Little Bird Flies

by Karen McCombie

  Will, Lachlan, Effie and I – we are as still as the boulders on the nearby outcrop. The quiet stretches, the birdsong swells in the vacuum. But at last Miss Tulliver speaks.

  “Yes, oh, yes, I will marry you!” she says in delight, though the water that runs from her eyes and even her nose could be mistaken for a sign of sadness by a stranger, instead of happiness and relief.

  “Then it is settled!” Mr Samuel says in delight, reaching out to take Miss Tulliver’s hands in his. “We will tell the Laird this day. He can have no objections, since he foolishly values you so little. Next week, we shall leave on the ferry together, and set off for my lodgings in Glasgow. Perhaps the old preacher can marry us here when he comes on Sunday, or we shall find someone to marry us when we get to the mainland. Even if we have to wait till we reach Glasgow, it will not matter. We will be together and…”

  Mr Samuel’s excited words fade to a babble in my mind, for I now see that Will is again staring, so intently now, at the top of the rocky outcrop. What can be so important as to take his attention from this glorious moment between our two friends?

  Sensing something might be wrong, I look that way now, squinting my eyes against the sun. And now I see that there are three figures up there. Will’s eyes are quite fixed upon them, and he seems uncommonly agitated.

  “Excuse me, but there is something I must do,” he suddenly says, and begins to hurry away, taking great strides around the little lochan that quickly turn into a run.

  “Will?” I call after him. There is a tightness in my stomach that tells me something is far from well here. “I must see what the matter is…”

  With that muttering to my sister and brother and the new sweethearts, I gather up my skirts and follow my friend.

  “Will!” I shout, as he disappears into the dark-green shelter of the pines on the far side of the lochan. “Will, wait!”

  It seems he does not wish to wait; as I dart beneath the cover of branches and leap over the tangle of roots, he shows me only his back, as if he wishes to be as far away from me as he can. But he cannot outrun me here; if we were on the flat moor he would win, but the uneven floor of the woods tricks him just as much as it does me. At last, as the effort of running burns my very lungs, I see Will take a wrong step and a tumble, just as the woods thin out and give way to the sunshine on the foot of the outcrop.

  “For shame, Will!” I gasp, catching him up as he struggles to right himself. “What can be so terrible that you run from me so?”

  “I am not running from you, Little Bird,” he pants in answer. “I am running to stop them.”

  “Who? Who is up there?” I ask, glancing up at the steep rocks. I know the other side to be steep too; the side that watches over the old droving road leading onward towards the most westerly township.

  “My brother George, and Fergus and Donal,” he says a little more steadily, as his breath calms. “They know the Laird has gone to see the last of his tenants today. They plan to lie in wait and attack him on his way back.”

  “Attack him?” I say, shock flooding my chest. “Do they mean to kill him?”

  “No, no! They have a rope laid across the droving path, which they will pull up to make his horse fall,” says Will, his eyes wide with the older boys’ secret. “Before the Laird sees what is happening, they plan to come from behind and hit his skull with a stone, and then flee. They told me it would look like a rockfall has happened.”

  “But to what purpose?” I ask, despairing of this wild and wayward plan.

  “They want him injured so that he may not be able to carry out his bad business. Or even so he gives up on the island and moves back to London.”

  “Will, this is madness!” I tell him with no uncertainty. “How could the lads be sure that would be the outcome? How could they be sure the Laird would not set eyes on them? And what is the difference between a blow that causes injury and one that kills a man – how can whichever one does the deed make his aim so fixed? Will, if they kill the Laird and are found out…”

  “I know. It came to me now just how dangerous a task it is,” Will says, getting back on his feet and beginning to clamber up the rocks. “And that’s why I must stop them.”

  Of course I clamber quickly after my friend, faster than ever I have scaled the stones of the Glas Crags.

  For perhaps George and the Matheson boys will listen to Will, and perhaps they will not. And if they do not, I can surely talk to them as the daughter of Robert MacKerrie, the most respected of the island’s elders.

  I know my father would tell them this is not the right action. I know he would counsel them to––

  “NO!” Will shouts, as he reaches the summit a step or two before I do. But the sound of it is lost as a loud, chest-thumping crack rings out below.

  Desperate to see what my friend is witnessing, I scramble closer, the loose covering of small stones underfoot making the going difficult.

  As I struggle to steady myself, I glimpse the scene below … a horse tumbled to the ground, unable to right itself for the weight of the fallen rider – the Laird, holding firm to it. Another horse rearing, whinnying, as Mr Jenkins clutches its reins with one hand while something glints and smokes in his other.

  “Stop, you cowards! I know who you are!” he roars, red-faced, to the lads I cannot see from this vantage point, but who must now be fleeing.

  A cold, hard sureness comes to me: the lawyer is holding a gun.

  The panic of it makes me lose my balance completely on this unknown, uncertain surface, and I start slipping and sliding backwards on the shale.

  “Little Bird!” I hear Will shout, as the ground seems to give way below me, sending me back down the way I came.

  Twisted arms of gorse flash by, my desperate grasp missing them, my fingers instead tearing and bleeding on jagged stones.

  And I begin to tumble now, over and over. Falling and falling and falling, like a bird shot on the moor…

  Till my wing is pulled hard, and the shriek of searing pain gives way to sudden blackness.

  CHAPTER 12

  I am in Father’s good chair, with the best cushions, right by the crackling fire.

  He himself is not in need of it; he is gone to the Big House to try to plead for George, Fergus and Donal, or to find out what fate has befallen them.

  And while we wait impatiently for news, I rest here with my head woozy from the warm milk and whisky Effie gave me for my pain … though in truth, the shoulder of my weak arm still throbs maddeningly.

  It came clean out of the socket when Will grabbed me on the outcrop and stopped me falling further. But once Mr Samuel carried me home, my sister expertly wrestled my shoulder till it cracked into position, afterwards binding it tight to me with a piece of cotton torn from the bottom of one of Miss Tulliver’s petticoats.

  Still, my wrenched arm is not what makes me so wretched.

  “Shush now, Bridie,” Effie says softly, from her seat at the other side of the fire, where Lachlan sits curled at her feet like a sickly dog seeking solace from the warmth of the grate. “Is it paining you more?”

  It is only on hearing my sister’s kindly tone that I feel the fat, hot tears springing from my eyes.

  “No, it is not that. I thought … I thought I might save the lads,” I tell Effie haltingly, as the tears trip up my words. “Will did, too. But we failed!”

  “You and Will did not fail, Bridie,” Effie insists. “For did Will not save you this afternoon, and you him?”

  I blink. Will did indeed save me from further harm, stopping me clattering on to the boulders that lay at the foot of the outcrop.

  “But how did I save him?” I ask my sister.

  “Bridie, he told me himself how he was frozen with fear, staring down for sightings of his brother or the other boys,” Effie says earnestly. “It would have taken but a second for the Laird or his lawyer to glance up and see him – and suppose him to be part of the plot. In rushing to your rescue, you helped Will save himself. And we mus
t be grateful for that.”

  Her words are balm to me indeed, more than any whisky and milk. Yet the gentleness and sense in them make we weep more, for she reminds me in this moment so much of Mother. Oh, how I miss––

  The door is suddenly thrust open, and Father rushes in, his brown eyes as dark as pitch with rage, his breath ragged from hurrying to us.

  “What is it? What has happened to George and the boys?” asks Effie, the colour quite lost from her face.

  “It seems the three lads stole away to the cove and took Mr Matheson’s rowboat,” says Father, slamming the door shut behind him and scratching agitatedly at his beard. “We can only hope they are well on their way to the mainland by now.”

  “The mainland? But that is too far to go in just a rowing boat, is it not?” I say.

  I know that the small boats are meant only for skirting around the island. To get to the mainland, folk wait for the ferry or hitch a lift on a fishing vessel.

  “It can be done,” says Father, with a hopeful light in his eyes. “If the lads aim for the rocky spit of land closest they can cut across the moors on foot to the town.”

  “Isn’t there an old fellow that scratches a living from a croft somewhere out that way?” asks Effie. “Perhaps he might help them; give them a lift to town on his cart?”

  “Mr Buchanan … he keeps himself to himself, but he is a good man, and may well help the lads,” Father replies. “I hope so; I hear one of the Laird’s London men is readying to set sail for the town to get the law on them.”

  So Fergus and Donal will not be standing proud and handsome in their kilts by the harbour tomorrow morning, ready to play their fiddles after George pipes the Queen a welcome as her ship docks.

  And more importantly, and sadder yet, the lads will never, ever again play those well-loved tunes and airs for the folk of Tornish…

  “May they run so far and so fast that they are never found…” mutters Father, as if he is saying a prayer.

  What he does not say is that we cannot contemplate another fate for them. Prison, or worse, is too desperate a thought.

  “Does Ishbel know?” I ask, thinking of our sister, working hard at the Big House to prepare for the royal party, for the pittance she will – hopefully – be paid before she finds herself without work.

  “Aye, and Mistress Matheson,” Father says, nodding and staring down at the ground, as if it is hard to think of the despair of both his daughter and the Matheson brothers’ mother.

  “Father, could you not have asked the Laird to forgive George, Fergus and Donal?” Lachlan now asks, from where he is hunched on the floor and hugging on to Effie’s skirts.

  At that, Father gives a sigh that is more like a soft roar of despair, and clutches his head with both hands.

  “Father?” I say urgently, knowing that there is something even more terrible that he must tell us.

  “I did go to plead for the boys on behalf of their families, though I knew it a fool’s errand,” he answers in a resigned voice. “What I did not suppose was that the Laird … that the Laird would blame me for the affair.”

  “You? But, Father, why would Mr Palmer-Reeves suppose that?” Effie asks, her grey eyes flashing with alarm.

  “He supposes it because he and his crony came across me at the township he was visiting. That was enough to make him think that I plot and scheme with his tenants against him,” Father tells us. “And with the Matheson lads and George caught trying to set upon him on his return, he is now certain that I, as the main elder, ordered them to do so.”

  “What does this mean, Father?” I ask, as a chill begins to replace the warm, woozy feeling inside me.

  “It means that if he cannot have the lads punished,” Father answers, “he will more than happily settle for me, I fear.”

  “No!” cries Effie with a voice sharp as a shard of glass. “Everyone on the island and beyond knows you to be honest and good!”

  “But, Effie, not everyone is a rich and powerful laird,” Father tells her, pounding one fist into the palm of the other hand, as if wishing he could do the same to Mr Palmer-Reeves. “And so – oh, forgive me, Bridget, my love! – we have no choice…”

  “No choice but what?” I ask, scared now that he mentions Mother in such a grave tone.

  “Your mother called us the lucky ones, to live our lives here on Tornish. But, my dears, our luck has run out. We must leave – all of us. Tomorrow,” says Father, staring solemnly at us. “There is nothing for us here now.”

  “I knew it! There have been so many signs…” Effie wails, clutching her shawl tight around her.

  I am not like my sister; I never was superstitious. But this morning at the Big House, I felt as if my family was undone and now I know it is so. And in the yawning silence after Father’s declaration, I think each of our troubled minds turns to the one we leave behind, lying at her peace in the churchyard.

  The one whose grave we will not be able to visit and place flowers on ever again, if we are to flee Tornish as Father insists…

  “Listen, I have already spoken of this to Ishbel, and she will return home as soon as she is able,” Father carries on, pausing only to comfortingly pat Effie on the shoulder and plant a tender kiss on her head. “Tonight, now, you must pack all that is most important, and carry it to our rowboat in the cove. And tomorrow morning, while the Queen lands on Tornish, we shall all be there to greet her at the harbour, as we should be.”

  “Father … I don’t understand,” whines Lachlan, looking so very alarmed.

  “We will arouse no suspicion if we are seen to be there to welcome Her Majesty, my little lad,” Father says to him, as he walks to the window and reaches for Mother’s tin box hidden in the eaves above it. “And while everyone is quite distracted, we shall all quietly steal away.”

  “Where to?” asks Lachlan, as we watch Father take money from the box and stuff it in his pocket, before returning the tin to its hiding place.

  “Glasgow, I think – it is a large place to hide away in, with good prospects for me to work,” Father answers. “And I am away now to see John Mackay. I will pay him to take you and your sisters on board his fishing boat tomorrow, and away from here.”

  “Just us? Are you not coming on John’s boat too, Father?” says Effie, alarmed.

  “No, because I do not wish to have him accused of helping put danger his way,” says Father, opening the cottage door. “If he is stopped with only you three girls and Lachlan on board, Ishbel is to say he is taking you to the mainland to visit family.”

  “And you will take the rowboat, Father?” I ask, picturing him crossing the choppy channel to the dangerous rocky outcrop he just spoke of.

  “Yes, and I’ll meet you on the outskirts of the town. I built a barn for a farmer there two summers back – if you tell him you’re my kin he’ll let you hide away there till I can join you, I’m sure,” Father explains. “And now I must go, there is much I need to arrange. And … and I’m sorry.”

  As the door closes on us, I feel too shocked to cry. But Effie and Lachlan give in to their tears and woe most mightily.

  “Here,” I tell them, struggling upright though all of my aches. “We must make haste. Lachlan, get the empty sacks from the byre. We can pack our things in those.”

  “But what should we take with us? What is important?” Effie cries in panic.

  “Clothes, blankets, candles,” I suggest, though I am not so certain myself. “Father’s tools, some of the dried foodstuffs for our journey…”

  I am as uncertain as my sister, but all I do know is that we can help Father by being as ready as we know how to be. Even if that means guessing.

  And so two hours or more of effort passes, with things being packed and driven in the pony and cart to the rowboat, in readiness for our escape in the morning. (What will happen to our steady old pony once we are gone? What of the cows and the chickens and the good house that Father built for us? Oh, I mustn’t think of that now…)

  There is s
urely much more to be done, but I am a poor help with my arm and tender bruisings. And Lachlan; Lachlan is grizzling, crazed with tiredness and worry, and so I shoo him to bed.

  When I come back from settling him, I see my sister standing at the open door of the cottage, watching as the early summer evening light begins to fade outside. I pad across and stand alongside her, in time to see the rich glow of the sun as it dips down to the west. It is a sight we will not see again – from the sweet framing of this familiar doorway at least. Neither of us speaks, but I feel Effie’s arm circle my waist, and I gratefully lay my head on her shoulder. I notice in this stillness that my secret self – the one who longs to leave – is lost for words for once, now that the harsh reality of our going looms large and heavy…

  But my reverie is interrupted by a sudden yapping, and out of the gloaming, a light streak of dog comes loping towards us in a most odd fashion, followed by the hurrying figure of Ishbel, and one other. It is Mr Samuel!

  He looks beside himself with grief. Does he know of our plans to leave undercover? I like Mr Samuel very much, but I do not think Ishbel knows him well enough to have trusted him with this sudden pressing secret of ours.

  Then quick as a blink, a shared look passes between Ishbel, Effie and myself. I am certain of its meaning; Mr Samuel knows nothing, and it is safest that way. The squeeze of a hand Ishbel gives us both as we all hurry inside tells us that we are together in what is to come. I have never felt so deep-down sure of my sisters and our bond. Mother would be proud!

  “Listen, I cannot get sense out of him,” Ishbel says to us in Gaelic as she throws off her shawl and Mr Samuel collapses on the settle. “I came across him and the dog in the woods on the way home. He was wailing as if the end of the world was come!”