Secret of the Ron Mor Skerry

by Rosalie K. Fry

  “Eh, lassie!” said Grandfather wearily. “This is a grand welcome to be sure.”

  “And nothing missing,” added Granny, running a practiced eye over the table. “It sure is good to have someone so reliable about the house.” But, although they had been so pleased to find the meal ready, the two old people did not seem to be hungry after all and scarcely ate a thing. They appeared to be worrying over something and for once even Granny was silent.

  “Did you have a nice afternoon?” Fiona ventured presently.

  Grandfather jerked himself out of his preoccupation, but he seemed at a loss for words.

  “Why, yes, indeed . . . that is, not exactly. . .you see . . .” “It’s no use glossing it over,” interrupted Granny quietly. “Far better tell the child the truth. After all, it concerns her as well as ourselves.”

  “Aye, I suppose it does,” agreed the old man, but he seemed unable or unwilling to say more.

  Fiona looked from one to the other.

  “What is it?” she asked at last.

  “Well, dear,” said Granny gently, “we find that our landlord, the owner of this house, wants the place for his son, who is waiting to get married. And the trouble is, he has nothing else to offer us but a place across on the mainland.”

  “The mainland!” burst out Fiona. “But we’re islanders, all of us!”

  “I know,” sighed Granny. “But apparently there are no island houses vacant at the moment, so we’ll just have to be content with what we can get.”

  “Why can’t his son go to the mainland?” objected Fiona.

  “Because he has a job on the island here,” explained Granny. “So of course he must stay. You see, we have nothing to hold us here . . . except our love of the Isles.” She spoke the last words softly, as though only to herself.

  “How soon do we have to go?” asked Fiona in a small voice.

  “He’ll let us stay till the end of the month—but that’s not long, goodness knows,” replied Granny, “especially as your grandfather is determined to spend every day of that time trying to find a cottage somewhere in the islands.” Then, glancing across to where her husband sat slumped in his chair, she added in a lower tone, “’Twill pretty near break his heart to go across to the main-land—he’s lived in the Islands all his life.”

  “And so have you,” murmured Fiona, and looking up into the troubled old face, she felt that here was another heart that would break. How she longed to do something to help.

  At that moment the door opened and Rory put his head around it.

  “No!” He laughed, seeing Granny reach automatically for the teapot. “I haven’t come for a cup of tea tonight. I’ve come to ask if you’ll let Fiona come out in the boat with me tomorrow.”

  Fiona’s eyes shone with sudden happiness, for she knew where he would take her—she knew they would go to Ron Mor!

  Chapter 8

  FIONA TOLD Rory the worrying news on their way to Ron Mor next morning. For a while he rowed in silence, and then he said slowly, “D’you know what I think? I think we must all go back to Ron Mor, you and I and Grandfather and Granny.”

  “You mean all go and live there?” burst out Fiona, her words tumbling over one another in her excitement.

  Rory nodded. “I do,” he said. “I’ve always intended going back myself, as you know, and now you’ve discovered Jamie there, you’ll be wanting to go and look after him.”

  Fiona nodded eagerly, then added a little apprehensively, “But what about Granny and Grandfather?”

  “Grandfather’d go like a shot, I know. It’s Granny who may need persuading, even though she’s in need of a home,” said Rory thoughtfully.

  “And yet she loves Ron Mor,” puzzled Fiona.

  “Aye, she loves it all right. For herself she’d be off there tomorrow with that old cow of hers. But the trouble is, she’s such a terrible motherly person, always worrying over Grandfather’s health, and now she’s got you to fret about as well. But I tell you what!” he exclaimed in sudden excitement. “We might persuade her to go there for Jamie’s sake. She was always terrible fond of Jamie.”

  There were no seals on the skerry this morning and no sign of Jamie or his cradle-boat when they landed in the bay.

  “Now, first of all we must make sure the cottages are sound,” said Rory as they tramped up the beach. “You’ll never get Granny into a damp house, that’s quite certain.”

  He went critically from one cottage to the next, methodically examining roofs and walls.

  “I’d say they’re as sound as ever they were,” he decided. “The thatches need patching up of course, and the paint’s flaked off the woodwork, but that’s easily fixed. And it won’t take long to clear back these weeds so we can grow vegetables here again.”

  “And I can clean the insides of the cottages and wash the windows,” added Fiona.

  “We’ll do it!” declared Rory. “Don’t let’s say a word to anyone. We’ll just come over every day until we’ve got everything ready and then we’ll bring them across and let them see for themselves. Now, for a start, I think we’d better concentrate on our own three cottages. We can do up the others later on if we need them. I only wish I’d brought some tools so I could start right away.”

  “And I wish I had a broom and a scrubbing brush,” sighed Fiona, looking about her. However, even without these things they were able to make a start. Fiona cleared the rubbish out of the old stone fireplaces and then set about collecting a huge pile of driftwood for each cottage.

  Rory found a broken spade in an outhouse and with it was able to make quite a clearance around the cottages. They had no real gardens, but here and there marigolds and candytuft peeped out between the weeds, and when he cut the nettles back he discovered some fat red buds hanging on a stunted fuchsia bush close to Granny’s door. At the back there were several tiny fields enclosed by dry-stone walls, and behind them the steep hill rose protectively. In front, a narrow strip of short green turf was all that divided the cottages from the white sand of the bay, where today the small waves murmured peacefully as they came glistening up the beach.

  They had not been long at work before a shadow moved across the bay and a sleek, dark head broke the surface of the water and turned toward the shore. A few minutes later a second head appeared and then a third and a fourth, and as though in reply to a secret summons, the bay became suddenly crowded with seals. They remained in the deep green water offshore with little more than their eyes above the water, silently watching everything that Fiona and Rory were doing. As soon as he noticed them Rory slipped quietly indoors to where Fiona was busy scooping cobwebs out of one of the old box beds.

  “I say, Fiona!” he whispered. “The seals are out there watching us from the bay. No! Don’t fly out!” he cried, grabbing her as she darted toward the door. “We shall have to be very careful. They’ll only let Jamie come ashore when they are perfectly certain that we ourselves are harmless. I’m sure of that, especially since Jamie himself is very easily frightened, according to all accounts.”

  “D’you think he’s out there with them now?” she asked, peeping through the crack of the door.

  “I can’t see him,” said Rory. “But the Chieftain’s there. See him right in the front? Now, whatever happens, we mustn’t alarm them. I don’t mean we must stay indoors, of course, but just go steadily on with our jobs, as though they weren’t there at all. If they see us do that they’ll get used to us and feel they can trust us with Jamie.”

  Fiona found it almost impossible to work steadily. She kept stopping to squint under her lashes at the crowd in the bay, hoping every minute to see the cradle-boat among them. But to her disappointment Jamie never came, and at last it was time to go home.

  “Mustn’t miss the tide again today,” said Rory.

  Granny was only too glad to let Fiona go off with Rory day after day, thankful to feel that she was happily occupied during these anxious weeks. She knew she’d be safe with Rory and she packed them up something t
o eat every day to make sure they were properly fed. But she was so preoccupied with her own worries that she never questioned where they went or what they did. Nor did she notice when Fiona borrowed a cloth and soap and a scrubbing brush and carried them off in a bucket from the scullery.

  Rory also borrowed from home and when Fiona saw the assortment of tools and tins in the bottom of the boat she laughed and exclaimed, “It looks as though you’re going to build the cottages instead of only mend them!”

  “You’ll be surprised to find how much needs doing!” He smiled as he shoved the boat off the quayside with an oar.

  Now they were able to get to work in earnest. Rory started on the roofs, pulling away the rotten thatch and uprooting the weeds and grasses that had grown there. He cut new sods of turf and spread them over the timbers, then rethatched the roofs with heather from the hillside. This done, he secured each roof in the age-old island fashion, crisscrossing the whole with lengths of rope weighted with heavy stones dangling in a fringe below the thatch.

  Fiona was equally busy indoors. She scrubbed out all the old box beds and polished the little windows until they shone. She then washed every bit of woodwork she could reach and swept and scoured the stonework until the three little cottages were clean inside and out and every corner smelled of soap and water. Every corner, that is, save one, for she never disturbed the low board table laid out with its tea set of shells, hoping that if she left it there Jamie might perhaps return and play with it after dark.

  As soon as the big jobs were done they turned to the smaller ones. In some of the cottages there were still some scraps of furniture—a battered old table in one, and in another, an ancient settle and several other odds and ends that had proved too old or too awkward to take away in the boats. Their most exciting discovery was a three-legged cooking pot complete with chain and hook. It had lost its lid and the old iron body was dented and very dusty, but Fiona took it down to a rock pool, where she scoured it with sand inside and out until it looked as good as ever. Meanwhile, Rory wandered along the tide line, turning over the driftwood until he found a suitable board, which he whittled into as fine a lid as any cooking pot needed. Then he hung the pot over the fireplace in Granny’s kitchen.

  “Now,” he said, looking about him, “I think our best plan will be to collect all the furniture we’ve got into this one room. Granny will feel better about the place if she finds it looking homelike.”

  They worked on steadily day after day and soon the three little cottages began to look as though they had never been empty. Smoke poured out of their chimneys as Fiona lighted tremendous fires to dry the rooms out after all her scrubbing, and Rory cut neat sods of peat, which he stacked against the cottage walls for use as winter fuel. And all the while the Chieftain and his clan watched from the bay.

  At last there came an evening when everything was done.

  “Now I really believe the time has come!” announced Rory, standing back to admire the results of their labors.

  “You mean we can tell Granny and Grandfather now and bring them here to live?” burst out Fiona.

  “We can bring them here to see it,” corrected Rory. “It may take some time to persuade them to come and live here, I’m afraid.”

  Chapter 9

  FIONA WAS out at the back of the lean-to scullery helping Granny with the washing when suddenly she felt that the time had come.

  “Granny,” she said very quietly, “I’ve found Jamie.”

  Granny dropped the soap into the water with a splash.

  “Found Jamie?” she echoed faintly. “Where?”

  “Well, sometimes he’s on Ron Mor and sometimes he’s off in the cradle-boat. But Granny, he’s as well as can be and he’s got quite tall—I should think he comes nearly up to my shoulder.”

  Granny sat down on the bench to think this over. Her hands were shaking, Fiona noticed.

  “He really is all right, Granny, I promise you,” she cried eagerly, smiling into the old woman’s anxious face. “I’ve seen him twice and Rory knows it’s true.”

  “Does your Grandfather know?” asked Granny.

  “Yes, we told him this morning, and he thinks . . . he thinks . . . Oh, Grandfather, tell her what you think!” she cried as the old man came around the corner, closely followed by Rory.

  “I think, my dear, that the time has come for us to return to Ron Mor,” said the old man, laying his hand on his wife’s shoulder.

  “Return to Ron Mor?” She faltered.

  “Yes,” he replied. “After all, we’ve Rory here, and Fiona. Rory is as big and as strong as any man, and you’ve said yourself how helpful you find Fiona. And don’t forget we are about to lose the only home we’ve got.”

  But Granny was not to be persuaded all in a minute. “Suppose you took ill?” she demanded, looking challengingly up at her husband.

  “Then Rory would go for the doctor. There’s nothing the lad can’t do with a boat, as you know.”

  “It’s all very well for you,” she argued, “but I’m the one as has to look after your health.”

  “And when have you ever known me to be ill, for all your worrying?” murmured Grandfather with a small smile of amusement.

  “Well, what about Fiona, then?” said Granny, determined not to be overruled. “They sent her here to get well. D’you think I’d be taking the child into one of those damp old cottages?”

  “But they aren’t damp!” protested Fiona. “That’s where Rory and I have been every day, drying them out with the hugest fires you ever saw in your life.”

  “Rory’s folks would never spare him,” declared Granny, seizing on yet another excuse.

  “Oh, they won’t mind,” asserted Rory. “They know I’ve always planned to go back to Ron Mor anyway. They’ll laugh and think I’m daft, that’s all. Though, mind you, it won’t surprise me if Jim and Donald come and join me the minute they leave school, and maybe Jeanie too. They’re just as keen as I am.”

  “Anyway, there’s the cow!” rapped out Granny on a note of finality, as though that settled everything; and, rescuing the pulpy soap from the washtub, she marched indoors.

  The other three looked at one another and decided that for the time being they had better say no more. Fiona rinsed the clothes and spread them on the grass to dry while Rory emptied the water and set the tub upside down to drain.

  “I’ll slip away home to my dinner now,” he murmured. “But I’ll come back later,” he added in answer to Fiona’s imploring glance.

  Fiona and her grandparents sat down to a silent meal. For once Granny did not seem to have anything to say, although she bobbed up and down more than usual. The other two said nothing, but from time to time they looked at each other cautiously with the hint of a secret smile.

  The world outside seemed in tune with their mood, for during the meal the sun went in and storm clouds began to gather in the west. As Fiona cleared the table the wind gave a warning growl in the chimney.

  “Looks like we’re in for a dirty night,” remarked Grandfather, going across to the window. As he spoke the wind rumbled again in the chimney and the house shivered slightly.

  Just as they finished the washing up Rory returned. He caught Fiona’s eye and raised an inquiring eyebrow. She shook her head and he moved without a word to a stool in front of the fire. As he sat down another gust shook the house, making the doors and windows rattle.

  As the noise died away they were all amazed by a sudden spurt of tremendous activity on Granny’s part. She began rummaging in cupboards and drawers and bringing out all sorts of foodstuffs and cooking utensils. She crammed them into a basket that stood on the floor.

  “Whatever are you at, woman?” Grandfather asked at last.

  “We’ve got to eat, haven’t we?” she replied shortly. The old man shrugged his shoulders helplessly and turned to look out the window. Already there were whitecaps on the waves.

  Now Granny bustled away upstairs and astonished them all by returning with her arms full
of blankets and rugs.

  “What in the world . . .,” began Grandfather.

  “You surely don’t want to sleep out on Ron Mor with no bedding?” demanded Granny.

  Fiona and Rory caught one another’s eyes and a look of joy flashed between them. But Grandfather was more sober.

  “Och, my dear, it’s right glad I am to see you ready to go,” he said, “but we can’t be starting today.”

  Granny stood stock-still in the middle of the little kitchen. “And why can’t we be starting today?” she demanded.

  “Look at the weather,” said her husband. “We’re in for a storm before nightfall.”

  “And that’s just why we must start immediately,” said Granny very firmly. “How d’you think that blessed child will fare out there in a storm?”

  “Jamie? Why, no doubt the birds and the seals will look after him as they’ve done these last four years,” he answered mildly.

  Granny snorted.

  “And will the seabirds be giving him a bowl of hot soup, I ask you that?” she cried fiercely. “And will those wet old seals think to wrap the poor child in a blanket?”

  Now it was Grandfather’s turn to try to think of excuses.

  “And what about the cow?” he inquired.

  “I’m not forgetting the cow,” she replied with dignity. “I make no doubt Rory’s mother will see to her for a day or two until we can arrange to fetch her across to the island. Maybe you’ll go and ask her, Rory, now, before we start? And Fiona dearie, you’ll want your coat and your thick green scarf, and as for you,” she said, turning to her husband, “don’t be forgetting your muffler as well as your coat and cap.”

  For the next half hour they were kept on the run, with Granny hustling and ordering them all to and fro between the house and the harbor. At last the boat was loaded with all it would hold and the four of them took their places, Granny and Fiona in the stern, with Rory and his grandfather at the oars.

  Everything had happened so swiftly that there was only a handful of neighbors on the quay to see them start. These few were inclined to shake their heads over the whole undertaking, but Granny silenced their misgivings with her own calm confidence.