Sun Dance (62 page)

Another summer and winter passed and so far as we could tell the major construction work on Sandray appeared to be finished. It was no longer such a cloak and dagger operation. Enquiries under the Freedom of Information Act as to its purpose were initially met with a blank refusal, National Security being the standard block; however thanks to internal leaks and a press campaign by the Glasgow Herald the nation now knew that a Scottish island had been developed by an American conglomerate as an international underground storage facility for highly radioactive nuclear waste. Few in the population at large had any idea of Sandray's whereabouts; anyway it was suitable remote and the news passed with little adverse comment except on the part of environmental groups and a scattering of green MP's.

Attempts to discover which politicians and government agencies had been involved in slipping decision making past the Scottish Parliament and various official planning bodies, proved difficult to unearth. Parallels were drawn with the sleight of hand which produced the Iraq war. Greenpeace called for a public enquiry but that was turned down. Tracks had been well covered.

Their imprint on Halasay life however was more obvious. Paramount to the running of the base was maximum security. Sandray Sound and the waters around the island were closed to any type of shipping. Local fishing boats, yachts, even inflatable dinghies were warned off by patrol vessels. On the hill several radar towers' scanning arms revolved continuously. Local gossip assumed the huge listening cups pointing at the sky formed some part of the facilities' protection from air attack.

The Castleton bar became a hot bed of conjecture. Heads were shaken over drams, what safety existed from an incoming missile? Archie at the end of the counter looked into his whisky, “It might even be an incoming drone.” Seamus ordered another round, “Whatever that is, it couldn't be worse than that droning bugger of a politician in the hall last night.”

To a catalogue of prospective disasters the troop of Halasay worthies gloomily drained their glasses. A gentleman new to the island, who perhaps considered himself better informed on the latest forms of terrorism, elaborated on the impact of an outbreak of cyber warfare. Even those listeners unfamiliar with the word ‘cyber', nodded none the less when he informed them in solemn tones, “A deadly virus could infect the phalanx of computers which run the Sandray complex. That would dislocate all their programmes, the effect would be calamitous.”

To allow his message to sink in he looked from one to another. They stared back in silence, until, “A virus, you mean a sort of ‘flu in the wiring?” remarked Seamus feigning innocence. “Exactly, absolutely,” replied the disciple of doom, unaware the circle of locals buried their faces in pint glasses. A wide eyed Seamus broke the silence, “Well now, I'll tell you, Mr. er, er..” “Montague Cholmondly,” the man interjected his name. Seamus swallowed hard, “You can't better a wee toddy for the ‘flu, unless it's another one.”

Much barstool debate speculated on various earth shattering possibilities, in fact almost to the exclusion of the ruinous sheep prices on the mainland. A desire to ‘get my hands' on the waste dump operators frequently curtailed the deliberations at closing time. Few however of the hotel regulars had met or even set eyes on Sandray's latest occupiers; from nuclear technicians to chefs, the islands workforce operated as a closed community, at least so far as it reflected their lack of attendance at the bar counter.

Perhaps just as well. To describe as hostile the attitude of Halasay locals to the takeover of Sandray without any form of consultation, would be risible. Meetings had packed the village hall to hear celebrity environmentalists warn of the dangers lurking next door, an alarming reality which served to fuel the anger of an island community who knew they'd been duped, made victims of the ‘not in my backyard' syndrome.

Attending another gathering, Eilidh and I sat through a Westminster MP's attempt to justify government action. He'd spoken boldly about job creation, moving towards sustainable low carbon lifestyles, and finally emphasising the safe role of nuclear power in cutting harmful emissions had ended by making the case for a wise mix of all options in the overall National energy policy. More mouth than man, we exchanged looks but kept silent. One old crofter at the back of the hall got the only applause when he stood up and addressed the platform, “It seems to me, and you can talk about being wise, Mr. Politician,” he'd forgotten the chap's name, “the peat fire has done my day without harming anyone, apart from giving my wife a bad back.” We all laughed until he said quietly, “But last year my grandson was killed in Afghanistan.”

It came about that one day, a shade reluctantly, the three of us set off to climb the hill above Castleton. An excited Eachan scrambled up ahead and stood waving down from his perch on the summit cairn. Eventually we reached him, to find the clarity of light exceptional. Island upon island blended into each other until slender tips, they became images on the blueness of a day that marbled the tall white clouds of June on an unruffled ocean. The hilltop air in its stillness floated tranquil as the sea.

We sat quietly. First it was near, and then somewhere far away. Was it out on the ridge? There was no telling. A lone whistle, soft and elusive, plaintive as the calling of what once had been. “That's a golden plover,” I whispered to Eachan. “It's the shyest of all the hill birds.” The boy listened in fascination. I looked across to Sandray flushed by summer grass, green and inviting to those of a shepherding mind.

A vast breakwater complete with a sizeable navigating beacon curved out from the east side of the island, an immense structure. A huge quantity of jagged rock, blasted from tunnel and hilltop, had been bulldozed into the deeper water, ton by ton dumped and levelled. I visualised a modest sized ship sheltering in the bay unloading steel containers of radioactive waste. Sitting on a sizeable pier a couple of hefty looking cranes reached over the water; they'd be for lifting the consignments onto a track way which, beneath a series of concrete pillars dotting their way up the hillside, led to a tunnel mouth and into the storage chamber.

An array of turrets and antennae spiked the flattened top of the Hill of the Shroud suggesting some of the incoming material might arrive by helicopter. Even to the naked eye the level of activity was staggering. Huge trucks and land rovers crawled along a road zigzagging up the hill and down to the east bay. Obviously building work continued apace. The scale of it all alarmed me. This was no small home- based requirement; at the very least it smacked of American, if not international involvement.

The headland, made conspicuous by its singularly tall pylon, hid the site of our old house. Cables dangling above the Sound continued in a line of pylons striding over the hilltop, carrying the supply of electricity which I knew to be vital to maintaining a critically cold temperature in the storage tubes. Leaning against the cairn I shaded my eyes, groups of sheep grazed the hillside unconcerned by the roar of an incoming helicopter. Another took off, heading east. A moment's glint of light caught large letters along its side. They read, Nuen.

The sound of a departing helicopter followed us down the hill. Quietness returned as we sauntered down the lower slopes to where the wild fescue grew tallest and the warmth of an afternoon sun brought out the scent of bog-myrtle.

Six years old, Eachan walked the two miles over to Castleton Primary School and always keen to help if he thought there was work with the animals, he'd run home. “Do you need a hand Dad?” The abandoned satchel hung on the gate, to the sound of his mother shouting from the door in Gaelic, “Come in and change your clothes.” Eilidh ensured the boy was bi-lingual, even I found myself fluent enough during our supper time conversations to talk sheep, cattle and the weather.

Weeks of unbroken sunshine baked ground and grass alike. It had been the easiest summer for hay making. Even the old worthies for whom the weather had always been better in their school days, complained of sunburnt bald heads and admitted that never before did such a spell of heat settle itself over the islands. Pastures and bodies alike were tea brown. A relentless sun favoured the appearance of bikinis, sometimes even less. The tourist migration to Halasay's wide open beaches added a fresh dimension to bar counter comments on global warming. Towards closing time, often tempered with a little wisecrack, the stories of an older generation tended to reflect the changing seasons, rather than the earthy observations of the more concupiscent.

“There was no school bus when I ran barefoot to the school and home again at the double to go fishing or whatever was doing,” my crofting neighbour, Roddy MacDougal, a man who'd gained his Master's Ticket at twenty-five and sailed the world, had just topped ninety. “You see my father used to graze the cattle on Eilean Fada, you know where I mean,” he nodded over his shoulder, “out there on the west side. I wouldn't be in school even, but many's the time I drove them across the strand, no problem, when the tide was out, the channel was dry. About May time it would be; what grazing, what a shine it put on them. You could pull a chair under them and eat your dinner off their back, it would be like a table. When the geese came back in October we took the cattle home, but in the old days the young women, my granny was one of them, would go over and milk them and make cheese, and stay for a month or more in a turf hut, and sometimes the boys would go across,” he winked at me,“ and on an occasion more than cheese would be made.”

Whatever story lay behind his wink, Captain Roddy gazed into the mirror behind the optics. Thoughtful eyes saw childhood days, a sheet of water, thin and bright as glass covering the sand and his father's cattle splashing their way across the ford. I waited until he looked back to me, “You see as the years went by it got more difficult, you had to wait a half moon and drive the cattle over at the neap tide. That was fine, but you'll know yourself, Eachan,” I'd long since become used to answering to the Gaelic of Hector, “that north-west gale we had two winters ago, I never saw a bigger sea running, the breakers were eating the dunes by the yard. There'll be no more cattle grazing on Eilean Fada, nor the geese either. The sea level is rising, and nothing will halt it now. The island just about covers at high water, and Eachan you'll see it yourself at Ach na Mara, those dunes at the far end of your croft are getting washed away.” “Yes, the marram grass isn't holding them stable now and when it goes.” there was no point in my stating the obvious.

A look to MacLeod and the ever attentive hotelier served another round. “The old granny used to say when I'd come home from sea and be telling about Atlantic gales, ‘Don't be speaking, it'll all be the same in a hundred years,' but you tell me, I‘m not so sure. They talk about climate change, storms follow heat, I tell you, the whole western seaboard of these islands is threatened; when Greenland gets back its colour these crofts will need more than a seawall.”

Sweltering heat indeed, Eilidh and I had made the most of it. A hay crop stacked in good order yielded a feeling all that mattered in our little insular world remained secure. We passed an unhurried afternoon raking up the last wisps of hay. Weeks of sunshine had lightened the shade of Eilidh's hair; it fell flaxen gold over her tanned shoulders, feminine and luxurious. A little ahead of me she gathered the scattered grass into lines. I watched the easy flow of her body.

Perhaps she knew, perhaps the sunshine betrayed my thoughts. With a laugh, I caught her by the waist. She spun around. The hay rake fell to the ground unnoticed and gently she curled her arms about my neck. Her eyes held in their light the blueness of our every tomorrow, “Eilidh, if only you could realise how much I…” She drew my lips to hers. My eyes closed. In the sun that would not let us part, time was for another day, another place, nothing could change. She trembled ever so lightly, “I know, I know how much,” her words, deep and tender, broke the silence, “it's the same for me, always,” and amidst the fragrance of summer we lay together in the hay.