The Bookshop on the Corner (26 page)

He looked down at his kilt.

“But I'm out now, aren't I?”

Nina looked at him playfully. “I don't know. Are you going to hug the bar looking angry all night?”

“I don't do that.”

“You did at the barn dance! You spent most of the night talking with that guy and totally ignoring everyone.”

Lennox sighed. “Oh aye,
that
night.”

“Oh aye,
that
night,” mimicked Nina. “You know, given all the social events that go on around here, I don't know how anyone keeps up with the whirl of it all.”

Lennox narrowed his eyes and kept his focus on the road ahead.

“Aye, I remember.”

Nina looked at him, waiting for him to elaborate. Eventually he did so.

“That . . . that was my lawyer, Ranald,” he sighed. “He wanted to talk to me face-to-face.”

He tightened his grip on the steering wheel. “Oh Lord. Sorry, Nina. I didn't want to tell you yet . . . not until I knew for sure. I've been trying to fix it, but I don't think I can. I'm sorry to have to tell you this, especially tonight, but I was . . . I mean, before. I was actually coming over to tell you . . .”

Nina looked at him. His face was pink.

“I . . . Kate wants the farm. Or she wants me to sell the farm.”

“What?” said Nina. She thought of the expensive lined curtains, the beautiful objects so carefully chosen, the care that had been taken on everything. Surely someone with such good taste, with such an eye for nice things, surely they wouldn't march in and destroy everything?

She realized how selfish she was being. This was only where she was renting a space. It was absolutely nothing compared with what was going to happen to Lennox.

“Oh my God,” she said. “She can't take your farm!”

“She's trying,” said Lennox.

“But isn't it a family farm?”

“Doesn't really matter,” said Lennox. “I mean, she was my family. For a while.” He fell silent.

“But doesn't she have a job?”

Lennox shrugged. “Doesn't seem to matter.”

“Didn't she leave you?”

“That neither.”

“What will you do if you don't have a farm?”

Lennox blinked rapidly. “I don't know,” he said slowly. “Start over, I suppose. Go and work on somebody else's farm.”

Nina couldn't see Lennox as a laborer somehow.

“That can't happen,” she said fiercely. “I've seen how hard you work on your place.”

“Well, the lawyers don't seem to think that matters.”

They bumped slowly up the rutted track, Nina aware that they were even less in the mood for a party than ever. But she had to ask.

“Why did you break up?” she asked quietly. “Did she really just fall for someone else, or was that an excuse?”

There was a very long silence in the car.

“Well, isn't it obvious?” said Lennox.

“You're a grumpy old sod?” said Nina.

“Uh no, that wasn't what I was going to say at all,” said Lennox, clearly hurt.

“Oh. Um.”

There was another long pause.

“She felt buried away,” said Lennox. “Felt that I'd promised her something different, something more. No, that's not it. I hadn't. I hadn't offered her anything. She knew what the deal was. And she thought that would be all right, that she'd be able to cope up here in the isolation. But she couldn't.”

He looked out over the golden hills.

“The winters are very long here, you know,” he said. “It's hard; it's very hard to be a farmer's wife. It's not foreverybody.”

“How did you meet?” said Nina.

“I was at the agricultural college in Edinburgh . . . she was at the art school.” He smiled. “Should have realized, huh?”

Nina tilted her head. “So why did she agree to come out here? If she wanted to stay in town and be a cool artist?”

“She thought it would be good for her work. To give herself the solitude she needed to truly become a great painter.”

Nina thought of the contemplative canvas on the wall.

“Oh,” she said. “That's hers! That picture! It never occurred to me.”

She thought again of the dark, gloomy layers, so at odds with the rest of the room.

“Oh yes,” said Lennox. “She didn't want to hang it. I did it. I thought . . . I thought it would cheer her up.”

“Did it?”

“Not really. But I did think it was beautiful.”

“It is,” said Nina fervently. “It's really beautiful. But why . . . why would she want to take your farm away from you, just because she hated it?”

“I think she's really hard up,” said Lennox. “It's expensive for artists, trying to make it in the city. It's pricey down there. And I think she's been teaching a little bit, which . . . I can't imagine she enjoys that in the slightest. Not really her type of
thing. And she says it's for my benefit, that I need to get out of the rut she thinks I'm in, stop working so hard, take on a more relaxing job.”

“She might have a point about that.”

Lennox looked at her. “Do you really think that?”

“I hear you up at all hours,” said Nina. “I see you striding for miles around the hills.”

Lennox's brow creased in confusion. “But that's what I do,” he said. “It's not work, it's a way of life.
My
way of life. I know she didn't like it, but that's not really my problem.
I
like it. I couldn't . . . Man, I just couldn't be in an office all day. Doing things on the computer. That would be torture for me. I'm not an artist like she is, and I'm not clever like you, finding something the community needs and bringing it in. I can't do that at all.”

Nina was embarrassed by the compliment.

“I think,” she said, “I think you could do all sorts of things. If there's one thing I've learned, it's that you never know what you can do till you try.”

“But I love what I do. I love this land.”

Nina looked at him. “There must be a way. There must be a way to stay.”

Lennox shrugged, then extended a hand. They had crested the hill now, and the valley was laid out beneath them, the railway line running through it. Nina averted her eyes from that. Instead, at the top of the next hill was a great crowd of people, striped tents and brightly colored stalls. There was a steady noise that sounded to Nina like the thrumming of rain on a roof, but as they drew closer, she realized it was in fact the sound of drums. She screwed up her eyes. A group of young men, in kilts but shirtless, with mud spread all over their chests and upper
bodies, were banging on huge bodhráns and making a massive racket. Every so often one of them would throw back his head and howl.

“Gosh,” said Nina. “Is there going to be much of this?”

For the first time, Lennox smiled properly. He had a lovely smile; it crinkled his blue eyes. “Oh, and the rest,” he said. Then his face fell again. “Sorry I had to notify you about your potential eviction.”

Nina blinked. “It's okay,” she said. “I've had . . . actually, I've had an offer elsewhere.”

Lennox's eyebrows went up. “Really?” he said carefully.

Nina swallowed. She didn't want to leave Kirrinfief, she really didn't. But she didn't see any point in making Lennox feel worse about things than he already did.

“Just sort things out with Kate however you have to,” she said. “Don't worry about me.”

The Land Rover came to a halt next to rows of other cars parked in a field. Lennox looked at her and nodded.

“Aye,” he said, but his face was worried.

“I mean it,” said Nina.

Lennox got out of the vehicle, then instinctively moved around the back to help her down; Nina had almost forgotten the dress she was wearing. It wasn't quite the thing for scrambling in and out of Land Rovers. He put out his long, rough hand and she took it.

“Where were you thinking of going?” he said as she jumped lightly to the ground.

“Oh, Orkney,” she said breezily.

Lennox stood-stock still. “Artney?” he said, pronouncing it the local way. “You're heading up to
Artney
? Is this really no' isolated enough for you?”

“If I don't have anywhere to live here, I might have to,” pointed out Nina.

“Oh,” said Lennox. “Aye.”

They stood awkwardly. The drumming grew louder and louder, and with it on the breeze came the sound of skirling pipes. Clouds raced across the sky, little puffy things being chased across as if something was after them. Nina heard a crowd of children laughing.

“Are you
sure
I'm dressed for this?” she said, and Lennox looked her up and down.

“You're gor—” he seemed about to say, then stopped himself. “Do you know what?” he said finally. “I am in the mood to get drunk. Want to join me?”

“You? What about all the little baby lambs?”

“The little baby lambs are bouncing about eating my thistles. And it's midsummer, which means one is required to get drunk, didn't you know?”

As if on cue, a hugely fat man whom Nina recognized as the local postmaster, even though he was tremendously well disguised, covered in red makeup, and with great vines of fruit and flowers draped around his copious shoulders, ran up brandishing a large horn.

“BACCHUS! BACCHUS IS HERE!” he shouted broadly. “Worship the god of the midsummer!”

“What is this?” said Nina suspiciously.

“It's midsummer night,” said the man. “We make merry and we make magic. Water shall turn into wine and flowers shall show the way. Also, it's five pounds.”

“That's not answering the question,” said Nina, but she took a tentative sip anyway. The concoction tasted a little strange—like wine flavored with raspberries—but it was fresh and fizzy
and good, and she smiled and passed the horn to Lennox, who drank deeply and smiled in response and handed over ten pounds, whereupon Bacchus shouted, “Come, come, join the revels! Also don't forget to support your local post office.” Then three of the young girls who normally hung around the village bus stop looking discontented with the world and complaining about things came bouncing up in their white dresses with big garlands of flowers and offered one to Nina.

“I don't think so,” said Nina.

“It's supporting the local girl guides,” said one of the girls, and Nina rolled her eyes.

“You need to bring deep pockets to the midsummer festival,” said Lennox. “On you go, then.”

And Nina bowed her head and let them put the flowers around her hair.

It was, to be fair, the most wonderful party. Little children were running and skidding about, the girls with floral headdresses and their dresses blowing in the wind, flowers everywhere, the boys in kilts just like their fathers, with loose white shirts, and here and there brandishing the little swords that came in their socks.

At the gate where they bought their tickets was a great bower, bent around with summer peonies and roses, filling the air with their heavy scent. Lennox had to duck to get through it, and beyond it they emerged into the most extraordinary sight.

A vast bonfire shot into the air at the very top of the hill, crackling and sending sparks upward. Dotted all around on the grass were musicians playing their fiddles to the noise of the heavy drums, and in the center was what in England Nina
would have called a maypole, though this strange arched object didn't seem anything like the twee Morris-dancing memories of her childhood.

This was larger, wilder, an entire tree trunk on its end, its full green foliage promising forests and vines. Couples, she now saw, were going up to the twisted tree trunk, winding foliage around their wrists to bind them together, then unwinding themselves around the trunk until they met again, full of giggles and kisses, on the other side, whereupon the vines would be tied back onto the maying tree and the ceremony would begin again. They must have been building it for weeks.

A huge figure loomed into view, startling Nina and several of the children. It was, she realized gradually, a green man on stilts. He was completely covered in leaves and looked like he was made of the forest itself, and he was controlling the drumming, ordering and arranging the couples, in general being the master of ceremonies.

More horns came around now, brimming with the strange wine, and Nina sipped at it even as she realized that it was going straight to her head; that the music and the drumming and the noise of the wind in the trees was pumping in her bloodstream; and that although she knew it was just a fund-raiser for the village—an event, that was all—everything felt rich and wild and strange.

She found herself gradually separated from Lennox and borne off with the other women, all in white and some wearing masks; most with flowers and ribbons in their hair, which made it difficult to recognize anyone, and even when she did, there wasn't time for more than the briefest wave until she was cast off again in the tide of people, laughing and dancing as children shrieked and ran in and out of their feet. She found herself
making new friends and greeting old ones and being totally unable to tell the difference between the two; it was impossible, anyway, with the noise levels and the crackle of the bonfire, to make or hear a conversation, so there was nothing to do except follow the flow.