The Skylark's Secret(16)

There’s something proprietorial in the way Bridie says all this. I feel myself bristling slightly and have to remind myself that she was one of Mum’s oldest friends and has always been a lynchpin of the community. It’s only natural, and she means well. Behind my smile, my defences are well and truly up, though: the emotional brick wall that I use to keep people out.

We amble onwards, along the road that winds its way beside the loch.

‘So, Lexie, will Daisy’s daddy be joining you here soon?’

‘No,’ I reply. ‘His work keeps him in London.’ At least I can say that in all honesty.

‘Och, that’s a shame. You’ll be missing him.’ Her eyes dart again to the third finger of my left hand, which is very obviously lacking any sign of a ring – engagement, wedding or otherwise.

I decide I might as well come clean. At least then it’ll put an end to Bridie’s questions. ‘Actually, we’re not together any more. He turned out not to be the paternal type. We split up before Daisy was even born.’

We walk on for about ten paces while Bridie digests this. I’m bracing myself for more questions, but in the end all she says is, ‘Well, I’m sorry to hear that. It’s hard bringing up a wee one alone. Of course, poor Flora knew that as well as anyone.’

Seizing this welcome tangent, I divert Bridie with a well-placed question of my own.

‘I’ve been wondering about that,’ I say. ‘You must remember the war years, how my parents met. Everything that happened. Mum never spoke about it all that much. I know my dad was in the navy and he died in the war, but that’s about it. Apart from his photo on the mantelpiece and his name on the Mackenzie-Grants’ stone in the graveyard, there’s not much I know about him. Could you tell me, Bridie?’

For once, she’s silent. Maybe I’m imagining it, but it seems to me that something in her usually open expression closes in on itself. It’s fleeting – a wary look in her eyes as she inadvertently glances towards the hills above the loch. Something about it reminds me of the look in my mum’s eyes when I’d ask her questions about my dad.

Then she pulls herself together. ‘Of course, darlin’. You bring Daisy over to mine sometime and we’ll have a cup of tea and a chat. I’ll be happy to tell you about Alec and Flora. They really were the golden couple. Well, here’s the jetty – you’ll be taking Daisy to look at the boats, I expect. I must be getting on.’

I stand and watch as she hurries on towards the shop. She turns to look back, giving us a wave, before she ducks through the door.

Is it my imagination, or do I get the impression that when I asked her to tell me about my parents, she was choosing her words very carefully? That caution – and the momentary silence that preceded it – are enough to pique my interest. Is there something there, something that concerns my own past?

Because, for once and most unusually, it seems to me that there’s something that Bridie Macdonald is NOT saying.





Flora, 1939




The ebb and flow of the navy’s ships in and out of Loch Ewe continued as winter drew in. Along the shore, wisps of peat smoke rose from the chimneys of the little white croft houses, the soft, familiar scent mingling with the sharper smell of fuel oil as tankers replenished the grey hulks on the water.

It was a clear, still morning, and although the December sun lay low in the sky it had managed to flood the loch with light for a few precious hours. Flora was making the most of the good weather, at work in the patch of garden alongside Keeper’s Cottage. Her fork plunged easily into the dark soil. It had been worked for generations, enriched with seaweed from the shore and rotted manure from the stables up at the big house, and it provided them with a good supply of vegetables under Flora’s careful stewardship. Digging up potatoes, she transferred them, still covered in a powdering of black loam, into a bucket. The tatties rattled against the tin sides of the pail, quickly filling it. Then she heaved it to the store behind the house and emptied it into the larger wooden crates where the harvest would keep through the winter. Ruaridh had suggested that they turn the storehouse into an Anderson shelter, as some of the other crofters had done in case of air raids, but her father had just shrugged and said it didn’t seem worth the fuss. Looking out across the water on that calm winter’s day, Flora tended to agree with him. The war still seemed very far away. And, after all, the secrecy afforded by Loch Ewe’s secluded position was the very reason for its use as a safe harbour.

Coming to the end of the heaped row, she straightened up, hands in the small of her back, and pushed a tendril of hair from her eyes with her wrist. Two small boys were walking along the road and she waved to them as they drew nearer.

‘Hello there! Stuart and David, isn’t it? How are you getting on?’

They wore clothes that were a size or two too large, jumper sleeves rolled up and short trousers hanging below their knees over thick woollen socks. Moira Carmichael must have kitted them out in her sons’ outgrown clothing. Despite the poor fit, the things were of good quality and looked a good deal warmer than the few clothes the boys had brought with them from Glasgow.

Two pairs of round blue-grey eyes regarded her solemnly. ‘Hello, miss,’ said Stuart, the elder of the two. ‘We’ve to go for a walk and get out of Mrs Carmichael’s hair.’