Bone Deep

  A note on the author

  Sandra Ireland was born in Yorkshire, lived for many years in Limerick, and is now based in Carnoustie. She began her writing career as a correspondent on a local newspaper but quickly realised that fiction is much more intriguing than fact. In 2013 Sandra was awarded a Carnegie-Cameron scholarship to study Writing Practice and Study at the University of Dundee, and she graduated with a distinction in 2014. Her work has appeared in various publications and women’s magazines. Her first novel, Beneath the Skin, was published by Polygon in 2016.

  Bone Deep

  Sandra Ireland

  First published in Great Britain in 2018 by Polygon, an imprint of Birlinn Ltd.

  West Newington House

  10 Newington Road

  Edinburgh

  EH9 1QS

  www.polygonbooks.co.uk

  1

  Copyright © Sandra Ireland, 2018

  The moral right of Sandra Ireland to be identified as the author of this work has been asserted by her in accordance with the Copyright, Designs and Patents Act, 1988.

  All rights reserved.

  This is a work of fiction. Names, characters, places and incidents are either the product of the author’s imagination or are used fictitiously, and any resemblance to actual persons, living or dead, events or locales is entirely coincidental.

  ISBN 978 1 83697 418 2

  eBook ISBN 978 1 78885 023 0

  British Library Cataloguing in Publication Data

  A catalogue record for this book is available on request from the British Library.

  Typeset by 3btype.com

  Bone Deep

  A Lyke-Wake Dirge

  This ae nighte, this ae nighte,

  Every night and alle;

  Fire and sleete, and candle lighte,

  And Christe receive thye saule.

  When thou from hence away are paste,

  Every night and alle:

  To Whinny-muir thou comest at laste;

  And Christe receive thye saule.

  If ever thou gavest meat or drink,

  Every night and alle;

  The fire shall never make thee shrinke;

  And Christe receive thye saule.

  If meate or drinke thou never gavest nane,

  Every night and alle;

  The fire will burn thee to the bare bane;

  And Christe receive thye saule.

  *

  From Brigg o’ Dread when thou mayst passe,

  Every night and alle;

  To purgatory fire thou comest at laste;

  And Christ receive thye saule.

  This ae nighte, this ae nighte,

  Every night and alle;

  Fire and sleete and candle lighte,

  And Christ receive thye saule.

  An extract from a North Country burial charm, collected by Sir Walter Scott in Minstrelsy of the Scottish Border, 1802

  Mac

  January

  I’d forgotten about the girl. Her email had suggested a vague time of arrival, but I’d been struggling with a particularly vexing passage and I opened the door wearing my face. Arthur named it that: my face. I suppose it’s a mixture of cross and vacant. Cross because my train of thought has been derailed, and vacant because my mind is still somewhere in the Middle Ages, and not here, on the doorstep, glaring at this scared-looking girl.

  ‘Take your hands out of your pockets. If the dogs see your hands in your pockets they go berserk. They think you’re about to dish out doggie treats. Basically you’re asking to be mugged.’

  At my warning, the girl drops her hands to her sides like an obedient squaddie. What a glum little thing she is, pasty, with dark hair scraped back in a most unbecoming fashion. She seemed larger when I’d interviewed her – more presence, more spark. ‘I’m looking for a Girl Friday,’ I’d said, and she’d replied, ‘Well, I’m a Friday kind of girl.’ Quite snappy, I’d thought.

  ‘It’s Lucie,’ she reminds me.

  I try to rearrange my expression into something more welcoming. I do remember. Lucie with an ie. Pretentious. Why don’t parents give their offspring good earthy names like Arthur? I step out into the chilly air. The rain has stopped but I can still smell it. The girl looks bemused. The dogs wag and sniff her shoes and Floss jumps up. Black trousers, never a good idea.

  ‘Stop that, you silly bitch.’

  The girl, Lucie with an ie, looks at me with a glint of fire, and I’m relieved that she isn’t as defeated as she looks.

  ‘Talking to the dog, dear, not you. Black’s not a great colour round here. You’ll see every damn dog hair on it.’ I lock the front door behind me and pocket the key. ‘Now, I’m putting you in the Miller’s Cottage. We have spare rooms, of course, but I like my space. No offence.’

  ‘None taken.’

  She follows me back down the driveway. For a few moments all I can hear is the irritating grind of her suitcase wheels on the gravel. It’s colder than I’d imagined, and I regret not pausing to grab my coat. I belt my old grey cardigan tightly under the bust with my arms. The dogs shoot off towards the road, scattering leaves and birds in every direction. I slow to let Lucie catch up and the suitcase trundle softens a bit.

  ‘Now, usually I rent the Miller’s Cottage out to writers and the like, reclusive types, but I can’t be arsed with all the cleaning. Do you like cleaning, Lucie?’

  She opens her mouth like a goldfish.

  I wave a hand. ‘No matter. Cleaning may or may not become one of your duties. Did we discuss duties? No? Well, I think we’ll just play it by ear. You can take tomorrow off. Get acclimatised.’

  We reach the road. I yell at the dogs but the wind’s getting up and they pretend not to hear. The wind sends them crazy. They gallop straight across the road. Good job it’s quiet. They know where they’re going, of course – down the track that leads to the mill. As always, an image of Jim looms large in my mind. I hug my cardigan more tightly.

  ‘This path used to be the main road to the next parish, many moons ago.’ I glance across the boundary wall. The view is as familiar to me as my morning newspaper, but still it’s stunning; all that sky, purple with rain, and the ploughed field and the sea on the horizon. On sunny days it sparkles like diamonds. Today it’s black and sluggish. I breathe in the rich aroma of cow dung. Seagulls wheel overhead and squeal like cats, or babies. Jim always thought they sounded like babies.

  ‘It’s lovely,’ Lucie says. I look down at her feet. She’s wearing those fashionable canvas trainers. No support, or a single bit of damp-proofing.

  ‘You’ll need boots round here,’ I say. ‘Gets a bit boggy after rain. There’s a bundle of old wellies in the cottage. Feel free.’

  The track opens up into the mill den. The cottage occupies prime position at the entrance to it, built on a gentle rise. Low and long and white, I have always seen it as a yappy little terrier, a watchdog, while down near the edge of the burn the old mill slumbers, a sleeping dragon. I steel myself not to look at the place. We march past the front of the cottage, the front-door key having been lost a long time ago, until we come to the tradesmen’s entrance at the rear. A pergola of trailing ivy forms a shelter over the back door, and there’s an old wooden bench against the wall. I rummage through a pile of gravy bones in my cardigan pocket in search of the key. Immediately, all three dogs appear, noses moist with anticipation.

  ‘You can take this key, I have a spare.’

  The back door scrapes across the stone floor like a wet sweeping brush. The place smells damp and mushroomy. Sometimes I leave a window open to air the place, but the ivy encourages the sparrows, and they’re a bloody nuisance. I’m always afraid they’ll find their way in and crap all over the curtains.

  ‘So the phone signal isn’t great, I’m tol
d. Can’t stand all that technical nonsense. I believe you can get the wi-fi. My son, Arthur, sees to that kind of thing.’

  The dogs skitter into the house, fanning out in all directions, while I lead the girl at a steadier pace through narrow, stone-flagged passages, past baskets of logs and kindling and wellies lined up on newspaper. The kitchen is big and bright, although I notice Lucie shiver. She’s looking around the place, taking in the oak beams and the shelf with all its old jars and bottles.

  ‘You can do what you want with the place, within reason,’ I say. I’m thinking cushions and throws. The young people like their comfort. ‘Go easy on the candles, though. I had a woman in here set my curtains on fire.’

  Lucie narrows her eyes. They are grey and rather bleak. ‘No candlelit evenings for me,’ she says. ‘You’re okay.’

  ‘Fair enough. Now, the heating’s on a timer. Don’t fiddle with it. But you can try and get to grips with the Aga, if you like, or you can light the fire.’ I nod towards the grate. It’s one of those old fifties surrounds with the puce tiles and a companion set. She’s probably too young to know how to light a fire. ‘There are matches and firelighters in that cupboard. You might need to use newspaper to get it going. I generally twist it into croissant shapes and –’

  ‘I know.’ She nods. ‘We have a coal fire in the parlour at the manse.’

  The parlour. I make a face. Very grand. I’m not sure what a minister’s daughter is doing here in Fettermore, buried in the country, assisting a cranky old academic. Shouldn’t she be at uni, or something? Too old perhaps; she’s in her mid-twenties, as I recall. Her application mentioned college. Media studies, or another of those Mickey Mouse courses. She’s worked in an ironmongers too, so that might come in handy, if she knows her way round a hammer and nails.

  We’ve come to a natural parting of the ways. I think I’ve covered everything. Perhaps I should mention the mill. Keep it technical, rather than emotional.

  ‘That’s the mill, obviously.’ I wave towards the window. ‘It’s for grinding corn. Oats originally, but now we mill – used to mill – wheat. It was working right up until –’ I stumble and she looks at me. I can see she is quite sharp, our Lucie. ‘It still operates, but no longer on a commercial basis. Yonder, in the dip behind, is Fettermore Burn. You’ll notice it runs past the mill, because the water supply we need to power the waterwheel is taken off at the weir half a mile upstream.’ My wave climbs higher. Warming to my theme, I mime channels and ponds. ‘The lade brings the water around in a big loop on the high ground, fills up the pond and then drops down to the mill wheel. The fall of the land gives it power. Never underestimate the power of water.’ She looks rather anxious, and I quickly adjust my tone. ‘And of course it’s a very picturesque walk to the weir and to the pond.’

  Lucie remains thoughtful, like a child with too much to digest. It’s on the tip of my tongue to say, Any problems, just phone, or pop into the house, but I don’t. She looks like a girl who has the sort of problems I could well do without.

  Lucie

  My mother threw me out on Boxing Day. Not physically. Even in her heels she’d have struggled to make five-two, but her sense of reproach filled every room in the manse, like the shadow of a grizzly bear. I knew my days were numbered.

  Reuben had joined us for worship, and my father was on top form as he scanned his flock from the pulpit. At this time of year, he warned, we remember that the rich and the powerful were not willing to give houseroom to the Christ Child. They’d kept him at arm’s length. My mother, sitting beside me, nodded so vigorously that the hard pew rocked a little beneath us.

  Afterwards, we had cold turkey and salad for lunch, because everyone was complaining of being over-full after all the Christmas day trimmings. Even then, we’d managed to demolish a whole trifle, and Reuben had been up for seconds.

  I sat there, remembering the day he’d first been introduced to the family. There had been trifle that day too, and mother had insisted on giving him the portion with the most cream, lashings of chocolate sprinkles and a cherry on top. That must have been about two years ago. There’d been such a fuss about meeting Jane’s new boyfriend. The two of them had rolled up arm in arm, a real couple, Jane looking all smug and entitled. Her grin lit up the hallway.

  But this Boxing Day, Mum had landed him a dollop of jelly with such force I thought I heard his bowl crack. Her eyes were as cold as pebbles.

  The confrontation came later, as we were clearing the table. I’d taken some plates through to the kitchen. Dad and Jane and Reuben had gone off to watch some old movie in the parlour. It was just Mother and me. She closed the kitchen door.

  ‘I’ve been biting my tongue since . . . since last Sunday.’

  ‘Painful.’ I turned my back on her and began to run hot water into the sink. My heart was thumping oddly.

  ‘Don’t get smart, Lucie. I wanted to get Christmas over. Christmas is such a family time.’ There was a catch in her voice, but I couldn’t look round. I squirted Fairy Liquid into the washing-up bowl and watched the bubbles mount.

  ‘You have broken this family, Lucie.’

  ‘That’s not fair!’ I swung round at that, but she’d turned her back on me, so our eyes couldn’t meet.

  ‘Stop it!’ She pulled out a chair and sat down heavily at the table. ‘It’s always someone else’s fault with you. You’re always in denial, Lucie! Well, I can’t unsee what I saw. I will not deny what I saw.’

  ‘Jesus, you sound like one of Dad’s sermons.’ I twisted off the tap and reached for a towel. ‘This is real life. Shit happens.’

  ‘You watch your mouth, young lady!’ She got up, and we faced each other. Her chest was heaving under her pine-green cardigan – she couldn’t unbend enough to wear a novelty Christmas sweater like the rest of us. ‘I will not be spoken to like this in my own kitchen.’

  ‘Where do you want to go then?’ I could feel the heat rising in me, staining my cheeks. ‘Where’s the best place to go for a really good row, Mother? Oh, I forgot, we don’t do that in this house, do we? We just drown in disapproval.’

  ‘If you don’t like the way we do things in this house, then feel free to leave.’

  I’d been twisting the dishtowel in my hands. Now I flung it across the back of a chair. ‘I’ve already apologised for what . . . for what you thought you saw.’

  ‘I know what I saw. Don’t insult me, Lucie. Actions have consequences.’

  ‘Oh, stop it with the sermonising! I’ve had enough!’ I stalked back to the sink, glaring at the white foam because I couldn’t bear to witness her disappointment.

  ‘Things have to change.’ Her voice had dropped. In the sink the bubbles popped under their breath. ‘I want you gone, Lucie. Get a job. Get your own place. Get out.’

  The Miller’s Cottage is an alien landscape where the slates lift in the wind and the windowpanes rattle like loose teeth. With Mac and the dogs gone, I am alone in the kitchen, rooted to the spot, as if I’ve come a long distance and cannot walk another step. The cold of the stone floor soaks through my trainers like water. Outside, I can see a tiny bird clinging to the telephone wire.

  The pine table is draped in an old-fashioned oilcloth, illustrated with cherries so succulent and glossy they look good enough to eat. A sharp twist deep inside makes me groan. I press a hand to my ribcage, grip the edge of the table as fragments of memory crowd my mind.

  Me putting cherries on the trifle. Mother checking the clock for the hundredth time, mouthing the time soundlessly, as she always does, then telling me, They’ll be here any minute. Stick that trifle in the fridge, quick! I remember my father’s disembodied voice from deep inside the parlour: Look at that squirrel on the bird feeder! You can coat the seeds in chilli powder, you know. It keeps the little buggers away. In my memory he’s standing at the front window, hands behind his back. My mother joins him there, and she’s saying, But what about the birds? Do they like chilli powder?

  Memories are weird like that, deceptive. I
never saw any of that in reality. In reality, I was skulking in the kitchen, because I was awkward around new people. I was awkward around my own sister, because she always made me feel too clumsy, too slow, too ignorant.

  Dad had passed some comment about Jane’s new red Mini, and Mum had clipped into the hall in those neat court shoes she always keeps for Sunday. Had it been a Sunday? I can’t remember what day it was. I should remember what day it was.

  Then they were all in the hall, kissing and hugging. Where was I? I may have been looking through the kitchen door, or standing awkwardly in the hall. I was on the outside, somewhere, gazing in. Jane looked amazing – all that hair, copper at the crown, paler at the tips, as if the ends had been dipped in something luscious. She was just finishing her teacher training then, in Dundee, so we hadn’t seen each other for a while. She spotted me and rushed forward. Lucie! I hadn’t moved. I can feel the same stiffness in me now, the way my mouth refuses to curve, the way my arms fold naturally across my belly. She’d changed her mind about hugging me and I think we were both relieved. Lucie, you look . . . the same! A bright little crystal laugh. Come and meet Reuben!

  Suddenly, Reuben was there, holding my hand. Okay, he was shaking my hand in an entirely appropriate manner, but our eyes locked in a way that probably wasn’t. It was over in a split second. He dropped my hand and my skin felt cold. Dad was talking about whisky and my mother had steered Reuben away. They left me standing there in the hallway, all broken loose inside. I couldn’t move. Reuben’s eyes had asked me a question. Who are you? Back then, I didn’t have an answer.

  I suddenly come back to life, drag the oilcloth from the table. Cherries jump before my vision like the images on a fruit machine. I try and fold it but it’s huge, inflexible. It threatens to engulf me. I wrestle it to the floor and stamp on it. Eventually, it lies there in an unwieldy ball. I carry it into the hall and fling it as far as I can out of the back door.