Reaching the stone he flung himself down at its foot and, sure that no one could see him save the distant circling buzzard, he abandoned himself at last to his tears.
The girl had seen him coming, though. Often, before, she had noticed him, a boy about her own age, winding his way up through the heather and she had hidden, either behind the stone or amongst the trees, or in the soft, drifting mists which so often descended on this place.
Three times lately she had heard him cry. It made her uncomfortable. She wanted to find out why he was so unhappy, to see him laugh and jump about as he had when he had brought the brown-and-white sheltie puppy with him. She had never approached him. She was not supposed to be here. Her brother would be furious if he knew she had strayed from his side, but she had grown bored with watching him carve the stone. The chisels, the small hammer, the punches, the tools of his trade laid out neatly on the heather with the rolled vellum template which he fastened to the stone to punch out the designs.
The dog had seen her and barked, its hackles raised along its back. She was puzzled by that. Dogs usually liked her. But she kept her distance. She didnt want the boy to see her.
His tears were exhausted at last. Sitting up he sniffed and, rubbing his face with the sleeve of his sweater, he began to look round. Far above him he could hear the lonely yelp of an eagle. He squinted up into the blue but the glare behind the clouds was too bright and he shook his head and closed his eyes. When he opened them he saw the girl for a fraction of a second, peering at him from the trees. Startled, he jumped to his feet.
Hey! Hello? His call was carried away on the wind. Where are you?
There was no sign of her. He ran a few steps towards the trees. Come on. Ive seen you! Show yourself! He hoped she hadnt seen him crying. Blushing at the thought he peered amongst the soft, red, peeling trunks of the trees. But she had gone.
It was twilight when he retraced his steps reluctantly towards the manse. From the path amongst the thickly growing trees on the steep bank of the burn as it tumbled towards the river he could see in the distance the lamp already lit in his fathers study window. Usually by now there would be a curl of blue smoke from the kitchen chimney but he couldnt see it yet against the darkening sky. Nervously he wondered if Mrs Barron had stayed on to cook supper as she often did, or was his mother, an apron tied over her dress, standing in the kitchen wielding the huge iron pans?
It was the back door he approached on tiptoe from the yard at the side of the manse. There was no one in the kitchen at all and no pans on the range. In fact the range was cold. With a sinking heart he crept out into the back hall and listened, half afraid that the quarrel would still be in progress, but the house was silent now. Breathing a quick sigh of relief, he tiptoed through to the front and stood for one long, daring moment outside his fathers study, then he turned and fled upstairs.
His parents bedroom looked out over the wall towards the kirk. It was an austere room, the iron bed covered by a pale fawn counterpane, the heavy wooden furniture unrelieved by pictures or flowers. On his mothers dressing table, uncluttered by make-up or scent or powder sat, side by side, neatly aligned, a matching ivory-backed hair brush, a clothes brush and a comb. Nothing else. Thomas Craig would not permit his wife to paint her face.
Nervously Adam peered into the room, though he could sense already that it was empty. It was cold and north-facing, the room where he had been born. He hated it.
Normally he liked the kitchen best. With the warmth from the range and the smells of cooking and the cheerful light-hearted banter between his mother and Jeannie Barron it was the nicest and most cheerful place to be. When his father was out. When his father was at home his dour, disapproving presence filled the house, Adams mother fell silent and even the birds in the garden seemed, to the boy, afraid to sing.
Standing in the doorway, he was about to turn away when he paused, frowning. Like a small animal, alert, suspicious, he sensed that something was wrong. He looked round the room more carefully this time, but in its bleak tidiness it gave no clue as to what might be amiss.
He had two bedrooms to himself. One, as sober and tidy as his parents, his official bedroom, was next to theirs on the landing. But he had another room, up in the attic, known to his mother and Mrs Barron, but not, he was almost sure, to his father, who never climbed up there. In it he had a bright rag rug, and several old chests for the treasures and specimens which formed his museum, his books and his maps. It was up here, alone, when he was supposed to be doing his school work in his official bedroom, that he led his intensely private life; it was here that he wrote up his notes and copied diagrams and studied musty textbooks which he had picked up in second-hand bookshops in Perth, all designed to lead towards his ambition to be a doctor, and it was here that he sketched the birds he watched out on the hills and here he had once tried to dissect, then to dry and stuff the dead body of a fox he had found in a snare. Jeannie Barron had soon put paid to that enterprise, but otherwise the two women had left him more or less to his own devices up there. Today however it did not provide the sanctuary he had come to expect. He felt restless and unhappy. Something was very wrong.
After only a few minutes leafing half-heartedly through a book on spiders he threw it down on the table and went out onto the landing. He listened for a moment, then he ran down the narrow upper flight of stairs, then the broader flight below and went to peer once more into the kitchen. It was as cheerless and empty as before.
It was a long time before he plucked up enough courage to knock on the door of his fathers study.
Thomas Craig was sitting at his desk, his hands folded before him on the blotter. He was a tall, rangy man, with a shock of dark hair threaded with silver, large, staring pale blue eyes and his skin, normally high-coloured, was today unusually pale.
Father? Adams voice was timid.
There was no response.
Father, where is Mother?
His father looked up at last. There was a strange triangle of livid skin beneath each high cheekbone where his face had rested on the interlinked fingers of his hands. He propped himself wearily on his elbows on the desk, then cleared his throat as though for a moment he found it hard to speak. Shes gone, he said at last, his voice lifeless.
Gone? Adam repeated the word uncomprehendingly.
Gone. Thomas lowered his face back into his hands.
His son shifted uncomfortably from one foot to the other. An inexplicable pain had settled in the pit of his stomach. He didnt dare look at his fathers face again, fixing his eyes instead on his own ragged plimsolls.
Thomas sighed heavily. He looked up again. Mrs Barron has seen fit to hand in her notice, he said at last, so it would seem we are alone.
Adam swallowed. His voice when he spoke was very small. Where has Mother gone?
I dont know. And I dont wish to. Abruptly Thomas stood up. Pushing back his chair he walked over to the window and stood looking out into the garden. Your mother, Adam, has committed a grievous sin. In the eyes of God, and in my eyes, she is no longer part of this family. I do not wish her name to be mentioned in this house again. Go to your room and pray that her evil ways have not corrupted you. A night without supper will do you no harm at all. He did not turn round.
Adam stared at him, barely taking in what he had said. But, Father, where has she gone? Little panicky waves of anguish were beginning to flutter in his chest. He wanted his mother very badly indeed.
Go to your room! Thomass voice, heavy with his own grief and anger and incomprehension, betrayed the depth of his emotion for only a moment.
Adam did not try to question him again. Turning, he ran into the hall, out through the kitchen and on into the garden. It was growing dark, but he did not hesitate. Loping round the side of the house he headed down the silent street towards the river once more. Slipping on the rocks in the dark he felt his feet sliding into the icy water but he did not hesitate, plunging into the woods and climbing as fast as he could up the hillside.
Once he stopped and turned. The manse was in darkness save for the single point of light, the lamp in his fathers study. From where he stood he could see the kirk and the dark trees round it, and the whole village, where one by one the lights were coming on, the evening air hazed with the fragrant blue smoke from the chimneys. The village was friendly, busy, warm. He knew every single person who lived in those houses. He was at school with children from many of them, in the same class as five other boys all of whom he had grown up with.
He stood looking down for a few minutes, feeling the wind, cold now, on the back of his neck, and he shivered. There were goosepimples on his thin arms beneath his sweater. He felt sick. Where had his mother gone? What had happened to her? Why hadnt she told him where she was going? Why hadnt she taken him with her? Why hadnt she at least left him a note?
It was better to keep moving. Walking in the almost-darkness amongst the trees with the flash of white water on his right needed all his concentration. If he walked he couldnt think. He didnt want to think.
Turning, he scrambled on, feeling his wet plimsolls slide on the track, and he grabbed at the wiry branches of the larch which hung over him to stop himself falling as he headed for the stone.
It was completely dark when he reached the cross-slab at last. He doubled over, panting, aware that the moment he stopped moving the icy wind would strip away his bodyheat within seconds. He didnt care. The moment he stopped moving he could no longer fend off the misery which was flooding through him. His mother. His adored, lovely, bright, pretty mother was gone and, he shuddered at the memory of his fathers words. What had she done? What could she have done? He wrapped his arms around himself, hunching his shoulders. He had never felt so alone, or so afraid.
She had never seen the boy come up here in the dark before. Behind the hills in the east a silver glow showed where soon the half moon would rise above the black rocks and flood the countryside with light. Then she would be able to see him more clearly. Quietly she waited.
Behind her, her brother Gartnait, five years her senior, was packing up his tools and stretching his arms above his head until his joints cracked. Between one moment and the next a black silhouetted moon-shadow ran across the ground at his feet. The light caught the gleam of an iron chisel and he stooped to pick it up.
Brid crept forward a little. The boy had a thin, attractive face with a childs nose still, but his shoulders and knees were beginning already to show the coltishness which would come before he developed the stature of a man. She stared at his clothes, colourless in the pale light, and she crept nearer. He never seemed to do much when he came up to the hill. Sometimes he sat for hours, his arms wrapped around his legs, his chin on his knees, just staring into space. A few times he had come up to Gartnaits stone and touched the carving with his finger, tracing the lines. Twice, in the hot months, he had stretched out on the hot ground and slept. On one of those occasions she had drawn closer, until she was standing over him and her slim shadow had touched his face. He had frowned and screwed up his nose and put his hand to his forehead, but he hadnt opened his eyes.
She could feel his misery. It was sucking at her energy, swirling round him in a cloak of black waves which lapped out into the darkness and touched her with its cold.
Perhaps her sympathy was so great it had become tangible; whatever the reason, he looked up suddenly, startled as though he had heard something, and he looked straight at her. She saw his eyes widen. Instinctively his hand brushed his cheek and he straightened his shoulders to hide his misery. His momentary fear at seeing a figure in the shadows gave way to relief when he realised it was the girl he had seen earlier and he made a brave attempt at a smile. Hello.
She frowned. She did not recognise the word, though the smile was friendly. She stepped forward.
When she spoke to him it was in the language of her birth, the language of the ancient Picts.
His heartbeat had steadied a little. The exhaustion of the steep climb, for the second time that day, and then the girl appearing out of the darkness of the trees had made him gasp for breath. He stared at her, more puzzled than startled now. She had said something to him in words he didnt understand. Gaelic, he supposed, a language his father considered to be barbaric. He shrugged at her. I dont understand.
Even in that dim light he could see the brightness of her eyes, the pert tilt of her nose and chin. She was wearing a rough dress which looked as though it were made of some sort of leather.
She shrugged back, mimicking him, and then she giggled.
He found himself laughing too and suddenly daring she moved closer and touched her finger to his cheek, removing imaginary tears. Her mime was clear. Why are you sad? Cheer up. Then her hands dropped to his and she gave a theatrical shiver. She was right. He was very cold.
He wasnt quite sure how he came to follow her. His misery, his cold, his hunger, all were persuasive. When she caught his hand and tugged at it, miming food in her mouth, he nodded eagerly and went with her.
He followed her towards the stone, his fingers brushing across the well-known shapes as he walked past it. There was a drift of mist across the path and he hesitated, but when she tugged again at his hand he went on, stopping only when he saw her brother. The tall young man, his tools now stowed in a leather bag slung over his shoulder, looked as startled as he was himself. He spoke quietly and urgently to the girl and she retorted with words quite obviously cheeky. It was then she introduced herself. She pointed to her chest. Brid, she said firmly. She pronounced it Breed. Gartnait. This was said thumping the young mans shoulder.
Adam grinned. He pointed to his own stomach. Adam, he said.
A-dam. She repeated the word softly. Then she laughed again.
They walked for about twenty minutes around the shoulder of the ridge, following a faint deer track through the heather before Adam saw in the distance below them the flickering light of a fire. As they scrambled down towards it he smelled meat cooking. Venison, he reckoned, and the juices in his mouth ran. He hadnt eaten since lunchtime. He refused to think about the empty cold kitchen at home, concentrating instead on his new friends.
At the sight of their destination he frowned slightly. It was no more than a round ramshackle bothy, thatched with rushes, hidden in a fold of the hill beside a tumbling burn. The fire, he saw as they drew closer, was being tended by a woman, from her looks the mother of Brid and Gartnait, who, he had already guessed, were brother and sister. The woman, tall and slim, very erect when she straightened from poking the logs beneath her cooking pot, had hair as dark as her daughters, and the same clear grey eyes. Throwing down her makeshift poker she made him welcome, a little shyly, and pointing to a fur rug spread on the ground near the fire indicated that he sit down. Her name, Brid told him, was Gemma. Gartnait, he saw, had gone to wash the stonedust from his hands in the stream. Brid too had disappeared inside the bothy. She returned seconds later with four plates and a loaf of bread which she broke into four pieces and laid on the plates near the fire.