That boy, that Brukie’s Sandy, he took his time drowning, as is the way of the young and the strong. He held on, held on. Until the freeze in his fingers. Until the weight of the sodden gansey and oilie. Until the drag of his boots. Until the sea in his lungs. He just held on, crying for the Lord to save him.

And Jeemsie Neish stood by and watched that boy drown.

~

‘Accidental death at sea.’ That’s what the newspaper over in Gadlehead said, and no-one in Roanhaven would say otherwise. They may have listened to whispers, the madman rantings of Sailor Finney. They may have suspected, they may have guessed. But never would they have spoken of it outside the village.

Didn’t mean they condoned what Granda did, no. There wasn’t one among them would have said that. And none could wipe the horror from their eyes when they looked on Jeemsie Neish, when they looked on any of us, his family. It was 1905, for the love of God, and they did not think themselves barbarians, did they? But they turned their backs on it, aye, they would not face what had been let to pass. It was knitted into the pattern of who they were, see, as much as it was into Jeemsie. To come right out and confront him, condemn him—well, that would be to condemn their old ones, all they themselves had come from.

It has taken a lifetime for me to see that the more afraid people are of the darkness, the further into it they will flee.

I don’t know whether that boy could ever have been saved. Two old men and a grapplie hook? No match for the icy North Sea. For the Witch. Mostly likely they would have been pulled in to be drowned themselves. But I’ll tell you this: I made a promise to myself that night I heard Ma crying for Brukie’s Sandy. I swore that if ever God put chance in my way, I would make up for the wrong Granda Jeemsie had done. I would never turn from saving another to save myself. I would not stand by and do nothing.

~

There it is, lambsie, there it is. The past in all its shame. Writing has been a heavy, wearying thing. I think it may be true you will not thank me. And maybe I will change my mind, after all, and tear the pages from this book, spare you the terrible burden of knowing your family’s shame.