Fiona turned to Tommy, standing silently beside them. “Did you never consider the farming life, Tommy?”

“No.”

“I suppose it isn’t for everyone.”

Malcolm watched Tommy, unsure whether his nephew would reply or if he himself would need to say something to cover the silence. But after a moment, Tommy came out with, “I do like the outdoors. But farming’s hard. It wouldn’t have suited me.”

“And remind me again, what is it you do in London?” Fiona said.

“Grant development manager,” Tommy said succinctly, a phrase that meant precisely nothing to Malcolm. “At a research centre.”

“Do you enjoy that?” Fiona asked, clearly as much at a loss as Malcolm.

“Not especially,” Tommy said.

“Well,” Fiona said. “We all have to do something, don’t we? To keep the wolf from the door.”

“Crofting’s never really done that,” Malcolm murmured.

“Ah, but that’s a way of life, not a job.”

“I suppose.” Malcolm wondered suddenly, and perhaps for the first time in his life, what else he might have done if there hadn’t been the croft. Become an accountant like John? No, he’d never been much good with figures. He’d have worked on the ferries, most probably. Croft or no croft, he’d never have left the island, even in his early twenties with his whole life ahead of him. Perhaps all this time what he’d thought of as love had really been fear.

Fiona excused herself to go and check on the lamb, and Malcolm found himself briefly alone with Tommy. “You O.K.?” he said, and Tommy nodded.

The next moment, Ed sidled up to them, emboldened by his beer. He’d refused the offer of a glass, and Malcolm could see from the way he lifted the can to his mouth that most of it was already gone.

“You on the water, lad?” Ed said to Tommy.

“Yes.”

“That’s not really the way we do things out here,” Ed said.

There was a short, awkward pause, and then Ed laughed. Malcolm wondered if he’d been drinking before he even arrived, perhaps wishing to prepare himself for the ordeal ahead. If so, Malcolm could hardly blame him.

“Water’s very refreshing,” Tommy said. He met Malcolm’s eye, his expression giving nothing away. “Sometimes nothing else will do.”

Kathy had been talking to Chris Dougdale and Gavin (Mary was nowhere to be seen, perhaps helping Fiona in the kitchen), but now she came up to join them.

“Ed, are you behaving yourself?” she said to her husband in her good-natured way, but Malcolm thought he detected a note of anxiety in her voice.

“Aye,” Ed said. “Just catching up with Malcolm and getting reacquainted with wee Tommy.”

“The man’s in his thirties, Ed,” Kathy said.

“Not in my head,” Ed said. “When you’ve known someone since they were a bairn, you always see them that way. They never grow up.”