2

This was the longest he had been apart from his wife since before they were married. The hill on which he stood had been Mary’s favourite spot on the island. You can see the world, she used to say. Her world, anyway. Below him lay Portnaseil, the only sound the grumble of the morning ferry as it prepared to set off across the Sound, which on this fine autumn day was a refreshing deep blue. Portnaseil was the largest settlement on Stoirm, its buildings nestling around the sheltered harbour, while the other villages clung to the eastern coastline. There was nothing to speak of on the western side, for that was where the weather so often lashed at the land and the cliffs. Not today, though. He lifted his eyes towards the dark bulk of the mainland across the water, where white splashes of villages reflected the sunshine. Behind him was the island, the houses and crofts dotted across the grasslands and heather until they gave way in the west to the corrugated hills that shouldered the sky on either side of the island’s mountain, Beinn nan sìthichean. That’s where the fairies live, Mary used to tell their children. They let you visit in daylight but not after dark. That’s their time, and anyone caught on the mountain after nightfall is theirs forever.

The breeze whispered through the reeds and tall grass around him. Spirits, Mary would say, singing to us from the other side. He listened carefully but he couldn’t hear her voice among them. He longed to hear it again, even if only once. Maybe, someday, he would.

Two days.

That’s how long she’d been gone.

Just two days.

It felt like a lifetime.

The church stood above Portnaseil, the old graves scattered around it like standing stones, the newer burial ground off to the side more ordered. For all her love of the old stories, Mary had been a believer, never missed services. The wind could be sharp enough to cut her in half, while the rains could attack as if it was personal, but every Sunday she would pull on her coat, grab her Bible and head out. She’d be back in the kirk soon enough, he thought. Only this time she wouldn’t come home and start preparing the roast. This time she wouldn’t stop for a chat with the ladies. This time she wouldn’t come up to this hill if the weather was fine, just to find a moment to herself and listen to the spirits singing in the grass. This time she’d stay in the kirkyard forever.

He closed his eyes and concentrated again on the soft sigh of the breeze. Just one word, he prayed. Just my name. Just one more time.

‘Dad.’

For a moment he thought it was Mary. Just a brief flash of something like hope. She always called him that in front of the children. Never Campbell, never darling, never anything but Dad. But that would mean his prayer had been answered and he’d long ago given up on any help from that quarter.

He turned and saw his daughter Shona heading up the hillside. She’d always favoured her mother—the same smile, the same laugh, the same look when she was irritated with something he had done—but now she was in her late thirties she was Mary’s double. Even her own daughter was showing a strong resemblance. Shona had defied modern naming traditions and called her only child Mary. That pleased him, because it meant a little something of his Mary would live on.

He said nothing to Shona. He knew why she had come to find him. He stared across the Sound, his jaw clenched.

She reached his side and stood for a moment, following his gaze.

‘She loved it here,’ she said.

‘Aye,’ he said.

There was another silence between them while around them the world played its own symphony. The soft melody of the breeze. The glissando of the waves as they caressed the yellow sand at the bottom of the hill. The bass rumble of the ferry engine as it pulled away. The percussive cry of a gull.

Shona slid her hand into his and squeezed. He squeezed back. He loved her but he didn’t want to hear what was coming next. He’d seen it in her eyes as she’d climbed the hill. He’d felt it in the touch of her hand. He already knew.

She said it anyway, her words so subdued that they were almost swept away by the wind and the waves and the cough of the ferry.

‘He’s coming back,’ she said.