could recharge the monkey at fuel stations, if we took the adaptor. Yeah, that sounds like a plan.’
‘You’re not taking me seriously.’
‘That I’m not. And why would we want to walk to anywhere, anyway?’
‘If we had to get away.’
‘Jeez.’ Hugh didn’t sound amused. ‘That’s not how you do it. There’s no
away
.’
‘People talk about going off grid.’
‘Yeah, they do. They talk about it. On the net. Nowhere’s off grid any more.’
‘There must be,’ said Hope. ‘There must be a place.’
Nick had stopped by the side of the path up ahead, and squatted down to gaze into the dark space underneath a huge holly bush. Max, programmed to occasionally ape its owner’s actions, squatted beside him. As Hugh and Hope approached, they heard Nick talking, as if to someone under the bush. Hiselbows were propped on his knees, and he gestured with his hands and forearms, each motion mimicked by Max.
Hope turned to Hugh, smiling, and raised a finger to her lips.
‘Cute,’ she murmured.
Hugh nodded. But he waited only a few seconds, and then coughed, and scuffed the ground as he strode forward.
‘Yes,’ he said to Hope as he reached for Nick’s hand and scooped Max to his shoulders. ‘There is a place.’
He sounded happy.
The Bright Land
There was a place. Hugh was fairly sure it existed and wasn’t one of his visions. The other lads, Malcolm and Donald, had seen it too. The reason he couldn’t be entirely sure was that the lads were Leosich themselves, and they could have had the second sight too, for all he knew, and spoken of it no more than he did. But he was almost sure there was more to it than that, even to this day: that the glimpse his pals had shared, and denied, was of some far reality. Hugh’s guesses as to the nature of its reality varied on a sliding scale of scepticism and self-mockery: an objective phenomenon, a space-time anomaly, a land under the hill, a fairy land, Tir Nan Og …
They’d all been about twelve years old at the time: old enough for big school, the Nicolson Institute in Stornoway. Old enough to look with a sort of affectionate pity at wee school, Valtos Primary, when they came back to Uig for thesummer holidays. Seeing the parish again after a couple of terms in the town was unsettling. The black houses and the white, the sheep-fanks and bothans, the corrugated-iron sheds, the dry-stone walls another inch deeper in the grass, the ruins and the new build, the rusting cars and tractors in the middle of fields, all seemed primitive and petty, almost shameful to be associated with, something you’d outgrown like childhood toys. Only the windmills and the wooden houses looked modern.
The boys and girls whose parents were natives or settlers had work to do on the crofts or in the shops. The girl children of the wind-farmers had help to give their mothers around the house. The boys didn’t (unlike the girls, who had home management in their curriculum). They mooched. They hung around the turbines and got in the way of the workers. Goggled and gloved, gaming, they squandered sunny days indoors until their mothers yearned to chase them out of the house with sticks.
Then a morning came when Hugh looked out of his bedroom window to see a sky whose blue was so deep and dark that he could have been looking at it through Polaroid sunglasses. He couldn’t imagine staying inside. He pinged Malcolm the minister’s son and Donald the rigger’s boy. About half an hour later they met in the back yard of the house where Hugh lived. The house was a mile and a half away from the wee school that overlooked the bay. It stood on the slope of a hill, the highest house in a village that, like most villages in Lewis, consisted of a cluster of half a dozen old houses, a few new ones and sites for several more, all scattered around the landscape for hundreds ofmetres. The road ran below it, over a culvert where a stream from a small freshwater loch at one side of the hill
‘You’re not taking me seriously.’
‘That I’m not. And why would we want to walk to anywhere, anyway?’
‘If we had to get away.’
‘Jeez.’ Hugh didn’t sound amused. ‘That’s not how you do it. There’s no
away
.’
‘People talk about going off grid.’
‘Yeah, they do. They talk about it. On the net. Nowhere’s off grid any more.’
‘There must be,’ said Hope. ‘There must be a place.’
Nick had stopped by the side of the path up ahead, and squatted down to gaze into the dark space underneath a huge holly bush. Max, programmed to occasionally ape its owner’s actions, squatted beside him. As Hugh and Hope approached, they heard Nick talking, as if to someone under the bush. Hiselbows were propped on his knees, and he gestured with his hands and forearms, each motion mimicked by Max.
Hope turned to Hugh, smiling, and raised a finger to her lips.
‘Cute,’ she murmured.
Hugh nodded. But he waited only a few seconds, and then coughed, and scuffed the ground as he strode forward.
‘Yes,’ he said to Hope as he reached for Nick’s hand and scooped Max to his shoulders. ‘There is a place.’
He sounded happy.
The Bright Land
There was a place. Hugh was fairly sure it existed and wasn’t one of his visions. The other lads, Malcolm and Donald, had seen it too. The reason he couldn’t be entirely sure was that the lads were Leosich themselves, and they could have had the second sight too, for all he knew, and spoken of it no more than he did. But he was almost sure there was more to it than that, even to this day: that the glimpse his pals had shared, and denied, was of some far reality. Hugh’s guesses as to the nature of its reality varied on a sliding scale of scepticism and self-mockery: an objective phenomenon, a space-time anomaly, a land under the hill, a fairy land, Tir Nan Og …
They’d all been about twelve years old at the time: old enough for big school, the Nicolson Institute in Stornoway. Old enough to look with a sort of affectionate pity at wee school, Valtos Primary, when they came back to Uig for thesummer holidays. Seeing the parish again after a couple of terms in the town was unsettling. The black houses and the white, the sheep-fanks and bothans, the corrugated-iron sheds, the dry-stone walls another inch deeper in the grass, the ruins and the new build, the rusting cars and tractors in the middle of fields, all seemed primitive and petty, almost shameful to be associated with, something you’d outgrown like childhood toys. Only the windmills and the wooden houses looked modern.
The boys and girls whose parents were natives or settlers had work to do on the crofts or in the shops. The girl children of the wind-farmers had help to give their mothers around the house. The boys didn’t (unlike the girls, who had home management in their curriculum). They mooched. They hung around the turbines and got in the way of the workers. Goggled and gloved, gaming, they squandered sunny days indoors until their mothers yearned to chase them out of the house with sticks.
Then a morning came when Hugh looked out of his bedroom window to see a sky whose blue was so deep and dark that he could have been looking at it through Polaroid sunglasses. He couldn’t imagine staying inside. He pinged Malcolm the minister’s son and Donald the rigger’s boy. About half an hour later they met in the back yard of the house where Hugh lived. The house was a mile and a half away from the wee school that overlooked the bay. It stood on the slope of a hill, the highest house in a village that, like most villages in Lewis, consisted of a cluster of half a dozen old houses, a few new ones and sites for several more, all scattered around the landscape for hundreds ofmetres. The road ran below it, over a culvert where a stream from a small freshwater loch at one side of the hill
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