The yacht curled into the bay at a clip, men scurrying aboard like ants and hauling down the billowing sails. Flora, standing on the ridge of the burn, watched as they collapsed like a sigh, the flying boat gliding to a graceful halt. Her finger twitched against her skirt, smooth skin against rough drugget, a nervous tic that almost always went unseen. As now.
Beside her, Effie, Mhairi, Molly and Lorna were watching the excitement too. It was just past the first week in September, and by anyone’s reckoning they should have been cut off to all but the whaling boats by now; but a rare spell of fine weather had kept the seas flat enough that Donald McKinnon and Mhairi had risked a last-ditch passage across to Harris, returning only this morning. Donald, like the other men, fearing another hard winter and not liking the terms offered by the factor, had undertaken the journey to trade surplus feathers, tweeds and fulmar oil with a farmer there for tools. Mhairi had been obliged to accompany him to meet the man’s son, with a view to possibly marrying him next year, for her own father needed to be relieved of the burden of providing for nine children. It was a fate awaiting all the girls of marriageable age, Flora knew – if they couldn’t settle upon a husband themselves, it would be decided for them one way or another.
Mhairi had been an unwilling passenger but to everyone’s surprise, the introduction had proved to be auspicious and she had disembarked only an hour ago with bright eyes and a new wildness in her spirit. Alexander McLennan, her intended, was handsome and fair, enterprising and clever, she said, and the girls had gathered her over to the burn where, hiding below its deep banks, they crowded round for details. Flora thought there was something different about her friend – a febrile, darting energy that couldn’t quite land – but before she could probe, the dogs had begun barking on the beach. They were the islanders’ alert to approaching incomers and often congregated at the water’s edge several minutes before a ship or boat nosed around the headland; they were never wrong.
But no one could have anticipated this sight. Tourist boats and the schooners of the rich regularly dropped anchor in the bay in the months between early May and the end of August, but something of this calibre was unprecedented.
‘I believe they call it a J-class,’ Lorna said in amazement, still holding the sodden dressings she had been washing in the burn. ‘It’s a racing yacht.’
Lorna knew of such things, for she was a St Kildan by choice, not by birth, and she had spent the first twenty-four years of her life in Sutherland. Besides her medical training, she had a wider world view that the islanders – even the men – trusted and respected, and as such she enjoyed a prominent role in island life, helping Mhairi’s father Ian with his postmaster duties too.
‘Perhaps it’s your sweetheart McLennan chasing after you, Mhairi,’ Effie joshed.
‘He owns a bicycle, not a boat,’ Mhairi mumbled. Two minutes earlier, owning the bicycle would have counted as a boast among a population with only some cows, a bull and several hundred sheep, none of which were reliable for transport – but things had already moved on, it seemed, and something of Mhairi’s sparkle was lost.
‘Shamrock . . . Shamrock V,’ Lorna murmured, reading the letters stamped along the back of the shiny navy-blue hull.
A J-class racing yacht. It belonged to a world they simply couldn’t fathom and as the huddle of young women slowly began to walk back to the village, Poppit trotting along the wall beside them, their eyes never lifted off it. The men were already on the beach and heaving the smack back into the water, woollen trousers rolled up to their knees and still wet from the earlier sortie as they jumped into their usual positions and began to row.
It was a morning of arrivals, it seemed.
‘Who is it, do we know?’ Lorna asked Mad Annie and Ma Peg, who were sitting on their stools outside Ma Peg’s house and knitting at a ferocious speed. Their stitch rate always went up when something exciting was happening, their attention wholly on the object of interest, needles bobbing up and down in a frenzy.
‘An eejit,’ Mad Annie said dismissively, making clear her disdain of the New World vessel.
They passed Effie’s cottage further down, where Robert was sitting on the wall. ‘Do you know, Father?’ Effie asked him. He was too lame to get himself in and out of the smack these days but he was smoking his pipe and, like the women, watching and tutting.
‘None is scheduled to come by,’ he muttered, looking concerned. The islanders knew from bitter experience that the capricious sea could take as quickly as it could give.
Effie indicated with a nod that she would hang back to stay with him, Poppit immediately settling herself down on the wall and waiting as well. She was Effie’s shadow, companion and comfort, and Flora sometimes felt she would call the dog her best friend too.
They continued down past the other houses, the women and children gathered in doorways as they all watched the visitors being rowed back to shore. Even from a distance, the sharp lines of their felted homburg hats were distinct from the soft tweed berets of the island men.
It was no surprise to anyone that the reverend and his wife had come out to greet the visitors. When the whalers and fishermen came ashore, the reverend would happily accede to their superstition that it was bad luck to be greeted by a man of the cloth, but when visitors were clearly rich, no time was given to ‘such fallacy’.
Flora’s fingers twitched against her skirt again as the smack approached the beach and she felt an agitation rising through her that belied the stillness of her bones. She watched as two men jumped out and the boat was pulled ashore. One of the figures needed assistance with disembarking but the other leapt onto the stones with a dynamic vigour, and she felt her heart quicken. Immediately she quashed the thought, knowing it was impossible – he would be leaving for the Faroes any day, if he hadn’t left already. But hope persisted even beyond logic.
It had been a month since James and the Rushtons left, and the days following had been long, lonely – and quiet. She had received a letter from him just a few days ago – and hastily wrote back by return – but he had offered no account of the journey home with his hosts, and she was left to imagine the tension aboard as both Edward and Sophia learned they had been betrayed at a single stroke. It must have been unbearable for everyone. Had the men fought again? Had Sophia wept? Had her parents cursed Flora’s name? Not knowing was the worst thing.
James had reassured her, as they were roughly parted in the dawn light, that all was fair in love and that in time, the Rushtons would see this was all for the best; but in the nights that had followed since, as she waited for the passing fishing ships and their sporadic mail bags, Flora wondered if their disruptive – inauspicious – start would bring its own fate.
With the coming change in seasons and his own remote location as well as hers, she knew communication would only become more difficult and she still feared that with winter’s protracted silence would come frustration, boredom, apathy and eventually, surely, abandonment. She had known him for only a day, after all, and it had hardly been love at first sight.
And yet . . . Our souls are not strangers . . .
The reverend stepped forward, a hand already outstretched in greeting as if to make the point that there was civilization even in this remote outpost in the middle of the North Atlantic. There was a pause as the figures, silhouetted against a sparkling sea, stood talking for a moment before a name suddenly carried on the wind.
‘Lipton! Lipton!’
Beside her, Mhairi revived at the name as Flora felt herself sag – hope officially suspended – and the villagers began pouring forth from their homes. Sir Thomas Lipton had been their saviour eighteen years earlier, sending over emergency supplies of potatoes, meat, flour, sugar and tea – naturally – when word had lilted to the mainland that the islanders, during the brutal winter of 1911, were almost starving to death.
Flora’s fingers curled inwards, her nails pressing sharply into her palms as she and Effie and Molly found themselves enveloped by the throng, everyone – including Mad Annie, who was never normally inclined to express happy delight – rushing past to greet their benefactor.
‘Shall we meet him, then, Flossie?’ Mhairi asked her, looping an arm through hers and leading her down towards the crowd now gathered outside Old Fin’s house.
The islanders bustled and jostled around the visitors excitedly, everyone talking and wanting to get a look at the man who had saved them. The concept of millionairehood was alien to a community with a barter economy but as Flora tipped her head to catch a glimpse, something of his power emanated from the short, stooped, white-haired man.
‘Ah yes, Miss MacQueen, Miss MacQueen,’ he said, spotting her and somehow identifying her. He stepped forward, the crowd parting so that he took her hand in his own. ‘I was told I would recognize you on sight.’
‘Sir Thomas, sir . . .’ Flora stammered, confused as he pressed the back of her hand lightly to his lips.
‘I have with me someone who wanted very much to see you.’
What? She felt her heart quake again as he stepped aside and his companion, whose face had been obscured by his hat, looked up. Hazel eyes met hers once more.
‘James!’ she cried, her hands flying to her mouth. ‘What are y’ doing here?’ Could it really be true? Her fantastical dreams were reality? Questions and confusion overran her thoughts. What about his expedition?
‘I have something for you,’ he said simply. ‘Something you said you would like.’
She watched, open-mouthed, as he retrieved a smooth golden barrel from his coat pocket. Her hands reached for it but she didn’t dare to touch it in case this was a dream that, like a bubble, would burst on contact. ‘Is it . . . is it . . .?’
‘Yes. I wanted you to have it before the winter comes in.’ He smiled, seeming charmed by her shock. ‘. . . Take it.’
His fingers brushed hers as she took it – their first touch since that fateful night – and she looked back at him, their eyes alive. Was this truly happening? ‘You came all this way to bring me a lipstick?’
He had asked her in his letter what she most desired from the mainland and she had said a red lipstick; to her, it embodied the glamour of the world to which he belonged, and she wanted him to think her naturally sophisticated in spite of her humble origins. But in truth, the only thing she had wanted from over there was him.
‘My dear, he all but hijacked us in his determination to bring it to you,’ Sir Thomas laughed as she pulled off the lid to reveal a bright, waxy vermilion stub. ‘Shamrock had just been sailed up to me in Glasgow from Pendennis, that I might give her a run before she’s sailed over to Newport for the next America’s Cup. Mr Callaghan, however, knowing of my long-held attachment to your people, convinced me a quick dilly over here would satisfy us both.’
The islanders huddled forwards at the sight of the lipstick, for the like had never been seen here before – but the minister recoiled at the sight of it as if it was the red devil himself.
‘It is a fashion from the mainland, Reverend,’ James said quickly. ‘But I appreciate it may not be suitable for island life. It is simply intended as an aide-mémoire – something to remember me by.’ His eyes met hers again and Flora felt the presence of her thirty-five neighbours drop away. As if she could forget him! He was the one who belonged to a world of countless pretty girls – he could meet a new face every day if he liked – whereas she was only ever surrounded by the rough boys of her childhood.
‘Did you bring us some more brew, Sir T?’ Ma Peg asked, less interested in love tokens than sustenance.
‘Naturally, Ma Peg. Along with some other provisions I thought you might enjoy. I hope you don’t mind the presumption?’
‘Och, no, we’ll indulge you!’ Peg quipped with an almost flirtatious laugh. ‘Shall we boil the pot, then? Tea and a piece?’
‘That would be splendid, though I’m afraid we can dedicate no more than an hour ashore.’
An hour? No! Flora felt a spasm of fear twitch through her. James had been back for only a few minutes, but already the thought of letting him leave again was unbearable. She looked at him with open longing in her eyes. There was so much to say . . . The memory of their single day and night was all she had had to sustain her for the past month and she would lie in bed at night, re-remembering the sequence of events from the new perspective he had given her. Chasing her while giving no impression of there being a chase, his eyes silently following her every move from the moment she had set foot in the yacht’s cabin, while Edward had paraded her as his own.
The girls had interrogated her, of course, on her return, and only Effie had seemed content with the men’s reversal of fortunes. Both Mhairi and Molly had fallen – like her – for Edward’s intense charm offensive, but from the start Effie had preferred James, with his self-effacing modesty and reserve. It had struck Flora as deeply ironic that the one girl determined never to fall in love had proved to be the best judge of men.
‘My crew are on a strict timetable for the Atlantic crossing,’ Sir Thomas was explaining. ‘My captain was quite displeased when I asked him to push back for a day to oblige our little outing.’
‘How long did it take y’ to cross?’ Old Fin asked, his voice fading as the elders began to head for Ma Peg’s cottage.
To Flora’s relief, James made no move to follow. Rather, his gaze seemed to deepen in intensity, like a setting sun about to pat the sea, and they communicated without words all the longing that had been held in abeyance these past few weeks. He was a man well able to disguise his yearning, she knew that about him now; but standing here, nothing was hidden, and all the longing of that last night on deck was still there. He wanted her just as much as she wanted him.
He dragged his eyes off her. ‘Mr MacQueen, I wondered if we might talk together, you and I?’
Flora’s mouth parted in silent exclamation – what about getting to know one another through their letters first? – though a ripple went through the remaining islanders. There was a pause before her father nodded.
‘I’ll boil the pot too, then,’ her mother said in a strained voice. ‘Flora, y’ can help me.’
Flora glanced over at Mhairi as her mother caught her by the wrist and began pulling her away. She widened her eyes and bit her lip, as if to convey her shock and excitement, but Mhairi didn’t appear to see. She was standing motionless, staring as the men walked past the side of the house towards the grassy area at the back, headed by the stone dyke that encircled the village. It was always quiet up there.
‘Did y’ know he was coming?’ Flora’s mother asked in a low voice as they walked back to the cottage.
‘No, Ma. It’s as much a surprise to me as anyone.’
‘You’re sure? You had a letter from him just a few days ago.’
‘He made no mention of coming over. I’d have talked him out of it if he had. It’s an unnecessary risk just to bring me this.’ Her grip tightened around the red lipstick.
‘But he didn’t come just to bring you that.’ Her mother looked over at her and reached out a hand to smooth her hair. There was a nervous energy to her movements. ‘You look feral again. There’s dirt on your cheek and your hem’s torn. I’ve been telling you to mend it these three mornings past.’ Flora stood patiently as her mother began rubbing the dirt off her skin, fussing and tutting all the while. ‘I’d no’ be surprised if he thinks the better of it on seeing you.’
‘Really?’ Flora looked at her mother with alarm.
Christina MacQueen softened, cupping her daughter’s cheek with a palm. ‘No, pet. But there’s many a gentleman likes the look o’ you. Are you truly sweet on him too?’
‘I am, Ma.’ There had been no hiding her delight when the letter had come and she had told her mother some of what had passed between them – his request for time to get to know one another, for her to wait for him to return from his expedition. To not marry anyone else.
‘But you scarce know him,’ her mother cautioned.
‘And yet somehow, I do,’ Flora said, feeling flooded with emotion. ‘We’re new to one another but there’s something . . . ancient between us too.’ She had been so afraid she would lose him to time, but now she felt her future whispering to her on the breeze.
‘Och, they’re coming back,’ her mother exclaimed, looking alarmed as she glimpsed a sight of the two men passing by the window. She licked her palms and smoothed her own hair down. ‘They wasted no time, then! Straighten up, lass. Look smart while I greet him.’
Flora fell still as her mother walked over to the door. She felt her entire life had been building towards this moment and she watched for their shadows to fall across the threshold.
She heard her father’s voice first, stray words drifting through like feathers.
‘. . . Callaghan . . . talked . . . a proposal for us . . .’
Flora bit her lip, scarcely able to believe this was real. A lipstick, and now—
‘Archie?’ Her mother’s voice was shrill and alarmed. ‘He wants to do what?’
‘This is a wretched idea!’ Flora implored her mother, panting, as she hurried to keep up.
The men had gone ahead, striding out with swinging arms, James’s coat left draped over her father’s fireside chair. As ever, the clock was ticking: time was against them.
‘I think it’s a smashing idea,’ Effie said, practically skipping beside her as they skirted the hem of the beach.
‘Your father said he insisted,’ Christina replied grimly, looking as worried as Flora felt.
She glanced across the sea-moss slope towards the village; word had spread quickly, and the younger villagers and anyone able to move at speed were streaming down the grass allotments to join them and watch the spectacle.
They passed the bluffs where Flora and Edward had picnicked, but all Flora saw now was where James’s rope had dangled down the cliffs as he had abseiled in, a smile on his face and sabotage on his mind. She remembered his interest in the Lovers’ Stone even then, as Edward had lain, languid, in the grass. Had he been planning this all that time?
They arrived at the spot a few minutes behind the men. Flora’s father was pointing out to James the idiosyncrasies known by the island men – the loose stone on the approach there, the uneven seam on the rock, the squally winds that screamed up the sheer cliff to the right.
James was rolling up his shirtsleeves. He had left his shoes and socks by her front door, and she was grateful that he’d had the foresight to acclimatize his feet for this venture by walking here barefoot. She stared again at his strong ankles, which had told her so much about him even when she hadn’t asked, and she saw the dark hairs on his legs – a glimpse of a body still unknown to her. They hadn’t even kissed . . .
She looked up to find him watching her. He smiled broadly and she rushed over to him.
‘You don’t have to do this.’
‘I do,’ he said firmly, tucking a stray tendril of hair behind her ear. ‘It’s important that I show your father I’m worthy.’
‘But you are!’
‘No, he only knows I’m rich, and those are two very different things. Besides, I want everyone to understand how serious I am about wanting this – wanting you.’
She stared at him, blinking rapidly. There were enough people here that she didn’t want to make a scene – but she wanted to make a scene. Anything to stop him. ‘Please don’t fall,’ she whispered.
‘I have no intention of it.’
‘But it’s so high. Your sort aren’t used to it.’
He gave a low chuckle. ‘Don’t worry, I’ve been balance training since I left here.’
She was amazed. ‘You have?’
‘Walking a slack line.’ He bent down and whispered into her ear. ‘I refuse to die when I’m on the very cusp of making you mine.’
His words made her blush, and he winked as he drew back again. How could she ever have thought him a man obsessed with fossils? His blood ran hot.
‘Shall we do this, then?’ he asked, turning to her father.
Flora watched, the small crowd cheering as the two men shook hands. Effie and Molly came over – Mhairi was resting after her arduous journey this morning. They each took one of her hands as James stepped onto the first rock. It wobbled, just as he’d been warned it would, and his arms shot out for balance.
‘Tch, look at them,’ Effie muttered under her breath. Flora followed her gaze to see Mhairi’s big brothers, Angus and Fin, watching James closely with dark expressions. ‘They look like they want him to fall.’
‘Don’t even joke about such things,’ Molly hissed. ‘They just don’t appreciate outsiders coming in and taking the eligible girls for themselves.’
‘They know full well I’d die an old maid over becoming a wife to either of them,’ Flora muttered.
‘Aye, but it’s the principle they object to,’ Molly reasoned. She was always reasonable.
James stepped forward slowly onto the initial slab. It projected upwards for a short distance before dropping by a foot to a lower slab wedged beneath it. This one rose sharply at forty-five degrees, for ten feet or so.
He walked carefully, keeping his chin up and his arms outstretched.
‘This is madness,’ Flora whispered, pressing her fingers against her friends’ hands and feeling her panic rise. ‘He doesn’t have to do this.’
The girls squeezed back nervously too.
‘It’s not like he’ll ever have to swing on a rope to provide for me,’ she whispered, ever more desperate. Training or not, he might plunge to his death at any moment. ‘We all know perfectly well I’ll have a more abundant life with him on the mainland than I could ever expect here. He doesn’t need to be agile or good on the ropes. This makes no sense!’ Her voice was rising.
‘Aye, but it’s the principle of the thing,’ Molly repeated, never taking her eyes off him. ‘And principles matter.’
James had reached the pinnacle of the slab now and was standing on the narrow ledge that created a snub platform at its very edge. Flora couldn’t breathe as she saw him lift his right leg several times, just an inch or two from the surface as if testing, before finally lifting it up and forward. She gave a small gasp as part of his body protruded into space above the sheer drop. Most people wouldn’t even dare to sit on the Stone, much less endure this. Much less willingly.
She stared at his left ankle, willing it to remain rigid and stable as it wobbled on the granite slab; she felt her heart leap several times, nerves getting the better of her, but slowly, so slowly, he hunched over slightly, reaching with both hands to clasp the right foot in a fist. He was a tall man, with long limbs adding to the risks. If he should lose his balance now, with his weight straining forward, it would be a straightforward tumble into the depths.
Everyone felt the tension hum at this, the most dangerous point, as – with James locked into position – her father began to count, his voice low, the rhythm steady.
Flora stared at James’s ankle, the only thing keeping him safe as he satisfied this stupid, reckless principle.
‘Eight . . . nine . . . ten,’ her father counted, nodding approvingly as James stood affixed as a tree, his shirt blowing in the breeze, the sun on his hair. ‘You may release the hold, Mr Callaghan. The trial has been completed.’
Carefully, James released his foot and pulled it back, stepping down quickly so that both feet were planted on the rock again. A cheer went up from the villagers – even the MacKinnon brothers, somewhat begrudgingly – as he turned and staggered quickly down the steep slab. The men slapped his back as he made his way off the Stone and jumped onto the grassy path. Her father shook hands with him and gave a nod. ‘We’ll make a St Kildan of you yet, Mr Callaghan.’
‘Thank you, sir. I should be honoured,’ James grinned. ‘Well, that’s the easy bit done,’ he said, drawing astonished laughs as he stood with his hands on his hips, looking back at the Stone with a satisfied sigh. ‘Now for the hard part . . .’
‘Aye,’ the men agreed, their voices a low grumble.
‘But are you quite sure about this, Mr Callaghan?’ her father asked. ‘A wild goose never laid a tame egg.’
There was laughter in her father’s voice and James’s eyes were bright as he looked over at her, an unstoppable smile upon his mouth. ‘I’ve never been more certain, sir.’
He walked over, not wasting a moment as he dropped to his knee and pulled a box from his trouser pocket. Inside twinkled a gold ring with three sapphires. It was more treasure than the islanders had ever seen and yet, if he should have fallen, it would have been lost to the depths with him.
‘Flora Rose MacQueen,’ he said, his eyes fastened upon hers. ‘I know it’s fast, but when love strikes, a man doesn’t need to buy time. And . . . well, frankly, the seas are against me.’ He shrugged. ‘Will you do me the honour of consenting to be my wife?’
She looked back at him consideringly, even while her heart somersaulted in her chest. It wouldn’t do to be a foregone conclusion.
‘. . . Can I think about it?’ she asked with an arch look, jutting her shapely hip provocatively.
‘Ha-hey!’ the men laughed.
‘’Tis hard to hold a conger by the tail!’ Angus MacKinnon yelled.
‘Aye,’ James laughed, refusing to get up from his knee. ‘But my own dear mother always said the best apple is on the highest bough – so I will reach, even though I may fall in the trying.’ His eyes never left her. ‘. . . Say you’ll marry me, Flora.’
‘Very well, then,’ she beamed, unable to suppress her joy for a moment more. ‘I will.’