Seasons on Harris (30 page)

But, to give him his due, he seemed determined to give me a sporting chance by carefully instructing me in the graceful art of fly casting.

“Jus' get a nice, steady rhythm…start at nine o'clock and don't go back beyond one o'clock. Keep plenty of slack on the line…lean forward a little as y'cast…pull in the line gently by hand…then repeat the process. Remember that technique from
A River Runs Through It
—the four-beat rhythm. Right? An' if this blue fly doesn't work, I've got some others you can use,” he said, pointing to a little menagerie of flies hooked around the brim of his deerstalker hat.

David patiently nurtured me through the learning curve. “Gi'y'sel' a
wee bit more line…keep castin'…the breeze at y'back…” (Finally we had a slight breeze that rippled the water hypnotically.) “Pull it in gently—don't jerk it…watch y'backcast, y'r letting it stroke the water behind ye…Then David chuckled, “Unless a'course you're trying to fish both sides of the boat…in which case, y'doin' jus' fine…”

Slowly, painfully slowly, a rhythm began to emerge from what had been a mess of jerky, uncoordinated reflexes and matured gradually into a smoother sequence—an almost graceful flow of movements. Simple yet infinitely subtle, although apparently, after half an hour of careful casting, not quite subtle enough to tempt the elusive salmon and sea trout.

And what made it particularly frustrating was the fact that every few minutes we'd see one of these splendid creatures leap vertically out of the water nearby, do a little aerial pirouette, and then crash back down into the loch as if to say, “Hey, dummy! I'm over here!”

After another utterly uneventful half hour, I sat down in the boat feeling a little dejected. David was encouraging, though. “You're the man behind the rod…y'gettin' it now. That's pretty neat castin' y'doin' here. Y'gettin' the hang of it right enough.”

“Yes, but not even a nibble yet. They seem to be everywhere we're not!”

David laughed. “Y'got to be patient…a' mean, just sit and look at all this. Enjoy it. All these mountains, the reflections in the water, those golden eagles up there—y'see 'em? Up in that corrie near those crags on Sronz…just floatin'.”

“Yes—right. I've got them now.”

“Y'see,” said David, “it's not all about catchin' things like some people think. It's about being here…a' mean, people pay a small fortune just to get a few days o' this. Some of 'em start out wantin' to shoot or hook anything that moves and then gradually the peace o' the place comes in and th'start to settle down…shows y'what a wonky world some of us live in when you've got to pay so much—did y'know, in addition to all the cost of the castle lodgings and the meals and whatnot, it then costs a guest an extra three hundred pounds more each time he bags a stag—an' go to such effort just to find a bit o' quiet and contentment.”

David Brown—Ghillie Supreme

“Yeah—it's strange, isn't it? We seem to have lost the ability to give peace to ourselves—wherever we are.”

“Well, there are some who can't get their minds off killin' things—particularly when it comes to the stags. And there's plenty of those all around us in these hills here…” (I didn't see a single one that day.) “But y'know, quite a while back I lost the taste fer it m'self. Not for ghillieing—I love that—but for the shootin'. And it's a long season to get through—July first to October twenty-sixth for stags and October twenty-first to February fifteenth for the hinds, the females. That last is really a cull for the locals to keep the numbers down for grazin'—not many visitors want hinds. Anyway, it was one day we went up to that high glen. Y'can just see it there beyond Sron Scourst. And this big German guy was with me. Real desperate to get a kill. Like his whole life depended on it. And we heard the sound of stags head buckin'…y'know, that wild crack of those huge ten-point clashing antlers. Echoin' all around the glen. So we crawled up to the top of that ridge and there
they were, just a wee bit below us—m'be a hundred yards away. Two beauties. Really going at it…”

David's voice tailed off as he remembered the incident. “A' mean, a' could have just laid there watchin' them all day. It was a beautiful sight. But this guy was itchin' to start shootin' and he said, ‘I want both of them,' and so he sights his gun, pulls the trigger, and wham! down goes the first…and then he pulls again and wham! there goes the other. Both of them…in a couple of seconds. Gone.”

Another long pause. And then David continued, “A'll admit, he was an excellent shot. Both clean kills—no wounding. But when I got down to them and kneeled to start to
gralloch
[gut and trim] 'em so we could carry 'em out, I couldn't help thinking that, a few minutes ago, these were two magnificent animals—combating one another—full of life and strength and pride. And now here they were, nothin' left at all of that power and that beauty…and it may seem strange for a hunter to say this, but I've had no desire to go shootin' again since that day. I can understand why others do it, and I'll always do a good job helpin' 'em, but I have no interest in doin' it m'self. Ever again.”

We sat quietly together in the boat. The breeze-buffeted ripples on the lake were lapping gently against its wooden sides. Eventually I reached into my bag and pulled out a pack of sandwiches I'd brought with me and offered one to David. “Ham and cheese,” I said.

“Great—I'll take one o' your pieces if you'll eat half my pork pie.”

It looked delicious—one of those baked, golden-brown, cold-crust pastry creations with a spicy pork filling, which he held out on a small plate. So I accepted. I was beginning to really enjoy the company of this man—an avid reader of books, a true nature lover (even the author of his own book on bird-watching), and full of quiet sensitivity and wisdom.

“D'you know,” he told me, “I've ghillied everyone from dukes to dustmen for over fifteen years. And when y'get down to it, t'me it seems we're all equal when we've got a gun or a rod in hand. The character of a man soon comes out and it's got nothin' to do with money or class or breedin'. Y'can tell the true mettle of a man after a day's fishin' or huntin'. Stands out a mile—clear as a bell…and what you learn is not always so pleasant. Sometimes I'm beginning to think that we're becom
ing a rogue species—us humans—for all our so-called superior evolution. A real
Homo tyrannicus
messin' up the whole world, destroyin' a whole evolutionary process that's been goin' for millions of years…”

Our conversation rambled on as we slowly ate our lunch in the gently rocking boat.

I'd always been curious about the eternal battle in the Highlands between the landowner lairds and the poachers. In the case of Amhuinnsuidhe Castle, the matter seems to have been resolved in a unique relationship between Ian and the North Harris Trust, which recently purchased the 55,000-acre estate, as part of a recent trend in “people ownership,” and then leased back the hunting rights to Ian. But even here, apparently, David had to supervise a group of young game wardens to ensure the fish stocks were not plundered by poachers.

Red Stag

“In some ways, though,” I said hesitantly, “it does seem a little odd to claim that these wild creatures—both the deer and the fish—‘belong' to the landowner…”

David dealt with my comment benignly: “Aye—it's an old problem. 'S'caused a lot of tension for generations and still does. There's talk of new laws—the new Land Reform Bill—that gives crofters the right to purchase land and game rights, even if the owner is unwilling. I think that could be a disaster—a real free-for-all. Most people don't realize how expensive estate management and husbandry can be to sustain the fish stocks and animals. I know the poachers don't agree, but just wait 'til they find there's no fish and no game left…”

In order to ensure an amicable outing, I decided not to push the discussion and, as I remembered Ian MacSween's tales about his grandmother, we went on to talk about “second-sighters.” “Och—everybody's granny's got second sight, if you believe all the rumors,” was David's comment as he laconically rolled his own cigarette in a small square tin filled with cut tobacco (a familiar sight in Harris). But he was adamant in his belief on the existence of waterhorses, one of that multitude of mythical Highland creatures. “Now
that
I do credit—I've seen one—a real
each-uisge
. Bigger than the biggest black bull…just stepped down into the top end of the loch here and kept walking in 'til it completely disappeared—and never came back up! Terrible creatures.” He grinned with ghoulish glee. “Shape-shifters. They can become a gorgeous lady or anything to tempt a victim. Some keep the shape of a fine-bred horse and as soon as someone tries to mount it, they leap into the water, drag 'em under, drown 'em, and eat 'em!”

And then, somehow, as I guess it does when you're bobbing about in a boat not doing very much of anything, the subject moved on to food and David described the annual Robbie Burns dinner he'd attended the previous January at Leverburgh, a riotous occasion Anne and I had missed due to an off-island journey.

“Och, that was a fine do indeed,” he enthused. “David Taylor from the castle did the cooking—y'know, the traditional cock a' leekie soup and then ‘Addressing the Haggis'—carrying it in all flaming with whisky and the bagpipes playing and served up with ‘taties and neeps.' Then
there was a real fine
ceilidh
with singing and dancing and Robbie Burns's poems—a really good Gaelic affair…all very traditional.”

I mentioned the fact that I'd served haggis to some guests at the cottage recently. “Bought it from MacLeod's in Stornoway—along with some of his black pudding, by far the best I've ever tried.”

“Oh, it is indeed, it is. Nobody makes it like him. I think it's the nutmeg, y'know.”

“Yeah, maybe, but there's something else in it too, and he wouldn't tell me what it was. You can buy it at Munro's in Tarbert.”

“Oh, yes—a good place, that.”

“Along with salted herring, salt lamb, white pudding with currants, real finnan haddie (smoked haddock)…”

“Och, stop it now, man—otherwise I'll have to finish all your pieces f'ye…”

We continued on after lunch as the sun eased up the sky. David rowed gently the mile or so to the end of the loch and then back past a particularly prominent rock—actually, a small islet—rising abruptly out of the water and covered in a rich intensity of vegetation.

“That,” said David sadly, “is what these moors and these hills would look like if they weren't so overgrazed by sheep. Oh, and by the way, this is the rock that they say inspired J.M. Barrie to write his play
Marie Rose
, when he was livin' at the castle. He called it ‘the little island that likes to be visited.'”

“I know his
Peter Pan
, but not
Marie Rose
…”

“Oh, it's a fine story. Very magical.”

And then came something truly magical. No sooner had David used that word than my rod—which, having become a little weary of casting to no effect, I'd rested on the back of the boat with the line trailing in the water—suddenly went taut. Fortunately, I managed to grab it before it was pulled overboard and I felt the power of something tugging and wriggling maniacally on the hook.

“Dammit, David, I think I've got something!”

“Okay—now just take it easy. Let it run a little bit, then start to reel it in. Tha's right…run, then reel…”

I couldn't believe that, at a time when I'd actually stopped casting, I'd
possibly caught a fish. Or, rather, the fish had caught itself. Slowly I reeled it in. It seemed a rambunctious and voracious creature, obviously extremely annoyed by its predicament, but I was winning and about to become the owner of a fine…tiddler!