Page 57 of Coming Home to Winter Island
He puts a hand on each of the dogs.
‘We said some dreadful things—’
Suddenly there’s a clatter behind me, making me jump. I turn and see the stags, up on the rise where we watch the seals, about to do battle once again. Only this time the older stag is looking tired, less up for the fight. Lachlan stands and shoos them away. The younger stag struts off, his head held high, but the older one dips his head, looking defeated. I turn back to Hector, who looks defeated too.
‘Someone needs to give in,’ says Lachlan. ‘No good will come of it. Looks like the old man is seeing sense.’
‘Pride comes before a fall,’ says Hector shakily. ‘Maybe I could learn from that.’ He looks at me. ‘It was here he told me he wanted to leave the island,’ he says, and I feel a shiver up and down my spine like someone is walking over my grave. This is it. He’s telling me what happened, and all of a sudden I’m not sure I want to hear it. I’ve loved the last few weeks getting to know this place, and Hector too. I don’t want that spoilt. I’m not ready, I think. I thought I was, but I want more time to get to know him and the island before that bubble is burst. But time is the one thing we haven’t got.
‘We came here for a walk, with the dogs. I think we had three at the time...or was it four?’ His mind wanders. The fire begins to crackle and I can feel its heat. Lachlan smiles at me reassuringly.
‘And you came here with your son, Hector. What was his name?’
‘Campbell. Campbell Hector Macquarrie,’ he says carefully.
Even hearing his name brings back the grief I felt when he died. The grief I’ve tried to shut out for many years. I can see his face so clearly. He wasn’t one of those funny, make-you-laugh dads. But he was always there for me. Unlike my mum, who was always chasing the next fun idea, the next group of friends, hoping that what she was looking for was round the corner. It still isn’t.
‘That’s right, I remember Campbell,’ says Lachlan, and I’m enjoying hearing his name again. I’d like to join in and help prompt, but there’s a huge ball still stuck in my throat.
‘There was a storm brewing. We walked down here and he told me he wanted to leave the island. I was...well, devastated.’ Hector looks up, and a single fat tear drops from his eye and splashes onto one of the Labradors at his feet. The dog doesn’t flinch. ‘I didn’t know what to do. The business was going well, really well. We were shipping out gin, far more than the whisky. Much to my father’s disgust. He thought gin was an English drink!’ He manages a deep chuckle. ‘But the whisky business was in trouble. We were going under. We had to diversify.
‘It was walking the island, taking in the sights and sounds, that gave me the idea for the gin, a drink that told the story of this place in a mouthful.’ Tears start to trickle down my cheeks. ‘A drink that told people how beautiful it was, how clean the air was, how refreshing the sea mist could be. A taste of the world that I loved, right there in a bottle.’ He looks down, as if imagining the bottle. ‘It was a hard time. The distillery was losing money. We had to make the most of what we had. Luckily, what we have here on this island is pretty special. Even in winter!’ he says, and I find myself agreeing. It really is special. And I realise I want to tell everyone about it.
One of the dogs raises its head, looks around, then puts it down again. I remember the bottle, holding it up to the light and thinking it was exactly the colour of the sky and water around the island.
‘And what happened when you suggested the gin to your dad?’ Lachlan feeds the fire and tends the seaweed on the drying rack. Then he takes the hip flask from Hector, wipes the top and offers it to me. I smile and take a swig, hoping it will shift the lump in my throat.
‘Oh, he didn’t like the idea at all! But after a bit of butting heads, he told me to try. He didn’t really have any other option. The business was going to close unless we could think of something.’
‘And it worked!’ I say.
‘Yes! It grew and grew. We took on more people from the island, and it saved the business and the house. People came to help for nothing to start with, and in the end we took them all on. It’s good to look after your workers, because they look after you.’ He smiles a watery smile, and I think of the parties they held at the house, their way of saying thank you to the community.
‘And Campbell, was he part of it?’
He nods. ‘He was...for a while.’ He looks down at the dogs, and for a moment my heart plummets and I wonder if that’s it...if he’s lost his train of thought. If transmission has been broken. I glance at Lachlan, who nods encouragingly, and I swallow to clear my throat and begin to sing, the very song that Lachlan finds it so hard to hear. Then Hector joins in with me, quietly but beautifully, and the tears fall all over again. When we finish, I reach out and put my hand over his. It doesn’t matter if he can’t remember, I tell myself. This is what matters. But he starts to talk again.
‘He’d met a woman, he told me. Well, we all knew that. He’d been with his girlfriend for a couple of years by then, a girl from a family from the other side of the island. We were waiting for an engagement. And that’s what I thought he was going to tell me. Instead he said that he’d fallen in love with a visitor to the island. He was absolutely smitten. He told me that he was leaving and going with her back to England! Not even Scotland...England!’
‘What was her name? Was it Stella?’ I manage to ask.
‘That was it! She was a singer. Here visiting a friend who had come to the island to write some music. All very glamorous, it was. We had a terrible row. Said terrible things. I told him he had to stay. There was no one else to take over the business after me. I was depending on him. The island was depending on him!’ He sniffs. ‘And he told me that he had to leave, that he was in love. More like under her spell, I told him. That was it. He stayed a few more weeks to help finish up orders for the gin, but we hardly spoke. I just hoped he’d change his mind and see sense. He had a good life here, but he wanted more.’
The flames flick-flack in the wind and I pull my coat around me.
‘But the day came. He packed up his belongings and stood waiting by the ferry. And then he told us there was to be a baby. His mother was in tears. I stupidly told him that if he went, he shouldn’t come back. He had to choose between us and leaving with Stella and the dreams she’d filled his head with. He told me they were to marry. I said it wouldn’t last the year. We haven’t heard from him since. We just...’ he looks up, ‘we locked horns and neither of us would step back. Stubborn, like the stags. I should have just let him go. Let him find it out for himself.’
‘They separated just after I was born,’ I say almost to myself. ‘I lived most of my early life with my father. After he died, I went to live full time with my mum. But it was never in the same place for very long.’
‘What’s that?’ He looks at me, confused, and I realise he hasn’t heard me.
‘Oh, er...’ I look at Lachlan.
‘She says she’s sure he’ll be back,’ Lachlan says.
‘Oh yes, I don’t doubt it.’ Hector lifts his chin a little. ‘He’ll come back soon, the baby too no doubt. My grandchild. And I’ll be here when they do, welcoming them home with open arms!’ He beams and sniffs at the same time.
I stare at his lined face. My grandfather, waiting for me with open arms, and for my father too. There was always a place for me here, but I never knew it. Both of them too stubborn to back down. But I know it now, and it’s not too late, for me at least. I just hope it’s not too late for Hector.
