Sun Dance (45 page)

Outside on the croft we’d left the sunshine of an early spring which each year would have lifted a winter heart. That day walking up to the house, the land seemed cheerless. Perhaps it was just in ourselves but the fields were desolate. We were not alone in our bereavement, the land too sensed the loss. The love of a man for the soil of a lifetime’s care must lie on the land, and who could prove it would not know their time of parting. In a holism which binds a man to the land, who should divide the quick and the dead?

Ella sat at the head of an open coffin, sunlight faint through the curtains rested on its plain wood and varnish. In those first brief minutes as we stood quietly beside Eachan’s remains, the days, months, the years, each sadness of the past, a prisoner of happy times was released and they came to me in the immense ocean’s cycle of grief. I placed a hand on Ella’s shoulder. She rose without a word and I gathered both women to me. Their sorrows mingled. No tears; they would be for the days of privacy and memory.

As in life, so in death, Eachan’s presence filled the room. I put my hands on the edge of the coffin, looked at those of a man who had become father and mentor, the man whose vigour of body and mind had set the pattern of my new life, saved me from mental wreckage, had given me the wisdom by which I’d come to understand the values that underpin human existence. I watched his face grow young and he walked the croft, and the fields, fresh and green were filled with lambs. I reached down and touched his cold forehead.

Eilidh beside me put an arm round my waist. Long, long was her gaze before, from a pocket, she took the golden disc and placed it in the hand which had known sun and storm alike, and bending she kissed his forehead and a tear glistened on his cheek. Ella stood quietly, “I knew you would know and come over,” was all she said. The living and the dead were one.

I left the women together and went out to the byre. Neck chains jingled as I pushed open the door and lying cows got to their feet. Heads turned and big round eyes stared at a stranger. The cobbles had been swept and the dung cleaned out, I guessed by Eilidh’s brother Iain. Loosing each chain, I let the cows out for water and taking the worn pitch fork, filled their hakes with the meadow hay of a summer past. In a little I heard them back at the door and one by one in they trouped. Reaching round each neck I retied the chains and gave each a scratch behind their shoulder. A line of heads lifted and long tongues pulled down their evening feed. The sweet scent of sun dried grass was in the air and the healthy smell of cattle on my hands.

I sat awhile on the milking stool looking up at the cobwebs on the rafters, dusty with age. Eachan was of the unhurried days, a fading lifestyle lost to the age of haste.

We hadn’t asked how he’d died, Ella would tell in her own good time. That night in the kitchen after supper, three at the table instead of four, Ella, strong minded and composed, began to talk, “He went out about ten o’clock at the height of that gale to check the boat. Well, well I waited an hour and he wasn’t coming. I took a torch and went down to the jetty, even in the shelter of the jetty it was wild.” Her voice fell to a whisper, “he was sitting in the stern of Hilda, I shouted down and shone the torch, but he was,” she looked up as though seeing Eachan coming in from the byre, “…he was dead.” I took Ella’s hand and she smiled though the mist.

The long silence was broken by a knock at the door and a “Hello”. Iain and his wife were the first of callers, friends and neighbours. Each went through to the room for a few moments of thought. A crowded kitchen had Eilidh busy with tea and bannocks whilst I dispensed ‘refreshments’ to the men. Muted conversations gave way to reminiscences which soon became more cheerful, crofting days and escapades. It was late, late, before the house emptied.

By candle flame we sat the night away through in the room. Ella spoke of their young days together, the children always about the croft and now scattered to a’ the airts as were so many island families. They would come home in the summer, there’d be a family reunion. In her soft musical voice she spoke as if Eachan were still alive and indeed in her heart, so he remained, “I know he died thinking of the poor Hilda girl,” was the last thing she said, and with her own thoughts she went quietly to bed.

Early morning sunlight flitted into the room. I watched it stray from face to face, the man in the coffin to the dark framed print of his grandfather above the mantelpiece of an empty grate.

Eachan’s fiddle lay on the piano.

‘From the ranks of death the minstrel boy was calling’.

Lime trees in full leaf shaded the white pine coffee table at which Sir Joshua Goldberg sat awaiting the Private Secretary to the US Chief of Staff. The constant cooing of turtle doves somewhere up in the top branches annoyed him intensely. What an abominable racket! Rather smart in a new cream suit and his old Etonian tie, Sir Joshua squinted apprehensively into the branches above his head. Too late, a splat hit the table at his elbow. He clapped his hands furiously, a pair of doves glided over to another tree. Glancing at his Rolex… he should not be kept waiting. Seething inwardly Sir Joshua vowed these official types would one day learn their place.

Flecks of pink and white cherry blossom drifted onto the verdant lawns. A small flock of bullfinches flitted from tree to tree feeding on the young buds, their glossy black heads and richly pink breasts alive with April sunshine. Destructive little blighters, thought Sir Joshua Goldberg as his eye caught the flash of colour. A pair of pied wagtails, flicking their long tails and gathering insects darted about the grass. Across from him on an artificial lake of reed beds and overhanging willow, brightly coloured ducks were bowing and squabbling. A wretched grey squirrel came hopping over the lawn. Blasted tree rats, they could bite. Goldberg heaved himself to his feet. These damned Pentagon gardens are a veritable haven for wild life, almost a zoo he reflected, ridiculous, very distracting. This had to be a hush-hush meeting, nothing written or recorded, no obvious top brass meeting, but surely somewhere inside the building would be more civilised.

A gangling figure crossed the garden towards him. The loping step and loose arms hanging just wide of his hips reminded Nuen's Chairman of the sheriff in a third rate Western movie. How preposterous he thought, anyway he instinctively disliked thin men. Ignoring the proffered hand, Sir Joshua remained seated, “I trust you realise I'm a very busy man,” was his greeting. The Private Secretary, sour faced and snake eyed, ignored the comment, “Well, Mr. Goldberg, I guess you're in a hurry, I won't detain you, it just happens that my boss wants to know two things. When will the weapons grade material for our Indian Ocean base be delivered and secondly, have you started work on the UK deep waste depository? We need results, pronto.”

“The name is Sir Joshua Goldberg” he began coolly. Knowing full well that a programme for dealing with the Iranian problem had reached the drawing board stage in the military HQ at their back, his firm intention was not to answer any questions directly but to extract substantially more profit from their current agreement, “The material will be delivered for flying abroad in due course but I have to inform you that as a result of certain technical difficulties, which you wouldn't understand, the arrangement at this stage registers a shortfall of something in the region of five million dollars, as you will see from these figures. I would point out this is contingency funding and covered by clause five of our minute of agreement and my company requires this further reimbursement before proceeding.”

“O.K. I'll pass that on.” He picked up the papers which Goldberg tossed over the table, “What about the waste dump? You've managed to bypass Westminster? You realise the dump is needed for other than the spent stuff, it's gotta cover for the storage of weapons grade material. We need that facility outside of the US, and real private,” and he drawled the words, “my friend.”

Goldberg held up his hand, the impudence of the man. “My dealings with Westminster are not your concern. A provision for weapons grade storage is already agreed between Nuen and yourselves and will be incorporated in our building programme. Please convey to your Chief that what is not yet agreed is the cost of this extra facility. A substantial monetary advancement will be required prior to commencing any work on the repository, or dump, as seems to be your preferred description. It so happens my surveyors are on site as we speak and construction of the repository will begin as soon as your financial response is forthcoming.”

Nuen's Chairman rose to leave, “Those papers I gave you are carefully worded to cover my Company's position and in the interests of confidentiality, for both parties, please ensure that once assimilated, they will be made permanently unavailable to anyone. By which I mean destroyed. Now if you'll excuse me, I'm exceptionally busy; kindly arrange these additional payments for both operations be made to my preferred account and at your earliest convenience.”

The American official hovered over Sir Joshua, a foot taller and brittle darting eyes, “Jest one small point, Mr. Goldberg- your past chairman at Nuen, Mr. Anderson.”

Sir Joshua, on the point of stepping past the official, stopped short, why Andrew Anderson? His heart beat quickened. Had the method of his take over of the Nuen Company been leaked? Surely only finance trader Nicky Fellows knew. Insider dealing? If that surfaced it would take somebody at the highest possible level to launder it clean. He swallowed hard and said nothing.

The Private Secretary took a long pause, allowing Goldberg to dangle in acute discomfort. Finally in a deadly casual tone, “You sure pulled off a nice one at Nuen, didn't you just, but we ain't caring too much about that jest right now.” More harshly he enquired, “How much is Mr. Anderson aware of the re-routing of weapons grade material, the stuff you and I know about?”

Fighting for composure Sir Joshua spoke huffily, “Whatever his past dealings may have been, as far as I'm concerned he knows nothing of our present arrangements. Now, if you don't mind, I have another meeting in twenty minutes”

“One moment Mr. Goldberg,” the American's sharper tone checked Sir Joshua's hurried steps, “I should tell you our men have kept track on your Mr. Anderson. Incidentally, by our reckoning, he became your ex-chairman pretty darn fast,” and waving the papers he'd been given, “We'll maybe look over your latest bill.” “Please do,” was all a flustered Goldberg could say before in a nonchalant manner, the man continued, “Hope ya don't mind me a- telling you, this guy's on a yacht, holed up on a Hebridean island.”

Goldberg froze, “Hebridean island?” The man's tone softened, “Yeah, an island. He used to be a good friend of ours and we don't like to abandon a real friend, now do we?” and in mock innocence, “He wouldn't be the sort of guy to have a loose mouth by any chance, now would he?”

Sir Joshua flapped a hand in dismissal, his face a shade paler than his smart cream suite. He began to hurry across the lawns. At his elbow, a soft drawl, “If Mr. Anderson's mouth just did happen to get a little too loose, sure the boys might have to arrange a small operation to tighten it,” and with a quiet laugh, “or any other mouth for that matter.”

Goldberg's chest tightened, he quickened his pace.

In the freshness of a lambing morning over the Sound they sailed, relations, friends, island folk brought together in the closeness of a funeral. To each there would be a last journey, undreamt by the young, imagined by the old. We’d roped Eachan‘s coffin on the foredeck of a fishing boat as the sun rose upon a spring day peerless in its unblemished clarity. Near and far the islands of the Atlantic emerged from the sea to an intensity of light so pure that, in its transparency, I saw they too in the fullness of time were fragile.

Quietly we moored beside the Sandray jetty. A green tarpaulin covered the remains. Eachan would have approved, the more so it took six men with slings to hoist him ashore. In that gentle rocking the reflections of a varnished boat scattered on the still waters of an ebbing tide.

I stood at the jetty’s edge. Little by little, each ruffle of water left wet and glistening razor shells, cockle shells broken and empty, bronzed scallops, the fruits of an ocean awaiting the grinding of tide upon tide. Slowly on a bed of mica sand they would dry in the sun, lose their lustre, be buried by the tumult of a storm to become the limestone richness of life out of death.

And the people of the islands came. Children at hand, the old with stick, their long line wound away from the jetty. A piper tramping the rough ground led the trackless journey out to the headland. Turn about the men folk took their place at the carrying poles. The cry of the birdlife was about the cliffs, echo of the pipes, plaintiff and calling.

Ella walked unbowed, the dignity of love and respect. Behind his remains, her steps made slowly to the headland which had claimed their daughter; was to be the resting place of her husband. Within the sorrow of parting lay an awakening to the fullness of summer. The abounding bird life that nested the headland sailing against the brightness, the seals and their cubs whose curiosity followed our arrival, they too lived its pattern. The day needed no pomp, a simple funeral, the island’s peace granted her solace. She understood.