His dark eyes shone with love as he gazed at her, taking in every inch of her face. ‘This is the image I’ll carry with me when we leave tomorrow,’ he told her, gently brushing back a tendril of copper-gold hair from her cheek. ‘Your smile will get me through the roughest seas and home again.’
He relinquished his hold on her for a moment and reached into the pocket of his tweed jacket. ‘I have something for you.’
The silver sweetheart brooch with the anchor and crown lay in the palm of his hand. ‘Ma wanted you to have it. She said it’s only right that you should wear it now.’ Carefully he pinned it to her jumper, above her heart.
Flora couldn’t speak for a minute or two as her emotions overwhelmed her. She knew how much the brooch meant to Lady Helen, and that this was a sign that she approved of Flora’s relationship with her son even if Sir Charles did not.
‘I’ll wear it every day,’ she said at last, ‘and treasure it as your mother has done. As we both treasure you.’
‘You’re my girl, Flora. The only one for me. Let’s not say goodbye. We’ll just say, “I’ll be seeing you.”’
She stood in the doorway as he walked slowly away up the path towards Ardtuath House. As she watched, she ran her fingertips over the brooch, which sat like a shield over her heart, tracing the outline of the anchor and the crown above it.
‘Come back safe to me,’ she whispered. ‘I’ll be seeing you.’ And her words followed him into the darkness of the winter night.
The three girls watched from the pier at Mellon Charles as the convoy sailed. Flora’s expression was outwardly composed, but she had wrapped her arms around herself, pulling the sides of her dark blue uniform jacket tightly across each other as though by doing so they might physically hold her together.
Mairi’s face was tense and pale as the merchantmen began to move slowly into their allotted positions, as if they were playing a sinister, slow-motion game of follow-the-leader. ‘Wheesht, you’re crying, Bridie,’ she said gently. ‘It won’t be doing him any good now, will it?’
‘Oh, how on earth can you both stay so calm?’ Bridie wailed, fumbling in her pocket for her handkerchief and blowing her nose long and loud.
As she replied, Flora’s eyes never left the Isla, the destroyer leading the string of merchant ships from the loch, knowing that Alec was on the bridge and would surely know she was there. ‘We have to stay calm, Bridie, to help them be strong enough to leave. And, let’s hope, to help them be strong enough to face the journey ahead of them and come back safely, too.’
Lexie, 1978
Mairi is at the same time a stranger and so familiar that the tears spring to my eyes as we embrace. I remember her, of course, from my childhood. Even though she’d left the family farm for a new life in America at the end of the war, she returned to Aultbea now and then and always came to see us in Keeper’s Cottage, bringing with her toys and huge boxes of excitingly foreign candy. Apart from the fact that her hair is now a white that’s as pure as the first snow on the hills, she looks exactly the same: warm brown eyes and a complexion as radiant as it was in her twenties.
She’s brought with her a pair of extremely cute pink-and-white-striped dungarees for Daisy and a large album of photos and newspaper cuttings. ‘Flora sent me these over the years. She always kept me in touch with all the local news. I thought you might be interested to see them.’ Despite all those years away, her accent still lilts with the soft inflections of the Scottish Highlands.
She and Bridie take it in turns to cuddle Daisy, who laps up the attention from her two surrogate grannies, charming them with her very own style of conversation.
‘Look,’ Mairi tells Daisy, ‘here’s a picture of your mummy when she was wee, making sandcastles on the beach. And here she is on her first day at the big school. See how smart she looks in her new uniform? And this is her singing a solo in the school show.’
‘Mum,’ Daisy says, pointing a chubby forefinger at the album.
‘Clever girl,’ coos Bridie, offering her a Liquorice Allsort, which Daisy pops into her mouth with a cherubic smile.
I’m fascinated by the photos, poring over them. My mother took these images, documenting my childhood. She put them into envelopes and sent them across the sea to the other side of the world, where Mairi kept them so carefully, lovingly preserving them in this album. It’s a little overwhelming, feeling this loved.
‘Here are some of Flora’s letters, too.’ Mairi takes a little bundle from her handbag, tied with a length of tartan ribbon. ‘I thought you might like to read them sometime.’