‘It’s just a joke, lass,’ he shrugs, suddenly unsure of himself. ‘Didn’t mean no harm. Don’t be stupid, mind,’ he rallies. ‘Call it your penny luck today. Call it a bond, paid in advance.’
Luck money is an old tradition. It is a goodwill gesture offered by vendors to buyers at the end of a day’s sale or other transaction. He is one of the sheep buyers. To my dismay, I realise I will see him later in the ring.
I do not like loud voices or rough hands. Violence is an assault. In childhood, when one parent is rough and the other, who should step in, ignores it, it is a double blow. You silence your own voice, overreact, seek safety by seeking approval, or retreat inside yourself. This triangle of complicity brings with it its own paralysis, whichever side of it you stand. We are all children within, and although I try not to, sometimes when I am scared or feel threatened, I swallow my fear and bury my anger in silence. I tell myself that our experiences make us who we are. But inside, a fighting spirit ignites. Perhaps that is why the auction mart makes my eyes shine fierce.
As I press on with separating the ewes from the flock, a young farmer opens the gate quietly. I look up. I am sweating, still upset by the earlier encounter, and my arms are struggling to hold a young male lamb.
He watches me for a moment and then steps in to help me. ‘You’re gonna have to be faster than that.’
I recognise him. His family lives in the south of the island. He moves easily, arms working lightly through the stock, making soft sounds and talking quietly to the sheep. We concentrate, working fast together in silence. When we are done, he shakes his head and smiles.
‘Sometimes it’s better to take the help that’s offered,’ he suggests. ‘It’s easier. Why make it so hard for yourself? You make friends that way.’
‘But I hate the way they’re so rough with them.’
‘Ach, don’t know what you’re worrying for. They’ll be dead in the morning, for all your care.’
He is right. We are both right.
I am grateful for his help. But it matters to me that this last passage and transit is as low-key and calm as possible.
‘You shouldn’t be doing this if it hurts so much,’ he shrugs.
And then, all of a sudden, we are on. Two mart stockmen stride into the pen as my number for the auction ring is called. I have been waiting for this, but it still comes as a shock. They are big, burly, thickset, striding past with arms flapping hard against their thighs. They give me a curious, dismissive glance. I am the only woman in the pens. The sheep try to scatter but there is no room for manoeuvre other than to be driven forwards. Ahead, the tannoy blares a deafening drone. There is no stopping this sound and motion: feet moving, fleece skittering forwards, boots sliding on wet sawdust, a slip of brown fear as we work our way closer to those hard bright lights. The drone becomes an intensely urgent, staccato yelling, abruptly followed by the crack of a hammer. There is a lingering pause and then it starts up again. The roar of the mart is one gate ahead of us. I swallow. Adrenaline is surging through my body like the lightning jolt of a high-voltage current, my heart pounding, mouth clamped down as the final gate slams shut.
‘Should’ve worn a skirt,’ the stockman winks at me. ‘Good luck. Smile at them. You’ll get the best of the day.’
I step on to a ledge as the lambs are weighed. Afterwards, I take the white printed slip and feel the soft weight of fleeces and warm, panting bodies pressed close against me.
I sense how every moment has led to this. They are big, muscular, beautiful animals. In those strong bones the struggle, beauty, and all the brightness of the sun; the rain, dew, snow thick on wet fleeces and all the wild flowers and heather closing as a pale moonlight drifts. Standing with my sheep I feel a sense of pride, and a keener-edged anxiety. As gates clang all about us, for a brief minute we are quiet, back on those hills.
There is a screech of metal as the huge, weighted gates to the ring are flung open. And I am moving into the blinding lights and treading sawdust. It is like stepping into a goldfish bowl. Self-consciously I walk across the ring and hand my white ticket to the auctioneer on the far side of the gates.
‘One hundred and six cross mule lambs. First pen of four.’ And then he smiles at me and says, ‘Let’s get you a good price, shall we?’ I smile back gratefully. He leans forward and says conspiratorially to the crowd: ‘A nice-looking pen this, take a closer look. Come on, don’t be shy. This one is high-class, pedigree. I’m not sure what I’d rather be selling. A flock of cross mule lambs or this lovely-looking ewe.’
‘No,’ I protest quickly, ‘my ewes are good enough.’
He sweeps his hand at me. ‘Ssh, now. Come on, lassie, be a good sport. If you’re after a good price for this pen today.’
I stare at him in disbelief. I feel a sickening in my gut. I shake my head, but he just laughs and shushes me. And then his voice starts shouting over the tannoy, drowning out everything else. ‘Come on, best in show. What’ll you give me for her?’ he cries. He raises his hand and starts the bidding. ‘Thirty pound, thirty pound, thirty pound, forty pound … I’m looking for more than that. A young one, too. Come on, now, let’s see how high you can raise it … and a pen of a hundred and six lambs thrown in.’
A sea of faces is pressing hard up against the rail. For a split second, it occurs to me to walk out, but I kill that idea instantly. It is unthinkable: it will be misunderstood as cowardice, humiliation, rage or shame. No one leaves their animals once they are in the ring. And more than anything, I do not want him to win on such a cheap point. To hell with him, I think fiercely. I will show my sheep professionally.
Only the crowd picks up on my discomfort, and the heckling begins.
‘Lovely gigots and hocks!’ someone shouts. There is a roar of appreciative laughter. A few low calls and whistles. ‘Let’s have a feel of her, make sure she’s as good as she looks.’
A louder shout from the back: ‘A fine-looking ewe!’ And then, as the tannoy crackles with the rising voice of the auctioneer recording the bids, the atmosphere changes. The fine skin on the back of my neck shivers and my shoulders tense. I recognise this feral, predatory undertone. I know that no harm will come to me and yet I feel intensely alone and vulnerable. But I am determined not to let them see it get to me. Eyes glittering and cheeks burning, I stay focused in spite of the hot anger kindling inside me.
The two stockmen are in the ring with me, banging sticks on the ground to control the sheep. One gives a crack to a back and I shout angrily as the lamb’s skittering body leaps forwards and its head strikes the metal gates. Each time the stockmen come near, I drive the sheep the other way. We swirl round and round together in a kind of grotesque dance. The bidding seems endless, but at last it is over and the hammer slams down. As the final bid is marked, the auctioneer hands the ticket to me. ‘Well done, you’re a tough lassie – now that was a good girl.’ I do not look at him. I do not shake his hand. I just take my ticket. I know my voice will be unsteady. But I cannot leave without saying something. I have to force myself to address him coolly.
‘That whole performance was out of order and unnecessary.’
‘Ah, but you got a good price. So don’t tell me you’re not happy with that.’
I turn away quickly, so he doesn’t see the hot tears in my eyes.
That burning anger stays with me all day, stoked by a rising sense of injustice and of the auctioneer not having played by the rules. I feel both humiliated and compromised: by accepting the buyer’s cheque my hands are bound. My lambs command one of the top prices of the day, but it is a bitter bargain. The words I really want to say only come later. I promise myself I will never sell my lambs in this ring again.
Later, on the ferry home, the farmers make a joke of it. So I ask, ‘Would you have treated your wife or daughter the same?’ They dismiss this with the same old argument. ‘You got a good price, what more do you want?’
And in their own way, they are right – at the auction, it is a man’s world and meat
is meat – but so am I.
I am glad of the peace and stability of the croft. It teaches me to watch over my animals ever more diligently, through quiet observation and gentle handling. It toughens me up as, with the hardening season, the grass gleams silver and cold glitters across the fields. Walking the croft at nightfall, you learn always to have one eye ahead, even as you heed, at your back, the weather and skies darkening. In the waning light, the croft’s boundaries blur, becoming ever more indistinct, and you are aware that you must commit to memory the run of those march lines. I know I will have to keep my wits about me if I am to hold my own and earn my rightful claim to this fistful of soil, and my place in the farming world, in the long, gruelling winter months to come.
4
Dead Grass
In the smoking dusk, the grass is fired with strange lights and shadows. Below the horizon, the wind stills as the sun glows a deep afterburn, so the raw skies are lit with an eerie portent. It is always this way when an empty moon is rising and the tides sink low. It is a time when you can glimpse the moon’s darkness facing the earth.
As I approach, the wrestling shape on the ground before me is beautiful and startling. Its plumage is soft and tawny and moves fluidly with a lithe grace all of its own. As it lifts and falls, it appears to dance with its own shadow. All the other roosting birds are silent, perched safe for the night. For a few minutes, I am transfixed. It is a strange creature, larger than a crow: a single body made up of four wings.
I look on as its component parts cleave together and then separate. It is hard to distinguish if this life is struggling to be free or struggling to be held. I guess it is a female buzzard feeding her fledging young, still grounded. Yet it hurts to watch, because she taunts the chick. There is a cruelty to the encounter – feral, primal and unsettling. The older bird forces the younger to flex its wings, to fight for regurgitated scraps. As soon as the fledgling is airborne, just a few feet off the ground, the parent lands against it heavily and knocks it down. There is something I recognise in this battle. The young bird is desperate for food, visibly exhausted by the relentless baiting and beating down. But it gets up, again and again, and takes what it needs to survive.
I blink blearily as the window is suddenly floodlit by the dazzling bright glare of headlights in the yard. It is late, some time gone midnight. I have been woken abruptly from a deep sleep, my arms wrapped about Maude in front of the cold fire. I am exhausted. The winter and early spring months are typically a time of rest before lambing, but every day, I am busy from dawn to dusk. Working outside is something I can do with my hands now they are slowly healing. Cutting back, washing containers, lifting plants or filling pots are all actions that strengthen the pincer movement between fingers and thumb that I have lost, and which the orthopaedic surgeons are unsure will ever properly come back. ‘Let’s give it some time before we think about breaking your hand again,’ they say.
The headlights switch off. Then I hear a car door slam and heavy footsteps walking over the rough stones. There is no time to react; no time to turn off the lights in the house or close the curtains. Normally when this happens I have time to hide upstairs. The next second a man is standing inside my door. He is middle-aged, stocky, with a pale, waxen face. I stare at him, startled. It is not that I don’t know him – on an island, everyone knows everyone. It is just that I do not want his company. This is something I often do battle with. The proud tradition that lights in a window signal open hospitality, and you do not refuse entry to anyone who comes to your door, is one that is too often abused.
Tonight I am too tired to deal with this. ‘I’m sorry,’ I say. ‘It’s far too late – I’m just on my way to bed.’
He smiles and shakes his head slowly. Then he falls heavily into an empty wooden chair, as if his legs have suddenly given way. A bottle of whisky is placed on the table. It is already close to empty. His eyes are watchful, glittering.
‘Always time for one last dram before bed,’ he slurs. ‘Now, let’s be having you. When’s this man of yours coming back?’
I choose my words carefully. ‘No, really. Please, you have to leave. I’m so tired – let’s leave this for another day.’
As soon as I say this I am kicking myself. I am trying to keep the atmosphere light, my tone courteous, civil. But this open invitation is one I did not intend to offer. He knows this.
‘That’s not much of a welcome. Come on, don’t be so …’ he searches for the word he wants, then says it slowly, ‘… tight.’
He smiles mirthlessly. Then he reaches back and tips a glass off the counter. He picks up the bottle and angles its neck towards me. ‘Want a dram?’ I shake my head and watch as the amber liquid sloshes halfway up the glass. It is a quadruple-sized shot. I know as soon as it is poured that I will struggle to get that chair to empty.
‘Not much hospitality here,’ he mutters. ‘You’re all the same, you incomers. No sense of community. Slange!’
He knocks the drink back, then his hand reaches to fill the glass again.
‘No, that’s enough,’ I say. ‘I really think—’
‘Better be leaving?’ he cuts in. ‘Like that, is it? I’ll go when I’m ready. But I’m not ready. I’ll tell you when I’m going. It’s not just yet.’
It is a challenge. Wearily, I pull up a chair. Arguing only creates more problems. Hostility is easier to deal with when it is soft-handled. So I sit there and watch him drink. I am at a loss to know what else to do. I cannot physically remove him from the table. Drink can make a person prickly, sensitive, quick to take offence or start a fight. I do not want the atmosphere to deteriorate further. It is like treading on eggshells. These days, I feel something brittle inside me is breaking, too. I keep an invisible momentum, angling him towards the door.
Drink is an unacknowledged problem on the island. This croft sits on what used to be a well-worn drinking track. It was different when Rab was here, but now that I am on my own it is unnerving to hear men outside the door at night, their hooting voices slurring – even when the house is in darkness. More than once, I have been woken by a group crowding through my door when I am asleep upstairs. The sound of someone in your house when you have not asked them, after those tense last years in London, always scares me. I lie there, holding my dog close to me. A few calls up the stairs, then they give up and I hear the door slam.
Another time stones are thrown up at my window. I have never hosted after-hours gatherings at my house, yet in the months after Rab left, even without an invitation, they came. It is easy to be caught off guard because these incidents are sporadic. The door is not locked – no one locks their doors on the island. It is a source of pride that in this small community, everyone knows everyone. The man in my kitchen tonight is not a regular. But it does not matter. He is still here uninvited and, when he is asked to leave, he refuses to go. Eventually, he departs of his own volition and, as I watch the headlights trail into the darkness, I wonder about fixing the lock.
These days, wherever I go, I have the sense that I am constantly dogged by a shadow. It has different voices, aspects, personalities and faces. But I know its shape and it knows me. That quick step and flicker of movement behind me. Sometimes I catch it out of the corner of my eye, or in a glance; other times, I can feel its arm silently wrestling me. When you start trying to avoid a shadow, daylight begins to feel brittle, ragged, sharp-edged; you become more vulnerable as you feel your own outline and shape, your confidence and trust, gradually disintegrating. In those early months, if I’d had the use of both my hands, I would have felt braver and stronger. I don’t know if sound hands can stop whispers or shadows, but they can at least make you feel capable of fighting back or keeping yourself from harm.
One day I am challenged on the ferry by a group of local men. It is a simple but loaded accusation. It is a relief to hear it so that I can confront it head-on.
‘Are you happy now you’ve kicked him out?’
I wonder how much to say or not to say.
<
br /> ‘Just wanted the croft all for yourself?’
I blink, because it hurts not just to hear this, but to know that someone wants to wield that sharp blade. I am at a loss. These men were not even friends of Rab’s.
And then they use that word again. It is a basic, abrasive form of name-calling, but shocking none the less. It doesn’t matter how many times you hear it, it always feels like grit in your eye or a stinging slap in the face. ‘Bitch.’ I know that word, with its sharp, upright letters. Not only have I heard it used of me before but, two months after Rab left, it was sprayed on to my walls in sheep-marker spray.
‘We made a decision. It was the best thing for both of us,’ I say. And then I am silent. I stare out of the window at the beautiful flowing sea. It is calming and somehow helps wash that deep hurt away. I do not say, ‘It was the only way.’ Sometimes there is no point in trying to explain.
Besides, it is still too raw to speak or even think of what happened all those months ago. Cristall says I am still recovering. ‘Recovering from what?’ I ask.
‘Shock and a longer lack of love.’
In my heart I know it is this and not this. Fear takes a long time to settle. Some memories cast a dark cloud that blocks out the sunlight.
Sometimes I stare for hours at the horizon, thinking everything I might ever need is waiting for me out there.
It is restful gazing into a wider view. My eyes learn to lift and seek out the wilder birds and the mountains. I listen to the beautiful, haunting cries of the buzzard and eagle as they soar in the high passes, flexing their wings. It is strangely uplifting to journey with them. I imagine a pale sunlight streaming through feathers in a cold rush of flight. It is reassuring tracing the dependable, solid contours and rugged faces of those peaks. I draw strength and inspiration from their uncompromising, weathered profiles. The realisation that the landscape no longer overwhelms me is startling. Instead it holds me. It gives me strength and the courage to walk away from social structures I no longer need and which no longer have any sway over me.
I Am an Island Page 15