Standing out on the yacht’s bow, there above my head, her black lettered name, ‘Valkyrie’, now a yacht cursed by some dastardly murder. So a boat is the animation of the elements, so too their spirit is in her, in her name. Would the maidens of Viking belief carry aloft a dead man’s soul in their arms? Are all souls in the arms of a myth, a myth within a myth? I made haste to sail.
The day’s waning heat brought a breeze, and light though it was, coming out of the south west it put a curve into the Hilda’s old brown canvas and a ripple at her bow. Often on a fine evening, just as I was doing, Eachan had chosen the aloneness of sailing round to Castleton and home again. A gentle night settled on the ocean, and as it would have done for him, the course for home on its glittering surface was lit by stars. Unheeding of a complexity which smothers the voice of simplicity, the sea spoke to me, the island slipped past, and the beaches of the gloaming awaited a moonlit hour when grains of silver would become treasure and emptiness their reassurance that all was not yet within the cell of man’s ingenuity.
The haunting tune, Lassie with the Golden Hair, sang in my thoughts, and in the gloam of a summer’s night it brought me to the jetty of Ach na Mara, and Eilidh.
Ignoring warrant and warning, ten days later we were back to our Sandray home. Another week and I had the conversion of byre to bathroom finished. Eilidh, calm and content, busied herself with baby clothes and bedding for the crib I’d made. Out on the croft Muille and I learnt a little of the art which passes between a shepherd and his dog. A mixture of luck and us both running, finally drove our small flock into the pens I’d built. By late afternoon the ewes were clipped and their fleeces spread over the loft space I created above our two rooms and the bathroom, “What better insulation. Do we need a new mattress?” Eilidh thought me half serious, and on reflection it wasn’t a bad idea.
A hot day, copious sweat and pleased I’d managed to clip our sheep without too much struggle, down to the bay I ran and splashed headlong into the sea. Eilidh followed down more sedately, the baby was due anytime. She undressed slowly, waded in and attempted to float alongside me. “I’m front heavy!” she called, turning over after the third try. I swam across and lifting her in my arms let her float face up. Wavelets circled the mounds of her body as I gently let her rock up and down. An intimacy that harks to the primitive surrounded us, and naturally as the setting sun is wedded to the long horizon, we belonged. Pressing her tummy Eilidh whispered up to me in a little excited voice, “I think the baby might come tonight,” and the blueness of her eyes glowed from the depths of a great happiness.
After supper I sensed Eilidh grew uncomfortable and ventured to enquire, “Should I go across for Ella?” She reached out and took my hand, “No Hector, it’ll be all right, I want it to be just us both,” she held her stomach for a moment, “so don’t leave me; that’s the first wee pain.” We’d talked about the birth often enough, now the baby was on its way. I fought to stay calm, “Would you like to lie down?” She smiled, “No thanks I’ll just walk about outside, don’t worry I’m fine.” Shaking inwardly I nodded and taking her hand, we walked round and round the house.
Every so often Eilidh would pause. Her contractions were becoming stronger, more frequent. We leant together on the gable of the old house. No shroud that night to cover the hill of its saying, for as at fullness of a golden harvest, an orb arose, wide, close and watching. Orange beams pierced splintered crags, the hill reached out, a black shadow at our feet. Haunted stone and fallen slab, amidst the breathless air, the solitary tread of a last journey, “A blue eyed boy, born beside the sea, his talisman a raven in a cage, it brought him here a thousand times ago,” Eilidh tilted her head, moonlight fell across her face, “The raven is gone, his severance from the coming of the sea kings is complete,” and in the hushed voice of reverence, “yet we are here.”
A woman was soon to add a generation to those from whom we came; time and place, wherefore its mystery? Words formed, extemporal and unbidden, “The hill too will vanish, the moon wander from its orbit, sun and planets be dragged into a blackness from which there is no escape, but for us there is no severance, no parting from the birth of light or from its ultimate future; we are entangled in an endless cycle, and to each other.” We went into a house that stone upon stone was built of the Hill of the Shroud.
In our bed by the light of the Tilley lamp, the baby appeared. A dark head of hair, Eilidh whimpered softly. I helped with the shoulders and a child slid into my hands, a boy. I lifted him and cleared his mouth with my finger. The umbilical cord, two pieces of thread knotted tight, my hands shook; scissors; I cut swiftly between the knots. The boy began to cry.
At the sound, Eilidh half sat up, and dragging pillows in behind her she cried quiet tears of elation. I put the slippery bundle into her arms. She bent over him and quietly licked his face. The crying stopped and stretching his arms he pursed hungry lips. After a little time stroking the boy, touching his long limbs, spreading out toes and opening his hands, Eilidh tenderly gave him her full red nipple. She looked up, tired but smiling. I smoothed her hair and out of a heartfelt joy, we laughed and rubbed noses.
The boy settled on his mother’s chest and they both fell asleep. A harvest moon had journeyed the heavens, a baby had been born. In the moon’s dying glimmer before the dawn, I slipped outside to bury the afterbirth, a part of us had returned to the island soil.
Mother and child wakened as early light flooded over Sandray. Covering our shoulders with a blanket, I took Eilidh on my arm and carrying the boy in the crook of my other, we walked barefoot to the beach. Wet sand, salt air fresh and heady, glittering pools blue and abandoned, two sets of footprints followed us into the sea, into the mirage of beginnings; there was none other to watch or gainsay; we were the last of a world grown weary of mankind.
We waded knee deep, nothing disturbed the emptiness. Eilidh splashed droplets over the child, a saltwater christening, “We’ll call him Eachan,” she announced. Equally certain, I agreed, “A fine boy and worthy of a name that’s handed down.”
I held the dangling new born creature aloft, his face to the sunrise, and then gently in the tide, we washed away the blood of his birth.
And his blue eyes were those of a son of the sea.
CHAPTER FORTY-NINE
Containers
The shock of waking revealed two masked faces framed against the ceiling, white eyes, black heads, a glint of steel. Fingers closed around his throat thumbs crushing his windpipe, a light blazed into his eyes. Arms dragged him naked to his feet. The slow drawing of cold metal crossed his neck.Terror seized him, he was about to be killed, a slit throat spurting blood. In abject fear his knees crumpled. They let him fall. Sprawling before them on the carpet was the gross frame of Sir Joshua Goldberg. An acid stench of urine filled the bedroom.
Behind the masks a snigger, no words, they knelt on the arms of a trembling heap of flesh. The torch rendered him blind. Unable to rise, Sir Joshua broke into hysterical pleading, “Don’t, don’t, please, mercy in god’s name, oh pleeese, pleeese, anything, I’ll do anything…” gradually his total abasement reduced to a blubbering whine.
A voice from the back of the bedroom spoke easily in a deliberately casual manner, the accent being that of a gentleman schooled at Eton, “My dear Goldberg, do calm yourself. I must apologise for this impromptu call at such a late hour, and I see we’ve upset you a trifle, most unfortunate, but then it does seem you’ve avoided contacting me these past few months, not the way to treat such a generous friend, now is it old chap?”
Instantly Goldberg recognised the voice, an influential businessman with Middle East connections. Into his fear contorted mind flashed the transaction to which he’d been drawn by the huge sums involved; the deal, the money, now this horrific nightmare, in the hands of remorseless martyrs, they’d detonate a mini nuclear explosion, trigger a mass conflagration, life had no meaning, but they’d kill him for pleasure, maybe torture first. The numbness in his arms acutely painf
ul, the stinking wetness of the carpet, “Please, I don’t want to die.” he lay whimpering.
The tone from the far side of the room sounded cool, a little impatient, “Let me remind you of our deal, four million dollars a kilo, thirty kilos in three consignments, and frankly gentleman to gentleman, believing you’d honour this arrangement, our first payment for a ten kilo container was placed with Midas Holdings in the Cayman Islands some months ago. Naturally a man of your undoubted means won’t concern yourself with paltry amounts of petty cash and I’m sure the container is in transit, but in case not, just thought I’d call, as one might say, to jog your memory.”
A squirming Nuen Chairman blabbered incoherently, “Please, yes, it has, it will, please, they watch… I… I… time, a little more, it’ll be taken off our next shipment to.. to..” he began crying.
“Your next shipment to?” the voice queried. Petrified of revealing top secret US military affairs, Sir Joshua’s crying rose to piteous wails. “Come, come, Goldberg, less tantrums. You were saying, a shipment to?” Threshing his legs on the carpet the cries became a fever of pleading. Cold and insinuating the voice said smoothly, “Stop making a fool of yourself; I hate to be unkind at this juncture but perhaps a little rehearsal of our special treatment might help your powers of recall.”
A gloved hand caught Goldberg’s chin, crashed the back of his head on the floor, stretched out his neck. He felt the first sharp nick, heard the voice flat and emotionless, “Please gentlemen, let us save his windpipe a moment longer. Now Sir Joshua, you were saying, a shipment to? “
The knife remained pressed on his throat. Warm blood ran into his ear. His bowels became water. Saliva left his mouth, gurgling its last drops; barely audible, he gasped out, “Diego Garcia.”
CHAPTER FIFTY
Cages
Several days passed before Eilidh would put Eachan into his crib and come outside with me to admire the kitchen garden. “Never in my life have I grown any food and to see this lot appear,” I waved a hand towards our crop of potatoes filling the ‘lazy beds’, the long drills of carrots I’d painstakingly thinned which we were eating raw straight out of the ground. Green topped rows of curly kale, fat purple swedes, the strong scent of the parsnip, never mind the taste and colour, they should keep us in vegetables through to the spring. “A plate of soup each day, that’s fair exchange for the sweat of hauling seaweed, better value than playing the stock market,” I said gravely, but unable to keep a straight face, “Next year I’ll grow you and the boy a prize marrow.”
Many the demands of a self sufficient home in the making, Muille at heel and a round of the sheep, a look to the boats, more fencing and building until the evening light finished my work for the day. Into the softness of candlelit kitchen and Eilidh would be feeding the boy. She’d look up smiling and her sea blue eyes would unveil the tenderness of our unspoken betrothal.
At two days old the child was put to sleep in his crib beside our bed. During the hours of darkness a snuffling wakened me. Eilidh had lifted a hungry boy and as she fed him mother and child fell asleep together. I put my arms around them. Busy days and broken nights, Thursday or Friday? We’d lost track, a week passed, maybe two. Summer’s light into autumn night and as the old folk must have done, I felt the apprehension of the coming months of spindrift and gale. The sun no longer set midway across the bay, that evening its angry tip fell behind the line of tooth like rocks which sheltered the seal’s roosting haven. A southerly swell was running, columns of spray burst on them in rainbow plumes that hung uncertain, and then fell back.
“The winds gone round to the south, tomorrow the Sound will be flat,” was all I said, a trace of sadness behind the words. Eilidh reached into the crib, somehow equally downcast. I stroked her hair. The intimacy of these days and months, as private as we could have wished had given us this fragile beginning to the circle of another life, and it seemed we couldn’t bring ourselves to break the spell. Eilidh shook away a tear, “Hector,” she murmured, “this is beyond happiness; it’s the happiness that becomes a suffering.” Rocking the boy in her arms, she looked from him to me, “tomorrow we must take young Eachan to see Ella.” Quietly we went to bed.
Crack, the air splitting snap of a rifle, another shot rang out, several more, reverberating on the window. At the first shot I was out of bed and at the door. The sickly yellow light of a dawn before the rain met me. In a trice Eilidh was at my shoulder, the boy in her arms. Dressed in seconds I ran for the jetty, a fusillade bouncing over the water echoed from the headland.
Two large inflatable dinghies slowly manoeuvred about the bay- kneeling in each bow, a man aiming a rifle. They were shooting the seals. Obviously the first shots had been at the colony lying hauled out on the rocks. Instant panic would have sent the animals crashing into the water. Now as they swam for the open sea each black head surfacing for air became the target. More snap shots. Bullets ricocheted off the water, thankfully not all found their mark. Throwing on shirt and trousers, I was at the jetty in minutes.
Leaping into Eilidh’s small dinghy, one pull of the starter cord and I roared out towards the nearest inflatable, bellowing at the top of my voice, “Stop, stop that bloody slaughter!” Before I reached them, a seals head broke the surface fifty yards off my bow. I heard the smack. A bullet found its mark. The head sank. I powered on. My bow wave shone red, the wake astern churned blood. A smell of cordite stung my nostrils.
I pulled alongside their inflatable, rouring at the two men, “What the bloody hell are you doing?” Equally furious they shouted back “Who the hell are you? Get out of our way!” the snarling voice certainly wasn’t local. Another seal came up for air. The rifleman took aim. Opening throttle, I rammed them. His shot went wild. “You damn fool!” he screamed at me, turning his rifle in my direction.
The second inflatable sped over, the man at their helm shouting at me, “Clear off, you’ve interfering with a licensed cull!” I took him to be in charge of the slaughter. “Get out of the way, get back to that jetty, I’m reporting this straight away.” He fiddled with a mobile phone.
I must drive the seals out to sea, get them out of range. Ignoring shouting and waving, I swung away from their boat and began circling the bay. Risky tactic, they continued firing. Eilidh appeared on the shore carrying Eachan. The possibility of a bullet spinning off the water greatly alarmed me. I steered rapidly for the beach.
Obviously this attracted their attention. Firing stopped and the boats drew side by side. Loud voices carried across the water, there seemed to be some arguing, presumably a thwarted operation had had to be abandoned. In a flurry of spray both inflatables disappeared round the headland. I made straight for the jetty, moored our dinghy and ran round to meet Eilidh and the boy. Poor woman, she knew too well what had happened, looking across to the empty rocks, her face glistened with tears, “Oh Hector, the seals won’t come back.”
Silence, and with it an air which had smelt of rain gave way to waves of drizzle that advanced from the sea. Folds of grey curtain closed about us hiding the seal rocks from our view. We walked back without speaking to a house surrounded by the first threat of winter.
An incoming tide and eight bodies washed back and fore in its swell. Three were of seal pups born that spring, their blood on the sand. One by one I dragged them up the beach and buried them beneath the dunes.
Violent shuddering overcame Sir Joshua, he remained sprawling naked beside the bed in a deep state of shock. Petrified by the belief his throat was about to be slit, creases of fat quivered in an uncontrollable reaction. Congealed blood filled an ear, his arms felt useless. For whatever time might have elapsed he lay, a groaning, prostrate mound of flesh on a carpet, soiled by his own defecations. Sunrise attempted to pierce the heavy damask curtains of Goldberg’s bedroom in a luxury suite of Qatar’s finest waterfront hotel. The stench surrounding him brought his numb mind to bear upon the ghastly nightmare. Finally he realised the men had left as silently as they’d arrived. Unsteadily he got to h
is feet and fell onto the bed sheets.
The service phone wakened him. He reached over, “I wish to be left in peace, do not ring again,” and banged down the receiver. This automatic form of addressing hotel staff bolstered his self esteem. The total humiliation he had suffered, both mental and physical, began to fade. Completely ignoring the filth smeared beside the bed, he showered, dressed, slammed the door, paid his bill and still inwardly shaking, stepped into a taxi. “Airport!” he rapped at the driver.
A car swung in behind them. Fear returned. Were they being followed? He slouched down, desperate to reach the safety of the Emir’s private airport lounge. Lift the phone and one of His Highness’s jets would be made available. Get out of this country; oh my God, hurry, hurry! Clasping hands to stop them shaking he fell to a silent importuning prayer, “Please good Lord, protect me from evil, from all who seek to cheat me. I have not buried or wasted your talents, truly I have multiplied them, not ten but a thousand fold. Lord, I am your humble servant, trust me,” his supplicatory rambling brought them to the airport and he felt strangely uplifted. Directing the taxi driver to carry his valise, Sir Joshua made rapidly strides to the Emir’s private lounge. With a salute of recognition the security guard ushered him in immediately. How useful to have influential friends he thought as the plane took off, so admirably wealthy, one day I shall…… he dozed off amidst the oriental cushions of the aircraft’s lounge deck.
Careful scrutiny in the bathroom mirror of his Hyde Park penthouse reassured Chairman Goldberg, it’s nothing more than a shaving nick. A good night’s sleep and time to think. Rage built by the minute. Compromised by a common arms dealer and his murderous thugs he might have been, and OK, the wretched man had graded up from supplying Kalashnikovs to Somalia, but to imagine that they could influence the deal in enriched uranium by brute force was laughable.
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