excerpt
No one knew how long the Burn had offered safe haven to boats harassed by the North Channel storms. But the longships of the rampant Danes were here a thousand years ago. Nowadays the herring trawlers and the stone coasters of the home ports crowded into it and quarrelled over room like gulls on a cliff. Their ropes criss-crossed on the granite bollards; their fishing nets and floats draped the harbour walls; and granite square-setts, stacked upon the wharfs, awaited shipment to the city streets of Britain.
Today the harbour was quiet; only three yawls and a few rowing boats were moored there. The water was as still as treacle. Across the river from the entrance to the harbour, diagonally opposite to where Caitlin stood, the ruins of Killyshannagh Chapel, also known as the Sailors’ Church, rejoiced in having been released from the choke of ivy and brambles and thorn trees that had hidden it from sight for a large part of the three hundred years it had stood there. Shipwrecked sailors, vagrants and unbaptized babies were buried in the overgrown field behind the crumbling stone walls. Caitlin’s grandfather, Big George Corrigan, one of the unloved travelling people, was buried there. So was her mother. Caitlin herself often wished she could be buried there, within sight of the hills and the sound of the sea, but no burials were permitted there now except by consent of the district council, but even that was most often withheld. Finn MacLir had a permit allowing him to be buried there in the same grave as his first wife, the tragic Roisin Corrigan, but his burial could well be the last at Killyshannagh. Beyond the harbour and the ancient church and the stone-walled fields behind it, the chevroned line of mountains gleamed as if they had been painted in enamel on the blank backdrop of the sky.
Caitlin stepped on to the wharf and crossed to the edge of the harbour, where Nora was standing, looking down. Only then did Caitlin see the figures. The scene had looked empty and lifeless, with only the glint of reflected sun to highlight it like a watercolour. But figures were clustered on one of the fishing boats, some standing, exchanging words and glancing down into the centre of the group where others crouched over or hunkered round something on the deck. Caitlin felt uneasy. She clasped her sister’s hand, and Nora glanced at her.
A few yards to their left, old Tom Stump—his real name was Stevenson—sat on a bollard with his short leg stretched in front of him, his clasped hands resting on the pads of his crutches. He was watching what was going on below him in the boat and did not notice Caitlin till she spoke.
Mayanaam
vequinox
Manolis 