BooksBarbecue
Back The Darkest Shore Save as PDF
Chapters (76)
  1. Cover
  2. About the Author
  3. Also by Karen Brooks
  4. Title Page
  5. Dedication
  6. EXPLANATORY NOTE
  7. PART ONE
  8. One
  9. Two
  10. Three
  11. Four
  12. Five
  13. Six
  14. Seven
  15. Eight
  16. Nine
  17. Ten
  18. Eleven
  19. Twelve
  20. Thirteen
  21. Fourteen
  22. Fifteen
  23. Sixteen
  24. Seventeen
  25. Eighteen
  26. Nineteen
  27. Twenty
  28. Twenty-One
  29. Twenty-Two
  30. Twenty-Three
  31. Twenty-Four
  32. Twenty-Five
  33. Twenty-Six
  34. Twenty-Seven
  35. Twenty-Eight
  36. PART TWO
  37. Twenty-Nine
  38. Thirty
  39. Thirty-One
  40. Thirty-Two
  41. Thirty-Three
  42. Thirty-Four
  43. Thirty-Five
  44. PART THREE
  45. Thirty-Six
  46. Thirty-Seven
  47. Thirty-Eight
  48. Thirty-Nine
  49. Forty
  50. Forty-One
  51. Forty-Two
  52. Forty-Three
  53. Forty-Four
  54. Forty-Five
  55. Forty-Six
  56. Forty-Seven
  57. Forty-Eight
  58. Forty-Nine
  59. Fifty
  60. Fifty-One
  61. Fifty-Two
  62. PART FOUR
  63. Fifty-Three
  64. Fifty-Four
  65. Fifty-Five
  66. Fifty-Six
  67. Fifty-Seven
  68. Fifty-Eight
  69. Fifty-Nine
  70. Sixty
  71. Sixty-One
  72. Epilogue: Autumn 1706
  73. AUTHOR’S NOTE
  74. GLOSSARY
  75. LIST OF CHARACTERS
  76. ACKNOWLEDGEMENTS

When she wasn’t dealing with matters pertaining to her boat, Sorcha was with the fishwives at the harbour. Working in groups of three, the women would bait the lines, some holding up to fifteen hundred hooks. After these were stored on board the inshore boats and the men were carried out and rowed away to loud farewells and wishes for a good and safe catch, the fishwives would turn their hands to first mending the nets from the previous day’s catch, then fakin’ them — folding them in a to and fro manner so they ran smoothly from the deck once the boats were out in the ocean.

The children were responsible for collecting bait in the shallows and among the rocks, usually mussels, which they either shieled or put in a scaup — a shallow rock pool where they could remain fresh until such time as they were needed. With their buckets they gathered cockles and other sea creatures for their own tables, sharing what they found. If the weather held, the more experienced fishwives, Sorcha among them, would collect salt and place it in barrels, ready for the fish on the men’s return. The cloots, the strips of fabric they wrapped around their fingers, offered some protection from the cuts of the sharp fins, the swift action of the knives, and the sting of the salt. It had taken three nicks of the knife before Sorcha found her old rhythm. Once the fish were prepared and ready for sale, the women would load their creels and head off into town or along the coast or even inland to nearby farms to sell whatever they could. It made for long days, but also a good night’s rest. Something that, until she returned to Pittenweem, had eluded Sorcha ever since Davan died.

As the weeks flew by, the foreboding she had felt the night Isobel Adam bowled into her house came to nothing. In fact, on New Year’s Day there’d been many fisherfolk, shopkeepers and villagers having a good laugh about what happened to the young seamstress, the gossip having spread as it was wont to do. It was dismissed in exactly the manner Nettie and Sorcha had: all due to McGregor being in his cups.