‘I’m just a writer for a mag—’

‘And we don’t need you bellowing the place down, Alec,’ Euan booms, ‘Showing us up.’

‘A journalist?’ Alec ignores Euan and swipes up the whisky, sloshing it over his fingers as he looks me up and down through narrowed eyes. ‘And what the hell is it you’re here to journalist about? The dig?’

‘No.’ I can feel my face heating up. ‘Just a story about something that happened a long time ago.’

‘Oh, really?’ Euan says. ‘Sounds very intriguing. And what—’

Alec lurches towards me, shoving Euan aside again. His eyes are wet-bright and heavy-lidded. There are sweat rings around his armpits. He’s quite a bit drunker than I thought. ‘Wait a minute. Wait a wee fuckin’ minute.’

I can feel Kelly bristling beside me, but for the moment, I’m frozen motionless, staring at Alec staring at me.

‘Jesus Christ. Ah, Jesus Christ. I’d recognise those eyes anywhere.’ His laugh is like a bark. ‘It’s you.’

It’s just my left eye. Permanently dilated after a car accident when I was four, and perhaps not noticeable at all if my eyes were browner, darker. Fitting, I suppose, that’s what finally obliterates all those maybe-it’ll-be-all-rights. Because I know exactly what’s about to happen. What he’s about to say. That ballast in my belly knows too. I’m almost relieved.

‘Alec,’ his wife says, tugging on his arm. Up close, Fiona MacDonald’s face, tight with anxiety, is liberally covered in tiny freckles. She shoots me a nervous glance, and then another. I can’t tell if she knows who I am or not.

‘Don’t mither me, woman.’ He shakes her off, downs his whisky, thrusts the glass back at Bruce. ‘Another.’ And when he looks back at me again, the disgust is still there, the hostility, the recognition, but there’s something else too. Something that makes me feel worse. I think it’s fear. He turns round to the rest of the pub, throwing his arms wide. People are already looking over. ‘You don’t recognise her? None of you? You don’t recognise little Maggie?’

‘What the hell are you talking about, man?’ Euan asks, now more confused than angry, one hand held up between us like a boxing referee.

Alec’s smile is icy cold. ‘Andrew MacNeil.’ He lunges close enough that I can smell the sour whisky on his breath. ‘You’re Andrew fucking MacNeil. I’m right, right? Right?’

I can hear mutters and exclamations from the lounge behind us. Loud and getting louder. Absolutely everyone is now looking at me.

‘D’you want to get out of here?’ Kelly mutters in my ear, just as I realise I’m squeezing her hand, digging my nails deep into her skin.

When I manage to nod, she jumps off her stool, drags me off mine, and marches us both towards the door. The squeal of its hinges makes me flinch, and Alec’s still furious shouts chase me outside, where the deserted darkness is as welcome as the headland winds blowing wild against my face and my too-hot skin. I should never have come here. And now it’s too late to go back.