Love and Music Will Endure Read Free Page A

his own mouth and chin. He made plans for her future as he watched her grow old enough to totter about, chuckling to herself. But she caught the fever that dulled her eyes until they shrivelled and shrank back into her skull. She died so suddenly, another small victim of the harsh heat of India. Damn the woman, he thought angrily. How dare she surprise him like that so that his heart floundered again after so long?
    He reached out for the decanter but stayed his hand. No, he had to starve the demon gout. He had made the mistake of giving Màiri too generous a measure and she had downed it so quickly. Is that why she had started smirking at him and digging him in the ribs? The whisky must have gone straight to her head. Good Heavens! Was she flirting with him? It was like being cornered by an elephant in must. He had heard the jokes about her cravingfor male company, a need that seemed to have grown rather than diminished over the years. Still, he had escaped lightly with a brief duet. He had taken care to ram his hands into his pockets to stop her seizing them.
    His eye was caught by a movement outside. It was one of the farm cats, a scrawny tabby, crouching down, one foreleg raised in slow motion, its eyes fixed on its prey. Suddenly he remembered the mongoose that used to live near his Indian bungalow. Half tame, it would hover around the kitchen quarters. The servants tolerated it because it killed snakes. One time he had seen it feinting and darting around an infuriated cobra. Màiri made him feel like that bamboozled snake, constantly swivelling his head to see where she would strike next. What a holy terror she was.

CHAPTER 3
Isle of Skye, 1810
    ‘Look there she is’, Iain pointed, his voice trembling.
    ‘Aye’, replied Flòraidh breathlessly, looking at the square-rigged ship sailing into the harbour at Portree. They had come down the hill from the Sluggans, the open ground at the edge of the village where the travelling people stayed all summer mending pots and living in their strange tents with a chimney sticking out of one end. They had been to the cattle sale there. Iain was pleased with the price he had got for his beasts and kept fingering the weight of the coins through the piece of cloth knotted around his waist. His plans were working out. There was enough money for a night at MacNab’s inn rather than having to stay with his wife’s relatives.
    ‘We can look around her before she sails,’ he said, quickening his pace and forcing her to lengthen her usual shuffle. They hurried down to the harbour to see the
Phoenix
. She had a battered grace, awkward as a heron among the small, bobbing craft that jostled her. Iain stared in amazement. He had never seen such a large vessel, a good ninety feet long. She must be able to carry two hundred people, he reckoned. A crowd had already gathered, some carrying belongings, others to gawp. A small boat was being lowered from the ship’s side with two men aboard. As they drew it up on the shore Iain caught a sailor’s eye and called out, ‘Did you have a good journey from Greenock?’ The man looked blank and sneered. Iain frowned. The other sailor spoke to him.
    ‘You’re wasting your time with most of the crew. They’ve only got the English.’
    ‘See Iain, there are families aboard already’, said Flòraidh, drawing his attention to some figures sitting huddled together in the stern.
    ‘We’re going back to the ship in a moment, Mistress. Why don’t you come with us and get a proper look?’ the sailor suggested.
    She turned to Iain who nodded in agreement but once she had been rowed over she gazed up at the ship in horror and bewilderment. How was she to get aboard? Small boats she was used to, clambering over the side into waiting arms. But the swinging rope ladder dangling from the sheer cliff face of this vessel terrified her, especially now that her pregnancy had made her body unwieldy. She imagined herself slipping and hurtling down into the sea