Wisdom from the Western Isles

Extract from Wisdom from the Western Isles

Chapter 2

I put the phone down, walked into the dining room, and there was Peter Calvay, sitting next to the table. He got up as I came in, smiling naturally as he took me by the hand. I winced with pain. For a moment I thought he intentionally meant to do me an injury.

‘I’m terribly sorry!’ he said, immediately releasing his frightening grip. He had genuinely hurt me. I sat down nursing my hand, to the accompaniment of his profuse apologies. He had hurt me all right, but I made the most of it. Things couldn’t have turned out better. The moment we’d met, the psychological advantage had gone to me. Instead of me feeling guilty and trying to apologize to him for what I had done, he was the one who was apologizing to me!

‘It’s all right,’ I said, bravely forcing a smile.

‘I just forget about these hands of mine,’ he said, as if he’d only had them for a few weeks. ‘I’ve always been in trouble with them ever since I was a teenager. You see, I have to depend on my hands so much because of my leg. I have to grip things more firmly than anybody else for security. My father was endlessly telling me off at home because I would casually turn the taps off in the bathroom and go out for the evening, and nobody could turn them on again!’ He laughed guiltily, as if he were anticipating another scolding.

The words ‘father’, ‘home’, ‘teenager’ broke the spell I had cast round him. So far, he had been little more than a stereotype stamped out in my mind. All of a sudden he had come alive. He was a person; an individual with a past, a mum and a dad, a home, and a history. He had a face too and a body – a big body!

He was a well-made man, about five foot eleven, with strong, powerful shoulders, supporting a heavy, well-shaped head with a mop of black hair, not shoulder length, but long enough to cover both his ears.

The man I was expecting to meet would have been at least fifteen years older. Peter looked in his late thirties, or possibly forty, but even my arithmetic told me he must be at least forty two.

I would say he had worn well, in spite of the telltale grey hairs, which were by no means abundant. A handsome man, no doubt about that. This was something I’d not expected either. It was a strong face with a touch of stubbornness about the chin, but the face had been softened through suffering, and was mobile with compassion. He wore a large donkey jacket, heavily patched with genuine leather at the elbows. Perhaps it was the thick white Arran sweater underneath that gave him such a heavy, powerful appearance. His trousers were strong black ‘cords’, and his right foot was supported by a large built-up boot, fitted to an iron caliper; oddly enough, he was wearing a massive homemade sandal on the other.

‘Are you all right?’ he insisted, with genuine concern.

‘Yes, yes, I’m fine, thanks, though I wasn’t expecting to meet an “all-in wrestler”,’ I replied, attempting to be funny. ‘Well now,’ I said, trying to take control of the situation and play the host, ‘Would you like a drink before dinner?’

‘If you don’t mind, James,’ he said, breaking out into another guilty smile, ‘I’d prefer to have a bath. Father Callum usually lets me have one each Sunday before dinner, so I’ve just got time if I go now.’

‘By all means,’ I said. ‘We’ll meet in half an hour for dinner, if that gives you enough time?’

‘Plenty, thanks,’ he replied. ‘It won’t take me long.’ He picked up an old sports bag, took his stick, which had been hanging over the back of the chair, and went upstairs.

I sat down with a sigh of relief. The worst was over; the introductions were done.

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