Burning Down George Orwell's House (11 page)

Left to his own brooding for too long, Ray came to recognize that nothing in the entire goddamn world meant what it was supposed to. He had just walked away from a high-paying job in order to hide out in a damp house in Scotland. Maybe that was another big fucking mistake. He had been so stupid, but part of him—a big part—no longer cared. Nothing mattered any longer, not really, except for the fact that each gulp of single malt scotch tasted even sweeter than the previous and that remained true down to the very bottom of each bottle.

Every two or three days Ray opened the front door and found another unidentifiable animal carcass on the mudroom stoop. His sightseeing expeditions extended to the edge of the garden, where he hurled the bodies into the bushes with a shovel. Otherwise he stayed indoors. He grew bored and claustrophobic, but some creature was lurking out there
waiting for him. His interaction with the locals consisted of peeking out the window when he heard their 4x4s driving past Barnhill. He came to recognize the sounds of five different vehicles that made their way from the Kinuachdrachd settlement down to Craighouse and back again.

Sometimes Ray couldn't remember why he had come to Jura and other times he couldn't imagine living anywhere else. The scotch pooled into a murky, aqueous sense of depression that ebbed and flowed, ebbed and flowed. Some days were better than others. Some days were not.

He was attempting to read the memoir of one of Orwell's contemporaries by the last evening light of the kitchen windows when a scraping noise came from the front door. He remained still, but the words “Loneliness began for me now fierce, desperate, taking on an importance out of all proportion to its quality which was that of a boy in his 'teens who” shook in his hands. There came another sound, and it grew louder. He put the book down.

Something rustled in the bushes outside the kitchen, then a monstrous face appeared in the window: an animal covered in mangy wet fur. It looked at Ray with knowing eyes that in a single glance interrogated him and his intrusive presence in this remote place, trapped in an old farmhouse a mile from the closest neighbors. The creature growled as if to speak and Ray screamed, but the hideous face still stared at him, its eyes shining with some fierce purpose, its crooked teeth glistening sharply from amid the soiled fur, until its so-nearly-human
expression changed. In some savage and instinctual way, the thing appeared as startled as he was. It motioned as if to communicate with him through the windowpane: “Is everything okay, Ray?” it asked.

“Farkas? You scared the shit out of me.”

“Not literally, I hope. Would you mind letting me in?”

Ray unbolted the front door, where Farkas stood dripping wet. “Come in, come in,” he said. “You're absolutely soaked.”

“Only on the outside, Ray,” Farkas said. “Only on the outside.” He sat on the mudroom bench and removed his wellingtons. “I could however use a wee dram if you have some on board.”

“I have a bottle I've been saving for a special occasion, in fact. You go sit by the fire.”

Farkas pulled a chair up. “I'm terribly sorry to frighten you like that,” he said. “And I hope I didn't catch you at a bad time, as I don't mean to interrupt what you're doing up here … what
are
you doing up here? I would've telephoned, but that wasn't really an option, now was it?”

Ray dragged another chair next to Farkas's. “I'm grateful for the company. I think I'm going a little stir crazy, in fact. Solitude is a lot less restorative than I thought. It turns out that life off the grid actually kind of sucks.”

“You're not the first man to discover that for himself,” Farkas said. His voice carried a baritone roundness that in a different life might have lent itself to the opera. He lifted the glass to his nose, which was barely visible through his dense
mask of mustache, beard, and eyebrow. “Nor I imagine will you be the last. This would be the eighteen-year-old, if I'm not mistaken.”

“You can tell that just from the smell? Slàinte,” Ray said. It was without question the most complex and delectable whisky that had ever crossed his tongue. It tasted the way living on Jura felt, like his humanity could reach a greater richness simply by living in such a rough and untamed land. “You certainly know your whisky. I forgot the water—I'll be right back.”

“Don't bother, don't bother. I can drink water at home. And I believe that I've had close to enough of the stuff for one day, and, in any account, malt
this
good deserves to be taken neat.”

“I didn't hear a vehicle pull up—did you walk all the way up here?”

“Sometimes I forget how big this little island truly is. I left my car at the public road and walked the last five miles. That path has destroyed sturdier cars than my own.”

“I believe it. But that's still quite a walk. I have to admit I'm beginning to wonder what Orwell was thinking coming all the way up here. It must have been even more remote back then.”

“The whole world's shrinking, Ray, at least in one sense, and that's the truth. As I've heard it, however, our Blair didn't get on very well with the locals. He was liked, as they say, but not
well
liked. There wasn't much use on Jura back then for socialist intellectuals,” he said.

“And now?”

“Funny that you mention it. You did manage to upset Gavin. Don't let it worry you, though. It's not entirely your fault. He may be holding you to blame for some past crimes. There are some old stories—and the details are murky—there are old stories that suggest our Mr. Blair got himself into some hot water while here on Jura. Gavin swears that Blair was responsible for some unpardonable offense against his mother.”

“Pitcairn's mother?”

“The very same. Blair was unwell even before he arrived. He suffered from tuberculosis where our climate, as perhaps you've noticed, can lean towards the damp. It must have been quite difficult for him, though they say he often took to sleeping outside in an army tent. It wouldn't be a stretch to believe that the man needed someone to look after him. He was incapable of preparing himself a simple cup of tea, so he certainly needed someone to do his cooking and washing up.”

“Let me guess. Pitcairn's mother?”

“Aye, Beatrice Pitcairn herself. A saint of a woman, bless her soul. Blair proposed marriage and, ever the practical Englishman, even offered her a considerable dowry in the form of his estate and future royalties to what would become
Nineteen Eighty-Four
. Unfortunately, however, he neglected to take into consideration the fact that she was already married quite happily. Our little Gavin was at that point still little more than a gleam in her eye, yet now he has come to believe that—like our Eric Blair—you're here to split up his family.”

“But that's absolutely—”

“Hear me out now,” Farkas said. “He knows that Molly plans to leave Jura at her first opportunity and he's none too chuffed about that fact. He believes that exposure to the likes of you and your so-called intellectual ideas is going to hasten her departure.”

“I came here to get away from people. Please explain it to him—I don't want to split up anyone's family.”

“I know that, Ray. Can I trouble you?” he asked, holding aloft his empty glass.

“Sure,” Ray said. “One sec.”

The sky had darkened even further. His reflection stared back at him from the same kitchen window in which Farkas had appeared, and Ray yelped again.

He brought the whole bottle. Farkas was adding some peat bricks to the fire and stoking the ashes. The sitting room grew ten degrees warmer. “Now you can't take anything Gavin says personally, Ray. He doesn't care for much of anybody other than himself, but he upholds a special variety of loathing for outsiders—especially the tourists. And although I was born here, he still sees fit to consider me an outsider too, but I do try to get along with him. I can't imagine what you said to the man, but I've never seen him so wound up, and you can trust me when I say that I've seen that man well wound up. You should have heard him the time Molly announced she was going off to art school.”

“Art school?”

“Aye, in Glasgow, no less. She didn't even tell him she had applied until the acceptance letter arrived. I would speculate that every living soul on this island other than Gavin Pitcairn knows the importance of an education for Molly. The sheep and deer and seals know it. He called the school and threatened to burn it to the ground.”

“What an asshole.”

“He's that, aye, but he's also a good man in his way. He wants what he thinks is best for Jura, and it's difficult to find fault with that impulse. That being said, before you go causing him any more trouble, I know for a fact that he would have burnt that school to the ground. Gavin's entirely capable of such a thing, so unless you want to have your guts for garters you might want to stay clear of him, Ray.”

“Why, what did he say about me?”

“That at his first opportunity he plans to throw you into the Corryvreckan.”

“The whirlpool is real? Orwell mentioned it in his diary, but I thought he made it up.”

“I don't know what you consider real or unreal, but right off the north tip of our island there's a whirlpool which has swallowed up more fishing boats than you can count. Every few years the telly producers come out here to shoot yet another daft documentary about how Ulysses himself made it as far as the Hebrides. And some will argue that Corryvreckan is actually the mythical Charybdis, which makes it not so mythical by my reckoning.”

“You're telling me that the sea monster from
The Odyssey
actually lives off the coast of Scotland?”

“That's what they say.”

“And where do they say Scylla lives? Let me guess—Ireland?”

“As far as you're concerned, she lives in Craighouse and goes by the name Gavin Pitcairn.”

Ray took a long drink. From the sound of things, he wouldn't be able to buy supplies at The Stores or collect his mail for fear of being attacked by a crazed Scottish arsonist. “I'll be right back,” he said, his tongue thick with whisky. He extracted a hundred quid from his wallet. “Give this to Pitcairn,” he told Farkas. “He says I owe him some money. That's why he's so mad. Tell him I'm sorry.”

“I'm afraid it may be a bit late for that, Ray, but I'm sure this will help. I'd encourage you to stay out of his way, which you will admit shouldn't be too difficult for you up here. How're you settling in, anyway?”

Good question. How
was
he settling in?

“Being here has definitely been liberating, and the whisky is spectacular. Do I remember correctly that you work at the distillery?” Speaking—or slurring, in this case—to someone other than himself felt great.

“I do, I do. I'm in charge of what you might call quality control.” Farkas touched his nose with a hairy finger. “This baby is my meal ticket. Or my drink ticket, I guess you could say. I possess an exceptionally acute sense of smell.”

“This house must be torture for you.”

“I'll admit I detected a slight plumbing problem when I came in. And you've been burning garbage in the fireplace.”

“That's quite a talent.”

“A blessing and a curse, Ray. A blessing and a curse, like most things. I will be happy to give you a tour—it's quite an operation. And it's my job, in a way, to keep a record of Jura's history. Now I'm going to pour one more dram and head on back.”

“You just got here.”

“Aye, but I've quite a long walk ahead of me. I should inquire if given your interest in our Mr. Blair, you happened to take the opportunity to speak with Singer on your way over?”

“The ferryman?”

“The very same. He may be among the last of the locals who knew Blair personally. I'm not saying they were fast friends or anything, but I'll be surprised if he doesn't have some good stories for you—even if they aren't what you might call true.” Stupidly, it never occurred to Ray that he should ask the older folks about meeting Orwell. Some of the longtime residents might still remember him. “And Miss Wayward up at Kinuachdrachd. I understand that her auntie knew Blair, though she's known to be a bit weird even for a Diurach.”

“Is there anyone else I should speak to?”

“No one that I can think of off the top of my slightly intoxicated head. Oh … Mrs. Campbell.”

“I should talk to Mrs. Campbell?”

“No! She is devout in her hatred of everything having to do with Mr. Blair, a fact that might explain why the two of you got off to such an awful start.”

“You heard about that?”

“Everybody on Jura and Islay has heard about that,” he said.

“That's not why she hates me, though. Or not the only reason. I really was terrible to her.”

“Aye, I heard that too.”

“What's her problem with Orwell?”

Farkas finished his fifth or sixth glass of scotch. “Well, there's been some speculation … and it's no more than that. One story, set somewhere between myth and reality, goes that Mrs. Campbell's dear mother, who lost her husband in the war, took quite a liking to Mr. Blair while he was here for the first time to inspect Barnhill.”

“And?”

“What do you mean ‘and?' You're going to have to keep your ears open on Jura, Ray. She took quite a liking to our Mr. Blair, if you know what I mean, while everybody else on the island detested the man. She may have even spent a few weeks here at Barnhill.”

Comprehension descended more slowly than it should have. “Are you telling me that Mrs. Campbell is Orwell's illegitimate daughter?”

“I'm telling you nothing of the sort. Rather, I'm merely
reporting, for your own edification, about some of the mythologies of the Isle of Jura, like Charybdis or our werewolf.”