Eye Of The Needle

The island's most constant visitor is the wind. It comes mostly from the northeast, from really cold places where there are fjords and glaciers and icebergs; often bringing with it unwelcome gifts of snow and driving rain and cold, cold mist; sometimes arriving empty-handed, just to howl and whoop and raise hell, tearing up bushes and bending trees and whipping the intemperate ocean into fresh paroxysms of foam-flecked rage. It is tireless, this wind, and that is its mistake. If it came occasionally it could take the island by surprise and do some real damage; but because it is almost always here, the island has learned to live with it. The plants put down deep roots, and the rabbits hide far inside the thickets, and the trees grow up with their backs ready-bent for the flogging, and the birds nest on sheltered ledges, and the man's house is sturdy and squat, built with a craftsmanship that knows this old wind.

This house is made of big grey stones and grey slate, the colour of the sea. It has small windows and close-fitting doors and a chimney in its pipe end. It stands at the top of the hill at the eastern end of the island, close to the splintered stub of the broken walking-stick. It crowns the hill, defying the wind and the rain, not out of bravado but so that the man can see the sheep.

There is another house, very similar, ten miles away at the opposite end of the island near the more-or-less beach; but nobody lives there. There was once another man. He thought he knew better than the island; he thought he could grow oats and potatoes and keep a few cows. He battled for three years with the wind and the cold and the soil before he admitted he was wrong. When he had gone, nobody wanted his home.

This is a hard place. Only hard things survive here: hard rock, coarse grass, tough sheep, savage birds, sturdy houses, and strong men.

It is for places like this that the word "bleak" has been invented.

"It's called Storm Island," said Alfred Rose. "I think you're going to like it."

David and Lucy Rose sat in the prow of the fishing boat and looked across the choppy water. It was a fine November day, cold and breezy yet clear and dry. A weak sun sparkled off the wavelets.

"I bought it in 1926," Papa Rose continued, "when we thought there was going to be a revolution and we'd need somewhere to hide from the working class. It's just the place for a convalescence."

Lucy thought he was being suspiciously hearty, but she had to admit it looked lovely: all windblown and natural and fresh. And it made sense, this move.

They had to get away from their parents and make a new start at being married; and there was no point in moving to a city to be bombed, not when neither of them was really well enough to help; and then David's father had revealed that he owned an island off the coast of Scotland, and it seemed too good to be true.

"I own the sheep, too," Papa Rose said. "Shearers come over from the mainland each spring, and the wool brings in just about enough money to pay Tom McAvity's wages. Old Tom's the shepherd."

"How old is he?" Lucy asked.

"Good Lord, he must be oh, seventy?"

"I suppose he's eccentric." The boat turned into the bay, and Lucy could see two small figures on the jetty: a man and a dog.

"Eccentric? No more than you'd be if you'd lived alone for twenty years. He talks to his dog."

Lucy turned to the skipper of the small boat. "How often do you call?"

"Once a fortnight, missus. I bring Tom's shopping, which isna much, and his mail, which is even less. You just give me your list, every other Monday, and if it can be bought in Aberdeen I'll bring it."

He cut the motor and threw a rope to Tom. The dog barked and ran around in circles, beside himself with excitement. Lucy put one foot on the gunwale and sprang out on to the jetty.

Tom shook her hand. He had a face of leather and a huge pipe with a lid. He was shorter than she, but wide, and he looked ridiculously healthy. He wore the hairiest tweed jacket she had ever seen, with a knitted sweater that must have been made by an elderly sister somewhere, plus a checked cap and army boots. His nose was huge, red and veined. "Pleased to meet you," he said politely, as if she was his ninth visitor today instead of the first human face he had seen in fourteen days.

"Here y'are, Tom," said the skipper. He handed two cardboard boxes out of the boat. "No eggs this time, but there's a letter from Devon."

"It'll be from ma niece."

Lucy thought, That explains the sweater.

David was still in the boat. The skipper stood behind him and said, "Are you ready?"

Tom and Papa Rose leaned into the boat to assist, and the three of them lifted David in his wheelchair on to the jetty.

"If I don't go now I'll have to wait a fortnight for the next bus," Papa Rose said with a smile. "The house has been done up quite nicely, you'll see. All your stuff is in there. Tom will show you where everything is." He kissed Lucy, squeezed David's shoulder, and shook Tom's hand. "Have a few months of rest and togetherness, get completely fit then come back; there are important war jobs for both of you."

They would not be going back, Lucy knew, not before the end of the war. But she had not told anyone about that yet.

Papa got back into the boat. It wheeled away in a tight circle. Lucy waved until it disappeared around the headland.

Tom pushed the wheelchair, so Lucy took his groceries. Between the landward end of the jetty and the clifftop was a long, steep, narrow ramp rising high above the beach like a bridge. Lucy would have had trouble getting the wheelchair to the top, but Tom managed without apparent exertion. The cottage was perfect.

It was small and grey, and sheltered from the wind by a little rise in the ground. All the woodwork was freshly painted, and a wild rose bush grew beside the doorstep. Curls of smoke rose from the chimney to be whipped away by the breeze. The tiny windows looked over the bay. Lucy said, "I love it!"

The interior had been cleaned and aired and painted, and there were thick rugs on the stone floors. It had four rooms: downstairs, a modernised kitchen and a living room with a stone fireplace; upstairs, two bedrooms. One end of the house had been carefully remodelled to take modern plumbing, with a bathroom above and a kitchen extension below.

Their clothes were in the wardrobes. There were towels in the bathroom and food in the kitchen.

Tom said, "There's something in the barn I've to show you."

It was a shed, not a barn. It lay hidden behind the cottage, and inside it was a gleaming new jeep.

"Mr Rose says it's been specially adapted for young Mr Rose to drive," Tom said. "It's got automatic gears, and the throttle and brake are operated by hand. That's what he said." He seemed to be repeating the words parrot-fashion, as if he had very little idea of what gears, brakes and throttles might be.

Lucy said "Isn't that super, David?"

"Top-hole. But where shall I go in it?"

Tom said- "You're always welcome to visit me and share a pipe and a drop of whisky. I've been looking forward to having neighbours again."

"Thank you." said Lucy.

"This here's the generator," Tom said, turning around and pointing "I've got one just the same. You put the fuel in here. It delivers alternating current."

"That's unusual. Small generators are usually direct current," David said.

"Aye I don't really know the difference, but they tell me this is safer."

"True. A shock from this would throw you across the room, but direct current would kill you."

They went back to the cottage. Tom said, "Well, you'll want to settle in, and I've sheep to tend, so I'll say good-day. Oh! I ought to tell you: in an emergency, I can contact the mainland by wireless radio."

David was surprised "You've got a radio transmitter?"