Page 76 of Meet me at the Seaside Cottages

‘Do you know where the nearest Starbucks is?’ Tristan says loudly. ‘Oslo!’ Then he laughs heartily at his own joke.

The ghillie watches them patiently. He’s seen it all before. Al doesn’t mind so much; Zara makes quite a lot of the same jokes, all the time. Nonetheless, he looks up and casually says, ‘You know deer have excellent hearing, yeah?’

‘What, and they’ll think I’m disrespecting the neighbourhood?’ says Tris, but he settles down as the men start to space themselves out as they’ve been told.

Essie watches them, lets them go ahead. She finds herself thinking of Felicity as she looks at the ghillie’s dog, Bran. They’ve been warned not to touch him; he’s a working dog. Essie finds herself thinking that Felicity should have coupled up with him, they’re much more suited, which is a ridiculous thing to think about dogs, but then she looks at Connor, tall, pink-cheeked, handsome. Obviously she and he belong together. Whereas Dwight, tanned and wee and crazily dressed – it was ridiculous.

‘Are you coming?’asks Connor quietly, turning his head.

‘Only to watch,’ she says. ‘I leave the whole deer-killing business up to Al.’

‘Hypocrite,’ says Al, smiling. ‘You’ll like the venison stew.’

‘I will,’ she says. ‘Get over yourself. I’m not denying being a hypocrite. I’m admitting to being a total wuss.’

*

The forest is a light covering of spring green, humming and bouncing with new life; tiny streams tumble; new leaves unfurl on every branch. There are nests visible high in the trees; awoodpecker can be heard, far off. Old trees fall apart beneath their feet, rotten to the core from their wet winter as nature discards and builds again. The sun dapples through the trunks.

Essie follows the paths, here and there, careful not to make a sound; it feels like a game, a magical exploration. She remembers her parents trying to drag her here for walks when she was young, on Sundays, and her vociferous complaints. But the silence of people tiptoeing and the gentle pad, pad, pad of the dog’s feet against the rippling, crackling life of the wood feel almost holy on this sunny morning; the forest is enchanted; the circles of toadstools absolutely ready for a fairy with a fishing rod. She feels as likely to see a human-faced faun as a deer.

Then, suddenly, the ghillie holds up his hand, and everyone freezes.

Nobody breathes. Nobody moves. There, over by the tiny burn, the beautiful stag’s great head lifts as it sniffs the wind.And the world stands still.

Essie has been completely in her own world, utterly enchanted by the deep Scotland she has found herself in, and her eyes grow wide as she remembers what they’re here to do.

She glances at Al, who is entirely concentrating on the animal and slowly raising his gun. Tris and Trumpet have their guns pointing now, each with one eye closed, trained on the great beast. Connor is starting to raise his, but reluctantly.

Essie can’t believe it.

They all glance at the ghillie, who drops his arm . . .

‘NO!’

Essie surprises herself by the sound of her voice; by the shout she had had absolutely no intention of making. The guns go off, above the treeline, skewed by her noise; the stag bounds, faster than seems possible without being able to fly, over fencesand tree trunks.There is a flash of red in the trees and the stag is gone, nothing but an incredibly fast bob of white as his tail vanishes.

Everyone stands for a moment, frozen in disbelief. The guns come down. Essie has that sinking feeling you get when you realise you have made a terrible, unwarranted error you really didn’t mean to make.

‘Oh for fuck’s sake,’ says Tris, in a terrible temper.

Essie doesn’t care. She whirls round.‘Don’t kill that beautiful creature!’

‘We’ve been through this, sis!’ says Al finally in anguish. ‘Don’t come if you can’t handle it!’

The ghillie is sucking his teeth, clearly profoundly unimpressed. Tris is tutting audibly. Connor is bright pink. Dwight is messing with his toothpick again, seemingly unconcerned. At the noise, there is a great flutter of wings overhead, as birds take off into the early summer sunshine.

Essie is tearful and furious at the same time. She wants to stamp her foot on the moss underfoot. Everyone is staring at her.

‘Seriously,’ says Al. Tris is sneering.

Essie is burning bright red now, full of embarrassment.

‘What if we’d swerved our shots and injured him? What then? And he’d taken off with his leg hanging off?’ Al is genuinely upset, very unusually for him. Essie sees, suddenly, that he means it when he says he cares about these animals, even if it looks perverse from the outside.

‘I know,’ says Essie, staring at the ground.

‘You never thought about that!’

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