The Piper's Tune (13 page)

‘What will I be doing?'

‘Learning to manage.'

‘And how long will that take?' Forbes asked.

‘Probably for ever,' Arthur Franklin said.

*   *   *

On that lovely summer's evening on the hill above Strathmore, Lindsay fell finally and irrevocably in love with her cousin Forbes.

In a sense she had begun to devise excuses for doing so from the first moment they met. She had also begun to detach herself from Cissie who would no longer serve as her confidante and ally. The silly business of ‘touching', the even sillier notion that Forbes was deliberately exhibiting himself were surely figments of Cissie's imagination. In the initial phase of disloyalty it even occurred to Lindsay that Cissie had made the story up because she
wanted
Forbes to kiss her and touch her breast. The temporary introduction of poor Mr Calder into the equation had been nothing but a bit of a lark. It did not dawn on Lindsay that her childish prank might have unforeseen consequences. Tom Calder was far from Lindsay's thoughts, however, that fine, clear summer's evening when the family strolled through the heather to the top of the ridge: three generations of Franklins – Pansy, Johnny and Ross scampering ahead, Martin, Mercy and Cissie next, Donald arm-in-arm with his father, then Arthur with Lilias, and at the rear, straggling, Lindsay and her cousin Forbes.

‘For ever,' she said. ‘No, I don't think Papa meant it literally. He was probably just warning you that managers have to keep up with the times.'

‘I thought that's what he meant,' Forbes said. ‘But it did give me a bit of a turn to realise what I've committed myself to.'

Lindsay was impressed by his seriousness. Stuck indoors for three days with Martin, Johnny and Ross she had almost forgotten that not all young men were so tirelessly hearty. She had been glad to see Papa, relieved to see Forbes. Cissie had hurled herself into Forbes's arms and greeted him as if he were a warrior returning from a campaign and not just a late arrival from the city. He had hugged her, bussed her cheek and then, Lindsay noted with satisfaction, had eased himself gently from her clutches. He had kissed Lindsay too, not on the cheek but on the side of the lips and as if once was not enough, had kissed her again, while Johnny and Ross chanted in unison, ‘Oi, oi, oi! That's enough of that then,' as if they were rehearsing a musical hall turn.

Forbes had gone upstairs to wash and change. He had returned in time for afternoon tea, shirt open at the collar, flannel trousers fastened with a plaited leather belt that added a touch of the gypsy to his appearance. He was more robust than the image of him that Lindsay had cherished. She wondered if in a year or eighteen months the sinuousness would be gone, if he would have broad shoulders and a broad bottom like Martin, or if he would remain slender and sleek and heart-stoppingly handsome.

Even Aunt Lilias could hardly take her eyes off him when he stood, teacup in hand, in the bay window that looked out upon the loch.

‘Air,' Martin had shouted. ‘We must have air. We must all go out – you too, Pappy – and make our obeisance to the sun. Lord knows, we haven't seen it once since we arrived. Come along, drink up and let's take to the road.'

‘For heaven's sake, Martin, calm yourself.'

‘Can't help it. Been cooped up too long.'

‘Where will we go?'

‘Up to the ridge. We'll claim the summit in the Franklins' name. What do you say, Pappy?'

‘If that's what you all want to do,' Owen answered, ‘I'm game for it.'

A half-hour later the family moved out through the evergreens on to the long, easy slope that led to the moors.

At the rear of the party Forbes and Lindsay conversed as if secretly, silently and separately they had both grown up at last.

‘I was under the impression that you came to Scotland to make a commitment,' Lindsay said. ‘I mean, nobody forced you, did they?'

‘Nup. I'm a willing volunteer.'

‘Then you've no right to complain.'

‘I'm not complaining,' Forbes said. ‘But I didn't come to Scotland just to learn about shipbuilding.'

‘What did you come for?' Lindsay said.

‘To be with my family.'

‘Your family lives in Dublin.'

‘Brothers and sisters, far too many of the wee beggars,' Forbes said. ‘No, Linnet, I mean my real family, the kin I sprang from.'

‘You're beginning to sound like Martin at his most pretentious.'

‘God help me!' Forbes said, grinning.

‘Do you really feel more Scottish than Irish?'

‘Yes, I really and truly do.' He walked close by her, penned by the heather and bracken that defined the peat-cutters' track. ‘I came here to find my family,' he said, ‘and got more than I bargained for.'

‘What do you mean?' said Lindsay.

‘I mean,' Forbes said, ‘I found you.'

‘Oh, yes, you found all of us.'

‘I mean,' he said, ‘you.'

Martin and Johnny had dragged Pansy to the summit, a flattened ridge of rock and bare ground. Martin stretched his arms above his head and for a moment looked as if he were struggling to catch the sun and bring it down to earth like a gigantic ball for his sisters to play with. He looked grand and manly and not at all foolish – but he was Martin, just Martin, and Lindsay found that she suddenly understood just how affection differed from love.

‘Do you not mean Cissie?' Lindsay heard herself say.

‘Sure and I do not mean Cissie.'

‘She's very taken with you, you know.'

Forbes took her arm. Her boy cousins had never seen any harm in hugging and hand-holding. Her father, like all fathers, was less demonstrative but even he would cuddle her when she was feeling low. Being touched by Forbes was different, though. If they had been alone on the hillside she might have sought his hand and pressed it against her skirts, answering sign with sign.

‘Stop it, Lindsay.'

‘Stop what?'

‘I'm not attracted to Cissie.'

‘Don't you like her?'

‘I like her well enough but it's you I…'

Up ahead Aunt Lilias and Arthur had paused to admire the view of the glen. She leaned on him, resting against his shoulder as if he and not Donald were her husband. She looked back down the track and waved.

Lindsay, heart racing, waved back.

‘Tell me,' she said. ‘Tell me, Forbes.'

‘It's you I'm going to marry.'

‘Marry?' She was taken aback.

‘Aye, marry,' Forbes said. ‘What did you think I was going to say?'

‘I – I don't know. That you – you liked me.'

‘I'm not too young for you,' Forbes told her. ‘It might seem like I am right now but in four or five years…'

‘In four or five years,' Lindsay said, ‘you will probably meet some other girl you like more than you like me.'

‘No,' Forbes said. ‘You know it, and I know it.'

‘What do I know?'

‘That we're made for each other,' he told her, ‘and that one day you're going to be my wife.'

‘I know nothing of the sort,' Lindsay protested.

If he had been older, if he had been less handsome she would not have protested. But she did not know how to respond to this moody boy, this dangerous young chameleon who had stepped into her life, who was her kin and yet a stranger, who was utterly unlike anyone that she had ever met before. She knew only that when he looked at her with that solemn, somnolent gaze she felt her heart beat like mad within her breast and all his flaws and Irish foibles mattered not one jot.

She believed him, trusted him, longed for him.

‘You do, Linnet,' he said. ‘Sure and you do.'

And Lindsay, already moving forward, whispered, ‘Yes.'

*   *   *

From that moment the holiday sped past; the days seemed all too short, the nights far too long. Lindsay would lie awake under the skylight listening to Cissie's snores and recall all the things that Forbes and she had done that day, all the compliments he had lavished upon her, the loving look in his eye when he happened to catch her staring at him.

She could not help but stare at him. When they were not actually together she was possessed by an irrational fear that she had lost him, that the quaint old house or the great weeping moor had somehow swallowed him up. Or – a scene she played over and over again – that he had drowned himself in the loch for love of her and that Papa, Martin or Aunt Lilias was on the point of bringing her the tragic news: then, of course, Forbes would pop up again, her relief would be tremendous and it would be all she could do not to rush to him, take him in her arms and defy the family's opprobrium.

It was impossible to disguise the fact that they were starry-eyed about each other and had, in fact, fallen heels over head in love.

And the family, generally speaking, was not amused.

‘Forbes, shall we go for a walk?' Lindsay would say.

‘If you wish, Linnet.'

‘I'll come with you,' Pansy would pipe up.

‘Me too,' Mercy would say.

If the younger girls were not around then a signal would pass between Aunt Lilias and one of the boys and, before Lindsay could protest, she would be flanked by Johnny and Martin, by Ross and Johnny or some combination of cousins whose purpose was to ensure that Forbes and she were given no opportunity to slip off into the deep woods or even be alone together in plain sight upon the lawn.

The boys were rather entertained by this sudden outbreak of ‘luh-urve' and inclined to be tolerant. Cissie, however, was fit to be tied. The same incidents that gave Lindsay joy drove Cissie into a fizzing sulk. Even at night, just before bed, she could not bring herself to be civil. Lindsay, equally stubborn, was not about to apologise for having won a famous victory; she regarded her relationship with Forbes not as the outcome of a contest but as something inescapable, something written in the book of Destiny.

Papa too was less than magnanimous. He was short with Lindsay, rude to Forbes. By the second week of the holiday the atmosphere in Pappy's country retreat was so volatile that everyone, in his or her own way, was having a grand time, for there was nothing the Franklins enjoyed more than conspiring against each other, an activity that beat sea-bathing hands down. Whispers rose from every corner, from behind every bush and tree. Martin, Johnny and Ross spent happy hours strolling by the loch, puffing cigars and nipping whisky while they analysed the pros and cons of marriage and romance. Only the youngest, Pansy, failed to see what all the fuss was about and had to be told, tactfully, that the flame of love was dangerous and that young people who did not know how to control their emotions might wind up ruining their lives.

‘What does she see in him?'

‘I'd have thought that was obvious. I mean, there's no denying he's a handsome young man.'

‘I had the impression that he was making sheep's eyes at Cissie.'

‘He was, but apparently he was rebuffed.'

‘Ah, so it's Lindsay on the rebound, is it?'

‘Of course it is. It won't last.'

‘A holiday romance, you mean?'

‘I'd stake my life on it.'

‘Nothing to worry about then?'

‘Oh, there's always something to worry about when a young man and a young woman imagine they're in love. But it'll soon blow itself out.'

Lindsay was wounded by their lack of faith in her judgement, saddened by the fact that nobody seemed willing to stand up for love.

The picnic, the ascent of Ben Cranachan, the march to church, the hike to Mr Tasker's farm, boating on the loch, a fishing lesson from Giles, bathing in the river – Forbes was constantly at her side: Forbes at the oar of the borrowed rowing boat; Forbes helping her cast a trout rod; Forbes taking her hand for the final pull up the big, broad-shouldered mountain; Forbes, muscular and hairylegged in striped bathing drawers, watching her step from the pool below the little waterfall, shivering in her flounced bathing dress; Forbes laying the Turkish towel about her shoulders, laying the towel gently about her while Cissie, still in the water, shrieked for attention.

‘Forbes?'

‘Yes, Aunt Lilias?'

‘Help your cousin Cissie find her footing, if you please.'

‘Sure and I will, Aunt Lilias.'

‘Lindsay?'

‘Yes, Papa.'

‘Go into the tent and dry yourself before you catch your death.'

‘But…'

‘Now.'

Within the box-like bathing tent the grass was springy, the canvas walls musty, the light dim, the air warm. Lindsay could hear Martin shouting, Cissie shrieking, Johnny's laughter, very light and gay and genuine, floating like a feather in the emptiness outside. She struggled out of her bathing dress and, without guilt or shame, stood naked. She wished that he would come to her, snap aside the canvas flap and, without a word of warning or a by-your-leave, clasp her to him, his flesh against her flesh, his lips on hers.

‘Lindsay, are you decent?' Mercy hissed.

‘No. No, I'm not.'

‘Do be quick. Pansy wants in. Her teeth are chattering.'

‘All right,' Lindsay answered softly. ‘All right. All right. All right,' and quickly covered herself with the towel.

*   *   *

Restlessness brought Lindsay downstairs early on Friday morning. Tomorrow they would all return home, the holiday over, and every second that remained was too precious to waste in sleep. It wasn't as if Forbes was returning to Ireland, thank heaven. Now that they had discovered each other they could be together as often as they wished. And if Papa would not allow Forbes to call on her at Brunswick Crescent they would meet at Harper's Hill.

Thursday had been a hot, cloudless day with an afterglow that seemed as if it would never fade. The family had eaten supper
al fresco
on the paved terrace at the rear of the house. They would have lingered out in the warm evening air if clouds of insects had not driven them indoors soon after the sun went down. They had spread themselves about the big drawing-room with the French doors wide open and had looked out at the shapes of the hills silhouetted against the sky. Then, quite unprompted, Lindsay's father had begun to sing. Lindsay had never heard him sing unaccompanied before, in the style known as
alla cappella.
He sang ‘O'er the Seas Eternal', a song that she hadn't even known he knew. He sang quite naturally and spontaneously, as if the lovely evening had roused in him subtle emotions that could not be conveyed by words alone.