by Laura Greene
Someone behind Melody lets out a short cry.
Well, you wanted adventure. This is it, Melody thinks to herself. She looks along the aisle and sees the pilot steadying himself with one hand on the wall of the cockpit. The plane vibrates again, something rattles somewhere. Something loose.
Melody turns her attention again to the ground outside as it rises up faster and faster to meet them. She sees a town come into view. Sleepy streets that bleed out onto the shore as rain now falls from above, spattering against the glass of the window at speed.
"Talon's Point", she says quietly, and the thought enters her mind that this will be her final resting place in a moment.
Beneath the aircraft, the landing gear lowers with a struggle. Then, a runway comes into view; one solitary, lonely runway. A gust of wind catches the plane and it wobbles to the side. Again, someone cries out. It feels to Melody as though the plane is now moving at a horrendous angle, the tip of the right wing veering dangerously close to the ground. One hit and a spark will ignite the remaining petrol, as they call it in Scotland, coursing through the plane’s veins.
Melody remains as calm as she can, but now her heartbeat feels louder than the calamity unfolding around her. She hears the pilot swear. Never a good sign. Once more, Melody says a prayer, hoping that the Good Lord hears her pleas.
The plane is unsteady.
The co-pilot suggests aborting the landing. As he does so, Melody can feel the passengers around her tensing up. When Melody hears the pilot say "it's too late", she watches as the other passengers brace for impact.
But in this moment, something takes hold of Melody. A serenity of sorts. She has felt this before. Many times, in fact. When terrible things occur, when the horrors of life become apparent, she suddenly falls into a deep state of serenity. She draws strength from her faith in God and the hereafter. She says her final prayer, for God above to take care of those around her.
Looking out of the window, the ground speeds by, the tarmac of the runway now like sandpaper, a passing sea of dark gray threatening to tear the plane and its passengers apart. Time slows, and Melody looks to the horizon. She sees the mountains, and with them comes something she has never experienced before. It is a strange feeling of belonging, almost as if she has been here before, but she hasn’t. If it is to be her final resting place, there are worse gravesites in the world.
The plane's wheels thump against the runway, pulling Melody from her trance. She thrusts her head between her knees, waiting for the next impact as the plane bounces across the runway. Something screeches across the ground and the smell of burning rubber fills the air.
Waiting for the plane to turn on its side and burst into a ball of flames passes like an eternity. But there is no fire. There is no death. The pilot yells as he fights with the control stick and, finally, the plane comes to a rest like an injured bird happy to be on the ground once again.
A few people applaud in relief, but most clamber past each other and the attendant as they make for the emergency exits. Not Melody, however. She sits there for a moment gathering her thoughts and saying a thank You to God. The mountains of Deacon Island loom over them, now more imposing, less welcoming than from above. From the sky they looked peaceful, but from the ground they are like watchful guardians of the island, and they do not make Melody feel welcome. The town of Talon’s Point sits at their feet, devout and minuscule in their shadow.
"Are you okay?" a strong male voice with a thick Scottish accent says from the aisle.
Melody looks up. It is the pilot. Sandy blond hair, blue eyes, and a scar across his cheek that somehow makes him even more handsome than he would otherwise have been, Melody looks at him with gratitude.
"Sorry for the theatrics, I've never had a landing like that on Deacon Island before..." He waits momentarily again for Melody to answer. When she doesn't he continues to fill the silence. "You're not one of the locals, that's for sure. I just don't want you being afraid to fly with us again. I've done this route a hundred times, if not more. That's never happened."
"It figures. Just my luck at the moment," Melody says. She reaches out her hand and shakes the pilot's. "I'm Melody H... Winter. Thanks for getting us down safely."
"My pleasure..." He looks at her with eyes that suggest he has only just now noticed her beauty. “American?”
“Yes, but don’t hold that against me,” Melody jokes.
“Against you?” the pilot laughs. “It’s great to have someone from the US here with us. You know some of the islanders settled in America a couple of hundred years ago, so many of us have a real soft spot for the good old U. S. of A.”
Melody is glad to hear that. “I’ll be a very happy woman if the other locals are as welcoming as you are.”
“Like anywhere in the world, some will be, some won’t. But don’t mind those last ones. You’ll find a lot of good people in Talon’s Point and around Deacon’s Island.”
“It’s such a strange name, Talon’s Point…”
“Aye, it is that,” the pilot says. He now looks at Melody again as though there is a connection between them.
Melody can tell that he is working up to saying something with risk. The risk of rejection, perhaps.
"I know this is a little forward, but I assume you're staying at the Howling Dog?"
Melody nods. It was the only place she could get booked. There aren’t many places for outsiders to stay on the island.
"I might be in there tonight, if you wouldn't mind me buying you a drink?"
Melody isn't in the mood for romance. She just wants to find her father and then get back to her dig. But, she recognizes this as an opportunity to put some feelers into the community. "I'd like that, but what do I get in return?"
“I did just save your life, you know?” the pilot smiles again. “But I guess I could tell you about the island and why it’s called Talon’s Point? You seem interested.”
“A passing interest in these things, Mr…”
"I'm Rob Maclean," he says. "Are you from the East Coast?"
"Yes, does that matter?"
Rob laughs. "No, we just don't get many of our Atlantic cousins over this way, and I’d bet you the shirt off my back that you’re from out Boston way."
“Good catch, you’ve been to the states?”
“No, but I watch a lot of movies.”
Offering his hand, Rob carefully assists Melody out of her seat. She lets him, though normally she'd get annoyed at that kind of old fashioned chivalry. For now, she feels indebted to Rob for landing the plane under difficult circumstances. Besides, the more accommodating she is, the more she might be able to find out about her dad. The last thing she wants is to create a bad impression on the islanders.
As soon as they leave the plane and walk down the steps outside, Melody is hit by the beauty of Deacon Island. The diminutive runway and solitary air control tower is stark in its contrast with the environment. A slender arial peeks out from the top of the tower with a blinking red aircraft light, and the smell of burnt rubber from the plane’s wheels is still prominent. But the surrounding world is anything but burnt, blinking or electrical. In the background, nestled at the foot of a large imposing mountain, is the town of Talon's Point. Rows of white bleached stone cottages form streets and avenues around the rugged terrain. A few cars here and there traverse the streets, but it's mostly by foot which people seem to travel here.
It's a far distance from Boston both in distance and appearance. Somehow this island is both ethereal and physically daunting at the same time. A quality that has the capacity to dominate the soul, surrounded by the depths of the sea and all its unknown inhabitants.
"I'll look forward to that drink tonight," Rob says, once more breaking Melody’s trance.
“Eh… Sure.” is all Melody can say, utterly enthralled by the ancient Scottish island.
Rob smiles and disappears up the steps into the air control tower, no doubt to fill out some sort of paperwork regarding their “eventful” lan
ding.
Now, Melody is now on her own. Her bag, a solitary green suitcase, is unloaded from the small plane and given to Melody by a man dressed more like a farmer than a baggage handler. He grunts and walks off towards a small hanger, and the other passengers have now long since abandoned the runway.
Taking a deep breath, the salt air fills Melody’s lungs. It is a cleansing breath, but one which carries something else upon it. Mystery, adventure, perhaps even danger.
Opening her eyes as the rain ceases, she then walks off towards town in search of where she will be staying for the next two weeks: The Howling Dog. Melody wonders if it will be as quaint as it sounds.
Chapter 4
In a place as small as Talon's Point, it seems easy to find the local pub-inn at first. But Melody has now been walking around the town for twenty minutes, negotiating its winding streets, cobbled lanes, and secretive doorways without much success so far. She has found a small square with a white stone war memorial, a courtyard with empty stables, and even the sight of an aging church up on a hill, but so far she has not been able to find The Howling Dog itself.
Maybe it’s run off, she jokes to herself. That one made her laugh, and a passing resident of Talon’s Point looks at her as if she is mad to be giggling at herself.
Melody doesn't feel like she stands out, but clearly she does, if the common reaction from those around is anything to go by. As she passes many of the residents of Talon's Point, she feels their gaze. Some are curious, but some, she feels, are almost antagonistic; a long way from Rob's welcome on the plane.
Approaching an elderly lady, Melody asks for directions, but the lady looks at Melody with a quizzical glance and then disappears into a doorway without saying anything.
It's as though there is an agreement not to talk with outsiders. Melody reminds herself of what Rob said on the plane: Some people are welcoming, others aren’t. It’s best to surround yourself with the former rather than the latter.
There is an old atmosphere to the town. It’s far away from the Scottish mainland, and even the mainland is filled with expanses of unpopulated mountains and vast moors. To visit Talon’s Point is to be immersed in a remote location surrounded by remote locations. Given the reaction of the people she has encountered so far - Rob’s assertion that a visiting American is a rare occurrence, and the strange looks from everyone else - Melody begins to see the island as a place out of time. Stuck in the past when the world was not connected by cellphones and computer cables. A place where the older ways rule supreme, perhaps even the oldest of superstitions.
But this is the 21st century, Melody reminds herself. The island may be remote, but surely they have electricity and the internet, and their houses no doubt have all the luxuries of modern civilization. It's not like even 50 years ago when some of these islanders would have been living a life straight out of the 1800s.
Melody is beginning to feel the reality of what one of her professors back in Boston describes as "the whiplash of academia". Professor Mantle is his name, and he helped Melody prepare for her dig in Greece. He continually warned her of this whiplash effect of when someone who has studied at a university is then immersed, not in theory, but a very real, practical world. That interacting with people and places that are no longer abstract descriptions on the pages of textbooks, shows one clear thing: Practical experience takes time.
Melody wouldn’t be the first academic to feel out of their comfort zone, and so Melody thinks of Professor Mantle’s advice that to gain practical experience, she needs to dive in head first.
The next person she sees on the street, she is going to stop. And she is in the process of doing just that.
“Excuse me, Sir?” Melody says, pulling her suitcase behind her and looking every bit the fish out of water that she is trying not to be. The wheel of her case momentarily snags on a piece of cobbled stone, which she finally gets passed with one sudden tug.
“How can I help you, wee lassie?” says the man in front of her. He is in his fifties, long gray hair and a beard partially covering his reddened face. His clothes are a strange mix of rural and formal wear. He has a pristine tweed suit on, but his trousers are tucked in a pair of black Wellington boots covered in mud.
“Lassie?”
“Yer not from around here, are ye?” he says, chuckling to himself. “It’s merely a term of endearment, wee yin. But if ye cannae understand me, then let me speak a wee bit clearer, eh?”
“I’m sorry,” says Melody. “I don’t mean to offend, I’m looking for The Howling Dog.”
The man chuckles again. “Well, yer in luck. Look up!”
Melody looks up and, for the first time, notices that she is standing beneath a small wooden sign. It dangles by two black chains from a green pole jutting out from above a door next to her. On the wooden sign is the faded image of a snarling dog. But Melody is willing to bet it’s known as a howling one.
“Oh, man… Sorry for wasting your time.”
“Dinnae worry aboot it. I’ll have some good craic aboot it later when I’m in there having a wee dram.”
Melody is barely following the thick accent. She smiles, thanks the man, and then turns to enter the dark doorway beneath the sign.
“The name’s Thomas, by the way. But my friends call me Tam.”
“Thanks Tam,” Melody says, still blushing.
“See ye, later, Hen. I’ll be in the Howling Dog after me dinner. If ye hear me talking about a lassie looking for the pub, you’ll ken I’m talking aboot ye!” The man continues to laugh as he walks further down the street.
Melody has a feeling this isn’t the last time she’ll encounter Tam. She shakes the worry of being made to look like a laughingstock and heads in through the doorway.
Inside, The Howling Dog is everything Melody thought it would be. A cosy little inn with a fire roaring beneath an old red-oak mantelpiece. Above, the head of a stag long since stuffed, pokes out from the stone wall, its horns and glassy eyes looming over two armchairs sat either side of the fire.
Throughout the large room, there are various paintings and photographs depicting important moments in the history of Talon’s Point, and Melody can’t wait to take a close look at them later. For now, she must contend with the watchful gaze of the few fishermen propping up the bar and the bartender himself who is clearly waiting to be approached.
Whiplash of academia… Melody thinks to herself. There’s only one thing for it, but to move forward…
“Hello,” Melody says, approaching the bar and stretching out her hand. “I’m Melody Winter, I have a room booked.”
“Oh, aye,” the bartender says. “The yank!”
“From America, yes.”
“I knew a yank once,” one of the fishermen pipes up. “Solid mate on a Norwegian Salmon boat. Good company. Only problem was, he thought he was bigger than the ocean.”
“And what happened to him?” Melody asks, almost certain of the answer.
The fisherman turns on his stool, his woolen sweater cream white, no doubt woven from local sheep farms. His face is red with drinking too much whiskey, and his weatherbeaten skin tells tales of storms and raging contests with the elements while dragging fishing nets up from the abyss. He grins.
“What happened to him?” he says, looking around at his drinking buddies. “What happens taw any man who thinks he’s bigger than the ocean.”
“And that is?” Melody asks.
“It swallowed him up.”
A few of the other fishermen nod in agreement.
“Well, I should be okay,” Melody says. “I respect the sea, and besides, I’m not a man.”
“Fair play, lassie,” the fisherman says, returning to his latest of many drinks.
“Never mind these old yins,” the bartender remarks. “I’m Morrison. This is my inn. We’re glad tae have ye stayin’ with us.” He shakes Melody’s hand. “I’ll get young Bruce to help ye wae yer suitcase. We serve food tae 8 o’clock, breakfast fae 6AM. But if ye need anythin’ els
e, it can be arranged.”
“Thank you, Morrison. It’s a pleasure to meet you,” Melody offers with a smile.
“Bruce!” shouts Morrison, his eyes staring at the ceiling.
In response, the clumping sounds of boots moving around on the floor above soon reach a staircase and plod down towards the ground floor. Appearing from a stairwell at the rear of the room, a young man with bright red hair appears. He is tall and slim, no more than 17 years of age, and the bright red hair is one only found in the Celtic parts of the world. A strange mix of strawberry and a hint of gold.
“This is Bruce,” Morrison says. “He’ll take yer suitcase up stairs.”