Mannie looks around the room. There are four people present – Jen, Jonno and his new friend Alex, and herself. Her eyes are scratchy with tiredness. She has hardly slept for days. Her mother is still missing and she feels utterly responsible. Work today was a massive challenge, but one she knew she must rise to, or lose her job.
The worst thing is being unable to master her feelings. All her life, Mannie has been in control. Smart, efficient, focused, she gets what she wants. She’s well aware that some people at work think she’s high-handed and arrogant. She doesn’t mind that. These are the weapons she needs in her armoury in order to succeed, and success is her goal. Her colleagues know that outside of the workplace she’s different, softer. Yet now that she needs her armoury as she has never needed it before, all her shields and protectors seem to have deserted her.
And what is this all about? She looks at the girl – Alex – that Jonno has brought with him. There’s an electricity between those two. He has found someone special.
‘Thank you,’ Jonno starts, ‘for agreeing to this, Mannie. Thanks, Jen, for being here. And Alex,’ he turns to her, a spontaneous smile lighting up his face, ‘for doing the research.’
Mannie is curled up on her favourite deep chair near the window in the living room of her flat. She has kicked off her shoes, but otherwise she’s still dressed for work in a knee-length straight skirt and white silk blouse. She hasn’t been back home for long and she feels haggard. Her hair, usually lustrous, is dull and lank. Her hand clutches a balled-up tissue, which she keeps squeezing convulsively. She can see Jen, bless her, watching her with concern.
‘Myra says sorry,’ Jen says to Jonno, ‘but she and Graham have something important on tonight otherwise she’d have been here.’
‘Thanks, Jen. Mannie,’ he says, turning to her, his expression serious, ‘Alex would like to tell you what she’s been researching. Okay?’
Mannie shrugs listlessly. ‘Okay,’ she said dully, ‘but I can’t imagine how anything’s going to help me.’
Alex says gently, ‘It’s something I discovered after Jonno told me your story.’
Mannie shifts restlessly. How many people has Jonno discussed her with? She’d be angry if she had the energy.
It seems that Alex has guessed at her thoughts, because she says, ‘I hope you don’t mind? I promise you, I haven’t told anyone else, and I never will, not unless you want me to.’
Mannie relents grudgingly.
I’m beginning to quite like you.
‘Something about your story rang a bell with me and—’
The sound of a bell ringing comes right on cue.
‘That’s the front door,’ Jen says, puzzled, ‘who could that be? Will I send them away?’
‘See who it is,’ Jonno says, an odd smile on his lips.
In her dreams, Mannie would not have dared to expect the visitor who appears a few moments later. She leaps to her feet, her hands to her mouth, her eyes round with astonishment.
‘Cal!’
‘Hi.’
Callum McMaster stands framed in the doorway, lithe and sturdy, his bright, intelligent eyes surveying Mannie a little warily, but his expression friendly.
There’s a moment’s awkwardness, which Jonno breaks by explaining, ‘I asked Cal to come, Mannie. I hope you don’t mind. This is something I believe we all need to pull together on and Callum’s agreed to come and talk about it.’
‘Here, Cal.’ Jen gets up from her seat next to Mannie and offers the chair to Callum. ‘I’ll move to the bean bag.’
‘I can sit there,’ Cal says, smiling at her.
‘No, you’re all right.’ Jen slumps down comfortably before Cal can preempt her.
He kisses Mannie’s cheek. ‘Hello fat-face,’ he whispers.
Fat-face! He called her fat-face! He doesn’t totally hate her then!
‘Hello thunderthighs.’
It’s barely even a whisper, but he hears it and grins, then subsides on the chair beside her.
‘Okay, as I was saying,’ Alex resumes, ‘when Jonno told me about Brian being your uncle, and about your feelings for him, Mannie, it rang a bell. I read a story in a magazine recently about a couple who had an adopted son, who basically fell in love with his sister. He’d never met her before, because she’d been adopted too, and she’d been taken to Australia.’
‘Shit,’ Jen shakes her head. ‘He fell for his sister?’
‘Apparently, it’s a lot more common than you’d think. And as our families get more and more complicated, it seems to be getting more frequent, although it’s not often talked about.’
She looks round at each of them.
‘I believe that what has happened to Mannie is that she’s fallen a victim to something called Genetic Sexual Attraction.’
‘Sounds like chlamydia,’ Jen grimaces.
‘Thankfully not, but it
is
a medical condition. It’s quite widely recognised now. It can happen when you meet someone – a relation, I mean – when you’re grown up, someone you didn’t know when you were young. I’m not making this very clear.’
Jonno takes up the explanation. ‘Apparently even mothers and sons can get it and end up sleeping together, setting up home together even.’
Mannie squirms uneasily.
‘But it’s not always reciprocal,’ Alex chimes in. ‘It can be a one-sided obsession.’
Callum says slowly, ‘And you think that’s what Mannie’s got?’
‘Think about it, Cal. She’s getting along perfectly well with you, in fact, I’ve never seen her so happy with anyone.’ He grins. ‘And I’ve seen her with a few,’ he adds irrepressibly.
Mannie is indignant. ‘Shut up!’
‘Then suddenly, wham! Instead of a fit guy like you, she’s lusting after a pretty ordinary middle-aged man, balding, building up fat round the midriff, and married. Not exactly a likely quarry, is he? Not really a prospect for a girl like you, Mannie.’
Mannie says nothing. What is there to say? She can hardly deny it.
‘Mannie,’ Cal looks at her steadily, ‘Is it reciprocated? Is this guy as obsessed with you as you are with him?’
Christ, this is hard, Mannie thinks. ‘I don’t know. He seems to like me.’ What was it he said? God, you’re bloody irresistible, do you know that?
‘I hope for all our sakes that he isn’t, because if he is, it’s going to be very difficult to work on this. From what I understand, this thing’s really powerful.’ Jonno looks at Alex, then adds, ‘But from what I hear he’s a bit of a womaniser and my suspicion is he’s maybe been a bit flattered by Mannie’s interest in him.’
Mannie’s face is burning. She hides it in her hands. This is horrible, horrible, horrible. If the floor could open beneath her she’d happily fall through it, anything to get away from this analysis, this probing, these judgements.
‘Mannie.’ There’s a hand on her shoulder, gentle, but firm. ‘Look at me, Gutso.’
She presses her hands harder over her face and shakes her head. ‘I can’t,’ she groans, her voice muffled by her fingers.
‘Look at me.’
She moves one finger aside. Callum is looking at her with such sweet concern that she could weep.
‘We can work on this, Mannie. Come on. We’re all here to help.’ He prises her fingers away from her face and imprisons her hand in a firm clasp. He turns to Jonno. ‘This is all very well, Jonno, but where does it take us?’
‘Alex thinks I should talk to him.’
‘Does he know? That you’re his nephew?’
‘I don’t think so. Mum wanted to tell us first. Maybe when I tell him, he’ll back off. That’s my hope, anyway.’
‘This has put you in a really difficult place, hasn't it? There’s no way of knowing where it’ll end up.’
‘I could be out of a job.’
Mannie is roused out of bleakness. ‘I can’t allow that, Jonno. You mustn’t put your job at risk.’
‘I can’t see any other way. Anyway, unless we get this sorted, I’m not going to be able to work with him.’
‘Then you need to let me come with you.’
‘No, Mannie. I think it’s best if you keep away completely. I’m going to find out about counselling for you.’
‘Counselling! I’m not a psycho.’
‘Being able to talk this through with a trained counsellor might help. I dunno, it might flush it through your system or something.’
Jen says, ‘I know someone, Mannie. She’s really good, and if it’s not her thing, I’m sure she’d be able to recommend an expert.’
‘An expert in this genetic sexual attraction stuff?’ Mannie snorts. ‘Right, so they get loads of cases, do they?’
‘Try not to be bitter, Mannie.’
‘Oh Christ. Listen to yourselves. It’s so bloody easy for you, isn’t it? Let’s all sit around and decide what’s best for Mannie. Well it’s not that easy for me, so you can all piss off, do you hear me?’ She uncurls furiously and stands up. ‘Just fuck off, the lot of you!’
It’s fifteen strides to her bedroom door and she makes it in three seconds, slams the door behind her, flings herself onto the bed and pulls a pillow over her head.
She doesn’t expect company. They’ll be staring after her and saying, ‘My goodness, Mannie’s in a mood, isn’t she?’ before they sit round and discuss what they might do about it for a bit longer.
But it’s only a matter of seconds before she hears the door open, and shut again, and Callum sits down on the bed next to her.
‘Is Miss I’m-Not-A-Psycho Wallace going to come out and play?’
‘Fuck. Off.’
He’s laughing. ‘Come on, Mannie. I’m just relieved to see your spirit hasn’t left you completely. I thought you’d been possessed by a creepy love bug but I see the real Mannie’s still in there somewhere.’
‘I said leave it, can’t you?’
He stops laughing and after a few moments he says, his voice kinder, ‘It will pass, Mannie.’
She sits up, infuriated, the pillow clutched to her stomach. ‘And if it “passes”, what then, Callum? Will I be able to turn back the clock? Will you come back to me? Will you love me again? Or will I always be soiled goods?’
‘Never that, Mannie.’ He eases the pillow out of her grasp and drops it onto the floor. ‘Listen, if Alex and Jonno are correct, you’re a victim in all of this, not a perpetrator, but much as I think they’re right, I still can’t answer your questions.’
He draws a light finger down her cheek to the corner of her mouth. ‘My feelings have been knocked sideways by this too. I loved you, Mannie, and that love was kicked into touch. Okay, so I understand now that you couldn’t help it, but it’s not just a simple matter of clicking a switch and making everything better.’
The hurt that fills Mannie is absolute. Nothing seems to function, not her breathing, not her movement, not her sight. The room is a blur, and she realises that her eyes have filled with tears and that she’s powerless to stop them. Another weakness, she thinks despairingly – then, hopelessly, I’ve lost everything.
A hand wipes the tears away, clumsily, and she realises that it’s shaking almost as much as she is.
‘I can’t make everything come right, Mannie. I suspect it may be some time before your world stops rocking on its axis and I’m not sure when the sun will shine again in mine. But I will promise you this: I’ll be here for you. If you need to talk, you can talk to me. If you want to scream, you can use my sweater to muffle the sound. If you need to cry, I’ll have a hankie ready, a whole boxful of hankies. I won’t abandon you, Mannie.
‘And one day – I don’t know. We’ll see. I think we have to take it one day at a time, don’t you?’
From Callum, it’s quite a speech. It’s all she can hope for and it’s more than he needs to give. Gratitude sweeps through her, and with it comes a faint ray of hope.
‘Thank you, Vicar,’ she says, and manages a smile.
The air on the island is sweet and balmy. It’s one of those June mornings when you know that spring is over and that the long, seductive days of summer are finally beginning. It can be a deceitful seduction, of course, in Scotland, on the west coast, on the island of Mull. The wind can change direction, pick up moisture, drop it with some vitriol on the lump of volcanic rock known as Ben More, drenching every moving being in its path as it moves on its malevolent way to the mainland.
Today glitters with promise and Susie, stoutly shod, is trudging up the long, rough path to the summit of the Ben with an odd sense of euphoria. It isn’t that peace has broken out in her mind, but perhaps hostilities have eased a little, a ceasefire has been called. In this place, in this weather, and putting all problems to the back of her mind, she’s able, for the space of a few hours, simply to exist.
She stops, breathless, and makes the view an excuse for the halt. It’s excuse enough. From her elevated position, the island is like a map spread at her feet. Below her, as blue as the skies above, lies Loch na Keal. A huge sea inlet, it rolls westwards, almost splitting the island in two.
At the mouth of the loch is the island of Ulva and its more famous infant companion, Staffa. Mendelssohn, drawn here, was inspired to compose his Hebridean Overture and so set the fashion for visitors to flock in their thousands to the dramatic cave.
Below her, to the west, is the grim remnant of the cottage at Gribun – just three low drystone walls surrounding a massive boulder. Susie shivers, remembering the story – a young couple were killed here on their honeymoon night when a storm loosened the boulder and it crashed down the mountain and demolished their home.
It’s an unforgiving landscape and an ancient one, the rocks among the oldest in the world. Forgetting the inherent dangers of the place, Susie laughs aloud because it’s indescribably magnificent, the most beguiling landscape in the world. It punctures self importance and puts you in your place. It’s unarguable: in the face of its scale and age and majesty, nothing else has significance.
And that’s what I need to remember.
‘Amazing, is it not?’
She turns. A young couple, descending the mountain unnoticed by her, have stopped to share the moment. ‘Stunning. Where are you from?’
‘We are from Germany,’ the girl says. ‘We are so loving your country.’
‘Thank you. I’m so glad you are getting the weather.’
‘We have the mountains near us too, bigger mountains than this, yes. But this is—’ the man halts. He can’t find the word he’s searching for and simply ends, ‘—very special,
ja
?’
‘Very special,’ Susie agrees. ‘But if I’m to get to the top I must press on.’
‘Not far,’ the girl beams. ‘Half of one hour, yes?’
‘Thank you. Enjoy your holiday,’ she calls after them, because they’re already bounding down the mountain with goat-like athleticism.
She pulls a face. What would she give for half their fitness?
You are what you are, Susie.
She ponders that thought as she trudges the last few hundred steps to the summit. Surely that’s one of the lessons she has to absorb: you are what you are – and you are
who
you are.
She puffs her way upwards, steeped in thought. It’s what she came here for, after all – to get some distance, to escape from the burden of political responsibility, to consider her past, present and future.
When she stumbled across to the studio, a mere thirty-eight hours ago, to find Archie’s notice firmly tacked onto the door, its capitals shouting their instruction ‘Strictly No Entry. Recording in Progress’, she refused to take the prohibition seriously. She had to talk to Archie, she was going to talk to her husband. She tapped on the door, then hammered on it, then pounded as hard as she could – but all to no avail. The soundproofing he had installed was too efficient and inside, no doubt, the band was giving it everything.
That was when she cracked.
Enough.
Every emotion she could name seemed to course round her body. Angry, hurt, and bewildered, she felt abandoned and distressed.
She cursed Mary and Robert MacPherson for their secrecy about the truth of her identity.
She blamed Archie for covering for them all these years.
She felt helpless in the face of her daughter’s anguish and concerned for her son’s position.
She’d met a new mother and hadn’t quite found it in her heart to either forgive her or love her and that made her angry.
And she already hated the brother she still hadn’t met for what he had done to Mannie.
To cap it all, her political career had nosedived. There was a journalist who seemed intent on destroying her reputation and her Party was forcing her to act against her beliefs.
She retraced her steps with burning fury across the courtyard to the kitchen. A least she could deal with the last thing. She pulled out some paper and a pen, sat down at her desk, and wrote.
Dear First Minister
I have given this a great deal of thought, and it is with much sadness and regret that I write to you to tender my resignation as an MSP. As you know ...
Now she can see the cairn that marks the summit, just yards away. She’s nearly at the top. One last effort – and here she is, queen of the world.
What a good idea this was. She has achieved something. She has climbed a Munro, all three thousand one hundred and sixty nine feet of it – nine hundred and sixty six metres.
And that, Mr First Minister, is worth all your votes of confidence and then some.
There were no stamps so she wasn’t able to post the letter. But the upside was she spotted the hotel voucher Mannie and Jonno gave to her and Archie for their wedding anniversary. Perfect. Why not? Just go. Archie won’t even miss you.
She threw a few things in the car and drove.
After a while Susie’s breath recovers and she allows herself to sit in the shelter of the small ring of stones and survey the view she has earned. Oban is a three-hour drive from Cairn Cottage, so she arrived in the middle of the night and parked the car in the queue for the Mull ferry. Boarding in the morning was easy. The magic started to work as soon as she stepped out of the car and onto the deck. The wind in her hair, the sun on her face, the sea blue and calm below them – and the island of her memories drawing closer and closer.
She called Archie soon after she landed, to put his mind at ease. ‘Listen Archie,’ she bawled down the phone, battling the wind around her, ‘it’s all too much. I’ve had to go away. You mustn’t worry about me, I’ll be back in a few days. Please tell the children and please don’t try to find me. I need this time on my own. Bye.’
She should call Karen and explain her absence – but not yet, an inner voice murmured.
Archie will tell her. I need this time to myself. There are still things I need to think through.
On her second morning on Mull, she hears her father’s voice in her head when she wakes. She can almost see him, grey hair, grey trousers, grey sleeveless V-neck, dark, thin, featureless tie, and kind, gentle smile.
‘You can achieve anything you want, love. Never settle for doing less than your best.’
His mantras might have been clichéd, but they were her guiding principles all the days of her childhood.
‘Be the best you can be.’
She’s so firmly in her past that she opens her eyes gingerly, unsure of where she actually is. She knows she’s not in her childhood home, the pin neat, old-world, much cared-for terraced house in the small town of Helensburgh, nor is she in Cairn Cottage, the home she and Archie so lovingly created together. The room, when she sees it, comes as something of a surprise.
It’s neat and impersonal. Heavy drapes mask the light from the bay window, two small armchairs by a low coffee table add a touch of informality. For the rest, two sets of drawers topped by a teak slab resemble a dressing table and a flat screen television is anchored to the wall above it. To her left, a door, slightly ajar, opens to a tiled bathroom. A hotel?
She remembers: Mull. I’m in Mull. I’ve run away.
She almost laughs at that. Yesterday, on top of the mountain, everything seemed so simple but now, with the voices of her past echoing in her head, she understands that escape is not going to be easy. There are duties, responsibilities, loyalties and because it’s in her nature and her upbringing, she’ll have to do her best to answer to them all.
She draws back the curtains to reveal the sweeping panorama of Tobermory Bay, then retreats to bed.
My nature and my upbringing.
There’s the key. For weeks now she’s been beating herself up because she doesn’t feel an immediate affinity with Joyce Henderson. Then again, she thinks, why should I? I spent the whole of my young life with Mary and Robert MacPherson. It was Mary who changed my nappies and fed me when I was a baby. It was Mary who read me stories and cuddled me and taught me to cook. And it was my father – Robert, not Jimmy Scirocco – who instilled in me the values I’ve held dear all my life.
My wee treasure. My wee giftie.
Again his voice is echoing round her skull and she can feel herself being lifted above his head, tossed screaming with delight and apprehension towards the ceiling, caught again safely. ‘Again, again!’ More screams, more laughter.
That’s it – the essence of her childhood. Being taught about adventure and danger, then being pulled back to safety and security. That’s what my parents gave me. The leaden lump that seems to have inhabited her heart for months begins to ease. She registered downstairs at Reception as Brenda Miles, needing to feel what it’s like to be Brenda.
‘You look like that actress,’ the girl on duty said. ‘You know, the one on the telly in that old soap thing. What’s her name again? Susie something. Susie ... Williams!’ she ends triumphantly.
‘I’m not Susie Williams,’ she said, truth made easy by the girl’s confusion. She signed the name, Brenda Miles, with a flourish. ‘But I do believe she might be a distant cousin.’
‘Ooh, how exciting. Imagine being related to someone on the telly.’
Does the past matter? Well, yes. Every day since she first heard the word ‘adopted’ she’s been driven to think about things she’s never considered before, about identity, personality, genetic inheritance. She’s had to think about the Miles inheritance and the Scirocco legacy.
She met Jimmy Scirocco once. He was a legend, then, back when she was in her twenties and fighting to emerge from the bit-parts and make her name as a leading actress. He had magnetism, dear heavens, the charisma of the man. Poor Joyce. A young waitress, and pretty, she must have been helpless in front of the tsunami of young Jimmy’s charm. What chance would she ever have had? Jimmy was never a man for restraint or responsibility. Has she forgiven him? Because whatever the effect his carelessness had had on her life, it had been equally traumatic for Joyce Miles.
A sleek yacht, its sails taut in a brisk breeze, scuds across the bay in front of the hotel. She knows she’ll have to talk to Joyce. Apart from anything else, she has to talk to her about Brian.
She showers and pulls her fingers through the tangled golden masses of her hair. The aches in her muscles are easy to cope with compared with what’s waiting for her.
She has to go back. However enchanting these days of freedom are, there’s no escaping the life she has back in Edinburgh. Reality is setting in and the time for action has come. She must square things with Karen and the Party. She has to give Maitland his answer about the film and press him about Rivo. Above all, she needs to start talking to Archie, because in the end her husband and her family matter to her more than anything.
She finds her mobile, but the battery is flat and she has no charger. She’ll have to pay the premium for the hotel line.
One ring, two, three, four. The call trips onto the answering machine at four. Archie must still be asleep in the studio, another late night at the music, no doubt.
So much for missing her.
She draws breath to leave a message, changes her mind.
She starts instead with Karen and gets through right away. ‘Karen? It’s Susie. Hi.’
And then it’s excitement and relief and chaos, and a discussion with Mo Alexander about the plot she’s hatching in her head, with a promise to call back after she’s talked to Joyce.
Susie has made some decisions and in one part of her life, at least, she’s regaining a semblance of control – but if she’s to become whole again, she has to put things right with Archie.
This day is as glorious as the last. She winds her way along the single-track road through the forests south of Tobermory until she reaches the small village of Dervaig. From there, it’s a small hop to Calgary Bay. She parks by the beach.
This was where she filmed with Maitland. This was where she played with fire and risked everything she had with Archie. For what?
For sheer, unbridled lust.
A light breeze ripples the waves and races through her hair, lifting the curls so that they move and glisten and echo the motion of the sea. There’s no-one in sight. Amazing that a beach this beautiful can be so empty. Transport it to France and there would be sun loungers and parasols as far as the eye can see, a beach café would be selling drinks and ice creams at exorbitant prices, children would be running into the waves, screaming with delight and men would be smoothing oil into naked, bronzed flesh of their girls. Yet here, although the day is pleasantly hot, there’s only a man and his dog and, on the road behind her, a distinctive scarlet post-van meandering on its way.
Twenty-nine years ago it all looked very different. An array of large trailers dotted up the road where the post-van had just disappeared, causing considerable inconvenience to the locals for the duration of the filming. The dunes behind the beach were a muddle of cameras and cranes, lights and sound equipment. The film crew seemed to be everywhere. And in the middle of the mayhem, she met Maitland Forbes for the first time and her world had trembled on the brink of collapse.
Susie blinks. The man is crossing the beach, his dog running gleeful rings around him, this way, now that, now back again, covering five times as much ground as his master. Such energy. It was Maitland’s dog she met first, she remembers. A wet nose on her hand, a curious muzzle in her crotch, embarrassment and laughter and her first glimpse of that notoriously handsome face. The lust had been instantaneous and mutual and completely, absolutely irresistible.