Fin saw his and Whistler’s wet clothes stretched over dry stones, steam rising from them on the far side of the fire, and realized for the first time that he was naked inside his cocoon. ‘What have you wrapped me in?’
‘A couple of woollen wraps and an aluminium blanket. And keep shivering, boy. That’ll generate about two degrees centigrade an hour. The blankets’ll keep it in and you’ll reheat yourself. With a bit of luck your clothes will be just about dry by the morning.’ He leaned over and put his fingers on Fin’s forehead, his touch as light as chiffon. ‘You’ve a nasty bang on the head, though. I’ve disinfected it and dressed it, but you’d better see a professional.’
Fin could see now that Whistler was sitting cross-legged on the far side of the circle of stones which contained the burning peats that were generating both the heat and the smoke. His long black hair was still wet, and swept back in a tangle from his forehead. The jumper he had worn beneath his jacket was dry, as were jeans protected by waterproof leggings. ‘What is this place, Whistler?’
‘We’re in a wee beehive dwelling at the north end of a pretty inaccessible valley somewhere between Mealaisbhal and Brinneabhal. There’s a few of them clustered here. Not real beehives, of course. That’s just what the archaeologists call them. God knows who built them, or why. Maybe shepherds at some point for when they brought the sheep up to the high grazing. Anyway, most of them are in ruins. Just circles of stone and turf. This one I remade myself, and keep it stocked with dry peats. Just as well, eh?’
‘What the hell do you come up here for?’
‘Deer. Mountain hare.’ He laughed, then. ‘And I’ve spent quite a long time in these parts searching for the cave of swords.’
Fin frowned. ‘What swords?’
A grin of something close to embarrassment split Whistler’s face. ‘Ach, it’ll be a bloody wild goose chase, I’m sure. But I was always fascinated by the story I heard once about a man who knew these valleys like the back of his hand. Got lost one time in a fog, and fell into a hidden cave among the boulders. There were steps down into it. And inside it he found a stash of rusted old swords. Dozens of the things. He couldn’t carry them himself, but he was sure he would find his way back with friends to bring them down to the village.’ Whistler shook his head. ‘He never did. No matter how many times he looked, he couldn’t find that cave again. No one ever doubted him, though, and there was a lot of speculation about where the swords had come from and who put them there.’
‘And?’
Whistler shrugged. ‘And nothing. I never found them either. My favourite theory was that they belonged to the men of Uig who hid them from the English after the defeat of the Jacobite army at Culloden. Everything “Highland” was forbidden, including the wearing of the kilt and the bearing of arms. So if the locals hid their weapons up here, there was no way anyone would ever find them, but they’d be quickly accessible if they were ever needed.’ He laughed. ‘I’d have loved to feel the weight of those Jacobite swords in my hand, Fin. Not least because they’d have been worth a bloody fortune.’ He tipped his head to one side, casting Fin an appraising look. ‘How are you feeling?’
‘Bloody awful.’
‘Good. As long as you’re feeling something you’ll be okay.’
He took a stout stick and tipped several blackened stones out from the embers of the fire on to the beaten earth floor.
‘When these have cooled enough for me to handle, we’ll wrap them into your blankets to help generate a bit more heat. Under your oxters, and at the back of your neck. God knows, you’ve no brain to speak of, but what little you have has a wee bit at its stem that regulates your internal temperature, along with your breathing and circulation. The hypothalamus. We want to keep that warm and in good working order.’ It was typical of Whistler that knowledge like that could trip off his tongue almost without thought.
Fin let his head fall to one side, still shivering, and heard the sound of the wind thundering all around the outside of this tiny stone dwelling. ‘I guess you’ve done it again,’ he said.
‘Done what, boy?’
‘Saved my life.’
Whistler roared. ‘Well,’ he said, when he was finally able to stop laughing. ‘It’s a family tradition.’ He grinned. ‘And given that I exploited that stupid pride of yours to lure you up here in the first place, there was no way I could let you die. No matter how hard you were trying to kill yourself.’ His smile slowly faded to be replaced by something like guilt. He hesitated for a moment, then: ‘I’m sorry I hit you the other night.’
‘So am I.’ Fin managed a rueful smile.
‘I shouldn’t have done that.’
‘No, you shouldn’t.’
Whistler’s smile returned, burgeoning into a grin that made light in his eyes. ‘No. I should have fucking killed that bastard Jamie Wooldridge. Next time, I will.’
Fin closed his eyes, and for the first time since consciousness had returned, felt his shivering start to subside just a little. He was aware, then, of Whistler tucking the hot stones into the folds of his blankets, and he could feel the warmth of them bringing life back to his frozen body.
Whistler was right. He was a bloody idiot.
He woke to a sound like the end of the world, and felt the earth moving beneath him, as if the whole mountain was shaking. The fire was blazing, and he could see the fear and confusion in Whistler’s face on the far side of it. Fin sat up and almost cracked his skull on the roof of the beehive. ‘What the hell’s that?’
The noise roared, even above the blast of the storm, filling the air, the ground fibrillating all around them. Whistler placed a hand flat on the roof above his head as if afraid that it might fall in on them. ‘I’ve no idea.’ His voice sounded very small, and Fin could barely hear it.
‘Feels like an earthquake,’ Fin shouted above the noise.
‘Aye, it does. But it can’t be. Not on this scale, anyway.’ If anything the shaking was getting more violent. Whistler put both hands on the roof now, like Samson in reverse trying to hold the temple up. ‘Jesus Christ!’
Fin had no idea how long it lasted. It felt like a lifetime. A lifetime in which the end seemed just a breath away. Though neither of them voiced it, each feared that they were going to die, without any clear idea of why. And then almost as suddenly as it had wakened them the shaking stopped and the noise subsided, and the sound of the storm took precedence once more.
They sat in breathless silence for several minutes hardly daring to believe that it was over, whatever it was, and fearing that it would start again at any moment.
Then Whistler tipped forward on to his knees and crawled towards the entrance. ‘I’m going to take a look.’ He pulled aside the big flat stone that sealed them in, and Fin felt a rush of cold air that threw sparks from the fire and fanned the peats to fill the dwelling with their strange, incandescent light. Whistler wriggled out into the night, and Fin sat wrapped in his blankets full of uncertainty and apprehension.
Whistler was back in less than a minute, soaked even in that short space of time. His hair was wild and smeared across a face that was unusually pale.
‘Well?’ Fin searched it for enlightenment.
But Whistler just settled himself again on the far side of the fire and shrugged. ‘Can’t see a thing. It’s pitch out there. We’ll need to wait till dawn.’
‘What time is it now?’
‘Just after two. Another four hours or so.’
Fin lay down and rolled on to his back, still tense, waiting for the noise and the shaking to start again. But only the storm disturbed the night, rain and wind assaulting their tiny shelter with the fury of thwarted attackers. The long summer of drought was well and truly over.
The next time he awoke it was daybreak, which is when he had found Whistler out on the ridge in that strange, pink dawn light, looking down into the vanished loch where Roddy’s plane lay canted among the rocks.
CHAPTER EIGHTEEN
