell, fire, and thunder to a people he had only grown to like and admire, and who had drawn closer to him the day he stepped off his pedestal and became a human being ‘who went to the wee hoosie to pee’ like everyone else.

  His voice had lost none of its command, but the content of his rhetoric was different these days and never more so than now when he spoke the words that joined Mark and Megan together as man and wife.

  ‘Do you, Megan, take this man—?’

  ‘Do you, Mark, take this woman—?’

  They did of course, joyfully, wonderingly. Gareth didn’t drop the ring. Very soon it was reposing on Megan’s finger, a plain gold band which she wanted to hold up and show the world but instead, decorously, she bowed her head and kept very still – and then willingly, naturally, she was in Mark’s arms, feeling the warm, firm promise of his lips against hers.

  And then it was over, Totie pounded the keyboard, played the newly married couple out of kirk, her fingers never faltering till every last person had left, and then she collapsed in a heap against her music sheets and smiled a smile of complete relief that she hadn’t struck one wrong note.

  The congregation poured out into the frosty air. The bagpipes struck up. Torquill Andrew and Todd the Shod played the newly weds down to the village hall where the reception was to be held, since the tiny church hall could never have contained so many people in its rigid confines.

  The hall was warm and welcoming. Christmas decorations jostled with wedding banners and balloons, a line of joined tables set at one side of the building held the wedding buffet, those on the other side contained the numerous gifts that had been showered on Mark and Megan from children and adults alike. In pride of place was a painting done by Dodie of Mutt sitting on his cushion in front of the Manse kitchen fire. Mark had been very touched by the gift. He had looked at it for a long time without saying anything, then he had gathered Dodie to his bosom and spoken in a husky voice which had so alarmed the old man that he imagined his gift had brought more pain than pleasure, till he saw the gratitude in Mark’s moist eyes and the tender smile that lurked at his mouth whenever he looked at the painting.