Hauling herself from the knee-deep water onto a rock as though she were pulling herself from a swimming pool she managed to avoid the heavy clatter of the bull’s feet, and as she flattened herself against the sheer rock face, he passed by, his wide haunch bumping her stomach as it squeezed through the gap in the rocks, knocking her breathless for a moment during which she watched the heifers stumble past two at a time, knowing that if one should slip it would push her from her perch on the rock.
The sound of their snorted breathing and distressed calling was startlingly loud. The calves at the back of the group struggled up the incline, and their wild-eyed mothers listened for their returning calls.
Beatrice’s hand shook as she held the ridiculously limp sea kelp stalk above her head, ready to slap the behind of any cow that attempted to turn, stamp on her feet, or invade her little safe space. But something else had joined the fray, something sleek and black. It was moving between the herd, coming between her and the animals.
‘Echo,’ she whispered, afraid of startling the animals more, and the dog bounded up onto the rock and sat upright by her feet facing the cattle, his presence making them swerve a little away from her rocky perch, giving her room to breathe.
The reassurance that flooded her body as she slowly reached her free hand down to touch his warm head was like a shot of anaesthetic calming the stress cortisone and adrenalin coursing through her. ‘Good boy, Echo,’ she whispered again. The dog quickly licked her wrist before turning back to his task of keeping the crazy English lady safe.
Out of the cacophony of her heart’s pounding and the herd’s hollering, a man’s voice rose commandingly loud, ‘Geet up!Go oan!’
As the last of the animals passed by her shaking body, she saw him standing on the coral. Atholl Fergusson.
Steeling herself not to cry with relief that the moment was over even though her shredded nerves willed her to sob, she wouldn’t lethimsee her weakness. Anyway, he was shouting, red-faced and angry.
‘What the hell do you think you’re doing?’
‘What am I doing? How was I supposed to know there’d be a herd of mad cows roaming the beach? They don’t put that in the bloody brochures!Come to the beautiful west Highland coast, get eaten by midges and crushed to death by free roaming cattle!’
‘This is their route between pastures on the hills. It’s more their beach than any human’s.’
‘Well that’s ridiculous!’ Beatrice was stuck for words now, regretting having shouted yet again. She wasn’t accustomed to angry exchanges and confrontation, in fact she’d do anything she could to avoid them usually, but this situation was very unusual indeed.
Her chest heaved as she became aware he was surveying her.
‘Good God, would you look at the state of ye.’
Only then did she realise her trouser legs were still unevenly rolled up from paddling and her knees were grazed and bleeding from her hasty scramble onto the rocks, and she was becoming aware of the salt water sting searing through her wounds. It occurred to her that she was still holding the flaccid sea kelp, her only defence against twenty wild cattle on a seaside rampage. She threw it to her feet in disgust and embarrassment, her cheeks burning.
‘I’ll have tae lift ye down. May I?’ He raised his arms, hands outstretched the way her mother had reached for her as a child when she needed rescuing from the top of the climbing frame in the park having been over ambitious and ended up stuck at the top and panic-stricken.
‘I can manage, thank you.’ Her reply came out louder and shakier than she would have wished, and she lowered herself onto her bottom and shuffled down over the edge of the rock, coming to stand in front of Atholl, ignoring the sea water filling her shoes again, a feeling of defiance flooding her.
‘Come up to the cottage, you’ll need tae be cleaned and bandaged.’
‘I’m fine. You can go on your way,’ she said, unconvincingly, as a trickle of blood made its way down her shin.
Atholl raised a challenging eyebrow. ‘It’ll take one minute. Besides, it’s time for yur lesson anyway.’
She eyed the cottage wearily, and heaved a ragged sigh. There would most likely be a kettle in there and she could do with a cup of strong tea after what she’d just experienced. Her hands and her balance, she realised, were still unsteady. ‘All right then.’
Atholl led the way over the coral, walking a few paces in front but occasionally turning his head back. Echo ran off along the beach and disappeared into the gorse. Atholl didn’t seem to mind so she concluded he was a Littlest Hobo kind of dog, off having adventures and saving damsels in distress all day long with little supervision from his master.
The path leading up from the beach to the But and Ben was lined with sea holly, frothy camomile and a cloud of buzzing bees and hornets. The grasshoppers halted their clicking as Beatrice followed Atholl through the garden gate and in the low door of the cottage, surprised to see him walk straight inside without knocking.
‘Is this the classroom?’ she asked, casting her eye around the squat room, taking in the thatch and rafters only a foot or so above her head. There were a few rustic-looking cabinets, an unlit fireplace under a wide chimney, a long table with benches on either side, and very little else. ‘Where’s the teacher?’
Atholl stopped rummaging in the first aid kit to deliver a look that asked whether she was concussed as well as grazed. ‘Iam the teacher. Surely you figured that out?’
The memory of Atholl scolding Beatrice this morning, telling her to hurry to class burned in her brain. He’d enjoyed withholding that little bit of information, payback for her criticising the inn and not wanting to take his willow-weaving classes or eat his brother’s haggis, she supposed. Her anger would have burned all the harder had she not been exhausted from the stampede. She could have been killed, and all for his own sick satisfaction. She glowered at him in silence.
‘May I?’ Atholl came to kneel on the bare earth floor at her feet, raising his hand to her knee but not making contact.
‘I can do it myself.’
‘No, you drink this, to stop the shaking.’ He pressed a small glass into her hand and the vapours coming off the peaty spirits told her this was whisky. She hated whisky but was surprised to find herself sipping as she watched Atholl wiping away the blood with clean hospital gauze.
‘You haven’t dipped that in whisky too, have you?’
