Murdo's War Read online

  ALAN TEMPERLEY was born in Sunderland and educated at the Bede Grammar School. As a boy he played rugby, cricket and tennis, sang in a big church choir, had many pets, enjoyed the theatre and read his way through the children’s library. At the age of 16 he joined the Merchant Navy and has sailed as deck officer, able seaman and trawlerman. Following two years in the RAF, he studied at Manchester and Edinburgh Universities and became a teacher of English in the northern Highlands. It was here his first tentative writings took shape, first prize-winning short stories and poetry, then volumes of folklore, and finally novels, particularly for school-age readers. Among them are the award-winning Harry and the Wrinklies (turned into three series for STV), Huntress of the Sea and The Magician of Samarkand (televised for the BBC). Temperley’s most recent book, Scar Hill, was nominated for the 2011 CILIP Carnegie Medal and the 2011 UKLA Children’s Book Awards. His books appear in 18 languages. Although work and travels have taken him far afield, he constantly returns to the north. He has one son, a young solicitor in Edinburgh, and two granddaughters. He lives in a former schoolhouse in rural Galloway.

  Murdo’s War

  ALAN TEMPERLEY

  Luath Press Limited

  EDINBURGH

  www.luath.co.uk

  First published 1988 by Canongate

  This edition 2011

  Reprinted 2013

  eBook 2014

  ISBN: 978-1-906817-34-3

  ISBN (eBook): 978-1-909912-97-7

  The publisher acknowledges subsidy from Creative Scotland towards the publication of this book.

  Map reproduced courtesy of Alan McGowan

  © Alan Temperley

  Contents

  Rogues on a Lonely Shore

  Visit by Moonlight

  Stranger at the Captain Ivy

  The Men in Hiding

  Stormy Seas

  The Boy in the Night

  ‘Operation Flood-Tide’

  The Last Trip

  A Bay Sheathed in Ice

  Switch Off the Moon

  The Road to the Hills

  Full Moon

  Alone

  Blizzard over Carn Mor

  Gone to Earth

  Wild from the Hills

  The Smoking Cliffs

  Rogues on a Lonely Shore

  A HEAVY BLANKET of mist wrapped the bay in silence. Fold upon fold it spilled down from the moors and flowed out between fierce headlands on to the still waters of the North Atlantic. Above, the heavens were spangled with icy stars and a blazing crescent moon that lit the rolling summits of the moor. But below, where the little open boat moved secretly across the dark waters of the bay, only a faint glow lightened the walls of mist that pressed in upon her. All was quiet, save for the soft lap of ocean under her bows and the muffled roar of breakers on the beach. An occasional squeak of bruised wood on wood issued from the rowlocks where the old fisherman gently pulled his boat towards the shore. The fog froze upon her shadowy timbers. Like a lonely cork she bobbed on the swell.

  Murdo, seated upon a hard-frozen coil of rope in the bows, shifted slightly and looked behind. His oilskins rustled as the creases were disturbed. On all sides the glassy swell spread around them, vanishing a few feet off into the moonlit mist. The squat figure of Hector was silhouetted, solid as a rock, on the centre thwart; quietly the blades of his oars dipped and pulled the boat forward. Between the old fisherman and himself, stacked on the bottom boards, the crates of whisky were still securely lashed beneath their tarpaulin cover. The boy brushed a warm hand across the moisture that beaded his face, and pushed a hank of wet hair from his eyes. Silently he peered around into the darkness, then settled himself once more on the icy ropes, and resumed his vigil.

  For a few minutes more the boat glided forward. The waves began to build up in the shallowing water. The soft roar of their breaking grew louder; they could hear the hiss on the gently shelving sand.

  Suddenly, from the beach, a voice rang out, making Murdo jump.

  ‘Is that you, Hector?’

  It was the signal they had been waiting for, and came from somewhere to the left.

  ‘Aye.’

  The old seaman pulled on an oar and the bows swung to port. Heedless of noise now, he rowed parallel to the shore. The sea caught his boat, the Lobster Boy, on the beam, so that she rocked and dipped in the waves.

  In a few moments there was the loom of a torch ahead, a white patch in the mist. They were almost on top of it before Murdo could make out the dark figure of a tall thin man with a boy beside him, the sea lapping about their ankles. Hector turned the boat in. Her bows glided up the sand, and the Lobster Boy, gently lurching to a halt, toppled to one side.

  Murdo picked up the frozen end of the painter and sprang over into the shallow water. The stern lifted a little and swung as the next wave came in. The three on shore gathered around the boat’s side and heaved as she lifted. She slid a few feet further in and then very firmly scraped to a halt.

  ‘That’ll do,’ the tall man said, flicking the water from his fingers. He turned to Hector, who was sliding the oars out of the way along the starboard side bench. ‘You’re losing your touch,’ he said smiling. ‘You were a hundred yards out there.’ He took the rusty steel pin that Hector handed out to him and flung it to the younger boy up the sand. ‘Well in, mind, Lachlan,’ he called. ‘The tide will soon be turning.’

  Hector laughed with friendly contempt. ‘When you’ve learned to row a boat yourself, I just might listen to you, Donald,’ he said.

  ‘There’s two miles of fog out there, and hardly enough swell for a man to hear the rocks. If it wasn’t for young Murdo’s ears we wouldn’t be here for a while yet.’

  Fifteen yards up the beach the two boys drove the pin deep into the wet sand and Murdo threw a hitch of the stiff rope around it. Then they splashed out to the boat and heaved themselves aboard.

  Hector had lit his pipe and was puffing contentedly on the thwart behind the engine casing. A red glow lit his nose and cheek as he drew a mouthful of the strong black twist.

  ‘What’s doing here, then?’ he said, the old stem clamped in his teeth.

  ‘Not a thing.’ Donald had a long Highland face. ‘Quiet as the grave.’

  ‘All right to light the lantern?’ Murdo said.

  ‘I should say so.’

  The boy reached into the for’ard locker and produced a storm lantern and a box of matches. In a few moments the lamp burned up, shining cheerily over the ice-sheathed timbers of the boat. A warm paraffinny smell filled the air. As Murdo leaned against the side of the boat the leather sheath of his knife pressed into his waist. He slid it around the belt, remembering afresh that he had left the knife on the jetty in Orkney that morning after a couple of splicing jobs. It annoyed him, for he treasured the knife, not that it was expensive but it had been given to him by his father two years before and he used it all the time. Regretfully he fingered the empty sheath.

  Donald was counting the cases of whisky, measuring the tar- paulin with his eye.

  ‘Thirty, is it?’ he asked. Hector nodded. ‘Thirty-four.’

  Donald whistled quietly. ‘That’s something like a cargo! What is this stuff – fifteen bob a bottle? Nine pounds a crate.’ He did the sum in his head. ‘Over three hundred quid. Yes, that is some- thing like a cargo.’

  ‘I daresay the odd half-crown might find its way into your own pocket,’ said Hector with a smile. ‘You never know.’

  He reached into the locker beneath him and pulled out a single bottle. The lantern shone on the bright amber liquid; he held it close so that the light shone through, burning and golden.

  Donald looked at it, his head on one side. ‘Aye, it’s a bonny colour,’ he said, pushing his hat back and scratching the top of his bald he
ad. ‘Do you know, Johnnie had nothing at the bar last night but one pint of beer for every man. One pint of beer. Not a nip between here and the Sahara Desert. It’s a terrible thing, the war.’ Innocently he gazed at the golden bottle, and back to Hector’s weather-beaten face. ‘You know, I was just thinking: well, it’s a cold night, and the fog – it gets awful into your bones when you have to stand about for a long time. A – er – wee droppie might just help to keep the cold out, don’t you think?’

  The slow smile on Hector’s face broadened to a mischievous grin. Reaching into the locker again, he produced three glasses. Holding them in one hand, he leaned over the side and swished them in the salt water, then placed them on top of the engine casing beside the lamp. With a squeaking pop the cork came out of the bottle. Carefully, Hector half filled two glasses, and put a drop in the bottom of the third.

  ‘Och, give the boy a proper drink,’ said Donald, looking at the stocky figure of Murdo. ‘How old is he now – fifteen?’

  ‘No, fourteen; and that’s all he’s getting.’

  Donald raised his eyebrows, then leaned across and picked up his glass.

  ‘Slàinte,’ he said.

  ‘Slàinte mhath.’

  Not entirely unaccustomed to whisky, Murdo took a sip. The burning spirit filled his mouth and lungs so that he gasped, but stifled it so that the men should not see. It tasted terrible. Then a warm glow started in his chest and stole down into his belly. It was good in the cold air. He had not realised how chilled he was. Another sip and it was finished.

  Lachlan, sandy-haired and twelve, built like a whippet, got none, though he was quite as cold as the men and his older brother. Hector felt inside his oilskins for a packet and passed the boy a strong fisherman’s lozenge.

  ‘Made for trawlermen off the North Cape,’ he said. ‘Strip your teeth down to stumps. That’s better for you than the demon drink.’ Donald rolled the whisky round his tongue and smacked his lips appreciatively.

  ‘That’s good stuff,’ he wheezed. ‘Good stuff.’

  Hector nodded and added a drop more to their two glasses, then set the bottle aside. ‘John-George Lyness,’ he said. ‘He knows what he’s about, that one.’

  Murdo passed his own glass across.

  Deliberately misunderstanding, Hector set it on the engine casing and cupped a hand about the bowl of his pipe. Fragrant smoke drifted across the lantern light. Suddenly he chuckled. ‘He’s a boy, is John-George. When we went there this morning he had it all on the jetty. Broad daylight. Thirty-four crates of whisky for all the world to see, and the police station not half a mile away.’ He shook his head. ‘And they’re hot, those Orkney bobbies, especially now with the war on.’

  ‘Aye, but you can be too clever, as well.’ Donald pulled a battered tobacco tin from his pocket and carefully rolled a cigarette.

  ‘There was something not right up there on the dunes tonight. I left the car beside yours at the graveyard. All the time I had the feeling somebody was watching us. There was another car pulled back off the road at the top end of the wall, a big black one. It wasn’t a police car – I don’t know whose it was. There was nobody in it, but I’m sure I heard someone in the graveyard. Lachlan heard it too, like footsteps – and it sounded like someone kicked a gravestone. We had a look, but we couldn’t see anything.’

  ‘Probably just sheep got in,’ Hector suggested.

  Donald shrugged. ‘The moon wasn’t so bright and the fog was pretty thick, sure enough. It didn’t sound like a sheep, though.’

  Hector picked up the three glasses and swished them clean on the dark water. Still dripping, he returned them to the locker, set the whisky bottle in a coil of rope and clipped the door shut.

  ‘Well, police or no police,’ he said, ‘it’s no good sitting here. Let’s get the stuff unloaded.’

  They pulled back the tarpaulin. Donald and Murdo jumped down into the shallows and Hector passed each a wooden crate. They carried them a few yards up the beach and dumped them on the wet sand.

  ‘Can you carry one safely?’ Hector asked Lachlan.

  ‘Aye,’ said Lachlan.

  ‘Come on, then. Give them a hand.’

  The boy took the crate of whisky with some effort and splashed ashore as his brother and Donald were returning. It did not take many minutes to unload the boat and soon the stack was complete, thirty-four cases of whisky stranded in the fog, far down the sands of a Highland beach.

  ‘You give me a hand now, Lachlan,’ Hector called. ‘We’ll take the boat round while they carry some of the cases up.’

  Murdo pulled out the mooring pin and tossed the painter over the bows. Swiftly Hector coiled it down then moved to the stern as all three threw their weight against the green timbers. The Lobster Boy was much lighter; at once she floated free. Lachlan flung himself over the gunwale and clambered aboard as Murdo pushed the boat into deeper water.

  ‘Back in about twenty minutes,’ Hector called out. ‘Watch yourself now, Lachlan.’

  The engine burst into life and the old boat backed out of sight into the thinning mist. Then the note changed and she put-putted away down the shore. The hazy glow from the lantern faded into darkness.

  The beach was silent, save for the hissing of the waves at their feet, and a soft roar where they broke over rocks a little way off.

  Murdo and Donald turned back to the crates. Each swinging one to his shoulder, they trudged up the long expanse of beach. The sand was flawless, smooth as a carpet right to the high stacks and rock buttress of the cliffs. A moment’s searching brought them to the cave, and they dropped their cases in the shadowy mouth. Donald disappeared inside, the light of his torch glimmering into the dark recesses.

  The mist was definitely lifting. From time to time the moon appeared overhead and the sands were lightening. Murdo sat on one of the cases and gazed out between the stacks. He was tired and enjoyed the luxury of a huge yawn that stretched his face wide and made his ears crackle. It was followed by another.

  Suddenly there was a sound down the beach – a muffled cough! Murdo’s heart leaped, his mouth snapped shut. It came from a little to the left, not fifty yards away. Frozen motionless, he stared into the mist, every fibre of his being on the alert. But he could see nothing in the shrouded darkness. There was another sound that could have been soft running footfalls, but equally could have been the wing-beats of a bird or a noise carrying a long way from one of the crofts on the headland beyond the river. Biting his lip, he took a few cautious footsteps down the sands. For a full minute he stood by an outcrop of rocks listening, eyes wide, ears straining. But there was only the noise of the sea. A slight breeze fanned his cheek and stirred his hair, a seagull cried a long way off. Nothing! He waited a moment longer, then walked quietly down to the water’s edge. Still – nothing.

  Back at the cave a warm light glowed from the shadowy depths, and Donald had lifted the two boxes from the entrance. Murdo followed him inside, squeezing through the narrow neck into the inner chamber. He found the tall seaman clambering awkwardly from a rocky shelf several feet above the tumble of boulders that choked the further end. A lantern shone golden on the lip of the shelf and illuminated the scoured walls of the cave.

  ‘There was somebody on the beach,’ Murdo said.

  ‘What!’ said Donald. ‘Oh hell! Did he see you?’

  Murdo told him about the cough, though he was beginning to wonder whether he had not imagined the whole thing, mistaken the cough of a sheep or a cow on the cliffs above him. He climbed to the shelf, and Donald passed him the second crate. He stacked it at the back, alongside the first one, and climbed down again. Then Donald blew out the lantern, and they made their way out of the cave to the brightening sands.

  Fifty yards down the beach they came upon a line of footprints. They were tumbled, very fresh, stretching away into the darkness.

  Donald swore softly in alarm.

  Murdo’s heart thudded and his knees trembled. He was poised for flight. But still there was nothin
g – no-one. All was still. He knelt to examine the footprints, feeling them lightly with the tips of his fingers.

  ‘They’re not big enough for boots,’ he said, ‘and there’s no tread marks. I think he was wearing shoes, whoever it was.’

  ‘Aye,’ Donald said. ‘It’s not sea boots or tackety boots, anyway.’ They followed the footprints down. In a few yards they came

  to a place where the sand was trampled. Clearly the intruder had been standing there for some time.

  ‘Perhaps he just heard something and stopped for a minute,’ Murdo suggested. ‘It might be someone staying at the inn.’

  ‘I don’t know,’ replied Donald. ‘I really don’t know.’ He thought for a moment. ‘It’s not the police, that’s sure. They’d have come up and caught us red-handed.’

  ‘Unless they’ve gone down to the stack,’ Murdo said.

  Donald settled his grip on the heavy rubber torch. ‘You’re a real bundle of joy,’ he said.

  Cautiously they made their way to the water’s edge. No-one was there. No prints but those of their own barred sea-boots disturbed the sand around the pile of whisky crates. The tide had turned and was now inching back in, spilling into their footprints, drawing ever closer to the stack of whisky.

  ‘Leave well alone,’ Donald said. ‘The quicker we get these put away, the better.’ Bending, he swung a case to his shoulder, tucked a second one awkwardly under his left arm, and started up the beach.

  In a few minutes Hector and Lachlan rejoined them. They had moored the Lobster Boy beyond a little headland in a rocky pool that Hector sometimes used in settled weather. They lent a hand and soon the pile of crates was well hidden from prying eyes.

  Hector rubbed a dew-drop from his nose. ‘I want to have a look at those footprints,’ he said.

  ‘Ach, leave them for now,’ said Donald. ‘Let’s get away out of here.’

  Hector, scarcely up to the tall man’s shoulder, gave Murdo a mischievous wink and picked up the lantern.

  The intruder’s tracks led down the beach from the direction of the graveyard. They traced them back until they were lost among the coarse grass of the dunes; they followed them down, passing the place where the man had lingered, until they vanished in the rim of the flooding tide. Forty yards on, however, the tracks reappeared, only to be lost for good where the man had climbed from the sands on to the barnacled rocks of the headland.