Storm Over Rhanna
Page 35
Old Annack Gow, for the umpteenth time since the wedding plans became common knowledge, shook her head at sight of the groaning tables and commented on how strange it was to be celebrating a wedding on Christmas morning. In the beginning everyone else had thought as Annack did, that it ‘was just no’ natural to get married on Christmas morning’. The island had never known the like before, it was outwith all tradition and, to quote Sorcha, ‘Doctor Megan is just like they flowery people on the mainland, doing all sorts o’ strange things just to get noticed. I wouldny be surprised if she turned up in kirk wi’ a shaved head and naught to cover her modesty but garlands o’ flowers.’
But Megan had wanted her wedding to coincide with the Lord’s birthday and of course she had got her way. In every respect, except its timing, the wedding was as traditional as every other on the island had been, and once the reception got into full swing even conventional beings like Annack forgot their doubts and threw themselves into the spirit of the event, literally, for Annack’s father had passed on to her the secrets of his illicit whisky still, and in the two months leading up to the wedding Tam and his cronies had dared to make use of the ‘wee secret room’ in Annack’s blackhouse with the result that a full barrel of best malt brew was ready and waiting for the night.
The whisky flowed, golden, tempting. Glasses chinked, laughter arose, the rest of the night passed in eating, drinking, singing and dancing.
Gareth Jenkins gently danced Eve round the hall. ‘When is the baby due?’ he asked at one point.
‘It will come in March wi’ the daffodils.’
‘And the mad March hares.’
She studied him. He was slim but well-built with curly dark hair and brown eyes that had been serious to begin with but now glowed with life.
‘You’re no’ as shy as I first thought,’ she observed frankly.
‘No,’ he agreed and whirled her off again, not in the least put out by her ‘condition’, which had been the pivot of much talk ever since it became known she was expecting Daniel’s baby.
‘What is it you do?’ Eve asked when she had to call a halt to catch her breath.
‘I’m a teacher.’
‘Of what?’
‘Infants.’
‘You don’t look as if you’ve got the patience.’
‘I haven’t.’
They both giggled. Elspeth raised her eyebrows, so did Behag, not because of the young folk but because Captain Mac came up at that moment to lift Elspeth to her feet and birl her away round the floor at a very unsober pace.
It was the turn of Captain Mac’s sister, Nellie, to raise her brows. She had come over from the island of Hanaay for the wedding and decided providence had sent for her in order to prevent a tragedy.
‘He canny be serious about that wifie,’ she confided into Behag’s long and willing ears.
‘If he isny, he’s makin’ a damty good job o’ pretendin’,’ nodded Behag with vigour. ‘’Tis bad enough watchin’ young folks creepin’ into haysheds on no good business but at their age ’tis an affront to decency.’
‘Never!’ Nellie was suitably shocked. ‘He’s a stupid auld goat, that he is, but I tell you this, he will no’ insult the good family name by giving it to that sour cailleach, no’ while I’m around.’
Old Bob, who was sitting within earshot, his pipe in one hand and a dram in the other, leaned forward and said confidentially, ‘You will have your work cut out trying to unhook Elspeth’s claws from your brother, Nellie lass. She might look an auld prune but passion smoulders sore in the breast o’ her, fine I know it too for she went full tilt at myself a whilie back and if Mac hadny come along when he did I doubt I wouldny hae escaped her clutches.’
With a wild ‘hooch’ he was up and away, seizing hold of Aunt Grace as he went and placing a shameless smacker square on her mouth.
‘This island gets worse!’ fumed an outraged Nellie. ‘It’s the talk o’ the Hebrides from Hanaay to Skye! The whole place is just jumpin’ wi’ lust and sin and ’tis little wonder my very own brother has come under the influence . . .’
‘Will you be havin’ this dance wi’ me, Nellie?’ Old Colin of Rumhor, a widower with six children to his credit, beamed a beguiling smile all over Nellie’s bristling girth. She fluttered and grumbled for a second while all around the fiddles played and everyone danced. ‘Well, just this once, Colin,’ she conceded coyly, and fleered away to hooch and yooch with the rest, leaving Behag to wonder if there was one, single, upright soul left in the whole of the island.
In the course of the evening, Mark made sure he had at least one dance each with Shona and Tina, both of whom needed no words to tell them how grateful he was for the loyalty they had shown him during his illness. It was there in his eyes, in ‘that nice wee crooked smile o’ his’ which came readily to his face these days so that one was apt to forget it had ever been missing.
Sometime during the festivities Megan had changed into a blue wool suit and at last she and Mark slipped away. It was three o’clock in the morning. The island lay calm and peaceful under the stars. Hand in hand they walked to the Manse where they would be spending Christmas with Megan’s relations and Mark’s friends. Both the Manse and Tigh na Cladach would be full to bursting for the next two days, afterwards the newly weds were travelling to London before going on to Greece to spend their honeymoon, from there to Wales to be with Megan’s folks for a while – and then it was back to Rhanna and the Manse where they would live and work together.
The big, old house was dark and silent when they went in. But Muff and Flops, the latter named for obvious reasons, were waiting for them. With the dogs at their heels they wandered wordlessly down to the wide, white stretches of lonely Burg Bay, there to stand at the water’s edge and look out over the vast, moon-silvered expanse before them. The music from the hall drifted down to them. The islanders would sing and dance for hours yet and still be up, bright-eyed, for the Christmas Day celebrations.
Mark slid his arm round Megan’s waist and murmured into her ear, ‘Don’t laugh, but one of my secret ambitions has always been to dance with a beautiful woman on a moonlit beach in the early hours of the morning.’
‘Nothing is impossible if you want it enough,’ she whispered back.
She went into his arms, their heads touched, his abrasive cheek rubbed against her smooth one. They glided together along the bay, silently lost in one another, holding passion at bay, savouring these shared moments of dreamlike movement, anticipating the minutes, the hours, the days yet to come.
Muff and Flops ran together, delighting in the novelty of the unexpected romp, dark shadows that quested the night as had another who had roamed these shores in the good days of freedom and sweet, happy contentment.
‘We’re an odd sort of couple,’ Megan spoke a trifle shakily, hardly able to believe that she was dancing here, by the water’s edge, in the early hours of Christmas morning, in the arms of this man who was now her husband. ‘You a minister, me a doctor, how different we are.’
‘I think we’ll make a wonderful team,’ his lips moved against her ear, making her shiver with delight, ‘you healing bodies, me comforting souls whose bodies can’t be healed . . .’
After that nothing more was said between them for a long time. He drew her in towards him. The scent of her made his senses whirl. Their mouths were close, tremulously tantalizingly close, then with a helpless little groan he crushed her to him, their lips met, blended together and all the pent-up emotions of the past were released as passions found expression in stirring limbs, awakening flesh . . .
Music drifted above them, around them, the dogs gambolled and played together, the sheep lay silent in the sylvan fields, Burg Bay shimmered under the stars, the sea chuckled, rattled the pebbles in the rock pools, and above all the moon sailed in its heaven and cast its ethereal beam over the tranquil, untroubled reaches of the Sound of Rhanna.