Chapter 25
Chapter 25
W hy am I flying this zoo express?” Erno had remarked in horror, and the ornithologists had been talked down once again from attempting to treat the chicken themselves. It was obviously too much like an exciting version of a medical drama for them, a scene in which a beautiful stewardess asked, “Do we have a doctor (for chickens) on board?” but Gertie managed to get them all onto the plane on time. It all went all right, apart from Senga muttering about Roddy getting his stupid seat up the front, and everyone coming up to pet the dog and talk about what a beautiful dog it was, which only seemed to rub salt in her wound.
Morag dropped the others off first on Cairn and Larbh, where they unloaded the ram, which made the dog sit up and start making a noise, but it wasn’t for long, and finally she got them turned round, traveling south, into the sun, heading back for one last stop at Inchborn.
She got off first at Inchborn. In her career, she had seen the sunrise in Singapore, glancing off the hundreds of huge ships lining up to take port; swept round the towers of Hong Kong; crossed pink deserts and seen the cooking fires of the wandering people below. She had flown over Table Mountain; banked so Paris looked up on its side, the Eiffel Tower a prong in the air. She had flown into Chicago when its evening sun was setting, lighting up the skyscrapers.
Nothing, but nothing made her happier than the swooping landing at the beach, coming down low—if the water was calm, you could see the little Cessna’s reflection on the water; if it wasn’t, which it normally wasn’t, you could see the ripples and shimmies and ever-changing directions of the water. Either way, she loved it—checking the headwinds carefully and lining up the plane. Where you would expect a runway was only a long flat beach, heading directly into the dunes.
Morag had had to make an emergency landing here the previous summer, but her training had kicked in; nobody had died, and all sorts of things had happened so she didn’t feel the least bit nervous about it. This was her plane, this was her turn; this was, as far as she was concerned, the happiest place in the world to her, because Gregor lived there.
He came down the dunes toward them, his face beaming.
Morag got up herself, to open the door that had the steps inside it. She secured them to the ground, then helped Senga out with the chicken.
Gregor dashed up to her.
“Is it very unprofessional to kiss a pilot while she’s wearing her hat?” he said. “I can never remember.”
Gregor cared about her career but was often hazy on detail.
“You can,” said Morag. “But not in front of your Auntie Senga.”
“Oh yes.”
“She put me at the back of the plane,” said Senga crossly.
“Not me!” said Morag.
“There’s only ten rows,” said Gregor.
“They put a dog in business class and they put me at the back.”
“We don’t have a business class, Senga.”
Gregor wasn’t listening to either of them, he was picking up the cage and gently opening the latch, making a low noise, which Morag thought might be clucking.
“Come on then, girl, what’s up with you?”
“Well, the bloody sex plane certainly messed with her nerves,” said Senga, incomprehensibly, but Gregor had turned and was heading back to the house already.
On the scrubbed wooden table was set a plate of fresh scones that smelled heavenly, and the kettle was whistling on the old stove.
“Och you’re a good lad,” said Senga, eyes lighting up.
A ray of watery sunlight came through the huge old single-paned kitchen window and Morag suddenly felt a real yearning to stay awhile. Except she couldn’t—she had mail to take down to the post office before it shut; she had two passengers sitting there to be dropped off. Fortunately they were tourists who thought making stopovers on the beach was so cool and they were busy taking selfies. Rather tourists than the wind farm executives who thought they were terribly busy and important and thought Morag’s plane was basically their private corporate jet because they all knew Calum, and treated it accordingly.
Gregor was now examining the chicken on a dishcloth on the table, very carefully, his long fingers keeping the creature calm (and only someone who has ever tried to calm a chicken will know just what an exceptional skill this is). Morag was almost faint with longing watching him. Behind her, Barbara the goat wandered through the open kitchen door and nudged Morag from behind. They watched him work together, a truce of sorts.
“Ah,” said Gregor. “Here it is.”
Carefully, he grabbed what Morag belatedly realized were her expensive eyebrow tweezers, and carefully pulled a fat blood-filled tick from the chicken’s abdomen.
“This can’t have been making you feel very good,” he said, stroking the chook carefully. “Morag, can you hold her?”
“No,” said Morag.
“I’ll take her,” said Senga, as Gregor carefully disposed of the wriggling tick, counting its legs carefully to make sure he had it all, outside far from the other birds, and then went and washed his hands.
“You’re not going to squish it?” said Morag.
Gregor shrugged. “It’s a living thing. It’s not its fault.”
“What if it jumps onto something else? What if it crawls up your butt while you’re sleeping?”
Gregor shrugged. “That’s why I put it so far away. Outside butt-crawling distance.”
“Maybe that’s what everyone thinks, before they find a tick up their butt .”
Gregor smiled as he dried his hands.
“And sterilize my tweezers, thank you.”
He grinned again. “Oh hey,” he said suddenly. “I have to tell you something.”
“What?” said Morag. “Is it about something else gross my tweezers have been doing because if it is I’m not sure I want to know.”
“Oh no, it’s something Calum said.”
“Calum Frost?” said Morag, surprised.
She glanced at Senga, who immediately stood up and said, “Ooh I wouldn’t want to interfere in work news,” and took the chicken out into the garden to try and make it more of a holiday.
“When were you talking to Calum Frost?”
“He popped by.”
“You do not pop by to Inchborn.”
“Oh well, you know. You do if you’re taking helicopter lessons.”
Morag rolled her eyes. “He doesn’t land it himself though, right?”
“Not everyone has to be a pilot to be a good person,” said Gregor mildly, pushing his glasses up his nose.
“Huh,” said Morag, who had been raised in a flying family and therefore although she theoretically realized that, it didn’t quite get in her bones.
“How often does he come here?”
“Well, he likes my cooking.”
“I get that.”
“And just hanging out.”
Morag sighed. “They are all the things I like. You’re not having sex with him?”
“We play a lot of chess,” said Gregor.
Morag pouted. “What?”
“Well, chess can get sexy.”
“Not necessarily.”
“It did that time we played it.”
Both of them thought back to those winter nights, the stove crackling, the darkness covering the island like a blanket. Gregor glanced at his watch but it was impossible. She’d be back on Friday, he told himself sternly. And his aunt was outside.
“Well anyway,” said Gregor quickly, clearing his throat. “I’m not sure how to tell you this but... apparently he’s been... he got a... message. From your staff.”
“What kind of message?” said Morag, frowning. “And who?”
“Uhm,” said Gregor. “There was an email. And a scarf, I think. He’s a bit weirded out by it all.”
“What are you talking about?”
“Your new...”
Gregor had only met Gertie very briefly and couldn’t remember her name.
“Gertie? No,” said Morag. And then, immediately: “Hang on, how come you live on an island by yourself in the middle of the North Sea and you know more gossip than I do?!”
She frowned.
“Hang on, she’s been bothering Calum?”
“Apparently. She knitted him something.”
“Is that all? She’s a good knitter.”
Said like that, it sounded rather sweet.
Suddenly she had a terrible thought.
“Hang on... it can’t be. I wonder if that was who she was... oh Lord.”
“What?”
“She was waiting for someone at the ceilidh. Then she stormed off home. And she’s been kind of a bit cross ever since. Oh. Surely not.”
“Well anyway,” said Gregor. “I’m just passing on...”
“Thanks,” said Morag, kissing him, and shaking her head. “God, I slightly miss the days when all I had to do at work was fly the plane. Do you think he’s going to want me to sack her?”
Gregor shrugged. “I don’t know. But he’ll probably want her to stop. Mind you he did say he was used to it.”
“Oh for God’s sake,” said Morag. “He’s so cocky and annoying.”
“... but not from people who’ve accessed his private email address on the airline’s system.”
“Argh,” said Morag. “This is my ‘flatmate.’ Mind you, kudos to her for setting her cap at the millionaire. Okay.”
Senga appeared at the door, chicken-free, looking expectant.
“She’s going to be all right,” she said. “Now, Gregor, you’re going to make me dinner, aren’t you? And we can have a good long chat.”
She shot Morag a look as if Morag would not be coming off well at all in that chat.
“I’d better get back. I’ll see you on Friday.”
It was so hard, kissing him, smelling him, and having to leave.
The evening light was soft with mist coming in from the sea, but they were going to beat it, she knew, as she clambered into the cockpit and suggested Erno take first chair, which he grumbled about, so she could concentrate on what Gregor had told her. It was so strange, she had only been impressed just that morning by how well Gertie seemed to be doing. Please let it not be all for nothing.