Something in my chest loosened as a knot of worry melted away.
I walked him back to his car while Sandra cleared up the remains of our picnic. We made small talk about the weather and our prospects for the coming week, and he had got into his car before I said what was really on my mind. I don't know what made me do it, what made me think that he was the man to ask, but before I knew it the sentence was out.
'Do you know anything about the monument out the back?'
He gave me a little sideways look over the top of his glasses and it was several seconds before he replied.
'And why should you let that thing bother you Mr Wilson?'
Before I could reply, he continued. 'If you really want to know the story, you'll find a version in a book on your shelves. A Tourist's History of Jura. I believe you'll find it educational. But make sure you don't tell your wife-it's not a tale for the faint-hearted.'
At that, he wound up the window and drove off, leaving me with an unexplained chill in my spine. I shook it off and went back to help my wife.
We were finally forced indoors by a chill wind which brought the clouds down the hills as the sun disappeared and a fine grey mist spread over the sea.
Sandra busied herself with some knitting-baby clothes, naturally, and I managed to locate the book which the doctor had mentioned.
It didn't take me long to find the appropriate section and I was amused to see that the chapter had been written by a certain Doctor Reid of Craighouse, Jura.
There was a block of description of the cottage and the surrounding area before it got to the interesting bit.
The mound behind the house is of some antiquity. A local legend associates it with the little people who seem to be all prevalent in this area, and one of the race in particular. In 1598, the battle of Trai-Guinard took place on Islay, the neighbouring island. The battle was going badly for Sir James MacDonald when he was approached by a dwarfish creature who proclaimed himself capable of swinging the battle in return for certain favours.
To cut a long story short (and in these parts stories can grow exceedingly long), Sir James, despite some qualms, agreed. An hour later the battle was his and his enemy, Sir Lachlan, lay dead of no apparent injury. Sir James retired to his house near Craighouse and that night, Wee Robbie was made a freeman of the estate.
And now we come to the meat of the story. The townspeople did not take kindly to the creature in their midst, but he was under the protection of the Laird and they were powerless. Until, that is, the children started to disappear.
Tales are still whispered around the fires of the scene that met the eyes of the men who had the courage to enter the dwelling of the dwarf. Hideous dismembered corpses lay strewn in all corners and a cauldron was bubbling in the grate, a foul brew of body parts which could be seen rising in the stew before falling back once more into the stinking mess.
And yet none had the courage to end the creature's life. They interred him in the tomb, a chambered cairn for long-dead kings, and they fixed him there with the cross and the iron.
It is said that sometimes, in the dead of night, the tortured screams of the Dubh-sith, the black elf, can be heard ringing from his prison, and that at such times it is wise to lock the doors and huddle around the warm hearths of home.
I could see why the doctor didn't want me to pass the tale on to Sandra. One thing she didn't need was lurid fantasies of a child molester in the back yard. When she asked me what I was reading I passed it off as some local colour and changed the subject.
For the rest of the evening, I tried to read about the wildlife of the island, but I couldn't get the vision out of my head of the seething pot of offal and the things which floated in it.
The next time I looked up, Sandra was smiling at me and it wasn't long before we adjourned to the bedroom and made tender, careful love as the darkness closed in around us.
Later, just as I fell asleep, I could hear the wind was rising, whistling through the chimney breasts and causing the trees to rustle and crack.
I woke early and squeezed myself away from Sandra, taking care not to wake her. After boiling some water in the kettle, I ventured out to see what the weather was like, but the first thing I noticed was the effect of the wind. The washing was gone from the line, torn off the rope during the night. I found a shirt in the left-hand stream, a pair of underpants halfway up a tree, and I could see Sandra's blouse hanging from one arm of the cross on the cairn.
I retrieved everything else I could see before moving to the mound of stones. I stepped over the railing, just missing doing myself an injury on the spikes, and clambered up the rocks, dislodging a few in the process and giving myself several bruises on my knees.
The blouse was wrapped around the rusted spar and, by straining and stretching, I could just about reach it. Catching hold of the blouse, I pulled, just as my footing gave way. I fell, pulling the blouse with me, and felt the material tear before something solid and heavy hit me on the head forcing me down onto the rocks, rolling dislodged stones until I was brought up against the railings.
I heard a loud creaking and looked up to see the cross, now with a spar missing, swaying from side to side in the breeze. When I looked down I found the missing piece, lying by my side with Sandra's blouse still wrapped around it. I left it there as I hauled myself over the railings and hobbled back to the house.
That was it for the rest of the day. I was dazed, bleeding from a head wound and bruised over much of my body. Sandra wanted to fetch the doctor but I talked her out of it. I didn't want anybody to know that I had defaced the cross, not yet anyway, not until I had the chance to try to repair some of the damage.
I spent the day in bed, most of the time with Sandra beside me, nursing my wounds and wondering what the islanders' reaction would be.
As darkness filled the room, Sandra fell asleep, but I lay awake, listening to the creaking of the cross, the rasping of iron against stone as it swayed back and forth in the wind.
At some point I must have fallen asleep. I was awakened by a cold draft hitting me just on the back of the neck. I rolled over, hoping to snuggle against my wife's warm body, but I met only more empty space. It took several seconds for me to realise that she wasn't in the bed.
Moonlight was streaming in through the window, enough for me to make out her pale figure and the cross which bobbed and swayed hypnotically in front of her. I was out of the room and through onto the grass before I realised that we were both still naked.
I went back to fetch some clothes, pulling on a long jumper for myself and picking up an overcoat for her. When I got back to the door, she was gone.
In the moonlight I could just make out the footprints in the grass and I followed them up to the cairn. I called out her name, twice, but there was no response.
As I got closer I could see that the cairn had collapsed in on itself on the left-hand side. A dark passage led downwards, down into the earth, and there was a dank salty smell wafting up into the night.
I looked around again but there was no sign of her anywhere. The only assumption I could make was that she was down there somewhere-down there in the earth. She had gone walkabout at night before, sometimes getting as far as the front door in our flat in London, but this was the first time that she had actually left the house.
I was worried, of course I was, but I wasn't thinking in terms of anything other than the personal danger to her should she stumble in the dark. I wasn't thinking in terms of monsters or dwarves. Not yet, anyway.
I called her name again, louder this time, but all I heard was the echo of my voice coming back to me. I entered the passage but after only two or three yards it became as black as a pit of hell. It was no good. I needed some source of light.
Precious minutes were wasted before I located a flashlight, and clouds had covered the moon when I finally went back outside. I called out, not really expecting a response, and none came. I put the overcoat on over the top of the jumper, and with some trepidation I went down into the dark.
