Blue Lightning

a figure on the hill and for a second assumed it was Angela, not imagining a ghost, but having forgotten she was dead. That was how she’d moved, purposeful as if she could carry on at the same pace all day. Immediately he knew his mind was playing tricks on him. This must be Ben Catchpole, doing the hill survey because Angela wasn’t there. In waterproofs most of the birders looked the same. He raised his binoculars to check, but the figure had disappeared over the horizon.

Dougie knew he was unfit. He lived on takeaway food and drank too much beer. In his local pub on quiz nights he could believe he had friends who weren’t birders. Weekends were spent twitching: long trips in the car with his birding mates, a brief burst of activity to see the rarity, then nights on the sofa, sharing more beer, more stories of great twitches in the past. Though often these days he spent the evenings alone with his laptop on his knee catching up on Surfbirds or writing his blog. There weren’t so many single men birding now and the married ones sloped back to their wives and their kiddies as soon as the twitch was over, with excuses for being late and promises to be more considerate in the future. Times like that Dougie was pleased he still lived alone.

Now, with the wind behind him, he enjoyed feeling the stiffness ease out of his joints as he walked. He should join a gym, play sport. Lose some of the weight round his belly and the girls at work might take him more seriously. He always felt better when he came into Fair Isle, took a bit of exercise, ate healthy food.

Where the road split south near the school he chose the lower westerly path with Malcolm’s Head to his right. It seemed a little more sheltered there or maybe the wind was dropping slightly. In the field below Midway, there was a flock of redwings, new in. As he passed they rose into the air, calling. The sight of the birds lifted his spirits again. They’d reached the island within the last twenty-four hours; no reason why something rarer shouldn’t be with them. He started to run through the possibilities in his mind. More daydreams.

The sea out from the south harbour was still dramatic, huge rolling waves and white breakers against the grey rocks. The sun came from behind a cloud, lit up a rainbow of spray, then everything was dark again. He walked past the small graveyard, which was so close to the sea that spindrift blew across it, tucked himself behind one of the boulders to catch his breath and keep his telescope out of the wind and the salt. A squall of rain pitted the water a little way out to sea, and he raised his binoculars to look at the storm, then focused again so he was looking closer to the shore.

There was a swan near to the beach where the water was calmer. It was back on and its neck was tucked beneath one wing, so he couldn’t see the head. He thought it would be a whooper; it was big and mute swans were hardly known on the Isle. Then the bird extended the neck as if it were preparing to fly. The beak was black. It took a moment for the detail to register and Dougie set up his telescope, fumbling with the tripod mechanism. God, why had nobody in the world invented a decent tripod? He needed to check this out. Perhaps a piece of weed had become tangled around the bill. Best to limit expectations. He’d been disappointed so many times before. But through the scope the beak was still black.

The huge bird flapped its wings slowly and raised its chest. It seemed to be running over the surface of the water, then it sailed slowly into the air. On one leg there was a thick metal ring. There would be numbers on it. Dougie was muttering a kind of prayer under his breath: Please don’t disappear. Nobody will believe this. I need someone else to see it too.

Dougie jumped to his feet and followed the swan north through his binoculars. It was flying strongly enough but not too high. With any luck it would land on one of the pools at the far end of the island. Whooper swans often settled on Golden Water. God, he thought, what would Angela have made of this? She’d have loved to put trumpeter swan on the British list.

He fumbled in his pocket for his mobile phone. He was wearing gloves and pulled them off to speed things up, dropping one in a rock pool in his hurry. Phone reception in the island was patchy but he might be lucky. He had to call the centre to get some people out to look for the bird. This time of year it got dark so early and they’d need to have it pinned down for the following day. If a plane could get in tomorrow, there were birders from all over the UK who’d want to charter flights. And Dougie Barr would be a hero. But his phone had no signal. And the swan was no longer in sight.

The nearest house was Springfield where Big James and Mary lived. He slung his telescope over his shoulder and began to run up the bank towards it, into the full force of the wind. His feet slipped on the shingle and there were tears running from his eyes.

I care more about this bird than the fact that Angela Moore is dead.

The thought came out of nowhere and stunned him more than the storm and was followed by another even scarier:

I’d kill to find a bird like this.

He reached the house. There was a light on in the kitchen. He banged on the door and was aware that he was screaming to be let in, heard the noise in his ears as if someone else was making it.

The two women inside stared at him as if he were a madman. The phone was in the living room. It was the first time he’d been in any of the island houses but he took no notice of the surroundings. He dialled the number of the North Light.

Ben Catchpole answered. The assistant warden hadn’t been out long and he couldn’t have done a proper survey of the hill. But that hardly mattered now. Ben would have access to the field centre’s Land Rover and Dougie was in no state to walk the three miles north to Golden Water.

‘I’ve just had a trumpeter swan.’

There was a silence on the other end of the phone.

‘Did you hear what I said?’ Dougie was tempted to swear but knew the women in the kitchen were listening. He couldn’t understand the lack of excitement, the lack of urgency.

Still no answer.

‘Can you pick me up? It flew north. It could be on Golden Water. And tell the others. They could walk down there, find it for us, while you come to get me.’

At last Ben spoke. ‘I don’t know-’

‘Just fucking do it!’ Ignoring the women, he screamed so loud that the back of his throat hurt.

‘Right,’ Ben said. ‘Right.’

Hugh relocated the bird and it was just as Dougie had pictured it, alone on the pool close to the North Light. The gale had whipped the water into waves and it bobbed on the surface. The sky was overcast again; the lunchtime weather forecast had predicted another depression coming in from the west, the tail end of Hurricane Charlie. So the swan looked very white against the grey water. Hugh must have run down the bank from the field centre because when they arrived he was still panting. Ben had picked the Fowlers up halfway along the road; Sarah seemed mystified by the desperation of the chase but John was as excited as they were. ‘To be in on a bird like this,’ he said. ‘It’s every lister’s dream.’ Dougie thought the man might be a stringer, but at least he understood how important the moment was.

Hugh was lying on his stomach in the grass with his telescope focused on it. He heard them approaching but he didn’t turn round. ‘Did you see it was ringed? It walked out onto that patch of sand and I could see the ring then.’

‘Did you get any details on it?’ Dougie held his breath.

Before Hugh could answer Ben interrupted. ‘Doesn’t that mean it was a captive bird and escaped from a collection?’ Escapes couldn’t be ticked. They all knew that. Dougie wanted to tell him not to be a prat and to let Hugh finish. How did someone as stupid as Ben Catchpole get to be assistant warden on Fair Isle? Because he had a degree, Dougie thought. Because he talked nicely and would be polite to the visitors.

Now Hugh did turn round and his grin lit up his face.

‘This was no captive bird. That’s a USGS band. You can read the unique number through the scope. The swan was ringed in the wild in the States and we’ll find out the date and the exact location of its ringing. There’s no doubt about this one, Dougie. Congratulations, you jammy bastard.’

Later, as he bounced along the track to the North Light in the back of the Land Rover, Dougie found himself resenting Angela. He would never have thought it possible: she’d been important to him for so long. But this was the biggest find of his life and he wasn’t going to be able to celebrate. They could hardly have a party the day after a woman had died and a find like this deserved a party. He just hoped they’d already taken her body away.