I could hear Kirsty screaming at them to stop, but her protests were ignored. George lowered his face to mine. ‘Just stay away,’ he hissed, then turned and, grabbing his sister by the arm, dragged her off protesting, the other boy trailing after them and grinning at me over his shoulder.
I was still on my knees, leaning forward with my knuckles on the ground, when I felt strong hands lifting me to my feet. A fisherman with a woollen hat and a face weathered by sun and wind. ‘Are you all right, lad?’
I nodded, only embarrassed that Kirsty should have seen me humiliated like this. Nothing was hurt as much as my pride.
It must have been an hour or more before I met up with my father again. He looked at me, concerned, and saw how the knees were out of my trousers and my knuckles all skinned. ‘What happened to you, son?’
I was too ashamed to tell him. ‘I fell.’
He shook his head and laughed at me. ‘Damn, boy! I can’t take you anywhere, can I?’
*
It was just a few days later that I saw her again. There was very little sunshine that day. The wind was whipping itself up out of the south-west and bringing great rolling columns of bruised cloud in from the sea. But the air was not cold and I liked the feel of it blowing through my clothes and my hair as I worked. Hot work it was, too, moving great big lumps of stone up the hill to chip at them with my hammer so that they fit just right in the wall.
My father had taught me how to build drystone dykes almost as soon as I could walk. ‘You’ll aye be able to keep some beasts in and others out, son,’ he had said. ‘Or put a roof over your head. The fundamentals of life.’ He liked to use big words, my father. I think he learned them from the Gaelic bible that he read to us every evening and half of Sunday.
The day was waning, but there were still some hours of daylight left and I was hoping to finish the sheep fank by week’s end when my father would inspect my work and give it his approval. Or not. Though I would have been devastated if he hadn’t.
I straightened up, back stiff and muscles aching, to look down on Baile Mhanais and the shore beyond it, strips of croftland running down the hill to the sea. Which was when I heard her voice.
‘Ciamar a tha thu?’
I turned, heart suddenly pounding, to find her standing there on the crest of the hill. She wore a long dark cape over her dress, the hood pulled up to protect her hair. But still strands of it managed to break free and fly out like streamers in the wind. ‘I’m well, thank you,’ I replied in English. ‘How are you?’
Her eyes dipped towards the ground, and I could see her hands clasped in front of her, one ringing the other inside of it. ‘I came to apologise.’
‘What for?’ Although I knew fine well, but my pride wanted her to believe that I hadn’t given it a second thought.
‘My brother George.’
‘Nothing to apologise for. You’re not his keeper.’
‘No, but he thinks he’s mine. I am so ashamed of how he treated you, after what you did for me. You don’t deserve that.’
I shrugged, feigning indifference, but searching desperately for some way to change the subject. Humiliation ran deep. ‘How is it you’re not with your tutor?’
And for the first time her face broke into a smile, and she giggled as if I had said something I shouldn’t. ‘It’s a new tutor I have just now. A young man. Just in his twenties. He only arrived a few weeks ago, and I think he’s fallen hopelessly in love with me.’
I felt a jab of jealousy.
‘Anyway, I can wrap him around my little finger any time I like. So getting away from the castle is not a problem.’
I glanced down the slope towards the village, wondering if anyone down there had seen us. She didn’t miss it.
‘Ashamed to be seen with me?’
‘Of course not! It’s just …’
‘What?’
‘Well, it’s not normal, is it? The likes of me seen talking to the likes of you.’
‘Oh, stop it. You sound like George.’
‘Never!’ The comparison fired up my indignation.
‘Well, if you’re so worried about being seen with me, maybe we should meet somewhere that no one can.’
I looked at her, confused. ‘Meet?’
‘To talk. Or maybe you don’t want to talk to me.’
‘I do,’ I said a little too quickly, and I saw a smile tickle her lips. ‘Where?’
She flicked her head beyond the rise to the curve of silver sand below us on the other side of the hill. ‘You know the standing stones at the far end of the beach?’
‘Of course.’
‘There’s a wee hollow below them, almost completely sheltered from the wind, and you get a great view of the sea breaking over the rocks.’