Chapter 9

‘He keeps it neat, this place.’

‘What? Sorry?’ Aggie turned, startled.

‘The hospital,’ Campbell said patiently. ‘Your doctor keeps it neat.’

‘Jonathon? Neat? He doesn’t know one end of a duster from the other – but, yes, this hospital is the apple of his eye.’ She came over to Campbell’s bed. ‘Is everything fine? Will I get the nurse for you?’

‘I thought you were the nurse,’ he smiled.

‘Me? No, I’m only helping. Mary’s our nurse. She worked in front line hospitals, right through the war. Over in Belgium and France.’

‘So why’s she here, with qualifications like that?’

‘Buckie’s her home. She was a gutter, like me, before the war. After she finished working in an English convalescent hospital, she came back.’

‘Weren’t you both walking with these fisherwomen?’ Angus Campbell was still trying to sort out the half-remembered fragments of that night.

‘That’s right. We’d all travelled up overnight from Yarmouth.’

‘Yet she came straight here?’

‘Jonathon needed her.’

‘Hmm.’ Campbell frowned. ‘Isn’t there a full-time nurse?’

‘With the hospital closing, he’d to pay her off. But she’s not as good as Mary. It’s Mary he always turns to when he needs real nursing help.’

Aggie tried to stifle the familiar ache of jealousy. Failed.

Campbell’s fingers played restlessly with the bed sheet.

‘How long has your doctor been looking after this town?’

‘Ever since he qualified. When he joined the practice, straight from medical school, our old doctor was almost seventy. It was meant to be a long apprenticeship. But Dr Fredericks took poorly and became one of Jonathon’s first patients. Jonathon was thrown into the deep end. Dr Fredericks watched, and judged, then handed over the practice to him, just before he died.’

‘So he’s good, this Jonathon?’

‘The very best there is.’

The vehemence of her reply made Campbell smile. ‘Even if he doesn’t know one end of a duster from the other?’

Aggie laughed. ‘Pay no attention to me. I grew up with Jonathon – I’m the last person in the world to take him seriously …’

Campbell nodded. ‘I’ve a sister back in Canada, who treats me just the same. She’s got a clutch of kids around her now, but she still reckons that she could out-run, outgun, and out-climb me.’

‘Good for her,’ said Aggie.

Campbell’s smile faded. ‘He has to be good, or I wouldn’t be here. Out where I come from, a burst appendix is usually a killer. Unless we can get people to a big hospital. This Jonathon of yours is one heck of a doctor …’

‘He’s one heck of a man,’ said Aggie. Then blushed, and began to chase non-existent dust.

This went deeper than sibling rivalry, Campbell thought wryly.

‘Yet his hospital is closed, apart from me,’ he said. ‘What’s the problem? Why are you shutting down, when you have people of the calibre of your doctor and your nurse?’

‘Bad luck,’ said Aggie. ‘A local man gifted this building to the town, then forgot to change his will. Now his relatives want the money.’

‘It happens. But why not raise the cash yourselves? Give them the money, and keep your hospital?’

‘Believe me, we tried. All we can raise is goodwill – there’s no money in the town. Not after years of war and poor fishings.’

Campbell nodded. ‘That’s what my grandfather says. But he was talking of Portgordon.’

‘They’ll have suffered just the same as us, and places like Findochty and Portknockie too. We’ve all got fewer boats chasing fewer herrings and are struggling to keep going. But it will get worse still – when this place closes down, that will hurt these fishertowns who have been using us. We’ll be back to where we were before our cottage hospital, with people dying before they can get to Elgin or Banff. People forget – but I remember just how bad it was back then.’ Aggie straightened Campbell’s sheets and plumped up the pillows. ‘Want a cup of tea?’ she asked. ‘That’s about all I’m trained to do.’

‘Could you make real coffee?’ Campbell asked, with longing.

‘What’s coffee?’ Aggie replied.

‘That’s what my grandma said,’ sighed Campbell. ‘Tea will do.’

‘Is the Wee Man sleeping?’ asked Chrissie, looking up from her knitting.

‘He’s out like a light.’ Aggie flopped wearily into her seat.

Chrissie’s needles clicked. ‘You’re doing far too much,’ she scolded.

‘Tommy’s a full-time job – and you’re more used to that than me.’

Chrissie’s needles clicked steadily. ‘Well, now that the fishing’s over until April, you’ll soon get back into the way of things.’

Aggie frowned at the fire. ‘I hate being away,’ she said. ‘I’m missing his childhood. Every time I come home, he’s inches taller. A proper boy now – I can’t believe he’ll be at school next year.’

Her daughter was in danger of missing more than her son’s childhood, Chrissie thought. She was missing her own best years. Chrissie sighed: if only she could find a loon who could see past the boy, to the woman.

‘That’s the third time you’ve made a noise like a burst balloon,’ Aggie accused her. ‘What’s up?’

Chrissie changed tack. ‘What’s got into Mary?’ she asked, pulling wool from the ball. ‘I’ve never known her so quiet … so listless. What’s been happening, down at Yarmouth?’

Aggie shrugged. ‘She’s had a falling-out with Neil,’ she said.

‘Over what?’

Aggie hesitated. ‘He wants her to aim high, to become a doctor.’

‘A woman doctor? I’ve never heard the like!’

‘Why not?’ Aggie shot back. ‘There’s women doctors in most big cities nowadays. It’s high time that women’s problems were dealt with by a woman, and not a man.’

Chrissie reached the end of her row. ‘Why should what Neil said have left her depressed? Is she sweet on him?’ No reply. She stared over her specs at her daughter. ‘Well?’ she demanded. ‘Is she?’

‘Is she what?’ asked Aggie innocently.

‘I thought she was going to be Jonathon’s nurse,’ said Chrissie.

‘With no hospital, is he going to need a nurse?’

Chrissie’s hands paused. ‘I suppose not.’

She waited, but her daughter had retreated into silence. Chrissie frowned, simultaneously pleased that her daughter could guard a confidence, and irritated that she wouldn’t tell it to her mother.

So Mary was sweet on Neil. And Neil was telling her to aim high, and be a doctor. Higher than what? A wife to himself? Chrissie’s needles clicked busily. If Mary’s heart lay elsewhere, then it wasn’t tied to Jonathon. Who had spent half his childhood in this very house: with Aggie spending the other half of their childhood in his.

So frustrating: without stirring from her chair, she could find a perfect wife for Jonathon – and a perfect man for her daughter. They were made for each other, for the long haul of life’s ups and downs. There was only one thing missing. Where there should be a spark of electricity, of romance, there was only what there had always been – easy-going affection. Pity about that.

Chrissie sighed.

‘You’re making that noise again!’ snapped Aggie.

Eric rose from the fish crate where he’d been sitting. The ship he’d been watching out for over two long days was finally steaming in from the east.

He’d recognize her anywhere: the Endeavour. Knocking out his pipe against his heel, he studied her keenly. Riding high and fast, as she should be doing, with no fish in her hold. No sign of damage. Then, as she turned into the harbour, he saw the patch of fresh paint along her waterline.

They’d known their trade, and made a good job of it, he thought.

Unhurriedly, he walked into the inner harbour, catching the warps that Johnnie threw up. Dropping each of them in turn over a rusty bollard, he fought down the urge to refill his pipe. Why should he be nervous?

Grasping the hoop at the edge of the pier, he swung his foot over onto the first rung of the vertical ladder. ‘You’ve taken your time,’ he called down to Johnnie. ‘I was nearly sending out a polisman, to look for you.’

‘Archie McCulloch, on that bike of his?’ grinned Johnnie.

‘Why not? With your steering, she’s more likely to be piled up on dry land than out at sea.’

Eric’s gruff banter made the deckhand’s smile broader.

‘Well, it was you that taught me, Skip.’

‘Then you couldn’t have been listening.’ Eric gripped the hand that was offered. ‘I’ve never been so glad to see a crew of wasters in my life.’

‘It was touch and go,’ Johnnie said soberly. ‘Neil pulled us through.’

‘Aye. Neil and the rest of you. He said on the telephone that he was proud of you. No panic. You just did what you had to do, like men.’

Johnnie shrugged. ‘Neil and Andy are in the deck-house, Eric.’

Eric grinned. ‘Scared to come out?’

Johnnie laughed. ‘We’ve all felt the rough edge of your tongue.’

‘Not this time.’ Eric climbed the steps and opened the door to the deckhouse. Andy was wearing a turban of bandages, hair curling out from underneath. He wouldn’t, or couldn’t, meet his father’s eye. ‘Well, well,’ said Eric. ‘The wanderers return.’

‘I’m sorry, Da,’ blurted Andy. Eyes on the floor.

‘What for? What did you do wrong? Hitting timber out at sea on a dirty night – that’s every skipper’s nightmare. Your luck was out, that’s all.’

Andy shook his head, winced. ‘It was Neil that saved us,’ he said.

‘Neil only did what you would have done – if you hadn’t had your senses scattered. Is it a new winch we’re needing, after that?’

Andy’s face came up, with a wan grin.

Eric walked to him. Gripped him by the arms. ‘Don’t you ever apologize to me again,’ he said fiercely. ‘For it was me that taught you, and I taught you to be the best there is. Get that head of yours mended – and the ribs. Then get out there and do what you’ve been taught to do. Bring back the top catches of herring to the port.’

‘Right, Da,’ said Andy. ‘I’ll do that.’

The words were important, badly needed. For themselves, and for their more crucial implicit message. His da still had faith in him. For Andy, that sound old man’s faith was priceless. Clumsily, he clapped his father’s shoulder, then slipped out through the deckhouse door.

‘He did nothing wrong,’ said Neil. ‘The boat’s as good as new.’

‘I know he did nothing wrong,’ Eric said. ‘But I’ll tell you this – I’m glad I sent you out, to watch over him. Or I would be one son less, and the town would be in mourning for eight lost Buckie loons.’

‘We made it, anyway,’ Neil grunted.

He glanced up at the quay. Looking once, then twice, then once again for the figure he didn’t want to see. But there was only Buckie harbour: a mess of boats and fishermen and busy colliers. Not a quine in sight.

‘I’ll get my gear,’ he said, leaving the deckhouse.

Eric lingered, where he had stood for many days and nights before, staring through the salt-stained windows. Eyes that could see the silver gleam of herrings in the water half a mile away, had seen something else.

The brief look of utter desolation on his son’s face.

Only a woman, missing, could put that there.

‘We need to talk,’ said Jonathon, sitting down on Campbell’s bed.

‘We do indeed,’ the Scots-Canadian replied.

‘You’re healing nicely – no more tenderness than can be expected, blood pressure and temperature sound. You’re fit enough to be transferred to Banff. I can drive you there this afternoon. They have a bed for you, and are happy to handle your convalescence. I’d rather keep you here – now that the girls are back, there’s no problem with nursing – but …’

Campbell nodded. ‘But you have to clear out your patients, then the beds, the theatre equipment, and whatever stores are left. In short, you need to empty the building, so that it can be put up for sale.’

‘That’s it, in a nutshell,’ Jonathon smiled.

Campbell’s face grew stern. ‘Well, you disappoint me.’

Jonathon straightened. ‘Why? Is something wrong?’

‘Yes. Badly wrong. Why are you selling the place?’

‘Because we have no choice.’

‘Why can’t you buy the building, leave it as it is? The local hospital?’

Jonathon fought down irritation. ‘Because we have no money.’

‘Then raise it. From the people who will use the hospital.’

‘We tried. We’ve barely raised enough to buy a new front door key.’

A slight smile twitched on Campbell’s face. ‘Perhaps you’ve been asking the wrong people?’

‘We asked everyone – far and near,’ Jonathon said simply.

‘No. You didn’t ask me. And I’m offended.’

The words were spoken quietly. So quietly, Jonathon wondered if he had misheard.

He studied Campbell, weighing what he knew of the man. Was this in jest? If so, it was in the poorest of taste. Somehow, that didn’t fit the picture he was building of the recovering patient.

They could hear Aggie’s voice, singing in the other ward. The cleaning regime went on, until the place ceased to be a hospital: that’s what both women had decreed.

An émigré Scot, from Canada. A bell went off in Jonathon’s mind.

‘When your family emigrated to Canada, did they own little more than the clothes on their backs?’ he asked.

‘We were flat broke. My dad was laid off, after years of bad fishing.’

‘And you’re an outdoor man – anyone can see that from your face.’

‘I am.’ Campbell’s eyes were twinkling. He was enjoying this.

‘Do you have anything to do with trees?’

‘I spend my life among them.’

Jonathon’s heart was beating as if about to burst from his chest. ‘You didn’t, by any chance, know Andrew Carnegie?’

‘A grand old man,’ said Campbell. ‘A tough old son-of-a-bitch when you were dealing with him on business. But a heart of gold. Yes, I was truly privileged to be his friend.’

Jonathon shook his head. ‘You can’t be …’ he said weakly.

‘I am.’ Campbell grinned. ‘I caught a first-class berth a couple of days before the Foundation’s letter. On impulse. Left them to tell you I might be dropping in. I decided I was due a vacation. To visit the Old Country, meet my grandparents, see the place my mom never forgot.’

His smile became rueful. ‘I didn’t bargain on researching your hospital quite so closely. But you run a sound little outfit here. Good doctor, good nursing staff, good reputation. My grandparents tell me that it’s the mainstay of … what did they call them? … the “fishertoons”.’

‘Well, I’m damned,’ Jonathon said weakly.

‘Quite the opposite,’ Campbell said. ‘How much are the lawyers asking for this place?’

Jonathon told him. Crossing his fingers, below the level of the bed.

Campbell nodded. ‘I’d be disappointing Andrew if I didn’t bargain them down from there,’ he said briskly. ‘Right, cancel all plans to evacuate the building. Your hospital equipment – and myself – are going to stay right here. You too. But first, I’m going to need a lawyer …’

He grinned. ‘This bit of hospital business, I am going to enjoy …’

Still dazed, Jonathon walked into the empty women’s ward, where Aggie and Mary were cleaning under the beds.

‘Oh, it’s you,’ said Aggie, glancing up. ‘I saw the legs and thought it was somebody important.’

Jonathon towered over them. ‘Stand easy, slaves. I’m going to make us all a cup of tea,’ he announced.

Aggie sniffed suspiciously. ‘Has he been drinking?’ she asked Mary.

Mary rocked back onto her heels, head to the side.

‘He looks sober,’ she judged.

‘Does this offer stretch to biscuits with our tea?’ Aggie asked hopefully.

‘Say the word, and I will run down to the town, and buy some.’

‘Consider it said,’ Aggie replied. ‘And there are witnesses.’

Jonathon sat down heavily on one of the empty beds.

‘Hey! I’ve just straightened these sheets,’ Aggie complained.

‘You will never guess who I’ve been talking to,’ Jonathon said.

‘There’s only Angus Campbell through there.’

‘Wrong. That’s our fairy godmother, who is lying through there.’

‘A fairy godmother with stubble?’ Aggie queried.

‘Why is he our fairy godmother?’ Mary asked, rising from the floor.

‘Behold this place,’ said Jonathon. ‘Everything that you see is ours: the beds, the chairs, the walls, even that old damp stain on the ceiling.’

‘He has been drinking,’ Aggie sighed.

‘Angus Campbell is a friend of Andrew Carnegie. The friend, the one the Foundation asked to help. He has seen us, likes us, and is helping. He wants a lawyer, a banker, and his chequebook. He is buying the building from Johnnie Meldrum’s heirs. Then giving it to the town – all threats removed, all documents signed and sealed.’

He smiled at Aggie: ‘You may close your mouth,’ he said benignly.

She did, with a click. ‘He’s doing what?’ she asked.

‘You heard.’

‘But I don’t believe.’

‘Feel free. Believe. This place is ours.’

Jonathon suddenly swooped down, lifted her from the floor, and started dancing round the space between the beds with her.

‘Stop it, you daft idiot,’ she laughed.

It felt good, so good, to have his arms around her – even in fun. And good to see in his laughing face the boy she had always known.

‘Stop it,’ she repeated. ‘Angus Campbell will change his mind, if he sees us behaving like this.’

‘I don’t care,’ said Jonathon. ‘Well, I do care, if it’s going to cost us the hospital. A day ago, we had no future. Now – or within a couple of weeks – we need never worry again about losing our hospital.’

He turned, gripped Mary’s shoulders, shaking her gently. ‘We can throw open our doors to patients again! We can plan, think through what we need to do to turn this place into a modern hospital. Go back round local businesses and local people to raise funds for new beds, new equipment – even new paint, once we’ve got everything else we need. This place is ours!’

It was impossible not to be caught up in his enthusiasm.

‘Whoever would have thought …’ said Mary. ‘We did no more for Angus Campbell than we’d have done for anybody. No bowing, or scraping: just treating him like an ordinary man.’

‘That’s what he likes,’ Jonathon said, more soberly. ‘We had no cause to try and impress him. He was just a stranger, somebody we could have done without, when we were closing down. But we put our own plans aside and dealt with his emergency. Then nursed him back through the effects of the anaesthetic and his early recovery. Without making a special fuss over him, because we didn’t know that he was in a position to help us.’

‘If we’d known, I’d have put extra sugar into his tea,’ said Aggie.

‘But you didn’t – that’s the whole point.’ Jonathon smiled down at Mary. ‘Well,’ he said. ‘An hour ago, I had nothing to offer. Now there’s a job for both of you, if you want it. Head nurse for you, Mary. Trainee nurse and chief tea-maker for you, my quine. Neither of you need ever gut a fish again.’

He pointed a quivering finger at Aggie. ‘But you will have to do what you’re told by me,’ he warned.

‘No chance!’ scoffed Aggie. ‘Are you serious? About the job?’

‘Cross my heart and hope to die,’ said Jonathon.

‘More to the left,’ she ordered.

‘Wrong. Your heart, contrary to popular belief, is under your sternum – your breastbone. In the centre of your chest. That’s your first theory lesson.’

Aggie ran her hands over her hair, realization dawning. ‘I’d never have to leave wee Tommy on his own again!’

‘Then I’ve got one nurse?’

‘As of now,’ she said. ‘When do we get paid?’

Jonathon laughed. ‘When there’s money. What about you, Mary? We can find a way to let you study nursing. I can help you with the book side of things, give you all the clinical training you need. You can sit, and pass, your nursing qualification in a couple of years.’

The light died in Mary’s eyes. She frowned.

‘Jonathon, can I think about that for a bit?’ she asked.

Surprised, he said: ‘Of course you can, my dear. But you are central to every plan I have, for this place. We need a good nurse. That means you.’

Mary’s shoulders drooped.

‘I’ll wash my hands and make the tea,’ she said.

Frowning, Jonathon watched her leave. ‘I thought she’d jump at my offer,’ he said. ‘She’s not still thinking about that crazy doctor idea, is she?’

‘Who says it’s crazy?’ Aggie demanded.

Jonathon shook his head. ‘Doesn’t she realize that she will have to study to get into medical school? Then seven long years after that, including her clinical experience? She could be in her thirties by the time she qualifies – if she ever lasts the pace, and passes her examinations. You don’t just wish to be a doctor. It takes years of study.’

‘She knows all that.’

‘Ah well,’ Jonathon said. ‘No point in crossing bridges until we come to them. First things first. We have our hospital back! I feel like dancing … madam, will you do me the honour of this dance?’

‘I certainly won’t,’ said Aggie primly.

Then she was picked up and whirled into something which might have been a lively waltz – or a drunken polka, or just about anything. No point in trying to guess which steps came next. She left her feet to look after themselves, and hung on for grim death.

‘Sorry!’ he said, tripping over her, for the umpteenth time.

She hauled him to a stop.

‘Jonathon!’ she said firmly. ‘You’ve got two left feet.’

‘It’s the orchestra. They’re an absolute disgrace.’

‘I don’t hear any orchestra,’ she said, still in his arms.

‘Exactly. They should be playing louder – and in tune … and all at the same time …’ Jonathon’s voice gradually tailed off.

They were standing very close, in each other’s arms. Smiling.

Somehow, without knowing who made the first move, they were kissing. Gently, almost in surprise. Then intensely, with real passion.

Jonathon finally eased her away. ‘What happened there?’ he asked nobody in particular. Then his hand came up to touch the dark curl on Aggie’s neck. ‘That curl,’ he said. ‘It’s been haunting me. It’s perfect. Your neck is perfect. In fact …’ he turned her slowly round at arm’s length, ‘… the rest of you is pretty perfect too. When did it happen, Aggie? When did you become this beautiful woman?’

She curtsied. ‘Thank you, kind sir.’

Then the words were out, before she even knew that they were there.

‘Is this a leap year?’ she asked.

‘I don’t think so,’ he replied. ‘Why?’

‘Pity. Because, if it was, I was going to ask you to marry me.’

Jonathon stared at her. Somewhere in the old house, an old clock was ticking slowly: the only sound in the place.

‘Shouldn’t you get down on one knee, or something?’ he asked.

‘I’ll get down on two, if it makes any difference.’

Jonathon studied her, then a slow smile broke on his face. ‘That’s it,’ he said. ‘I’ve just solved a problem that has puzzled me for years. I have always loved you – that’s why I’ve never looked at any other woman.’

He scooped her up into his arms and strode out of the ward.

‘Where are you going?’ she gasped, clinging to his neck.

‘Through to see Angus Campbell. To show him that he’s bought me a wife as well as a hospital.’ Jonathon smiled. Then looked down on her. ‘But you’ll still have to make the tea,’ he warned. ‘No special privileges.’

‘It’s a deal,’ said Aggie, burying her face into his neck.

The wind from the sea was bitingly cold. Mary wrapped her shawl more tightly round her head and shoulders. Only seven months before, she had hurried down this slope towards the harbour, joy in her heart: because at last she had come home, to pick up the threads of her life again. Now her step was slow, and her heart was heavy.

So much had happened, in between.

The harbour was deserted. At the end of the winter fishing, the men were back with their families, taking things easy for a bit. After the New Year had passed, the harbour and its shipyards would be full of life again, as boats were winched up and repaired, getting ready for the year ahead. Until then, the drifters were moored two and three deep around the quays.

Mary walked slowly under the harbour wall then stopped, looking down at the solitary figure below. Sitting on the raised edge of the hold, hunched over the pad on his lap: drawing something that existed in his mind alone, because his head never came up, to check the subject.

‘I thought I’d find you here,’ she said.

His face lifted: his eyes, which were the colour of the sea, quiet and guarded. ‘Mary Cowie,’ he said.

The hairs on her neck tingled, each time he spoke her name like that.

‘What are you drawing?’ she asked.

‘Scribbling. Just passing the time.’

Mary dropped the shawl from her head. ‘I didn’t come down to see you land from the south,’ she said. Having had to fight herself to stay away.

‘I wasn’t looking for you,’ he lied.

They studied one another: he made no effort to climb the ladder to the quay; she didn’t ask to come down, because it was bad luck for any woman to step on any fishing boat. Although her own luck could scarcely be worse.

‘Jonathon’s offered me the nurse’s job,’ Mary said.

He waited, then asked: ‘And?’

‘I’m thinking about taking it.’

‘Why?’

‘Because I want to stay here, in this place. With my friends.’

And you, she added silently.

‘Wrong decision,’ he said quietly. ‘You’re a fighter. A fighter should always fight, not hide away. What’s happened to the fire that was in your belly? Your hunger to be a pioneer? One of the first women doctors?’

‘That doesn’t matter anymore,’ she said.

‘It does. Deep down inside. I can see its flame.’

She dropped her head, unable to hold his gaze.

‘There is an alternative,’ she began.

‘Which is?’

Despite the biting cold, Mary’s cheeks burned. ‘I could study, through in Edinburgh. Try to get into Elsie Inglis’s hospital, to be trained with the other college girls. Study for years, just to catch up with them. Then study to become a doctor. When I don’t know if I have the brains – or the courage – to finish the job. And I would never know where the money to buy my next meal was coming from.’

He watched her silently.

‘Come with me,’ she said. ‘Come back to the city, to study art.’

‘Me? Leave my own people and my work behind? I’m born to be a fisherman – not to stake my future on a talent I’ve only just discovered.’

It was no more than the truth. She was asking him to come and share her sacrifices, and the risk that everything might easily be in vain.

‘I need your courage,’ she said honestly. ‘I can’t do this on my own.’

‘Nor can you do it leaning on a broken reed,’ he told her grimly. ‘On a man who still can’t sleep, who gets the shakes. Who is afraid.’

‘We could be scared together. Help each other overcome our fears.’

She should be ashamed, a woman offering so openly to share her life with any man. But this wasn’t just any man: it was Neil, and she was driven by her fear.

Because there was more than studying which scared her. She had worked among these pioneers, and had no illusions about what she would be taking on. If she went to Edinburgh, it wouldn’t be just to enter medicine. It would be to move into the front line of politics, to fight in that other war; the war that had still to be won. The fight for women’s rights – where men were the main enemy. It was a bleak and lonely campaign: you couldn’t fight men for women’s rights, then go home to live with one. From what she’d seen, none of these fiery women warriors could sustain a relationship with a man.

But Neil was unique: the only man she knew who might understand the broader context, and support her; who could help her to define and guard a space which would be theirs alone.

Where she could be a woman, not just a warrior.

They could be the exception to the rule. Without him at her side, she would be condemning herself to loneliness, whatever her studies won.

Their eyes locked. In his face, she could read his indecision.

His eyes dropped, and he closed the child’s exercise book he used for sketching. There was something utterly final in that gesture. ‘I cannot tell you how honoured I am,’ he said quietly. ‘But she travels fastest, and furthest, who travels alone. I would be worse than a sea anchor to you. I would only drag you down.’

‘A sea anchor saves lives in a storm,’ Mary argued.

‘As you will. But first, you must become a doctor.’

The wind ate into her bones. She felt old, and cold. Unwanted. Pain and tears were welling up, from deep inside.

‘Then it’s no?’ she asked, fighting them.

He stood silently. Mary lifted her shawl, automatically covering her head again, and walked leadenly from the harbour.

‘Because I love you too much to say “yes”,’ he finally replied. When he knew she was gone, and would never hear him.

He opened the exercise book with fingers that shook, and found the page where he’d been working. A young woman’s face, tilted slightly, looking directly at the artist, laughing. There was wind in her hair, teasing it from her face, giving it movement and life. A sparkle of light and humour in her eyes. For the first time, he had caught light, and set it down on paper.

It was Mary’s face. All that he would have of her to remember.

It had rained all morning, and was raining still. A small grey rain that stung with the intensity of its cold. Down over the harbour, Mary could hear the seagulls calling endlessly. For many years, the sound of home.

She looked along the station platform. Two or three knots of people waiting for the Aberdeen train. Huddled together for warmth, their umbrellas up and slanted against the endless Buckie wind.

She was on her own. Sneaking off, like a thief, because she couldn’t bear the thought of having to say goodbye to anybody. Up at the water tower, she saw the engine taking on water, steam swirling round its wheels.

She wished Aggie well. Wished her and Jonathon all the joys that life could offer – joys that would never now be hers.

Once again, she was leaving home – her future stark and uncertain: heading south to Edinburgh with barely enough in her purse to cover a couple of months’ accommodation. Bruntsfield Hospital: she had heard so much about the place. Were they still training women doctors? Would they take her in, as a student? How would she earn the money to keep herself there?

What if they shook their heads and closed the door on her?

She couldn’t stay here, whatever happened. Not now. Once Buckie had been her home. Now, she had no home. Her heart ached.

Mary looked down at her small case, which held much less than her kitbag as a gutter quine had done. Like Dick Whittington: she was travelling with little more than he had carried at the end of a stick, when he set out to make his fortune. The thought brought a wry smile. No bells for her.

With a hiss of steam and clank of metal wheels, the train slid into the station platform. Her hand on the door handle of an empty compartment, she took one last look around. People entering their compartments, shaking water from their folded umbrellas. A young couple: she leaning out through the open compartment window, he straining up to her for one last kiss. She hoped life would be kind to them.

She should have dropped in on Gus, to say goodbye: but she didn’t have another goodbye left in her – and she could only hope that Aggie would understand. She would miss her strength, her lively sense of humour.

Mary opened the compartment door and climbed in. Closing the door, she lifted her case onto the string cradle of the luggage rack, and sat down beside the window. Steam hissed out around her feet, bringing sooty-smelling heating to the carriage.

Outside, the guard’s whistle shrilled. Mary half rose to let the window down, for one last look. At the town, of course, but also at the empty platform, hoping for the miracle that would never happen: the sight of him coming at the last minute to bring her home. She made herself sit down.

The carriage jolted, then moved, amid dense clouds of steam. Far in front, she could hear the chug of the engine, the metallic scream of its wheels spinning, as they fought for traction. Through the drifting steam, the platform passed quicker and quicker.

Then the figure of a man came running; looking into each compartment window in turn. Her door was wrenched open. A kitbag sailed in across the dirty floor, then the man came hurtling through behind it, landing on all fours, rolling across her feet. Outside, a stream of invective as the stationmaster cursed, then slammed the door closed as it passed him.

Neil looked up, soot smudged across his face.

‘You took your time,’ she said. Her heart racing.

‘I couldn’t find my pencils. I’ve had to leave them all behind.’

He reached up a hand, and she braced herself, nurse-style, to help haul him to his feet. ‘Did you change your mind?’ she asked.

‘About coming, yes. About you, no. Never.’

His hand turned, until their fingers were gently laced together.

First the town, then the countryside, sped past. She couldn’t speak.

‘Somebody had to see you off,’ he said at last. ‘Make sure you caught the proper train in Aberdeen. Make sure you found yourself some decent digs, in Edinburgh. Then make sure that there’s food on the table, for you coming home at night. Unless I’m drawing, and forget about everything else.’

‘For how long?’ she asked breathlessly.

‘For as long as it takes.’

‘What if we starve?’

‘Then we starve together. Only, we won’t. I’ll find a job, to put you through the college. And put food on our table.’

‘What if it takes seven years for me to be a doctor?’

‘It will take six, part-time, for me to become an artist. Maybe longer.’

‘Race you,’ she said, her heart singing, bursting with joy. ‘Like we used to race as kids, from boat to boat, across the harbour.’

‘You always won. I let you win.’

‘You never did!’

‘I stayed behind you, in case you fell into the water.’

Somehow, in the rocking carriage, they were in each other’s arms.

‘What did your dad say? And Andy?’ she asked breathlessly.

‘I didn’t have time to tell them.’

‘Why not?’

‘Because I wasn’t coming. Right up until I saw your engine at the water tower. And knew that in ten minutes time, you would be travelling out of my life forever. I couldn’t bear the thought. So I just followed my heart and my feet, raced home, threw some clothes and my sketch pads into my bag, and ran for the station. I nearly didn’t make it.’

She hugged him tightly. ‘And I was crying,’ she said. ‘It felt as if my heart was breaking. I think I would just have got out of the carriage at the next station, and caught the first train home.’

He kissed her fiercely. ‘Waste of a ticket, that,’ he said. ‘See? I’ve saved you some money already …’