The Serial: Far From the Rowan Tree Day 62

When the nurse eventually came everything was in order. The house was as sparkling as I could make it. I had to do it for the witch’s next visit anyway. I was hanging nappies up on the rope beside the boiler when the health nurse came.

I had paid particular attention to getting them really white of late. When she walked in unexpectedly they were as white as the snow in the front gardens.

She examined Mahri-Louise whose skin had begun to glow with being out in the fresh air. “She looks a lot better,” she said almost accusingly.

“Yes,” I said adding nothing. “You seem to be coping well enough.” “Oh I’m fine,” I said. “I won’t be back,” she said. “But if you need me you know where I am.”

Under my breath I answered, and I won’t be back, and breathed a thankful sigh of relief.

About 10 weeks after getting our basement flat, Adrian from Sandy Hills breezed in. We had sent him our address but this was the first time we had seen or heard from him.

Good company

“I’ve quit,” he said. “Fed up with Jacobs’ nonsense and I’m fed up with farming. Don’t want to be a dirt farmer or a slave all my life. That’s not what I came out to Canada for.

“I’m getting married soon and I want to get a job in the city. Gloria wants to come to the city also. She is tired of the ‘sticks’. Can I stay with you for a bit until I get a job and a place of my own?”

“Certainly,” Ronald said. He was pleased to see the bright Adrian again. “I’d better ask the landlady but I don’t see how she’d mind. There’s an extra room.”

I liked the idea also. Apart from good company it would give us a bit of extra cash. I asked Jean if she thought it would be all right.

The next time the witch came Ronald happened to be in. She had heard about our lodger from Jean and kicked up a great song and dance.

“Look at all zee extra electricity he use for plugging in zee car and other tings,” she said.

“I’m not made of zee money. If he stay you’ll have to pay to me some more.” And she mentioned an exorbitant sum.

Ronald had been intending to say nothing to her about her unwelcome intrusions until we had become a bit more established but this was the last straw.

“All right, we’ll pay for the time he has been here,” he said quickly, “but you’d better start looking for another tenant. This is the last month’s rent you’ll get from me. We’re leaving!” Ronald’s confidence was growing. Rounding a bend in the road, after travelling along its straight, dusty gravel tracks for what seemed like for ever, the lake suddenly appeared before us as blue as the June sky and catching sun diamonds in its watery net.

The great expanse of water immediately in front of us was surrounded by trees, poplar and birch, each fragile leaf of each tree a mirror from which the sun renected.

Sunny day

My heart missed a beat. This could be Scotland on a sunny day. Ronald’s words echoed my thoughts. “Like some loch back home, isn’t it?”

It was mid afternoon on a Friday in June. We wanted to be at the lake in time for potential customers at the weekend.

In front of the lake, at the top of a steep gradient, not quite big enough to be called a hill, stood a house – a baronial type mansion fashioned from wood.

We had been told there was a house by the lake but were surprised at its size and appearance.

It had been built by an Englishman, all his own effort, earlier in the century.

The story went that he had lived here on his own, a recluse for 30 years or more before drowning himself in the lake – no reason given, but maybe loneliness had at last got to him.

It was miles from anywhere – no road in or out. It wasn’t until recently, since Empire Real Estate had bought it, in fact, that a road was being put in and it wasn’t finished yet. What puzzled me, even more than its remoteness, was why build so baronial a mansion just for one. Was it a dream he had?

Did the lake remind him of home? Had he been a remittance man, someone from a well-to-do, respectable family paid to stay away in another land because of some misdemeanour in his youth – unable ever to go home?

With the passage of time the house had taken on a ramshackle appearance. Wide wooden steps in need of repair led up to a large wooden door standing open when we arrived.

Only the screen door remained closed. Sitting at the door on a listing veranda, in the warm afternoon sunshine, was a middle-aged man.

Weather-beaten

He was dressed in a pair of tight-fitting jeans, the belt of which had slipped below his over-large belly. His top half was bare.

His chest was broad and muscular as were his shoulders.

He had the permanent tan of someone who worked perpetually out of doors. His round weather-beaten face had a stubble of beard. The sinews on his strong neck stuck out like tight ropes.

We let the boys out of the car to get rid of some of their pent-up energy. Ronald ran up the wooden steps, two at a time, to introduce himself. I followed more sedately.

“I’m Ron Gillies from Empire Real Estate,” he said. The man didn’t move from the wooden box he was sitting on. Beside him stood a crate of beer.

Before acknowledging Ronald’s greeting he popped an empty beer bottle in the crate and took out a full one easing the top off with his teeth.

He put the bottle to his mouth, took a swig, the liquid went down easily.

“I’m Glug-Giug Stevannuk,” he said, obviously revelling in the Christian name he had adopted.

“Here, have a beer.” (More tomorrow.)

“With the passage of time the house had taken on a ramshackle appearance. Wide wooden steps in need of repair led up to a large wooden door standing open when we arrived

By Margaret Gillies Brown