Never Go Back (30 page)

The funeral of Murdo Munro took place on Vatersay a week later. Harry was the only mourner who was neither a relative nor an islander. Ailsa had asked him to attend if he could, though her husband’s demeanour suggested he would have preferred him to stay away. Others may have felt the same. Dougie McLeish for one shot him several disapproving glances as the coffin was lowered into the ground. Nothing was actually said, though. Even by McLeish.

Much would be said later, of course. The rumour mill would grind on, probably for years. Harry knew that. He also knew that attending the gathering held afterwards in Vatersay’s community hall would not be the smartest of moves. Murdo’s friends were aware that a great deal was being kept from them about the circumstances of his death. They did not need Harry’s company to remind them of the fact.

Ailsa was to some degree in the same position as Harry, though granted special consideration as the sister of the deceased and only surviving child of the late lamented Hamish. This, she explained when she drove Harry up to the airport in good time for his flight back to Glasgow, was the real reason why she had pressed him to come in the first place.

‘You’re the only person who experienced it all with me,’ she said, as they crossed the causeway to Barra. ‘I’m holding out on people to greater or lesser degrees and they know it. Aunts, uncles, cousins, old friends of the family. Even my own children. I tell them so much and no more. It’s in their own interests, of course, but…’

‘It rankles.’

‘It does. With them and me. There’s no alternative. I realize that. And Iain agrees. I’ve told him everything. As I assume you have your wife. Does she feel the same way?’

‘Yes. Let sleeping dogs lie seems to be the general consensus.’

‘Sleeping dogs — or dead ones.’

‘What has Knox told you about Wiseman’s death?’

‘Heart failure. A congenital weakness, apparently.’

‘Congenital — and convenient.’

‘Quite.’

Wiseman’s death was of course even more convenient than Ailsa knew, since it ensured no-one would need to ask awkward questions about who else might have killed Danger-field — and why. But Harry had no intention of mentioning that aspect of the affair, so it seemed safer to change the subject. ‘Will you keep the croft in the family?’ he asked.

‘No, no. We’ll let it go. There’ll be nothing to bring me back here now. And in the circumstances…’

‘That may be best.’

‘Yes. It may.’

—«»—«»—«»—

Harry had spent the previous night at the Heathbank Hotel, close to the airport and diplomatically distant from Castlebay. They stopped there to collect his bag. The cycle of the tides had shifted flights to and from Barra into the afternoon since his last visit. The plane was not due to depart for Glasgow until 4.15, leaving him with time on his hands. Ailsa was in no hurry to return to Vatersay. It was clear to Harry, indeed, that she was glad of any excuse not to. She drove him out past the airport to a beach at the far northern end of the island, where they strolled across an empty expanse of white sand beneath a wide blue sky mirrored in the glassy plane of the ocean.

‘Good weather for a landing on Haskurlay,’ said Ailsa, after they had walked in silence for several minutes.

‘Will you ever go there again?’

‘I’m not sure.’

‘I saw a photograph at the house of the three of you as children on a trip to the island with your father. You all looked… very happy.’

‘That photograph is how I’d like to remember it. And them. And maybe I can. If I stay away. Ironically, of course, you’ve never been there.’

‘No. Though if Wiseman had had his way…’

‘Why did he do it? Killing Father and Andrew in a panic was… almost pardonable. But cold-bloodedly commissioning the murder of several of his old comrades fifty years later … How could he bring himself to do that?’

‘As far as he made any sense on the subject to me, it came down to pride and vanity. He couldn’t stomach the shame of admitting what he’d done. And it seems he never thought of us as his comrades in any true sense. We were just… problems he hired Frank to solve for him.’

‘But in the process… he lost his own son. Poetic justice, I suppose. Blood for blood.’

‘Is that how it seems to you?’

‘No, Harry. It just seems like a madness that’s run its course. And for that at least… I’m grateful.’

—«»—«»—«»—

Half an hour later, they were standing in the airport car park next to the terminal building, watching the small Twin Otter touch down on the broad, flat sands of Traigh Mhor. Soon, Harry would be on his way. Soon, very soon, he would be leaving this tranche of his past far behind.

‘Has your wife gone home yet?’ Ailsa asked as the plane taxied across the beach towards them.

‘Last weekend. Duty called, I’m afraid.’

‘When will you join her?’

‘Tomorrow.’

‘Will you see Barry before you leave?’

‘Oh yes. We’re meeting for a farewell drink before I fly out.’

‘Is he up to that?’

‘Apparently. He’s been convalescing with his ex-wife in Swindon. I think he’s feeling better than he’s letting on, actually, for fear she’ll turf him out. Which she will do, of course. Eventually.’

‘What will he do then?’

‘I don’t know. I don’t suppose he knows either.’

‘Insecurity at his age can be difficult to cope with.’

‘True. But like he said to me before he left hospital, it’s better than oblivion. He could easily have died on that boat. We all could have. So…’

‘We’d better enjoy everything life has to offer.’ Ailsa beamed at Harry. ‘Hadn’t we?’

While Chipchase had been recuperating at Jackie’s house in Swindon, Harry had visited his own ex-wife, Zohra, and her growing family, in Newcastle. He had also spent a few days with his — and Zohra’s — former landlady, Mrs Tandy, in Kensal Green. He was, quite consciously, taking his leave of those he was fondest of in the land of his birth. With his mother dead and his old home destroyed, there was no telling when — or even if — he would be back.

The final farewell promised in its way to be the most poignant, manfully though both he and Chipchase would strive to disguise the fact. Harry stayed overnight with Mrs Tandy following his late return to London from Barra and took the train to Swindon the following morning. It had been arranged that he and Chipchase would fit in a couple of hours in the Glue Pot before Jackie drove Harry to Heathrow for his 4.30 flight to Vancouver.

This, then, was the end of many things. It could not be helped. It was bound to be. Harry belonged elsewhere now, happily so. Yet still his heart was heavy as he left Swindon station and headed west past the boundary wall of the GWR engineering works that were no more towards the Railway Village — and 37 Falmouth Street, that was also no more.

An inspection of the fenced-off gap between numbers 35 and 39 was an experience he intended for the moment to spare himself. Instead, he retraced his steps of three weeks before, across the park and up past his old primary school to Radnor Street Cemetery.

One happy consequence of the misadventures that had come his way during those weeks was that his return to Vancouver had been delayed long enough for him to be able to admire the re-erected and additionally inscribed headstone on the grave where his mother had so recently been buried, all of sixty-seven years after his father.

STANLEY REGINALD BARNETT

1905-1938

ALSO HIS LOVING WIFE

IVY ELIZABETH BARNETT, NÉE TIMMS

1912-2005

REUNITED

‘I hope your reunion up there went better than the one I got talked into attending down here, Mother,’ Harry murmured as he stood at the foot of the grave. ‘It can’t have gone worse and that’s a fact. But I’m OK. Which you’d probably say is the main thing.’

—«»—«»—«»—

Harry’s route from the cemetery enabled him to reach the Glue Pot without traversing Falmouth Street or even glancing along it. Later, after a suitable infusion of Dutch courage, he reckoned he might be up to taking a look at the burnt-out remains of the house he had been born in. He might even ask Jackie to drive round that way. Then again, he might not. He would have to see how he felt when the time came.

Chipchase was already installed in the pub and had been for a little while to judge by. the inroads he had made into a pint of beer, not to mention the amount of cigarette smoke hanging in the air. It was barely past noon and there were only a few other customers. A tranquil atmosphere prevailed, sunlight shafting hazily through the windows, the past readily conjurable in surroundings that were for Harry instantly and intimately familiar.

‘They’ve still got the Monkey’s Revenge on,’ said Chip-chase, who looked less like an invalid now his head was unbandaged, but rather more like an escapee from a chain gang thanks to the partial regrowth of his hair. ‘I’ve put one in for you.’

‘I thought you said you were feeling fine.’

‘I am.’

‘You can’t be if you’re paying for the first round.’

‘Ha-bloody-ha.’ The freshly pulled pint was plonked in front of Harry by the barman. ‘Get that down your neck and stop being so sarky.’

‘Cheers.’ Harry smiled and savoured a first swallow of beer. ‘That’s good.’

‘Let’s park ourselves over there.’ Chipchase slid off his bar stool and led the way to a settle just inside the door.

‘You’re sure you are fine, aren’t you?’ Harry asked after they had sat down. ‘Joking apart.’

‘Not according to the doc. He says I’m killing myself with booze and fags. But apparently they’re likely to be the culprits when I snuff it, not that bash on the bonce I gave myself. So, yeah, old Chipchase is officially as close to tip-top as he’s ever going to get.’

‘Delighted to hear it.’

‘There have been times when you might have preferred to hear I was sinking fast.’

‘There have been times when I had every right to feel that way. But after all we’ve been through together these last few weeks…’

‘Don’t tell me I’m back in your good books at long bloody last.’

‘I wouldn’t go that far. But I’m definitely willing to let bygones be bygones.’

‘Is that all I get for laying my life on the line for you? Bloody hell, Barnett, you’re a hard man.’

‘I’m a pushover and you know it.’

‘Bygones.’ Chipchase stubbed out his cigarette, quaffed some beer and glanced around the bar. He grew suddenly thoughtful. ‘Well, there are more than a few of ours linked to this place.’

‘That there are.’

A minute or so of reflective silence passed. Memories, remote as well as recent, crowded in around them. Then Chipchase said, ‘But let’s not start wallowing in nostalgia. Look ahead, not behind. That’s always been my motto. Even if just lately the view in either direction hasn’t been exactly mouth-watering.’

‘Made any plans?’

‘For the future, you mean?’

‘Well…’

‘I applied the old brainbox to the problem while I was laid up, since you ask.’

‘And?’

‘Drew a total bloody blank.’

‘Oh.’

‘Then…’

‘What?’

‘I had a stroke of luck.’ Chipchase grinned. ‘Yes, Harry old cock. Looks like I might not be a complete bloody write-off after all.’

‘How come?’

‘You might at least have the decency to look less surprised. My losing streak was bound to end sooner or later.’

‘OK. But how did it end?’

‘Well, while you were in Barra, Shona came down to see me. Wanted to check I was all right. She’d been worried about me, apparently, which was good to hear.’

‘I was meaning to ask. Did you and she ever…’ Harry’s raised eyebrows supplied their own question mark.

‘Mind your own and stop interrupting. The point is that Shona’s suddenly able to afford things like a spur-of-the-bloody-moment trip from Aberdeen to darkest Wilts because Danger left her a little something in his will, soft-hearted old bugger that he was.’

‘He did?’

‘Maybe more than a little. She was a bit coy about the exact number of noughts. Anyway, she’s decided to use the spondulicks to start her own business. She talked the idea over with Jackie. Evidently sees her as some kind of role model. They got on like a house on fire.’ Chipchase grimaced. ‘Bloody hell. Sorry, Harry. I could have put that better, couldn’t I?’

‘Never mind. What is this business?’

‘A guesthouse — well, small hotel, really — in St Andrews. She wants to get out of Aberdeen and reckons Fife is the area to aim for. Probably hopes that shiftless git of a son will refuse to go with her. I certainly hope so.’

‘Why should it matter to you?’ Harry asked innocently.

‘Because Shona will need someone to help her run the place. Someone… mature, far-sighted, adaptable—’

‘You?’

Chipchase smirked. ‘I’m on a shortlist of one.’

‘Bloody hell.’

‘Not bad, hey? Not bloody bad at all.’

‘I don’t know what to say.’

‘Congratulations would fit the bill. Well played, old sport. Something along those lines.’

‘But… St Andrews? Isn’t that the mecca of golf?’

‘So?’

‘You hate golf. And golfers.’

‘True. But taking money off golfers is a different bunch of bananas altogether. I could get seriously used to that. And just think of the scope I’ll have for dangling juicy investment opportunities in front of our golf-crazy, cash-laden guests.’ Chipchase finished his beer in a single gulp. ‘Let the good times roll. Again.’

Harry laughed. He could not help himself. It was a laugh of genuine pleasure.

‘What’s so funny?’

‘Life, Barry. Just life.’

‘Full of ups and bloody downs in my experience. And yours. It’s best to enjoy the ups while you can, Harry old cock.’

‘I’ll drink to that.’ Harry drained his glass. ‘My round, I think.’

‘Same again for me.’

‘Maybe we should switch to something weaker.’ Harry stood up, empty glasses in hand. ‘This stuff isn’t exactly a session ale, is it?’

‘Depends what kind of session you want.’ Chipchase clamped a celebratory cigar between his teeth and winked. ‘It’s up to you.’

ACKNOWLEDGEMENT

I am very grateful to John Brooks for sharing with me his memories of life in the Royal Air Force. Needless to say, his experiences bore no resemblance whatsoever to those of Aircraftmen Barnett and Chipchase.