“I’m looking for work.”
“Can you sail?”
“A little.”
“Well, I could do with another hand aboard. A cutter’s coming in soon and we’re off after a consignment of illegal whisky.”
“You’re an excise man?”
“Aye. Maybe yon fisherman thought you were one, too.” He scrutinized Tom again.
“Of course, that would make sense.” Tom smiled.
“Mmm. I’ve had word a boat’s setting out to Tiree. Sailing the longer way, southwest around Mull to put us off the scent. Be ready in a few minutes.”
Tom nodded. After Sinclair had gone he walked along to a more secluded part of the shore and waded into the sea to clean himself. When he returned the cutter was waiting, a spare thoroughbred of a vessel, rocking at anchor as if eager for the chase. Tom nodded to the five other crew members but took care to say little. A brisk wind was behind them and there was soon plenty to do, setting a course and unfurling the sails. He was relieved that some of the other sailors were topmen. He hadn’t climbed rigging since his days as a midshipman. As they rounded the southern corner of Mull, he remembered how the captain had explained about St. Columba’s arrival on the nearby island of Iona. He had been given his name as a joke, for he was more eagle than dove.
“Rather like Little John, sir, in the tales of Robin Hood,” Tom had said.
“The very same idea,” Captain Otter replied before relating how the future saint had been banished from his native Ireland for starting a quarrel that led to a fierce battle and loss of lives. “A typical Irishman!” the captain had roared.
Columba’s punishment was exile. He was ordered to settle somewhere where he could no longer see his homeland. At first he stayed in Kintyre, but he found that if he climbed a hill he could still see Ireland in the distance. So he traveled onto Iona and founded his monastery there instead.
Tom felt a wrench of guilt when he remembered the captain. He was a considerate man, not a martinet or bully. The father Tom would have liked to have. He imagined the captain sitting in his cabin, rifling through recent events in his mind. To a rational man like Captain Otter, his desertion would make no sense. It didn’t make much sense to Tom himself. But like Columba, Tom couldn’t turn back.
They continued up the west coast, passing Ulva and other smaller islands clustered around Mull. Poking the ship’s snout into every bay in case their prey had beached their boat. But there was no sign of the skiff. At last the cutter pointed northward into open water toward the island of Tiree. They all scanned the horizon but Tom was the first to see the distant sail, a feather flickering on the horizon.
“Well done, Englishman. That’s the skiff. They’ll make a dash for it. We can outrun them but we’ll need every scrap of sail to do it,” Sinclair grinned showing yellow, wolfish teeth.
So they spurred the cutter to her limit. Her sails swelled and strained against the rigging. The foaming spray at her prow bubbled like the breath of a galloping horse. Tom remembered fox hunts in the landlocked county of Warwickshire where he grew up. He had clung to the neck of his father’s mare as they pounded over fields and soared over hedges. But he could also remember looking away as the spent fox cowered, waiting for the hounds to tear it to shreds. “What will happen to them?” he asked Sinclair.
“The scunners will go to prison. Hard labor is what they deserve. I need a closer look at that vessel.”
Tom felt in his jacket pocket but stopped his fingers just in time as they circled the cold metal. Instead, he waited for Sinclair to take out his own telescope.
“Here, have a look.” He handed the spyglass to Tom.
It was a good instrument. Tom could make out three men aboard the skiff. The chase continued with the cutter gaining ground.
“Can they escape?”
“Not now. There’s nowhere to hide before Tiree itself. I doubt they could outrun us if they carry on to the Outer Isles.”
The skiff turned in toward Tiree and disappeared as it sailed around the southern point of the island.
“We’ll have them when they land in the bay.” Sinclair snapped his spyglass shut.
The wind held while the cutter headed around the point. Tom remembered that Tiree differed from most of its Hebridean neighbors in being flat and fertile. The machair, strewn with wildflowers in the spring, reached down to the sandy bay. There was nowhere to hide a boat. As the shore came into sight, they gasped. Where was the skiff?
All they could see were the inhabitants about their usual tasks. A row of fishing boats was drawn up on the sand. Alongside the boats were a pile of lobster pots and two old men smoking clay pipes while they checked fishing nets for holes. Cattle were being herded through the machair by children who sang as they tapped the beasts’ flanks with sticks. Beyond them were other figures spreading seaweed onto their potato patches.
“Where’s the damned skiff? Get ashore and find out what’s happening.” Tom and the rest of the crew ran over to the boats while Sinclair interrogated the old men. All the vessels were glistening. They had been in the water recently. Some were speckled with sand where the cattle’s feet had trampled close by.
“Have you seen a skiff, a boat, sailing past?” Sinclair asked the old men.
One stared open-mouthed while the other put his hand to his ear. “Dè? What?”
“Come over here, Masters. Can you understand their confounded language?”
Tom sprinted over. “An robh bàta ann air a’ mhuir? Was there a boat on the sea?”
“Bha. Bha torr bàtaichean iasgair a’seòladh,” the old man shrugged.
“He says there were plenty of fishing boats out at sea,” Tom told Sinclair.
“Ask him if they saw a boat sailing past the point.”
The old man tilted his head to listen to Tom’s stumbling question, “An do sheòl bàta seachad air an rubha? Did a boat sail around the point?”
The bodach removed his pipe from his mouth and spat a sticky black globule on the sand before shaking his head.
“He’s lying. They’ll be heading for the Outer Isles after all. Get back on board,” Sinclair ordered.
The crew scampered toward the cutter. As Tom turned to follow, the old man grabbed his sleeve and started talking to him but his speech was too rapid to follow. The fisherman smiled and patted Tom’s arm. So off they set again. Sinclair ordered the crew to continue even if it meant sailing through the night. They would follow the coast of the Outer Isles from the south northward, scrutinizing every harbor on their way. The wind still favored them but Sinclair’s temper worsened as they found no trace of their quarry in Barra or the Uists. He stopped pacing up and down the deck to confront Tom. “Tell me again what that old fool said to you.”
“Nothing, except for that last speech I couldn’t follow.”
“There’s something fishy here. When we get to Stornoway, I’ll hand you over to the authorities. We’ll get to the bottom of it.” He turned to bellow at the bosun, “Make sure he’s watched all the time.”
Tom clenched his fists but stayed quiet. He was terrified of being arrested but inwardly rejoicing at the thought of the people of Tiree toasting each other with the illicit whisky. What a clever plan it was to hide in plain view what you wanted to keep secret. The boats had all looked the same, all soaked in seawater. The sand had been churned up by the cattle so that no marks showed where the whisky-laden skiff had been hauled ashore. Where had they hidden the drink? Among the nets he suspected. They had worked very fast but they hadn’t allowed for Tom’s keen eyesight. When he walked along the line of boats, he had noticed the letters EA painted on the side of one of them. He remembered squinting down the telescope earlier and reading the skiff’s name, Eala, or “Swan.” He hadn’t understood the old man’s words but he had heard the plea to keep their secret safe, as had Sinclair.
Chapter 22
Stornoway, 1861
Without intending to, Tom dozed fitfully during the hours he waited, sitting proppe
d up against a mast and watched over by a succession of crew members. Each time he awoke it was with a start. How was he going to escape? His only chance would be when they neared land, perhaps while the crew was busy mooring the ship. He tried to remember the chart of Stornoway Harbor. Like Big Harbour on Rona, it had a lurking dragon at its entrance. Here were the rocks known as the Beasts of Holm. The lighthouse had been built at Arnish, ten years ago. It was a white, iron tower, bitterly cold the keepers complained. Alan Stevenson, Thomas’s brother and fellow engineer, had made an ingenious reflecting beacon on the nearby rock shelf. It projected the beam across so that even the local fishermen swore that the light shone from the lighthouse itself.
Sinclair and the crew ignored Tom as they approached Stornoway. They knew an early escape would be too dangerous, even for a strong swimmer. I’ll have to stay alert and seize my chances when we’ve entered the harbor, he thought. Highlanders hate the excise men. So maybe they’ll help me escape.
As the crew coaxed the cutter into the neck of the inner harbour, the youngest hand came and stood over Tom. He was a slight fellow, still in his teens, rather insulting to post him as a guard. But then maybe that could work to his advantage?
Stornoway was a busy port. The flow of water was clotted by fishing boats, so many of them that they formed floating islands. The cutter had to pick her way between them, lifting her skirts like a lady in a muddy farmyard. Tom’s jailer leaned over the side to gawp. Tom took his chance, crashing into the lad so he overbalanced. Leaping over the side and praying that the water below him was deep enough to break his fall. It was! But he was choking and stunned by the impact. He surfaced and headed toward the shore. His flailing arms reached the side of a small boat. He spluttered, “It’s the excise men,” and the astonished rower hauled him aboard. Tom flopped, coughing while the sailor rowed them toward the shore, scurrying between the larger vessels.
Angry roars came from the cutter. Her size impeded her, a man on stilts struggling through a crowded street. The rower reached a flock of small boats moored together close to the shore. He gestured to Tom to jump. Grinning while Tom waved his thanks and clambered aboard the first boat. Leaping from one wobbling vessel to the next, he used them as steppingstones until he was able to wade ashore.
Not safe yet. Glancing behind he saw the cutter’s launch lowered already. Where was he going to hide? There were the usual harbor buildings with their clutter of carts, heaped-up barrels and men unloading cargo. Nowhere there. Farther over, he spotted the gutting tables. There were the fisher girls, their quicksilver fingers darting among the fish. He ducked behind the buildings and using the barrels as cover crept up to the women, finger to lips. One of them looked up, a greasy curl sneaking out from her kerchief. Barely stopping her work she jostled him over toward a huge trough that stank worse than anything he had ever smelled in his life. Shuddering and holding his breath, he lowered himself into the oozing mound of fish entrails. A hand pressed him down and scooped more of the foul mess over his back.
Time stood still while he lay engulfed in the slime. What would my shipmates think if they could see me here? He smiled to himself, then immediately closed his mouth as a rotting fin slithered against his lips. He had always been so particular over his dress, vain almost. Now he was only fit to be a hermit. But he was safe, at least for the moment.
Finally fingers, bloated with strips of bandages, tapped him on the shoulder and strong arms pulled him to his feet. His legs buckled and he was propped against a barrel. The girls laughed, holding their aprons up to their faces. He joined in the joke, lifting his sleeve to his nose and reeling back from the stench. There were two girls. The stocky one with the escaping curl introduced herself as Beathag and her slender, pale friend as Peigi. He saw with relief that the sky was darkening as they urged him to follow them. He tottered along behind their brisk steps through narrow streets behind the harbor. Soon they left behind the shops, businesses, and blacksmith’s forge and walked along a pitted track toward a group of black houses. They took him to a well at the back. Beathag kept a lookout while Peigi started to pour bucket after bucket of icy water over him until he begged her to stop. Close up, he saw that beneath the grime she had the soft skin of a young woman. Shyly she stretched out her hand. “S e lochlannach a th’annad,” she whispered as she touched his dripping pale hair.
He smiled at being called a Viking and wished that he had a Norseman’s ferocity. Then he could have tackled the crew of the cutter, laying about him with a war axe. That would have been better than lying among putrid fish.
She mimed that he should take off his soaking clothes. He removed jacket, gansey and vest but kept a tight hold on his trousers. Later, as he warmed up by the fire, she handed him a bowl of porridge. He wondered if the foul smell from the fish trough would destroy his appetite but to his surprise he felt his mouth watering.
“Manna from Heaven,” he said.
The fisher girls gathered around him, smiling encouragement as if he was an orphan calf they were trying to rear. Tom decided it would be a good moment to bring out his drawing. His pack had been doused in seawater and smeared with fish innards but the paper had survived inside its oilskin wrapping. They scrutinized the drawing but then shook their heads.
Beathag explained to him how the group of girls stayed together in the house for the fishing season. He could sleep in the outhouse. They had found him some clean trousers and drawers. There was much giggling from her companions as she handed them over. She would speak tomorrow to the fishermen about a passage back to the mainland for him. It wouldn’t be difficult. The story of the fair young Englishman who helped the folk on Tiree to fool the excise men had sped across the sea before him. He made a nest with some old blankets on the earth floor of the outhouse and fell into an instant sleep.
Awakening the next morning his heart plunged with fear until he recognized his surroundings. Feeling more cheerful than he had for days, he rushed outside bare-chested and sluiced himself at the well. His hair and beard still seemed greasy. So he found his razor inside the pack, rust splattered but intact. He shivered as he examined it, running his fingers along the side of the blade. He felt a pang of grief for Richard, slicing his neck open like the fisher girls split open the fish. Tom knew he could never do that. He would only use the razor for its intended purpose. He felt cleaner after his shave and hoped that a change in his appearance would make it harder for him to be recognized.
A rumbling stomach drove him into the house. He wondered about asking Beathag if she would cut his hair but the house was empty. He had no idea of the time. Had they already gone to their work? Surely they would have told him before leaving? His heart thudded as he wondered if they had betrayed him. Had they been kind so that they could lure him into a trap? He peered out of the small, bleary window but all was quiet. Tearing around the single room he sent stools flying. He kicked the black pot hanging over the fire so that it listed and spewed out porridge. After swearing and stamping through the ashes he noticed the press in the corner. He flung the doors wide. Crouching down to cram oatmeal and pieces of smoked fish into his pack.
Chapter 23
Argyll, 1861
The door scraped open and Tom swung round, fists up. There in front of him stood Beathag, Peigi and the others, staring. Red-faced he lowered his arms. Beathag shook her head and held out the Bible she had clutched in her hand.
Now that his heart had stopped banging in his ears, he saw that they were all dressed in clean, sombre black. Several of them had Bibles cradled in their raw fingers. He could barely recognize them out of their rank work clothes. Before they were anonymous but now they had become shapely young women. Only their ravaged hands betrayed them. He felt contrite at doubting them. He had condemned them as being coarse and loud mouthed, felt a secret relief when they didn’t recognize the portrait. He had loathed the idea that his Celtic princess might be reduced to becoming a fish gutter. Yet, despite doing foul, tedious work, they took such pains to spruce themse
lves up to attend church.
He stammered an apology. They smiled and nodded, but they were subdued for the rest of the day. He didn’t know whether it was because he had offended them or if this was their usual Sunday demeanour. At the break of day the next morning, Beathag stuffed his pack with provisions. She just smiled when he turned out his pockets to show their emptiness. She led him along narrow tracks to a quiet inlet away from the town. Two men waited by a skiff very like the one that had eluded the cutter. He owed these poor women so much. He felt in his pack and took out his telescope, the one that he used to keep in his uniform jacket. His father had given it to him when he left to become a midshipman. His last link with home. Damp had dulled the brass and streaked it green but it was still valuable. He pressed it into her reluctant hand and ran to help launch the boat.
The fishermen sailed first to Tiree. “Before they run dry,” one of them said.
There was a cheering crowd to greet them and a forest of arms to pull the boat up onto the smooth golden sands. Tom was feted like a hero. All the men wanted to pump his hand or slap him on the back. The children pulled at his jacket or tweaked his fingers. The women were more circumspect, giving him sidelong glances from lowered eyes. In the evening, a fiddler appeared and everyone danced on the springy machair. Now the young women became bolder and held onto his hand as they spun with him in the reels.
Disentangling himself he sought refuge with the men drinking the smuggled whisky.
“Seo an duine bàn, Here’s the fair man,” called out Alasdair, the old man who had been sitting on the lobster pots. The whisky was raw and Tom had lost the habit of taking strong drink. His legs crumpled under him and he remembered nothing more until he woke up on a sweet-smelling, heather-filled mattress. He groaned as daylight dazzled his eyes. Alasdair came to see him, accompanied by a man wearing a starched collar and tie. Tom leapt to his feet but Alasdair’s smile reassured him.
The stranger was a neatly made man with smoothed down hair. He explained that he was the schoolmaster, Alan MacMillan. He had come to translate for Alasdair. “He says you were somewhat, er … intoxicated last night.”
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