Christmas at the Edge of the World

checked it last night,” he admitted with a crooked smile. “I’m not much of one for technology.”

Neither was Eilidh, but at least she had email in Spain. “Well…” Laurel said with a shrug, because what else could she do?

Archie gave a grudging nod. “Right, I suppose you’re deserving of an apology.” Laurel waited, but it seemed that had been it. “What are the two of you doing in this part of the world in the darkest part of the year?” he asked.

“Good question,” Zac muttered, still looking a bit shell-shocked from the whole bizarre exchange.

“We wanted to spend Christmas here. I have many happy memories of summers at Eilidh’s cottage.”

“Aye, but it’s winter.”

True enough. “I need to get the rest of the things out of my car,” Laurel said a bit pointedly. Surely, now that he’d checked them out, Archie could go back to wandering the wilderness, or whatever else it was he did? He looked like a cross between a hobo and Bear Grylls.

“I’ll give you a hand,” he said, not making it a suggestion she could politely refuse. “And I’ll show you around the place—there are a few wee tricky bits.”

“Tricky bits?” Laurel repeated. “What do you mean?”

“The Rayburn’s got a bit of a temper,” Archie answered with a shrug. “And the taps on the bath upstairs don’t always behave.” Laurel was reminded of the animated house of the Beast in the Disney film, imagining an angry cooker and a dancing sink.

“What do you mean, exactly…” she began, but Archie was already heading out into the rain, and after a second’s uncertain deliberation, Laurel followed him. Zac sloped out after her, and between the three of them they managed to get all the bags and boxes into the cottage in one cumbersome load.

“How long are you staying here for, then?” Archie exclaimed as he hefted a box of tins and packets onto the old, laminate worktop. Laurel hadn’t remembered it being quite so grotty, but a spritz of cleaning spray would certainly help matters.

“Just for a couple of weeks, but I wanted to be prepared.”

“There is a supermarket on the island,” Archie said with a wry look. Laurel couldn’t quite make him out. His manner was both brusque and joking, his face craggy and wind-burned, his blue eyes surprisingly bright and deeply creased. Underneath his flat cap his hair looked wavy, unmanageable, and liberally streaked with grey. He seemed both ageless and ancient, the kind of person who was part of the landscape, rooted like a tree.

“Yes, I know,” Laurel said, her tone sharpening just a little. She felt defensive all of a sudden. Perhaps it was because of the gun. “I have spent a fair amount of time here, you know.”

“Yes, back when you were a bairn.” Archie nodded. “I remember now.”

“You remember?” Laurel goggled him. Surely she would have remembered a character like him?

“Aye. You and your sister. Bonny lasses, the pair of you, along with your mum, Isla.” He glanced at Zac. “This your son?”

“No, my sister’s son.” An explanation about why Abby wasn’t here bottled in her throat, but Archie, thankfully, was not the kind of man to ask nosy questions. He merely nodded a greeting at Zac, who nodded back, seeming more discomfited than Laurel had ever seen him before, but then she was discomfited too, by just about everything right then.

“So, the Rayburn,” he said, and started towards the cooker.

Laurel watched him apprehensively as he crouched in front of the old dark green Rayburn and flipped open one of the doors on its front. “This is the control panel,” he said as he twiddled a dial. “If I’d known you were coming, I would have turned it on.”

If you’d checked your email, Laurel thought silently, and then wondered why this oddball farmer got her back up quite so much. He was just so…eccentric. Which was a trait she normally didn’t have a problem with, but she was already feeling touchy and on edge and Archie’s confusing manner, brusque, joking, and wielding a gun, was something she did not have the emotional reserves to deal with at present. She needed one thing, one person, to be simple.

With another twirl of the dial and the flick of a switch, the Rayburn slowly rumbled to life, like a monstrous beast beneath the cottage’s weathered floorboards stirring from a deep slumber.

“There we are,” Archie said with satisfaction. “Should be nice and toasty here in a couple of hours.”

“Thanks,” Laurel said. Until then they could freeze, she supposed.

“Now if it goes out,” he continued, “you just need to fiddle with the dial a bit.”

“Fiddle?”

“Spin it this way and that. Talk to her nicely.” He slapped the side of the Rayburn the way Laurel imagined he might the flank of a cow. “She likes a kind word now and then, but don’t we all?” He let out a laugh and Laurel managed a smile.

She couldn’t help but wonder if he was making fun of her a bit? Playing up the whole Highland yokel act? But, no, she really didn’t think he was.

“If you run into real trouble, you can give me a shout.” He straightened, nodding towards the window and the darkened field beyond. “I’m just along that paddock there.”