The Visitors (4 page)

I studied her. Mum had me when she was very young, the age I am now. I’d seen the photos of her pregnant, and she was like a girl. She was now in her mid-thirties, and that left seventeen years between me and Jamie. He was pudgy and smiley and thought everything in the world was great. And it probably was, for him. Mum said I was an awful baby. Jamie had proved a nice surprise. I felt more like his babysitter than his sister, most of the time, but it was good to have him in the family. Even with the late nights and early mornings, he’d made things easier in the house. Jamie was something we all had in common, a splash of blood shared amongst us.

Splashing resounded from the bathroom, and Jamie shrieked with delight. I lowered my voice.

‘Ronny’s really worried about Dougie.’

She softened. ‘He’s a crooked penny, is Doug. He’ll turn up.’

‘Aye, I know. I hope so. I’ll get tea served up.’

We settled down to eat. Anders plonked a bottle of whisky on the table, and Ronny fetched cold beers from the fridge.

‘If I’d known you were coming, I’d have cooked more.’

‘I am a growing lad,’ said Anders.

‘Aye, outwards,’ I muttered. He threw a pea at me.

‘Come along, children,’ warned my mother.

‘Sorry, Mum.’

‘Sorry, Cath.’

‘Hey,’ I said. ‘Did you know about the people on Dog Rock?’

‘No.’

‘There’s folk moving into the cottage.’

‘You’re kidding?’

‘Really?’

‘Aye. We saw them moving in.’

‘So what were they like?’

‘There’s two of them. A father and a daughter. He looks about late-forties, I guess, and she’s about my age. They turned up in a van, and shipped all their stuff over in a blow-up dinghy. They had all their stuff in those boxes you get in offices.’

‘I thought that place would stay empty until the day it fell over.’

‘It’s a mess.’

‘Would have been a good place for a still,’ lamented Anders.

‘They’ve been at it already. Chucking out the old stuff.’

Mum stood up from the kitchen table and crossed to the window. She peered into the evening blues.

‘There’s a light on,’ she confirmed. ‘And a fire.’

‘Tell you what, though. He’s really good-looking,’ I said.

‘Flora! And with Richard barely gone,’ said Ronny, feigning shock.

‘That’s really funny, Teenwolf. No, I was thinking more about Andrea Simpson or that Campbell woman hanging round.’

That gave them pause for thought.

‘Lord. Imagine having Janet Campbell as a neighbour.’

‘Come on. We don’t know this new lot at all. They say better the devil you know.’

‘Aye, well, they never knew Janet Campbell.’

‘I knew Janet Campbell,’ said Anders, smugly.

‘None of that in front of the kids, Tommasson.’

‘Sorry, Cath.’

‘Dog Cottage. Fancy that.’

‘It’ll have barely cost them pennies,’ said Ronny. ‘Still, it’ll be nice if the girl’s your age, Flo.’

I rolled my eyes. ‘We’re never back to this again?’

‘No attitude, Miss,’ said Mum. ‘You can share the bus to school.’

‘But what if I hate her?’

‘Now, whyever would you hate her?’

‘I’m just saying. There’s no guarantee I’ll like her. She might be a terrible person.’

‘I suppose so,’ said Ronny, then gestured helplessly at the kitchen window. ‘But look around, Flo. Who else is there?’

‘I’ve learned something today. I’d sooner be alone than stuck with someone because they’re all that’s left. No more easy options for me.’

‘Only teenagers actually want to be alone. Trust me,’ said Mum.

‘I’m eighteen next year,’ I protested.

‘That’s exactly what I’m talking about.’

‘Come on, Mum. I’ve always looked after myself.’

‘You’re very independent, love. And you know your own mind. We just wish you’d spend more time with folk your own age.’

‘Like I have a choice,’ I said. ‘Back to school tomorrow.’

Mum and Ronny exchanged glances.

‘Maybe you’ll try a little harder with other kids this year,’ said Ronny.

‘Aye, and maybe they’ll try harder with me,’ I glowered, and hunkered down into my tea.

I didn’t want any friends my own age. With Richard gone, the last thing I needed was something else chaining me to the island.

I didn’t speak much for the rest of the meal. My folks and Anders talked a wee while about what might bring people to Bancree, but couldn’t find that many reasons. They could only think of reasons to leave.

‘Hey,’ said Ronny, softly. ‘You heard about Dougie?’

‘I heard,’ said Anders. ‘The police called me.’

‘What on earth for?’ asked Mum.

‘Dougie was staying at my house sometimes.’

‘When he had nowhere else to go,’ chimed in Ronny.

‘My place is empty so much. It is not good to be always without a fire in the hearth. It was important to have him there. A house needs a life inside it. And now he is gone. I wanted to see this for myself.’

‘That’s really why you’re back, isn’t it?’ said Ronny.

‘Yes, my friend. They have looked for him, but I must look also.’

‘I’ll help.’

‘Then we will look together. But we must watch the game also. And we must drink to absent friends.’

‘Not here you don’t,’ yelped Mum. ‘Last time you two started howling at four in the morning, and the baby’s only just gone down.’

‘It was a full moon.’

‘It was awful. Go on. Bugger off to the Bull, and come in quietly. And you, Ronald McLoughlin, mind you’re working tomorrow.’

Ronny and Anders grinned across the table, then headed for the door.

Mum went to read her book, and I did the dishes. The water in the sink ran brown with peat, and my hands disappeared into the murk at the bottom of the basin.

I couldn’t stop thinking about Richard and his escape. It was like fumbling at a splinter, but only ever pushing it deeper. I imagined myself on the bus south, the train, my head resting against the window, feeling engines rumble through the glass. New people, new places. Freedom.

The splinter ground in deeper.

It should have been me.

I went to my room.

I felt restless, both wired and exhausted by my afternoon nap. I was uneasy about the new girl, and Richard had left me sad, and angry. Reading didn’t help. I was sick of my book, and irritated by everything I knew. The ceiling was too low, the lamplight too invasive. I was sick of my room, sick of my clothes. I wanted something different.

The air felt thick and strange, the evening edgy and unsettled. Part of it was the emptiness of the last night before school, but there was something else, too, something almost tangible. Dusk was growing into night, dark and ribbed with cloud. Scanning through radio channels, I found a rock ’n’ roll show on Radio 2. The damp spots on the carpet were drying out already. I wandered to the window and tried to relax, losing myself in sunset’s shadows.

About now, Richard would be stretched out in an armchair, watching a film or playing cards with his folks. I let my mind wander to his house, his room – his bed – but couldn’t place him. There was only laughter in downstairs rooms, and cold sheets on an empty mattress. It was sad to think of how much I might miss him. It was sadder still to think that I might not.

The Atlantic shifted black against a band of pale horizon.
A slice of moon shimmered on the crests of scattered waves, turning the sea indigo dark in contrast. There were lights in the windows of Dog Cottage. Being nosy, I trained my binoculars on the islet. Magnified so many times, I caught the tiny windows glowing in the dark. I watched for a while, hating myself for spying, but couldn’t see anyone. Bored, I scanned idly to one side, sweeping from Dog Rock out towards the sea, then jerked with shock. I doubled back, training the binoculars again on the islet. There was something in the inky sea. Peering, eyes screwed tight, I scrutinised the waves splashing at Dog Rock. There was definitely something there. A dark shape, black against the blue, bobbing in the surf. Or was it only waves, slopping on the shore? Ducks, feeding late into dusk? The shapes bobbed further from the islet. Not ducks. It was something swimming. It must have been an otter, or a seal, but I’d never seen them out so late. Little wonder when they’re so hard to spot, dark on dark on dark.

The clouds drew back, allowing more of the thin moonlight to filter down. I gasped and jammed the binoculars into my sockets. For a fraction of second, the shape in the water was a head. The focus wheel slipped and the image blurred into total blackness. I hastily refocused and looked again, desperate to find the shape in the water. There was nothing but the sea. The shape had gone.

A head. A face. The old man of the sea.

I’d thought it was a head. A human head. I quickly panned across to look at the cottage, but a curtain had been pulled across the window, leaving a dark and muted orange. The strangers were inside, and now the dark sea swelled empty. There was nothing bobbing in the water.

I must have been wrong. It was ridiculous. The moonlight was too dim to see anything for sure, and no one would swim
so late at night. It would be stupidly cold and lethally daft. It must have been a seal.

I watched through the window until the last rind of light on the horizon dimmed to black. Waves breathed on the shore. Mad gulls made catcalls in the night, and I looked out onto a magnified nothing.

I didn’t sleep well. My dreams were fish, flicking between night and water and Richard and creaking pines and kelp, rivers of kelp, seaweed falling from the sky in endless towers. It drifted down to touch me, and curled around my wrists. It wrapped around my ankles and began to lift me up.

The alarm jolted me awake. I lay in bed for a few welcome moments, looking at the ceiling. I could hear Mum changing the baby in the bathroom, the two of them cooing at each other. It all felt very normal.

The first day back at school. My first day of sixth year, the first day of my last year. Because Richard and I had always commuted together from the island to the mainland, I’d spent most of my time at school hanging out with him and his mates in the year above. They’d been pleasant enough, but now they were all gone. I hadn’t any friends of my own. The next year seemed a bleak prospect. But it was only a year. One year, then escape. Freedom. I still wasn’t entirely certain what my freedom looked like. I hadn’t found any job I wanted to do. All I knew for certain was that involved somewhere away from Bancree.

I showered and dressed.

Sixth year meant I didn’t need to wear uniform any more. No more regulation skirts or stupid blazers. I wore jeans and sneakers, a vest top and a jumper and a jacket. I sat on the
edge of my bed to apply mascara, flexing my toes in the trainers. It didn’t feel much like going to school. It felt good. A new start. A step up in life.

Anders was passed out in the living room, making a mountain of blankets on the sofa. I hadn’t heard them come in, so it couldn’t have been a very heavy session.

I wolfed a banana and a cup of tea and stuffed my rucksack with books, notebooks, purse, make-up and phone. Mum came through with Jamie perched on one hip.

‘Morning, Mum. Is Ronny still asleep? Can I get a lift with him?’

‘He made it to bed at a respectable two o’clock, so no. He’s long gone.’

‘Two o’clock? Lightweights.’

‘I think he’s warming up. They want a big night with the football. You’ll have to catch the bus.’

Anders appeared in the doorway, blankets gathered around his shoulders.

‘Morning, Cath. Morning, Flora.’

‘How you doing, trooper?’

‘Many things in life become easier as you age. But hangovers, not so much.’

‘You look like you’ve been dug up,’ I said. ‘Tea?’

‘You and your tea. Bring me coffee, child. Coffee.’

I made him some coffee, then yelled my goodbyes and waited for the post bus on the road outside.

The weather had turned overnight. There was no rain yet, but it felt like the end of summer, cooler and blustery, the surf suddenly up and pushing at the shore. Clouds scudded low over the Bancree Sound in blooms of white on grey. On the hills behind Grogport, rising away from the sea, plantation trees breathed in slow waves, and my dreams returned in the creaking of the pines. It was a great day for
driving to Glasgow, Bristol, the world. Good weather for a jailbreak.

There was movement up the road. A man appeared, approaching Grogport from the north. From this far away, I guessed it was some hiker, a tourist out of season. He walked in swift, confident strides, devouring the distance. But as the man moved closer, I found myself shrinking. It was the new neighbour. Despite the coolness in the air, he wore shorts and a T-shirt, a canvas kit bag slung across one shoulder. He faced straight ahead as he crossed the bridge into the village. Even yards away, he radiated a bad mood. I couldn’t help but stare, drinking him in. He ignored me completely, not even looking up as he approached my house. He had almost walked past by the time I thought to greet him.

‘Hello,’ I faltered, then spoke louder. ‘Hi!’

He stopped, momentarily, and stared at me, scrutinising. He nodded, once, and continued down the road. Mouth still open, I watched him walk away. He took a piece of my stomach with him. Like his daughter, there was something deeply sensual in his face, but something strange as well, something cold. He had very dark eyes. He was stunning. His hair was wet, soaked into twists and curls.

A thought occurred to me, ringing like a chime. If he was walking home, at this time in the morning – then where had he come from?

I was still lost in contemplation when the minibus arrived. It rolled to a clunking pause outside my house, shunting my daydream to one side. The driver peered out.

‘Morning, Flo,’ beamed Bev, ‘all set for another year?’

‘Just about,’ I said.

All Bev did every day was drive the post bus, delivering both packets and people. She collected the mail from the first ferry, then drove the minibus round the island four or five
times. It took an hour or so to run the perimeter road, delivering parcels and letters and giving lifts to anyone who needed them. This included the school run for the island’s dozen children. Bev loved her job. It was my idea of slow death.