Well, as they journey on with the boat going chug-chug-chug the sky begins to darken and clouds gather, and the sea gets a wee bit rougher. It seems to Jack that they’re travelling faster now, and that the boat’s engine isn’t what’s pushing them along, it’s like they’re being pulled by some great force underneath them, and in fact when he looks down now he can see that the water is rushing in the same direction as them, so fast that it makes him feel sick. And he shouts to the ferryman, ‘What’s happening?’ and the ferryman has a wicked grin on his face and shouts back, ‘Well, Jack, what did you expect? We’re getting close to the edge of the world and all the water goes over it.’ ‘What about us?’ Jack shouts. ‘Oh, we’ll be all right,’ the man says. ‘I’ve been here many times before, I’ll not let the boat go over.’ And Jack’s shaking with fear and wondering what’s going to happen next, but what’s strange is you’d expect a terrible noise with all that water going over the edge, you’d expect a roar like a hundred Niagaras, but there’s hardly any noise at all. The ferryman says, ‘Now, Jack, get yourself on your feet and be ready to jump, for in a minute I’m going to bring the boat round, right on the edge of the world, and there’ll be a rock beside the boat, and you must leap on to it. Don’t leap too far or you’ll go over the edge, and don’t leap too short or you’ll go in the water and be swept over.’ And Jack wants to ask if it’s too late to change his mind but suddenly the ferryman says, ‘Ready? One, two, three – jump!’ and pushes the tiller away from him so the boat suddenly swings round to face the opposite way and Jack, before he knows what he’s doing, is half-thrown and half-leaps from the boat and lands on a bare, dry bit of rock sticking out where the water disappears over the edge.
Well, what a place it is! To his left is a waterfall, a straight line stretching off into the distance as far as he can see, and to his right is exactly the same thing, and here’s Jack, on a wee bit of rock about three feet above the water, a kind of ledge two feet wide and six feet long, about the size of a bed but very narrow. And the water sweeps round it on either side but it doesn’t go over it, the top of the rock is completely dry. And then, when Jack looks carefully over the edge, all he can see is the water dropping away from him, down, down, down, as far as he can see. And there’s no roar, no clouds of spray, no foaming and gushing, just an endless sheet of water flowing over the edge and down. It’s like it’s turning a corner rather than falling. And it’s a terrifying place to be, crouched on this stone just where all the water turns, and what with the silence and the speed of the water and the fact that it’s not like any waterfall he’s ever seen before – well, all Jack really wants to do is get back in the boat as quick as he can. But already the engine is chug-chug-chugging away from him, fighting the current to get clear. Jack shouts at the ferryman, ‘Come back! I knew the world was flat, but I didn’t think it was so tall!’ And the ferryman calls back, ‘The world isn’t flat, Jack, it’s a cube, like a sugar lump. The water flows over the edges of the six faces, from one face to another, it never stops, and this cube is so big that if you’re on a bit of land you’d never know it because all the land in the world is so far from any of the edges of the cube. Think about it, Jack!’ he says, and the boat gets wee-er and wee-er until at last Jack can’t see it any more.
Well, he’s crouching there on the rock and he’s afraid to stand up and he’s afraid to sit down, and every so often a fish or a seal or some other sea creature shoots out of the water as it goes over the edge, and then lands back in it and disappears again. And sometimes a seagull appears above him, and flies over the edge, and then changes direction and continues on its way. And apart from these things, Jack is there at the edge of the world all alone, and he doesn’t like it, not one bit.
So he thinks, what I have to do is turn three times widdershins and the ferryman will come back for me, if he was telling the truth. God, I hope he was telling the truth, he thinks. But when Jack tries to turn round he loses his nerve. He’s already dizzy on that rock, and he can’t bring himself to do it, he’s that frightened of falling off. So there he is, stuck on the rock, and it’s getting dark, and he’s awful hungry and tired, and eventually he’s so tired that he just has to sit down, and he manages to do it. And then he begins to fall asleep, and wakes up with a start, and then he lies flat out on the narrow bit of rock, as far away from the edge of the world as he can get, and falls asleep again, dreaming of cheese pieces.
Now as Jack dreams he turns over in his sleep. He turns once – and he rolls into the middle of the rock – twice – and he rolls again – three times – and he’s just teetering on the edge where the water falls away when there’s a shout from near by, and he wakes up with a start and only just stops himself from falling off. It’s morning again and there’s the ferryman with the boat alongside the rock shouting, ‘Jump, Jack, jump! Quickly now, for I can’t come back again!’ So Jack jumps, but he jumps too hard and he crashes into the ferryman at the stern of the boat, and knocks him over, and the man loses his grip of the tiller, and the boat spins round and suddenly the boat and Jack and the ferryman are shooting over the edge of the world and Jack’s falling out of the boat. He tries to grab hold of the wee man who’s grabbed hold of the side of the boat but all he gets a grip of is the string round the wee man’s neck, which breaks, and Jack shoots up in the air and lands with an almighty
DUNCH!
Not a splash. A dunch. He’s not in the sea at all. He shakes himself and sits up and there he is, where he fell asleep in the sand dunes. Och it was all just a dream, he thinks, but then he looks in his hand and there is a length of string and at the end of it a key. How can that be if it was a dream? And oh, how cold he feels. The sun’s just coming up and he’s cold and stiff and hungry, but the coldest, emptiest bit of him is just in at his chest and he knows what that means: it means his soul is missing. And he remembers that the ferryman took it, so Jack stands up and walks along the beach and round the point. And there are the two boats, the one with the oars and the one with sails, but there’s no sign of the third boat, the one with the outboard motor, and there’s no sign of the ferryman. But there’s the old kist lying on the beach. Jack takes the key and he unlocks it, and opens the lid, and as soon as he does something rushes out and he feels a warm blast of air go through him, and he feels whole again.
So he hurries off home. He can’t get away from that shore quick enough. But it’s a long, long walk back the way he came, and by the time he gets home it’s dark again, it’s the middle of the night, so he lets himself into the house very quietly because he doesn’t want to wake his mother, and he creeps up the narrow stair to his room and gets into his old familiar bed and in a few seconds he’s fast asleep.
In the morning, he’s woken by the sun shining through the window, and up he gets and down the stair he goes to the kitchen for his breakfast. There’s his mother working away at the fireside. ‘Here I am back again, Mother,’ says Jack. ‘What do you mean?’ she says. ‘You’ve only just got up.’
‘Have you forgotten?’ he says. ‘I’ve been away to the edge of the world.’
‘Oh aye,’ says his mother. ‘Well, there’s the piece I made up for you last night for your journey, just a hunk of bread and some cheese, but since you’re still here you can have it for your breakfast.’ And Jack remembers that she made it up for him, but did he not eat it before? Well, he’s puzzling this out, but he’s that hungry that he sits down and eats it anyway, and while he’s eating he tells her all that happened.
Well, she listens to him and at the end she says, ‘Aye, Jack, you tell a good story, but there’s one thing I know and it’s this. The world isn’t flat, as you thought, but it isn’t a cube either, it’s round like a ball. When you said you were wanting to go to the edge of the world I thought you’d just go to the coast and come back again. But you’ve not even been away yet.’
‘Oh yes I have, Mother,’ he says, ‘and anyway you’re wrong, just as I was wrong. The world is a cube. It’s like a sugar lump. I know it
is because I’ve been to the edge, or one of the edges, and I’ve seen it.’
‘Jack,’ she says, ‘dinna be a daft gowk. The world is round. You were dreaming.’ So he puts his hand in his pocket and draws out the key. ‘So where did I get this from then?’ he says. ‘Och, Jack,’ she says, ‘where did you get it? We have no need for keys here.’
Just at that moment the door opens and in come Jack’s two older brothers. They’ve been out working in the fields and this is them coming in for their breakfast. But just a minute, did you think Jack didn’t have brothers in this story? Aye, well, neither did Jack. So that just shows why you shouldn’t believe everything people tell you. And the brothers sit at the table next to Jack and say, ‘Aye Jack, what have you been up to now? You’re always dreaming about something.’ ‘But I wasn’t dreaming,’ Jack says. ‘Here’s the key I took from the ferryman’s kist.’ ‘What ferryman?’ they say, so he tells them. Well, the brothers listen to his story, but they don’t believe him, they think he’s stolen the key from somewhere, and they decide they’ll have to bury it to keep Jack out of trouble. So they take it off him and bury it out in the fields and it’s never been seen again. And Jack says, ‘Well, at least I left the kist unlocked and the lid open, so that ferryman can’t take anybody else’s soul and lock it away.’ ‘Ach Jack,’ his brothers say, ‘you just think what you like.’ And he does. Jack knows what happened. And that’s an end to this story.
§
In the morning – the very late morning – Mike wakes and tentatively assesses his physical and mental condition. Astonishingly, he doesn’t feel too bad. His mouth is dry, his stomach a little unsettled, but generally he seems to have got away with it. He slides out of bed, washes, gets dressed and goes through to the kitchen. Jean is there, reading a book, smoking away.
‘There’s tea in the pot,’ she says. ‘And there’s bread in the bread bin if you want toast. I’ve had something already.’
He can see that she has. The carry-out cartons are empty.
‘I don’t think you’re anywhere close to dying,’ he says. ‘You’re indestructible.’
‘No doubt I shall pay for it.’
Despite his escape, he isn’t ready to risk food yet. He opts for several mugs of black tea.
Jean puts down her book. ‘Are you definitely going back today?’
‘Aye. It’s a non-transferable ticket. The train’s in an hour and a half.’
‘You can stay if you want.’
He shakes his head. ‘I’ll come again soon. For the exhibition, if not before.’
‘Well, it’s been good,’ she says. ‘At least, I think it has. I hope it’s been useful.’
He remembers Angus describing Jean as having been ‘useful’ to him.
‘You’ve given me plenty to think about,’ he says.
‘Don’t get too hung up on this essay,’ she says. ‘The photographs are what matter.’
‘I know. I’ve known it all along really.’
‘Get someone else to write the essay.’
She pushes her empty mug towards him and he refills it, and his too, and goes to put the kettle on again.
‘Did you ever tell me,’ she says, ‘what you did with Angus? After the funeral, I mean.’
‘I took him back to Cnoc nan Gobhar,’ he says. ‘We’d talked about what he wanted. For a while he’d said he wanted to be taken out on the water and scattered. But then he went off that idea. First he said he didn’t want to be fish food, then that he didn’t want to get mixed up with radioactive particles drifting along from Dounreay. Just keep me on dry land, he said. Plant a tree on top of me. So I did. I dug a hole at the front of the house, mixed him up with some compost and packed him in round a rowan sapling. To begin with it didn’t look like it would take, it gets such a blasting from the wind in winter, but last year it was healthier. So that’s where he is.’
‘I’m sure he – it – will do very well,’ she says. ‘And it will keep the witches away. Not, I suppose, that any of them are likely to visit.’
‘None so far,’ Mike says. ‘So it must be working. I don’t suppose you’d like to come?’
‘Let’s see how things go,’ she says.
‘We covered a lot of ground last night, didn’t we?’
‘Aye, we did. It’s odd, but the things from thirty or forty years ago still feel like they only happened yesterday, whereas the things that happened yesterday – well, ten years ago, twenty at the outside …’
‘… seem ancient,’ he says. ‘I know. It’s an ageing thing.’
‘Is it?’ Jean says.
‘The detail isn’t so clear either,’ Mike says. ‘I mean, do you really remember the ’90s? The way you remember the ’70s? I don’t. Maybe not enough time’s gone by, they’re not in focus yet.’
‘Maybe that’s what it is,’ Jean says. ‘Well, I’ll look forward to them when they sharpen up.’
‘Another story,’ he says. ‘But I thought you were going to die soon.’
‘Oh aye,’ she says. ‘So I am.’
§
On the way to Waverley he tries Murdo’s mobile, but there’s no answer. He leaves a message asking to be collected at Lairg at half past seven. At the station he buys a big bottle of water for the journey and a newspaper, but he can’t concentrate on the latter. By the time the train reaches Perth he’s beginning to feel unwell. He closes his eyes, trying to induce sleep. His mind travels northwards, ahead of his physical self, towards Murdo. And he remembers.
Once, early on – when they knew each other but were not yet bold enough to act on that knowledge – Murdo told a story that revealed something of his deep mystery, and made Mike want to fall headlong into that deepness. He’d not been more than a few months at Cnoc nan Gobhar, and was finding it difficult to manoeuvre around the remnants of Angus’s life. He’d thrown out some things – towels beyond redemption, mugs so discoloured he couldn’t bear to drink from them – but other stuff, like rickety old chairs and chipped vases, seemed to offer a kind of connection or continuity between father and son. Perhaps it was just his own squeamishness that made the distinction between what should be saved and what must be discarded. Sometimes he became incapable of making decisions and had to escape the house altogether. All through that autumn and into winter he ran away with his camera for whole days, heading for remote beaches, or at least beaches where he could be remote. An empty beach in summer is a delight, but it is nothing to an empty beach in winter. The brutality with which the meeting of land and sea reminded him of his insignificance was mesmerising. He’d walk for miles, sometimes taking many photographs and sometimes none at all. When he returned, tired and hungry, he found he liked the house more, and that during his absence it had somehow become less Angus’s and more his – until the next time he needed to get away.
He’d asked Murdo if he would do some work on the kitchen. A worktop made rotten by water needed to be replaced, and some of the unit cupboards were in disrepair. Murdo had had a look: yes, he could fix everything. When Mike had tried to pin him down to a date, Murdo had been non-committal. ‘I’m not always at home, you see,’ Mike had said. Murdo had given his slow, shy smile and said, ‘Well, just leave the door unlocked if you go out. That way neither of us will be tied to any firm arrangements.’ What could Mike do but agree? And it was at the end of one of his days of escape, returning from the west, that he drove up the track and found the red van parked at the back of the house, and Murdo just packing away his tools in the kitchen.
He showed Mike what he’d done. His work was neat, careful and complete. Mike thanked him and asked how much he owed. ‘Och, call it fifty pounds.’ ‘You sure?’ ‘Aye.’ ‘Cash?’ ‘That would be preferable.’ ‘I’ll get it to you in the next day or two. Are you wanting a cup of tea before you go?’ ‘That would be grand,’ Murdo said.
They sat at the table across from each other and talked about what else Mike might do to the house, and sometimes their glances met, and when they did Murdo looked awa
y. Needing something else to say, Mike found himself talking about how he hadn’t yet fully adjusted to Angus not being around the place.
‘Well, maybe that’s because he is still around,’ Murdo said.
‘Aye, quite likely,’ Mike said. ‘So, anyway, I go away. Today I drove to Oldshoremore and walked to Sandwood Bay. Have you been there?’
‘Oh aye,’ Murdo said. ‘Not for a while, though. A few years.’
‘It’s a good long walk,’ Mike said. ‘I’m shattered, actually. But it was well worth it.’
‘It’s some place.’
‘It’s magnificent.’
‘Yes it is,’ Murdo said, and a silence lay between them, and to Mike it was as if they were both remembering it together: the empty, austere beauty of the beach and dunes, the great waves rolling in, the sheer expanse of sand and sea. And then Murdo said, ‘The last time I was there I found a dead man.’
The images in Mike’s head crashed. ‘On the beach?’ he asked.
‘Aye,’ Murdo said. ‘How far did you go? Did you go past the outflow of the loch?’
‘Just that far. It was running pretty full, and it was getting late, so I turned back.’
‘I crossed over,’ Murdo said. ‘It was about this time of year, a fine day like this but there was a strong wind blowing off the sea. If you cross the outflow the beach goes on at least as far as you went today, but it narrows. At high tide there’s not much of it. Then you come to another river running into the sea, and the bay comes to an end there. There are some small dunes, and then rocks and a cliff. It’s an unforgiving kind of place. And that’s where I found him.’
‘Were you on your own?’
‘Aye. He had been there a long time. He was half-buried in the sand and in fact I think it was the wind that had uncovered him. Perhaps he had been buried and uncovered several times over, for there wasn’t much left of him. But there he was.’
Stuck once more for something to say, Mike said something trite. ‘That’s terrible. Horrible.’
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