Love and Music Will Endure (8 page)

‘Stay with me.’

So Màiri stayed until the faint breathing faded away completely.

Màiri sat motionless on a hard chair in the darkened room, the rough bark of her fingers rubbing together. The house had never seemed so empty. The wake, with all the stories and songs, had briefly conjured up life like
Na Fir Chlis
who swirled and swooped across the heavens. They disappeared as suddenly as they had come and left the sky doubly dark. How strange it was to sit here so idle. She spread out her blotched hands with their swollen joints. For so many years she had been so busy, filling every moment. That busyness had stolen her life away, as it did for people who had spent time with the Fairies. Their time with them would seem to pass in a flash but when they returned home they found that years had gone by and everyone had grown old and grey.

When she looked back at her life it seemed like a river. For the first part before she left Skye it wandered like the Snizort, winding down to the sea. Those early days spent under the
cloud-wrapped
hills, tending the crops and the animals, seemed to stretch back as far as her eye could see. Her life since she came to Inverness had drawn her along the current of the broad River Ness, its waters swelling and teeming as she spent years carrying the cargoes of husband and family.

Now the children were grown, especially Flora, a brisk and calm young woman who had come up to Inverness to scoop up the stunned and silent Effie and take her back to Glasgow. Poor Effie, she was the only one who wasn’t full grown, not much older than Morag had been when she had lost both her parents
and … no, she mustn’t let her thoughts stray near the cliff edge. Effie was not going to be an orphan like Morag. No, Màiri thought, I will recover. It was only that she felt so completely lost and abandoned. She was like the weaned calf taken from its mother too soon, wandering in circles and lowing inconsolably, hungry but refusing the bucket of milk. But like the calf she would bow her head in time, accept sustenance and live with what was left, in spite of all that had gone.

Time, it would take time. And there was her son Iain, working with time, learning to be a watchmaker. He was safe enough living at his master’s house. She didn’t have to fret about him. How strange it was that in measuring time, counting it out in small change on a clock face, men could think that they had trapped it. Time for her had stopped. She was a clock beyond repair.

Still, she must count her blessings. But it was so hard to swim against the tide of despair. She had five healthy children, all well grown. It was only her third born, the first wee Màiri, who had died. That was the only birth that had left her ill. She had been feverish for days and weak as water. It was the only time in her life when her strength had failed her and she had feared that she might die. But her fear had nested in the wrong place. She had begun to recover. That spring morning the hopeful light had woken her and she had turned to the cradle beside her bed, but she knew at once that the baby’s soul had fled her body. She held the tiny cold corpse in her arms, fragile as a dead bird. The worst of it was knowing that she had died alone in the depths of the night without a warm breast to comfort her. But no, even worse was the gnawing fear that her death could have been avoided.

When her labour was under way Isaac had hurried to fetch Anna MacDonald, the wise midwife who had helped at Mairead’s birth. Unfortunately Anna had been stricken down with a
looseness of the bowels and could not attend this time. Isaac had been terrified of going back home empty handed. He was feeling guilty, too, for this baby had been conceived when Mairead was only four months old. He was given the name of another woman, a stranger with sour breath and broken, dirty finger nails.

She it was who, like an evil fairy, had tainted Màiri and stricken the baby mortally. She shivered and drew her shawl closer around her. How it hurt to press old scars but her mind shied away from touching the new raw wound. She stood up and opened the door to gulp down the cold outside air. How she missed Isaac. Sometimes she would sleep so heavily, in a deathly trance sinking to the black depths of the ocean. Then dawn summoned her back to the surface. She would lie back with the waves gently lapping her face, looking about her like a curious seal, wondering about the day ahead. Her hand would touch the cold sheets beside her, she would remember and the net would tighten, dragging her down, her lungs bursting for breath. Desperately she would bite through the tangled ropes and burst back to the surface exhausted.

The evenings were cruel too. She would hear his slow footsteps and the rasp of the cough that had dogged him ever since he started cleaning chimneys. The acid soot had bored through mouth, eyes and skin, sucking out his strength. The bones of his broad shoulders protruded like scoured rock and he lacked the strength to fight the terrible headaches and fever that felled him. For two weeks he lay in the darkened bedroom, groaning and retching in torment. It had been a blessing when delirium released him from pain. And she was so helpless. All she could do was nurse him, damping him down with wet cloths and soothing him.

It was odd, really, how she had gained a reputation as a nurse when she didn’t believe in fussing and clucking over patients. Maybe it was that steadiness she had; people trusted her to cope.
She was often asked to lay out the dead or to sit with the gravely ill and dying. She supposed that her gift was that she could hold them safe, as she had done all those years ago with the basket of sodden laundry. Earning some money had been useful too but what was she to do now? How could she bear to nurse anyone, when all she could see was the torment in his sunken eyes and thrashing limbs? How could she help others hold on? Yet what else was there? Taking in washing paid so little and would wear out her ageing body. How could he have left her in such straits? All those fine dreams of his dissolved away.

She had dreamt of him last night, upright and sturdy, in his prime. He had called out, “Look at that rainbow. It’s so bright and I can see where it comes to earth.” By the time she turned her head to see it was already beginning to fade and soon there was nothing left at all. He had worked so hard crafting beautiful shoes and cultivating the gentry. He had even taken on that lad Ruaridh, chirpy as a wagtail, for an apprentice, but changing times overtook him. He condemned the crofters for clinging to old ways but then he did the same thing himself.

By the time Effie was born Baillie Simpson was opening his shoe factory. The machines could cut and sew the leather tirelessly. So what did Isaac do but work longer and longer hours to keep pace, barely sleeping. To no avail as his shoes still cost more to make than the factory ones. She would wake in the night and feel the cold space beside her. Shuffling downstairs she would find him slumped asleep over his lasts, like a worn out horse drooping between the shafts. Soon they were living on little more than potatoes and onions. The children’s faces were china white.

It was she who had insisted that he pocket his pride and ask for work at the factory. For so long she had acted the dutiful wife, quiet as a parrot in a covered cage, but now she squawked loudly and wouldn’t be silenced. At first things improved; he had regular
wages although he hated the loss of his freedom. Then the Baillie showed that he was as black-hearted as the landlords who kept tightening the noose on the crofters. The landowners raised the rents while the Baillie’s treachery was to shrink the wages. Isaac thought he had the answer, ‘We working men must stick together and use the law to help us.’

So he started a union and told Baillie Simpson that he must increase their wages or face a strike. Again they were back to near starvation for weeks until the Baillie agreed a small rise in the wages if the union was disbanded. So the shoemakers returned to work, but Isaac was stopped at the door and turned away. And did any of his workmates stand by him? Not them, too scared of losing their own livelihood. There is no worse betrayal than that of a friend.

Isaac pulled himself up again, ‘I shall work for myself and then no-one can turn against me,’ he used to joke when he started to clean chimneys but after that he never had the same spirit. He was clogged up with all the disappointments until he seized up altogether. He couldn’t be taken apart, cleaned and put together again like one of Iain’s clocks.

He said that he was the captain of our family’s ship, thought Màiri, but he couldn’t read the waters. I rage at him for letting our boat hit the rocks and losing the cargo of our dreams. I rage at all the men who treat us Gaels so wrongly. I shall never believe again that men should act while women keep silent. But I feel so sad for that young man I met, vivid and bright as a rainbow in a lowering sky.

For the first time Màiri allowed herself to weep at the death of Isaac and all their hopes, splintered on the rocks and scattered on the ocean.

‘Don’t just sit there lass. Go and finish the cleaning,’ scolded Màiri.

‘Why? They’re all away at the funeral, thank the Lord. Then they’ll have the cold meats. The master won’t be back for a long time and do you think he’ll notice a bit of dust?’ replied the girl, flicking a greasy strand of hair that had sneaked its way from under her cap.

Màiri shook her fist, ‘Don’t you use the Lord’s name in vain, you slovenly wretch. Show some respect for that poor bereaved gentleman.’ She glowered at the girl and stalked off into one of the bedrooms. Kate grimaced at Màiri’s broad back, held stiff with indignation.

‘Who does she think she is, ordering me around?’ she muttered.

Màiri’s shoulders sank as she closed the door behind her. She slumped into the bedside chair. If only it were Flora helping her, hardworking and capable Flora instead of this impudent young miss who mocked her behind her back. She smoothed the bedcovers distractedly. There was no imprint left behind of that poor lady who had sweated and shivered her life away. It was hard to believe that she was no more. She had been so ill and so scared, clinging to Màiri, her eyes tormented like a child awoken by night terrors.

‘Tell me I’m not going to die,’ she had pleaded.

And she was far too young to die, only a little older than her own Flora. When the Captain opened the door he would be so
alarmed by his wife’s distress that he hung back in the doorway, not knowing what to say or do. He was a frightened boy, his fine uniform only a dressing up costume. So Mrs Turner, poor soul, had no-one to talk to but Màiri. With her sparse English she struggled to understand her patient’s delirious mutterings. So she tried to comfort her as she would a sick child. She stroked her hair and sang her lullabies. The words were foreign to her but the music seemed to give her some solace, helping her slip into a restless sleep.

She had tended her charge well, mopping her with cool cloths and cleaning up the stinking fluids that gushed from her trembling body. However, the singing, cleaning and soothing had not been enough. Mrs Turner had died, and less than a year after Isaac. Màiri felt a crushing weight around her heart when he went but this woman was virtually a stranger. It wasn’t the same but she still felt a heavy sadness at the waste of a young life. She reminded herself that she had nursed Mrs Turner well and eased her passing. There was nothing to reproach herself for. She had kept her mind fixed on the task and like a soldier under fire she didn’t allow fear to unravel her. She had gained a reputation for being calm and reliable. That was why Captain Bolland had recommended her to care for his friend’s suffering wife. Not many women would nurse those who had the signs of high fever and agonising loose bowels. They were afraid of being infected themselves and carrying the contagion back to their own families. No one knew how the deadly illness spread but Màiri believed that keeping herself and her patient spotlessly clean would give them both a better chance of surviving.

‘More clean linen today, you’re as fussy as the gentry,’ that slatternly lass had mocked. Màiri had lashed her with her tongue so that now the wretched girl only muttered under her breath. This time, of course, cleanliness had not been enough to save her
patient although maybe it had protected Màiri herself. Did saving her own life matter? She was still uncertain about that. The pall of Isaac’s death still hung over her and today she felt exhausted. She had slept fitfully, waking, startled, by a dream of home.

She was walking along the familiar loops of the Snizort when the encircling hills started to tilt and lean as if they would fall inwards and bury her underneath their weight. Surely that was a warning of some impending trouble? No, she wouldn’t brood on that. Today or tomorrow she would be paid. Then it would be back to her usual duties at the Bollands’ house. She should rest now while she had the chance.

In the small hours Màiri was startled awake by a thump on the door. She called out to the girl to open up but there was no response. Grumbling, she struggled to her feet, wrapping her shawl over her nightclothes. As she unlocked the door it was flung back on its hinges by a soldier who called out to someone behind him. There was Captain Bolland looking stern and Captain Turner too, staring at her with hatred in his eyes. Before Màiri could gather her wits the first soldier pushed her aside and marched through the hallway to her room. She rushed after him, pulling at his jacket as he flung open the battered chest that held all her belongings. Shrugging her off roughly he delved inside and, triumphant as a magician, tugged out a flurry of clothes. At the top was a scarf of jade green silk. He swirled it aloft before handing it to Captain Turner. He stared at it before crumpling it against his nose and inhaling deeply. For a moment his face was screwed up in torment before he brought it back to stiff attention. Màiri gasped as she too caught the lingering traces of Harriet Turner’s scent.

The two officers exchanged a glance and nodded at the soldiers. Màiri was seized and pushed roughly towards the front door. Shouting in indignation she gestured towards her
nightclothes. Captain Turner nodded brusquely. She was released and allowed to return to her room to dress herself with clumsy, trembling fingers. What terrible mistake was this? Did they really imagine that she, a woman renowned for her honesty, would steal anything from her dead mistress, let alone her favourite scarf, the one she had clutched in her last agonies, twisting and winding it in her poor frenzied fingers? Màiri’s thoughts scattered like rooks at the crash of gunfire. Her few words of English had been scared from their roost.

‘I have done nothing wrong, I have done nothing wrong,’ she mumbled to herself in Gaelic, raising her voice as she stepped into the hall and finally delivering it in a loud volley to Captain Turner. He glared at her before turning his back. The soldiers pinioned her arms and forced her outside, hauling their stumbling captive towards the prison. The few people out and about so early stopped to stare and Màiri felt her face redden. Suddenly she heard her Pappa’s voice breathing in her ear, ‘Step out, Màiri. Remember those long strides of yours. I always said you had the quick gait of the Fairies in covering the ground. March out now.’

So she held her head high and stepped out strongly. In a daze she trudged over slabs gleaming damply, flat as gravestones marking the death of her good name. Then the cell door clanged shut on her, final as a coffin lid.

I must not carry a burden of shame that’s not mine, she thought. There is the stink of treachery here. What would my dear mother say about it? She would turn to the Bible. Betrayal. Wasn’t our Saviour betrayed for money? And Joseph, of course, I have always felt drawn to him. When I daydreamed while I was churning butter or milking the cow Mamma would say, “Behold the dreamer cometh,” mocking me as his brothers mocked Joseph. Then they sold him into slavery before he was betrayed
a second time by Potiphar’s wife. She hated him when he turned away from her lust and had him thrown into prison, just as I have been. But he wasn’t abandoned. He had the second sight and his dreams came to Pharoah’s ear. His predictions of famine were heeded and he saved the Egyptian people from disaster. Like him I will not lose hope. No doubt the minister would say that I have false pride to place myself on a level with Joseph. Me, a mere woman whose task is to obey and be silent. She stretched out on the hard bed, but sleep was impossible. Her thoughts writhed like eels in a net.

But have I not been obedient? I have bent like a sapling in the wind to the will of others. I was a dutiful wife to Isaac. Later I was a dutiful nurse, hiding the gashes in my heart while I tended that poor dying lady. But where has that duty and sacrifice led me? My spirit is as empty as my parents’ old house, slowly fallen in on itself. The door has warped and buckled, the roof sags. Soon the stones of the walls will be spat out like decayed teeth and the undergrowth will grow a green shroud over it all. Only the gable ends will stand as dumb memorials to all my hopes when I was a girl.

But dumbness is no disgrace. I’m only dumb because I haven’t the English words to proclaim my innocence. Who would want to bear false witness against me? Baillie Simpson’s son is a powerful man now, a judge. Would he remember his father’s anger about the strike? Would he want revenge so badly that he would pay someone to take Mrs Turner’s things from her closet and hide them in my chest? I find that hard to believe. Maybe he will judge my case. If so, I pray he will be a just man, like Solomon.

What about Captain Turner? He looked at me with such hatred. Has he been turned inside out with the madness of grief and blames me for his wife’s death? I don’t know who has done
this to me. I must take comfort from my clear conscience. When I am taken to court they will see that it is all a foolish, terrible mistake.

Màiri spread the thin, dirty blanket over herself and tried again to settle on the hard board. She remembered lying on a mattress freshly filled with heather as a child. When she couldn’t sleep in the long white midsummer nights Pappa would tell her to compose a poem in her mind so that it would mingle with her dreams in the magic space between the sea and the shore. But how could she make a song out of angry words alone? They would be too jagged to make a poetic shape. Surely songs were about love, joy, sadness or exile?