It was my turn to walk off and she had to trot after me. After all these years of longing to know who my biological father was, I was thrown off balance. Duncan MacKenzie! True, I hadn’t known him very long, but he wasn’t a man I had warmed to. Probably it would have been a shock whomever she’d named, but I wasn’t in a rational frame of mind and all I could think of was “Why him?”
We walked for about twenty minutes, in which time I said exactly three words. “Does he know?” to which Joan replied, “No, he doesn’t.” Somewhere along the walk, Nic had gone back home.
“Do you still want to see the village?” Joan asked.
“Why not? As you say, I’ve always wanted ancestors. It’s raining cats and dogs with ancestors now.”
She smiled uneasily at this, but we went on.
We trudged across a rocky beach, up the path to a double gate. Ahead of us the slope was dotted with several low, grey stone houses, all of them with neatly thatched roofs. We pushed open the gate and followed a paved road through the centre of the village. Joan stopped in front of one of the houses. A hanging sign proclaimed it was the public toilet. A young fellow carrying a backpack almost as long as himself walked past us and ducked through the low door.
“Duncan warned me the village had been reconstructed,” said Joan. “Our toilet was out in the back grass in summer and was a bucket in the byre in winter. Add some chickens, two or three dogs lying around, a cow tethered in the back, and the women coming and going to the shore with their heavy wash in a tub on their hips. It was never as quiet as this.”
We walked on down the road, and she stopped again in front of one of the houses, which advertised itself as a self-catering unit. She was chattering at me over my own silence.
“The three MacLeod sisters lived here. They never married, even though they were all as lovely as daisies when they were young. Anna was a weaver and she designed her own patterns. She even won a prize for one of her rugs. It was a glass bowl and it sat in pride of place on her dresser. She’d let me take it down and look at it. I handled it as carefully as if it were as fragile as a new babe.” Joan’s face was wistful. “Nowadays, Anna would be considered an artist and she’d have a studio instead of a byre where the cow lived in winter. All three of them were middle-aged when I knew them, but I’d come here whenever I could and always be welcome. They made a pet of me at a time when I so needed to be fussed over. Christina would always make me a cuppa, even when I was young. She’d boil the water and the tea leaves together in a pot over the fire. It tasted of the peat smoke and was so strong almost nobody else could drink it.”
I remembered how much Joan had liked her cup of tea in the mornings. When I hit my snobbish, critical adolescence, this was one more thing I held against her. All the other parents I knew drank coffee.
“Am I related to them?”
She managed to laugh. “Not directly. We have a lot of catching up to do, Chris. Like I said, I wanted to sever my roots completely when I left. Which was stupid and impossible anyway, but what can you do?”
What indeed.
We walked on and went into one of the black houses, which had been restored to a period in the 1950s and was crammed with furniture. The stone walls were lined by wood siding, painted a shiny beige, the linoleum on the floor was beige and brown. Nothing matched
“I think they’ve gathered together whatever they could find from lots of different people. That was Mrs. Duncan MacLeod’s radio for sure. Her son brought it back from the mainland when we got electricity, and she was so proud of it. Oh my... ” She halted in front of the dresser. “There are Auntie Peggie’s best teacups. She’d bought them in London when she was with the herring boats. I don’t know if she ever used them to drink out of.”
There was a curtained bed tucked into the corner of the room, which was also the living room/kitchen. I could see that the only other room adjoining had two bunk-style beds, also with curtains.
“Most people had big families, and it was customary for unmarried sisters or brothers to stay living with the family. They were a healthy lot and most of the women lived into their nineties. Our house was about this size, but there was a little room off the kitchen, which I had. No bigger than a cupboard really.” She shuddered. “I can’t stand to think about it.”
We walked out into a room that adjoined the entrance. It was unfurnished, more like a stable than a room.
Joan paused. “This is where the cow would be for the winter, and the chickens. I was good at milking.” She pointed at an iron tub by the door. “Look at that! They’ve found a pee-tub. They weren’t as common when I was a wee one as they were earlier, but every household had one.”
The tub looked too big to serve as a chamber pot. “What were they exactly?”
She was happy to go on sharing her stories. “The weaving industry was crucial to the islands for a long time, and tweed became very popular, especially with the British. However, the sheared wool was oily, and before it could be woven into tweed it had to be cleaned. This was before you could get ammonia easily mind you, so they used urine to wash out the oil. The pee-tub was in every cottage.” She held her nose. “It could get pretty strong back here when the tub filled up. We’d have a giggle about the fact that, on a humid day, the English la-di-das were likely to walk around in their tweeds exclaiming, ‘Hm, dahling, smell that glorious heather!’ What they were actually smelling was human pee.”
That broke my sulk, and we were laughing together when a young man ducked through the entrance. He was impressively clean cut, with short hair and a neat, unobtrusive, dark wind-breaker and jeans. I would have pegged him as secret service immediately, even without the radio communicator in his ear with the strange growth-like curly cord down the back of his head.
“Good afternoon, I’m Simon Wilson. I’m with British security and I wonder if I could ask you a big favour, which is to leave off your tour for the moment and wait outside.”
His accent was what I’d call posh British, and he was so polite, he was butter coated.
“What’s wrong?” Joan asked.
“Nothing wrong at all, Ma’am. We just need to clear the area for security reasons.”
“My god, a bomb?”
He smiled again. “No, Ma’am. Nothing like that.”
“I believe the old homestead is about to be visited by Wills himself.” I said to her.
She stared at me. “The prince?”
I nodded at the officer. “That’s it isn’t it?”
“We do have a royal party arriving.”
Mr. Wilson’s expression was friendly, but his eyes were ice. He’d had too much experience of the worst excesses of star-struck bystanders. He looked as if he were hoping we were too old for hysteria, and wouldn’t suddenly lift our sweaters to display our breasts.
“Do you mind, Ma’am?” He indicated we should leave the house, and, rather excited, I must admit, I followed after him. Joan was behind me, also rather twittery. The royal lad had that effect. Outside, a couple of uniformed officers from the Northern Constabulary had appeared. Some tourists had been moved from the gift shop and were “standing back.”
Then I saw two men walking up from the direction of the beach. Each was carrying an ordinary fisherman’s pail with a closed lid. One was Colin MacLeod, the other man was tall and thin, with a mane of dark hair almost to his shoulders, Black John in the flesh. At the same time as that registered on my brain, I saw two dark-blue sedans pull into the parking lot at the upper end of the village. Both had the royal-standard pennants flying from the front of the car.
Oh God. Colin was up to mischief. Both men were moving with far too much deliberation, and they were carrying the pails out rather carefully from their sides.
I grabbed Joan’s arm. “Quick. Look at those men coming towards us. What do you think they’re carrying?”
Responding to the urgency in my voice, but not understanding, she squinted at Colin and his pal.
“If I didn’t know better, I’d say they were piss buckets, but I haven’t seen them in years... ”
The passengers were getting out of the sedans. First two bodyguards, then a tall young man with reddish-blond hair. He was casually dressed in jeans and a blue blazer. By any standard he was a handsome lad, but transferred excitement made the air around him shine. He gave a helping hand to his companion, a young woman who was also tall, with short, fair hair. I had an impression of easy grace from the young man and self-consciousness from the girl.
That was all I had time for. I stepped quickly over to Wilson, who had taken up his position in front of the cottage entrance.
“I’m a police officer from Canada. I’ll show you ID later. Those two men at the gate are planning to do something. One of them is a known agitator. His name is Black John.”
He didn’t wait for a further explanation. He was an experienced officer and he observed the same thing I did. He started to walk forward to intercept Colin and his pals and spoke into his lapel. I went with him.
“They’re planning to embarrass the prince. I think they’ve got urine in those buckets and they intend to throw it on him.”
“Shit!” said Wilson, appropriately.
Colin had put down his bucket so he could unfasten the gate. The other man waited behind him. We were there now, and Wilson grabbed hold of the top bar.
“Excuse me, Sir, I can’t let you through at the moment.”
Over my shoulder, I could see the royal party was almost at the door of the black house. A little smattering of applause from the watching attendants and backpackers. William smiled and waved to them. Black John suddenly pushed on the gate, taking Wilson by surprise.
Colin seized his chance, grabbed his bucket, and was almost through the gap. I was hovering on the right of the secret service, and I shoved Colin back with my shoulder. He lost his balance and sat down, the bucket fell over and the lid came off, spilling stinking yellow urine all over his own pants. Black John tried to get past, but Wilson was too fast for him and pulled his hand through the bars so that he was jammed against the gate. Two of the uniformed officers saw what was happening and came running over.
“MacLeod, what the hell are you doing?”
Colin was too busy trying to wipe off his pants on the grass to answer, but Black John shouted out.
“Give us back our land. We won’t tolerate cock-boys any longer.”
Wilson spoke into his coat again. Immediately, one of the prince’s bodyguards came out of the black house and ran over to us. The spectators watched curiously. An adventure indeed on a grey, ordinary day.
“What’s happening?” asked the bodyguard. He was thirtyish and formidable.
“These two toerags were about to douse the prince with piss.” Wilson had temporarily lost his cool.
He was still holding Black John jammed against the gate and had twisted his arm up painfully through the bar. He’d break the wrist if necessary.
“We’ll ask you to come with us.” The bodyguard never lost his polite, quiet voice, but I’d hardly ever heard a tone so chilling and powerful. In the meantime, I picked up the second bucket, which was now on our side of the gate, and carried it to the grass. To be safe, I emptied out the contents. Colin finally acknowledged me, but he didn’t look embarrassed or ashamed. Just arrogant.
“We have a right to make a public protest. This is a democracy, isn’t it?”
He was getting to his feet, but the uniformed officer, whom I realized was Constable Fraser, bent over him. He said something in Gaelic and Colin sat down again. A translation wasn’t necessary.
“Everything under control?” asked the prince’s bodyguard. A nod from Wilson and he hurried back to the black house.
I kept my eyes on Colin and his pal, as did Wilson and the constable. I heard more applause and gathered that the royal party had emerged. A quick glance over my shoulder and I saw the long-striding prince was walking back to his car. The girl was beside him. The second bodyguard gave a quick wave to Wilson. In a minute, they were all in the car and one of the black sedans drove out of the parking lot.
“Are you going to let us go?” demanded Colin. “If you’re not, I want to know why we’re being held.”
“How about vandalism?” said Fraser. “You’ve spilled piss all over a public walkway, and that’s an offence.”
Joan had remained at the door of the black house, and she now came over to us. “What’s going on?”
I stepped away from the gate. “Mr. MacLeod here was trying to perpetrate some public mischief.”
She stared at him. “Colin MacLeod! You’re Mairi MacKenzie’s husband. Why aren’t you home with your wee babe? Shame on you.”
Hey Joan, way to tell it like it is!
Two more beefy constables arrived and they hustled the two men unceremoniously into their police van. Black John tried to shout out slogans to the spectators who were hanging around the cottage, but to my delight the onlookers, all of them ordinary middle-aged people and a few attendants from the shop, yelled back. ‘Shame! Shame on you!”
Finally, the official cars left, except for Agent Wilson who stayed to thank me and to get my name and address in case of later charges against the protesters.
Joan and I started our walk back to Duncan’s house.
If you were to ask me what had been the most unusual day I’d ever spent in my life to date, I’d say this was it.