A Book of Death and Fish (25 page)
Read A Book of Death and Fish Online
Authors: Ian Stephen
Once you’d jumped through the hoops and passed everything, you took charge of the watch when the senior man was on leave or sick. You usually worked with the same people and get to know them pretty well. When the watch was short, it could be filled on overtime. You’d find yourself working with guys you didn’t really know.
This guy’s just back from his training course. Pukka procedure. Time and a place for it, as they say. But he’s been a Chief Petty Officer in the Navy. Mentioned in dispatches in the Falklands. So he’s got kind of used to getting a bit of authority into his voice on the VHF.
We get this wee shout on channel sixteen. ‘Hello Stornoway Coastguard, can you ring this number in Bernera? Can you do that for me? Over.’
I see his Adam’s apple twitch under the microphone attached to the headset. So I catch his eye and stroll over before he gets his oar in. I know his script. Would have followed it myself, maybe at the trainee stage of the career. You come over as pompous because you don’t know you’re twitchy. Something like, ‘That’s Commercial Traffic. Call Hebrides Radio on channel two-six. Over.’
Instead I strolled over to the channel sixteen desk. ‘Ask him what’s up.’
‘
Mallard
, this is Stornoway Coastguard. What’s your situation? Over.’
‘Yes, Coastguard,
Mallard
here. Thanks for coming back. Well, the gearbox is packed in and we might need a tow. Over.’
‘Mallard, Stornoway Coastguard. What is your position? Over.’
They’re talking now but I catch my Number One in the new gold braid and Persil Automatic shirt looking bloody amazed as I hit the Scramble button. Fair do’s, he doesn’t show it in the voice, just a wee bristle but
when there’s a wee break and he catches his breath he gives me a ‘You’re in charge but…’
I stop him short. ‘We’ll talk about it later.’ And when there’s a lull, I add, ‘By the way, you’ve just heard the West Side Mayday.’
He’s thinking of wind strength and direction, glancing at the white-boards. If it’s an offshore wind, that strength, what’s the problem? The new boy’s used to a few thousand gross registered tonnes under his arse. Hundreds of guys to run around the ship.
The West Side’s different. The boys are throwing out creels there, as close to the reefs as they can get. Drying bastards, breaking bastards and every other kind of bit of brick. Doesn’t have to be a lot of wind, in from Old Hill. There’s something to collide with, any way you drift.
I ring the number in Bernera. A woman says she’ll get a hold of her husband on channel eight. Should be all right.
The chopper’s on scene in half an hour. ‘Disregard the vessel’s report of Force Four,’ they say. ‘A lot of white down there. Not very good conditions. Gusting over thirty knots. We’ll stick around here till the tow’s connected.’
It took about an hour before the ‘return-to-base’. The boys got it sorted out between themselves, this time. No further assistance.
Couple of weeks later the
Mallard
breaks up. The guy’s OK. He drifted onto one of the countless skerries in West Loch Roag. It all happened too fast to get on the radio. He got ashore on a reef that wasn’t going to cover too soon. He was picked up from there.
Bits of blue-green fibreglass were getting swept up from Barvas to Cape Wrath. The gearbox again.
This was it, had to be. The croft was newly fenced and you could make out a pattern of plastic tubes, a strange faded pink, inside the wire. These were about four feet high and staked to protect trees at a vulnerable stage. There was shelter from the slopes on either side of the renovated house. As long as the drainage worked, the trees should grow, on this croft.
Kenny was turning a pepper mill over the soup when we came in. This was the New Lewisman before our very eyes, Gabriele said. Another voice said to come and we’d see the virtual Lewis. Through a sliding door, off the kitchen, in what must have been once called a scullery, Mairi Bhan was sitting in front of a colour screen.
‘So you don’t have Windows in South Lochs, yet, blone?’
‘Flick’s sake, a white c on a blue screen is all you need. You don’t want all these icons jumping up to distract you, all over the place. You’re looking at the appropriate amount of technology, SY cove.’
She had a coo at the sight of sleeping Anna. Kenny F was fair taken too. ‘She’s no bother,’ I said. ‘She always goes to sleep in the van. She’ll be down for a couple of hours now.’
Mairi showed me where to put the carry-cot – a quiet, clean corner.
‘A few jobs to do yet,’ Kenny said.
‘Tell me about it,’ Gabriele said.
‘Time was they asked you to take off your boots on a coorse day and warm your feet in the slow oven. Now they show you the pace of the modem.’
‘You can still perform primitive rituals in this house. First thing I do when I get home in the winter. Cup of tea, feet in the stove.’
The heater in the van was on Kenny’s list. A long way from the top. Another year and the South Lochs
Autobahn
would be ready. Good councillor, they had. European funds.
‘Aye, it cost a lot of cod and hake and haddock, but.’
It was a 22-carat Lewis dinner – soup, lamb, rhubarb crumble. But the soup was a light fish broth with Erisort mussels and singed peppers. The gigot had been marinaded in olive oil, garlic and rosemary and the flesh was still pink near the bone. A dusting of nutmeg, freshly grated on the crumble with its toasted oatmeal topping. ‘Hell, Kenny, that’ll just about do,’ I said.
Half the point of eating like that is the mood you’re all in. The yarns get going when the scoff is done. The girls were on the CabSauv and the lads were on the water. We were also on the topic of uncles. A lasting friendship between North and South Lochs. There was hope for the world. I told him I still remembered a yarn with Angus in the Woolies a few years back. Was he still trapping eels? He’d been good to us when we were young. Hadn’t seen him for a while.
So we got Kenny’s story. I remembered he didn’t get to tell his bit, at the office party. I’d been letting the hair down while there was still some left to do so. Now we were again back to the year of the herring ban. One mo time. Kenny said:
My uncle Angus seemed fit enough then, but he’d to watch the angina. We cracked about the heart condition. What else do you do? How many peats can you cut to one of them pills? If any bit of bare flesh appeared on the telly, we’d say, better get one of them down you, man, so you can cope with the shock. Then we’d be looking out for the first salmon of the year. When you saw a few corks go down, then heard the splash you’d say, pop a pill now, Angus.
Angus said he could handle all them things with only one pill but the first herring would be too much. He’d need half the bottle. Or a half-bottle. And that was definitely not a good idea. He painted the boat, though. Then put the antifouling on. We’d to pull it down to the running mooring he’d laid. He checked the endless rope for wear. He gave it the nod. Then it was time for his siesta.
You know him yourself. Glasses held together with sellotape. Not just the frames. One of the lenses, too. He keeps his good pair in the house, says he’d just leave them behind, when he got talking somewhere. But he never does. Leave them behind, I mean. He gets talking everywhere he goes.
You know what the weather was like that year. There was no fun in taking salmon any more. Fish were queueing from the Creed to Eishken to get up the burns but there was only a trickle.
We had all the troops from Glasgow home for the summer holiday. They weren’t that impressed with the swimming pool and carnival and other town stuff. So there was this wee exodus to the uncle’s, down Garyvard. Sure, sure, I know I never came clean about the Garyvard Connection – good name for a rock band. Think the olaid had the idea of getting me out of the Crit and the Star and back to the great outdoor life. The uncle’s boat was the thing but I wasn’t so sure about taking the whole gang out the loch. You know the tides sweep round the points. You’re past the Kebock into the Sound of Shiants before you know it.
A good sea boat, though. On the heavy side but stable. Built by Matt Findlay, on Goat Island, for the seaweed cutting. We always had her painted plain grey. Think we got a job lot of it with the boat. Good colour if you don’t want to be seen. Bad one if you’re in the shit. Tidy transom stern and a decent inboard. The Norwegian one, a Sabb.
‘The one with the big flywheel,’ I said. ‘Sabb with the double b, not to be confused with the Swedish car. Chemical cigarette for the cold start, in winter. Beautifully balanced. Not one of these bastards that shakes the ribs out of the boat.’
That’s the one. Everybody’s on holiday. Angus is off to his bed, next door after giving me a warning look. Kids are out of the game. The visitors are staying over. The bottle’s getting passed about. Nobody’s warned them their cousin Kenny’s got to watch it. The word ‘herring’ was mentioned.
So the bottle was emptied and there might have been another and that went too so there was no chance of me getting a livener in the morning. A short night. Next day, the kids are jumping on top of you. Everyone was digging out herring nets, buoys. Making pieces, filling flasks, diluting orange squash, all that.
I’m not feeling that great. The weather’s clear and I’m trying to backpeddle. I’m saying it’s not going to get dark till late on. It’s a bit dodgy with wee Murdo and Cathy. Angus is looking over the top of his glasses and telling me, I was out in the boat at night, at their age. It wasn’t as if there was school tomorrow. And he’s going over his marks and the tides. Telling me when we’ve got to start back, so we’ll get the last of the flood come home on. There’s a wee margin but we couldn’t linger too long at the nets.
We had plenty of diesel, warm jerseys, the compass, all that. Angus checked it all over. No flies on him. He knew me as well as that boat. He knew I thought the world of these wee guys.
You stood up to steer that boat. One hand by the gear and the other by the throttle. Just like the old Heron. The tiller nudging against the leg of your jeans. The way a collie puts her snout against your knee. We were soon out the loch and no-one was trying to gab against the thump of the engine. The kids were right up for it.
So we sent a big pink puta over the wall and then the corks were going out. I got her going astern and it was all running sweet. We were getting the second net ready. The cousins were going for it.
When the last of the gear was out we’d just tie everything off. It would be a waiting game then. Time for a game of I Spy. That would be tricky. I was just giving her a few kicks astern now and then, to keep her moving away from the corks, leaving a line of them, well clear. And then one of the wee ones came running forward to tell me something and hit against the gear lever. So we shunted forward towards the net. I kicked the lever back but the screw was in it. Maybe my reflexes weren’t as fast as they should have been.
I could have gone over the side with the knife to free the prop, but not in that tide. I didn’t fancy trying anything heroic. We just cut it as close as we could so there wouldn’t be much loose stuff trailing. I tied on our last buoy so we wouldn’t lose the net. We dug out the big sweeps. There was no chance of turning the prop. Rowing practice, folks.
We wouldn’t make the entrance in the time we had the tide with us. We had to get in close and get an anchor down. So I knew I’d got to involve the kids. They were right up for it.
I rowed till the blisters came up. When the tide turned, we threw the hook over. It held. Everyone was in a huddle, getting some rest. I rigged handlines for the kids and that kept them going. One of them got a big lythe and they thought it was all great. The kids got some more juice and another jersey on and there wasn’t a moan.
Dolphins came close, the big ones, blowing, diving under our bow and that kept the kids sweet. Soon we had three heads settling, on the boards, beside their mother. It wasn’t that bad a night.
Once we felt the change in the tide, we pulled up the anchor and made the most of it, with the oars. The tide did most of the work for us.
He was waiting for us, of course, old Angus. His shape, in the old funeral-coat, was pretty clear in the morning light. He helped the kids out and made sure their mother was fine. They’d had a grand time – it made their holiday.
Angus just slipped me the nod – I should get my head down for a few hours. He’d use the fall of the tide to get the prop cleared. Then we’d need to get back to our nets, when she floated again.
I knew he was coming this time and didn’t try to argue. He had me take the helm, find my transit. I was cream-crackered. ‘Where the hell were yous fishing last night, off Lochinver?’ There was hardly a ripple and these big pink buoys should have been visible for half a mile. My eyes were on the skyline, trying to find the Last House, over Calbost way. That was trickier in daylight. I saw Angus make a reach down with the boathook, no hurry in the movement. Here was the blue warp.
I need to get myself glasses like these. Infra-red sellotape. He gave me the nod to start hauling. This net was full of herring. He pulled out one sample fish and grinned. Then he let me shake them out, maybe four full boxes. No, he didn’t need to take a pill. The second net was heavy and sad. He thought it was maybe a basking shark but it was worse.
Long marblings, perfect black and white, in the leather. There were two types like this, he said. He leaned over. The white didn’t continue above the mouth so it wasn’t the more common, the white-beaked one. This was the more scarce one – the white-sided dolphin. Not so heavy in the body. Poor lass. Then he turns to me and he speaks, dead quiet. I can tell you every word he said to me.
‘There’s two things we can do,’ he says. ‘One is just to cut her free and let her sink.’ A memory I could blame next time I took the top off a bottle and threw it over my shoulder. Or I could help him take out the jaw. The researchers wanted these, for positive identification.
He handed me the knife and I got on with it. I did it. We let the rest sink down to the crabs and the congers. That’s what happens at sea.
That was it, for me, I mean off the fucking sauce, and on the tack.
We came home with the boxes of herring. The dolphin’s jawbone, in a bag. I’d to make a driftwood fire and boil it down on the shore. Hell of a soup that would have been but it was better than posting the whole job to the Natural History Museum in August. The dog days. It would have been buzzing when it got there if I’d sent the whole thing. But I just posted off the bone in a box.
While I was dealing with that, Angus was driving all over Lochs, dropping off herring and coming back with eggs and ducks and cabbages and the rest of it.
Kenny was already up at the kettle as he finished his yarn. See a Lewis cheerio, it’s in stages. You do the first bit sitting down. Then someone says how they’ve got to shoot the crow. There’s always a few more yarns when you’re standing. At the door, you lean back against the wall. That’s how it’s done.
At the gate, he said we could bring a bottle over next time but that would be some nice extra-virgin. Plenty of space in the VW for that, next time we hit the continent.
That could be arranged. But it might be a while before we were in the olive latitudes again. You needed that much stuff, travelling with the baby.
‘You’re looking well on it,’ Mairi Bhan said, to Gabriele.
I’d never known Mairi so quiet so long. And she was looking at her man like she’d just met him. It looked good.
Just like Kenny F, I’d like to end the story there. It’s a great knack, that, knowing where to stop. Never cracked it, myself. People like his uncle Angus, people like both my grannies – they had it. I can’t do it this time. There’s more of this story to come. Not now though. Maybe later.
I think we got the van back down to Garyvard once. We remembered the oil but it came from the Co-op. First cold pressing for his pizza dough that had to rise half a dozen times over. It would get beaten back and back and it would keep on getting up for more. Like Floyd Patterson. Until he met his Ingemar Johansson. Then he came back again and rose up again and again until he’d regained the title. But even Patterson would have to meet his Sonny Liston.
