Sealskin Read online

  His mother looked at them both, and suddenly Donald thought of what she must be seeing: her son holding the wrist of this near-naked girl, wide-eyed in the firelight, with blood on her bare legs. He would not meet his mother’s gaze. There was a long moment of silence, and then she was up, putting an arm around the girl and leading her into the bedroom, murmuring something soft and reassuring. Over her shoulder she said, ‘Go and get water and put on the kettle. Now!’ and then she shut the door upon him.

  Donald turned away, letting responsibility slide from his shoulders. She was in charge now, as she had been all his life. She would take care of it all.

  He went to and fro, filling buckets from the well, making up the fire and setting the kettle to boil – all the simple things he had been doing every day of his life as far back as he could remember. There was no room for what had just happened, no sense to be made of it, and so he did not try. He thought about the sealskin, bundled where he had left it between the rocks. It was safe enough; it was well above the tideline, and there were no storms due. His mother came through for hot water, and left without speaking to him. There was nothing to do but wait for what came next.

  He was staring into the fire when the bedroom door finally opened again. His mother stood in the doorway, so he could not see past her into the bedroom. She put a hand up to the doorframe and rested her weight against it for a moment, as though she were very weary.

  He started up, holding out a cup to her. ‘Shall I pour one cup, or two? I wasn’t sure if…’ He faltered to a stop under her straight gaze.

  ‘Donald,’ she said, ‘what have you done?’

  ‘I found her like that, just by herself there. Will she be all right? Maybe there’ll be others from the wreck; I’ll go and look, shall I?’

  She cut him off with an impatient sweep of her hand. ‘For God’s sake, boy, there’s not a spar or a cask comes ashore but everyone knows about it. There’s been no wreck. Now tell me exactly how you found her, and where.’

  Resentment rose hot in his throat, mixed with a strange kind of relief. He had never been able to lie to her. ‘Mother,’ he said, his voice rich with the wonder of it, ‘she’s a selkie. They were dancing on the skerry, and I saw them.’

  She nodded, once, as though she’d already guessed the truth of it, and came slowly forward to drop into the other chair by the fire.

  The story came tumbling out of him now, all of it except the thing that he had done to her, the thing he could not bring himself to think about, here at his mother’s hearth. When he had run out of words, she looked up at him, and there was something in her expression he had never seen before. Respect, or scorn? Elation, or fear? Or, somehow, all of those things at once. Donald was unnerved. ‘What is it? Why are you looking at me like that?’

  ‘Well,’ she said. ‘Where to start? I never thought I’d see you married at all, Donald Macfarlane, but it seems you’ve managed it in your own strange way, and we must make the best of it.’

  ‘What? What are you talking about?’

  ‘Use the brains you were born with, boy. That dance was never meant for you. They were maidens, ready for mating. If you hadn’t come along, she’d have had a husband of her own kind by the end of the night. But you took her instead. You’ve made your bed, and now you must lie in it.’

  He pushed back his chair, away from her and her senseless words. ‘What are you saying? I can’t marry that … that creature!’

  His mother’s eyes hardened. ‘It’s too late now. You can’t undo what you did.’

  ‘I’ll take her back there, tonight! I’ll give her back her sealskin, and there’s an end of it!’

  ‘Oh, Donald. You could have just left her there, let her go back to the sea. But you brought her home. Why?’

  ‘I don’t know! I don’t know how it all happened; I never meant to…’ He faltered to a stop, then tried again. ‘It felt as though it was just for me. If you had seen them! I couldn’t just leave her. They were so marvellous…’

  His mother said nothing. Only watched, and waited.

  ‘Well,’ he said at length, ‘I was wrong, then. I got it all wrong, like I always do. I’ll go now, while the moon’s still high.’

  ‘Donald,’ his mother said patiently, ‘there will be a child.’

  4

  ‘You can’t know that!’ he shouted at her. ‘How could you possibly know that? Even I know it’s weeks before you can tell for sure. And anyway, how could you even think of such a thing? What sort of monster would it be, for God’s sake? You’re out of your senses. I’ll take her down there right this minute.’ He had risen from his chair and was starting towards the bedroom door, but his mother was there before him, and he could not bring himself to lay hands on her.

  ‘Donald, will you sit down and listen to me? We haven’t much time. The whole village will know soon, and we have to think out what we’re going to say.’

  Again, she’d caught him off balance. The whole village? What had it got to do with anyone else? He turned away and went to the window, to stare out at the moonlit garden. It looked just the same as ever, but he listened, despite himself, as his mother’s words unmade his world.

  ‘I don’t know for certain, of course, but it’s very likely,’ she said slowly, as though she were thinking it out as she spoke. ‘They would have been maidens, ready to choose their mates. It’s the right time of year for that. And you’re both young and healthy, so that’s the way of it. We’ll know for sure before too long. And in the meantime, people will be talking.’

  ‘But there needn’t be any meantime! I can just take her down to the skerry now, and no-one will be the wiser!’ He had swung round to face her, but his resolve withered again at the look in her eyes. Not many people would cross Bridie Macfarlane when she was determined, and her own son least of all.

  ‘I don’t know if she could change back, with your seed inside her. And even if she could, would you condemn your own son or daughter to be born out there on the rocks, when the time comes? You may find it hard to imagine what goes on in other people’s minds, Donald, but you’re not a cruel man. And in any case, I won’t let it happen. This is my grandchild we’re talking about, and I will do all I can to give it the best possible chance in the world.’

  She saw a change in him, saw that she had won, at least for the time being. She came to sit down again. He said nothing, and after a few moments she went on.

  ‘I was thinking it through while I was tending to her. The best way is to say she’s some kin to me, say a cousin’s child, back inland, where I grew up. That’s fairly safe; no-one travels there much. We can say her parents have died recently, and when we visited last spring, you and she made … an understanding.’

  Donald snorted. ‘As if she could understand anything! How will you explain that she’s wordless and witless too? And how could she have come here by herself, with nobody noticing?’

  Bridie nodded at this. ‘It’s a problem, that’s true. If we can keep her hidden for a few days, we can say you went to see her and brought her back with you. As for the way she is … maybe we can say she had the fever as a child, and it’s altered her mind. But Donald’ – and here she looked straight at him – ‘you don’t really think she’s a witless creature, do you?’

  ‘I don’t know! No, I suppose not – how can I tell?’ He thought of the selkies’ playfulness on the skerry, the way they had helped each other. And he thought, too, of the terror she had put into him as she lay under him on the sand. Was that her doing, or was it his own sense of wrong that had given him those nightmare visions? He wrenched his mind away from that place. ‘No,’ he said again, more slowly. ‘It’s more like they were children, just doing everything for the first time.’

  ‘That’s how it seems to me, too. Her eyes are like a young child’s who has it all to learn. And her skin is so soft, so fine; it’s like Maggie Kildare’s baby’s, that was born before its time. But we’ll know, soon enough.’ Bridie got up again, and her weariness was strong
er now. ‘We must get some rest. And you must stay out of sight, if you can. The rest we’ll have to leave until morning.’ Without another word, as though it was all decided, she went through into the bedroom and shut the door upon him.

  5

  For the next few days, Donald took himself off before dawn – to beaches and coves that were far away from the village, and inland to hunt rabbits and gather herbs for his mother’s medicines. If the weather had been fairer he would have slept out somewhere, for he had no desire to come back to the house at all; but it was too cold for that. He crept back under cover of darkness, to eat a hot meal and fall into bed. Once, when his mother was seeing to the beasts in the barn, he went to the bedroom door and looked inside. She was there, curled in the big bed, dressed in one of his mother’s nightgowns. Her long, dark hair spread over the pillow, and slow, silent tears welled from her open eyes. At the sight of him she shrank back against the wall, and he quickly closed the door. I’ve seen the seals weep like that, he thought; it doesn’t mean anything. Even as he thought it, he pushed the idea away in disgust and flung himself out again, into the rain.

  On the fifth evening, when he came in, his mother and the girl were sitting at the kitchen table. Bridie was holding a bowl of hot barley broth and spooning it into the girl’s mouth as though she were feeding a baby. The girl opened her mouth obediently, waiting for the next spoonful, but she started up when she saw Donald.

  Bridie said to him, ‘Don’t move!’ and then, with gentle hands and soothing words, she persuaded the girl to sit down again. ‘There, you see, nothing to worry about at all. It’s only Donald; he’ll do you no harm, I promise you.’

  The girl could not have understood the words, but she grew calmer as she listened. Then Bridie said, ‘Watch now,’ and she put the spoon into the girl’s hand. Curling her own hand around it, Bridie guided the spoon again up to the girl’s mouth, and then let go. After a moment, she pushed it into her mouth of her own accord, and when Bridie smiled and said, ‘Well done, lass! That’s the way!’ she smiled back.

  ‘You see?’ said Bridie to Donald, without turning around. ‘She’s learning all the time. Maybe she’ll even start to speak, one day. What stories she could tell! If she remembers her old life by that time, of course.’

  ‘Why would she forget, if she’s so clever?’ Donald could not stop himself; they looked so cosy there by the fire.

  Bridie gave him a hard look. ‘Enough of that. We must give her a name. If she had one before, she can’t tell us what it was. What do you think?’

  ‘How should I know?’ said Donald, sullenly.

  ‘Well, I think Mairhi would be a good name for her; it’s in my family, after all, so no-one will think anything of it.’

  Mairhi. The name on the headstone, wearing away now, up in the churchyard under a rowan tree. He could just remember his little sister, stumbling after him down the path, crying when she stung her hand on the nettles, laughing when he tickled her. She had had it all to learn, too, when the fever burned her life away. His mother was looking down at the bowl of broth, so he could not see her face.

  ‘Aye,’ he said, more gently, ‘it’s a good name.’

  ‘Well, then,’ she said, and her voice trembled a little, ‘that’s who you’re to be, my lass. Mairhi.’ And she reached out to touch the girl’s chest. ‘And I’m Bridie, and this is Donald.’ She beckoned him forward. ‘A new start, Donald,’ she said in a low voice. ‘And better than the last one.’

  He felt his face flame, but said nothing. After a moment he came to sit at the table, and nodded awkwardly to Mairhi. His mother brought him some broth. When he picked up his spoon, Mairhi picked hers up as well, mimicking him as he put it in his mouth and swallowed. When he blew on the broth to cool it, she did the same, and pieces of barley and carrot sprayed onto the table. Donald laughed, and then she laughed too; that same hoarse chuckle he’d heard on the skerry. She blew again, harder, and crowed with delight. Even his mother was smiling, though she put out a hand and said, ‘That’s enough, now.’

  ‘What’s happened to her arm?’ he asked sharply. Where the sleeve of the nightgown had fallen back, the skin was red and blistered as though it had been burned. Mairhi cringed back in her chair, and his mother soothed her again, though Donald saw that she avoided touching the sore place.

  ‘It’s just her skin, reacting to being clothed, I think. Remember how yours used to itch and burn, when you were a wee lad? You still need my salve on your hands and face when you’ve to go out in the cold wind. I didn’t realise at first, but when I wrapped her in my woollen shawl, it brought her out in great weals all over. It’s as though her skin’s too new, or too thin. I’m hoping it will get stronger in time. I’ll need you to get me some more chickweed and nettle tops tomorrow, if you can find any; I’ve used up all my stock. But she really is learning, Donald; you can see for yourself.’ There was a hint of pleading in her voice, but he gave his attention back to the hot broth, and she said no more.

  He remembered, all right; remembered the jeering in the schoolyard when they pulled up his shirt to look at the latest crop of blisters. No-one else seemed to have trouble with ordinary things, like wool against flesh; no-one else had hands that cracked and bled so easily when they hauled ropes or mended nets. It was one of the reasons he went out alone so much, staying inshore and working the crab and lobster pots, though it paid poorly. He could not pull his weight, and he knew, in their eyes, it made him less of a man. He still itched and burned on hot nights, but he did not cry for his mother’s salves any more. Some things you just had to learn to bear.

  6

  The next day, they took her outside for the first time. Both of them together, though neither of them voiced the fear that she might try to run away. But Mairhi only looked around her as though dazed, at the vegetable garden and the hens and the low wall between croft and open hillside, and at the distant seashore. The sound of the waves came to them on the wind, and they watched for some sign that she recognised it; but there was none. Perhaps it was simply that she had never been without it; or perhaps, for her, the world was so changed, she did not recognise the traces of her old life.

  She lifted her feet up and down, feeling the weight of Bridie’s old boots, which were too big for her, and, staying close to Bridie, watched the hens scratching for food. She shrank away when Donald brought out the cow for milking, but when one of the barn cats came and rubbed itself against her, she laughed, and put out a hand to smooth the soft fur, her arms sore, blistered. Donald knew how that must feel, how the cold wind would be soothing even while it made the soreness worse. Maybe the other children had felt the way he did now: a queasy mixture of pity and revulsion that made them want to hurt him. His mother had tried to help, telling him it was not his fault; but somehow that never quite felt true. And now, of course, it was his fault, and there was no getting out of it.

  When the milking was done, they went back to the house. As they rounded the corner of the barn, Bridie nodded towards the nearest house in the village, almost out of sight behind the hill. ‘This’ll bring them out, sure enough,’ she said.

  She was right, of course. There had been no sign of anybody all the time they were outside, but while they were at breakfast the next morning, a knock sounded at the door.

  Bridie threw Donald a look as she went to open it, a look that said plainly, ‘Let me do the talking.’ Donald was not about to argue. He always let her speak for him, except when he could not avoid it.

  It was not Hector Macdonald, their nearest neighbour, but old Mrs Mackay from the main street of the village, by the harbour. She rarely went far from home these days, but her appetite for gossip, and her status as one of the oldest married women, meant that she had claimed the right to be the first to come calling. It also meant that the whole village knew by now, and there was no more hiding. Faced with a visitor, Donald would normally have muttered some excuse and made his escape, but he knew better than to try that this time.

  ‘Mrs M
ackay,’ Bridie said brightly. ‘What brings you out in this weather? Come in by the fire and take some tea. Donald, would you fill the kettle for me?’

  The old lady sank into the fireside chair, taking her time. ‘Oh, well now, it’s not so bad. But my joints have been aching with all the wet, and I’ve just about used up the ointment you made for me. I was hoping to catch you in the village, but no-one’s seen you about for days, so I thought I’d come and ask you before I run out altogether.’ Her eyes were busy as she spoke, flitting like summer flies here and there, but never resting anywhere for long. Most especially, she did not once look directly at Mairhi, who still sat at the table, spoon in hand.

  ‘Goodness me, and I thought I’d given you enough to last for months! I’ll see about making some more later on, then I’ll bring it down to you myself. I would have been out sooner, but we’ve had sickness in the house.’ Bridie glanced at Mairhi, and back to her guest. ‘Oh, we’re safe enough now, I should think; it’s been almost a week since she came, and no fever for the last few days, though she still has a rash.’ And then, as though it had just occurred to her: ‘But where are my manners? This is Mairhi McArthur, my cousin James’ daughter from Kilbeag, where I grew up. Donald’s been away to see them, and he brought her back with him.’ Then, lowering her voice, as though Mairhi, sitting not three feet away, might somehow not hear her next words, she said, ‘He found them all poorly and stayed to help, but it was too late for her parents, poor lass. She’s got no-one else in the world, so he brought her away. And we’ve stayed indoors until I was sure it was safe, you see.’

  ‘Dear me,’ said Mrs Mackay, looking directly at Mairhi for the first time. ‘And no family left at all, the poor lassie. That must have been a terrible fever. What were you thinking, Donald, to bring a poor sick girl all this way?’