Chapter 22
fichead ’s a dhà / twenty-two
Cal almost missed the ferry and it took him until the evening to get back to the island.
A lorry driver picked him up and dropped him at the top of the road and he jogged towards Falabay, muttering to himself, imagining ways in which he would like to humiliate Innes and hurt him as he had been hurt.
He had woken that morning to an empty hotel room.
At first, he assumed Innes had ventured out in search of a greasy breakfast or a packet of Resolve.
He must have fallen back asleep because when he next awoke, the hotel was busy with the hum of chambermaids and he saw the money Innes had left on the dresser.
As he jogged past the MacInnes croft, he saw that Innes’s van was gone, so he slowed his pace and headed on towards home.
There were several cars parked outside the Macleod house.
The light was on in the good room and he wondered why they should have so many visitors on a Saturday night.
He went to the rain bucket and, scooping aside some dead flies, he splashed his face.
He took a mouthful and drank it, then took another, swished it between his teeth, and spat it onto the grass.
Creeping through the back door, he was surprised to find that Ella was not in the kitchen.
He took a bite out of a block of cheese that was lying on the counter and went through to the front of the house.
The door to the good room was slightly ajar and he stopped just outside and heard a voice he thought was Beady’s husband, Shockie, saying: “I know this is a big decision. Think of everything John has done for you.”
Cal peered through the crack in the door.
He caught a glimpse of the minister. The room was full of church men.
Ella was standing in the middle of the rug.
They had come to see her about the assignation, no doubt, and he sneered at his father’s calculations, calling upon seven men in suits to help guide an old woman to the light.
He watched as his grandmother loaded dishes onto the tea tray.
He stepped back and waited until she came into the hallway.
Setting the tray on the telephone table, she rubbed her temples and whispered, “Go into the kitchen. Hide the fuckin’ knives.”
Before he could respond, his father called out, “Cal, is that you? Come in here a minute.”
Ella sighed. She straightened his collar. “Mind what you say. They’re in no mood for your nonsense.” Then she ushered him towards the door.
The first person he checked for was Innes, but Innes was the only man who didn’t look up as he entered.
The fire was roaring. It was bath night so none of the men had bathed yet, and the room was sour with the fug of tea-tarred breath and working men in woollen suits.
They all wore their best tweeds and the minister wore his collar.
Only his father was in shirt sleeves, his bare forearms somehow out of place in his own home.
“Where have you been?”
The only place he might have overnighted was at his mother’s, but he wanted to avoid saying that in front of the men. “I-I’ve been getting sheep feed.”
His father narrowed his eyes and Cal realised his error. Wintering the sheep in Innes’s barn had left them with plenty of feed. “The minister’s been waiting all afternoon.”
“Not to worry,” said Reverend Rose. “It is us who are unannounced.”
Cal shook the minister’s hand and apologised for keeping him waiting.
Then he went around the room and greeted all the men.
He shook every hand, which was both entirely proper and completely unnecessary.
He was stalling for time, searching the faces, trying to decipher what had brought the men to the end of the road to interrupt his father on a Saturday evening.
As he met every eye, they all seemed to have a quiet smile for him that told him nothing.
Were they pleased to see him? Were they awaiting some comeuppance?
The men shared the same nervous energy. They were sitting stiffly upright, good boys, keen to be on their best behaviour in front of the minister.
Reverend Rose was sitting in his father’s armchair while his usurped father sat on the settee in the place Ella usually sat.
Innes’s father sat in the middle of the couch and was being fed small bites of a sandwich by Innes, who sat on his other side.
Shockie, Flash, and Doll’s father, Donnie, looked uncomfortable, too large for the chairs that had been hauled in from the shed.
Doll was sitting on the tufted footstool by the hearth like some beloved pet.
Despite the roaring fire, his handshake felt cold and clammy.
He was hardly in their favour but Cal wondered why his golden head was so cowed.
He realised that Doll was nursing a hangover, that at half past five in the evening, he had gone past the shakes and the sweats and was now concentrating on swallowing his rising bile.
He hadn’t seen Doll since the cèilidh, not since he’d been turned out for the landlady.
He felt a prickle of hurt, followed by a desire for revenge.
Ella entered. She was carrying a low footstool that was little better than sitting on the floor.
He took it from her and sat on the other side of the fire, opposite Doll.
They seemed like a pair of penitent gargoyles.
The stool was so low that his knees were almost up to his shoulders.
He extended his long legs in front of the fire but he could tell his father disapproved and so he drew his knees in and hugged them.
“I feel like I’m in trouble and I don’t know why. ”
“Have you done something wrong?” said the minister.
“We are all sinners, are we not?”
“We are,” said the minister. “We are.”
Shockie and Doll lacked a fluency in Gaelic. They understood most of what was said, but were slow, ineloquent, in forming a response. For that reason, the men kept their talk to English.
The minister set his cup on the table. “Well, we won’t keep you from your work. The rain won’t be off for long.” He swept his thinning hair over his freckled head. “What exactly is old Lockhart charging for a bag of feed these days?”
“I don’t know. We prefer Gillies. He just marks it in my father’s book.”
He could feel his father scowling at him. He put his hands into his pockets, then thinking it disrespectful, he clasped them over his knee. He stole another glimpse at Innes but Innes was looking down at the plate in his lap.
John followed the beam of Cal’s gaze. He frowned. “Mr Macdonald would like a word with you.”
As soon as his father said it, Cal stole a glance at Doll, wondering if this was somehow about the great drinking binge. But Doll had his hands in his oxters and was rocking slightly, oblivious to the conversations happening around him.
“Just a minute, John,” the minister said. “How is your mother, young John? I’m right in thinking you still see her?”
“Yes, she’s well, thank you. Business is good but stressful, I think.”
“My wife is mad for that soap of hers. Swears it’ll take the prints off your fingers, though on moral stains, it’s much less effective.
” He sat back with a little giggle. When he giggled, he did it with his mouth closed, his lips sealed tight against the sound as though he was ashamed of it.
He caught the giggle in his throat and it trembled like a chirrup, like a bird at the bottom of a well.
“You’re a good man to not let the shame you feel stop you from loving her. ”
He couldn’t help himself. “It takes no effort. She’s my mother—”
“We don’t talk about this!” said John, interrupting.
This. Not her, but this, or that, like she was a mess, or the weather, or a table.
The minister nodded. “Well, I always liked your mother. I wouldn’t like to see her burn.”
John’s gaze was leaving an indentation on the side of Cal’s face. Cal could feel the pressure, as though John’s index finger were actually pressing into him. He wanted to lift his hand and rub his temple. “No. She’s a good person.”
“Good? Careful now,” he giggled. “You sound like a Hutcheson man. You’re not a believer in inherent morality, are you?
” He reached over and tapped the table before John.
“Maybe you were right to be worried about that art school.” The minister laughed and all the men joined in a half-beat later.
He had light grey eyes in a soft, pale face.
“Looseness. Slackness. I hear that is the way of the lowlands. All types of people rubbing along together. Men and women fornicating before and alongside their marriages! Alongside. I mean, God help us.”