The Blackhouse: Book One of the Lewis Trilogy by Peter May

Author:Peter May [May, Peter]
Language: eng
Format: epub
Publisher: Quercus
Published: 2011-01-04T22:00:00+00:00

Gigs’s croft was one of several on the lower slopes below Crobost, a narrow strip of land running down to the cliffs. He kept sheep and hens, and a couple of cows, and planted root vegetables and barley. He did a bit of fishing, too, though more for personal consumption than any kind of commerce, and would not have made ends meet had it not been for his wife’s part-time job as a waitress at a hotel in Stornoway.

Darkness had fallen by the time I got back from Mealanais, and I sat up on the hill above the MacAulay crofthouse looking down on the single light shining out from the kitchen window. It fell in a long slab across the yard, and I saw a cat moving through it, stalking something in the dark. Someone with a sledgehammer was trapped inside my chest and trying to break out. I felt physically sick.

There was still light in the sky away to the west, long, pale strips of it between lines of purple-grey cloud. No red in it whatsoever, which was not a good sign. I turned and watched the light as it faded and felt cold for the first time in weeks. The wind had turned. The warm, almost balmy south-westerly had swung around and carried on its edge now a chill straight down from the Arctic. The pace of the wind was picking up, and I could hear it whistling through the dry grasses. Change was on the way. When I looked down towards the crofthouse again, I could see the shadow of a figure in the kitchen window. It was Gigs. He was washing dishes at the sink. There was no car in the drive, which meant his wife was not yet back from town. I closed my eyes and clenched my fists and made my decision.

It took me only a few minutes to get down the hill to the croft, but as I reached the road a pair of car headlights swung up suddenly over the rise and raked across the moor in my direction. I ducked down by the fence, crouching amongst the reeds, and watched as the car turned into the drive and parked outside the crofthouse. Gigs’s wife got out. She was young, maybe twenty-five. A pretty girl, still in her white blouse and black skirt. She looked tired, a drag in her gait, as she pushed open the kitchen door. Through the window I saw Gigs taking her in his arms and giving her a long hug and then a kiss. My disappointment was acute. This was not something I could discuss with Gigs when his wife was around. I stood up from the long grass, leaped over the fence and pushed my hands deep into my pockets, heading off then towards the bothan on the Habost road.

There were very few bothans still operating after the big crackdown by the police. I never really saw what the problem was. They might have been unlicensed, but they were never run for profit.

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