kneeled on the chair. ‘I like yir dress,’ he said.
‘This old thing?’ Maisie laughed. She lifted an arm, and fanned out the huge batwing sleeve. ‘It’s my Lautrec look.’
Barra looked at the two posters on the far wall. Neither La Modiste nor the Lady At Her Toilet (which always slightly embarrassed him – even though the lady wasn’t actually at her toilet) looked anything like Maisie Henderson.
‘How d’you mean?’ he asked.
‘Toulouse, my cultural friend. Too loose.’ She sighed. ‘Except nothing’s too loose on Maisie.’ She buttered another slice of bread. ‘I’m eating for two,’ she said, and they both roared at the old joke. The ‘two’ Maisie referred to were herself and Doug. Doug wasn’t much of an eater. He liked the drink, though.
Barra thought it must be a great thing to enjoy your work as much as those two – Doug at the bar, with all that drink around him, and Maisie in the café with … He’d nearly forgotten why he was there.
‘Isla’s coming back?’ he asked.
‘Aye. My sister Fiona wants her down here. Out of harm’s way, so to speak.’
‘What harm’s she doing?’ Barra asked.
‘The same harm any buxom dame at that age should be doing,’ Maisie answered, making Barra blush.
She noted the flush spread across his features and laughed again. ‘You’ll no’ be letting her lead you astray now, will you?’
‘Course not,’ Barra replied, more sharply than he had intended.
Maisie leaned back. ‘Begging your pardon!’
‘Sorry, Maisie.’
‘Och, Barra, I’m teasing you.’ Maisie gnawed on her bread. ‘Isla’ll be here on the Sunday afternoon bus. You come in and have a blether. She’ll be glad to see you.’
‘I doubt it,’ Barra answered, sounding unusually forlorn. ‘She didn’t take to me.’
Maisie leaned into him. ‘Who couldn’t take to you, Barra, y’bonny boy that you are?’
Barra cheered up. ‘I’m off, then,’ he said. ‘Tell Doug I said hello.’
Maisie shrugged, and pointed above them. ‘Always supposing he sleeps it off before you’re back.’
‘He will,’ Barra assured her. ‘He’ll be opening up soon.’
‘Another grand evening in front of us, then,’ Maisie said, returning to her soup. ‘I hope Isla will appreciate it, the sophistication of it all …’
Maisie was eight years older than her sister Fiona, and it had been shortly after Fiona’s birth in 1923 that their father succumbed to the ’flu epidemic which had ravaged the British Isles. Their mother, a large, capable woman, had worked hard to keep the small grocery shop in Craigourie, and had quietly invested the profits over the years.
On the morning of Maisie’s twenty-fifth birthday she rose to bring her mother breakfast in bed, just as she’d done every Sunday for as long as she could remember – and would never do again. Her mother lay cold as stone, having died in her sleep from a massive heart attack.
Maisie had taken charge, arranging the funeral, organising the shop, and interrupting each new heart-rending chore to stop and comfort Fiona. After her mother had been laid to rest, and Fiona had gone to bed, Maisie lay in her darkened room and waited for her heart to stop breaking.
She had never even guessed at the extent of the inheritance she and her sister had been left. That night she would gladly have thrown every last pound of it into the flickering coals if, for one day longer, she could have held her mother close.
The morning after the funeral Maisie rose, washed and dressed, and opened the shop door on the second of nine o’clock. Over the next nine years she soldiered on single-handed, while Fiona took her less-than-impressive typing skills and set off across the Great Glen, moving from hotel to hotel in search of a happiness which seemed constantly to elude her.
In the summer of 1949, as the country recovered from the ravages of war, Fiona arrived back in Craigourie with her new husband – and a swollen belly. Duncan Gillespie had married Fiona in the mistaken belief that she had a substantial amount of her inheritance still waiting to be spent.
They had bought a small home in Fort William, under the glowering shadow of Ben Nevis, and Duncan looked cheerfully forward to giving up his back-breaking work in the hospital laundry for an altogether more carefree existence.
By the time his daughter Isla was a year old, Duncan had come to realise that he was having to work ever longer hours to provide for his wife and family. He strung his guitar across his back and walked out, whistling his way southwards.
Five years later, Maisie sold her parents’ shop and bought the Whig, continuing to support her sister while Fiona, who had taken a part-time job in one of the hotels which stretched along the Fort William seafront, adamantly insisted that the monthly cheques she received from Maisie were temporary loans – just until she got on her feet again. When it became apparent that Fiona was unlikely ever to get on her feet, Maisie had purchased the house outright, providing a permanent home for her sister and her young niece. Fiona uttered not one syllable in protest.
Then, three years ago, she had once more returned, this time bringing with her Jack Strachan. Jack was the night porter at the hotel where Fiona worked – and her husband of two weeks.
Maisie detested him on sight and her heart went out to Isla, who had had to put up with her mother’s endless stream of boyfriends over the years. She could tell from the hunched shoulders and sullen expression of her niece that Isla, too, felt less than happy at Fiona’s choice.
Indeed, Maisie had no doubt that Isla’s imminent return had more to do with Jack Strachan than even Fiona realised.
The rutted tarmac at the back of the Whig allowed parking space for five cars before ending at the woods which led further into the hills, and then down to Barra’s home half a mile further on. He meandered along the trail, stopping here and there to explore this, examine that.
In a ditch long since carved by the rush of a stream escaping its lofty source, he spied the featherless frame of a dead nestling. He couldn’t tell what it might have been, but the sadness of its short life washed over him as cold as the water which carried its body out to the distant loch.
A picture came to his mind – almost a year ago, the May holiday weekend, a day just like today, with the sun shining and the canopy of blue sky above. Jim Pascoe had called for him early that morning and they’d gone fishing together down by the banks of the river which flowed past the big house. Jim had landed a fat wee trout almost at once, and Barra had watched as Jim removed the hook from its mouth.
‘Looks like we’ve made a good start on the supper.’ Jim laughed. Then he noticed Barra’s expression. ‘What is it, son? We’ve done this many a time before …’
‘Aye. It’s just … It’s just, well, d’you think he feels it?’
Jim had shaken his head. ‘They’re cold-blooded, Barra. You know that.’
‘Aye …’ Barra shrugged, ‘but it’s no’ as if we’re needing it for our supper.’
Jim held the trout for a moment, and then released it, skittering, back into the water. ‘Well, that’s put the tin lid on our fishing trip.’ He sighed.
‘Och, Mr Pascoe, I didn’t mean … I didn’t mean to spoil the day.’
Jim clambered up off the shingle and lay on the grassy bank. Crossing his long legs in front of him, he clasped his hands behind his head.
‘You’d have to be the devil himself to spoil a day like this, Barra.’ Then he had laughed. ‘And there’s not a single good reason why that wee trout can’t enjoy