A Changing Land(69)
Maggie walked the hill of her home these past twenty-five years, stroking the stone wall that breasted the hill. It was a pleasing aspect, for Robert was a fine crofter. Not one stone wall was in disrepair, not one shingle loose on the roof of their house. Their few sheds were weatherproof, their new potatoes were soft and buttery and there was always a neatly stacked heap of peat for the fire. The cow always gave milk and Maggie still churned their own butter, though their neighbours laughed at her domestic tendencies when a trip to Tongue could supply most of what Maggie grew or made. If she were to ask herself if she were happy, her answer would be yes. Although she also comprehended that she knew no better. How did one judge a life if there was nothing to compare it with?
At the top of the hill Maggie paused by a cairn and collected her breath. Her forty-seven years were now presenting themselves in the form of swollen ankles and a stiffness that did not abide with the passing of winter. Even her breath seemed shallow now, as if her lungs were shrinking with age. Shielding her eyes from the sun, Maggie looked back across their loch. It was a fine view. The water stretched out like a wide yawn to disappear at the foot of another hill. Summer brought a shimmer of heather to the landscape and as the breeze picked up, the landscape shimmied with the vibrancy of a young girl at her first ceilidh. It was a far different atmosphere to the memory of her childhood.
The view from the hill of Maggie’s youth took in a wedge of flat country and the village of Tongue. Usually she would reach this hilltop after scrambling up its grassy sides, her calves burning with use. It would be then that the dreadful sameness of her life stared back at her. The thousands of rocks which some cataclysmic event had spewed up from the ruins of the earth; the stagnant pools of water lying dank across the flat country, the B&Bs that signalled the yoke of the English and the measly four acres most crofters were expected to survive on.
Maggie would breathe then, a great lungful of unpolluted air, and cast her eyes across to the adjoining hills at the cairns topping each successive high point, until the furthest mound of rocks looked like an unlit candle on a poorly made cake. The urge to run this route of ancient markers would be so great that Maggie scarcely acknowledged she had made the decision to be punished again by her weary mother. Her feet would take her to one and then two cairns before her brain bargained with her pumping heart to return home.
Was it so long ago? Maggie asked, stooping to place a fallen rock on the crumbling pile. With a sigh she turned downhill. There were still the breakfast things to be tidied, a pair of Robert’s socks to be darned and the fish man would be calling. They would be having haddock tonight, probably breaded, for being a Friday Robert would call at the local for a few ales and be wanting a bit of a fry up for his dinner.
She looked at her watch, wondering at the time in Australia. Hoping her boy was with friends; wondering if the getting of the money would be as easy as everyone expected. Jim’s silence from the far side of the world set Maggie’s memory in motion and her ulcer to flare. Inside the house she poured herself a long glass of milk, her hand only briefly hesitating before pouring a good measure of whisky into the glass. She gulped the liquid down, feeling the fresh cow’s milk glaze her tongue and gums with a fatty coating. She hoped Jim would return home soon. With a sob Maggie lent on the kitchen bench, her hands cradling her forehead. The waiting was proving too much for her.
How had all of this happened when she had only wanted a pair of running shoes?
The night dripped with the heat of a long day lingering. There was a closeness in the air; a tight constriction existing beyond the mantle of discomfort left by the sun’s blaze. Boxer felt the constraining pressure of the unknown in the droplets of sweat beading his neck, arms and chest. The moisture tracked a path to pool at his stomach, while the wadded blanket cushioning his head from the dirt beneath grew wet from the water seeping along the wrinkled coils of his neck. His hands swiped irritably at the sheen covering the dark skin of his body. The spirits wanted to make their presence known, regardless of Boxer’s inclination.
Leaving the woman by his side, he crawled awkwardly from the bark humpy. His knees cursed at the clash of bone against bone, nonetheless he managed to stand, his aged slowness masked by the night sky. As his muscles warmed, Boxer’s feet traced the dirt track. He walked nimbly, skirting the edge of the camp, weaving through trees and grass tufts until the creek snaked its scent into his nostrils. When his cracked soles finally sank into the cool, sandy mud he sniffed in recognition. Here, in the dank still of the creek, he breathed in the cloying odour of stagnant water, oozing mud and rotting vegetation. Layered within hovered the remnants of campfires, and the tangy fish scent of mussels. His splayed toes clenched at the sinking softness. The water ebbed at his ankles. If he walked to the left, Boxer knew his feet would be ripped by the mound of opened shells that supplemented the white’s food the tribe was given monthly. To the right, further up around the second bend in the creek, was the women’s sacred place. Directly opposite across the water was what he’d come for.