Deathly Wind

chapter two

The Wee Kingdom was almost another island of the archipelago that formed West Uist. It was a roughly star-shaped peninsula with steep sea cliffs, home to thousands of fulmars and gannets, facing the Atlantic Ocean on its north-west coastline. Gradually the terrain descended to sea level at its most westerly point, where three successive basalt stacks jutted out of the sea. On the top of the last one was the ruins of the old West Uist lighthouse and the derelict shell of the keeper’s cottage. Moving inland, the machair gave way to lush undulating hills and gullies surrounding the small central freshwater Loch Linne. To its inhabitants this oft-times wind and sandstorm swept islet was heaven on earth.

The name, the Wee Kingdom had been coined back in 1746 by the families that farmed the islet after the Jacobite laird, Donal MacLeod had granted the land in perpetuity to them and their descendants and heirs in gratitude for the sanctuary they had given the fugitive Bonnie Prince Charlie during the five days that he had stayed on the island while waiting for a French vessel to take him to safety. It had been the sighting of a heavily armed English frigate by Cameron MacNeil, the lighthouse-keeper that resulted in the change of plan to move the prince back to South Uist from whence Flora MacDonald helped to take him over the sea to Skye and thence to freedom.

An automatic beacon on the cliff tops above had rendered the old venerated lighthouse obsolete in the mid-1950s, and it remained a ruin, accumulating a veneer of guano from generations of seabirds.

There were six smallholdings on the Wee Kingdom, each lived in and worked by a person or family, who had inherited it from a forebear or patron in keeping with the original dictates of Donal MacLeod’s grant. Essentially, only six holdings were ever to be worked on the Wee Kingdom, the lease for each depending upon a peppercorn rent paid to the current laird in goods manufactured on the Wee Kingdom by the holders themselves. Effectively, the holdings pre-dated the crofting system by a full fifty years.

All six crofts were granted the right to use the natural resources of the islet of the Wee Kingdom and the surrounding waters up to a good stone’s throw off the coast, including the same area around the three stacks and the lighthouse. And well stocked it all was. In days gone by the crofters had taken the eggs and birds from the cliff-faces, just as their distant neighbours the St Kildans had done for centuries. Like them, they cut and burned peat, farmed Soay sheep and kept a few cattle, goats, ducks and geese. They grew crops of potatoes, cabbages, turnips and beetroots on the traditional feannagan, or ‘lazy beds’ that had been artificially built up in long swathes and fertilized with innumerable barrowloads of seaweed over two and a half centuries. They each operated a treadle loom, using their own wool and traditional methods to produce the famous West Uist Tweed that was bought and sold down the west coast of Scotland. And in the shallow southern waters between the causeway and the edge of an underwater shelf they collected edible seaweeds for cattle fodder and fertilizer, and farmed the rich oyster bed, using their own boats and ten-foot long oyster tongs to rake up the valuable delicacies that were in much demand on West Uist and the other Western Isles. All in all the Wee Kingdom Community was a throw-back to the old days. Although each croft was worked as a separate enterprise, they still co-operated, shared and bartered; and they produced West Uist Tweed, pâté and oysters which were marketed under the label of the Wee Kingdom Community. All profits were poured back into the community and used or shared in equal measures. It was a system that had worked successfully for two and a half centuries.

An unmetalled road that was in a continual state of disrepair had been constructed across the causeway, wide enough for a single vehicle. It was just after noon when the Padre zipped across on his Ariel Red Hunter, the classic motor cycle that was his trademark, as he followed the wake party led by Rhona McIvor’s erratically swerving minibus and a motley assortment of cars, vans and wagons. The state of Rhona’s battered minibus was testimony to her propensity to bump car fenders, roadside rocks, gates and harbour walls. Her corner-taking was renowned and most people were aware that her vision had been progressively deteriorating to the point where she should not be driving, yet no one had so far had the temerity to suggest it to her.

The cortège followed the minibus up the rough pockmarked road to Wind’s Eye, the late Gordon MacDonald’s croft, then parked up amid the pens and outhouses and disembarked. Inside the austere thatched cottage with its mixed smells of seaweed, brewing yeast, turnips and stale tobacco, Rhona had already set out a spread of sandwiches, beer and whisky.

There were about a dozen mourners standing awkwardly in the low-ceilinged main room that had served the old crofter as a sitting-room, kitchen and workroom. The old thatched cottage, which had been built on the site of one of the old medieval ‘black houses’ reflected the late crofter’s personality and had never been renovated or added to, as had most of the other Wee Kingdom dwellings. Fishing nets and rods were stacked in a corner; a large brewing bin took up space beside the plain porcelain sink and on a shelf lay a well-thumbed King James Bible, the only book in the cottage.

‘He was a religious man in his own way, Padre, Rhona said, as she lifted a tray of glasses, a whisky bottle, a jug of beer and a jug of water. As she did so, Lachlan noticed how pale she suddenly looked. He also noticed the slight intake of breath, as if she had experienced a spasm of pain.

‘I’ll take that, Rhona,’ he said, reaching for the tray, his manner brooking no argument. ‘Is it the angina again?’

A thin smile came to Rhona McIvor’s face. She nodded and pushed her thick-lensed wire-framed spectacles back on the bridge of her nose. She was a slim woman of about his own age he guessed, since it was not a statistic the remarkable Rhona ever cared to divulge. Lachlan remembered when she had taken her croft some twenty odd years before. Back then she had been a glamorous redheaded woman of the world. A freelance investigative journalist and a prize-winning cookery-book writer, she had come to the Wee Kingdom upon inheriting her holding, having made the decision to retire from the rat race forever. And that she had done, immersing herself in the crofting traditions and lifestyle of her forebears. ‘It’s a paradise, Padre,’ she had told him one Saturday morning many years ago when he called in on one of his pastoral visits to the residents of the Wee Kingdom. ‘No telephones, no deadlines, no editors breathing down your neck. You just have to put bread on the table and wool on the backs of the rich folk of Inverness.’ He remembered her peal of laughter, as she then set about shearing a sheep, a cigarette in an ebony holder clasped between her small pearly teeth. In her dungarees and Wellingtons she made an impressive, if incongruous, sight.

The Padre had looked at her concernedly, but was relieved to see the pained expression quickly disappear. She was dressed in a smart trouser suit, her once tumbling Titian locks now iron grey, pulled back in a pony-tail that exposed her intellectual brow and the long neck that had attracted so many would-be suitors over the years. It was widely believed that she had had several lovers since she came to live on West Uist, yet neither she nor they ever broadcast the fact. Discretion seemed to be a guiding principle in Rhona’s life.

‘Aye, this angina is a bugger, Padre,’ she said with a twinkle in her eye as she produced her trade-mark ebony cigarette holder from her shoulder bag and slipped a fresh cigarette into it. Lighting it with a small silver petrol lighter she blew out a stream of blue smoke. ‘These things will be the death of me, I suppose.’ Then she sighed. ‘But we all have to go some day. Gordon was only a couple of years older than me, you know?’

‘You’ll go on forever, Rhona,’ said the Padre.

‘God, I hope not,’ she returned, picking up a couple of plates of sandwiches. ‘Look, you do the drinks and I’ll feed the hoards.’ Saying which she was off, a trail of smoke following in her wake.

Lachlan turned and went over to the two McKinleys standing by the merrily burning peat fire. Father and son, they worked Sea’s Edge the most westerly croft on the Wee Kingdom. As he held the tray and muttered a few words about the funeral he let them help themselves. Unconsciously, he found himself appraising them.

Alistair McKinley was a smallish wiry man in his middle fifties with the gnarled and wrinkled skin of a man used to the elements. He was bearded with short cropped hair and an almost perpetual scowl on his face. He helped himself to a whisky from the tray while his son Kenneth McKinley took a glass of beer. In contrast to his father he was tall and broad-shouldered, his eyes blue like his dead mother’s. His expression not as severe as his father’s scowl, yet there was about him a suggestion of unease, as if he was anxious to be off somewhere. Lachlan had seen that look so often among the young islanders as they began to hanker after some of the comforts, luxuries and attractions of civilized life. He wondered if the younger McKinley would soon announce to his father that he was going to cut loose.

‘Is the croft going well?’ the Padre asked Alistair.

‘Passable, Padre. Passable.’ The older crofter flashed a look at his son. ‘It would be better if we were more focused.’

Kenneth McKinley shook his head slightly. He was twenty-two, but looked five years older. ‘Och, we’re doing fine, Father. We just need to ask—’

‘We need to be patient, Kenneth,’ Alistair said curtly. He sipped his whisky, and then turned back to Lachlan. ‘You best see to the others, Padre.’

Lachlan nodded, quite unperturbed by the other’s curtness, since he was renowned for it throughout West Uist, just as his father and grandfather before him had been. He went over to a trio, two young women and a man, standing by the door. Katrina Tulloch, the local vet was chatting with the two newest crofters, Megan Munro and Nial Urquart.

‘Anyone for a dram?’ he ventured. ‘To see old Gordon off.’

A pretty girl in her mid-twenties with finely chiselled features and spiky blond hair smiled and took a glass of water. ‘I’d love to have a beer, Padre, but I’m afraid I am still on duty. A vet is always on the go in the Hebrides, you know.’

‘Like a minister, eh Katrina?’ said Lachlan, giving her a wink. ‘I doubt if the sheep will notice the smell of beer. They never seemed to mind your uncle when he had the practice.’

‘I’ll have a glass of water as well, thank you, Padre,’ said Megan Munro who was about the same age as Katrina Tulloch, the West Uist veterinary surgeon. Unlike the other mourners Megan had come in her work clothes, a beanie hat pulled down over her auburn hair, and almost over her earlobes from which dangled large hooped ear-rings. Despite her lack of make-up and grooming she still had the looks and curves that would make many men turn their heads. Her features were only slightly marred by a certain sternness of expression that seemed fastened around her mouth. ‘I don’t approve of alcohol,’ she said firmly. ‘I don’t know why everyone thinks they should drink at funerals. I think it’s a sad occasion.’

The Padre was about to say something when Nial Urquart, her partner, chipped in. ‘That’s a bit harsh, Megan. Gordon was a neighbour and we’re all sad to see him go, especially the way he did, but it is natural to have a little party. Give him a send-off so to speak.’ He nodded at Lachlan. ‘That was a beautiful funeral service, Padre.’

Lachlan smiled, noticing that two pink patches had formed on Megan Munro’s cheeks; a mix of ire and embarrassment, he thought. Although the couple had only lived on their croft for six months he had already had enough contact with her to form an opinion on her character. She was strong-willed, passionate about animals and the environment and moderately outspoken.

‘This is a community, Nial,’ she said, arms hanging rigidly at her sides. ‘Poor old Gordon died in this cottage and no one noticed for two days – and that’s us included.’ She looked about the room melodramatically, then asked, ‘And just where are the rest of the Wee Kingdom residents? Where is Vincent Gilfillan? Where are the Morrisons? They should be here now!’

‘Vincent was at the funeral, Megan,’ said Lachlan, turning to dispense drinks to a party of mourners, consisting of various tradesmen and shopkeepers from Kyleshiffin, who had known the deceased crofter for decades.

‘But why isn’t he here now?’ he heard Megan Munro persist. ‘This is a time when a community should pull together.’

The Padre smiled to himself as he heard Nial Urquart remonstrate with her. Lachlan quite liked the young Scottish Bird Protection officer, and thought that he had taken on a challenge when he moved into Megan Munro’s holding with her. The word was, of course, that she had seduced him after one of the public protest meetings that she had organized after it had been announced that there was to be a cull of the hedgehogs on the island. Nial Urquart was there to lend strength to the argument that the hedgehogs were devastating the seabird population by stealing eggs. However she did it, whether by art, craft or sexuality Lachlan did not know, but he had moved in with her and now he helped her to run her croft.

‘Would you listen to her, the wee madam,’ Rhona whispered in his ear, as she met him back at the big table where she was picking up another salver of sandwiches. ‘She’s only been a crofter for six months and she’s telling everyone where they should be. She’s really put old Alistair’s back up with her hedgehog sanctuary and all her vegetarian propaganda.’

‘Alistair has been appointed in charge of the hedgehog culling, hasn’t he?’ Lachlan asked in a half whisper.

‘That’s right, and a fine to-do they had over it. And there’s another war brewing over the way he slaughters the livestock. And she’s already made it clear to me that she doesn’t think we should be making pâté from the duck livers.’

Lachlan frowned. ‘But he’s been doing it for years. He’s a trained butcher, isn’t he? And the Wee Kingdom pâté sells all over the islands.’

Rhona shook her head as she screwed another cigarette into her ebony holder and lit it. ‘But that doesn’t cut any ice with Megan. She thinks we should all turn vegetarian.’ She sipped a whisky. ‘I doubt that she will last long as a crofter. We never had any trouble with her great uncle, Hector Munro. He’d be turning in his grave at the way she carries on. And that poor Nial.’ She shook her head sympathetically.

‘Where is Vincent, by the way?’ Lachlan asked.

‘On his way to Benbecula. Oh it’s quite legitimate. He talked to me after the funeral. He has to be there to meet the tweed buyer. It’s normally Geordie Morrison’s job, but he’s gone off somewhere and taken the whole family with him.’

The smell of tobacco had given the Padre a craving and he pulled out his cracked old briar from his breast pocket and filled it. ‘But it’s still school time. He surely can’t have taken wee Gregor and Flora away with him?’

‘Och, Geordie is a law unto himself. Sallie Morrison has just about given up. He gets a bee in his bonnet about going off looking for whales or something, and just tells her that it’ll be educational for the children. And off they go. They’ll be back in due course.’

‘So they don’t know about Gordon’s death?’

‘No, they’ll be devastated when they find out, but we have no idea where they are just now.’

Lachlan struck a light to his pipe and picked up a glass of beer. He was about to take a sip when Megan Munro’s raised voice carried across the room and caused all heads to turn.

‘But you’re a vet, Katrina! You can’t condone the killing of innocent hedgehogs.’

‘Megan, we’ve been through all this before,’ Katrina returned, patiently. ‘The hedgehog population is getting out of control.’

‘It’s no good, Katrina,’ came Nial Urquart’s voice. ‘Megan just won’t accept that point. She doesn’t like birds; she’s just into cute little hedgehogs, hence her Mistress Prickleback Sanctuary,’

‘I might have known you’d bring it round to your precious birds,’ said Megan, heatedly.

‘It’s not that simple, Megan,’ Nial returned. ‘The golden eagles up in the Corlins may take a lot of eggs and young seabirds, but not as many eggs as the hedgehogs. In any case they are a protected species, unlike the hedgehogs. Here the hedgehogs are regarded as vermin.’

Megan was about to reply, when the McKinleys joined the discussion. ‘They are vermin right enough,’ said Alistair, his beard bristling. ‘But so are those eagles in my opinion.’

Katrina Tulloch looked aghast. ‘You can’t be serious, Alistair? The golden eagles are a national asset. We’re lucky that they are nesting on West Uist again.’

‘Not when they take our young lambs,’ cut in Kenneth McKinley.

Katrina McKinley shook her head and smiled at him. ‘I think you’ll find that’s a superstition, Kenneth. Eagles don’t take lambs.’

Kenneth McKinley stood up straight. ‘Don’t patronize me, Katrina Tulloch. You may be a vet, but I’ve lived on Sea Edge with my father all my life and I’ve seen them.’ And suddenly his eyes widened and he pointed out of the window at the majestic sight of a golden eagle in the distance flapping its way towards the Corlins. ‘If I only had a rifle now, I’d get that one.’

‘And you’d end up in jail,’ Nial Urquart returned. ‘They’re beautiful birds and as Katrina says, they are protected.’

Megan Munro had been seething for a few moments. ‘That’s everyone’s answer to everything here, isn’t it? Kill it! Shoot it! Well, you won’t touch any of the animals in my sanctuary. If you do I’ll have the police on to you straight away.’

‘The police!’ Kenneth McKinley exclaimed with a sarcastic tone. ‘If you can find a police officer on the island you’ll be lucky. They all seem to be disappearing faster than smoke around here.’

Katrina Tulloch spun to face him, her eyes registering disbelief mixed with ire. ‘Kenneth McKinley! You – you insensitive oaf!’ She snapped her glass down on a window ledge, swung her bag onto her shoulder and with an involuntary sob, ran for the door.

Lachlan was about to go after her, but Rhona stopped him with a hand on his arm. ‘Let her be, Lachlan,’ she said, as the silence that had momentarily followed Katrina Tulloch’s exit was immediately broken by a cacophony of raised voices.

‘Maybe we ought to break it up,’ the Padre whispered to Rhona. ‘It looks as if there’s going to be a civil war in the Wee Kingdom.’

But before they had time to move, there was a loud rap on the door which was shoved open to reveal Jock McArdle and his two boys. Lachlan noticed that they were all dressed as they had been that morning, except that Jock McArdle was now wearing a pair of wire-framed spectacles and a black blazer on top of his golf clothes.

‘Correction, Padre,’ said Rhona, suddenly stiffening. ‘It might be the start of World War Three. Unless I am mistaken this is the new laird.’

Jock McArdle stood nodding his head at the assembled mourners and took off his wire-framed spectacles. ‘It’s a sad day. A lassie just ran past us as we came in. Greeting her eyes out she was.’ He pulled out a handkerchief and swiftly and noisily blew his nose, then, ‘For those of you who don’t know me, and I think that is probably you all except for the Padre there, I am Jock McArdle.’ He paused for a moment, then added emphatically, ‘I am the new laird of Dunshiffin.’

Rhona was the first to say anything. ‘You will have come to pay your respects to Gordon MacDonald. That’s good of you, Laird. Would you and your sons like a drink?’

Jock McArdle stared at her in bemusement for a moment as his two minders smirked. He shook his head. ‘Oh no, these are my boys, but not my sons,’ he replied cryptically. ‘But a drink would be good, thank you. And I thought that this would be a good time to meet my tenants. A good opportunity to let you know a few of my ideas.’

The Padre being used to organizing groups introduced everyone while Rhona poured drinks.

‘We are not all here, though,’ Rhona said, as she lit another cigarette. ‘Vincent Gilfillan is doing business on behalf of the Wee Kingdom Community in Benbecula and the Morrison family have gone – off somewhere. You will be meeting them in due course I am thinking.’

‘What about Gordon MacDonald’s croft, Laird?’ Kenneth McKinley asked.

Alistair McKinley gave his son a poke in the ribs. ‘My son has pre-empted me, Mr McArdle. I was going to make an appointment to see you. We have some business I need to ask you about.’

Jock McArdle shoved his hands into his golf trousers and stood facing the old crofter. ‘Ask away. I am here now.’

Alistair McKinley cleared his throat. ‘Could my son here take on the lease for the Wind’s Eye croft? Gordon MacDonald died without issue and it is traditional that the holding—’

‘No!’ the new laird replied emphatically. ‘He cannot take it on.’

‘And why not?’ Kenneth McKinley demanded, heatedly.

‘The holding will not be re-leased.’

Rhona McIvor removed her cigarette holder from her mouth. ‘You are not serious! The Wee Kingdom Community has always had the right to pass on the holdings to family or appointed heirs.’

‘I am rescinding that right,’ the laird replied, removing a hand from his pocket and languidly taking his glass of whisky from Liam Sartori. ‘It will not be the case in the future.’

‘Are you sure that is legal, Mr McArdle?’ the Padre put in.

‘Oh it is absolutely legal, I assure you, Padre,’ McArdle returned, his eyes glinting behind his spectacles. ‘I have had my lawyers check over the original agreement. If any of the holders had ever taken the trouble to research it they would have seen that it was written up in such a way as to give the laird the right to do whatever he wanted with the land, subject to certain minor restrictions.’

‘Lairds! I knew this would happen!’ barked Kenneth McKinley. He made for the door, but found his way barred by Liam Sartori and Danny Reid. He squared up to them.

‘Out of my way! Now!’

Neither seemed inclined to move, the same challenging grin having appeared on each of the two minders’ faces.

‘Let him pass,’ McArdle barked. Then once the younger McKinley had stomped out he turned back to the assembly. ‘I will be putting up several wind installations on this croft in the next few days.’ He grinned patronizingly. ‘It will be good for the whole island, you will see it will.’

Rhona had been standing beside the Padre, her face getting whiter and whiter as anger seethed inside her. ‘We’ll not permit this. We will fight you.’

‘That is not recommended, Rhona,’ he replied smugly.

‘You will not break up the Wee Kingdom Community. If you do, it will be over my dead body.’

Liam Sartori sniggered.

Rhona saw him and made to cross the room towards him. ‘You young whelp! I’ll teach you—’

She had taken two steps then suddenly halted, clutching at her chest before collapsing on the floor.

Lachlan was by her side instantly, feeling for a pulse. His face was like thunder as he turned and rattled out the order, ‘Somebody call Dr McLelland. Now!’