The days grow darker but no one sleeps. Cesare explains the cuts and bruises on his face to the other prisoners by saying he fell one night on the way to the chapel.
‘Do they believe you?’ I ask. His lips are cut and one of his eyes is half shut, blackened by Angus’s fists.
‘Gino does not,’ he says. ‘But I cannot be truthful about this.’
He doesn’t need to tell me why. I imagine the prisoners turning on the guards in revenge. I imagine the retribution that would follow.
I run my fingers over his scabbed lips, thinking of everything we have to hide.
Each evening I stay in the chapel with Cesare for as long as I can. Often, we don’t speak at all, but he rests his hand on my cheek or my leg. I can feel him looking at the marks on my neck; they are fading, but the feel of fingers there never leaves me. Sometimes, as if sensing the bleakness of my thoughts, he wraps his arms around me. Each gesture is one of comfort, with no hint of demand in it. We haven’t been back to the cave.
When my eyelids are starting to droop, Cesare walks me to the bothy, where he kisses my cheek gently, then goes back to the camp. Angus must have gone to Kirkwall hospital to have his injuries tended, because he is not in the infirmary. I dread to think what he must be planning in Kirkwall, with his friends who hate the prisoners and resent the chapel.
I lie awake in the darkness of the bothy, my mind humming. When I close my eyes, I see Angus’s face pressed close to mine; I feel the crush of his lips, the heat of his breath. If ever I do sink into an uneasy doze, I startle awake with the sensation of his hands around my throat. Con strokes my hair when I gasp upright, or rubs her hand over my back if I weep. ‘It will get better,’ she whispers.
She can’t sleep either, so much of our time is spent planning how we will get Cesare away from the island without anyone noticing. I still can’t decide what to do. If I go, I will be leaving Con alone. She tells me she will return to Kirkwall, that she will work in the hospital there. She tells me she has befriended Bess Croy, who also wants to work in the hospital after the prisoners have left.
‘What about him?’ I ask.
Her jaw tightens, but her eyes are clear. ‘I will stay away from him,’ she says, even though we both know that in a place as small as Kirkwall, that won’t be possible.
In the chapel, Cesare says to me, ‘I will escape alone. If you want to stay with your sister, I will go first. You can follow soon.’ His expression is pained as he says this, but I know he means it.
And I think of how this war has shown everyone’s true nature.
I imagine Cesare on the boat alone, sailing through the rough autumn waters, and then I think of our parents setting sail in the dark, never to return. And I know that my decision was made long ago, when I picked up a wind-whirled piece of card and gave it to a man I didn’t know.
The question is, how we will get away without being noticed. We need a distraction.
On the first day of September – five days after Angus held me up against the forge wall by my throat – Cesare knocks quietly on the bothy door in a quick pattern of five raps, which we’d all agreed on, so we would know it was him.
I’m lying on the bed, but Con gets up to answer.
Cesare’s cheeks are flushed from the walk up the hill, and there’s a tension around his eyes.
‘What is it?’ I ask.
‘Major Bates says we are having a feast. For . . . Michaelmas?’
‘But Michaelmas isn’t until the end of September.’ Con frowns.
‘He says we will not be here then. The barriers will be finished and we will all be gone. But now there is much spare food to use and he wants to celebrate the chapel and barriers also. He will bring people from Kirkwall.’
My mind whirls. People from Kirkwall . . . That will mean Angus. My stomach drops. But with all the disruption, people coming and going from the island . . .
‘This is our chance to escape,’ I say. ‘When is the feast?’
Cesare hesitates. ‘Tomorrow,’ he says.
I look at Con. She’s trying to smile but her eyes have filled with tears.
‘It’s good you don’t have many things,’ she says. ‘Packing will be quick.’
I pull her in close. ‘Thank you,’ I whisper.
The next day dawns grey and bleak. September is the time of Gore Vellye, the autumn tumult, when the weather turns vicious and the sea batters the land. Tales tell us it is the time of the battle between the Sea Mither and the monster Teran. Every spring, the Sea Mither battles the vicious Teran and imprisons him at the bottom of the ocean. But each autumn he rises again and banishes her. Then he begins his six-month winter tyranny: he buffets and pounds the islands, and pauses only to listen to the gurgling cries of drowning sailors.
It is a year to the day since our parents disappeared.
I don’t mention it and neither does Con, but her face is anxious and, when she thinks I’m not looking, she wipes tears from her eyes. There is little time to grieve, though: we rise at dawn to stuff clothes and food into a bag. Con makes some dry oat biscuits and wraps them in greased paper – enough for Cesare as well as me: he won’t be able to take food with him from the camp without arousing suspicion.
After we have fed the chickens, Con disappears behind the bothy and I hear the scraping sound of her digging. I remember all those months ago, when I’d heard a similar sound after the night of fog.
I don’t look at her when she returns: I don’t want to pry. But she places a small material bag in my hand. It contains something cold, which jangles lightly, like far-off bells. I go to open it, but she places her hands on mine.
‘Don’t,’ she says.
‘What is it?’
‘Something I don’t need any more. I’d like you to throw it into the sea, somewhere far away from here.’
I nod and tuck it into my pocket.
As she turns away, I murmur, ‘I didn’t ever blame you.’
And I don’t know whether I mean I didn’t blame her for our parents, or for Angus, or for the life we had to build here. I don’t know if it’s true. Perhaps I did blame her sometimes. Perhaps I thought her guilty or weak or frustrating. Perhaps I thought she’d brought all this upon herself and had dragged me into it too.
But I don’t blame her now. Now, finally, I understand.
People start arriving from Kirkwall just before midday. We watch them setting off from the far shore; some walk along the barriers as far as they can, then decide that the gap in the centre is still too big and they must take their boats. The sea is whipping up a fury and the route across is nearly impassable. As soon as the barriers are finished, that won’t matter. For thousands of years, this island has been cut off, private, cursed. Now those old tales are dying out.
The faces of the Orcadians in the boat are eager, expectant. Some of their owners point across at the chapel on the hill, and the place where Con and I are standing. We have positioned ourselves here intentionally. So much of today’s success will depend upon us being seen.
Angus MacLeod must be among the people in the boats – he wouldn’t miss this. Standing on the hill, letting him look at me, but unable to see him, I feel as if everything is being flayed from me. Clothes, skin, flesh. I stand, shuddering in my bones.
Con slips her hand into mine.
After the boats have moored in the bay, she and I walk across to the chapel to wait. I wonder where Cesare is, in the camp. I hope he doesn’t meet Angus when he is alone. My chest contracts in fear.
The chapel is cold and filled with a light the colour of old paper. While we are waiting, I offer up a quick prayer to whatever force for good there may be in this world. Then I stand, alongside Con, just inside the door. My legs feel weak and I’d like nothing more than to hide in the bothy. I know from her uneasy expression that Con feels the same, but it won’t do: we have to be seen by as many people as possible.
We hear them coming up the hill: their shouts and laughter. It is a feast day, after all, and for many of them, it’ll be the first time they’ve been to the island. They hesitate outside the chapel: we hear them marvelling at its beauty, its elegance, at how like a real stone building it is.
I feel a swell of pride and wish Cesare could hear them. Except that they probably wouldn’t say it to him.
John O’Farrell is the first into the chapel. His hair is greyer than I remember it, his face pouched, his skin pale. Bess told me the rumours about his son, James, and my heart aches for the boy I remember playing with, and for the man standing before me now – the man who was once my father’s best friend. He stares at the walls and ceiling in gape-mouthed wonder – he doesn’t notice me, or Con, standing just inside the door.
‘Hello, Mr O’Farrell.’ I feel suddenly shy, meeting this man from my old life, who helped teach me my times tables and how to hold a pen.
‘Oh, hello there!’ His eyes flick from me to Con, and then he looks at my skirt and her trousers and says, ‘Dot.’
I nod, wondering how much we’ve changed to other people. How is it possible to be entirely transformed on the inside and still look like the same person to the rest of the world? I thought the same after our parents disappeared when people would say, approvingly, You look well, as if they expected me to be constantly wailing or tearing out my hair. As if they expected sorrow to have bent me double, or aged me, or twisted my features. As if, because this hadn’t happened, I must be coping.
And I would think, What do you know about grief? About loss? About anything at all?
John O’Farrell shifts awkwardly and looks down at his feet. ‘I’m sorry if things have been . . . difficult here.’
I wonder how much news from the island has reached Kirkwall, how many made-up stories. And I think of the promise John made, to our fisherman father when our mother was so ill, that he would always protect us if he had to.
‘I think . . .’ I say, and I can see John bracing himself, I think war makes everything difficult, everywhere. One way or another.’
He smiles gratefully. ‘You’re a good girl, Dot.’
I return the smile. And I think, What do you know?
After John has moved to the front of the chapel to look at the paintings, other people file in: old Mr Cameron, coughing; Neil MacClenny and his family; Bess Croy’s mother, Marjorie, with all her young brood. The children gasp and gawk at the pictures. They run their fingers over the plasterboard and stroke the rood screen. Laughter echoes through the chapel. Every face is filled with wonder and delight.
Then Robert MacRae comes in, his face set in a sneer. And behind him walks Angus MacLeod. Nausea rinses through me, but I do exactly as we’d planned. I go to Con’s side, straight away, standing close enough for our arms to touch.
Angus stops in front of us.
‘Well, aren’t you a doubly fine sight on a terrible day?’ he says.
‘Hello, Angus.’ I force the words out. There are so many reasons that I must be friendly to him today, but the most important one, at the moment, is that he must be calm when Cesare arrives. Because I will not be here to keep the peace.
He looks me up and down, smiles, then leans in close. ‘I’m sorry about . . .’ He touches his throat briefly. ‘I didn’t mean to hurt you. Truly.’ His eyes are wide and earnest.
I want to shout, You held me against a wall by my neck. You forced your tongue into my mouth. You tried to tear off my underwear. How could you not hurt me?
I swallow. I nod. I can hear my heart beating in my ears. If I say anything, I will vomit or scream. I force myself to smile. My muscles feel rigid, wooden.
‘Con.’ Angus says, and I see the same stiff smile on her face.
‘Hello,’ she says, and her voice sounds high-pitched, as if fingers are pressing against her throat.
Angus looks us both up and down again, then moves on into the chapel. I hear him whisper something to Robert and both of them laugh, loudly.
My skin crawls.
I turn to Con. She is pale, her breath coming fast.
‘Right. We can go now. You’re ready?’
Wordlessly, she nods and we walk back towards the bothy. The wind is whipping more strongly now. Down in the camp, the prisoners are lining up, ready to march up to the chapel for the blessing. Cesare must be among them, but I can see only a mass of those brown uniforms with their red targets. My mouth is dry. We can’t afford to fail.
Inside, the bothy is warmer, with the last faint ashes of the peat fire still glowing in the grate. I hold my hands up to it – who knows when I will next be warm?
Then I take off my skirt and give it to Con. She pulls off her trousers and passes them to me. They hold the heat from her skin still. I put them on, experiment with bending down in them, then try lifting my legs high, as if I’m climbing into a boat.
‘This is so much easier!’ I exclaim.
‘I know.’ Con pulls on my heavy woollen skirt with such distaste that I can’t help smiling, despite my fear, despite my dread. Despite the electric stretch in the air, like a thread ready to snap.
I turn to take a last look at the bothy, imprinting it on my mind. Then I tuck the bag under my coat and Con and I walk out of our home into the gathering storm.
No time for tears, although I can feel the familiar ache in my throat, the bubble of grief swelling in my chest as we walk towards the camp. Dot says nothing, but flashes a quick, tight smile at me.
What will I do without you?
The thought echoes what our mother used to say to us, after she became ill and we moved back into the Kirkwall house to nurse her. We would sponge her cheeks and chest; we would hold a glass of water to her lips. We were twenty-three and all our lives she had been the strongest person we knew. She lay in bed, weak as a child, her eyes burning. And she would say to us, What would I do without you?
The words wheezed from her; the house echoed with the rattle of her breath. On the day she and Daddy were supposed to go on the boat to Scotland, to get her some better medicine, I stayed out late walking, because I didn’t want to say goodbye to her. I didn’t want to watch her go, knowing I might never see her again.
But she wouldn’t leave without saying goodbye to me. So they waited for me to return. They waited and waited and, all the while, the wind rose. And by the time I arrived home she was grey with pain but the waters were too rough for rowing across to Scotland. But I felt guilty, so guilty. I couldn’t stand the thought that I’d increased her pain. And so I persuaded them to row out on those rough waters. Daddy had been out in worse, I knew. I told them to go so that I wouldn’t feel so guilty for being selfish and not wanting to say goodbye to her.
I screamed at them.
They never came back.
It won’t be like that today, I tell myself. Dot will be safe; she will return. This isn’t for ever, it’s just for a short time, just until the war is over.
If the war is ever over.
I crush the thought.
Dot is walking next to me, deep in reflection.
I don’t know what to say to her. The wind whips tears from my eyes. The sea heaves, covered with white caps. It is a grim and sickly grey.
‘Are you sure you won’t come with us?’ Dot asks.
My stomach twists but I shake my head. ‘The hospital in Kirkwall needs nurses. There are always people brought in after storms – I’d like that, I think, helping people.’
I think of our parents: of how I wish I could have taken them from the sea and cared for them. How I wish I could have kept them safe. I clear my throat and say, ‘There’s a life for me here.’
I keep my voice level because I can’t allow her to guess at my uncertainty and fear. I can’t allow her to suspect the other part of my plan for today, the part I’ve barely allowed myself to think about. The part that will allow me to be free. If Dot suspects, she will try to stop me. If she suspects, she will not leave.
And if it works, I will be able to live in Kirkwall again. I will refuse to feel shame. I will face people again. I won’t run away.
The camp is deserted, apart from a single guard, who is red-faced and squinting in the wind, and keeps looking up towards the chapel. His body stiffens when he sees us walking down the hill. I feel a flash of fear and have to remind myself that he won’t hurt me.
I don’t think he’ll hurt me.
‘Shouldn’t you be up at that get-together in the chapel like everyone else?’ he asks resentfully.
I force myself to smile. ‘We have to come to the infirmary and check on the patients,’ I say. ‘So we’re working, just like you. But it doesn’t seem fair on you, when the other guards are all having fun. Are you here alone?’
He scowls. ‘We drew lots,’ he says. ‘So it’s fair enough, I suppose.’
I step closer, making my voice light, despite the fear I feel at being so close to this man, this stranger, who is so much stronger than me. ‘Why don’t you go up to the chapel with the others? It seems a shame for you to miss it. There are hardly any prisoners here, only the men in the infirmary and we’ll be watching them.’
‘I can’t leave my post without getting a court-martial.’ He eyes me suspiciously, then looks at Dot, at the bag she’s carrying, full of her things for the journey.
‘What’s that you’ve got?’
I curse myself, wishing we’d hidden it better. But I’ve underestimated Dot.
‘Incontinence pads, for the soldiers whose catheters have come out. I’ve brought some of the cloths I use for my monthlies. Here.’ She holds up the bag; he turns away with an expression of disgust.
‘Get on with you.’
I hurry towards the infirmary, exhaling some of the jittery fear I’ve felt, and Dot follows.
‘If Bess is there,’ I say, ‘I’ll sidetrack her.’
But the infirmary is quiet. There are only three men in the beds and all of them are asleep. Bess must be out at the chapel, or else she’ll have gone into the mess hut to get to the food before all the prisoners arrive back.
‘Quick,’ I say to Dot, and turn to keep an eye on the door, while she goes to the supply cupboard. I hear the clink of bottles dropping into the bag, and the rattle of pills.
‘Take as much as you can,’ I say. ‘You might need to trade.’
She stuffs two extra bandages and another bottle of sulfa tablets into the bag, her face tense.
‘I don’t like doing it this way.’
‘You’ve no choice.’
When we go back outside, it’s raining. The guard by the gate stands with his back to us, hunch-shouldered.
‘I’ll distract him,’ I say. Because I can do this for her. I can.
She nods and pulls me into a hard embrace. I wrap my arms around her, concentrating on the rhythm of my breath, on keeping it steady, in time with hers.
I mustn’t fall apart now.
‘Be careful,’ I choke.
‘You too.’
What else can I say to her? How can I say goodbye to half of myself?
I let her go. She turns and steps into the shadows behind the infirmary as I crush my nerves and call out to the guard. I tell him I heard a noise. I ask him if someone might have come across to the camp from Kirkwall, instead of going to the chapel.
The guard grumbles in irritation, but he dutifully searches the other side of the infirmary, and down between two of the first empty huts. And while I help him to check, Dot slips out from behind the infirmary and towards the gate. She doesn’t turn to wave, or for one last look, but puts her head down against the rain, walking quickly in the direction of the bay.
Something inside me cracks and collapses.
And as I thank the guard – who cannot find anyone skulking near the infirmary – and walk back up the hill towards the chapel, I feel a ripping sensation in my chest, as if my lungs are being squeezed and I cannot draw enough air. Or as if a hand is reaching into my ribcage and placing a cold finger next to my heart.
The wind snaps my hair across my face and drowns the sound of my sobbing.
By the time I reach the chapel, my breathing has steadied.
The Italians are massed around the outside of the building – and perhaps some are inside, too, with the people from Kirkwall. Maybe those prisoners who helped with the farming work on the mainland have also been allowed into the dry and the warmth, or perhaps not. I’m sure that allowing the foreigners to work on their land feels very different to the island people from being alongside them in a church.
At first, I worry that I won’t be able to find Cesare, but after the first few prisoners turn and see me, the word travels through the crowd, and soon they are all turning to look at me.
Like a pack of hungry dogs, I think, and the old fear washes over me again. I nearly turn away, nearly walk back over the hill to the bothy. But I cannot. Because of Dot. Because I am being brave.
My cheeks flame as the prisoners step to one side. As I walk through the crowd to try to find Cesare, I am aware of the closeness of these men, watching me. The size of them, the musky smell of them, like something feral and waiting. I imagine all of them with Angus’s face, with his greedy eyes and his crushing hands.
And I stop, staring at my feet, at the size of them, surrounded by these men’s boots, the smell of their sweat, the heat of their bodies, the boom of their laughter. I want to be with Dot, walking down towards the boat. I want to be back in the bothy. I want to be back in the house in Kirkwall, before our parents left.
‘Dorotea!’ a prisoner’s voice shouts. And I turn, hope rising in my chest, expecting to see her coming over the hill. But the prisoner calls again, and someone grasps my hand. And I jump and recoil and look up into Gino’s face. He has a cap pulled down low over his head.
‘Dorotea?’ he asks.
I remember. I swallow my fear. ‘Yes,’ I say.
‘Cesare is here.’
I nod, unable to force any more words past my dread.
Cesare is standing just behind Gino. He, too, is wearing a hat, where most of the other prisoners are bare-headed.
Cesare smiles when he sees me, and says, ‘Bella,’ but there is another question in his eyes. Something like, Is everything all right? Or, Is she safe?
I give a tiny nod and watch the relief tug his smile wider. And there is no name for what I feel then, for the mixture of jealousy and loss and release. She has someone who loves her absolutely, and without question. I have only her in this world, and I have to let her go.
Cesare stands next to me until the people from Kirkwall begin filing out of the chapel. They flinch as they walk into the blasting wind and rain, but still, I see Angus emerge from the building, searching, ignoring the weather. His gaze travels over the crowd of prisoners, finds me, standing next to Cesare, and stops.
His mouth sets in a thin line and he begins moving towards us, just as the guards blow the whistle for the prisoners to walk down towards the mess hut.
The Italians give a whoop and I’m carried along with them, down the hill. Cesare is next to me, within arm’s reach, and Gino is walking three steps ahead of us, although I notice he has taken off his hat. Somewhere behind us, Angus is watching. He will be trying to fight his way through the prisoners, trying to get to me.
My neck and back feel exposed but I daren’t look back.
Cesare turns to look at me. ‘You are ready?’ he calls.
I nod, although I don’t know the details of this part of the plan, don’t know what to expect.
Gino lifts a guard’s whistle to his lips and gives a short blast. Then I hear shouting off to our right, a scuffle and a yell: some of the prisoners have begun fighting. Everyone stops and turns as one prisoner shouts and swings his fist at another. More guards blow their whistles; the men all around me roar and, in the midst of the confusion, Cesare gives my fingers a quick squeeze, takes off his hat, and pushes away to the left, out of the crowd, away from the chaos. In less than three heartbeats, Gino is next to me, his hat pulled down low over his ears.
‘Now we are to stay away from that bastardo MacLeod,’ he says, ‘and we will make him believe that we are Dorotea and Cesare.’
I nod. I search the crowd anxiously for Angus and catch a glimpse of his face. He is watching the fight, looking on with satisfaction as the guards drag the two fighting men away, and off towards the Punishment Hut.
‘Do not worry,’ Gino says. ‘They will have extra food and cigarettes after.’
But I’m not worried about them – not truly. I’m thinking of Dot, waiting for Cesare. I’m imagining him running down the hill towards the bay. I’m picturing them stepping into the small rowing boat. I’m trying not to think of the danger that lurks under the grey-green surface of the water. Sea the colour of illness. The colour of drowned bodies.
I close my eyes and hold my breath, as if my hope and longing could carry her safely past the barriers.
And then the crowd begins to move forward towards the mess hut, and I walk alongside Gino, hoping we can fool Angus for long enough.
Food is laid out on all the tables. Bread and beans and tureens of steaming stew. There are plates of eggs and even a little bacon. The prisoners exclaim with joy and, in spite of my anxiety, my mouth waters: it is more food than I have ever seen and I’ve been too nervous to eat for days.
‘This is all the food for two weeks,’ Gino says. ‘Because we are finishing the barrier quickly. Just one gap and then it’s finish. We are leaving soon, I think. They say we are going in Wales? I do not know but I am eating all this food today, until I have a fat stomach!’
He laughs, but I can see tension around his eyes and I know that he must be thinking of Cesare, wondering if his friend is safe. He must be pretending, just as I am, must be gripped with terror, just like me.
He piles his plate high and offers to do the same for me, but I shake my head. He leans in and says, ‘You must try to eat, bella. Remember, you are Dorotea and I am Cesare. People must believe this. We are in love.’
‘I know,’ I say faintly.
His gaze is soft with pity. ‘We do a good thing for them. Now, you tell me if you see the bastardo and I turn my face from him. We must give them much time to escape.’
I nod and pick at the bread roll he gives me. It is like chalk in my mouth.
Around us, the prisoners shout and sing and eat. I can’t see Angus, and then I spot him, over in the corner of the mess hut. He isn’t eating either; his eyes skim repeatedly over the prisoners. I incline my head, so that Gino knows where he is standing. Gino moves his body so that Angus will see only his back, and I position myself so that Gino hides my face from view.
There are other people from Kirkwall in the hut now, other people who are not in uniform and will make me harder for Angus to find.
I keep my eyes fixed on Gino, watching him eat, and on Angus, but I can feel the assessing glances of the Orcadians. Blood creeps into my cheeks as I’m flooded with shame once more.
Dot had asked me once, just before we left Kirkwall nearly a year ago, if I thought I was punishing myself by hiding away, by refusing to look at my face in the mirror. And, in a way, I suppose I was torturing myself for what I’d allowed to happen – I felt I deserved to be unhappy.
But now, seeing the smug expression on the Orcadians’ faces when they note me blushing, I understand that I punished myself because that was what people expected. There was something reassuring to them in my shame, in my guilt, in my self-loathing. When I condemned myself, when I hid myself away, I made them feel safer – as long as I felt disgraced, then all was well in their world. Every time I looked in the mirror, I didn’t see myself through my own eyes, but through theirs. I saw my humiliation.
I’m tired of feeling ashamed.
And that is when I step away from the protection of Gino’s body. He is talking and laughing with another prisoner, so he doesn’t notice me moving to one side, into Angus’s line of vision.
I wait, feeling a jolt as Angus’s eyes lock on mine. I don’t know if he realizes it is me, or if he thinks I’m Dot. Either way, I know he will want to follow me.
Quietly, I squeeze through the crowd of prisoners until I am near the door.
Dot and Cesare must be in the boat. They will be moving out of sight, rowing towards freedom. There will be no one to see me, or Angus, now. There will be no one to stop me.
I turn back, to make sure he is following me, and then I push out into the cold and the growing darkness.
There are still some people from Kirkwall and some prisoners waiting outside the mess hut, but they are so keen to get inside and reach the food that they barely notice me.
I don’t look back again, but walk briskly across the yard. My boots tap on the stony ground. The sound is certain, definite. I listen to the rhythm of my footsteps, imagining that they belong to a more confident woman, a fearless woman. Imagining that they belong to someone like Dot.
I picture them together, passing through the barriers, out of sight of the island. The night will be closing around them, like a fist, hiding them – hiding everything.
The sea will be wild. The rocks are sharp. And if I am ready for Angus, if he doesn’t suspect anything, I will be able to surprise him.
I imagine the single hard push against his chest. I imagine him falling. I imagine the splash.
I am out of the yard now, out past the guard, out of sight of the camp. My fear is an animal thing, a writhing sickness that threatens to overwhelm me, but it mustn’t. I mustn’t stop now. I look back once more, to see that Angus is following.
And I begin to run.
Twice, while waiting for Cesare, I nearly go back to Con. But then I remember the thud of Angus’s fists against Cesare’s skull. I remember the pressure of his fingers around my neck. And I stay by the boat, waiting. In my pocket is Con’s gold chain. I will find a place to fling it into the sea, once Cesare arrives.
I imagine him changing his mind. I picture him going into the mess hut with the other prisoners, staying with Gino and the rest. He is giving up everything for me. And I am giving up everything for him. But what if it’s not enough? What if everything we have to give and all the things we sacrifice are not enough?
I run my hand over the metal heart again and again, thinking of his hands making it, picturing the smooth, scarred skin on his palm.
The hill is blank and bleak. From here, I can’t see the chapel. I can’t see the camp or the bothy. The island looks deserted, as though it has been plucked out of time. As though no one is alive here any more, apart from me, standing on the beach, waiting, my heart in my hand.
And then I see him. He is running down the hill towards the beach. For a moment, I worry that someone is chasing him, but there is no one. He is here. He has come for me and all will be well.
He wraps his arms around me, lifting me briefly off my feet. His cheeks are cold.
‘I thought you were going to leave me here,’ I say.
‘I will not leave you ever.’ But he doesn’t meet my eyes, and though he sounds sure, and though he is here with me, I see how much it’s hurt him to abandon his countrymen. And I feel the same dull thud in my chest at leaving Con, at leaving part of myself on this island.
‘You are ready?’ he says, eyeing the greenish sea, the dark waves, the white-caps.
‘Yes.’
Together, we push the boat into the water, battling against the surging waves, and scramble in, soaked and shivering. The clutch of the cold sea gives me a moment of doubt, but I push it away. There can be no return now.
I pass him an oar and we begin to row together, heaving the boat away from the shore. He rows awkwardly at first, but he is strong, and soon we find a rhythm, although the wind and waves make it hard to keep time against the pitching boat and the rolling swell of the sea. Salt spray stings my eyes and fills my mouth; my skin is cold and rain-slicked but I pull on the oar with all my strength. A savage energy courses through me. Soon, we will be safe; soon, he will be free.
There are many small towns along the north coast of Scotland – Con and I visited them once with our parents, spending a week travelling from John o’Groats to Wick and down to Crowbie. Inland, I remember a wild landscape of rocks and heather and gorse – whole areas without a house in sight. And I remember old, deserted farmhouses and fishermen’s cottages with collapsed roofs. Con and I have lived in the bothy on Selkie Holm for almost a year: Cesare and I will be able to find somewhere to shelter, at least for a while – somewhere isolated, away from people, where his accent and dark hair and tanned skin won’t matter because no one will find us. And perhaps, if we stay in an area close to the shore, I will hear news of Con from people in one of the villages. And perhaps, after the war is over, I will be able to convince her to come with me to Italy.
Perhaps. Perhaps.
I know these are fairy stories, so I don’t say them out loud to Cesare. I pull on my oar, and every stroke makes my muscles burn and my heart ache.
‘Was Con safe when you left her?’ I ask.
‘Yes, bella.’ He is out of breath but pulls hard on his oar. The boat pitches with every wave. ‘She is safe with Gino.’
We are nearing the barriers now: the water crashes against the rocks and cement, and torrents through the last small gap. I heard Neil MacClenny saying in the chapel that the barriers have changed the current. Everything is dragged northwards now – to who knows where? For a moment, I allow myself to imagine our rowing boat being hauled towards the blank expanse of the North Sea. If we were lucky, we might reach the Shetland Islands, or Fair Isle, where my mother was born. More likely, we would die of thirst.
The boat rocks and pitches. Salt water burns my eyes.
I imagine Con, waiting for me to return. I imagine her alone.
I hear a shout on the wind. A voice that sounds like hers. A word that sounds like a cry of despair.
No!
At first, I think it’s my mind playing tricks on me, but then I hear the cry again and I see a figure on the barrier, running.
No! No, it can’t be.
A figure wearing a heavy skirt, and with long red hair, which is snapped around her face by the squall. She has stopped, her hands shielding her eyes, staring out towards the boat. Then she turns and begins moving back towards the land, running away from the barriers, away from the sea and our tiny vessel.
And then I see why.
Another figure is running along the barriers towards her – towards us. A man. He has seen our boat and gives a cry, pushing past Con and moving towards the end of the barrier, the part we will have to pass through to leave these islands.
I’m not close enough to see his blond hair or that sneering, handsome face, but still I recognize him. Even if we do get past him, Con will be left alone with him.
‘Shit,’ I say.
Cesare follows my gaze and says something in Italian that I don’t understand.
‘I have to go back to help her,’ I shout above the wind.
‘I will come with you –’
‘No! No, you mustn’t. He will kill you.’
‘I will not leave you,’ he calls. And he is already trying to turn the boat, trying to row away from the current that surges between the two halves of the barrier. And I love this man so much. This man who will risk his life for me without hesitation. This man who says, I will not leave you, with utter certainty, as if he is telling me that the sea is wet, or the sun is hot.
On the barrier, Angus is running still, but Con is following him, is running behind him. And I see what she intends.
I pull on the oars harder. We have to reach the barrier before she gets to him. But it is hopeless. The current has gripped the boat and is dragging it towards that gap between the piled rocks and steel and stones, where the water roars. We will be carried through and will leave them behind. I will be leaving Con alone in the darkness, on the lonely blockade, with him.
‘Con!’ I call desperately. But she has already reached Angus. She shoves at his back, but he doesn’t move, doesn’t waver, doesn’t stumble. I watch him grabbing at her arm, see him shouting something into her face. I see her shake her head and try to fight him off. But he won’t let go. And our boat is being dragged further away from her.
And then I’m standing up and the boat is plunging, and the sea is surging.
Cesare calls out and grabs my hand, but I shake him off.
And I see Con pushing her hands against Angus’s chest.
I watch him lose his balance and flail backwards.
I see him grab hold of her.
I watch them begin to fall together.
I hear her shout my name.
I jump.
The water hits me and I go under, fighting upwards to the surface, fighting against the current that is dragging everything towards the barriers. A wave crashes over my head and takes me under and twists me around. For a moment, everything is a mass of roaring water. There is no air.
I swim desperately towards light and life, but there is nothing except bubbling confusion. My lungs burn.
I surface briefly and gasp a lungful of air, fighting to see Con or Cesare. But the boat is gone and the wild water around me is empty. Terror and panic swamp me. I have to find them. I swim towards the direction of the barriers, towards the place where I might be able to drag myself out. But another wave crashes over me, taking me under.
And then something grabs at my leg, pulling me further down, pulling me deeper, in towards the rocks and metal under the barrier.
And I know that the hand must belong to Angus, and that he is trying to drown me. And I know that the only thing to do, the only thing that will keep me alive, the only thing that will keep Con alive, wherever she is, is to drown him first.