‘I’ve not seen her in hours,’ Aunt Mary said. ‘Did she go fishing? She mentioned she might.’

Rachel McKinnon shrugged. ‘Or is she with Mary? She said she had to check on her.’

‘Shall I look?’ Effie asked, poised to sprint again.

‘No, there’s no time,’ Archie replied grimly. ‘She could be anywhere and we can’t afford to wait.’

The boat was nosing the waterline now.

‘I’ll help you,’ Sholto said, wading into the sea with Archie and jumping into the boat as it began to float.

Archie McKinnon simply nodded, his face grim set; there was every chance it was one of his own sons they were saving. The two men grabbed the oars and began to pull, their bodies dipping back and forth in unison as they coaxed the boat into cutting a line through the water.

Along with the other women, Effie stood up to her knees in the water, watching them go. Their hands were pressed to their mouths, tears gathering in their throats, but there was no use in crying. Not yet. Though they were racked with alarm, it would be several hours before the men got back here and they knew who to worry for. All they could do now was watch and wait.

It was the children’s idea to run tags from Rubha Cholla, the point where the boat would round the headland at Oiseval and slip back into the embrace of Village Bay. The older ones formed a broken line along the track, Neil MacQueen, Flora’s younger fourteen-year-old brother, taking up position as the sentry. ‘He’s got wheels,’ their father always said of him, and sure enough the boy sprinted like Hermes himself once the boat came closer.

The name had been passed four along before they could hear it on the beach. ‘Donald McKinnon! Head wound!’

Lorna gave a sombre nod in reply and turned to her medical bag. Effie knew she had been hoping for a broken arm to set, something mechanical. Heads were never simple. They kept injuries as hidden as thoughts and lies, promises and secrets.

‘Should I tell Mary?’ Effie asked her. It had turned out Lorna had been tending to the expectant mother after all; she had been a few hundred yards away from the drama on the beach, their shouts drowned out by a pan on a rolling boil. More vital time had been lost.

The nurse considered for a moment. ‘Yes. You had better. She’ll need time to get down. We’ll not know how grave it is till they beach but she should be here, in case.’

Effie ran up onto the grass, sprinting through the Mac-Queens’ plot, accidentally planting a bare foot in the freshly manured lazybed as she went.

‘Mary,’ she called. ‘Are you there?’