Sun Dance (38 page)

The Valkyrie lay on her side, knocked down by the inexorable will of the elements. They hear no prayer, nor care. Only the power of the old Viking Gods, the Hero’s of Asgard in their Halls of Valhalla might save one of their own. Strange a modern man in his moment of need should cry to a long dead belief. What power a myth to force itself from the mouth of a drowning man?

Any man who has seen beyond the ultimate eclipse of this life’s conscious being, glimpsed in his final vision a glory which shines out, that draws him moth like to the eternal flame, to the indestructible energy of a universe which knows not death, only unending change; such a man is transformed, no longer a helpless victim of mindless faith but the possessor of inner knowledge.

Andrew Anderson’s eyes opened to the sky, conscious that he lay across the yacht’s boom. He felt it lifting him. Vomiting water, retching and coughing, he clung to the spar, vaguely able to see the Valkyrie’s mast slowly rising. The yacht fought to right herself. His feet dangled in a flooded cockpit; seas pouring off her decks she lay, a stricken vessel on a great black shoulder of water. The cascading mass, having flattened the sea, forged into the darkness, streaked with anger. Thwarted? The devil is never defeated. The gale raged into the chasms of nightfall.

Regaining breath Anderson swung off the boom, aware the snagging of his rope on the spar as it lay in the water had saved him, saved him, so far? The Valkyrie, swinging broadside to wave and gale lay ahull, at the mercy of the whole weight of any freshly breaking crest.

Action. The yacht sat heavily, no longer her buoyant self but a flooded hull. He opened the hatch, water sloshing at bunk level. A yacht half full, the next dump of sea would…? He reached for the instrument switches, panel dead, no power, no electric bilge pump, cockpit hand pump too slow, a pail the only way. The yacht rolled alarmingly, dipping her gunnel to coach roof level as each wave drove under her; swilling cabin water added to each roll; to a fatal list?

Pail’s in the ‘heads’. He unhitched the rope strop, clambered below, waded through the cabin, grabbed the pail, floundered back to the hatch. Balance and bale, bale with each roll of the boat, get the water out before another wave crashes over her, hatch open- another would smother her she’d fill and sink.

Working frantically; save the yacht, no fear for himself, the spirit of Valkyrie spoke to him, her voice was at his shoulder, “Together we live or go down, be with me and we live.” The soul of man and boat fused in a bond of kinship known only to those in peril.

Pails of water flung over the stern. The boat rolled hideously, rode the crest of another shattering top. Another truly big one would bury the Valkyrie, make the Atlantic their grave.

Sea anchor and ride the storm? Water level down, out of the cabin he climbed, groping along the deck, not tied on, handholds only to the for’ard hatch. She rolled, he fell, arm broken? Huge waves, always far apart. Wait the next lull. Pain, soaked and frozen, fumbling the catch.

Watching the sea he lugged the anchor from the hatch, a huge canvas cone, heaved it over the bow. Paid out rope, fathom by fathom, secured it to the Samson post.

Would her head come round, face the onslaught? Ride the crests?

He looked northwards. Out of the night, a window of light, a star showed.

Did the God of his forebears look down?

Was faith alone his anchor?

On the beaches of our consciousness wash
countless grains of time

That change with every tide, with every fresh born galaxy

Whose mineral palette is the swirling photon brush

Which paints the beauty of the cosmos

As love’s simplicity.

Eilidh and I spent our first Christmas on Sandray, alone together in Tigh na Cala. The old house and its bothy style of bare essentials had been blitzed. Creaking chairs and enamel basins were out, our supplies no longer sat in wooden fish boxes declaring,’ Lochinver Fish Selling Co. No Unauthorised Use’. A number of boat trips transported some practical comfort. Easy chairs were in; under a woman’s hand, cushions, curtains and a bedroom carpet appeared. From tablecloth to tapestry wall hangings, Eilidh’s flair for bright colours had a distinctive style, the rooms came to life, we had a home, and to prove it Eachan and Ella came over the Sound on Boxing Day. “Ach,” said Eachan, “I’d never heard of this Boxing Day stunt until I was twenty and then it was just a practice for Hogmanay,” adding with a wink at me, “not that some were ever out of practice.” “And who knows that better than yourself, Eachan MacKenzie?” Ella piped up. He pretended not to hear.

Whilst the two women discussed our home’s next improvements, Eachan sat quietly. Not a man given to showing emotion, to see the house of his childhood rescued from dereliction affected him greatly. A dram eventually brought out the stories of his youth, how they’d gathered the island sheep, the danger of the sea cliffs to sheep and men, “I once lost a dog, ‘Shep’ to name, a topper of a dog, he cut out to the far side of sheep that were making to dodge down the cliff, running fast, his eye was on the sheep, over he went, poor beast. I blamed myself.” he said slowly. The names of his father’s collies came to him, laughingly he went on, “the bodach would work one dog in the Gaelic and the other in English, sometimes he got it mixed, so I dare say the dogs were bi-lingual.” Each cnoc and hollow flitted through his mind as he saw the lines of sheep drawing towards the stone built pens, all Gaelic names which told of the lie of the land or the nature of the ground. I wrote it down as he spoke. Were any left of the generations who knew the features of the island with the intimacy of tramping feet? His reminiscences paused as I poured another wee ‘toot’, “Who else could tell me these names today?” I asked him. “Nobody,” was his slow response, and then with a fixed look at me, “but I’m telling you, Hector boy.” His meaning was not lost.

We’d taken in the bells in our own home and sailed the Sound in the cold early hours of a star bright night to be the first foot at Ach na Mara. Lights blazed from every croft on Halasay. We made it. Eilidh lifted a peat from the stack beside the house, “This’ll do, we’ll have ours next year.” First to cross the old couple’s doorstep and put a peat to their fire, “Happy New Year!”; oh boy the welcome! Eachan swept Eilidh off her feet, “Woman, I wish I was young again,” they were so fond of each other. I hugged Ella till she gasped to Eilidh, “I’ll bet he’s as wicked as his namesake.” “I’m beginning to think that.” A laughing Eilidh flush-faced from the sail looked beautiful. No shyness at our second kiss of the New Year, and the old couple took our cue.

No knocking and waiting either, the door opened and neighbours carrying clinking supplies appeared in droves. Good cheer came in more than a bottle, this was a community of like people, no pretensions, as natural as the land they crofted. Lively folk brimming with music and not a little refreshment. Soon they were singing, dancing and for those who would listen or could hear over the laughter and Iain’s accordion, some were telling stories. Ensuring all glasses were charged, though not for the first time, Eachan called the toast, “To absent friends.” It was echoed round a tiny crowded room. I remembered the old Scots song, ‘My ain Folk’, my father at the piano, mother singing; in words and music an exile’s longing, the missing of ‘the lang syne days, the old folks ways, and the hills of the heart’s romance,’ as he used to quote. I asked Eachan and Iain to play it in their memory. My first New Year in the Highlands, ‘at hame with my ain folk,’ and I’ll swear by five in the morning old great grandfather of the photo above the mantle shelf was smiling down.

New Year’s night and dancing down in Castleton. The following evening on a circuit of village friends, it occurred to me that months had passed and I’d yet to call at the Police Station. Eachan looked serious, “What’s the hurry?” I put it off, wisely so, in the circumstances. Another night around various crofts, I marvelled at the stamina. “Wait you for the Old New Year,” Eachan warned. I must have looked puzzled, “the old folks always kept the twelfth of January as their New Year and some of us still keep up the tradition, out of respect you understand, so now we have two celebrations.” On the fourth day we retreated to Sandray for a sleep. A Highland New Year was not to be under estimated.

By the first week in January I could tell a difference in the length of day. Settled weather hung over an oily Atlantic, vague mists drifted its flat calm surface, ideal for working the land. I hauled up kelp from the shore, set to digging the lines of ‘lazybeds’ which would take our first planting of tatties. Eilidh sailed back and forth to Halasay, food supplies, kitchen equipment, piping, wood and fittings, boat loads of ‘home improvement’ trips. Each evening by the hissing lamp, I fitted sink and draining boards, cupboards. A week and Eilidh could turn on a kitchen tap, cold water admittedly but the solar panels and a boiler were on order. One corner would host a peat burning stove. By May, I’d be at the peat bank cutting for next winter. Hugging each other to sleep each night we talked plans, sheep, maybe cattle, fencing a field for hay, pioneer homemaking, “What about a collie pup,” my last words and a tired Eilidh nodded in her sleep.

The winter sun had rolled along the horizon each day to give us weeks of dry invigorating weather. A break coming? I felt it on my skin as late one evening we crossed salt bleached grazings on the gentle rise towards the headland. Deep in the conflicting energies which surround the planet a disturbance was about to strike, a maelstrom of electrons were funnelling into the earth’s upper atmosphere, I’d seen its first flickers from the doorstep, “Come on Eilidh,” Putting down a cushion she was sewing and joining me she whispered at my elbow, “Yes, Hector we must see this tonight.” Pulling on jackets, for the night had the chill of January’s end, Eilidh took my hand and off we set.

The night held a curiously anxious feel, as we walked it seemed electrified. The planet faced violence from the sun; a geomagnetic conflict. Hot plasma hurtled towards the earth in a cascade of high energy particles. From the north came a cosmic outburst, flashing onto the sky, filling the horizon. The planet’s magnetic shield was fending off a massive onslaught of charged particles, a solar storm. Stars faded and died. Vast curtains of green light appeared, hung in swirling drapes from the firmament. Totally incongruous colours were suspended from a mammoth screen, flickering with intensity, pierced with leaping white flares. It moved by unseen hand.

Gradually the swaying green canopy gave way; orange searchlights shot skywards, a garish mauve covered cliff and sea. Ripples of violent discharge spread far beyond earth’s orbit. In turn their brilliance morphed to sheets of a deepest pink reaching outwards and upwards, hanging over us. Immense magnetic fields were thrashing the heavens. The omnipotent power of the solar wind, a hurricane of the sun’s ejected electrons rushed past the planet, millions of kilometres an hour, smashing molecules in the upper atmosphere, whipping the earth’s girdling magnetosphere into a frenzy of twisting electric fields. Potential havoc to satellites and power lines could be the very least; were our protective shield to fail, the solar wind would slowly strip away earth’s atmosphere. Exposed to toxic carcinogenic rays life would shrivel and die. The Sun would triumph.

The grandeur of space weather played out above our heads. One moment the bleached grass at our feet shone green, the weathered stones tinted by its weaving eeriness, and the sea a deep green empire until shafts of white gave way to changing shades; pale green faded and the heavens were immersed in a deep rose pink. The sea before us became dark crimson.

We neared the headland. Against a lurid sky the prow stone of the old Viking grave ship stood out, a huge black figure. Ancient hand- placed stones, their mica glinted as sparks of a fire ignited by the sky. A funeral longboat burnt again. The dancing aurora were bearing away one of their own, carrying his soul to the land which had grown the timbers of his ship, back to the northlands of larch clad fiords, and the raven crags of wisdom.

We sat with our backs to that prow stone. The people of sword and longship sailed the galaxies of belief, plundered the cosmic beaches, put fire to the heavens and feasted by its light. Shadows fell about us, regal in their shades; the myths were alive, an unquenchable mystery buried deep within layer upon layer of generations who’d watched in awe from their arctic vastness.

Slowly the skies were fading, the stars returning. The Gods drew their raiment about them, and left the night to us. Low on the horizon the lights were dimmed below the Halls of Valhalla.

The woman beside me shivered, I drew her close. We were both greatly affected by the weirdness of the night. No man- made light, two people alone beside a wondering ocean, crouching within the stones of a boat grave, the symbol of death’s aspirations.

Together we’d witnessed the most powerful forces of nature, had seen threading currents rip through nearby space; remoteness brought closeness and with it came a reverence for that which may lie beyond.

I listened to the rustle of the sea beneath the cliff, conscious of my close encounter with death, “Eildh,” I whispered, “Whoever lies buried within this ship lived with a vision, he looked north from this headland, held fast to an unshakeable belief that one day he would sail the cosmic oceans of his mind. Nothing has changed. Since humans first felt the presence of the stars on the road of discovery the myths of man’s religion have simply invented fresh gods. I believe there will be no end, only fresh beginnings. The celestial forces bind our destiny to the pathway of infinite knowledge.”

She was silent for a long time, looking to the last glimmer of the aurora. Reaching to me she held both my hands, “Hector,” her voice, a tremor of excitement, “Hector, we’re having a baby.”

Dumfounded by joy but unable for a moment to shake off the drama in the skies, my first thought tumbled out, “A child of destiny.”

Gently I took her to me.

The night was in our arms, a night for loving,