The House Between Tides (14 page)

Before them lay a great white sweep of beach, bordered at both ends by low, rocky headlands. Waves which had broken further out at sea came in layer upon creamy layer, their rhythmic sound
muted by the heavy burden of weed which had built up against the rocks. A lighthouse stood etched against the clear horizon, and in the distance lay the grey shapes of small islands and skerries trailing away like the fraying hems of a loosely woven shawl. She recognised the view from his painting and stood mesmerized by the dazzling light on pools along the sand. Cameron stopped beside her. “It has a pull,” he said softly, “even over three thousand miles.”

The dog settled herself in one of the hollows and began grooming, while Beatrice and Cameron sat resting against the wall of an old ruin, and Cameron scanned the shoreline through field glasses. “He's right,” he said after a while. “Look. There!” He pointed beyond the breaking waves. “No. Gone. Wait and it'll be up again. Keep watching just beyond the weed, you'll see a neck and a body low in the water.” She waited and watched. “There, now!” He handed her the glasses, and she followed the line of his pointing finger and saw a large bird with a short thick neck thrown back, its head held alert, questing.

“But it's plain and grey,” she said. “Not like the smart fellow in the dining room at all.”

“Immature. They don their fine colours to go looking for a mate, and when they find one they mate for life.” The bird dived. “They've a wild, haunting cry which echoes through the woods like a weird spirit. I stayed awake all night once north of Lake Superior, listening to a pair calling to each other. Some Indians say they're omens of death, and you can well believe it when you lie there in the dark with your hair standing on end.”

“But they don't nest here?”

“Occasionally, perhaps . . . We don't really know.”

Because Theo shot the one who might have tried, she thought as she passed the glasses back to Cameron. She studied his profile as he followed the bird's progress up the beach, thinking of the conversation in the study that morning and the quarrel the preceding
day, and decided to quiz him a little. “If you disapprove, as my husband said, I wonder if you
would
tell him if you saw one all decked out in his fine feathers.” She kept her tone light, but he made no reply. “Would you?” she persisted.

He continued watching the bird through the glasses, saying nothing, but the crooked line beside his mouth suggested he was smiling. After a moment he murmured, “Mr. Blake has a collector's instinct, madam, and a collector's—” He broke off, as if choosing his word.

“Ruthlessness?” she suggested, and waited for his reaction. He smiled briefly, scanning the ocean in the other direction, making no response. “You didn't answer my question.”

“Didn't I?” He lowered the glasses. “Mr. Blake takes the view that what happens on his estate is his own business, madam, and that includes the birds.” His voice had taken a different tone. A fulmar swooped low beside them, and he watched it lift on the breeze. Further probing began to seem unwise, so she turned back to the white sands of the bay and changed the subject.

“Tell me what else is out there now. My husband has been trying to teach me, but I fear I'm something of a disappointment to him.”

“Surely not,” he murmured, scanning the beach. “Tell me what you see, and then we can decide what it is.”

She looked out over the glinting darts of light. “I can recognise the gannets. Theo . . . Mr. Blake took me once to Bass Rock. But the gulls are impossible.”

“No more difficult than periwinkles and limpets,” he said, with his usual smile. “You just need to learn what to look for.” And so they sat there, sharing the field glasses, while he pointed out the differences which distinguished the species, and she nodded, watching his face, amused by his determination to instruct her. “And there are your tormentors, fishing this time,” he said, pointing
to the flashes of white where the terns were diving just beyond the rocks.

They left the dunes and dropped down onto the beach, sending up a cloud of shore waders which rose only to settle again a few yards further on. And he guided her past a shallow scoop in the sand where three eggs lay camouflaged among the small stones, drawing her away as the parent bird appeared from nowhere, piping stridently, feinting an attack. “Not again!” she protested, and he laughed. Then he saw that the diver too had made its way back along the beach, and they sat again, while the sun sank low over the sea.

Eventually he rose and looked over his shoulder to where they had left Bess in the dunes. “Perhaps we should turn back,” he said.

She stood and took a last look at the wide bay, regretting again that Theo had not brought her here himself, for he had often spoken of Torrann Bay. “You know, Cameron,” she said slowly, “I think if you do see a diver looking for a mate perhaps you need
not
tell my husband. If they are lucky enough to find each other out here on the edge of the world, they deserve to be left alone, don't you think?” He raised his eyebrows in mock astonishment, saying nothing. “Though you could tell me, of course,” she added lightly, dusting the sand off her skirt and looking around for her hat.

He retrieved it from behind a clump of dune grass. “And you'd say nothing?” he asked, handing it to her.

She was conscious suddenly of disloyalty, off guard after a delightful afternoon; Theo would not thank her for inciting Cameron to further rebellion. But he did not press her for an answer, turning to whistle for Bess instead, and as the dog came bounding joyously towards them, they dropped down from the dunes to rejoin the clear track back to the house.

2010, Hetty

“I hadn't realised who you were.” Hetty had been on the point of going back across the strand when her landlord appeared on the doorstep and introduced himself, following up with what felt like an accusation. “Have you everything you want?” he asked, stepping into the kitchen. “If you don't like the peat, there's coal to buy at the co-op.” The peat was fine, she told him, now she'd got the hang of it. “And there's extra bedding in the bedroom cupboard.” A thin blanket reeking of mothballs. She'd already rejected it, preferring a hot-water bottle. “I'll be back to read the meter for the electric before you go.”

“I'm here until Sunday.” At least. But if she stayed away much longer, her few remaining clients would be wondering if she had emigrated.

“Aye, well. I'll come Saturday teatime, and we'll settle up.” He looked around at her meagre supplies and seemed reluctant to leave. “I've croft land on the island, you know?” he said abruptly, like another assault. “My grandfather's.”

“Have you?”

She waited for him to continue, but he kicked at the split lino instead and looked up at the water-stained ceiling, a pugnacious bottom lip thrust forward. “I'd been thinking of doing this place up.” His red-rimmed eyes gave her a baleful look. “But a big hotel'll take the business from me.” Really? She held the look and he dropped his gaze. “And I've a closed-season license for the geese.”

He nodded curtly, leaving her mystified by that one, and she stared at the closed door in consternation. Back in London, Giles had convinced her that her proposals would be greeted with enthusiasm by the locals, bringing jobs and prosperity to the area. “You'll need professional hotel managers, of course, but there'll be jobs for chambermaids, kitchen staff, and the like, as well as groundsmen and ghillies, if they still call them that.”

But neither James Cameron nor her landlord came anywhere close to enthusiastic.

After he had gone, she set off, intending to go across to the island and visit the painter's grave, but as she approached the place where the track led down onto the strand, she found it occupied by a huddle of noisy children, jostling each other and running around in circles. Then she spotted Ùna Forbes amongst them, who raised a hand in greeting.

“Hello there!” A friendly face, thank goodness. “Are you going across? We'll go with you.” The children gathered around, staring like curious calves, and Ùna smiled. “Art and Nature, once a week, weather permitting, to suit the tides. Better than a stuffy classroom, don't you think?” She introduced her teaching assistant, a girl in her late teens, and then turned back to her flock. Whatever she said to them triggered a cheer, and they shot off as if she had drawn a cork, fanning out and zigzagging their way across the strand, her assistant following gamely. “We use one of the old outbuildings as our studio, where we can make as much mess as we like, splash paints and clay around to our hearts' content, and then just rake over the floor.” She paused, adding cheerfully, “I suppose we ought to ask your permission now, I hadn't thought of that. Do you mind?”

“Not at all.” At least, not yet.

“Good. The children love it. We collect stuff as we walk across and then make collages to sell at the school fete. You know, matchboxes with gluey shells all over them, that sort of thing.” Ùna
caught at her hair and stuffed it into her hood as she scanned the open beach ahead of her, counting heads. “And what about you? How are things coming along, after such a poor start?”

She gave a brief laugh. They hadn't improved. “James Cameron says I should pull the house down and build a cottage, and my landlord's complaining that a hotel'll ruin his business.”

Ùna gave a whoop of mirth. “
What
business? Propping up the bar? Dùghall will be just fine.”

“But James was serious about the house. He says it's past saving.” She watched her companion's face carefully.

“Aye, he said as much to us.” Ùna looked back at her. “So what will you do?”

She hesitated. “Get a second opinion, I think,” she said, realising that this might offend.

They walked on. Ùna called out to one child who was spinning in circles holding a long band of wet green seaweed and causing squeals of delighted anguish from his companions. “
Fionnlagh, sguir dheth!
” Hetty smiled and reached for her camera, then realised she had left it on the table, distracted by her landlord's sudden arrival.

Order restored, Ùna glanced at her from under her hood. “James knows his stuff, though.”

“I'm sure he does, but I sense that he's against the whole idea.” Her companion walked on, head down. Would no one explain? “He seems to think it would inflame ancient grievances.”

At that Ùna looked up. “Grievances? From before, way back?” She shook her head vigorously. “No, no, it's not that. It's more a worry about what a hotel would do to the island now, today.” She gave Hetty a lopsided smile. “I suppose no one likes change.”

“Is that all it is?”

The island woman hesitated. “When you've grown up in a place like this, it's a rather big
all.
” They walked on, the gulls wheeling
and turning above the children, who were scattered like plump shore waders across the strand. “You see, we're not used to constraints here and do our best to avoid the rules everyone else has to obey. A hotel on the island would change that.” She gestured to the children. “I taught in Glasgow for a while. Can you imagine letting children run wild like this anywhere else but here?”

Free spirits? They were an enchanting sight, but—“And when they grow up? Won't they need jobs if they want to stay here?”

“A lot will leave, of course, they always have done, but some will come back. And the place never leaves you.”

Hetty walked on, digesting this new slant on matters. Surely there was some compromise to be reached, rather than just tearing the house down. Something more constructive, more positive.

Ùna changed the subject. “Ruairidh told you about the forensic team getting turned back?”

“Yes, he did,” she replied, then added, “Did he have any more thoughts about who it might be?”