The Boat Comes In

The morning boat came in past a low headland and tied up at Stromness, where the houses stand with their backs to the water and their gable ends turned into the wind. Polly stepped onto wet flagstones and understood the wind at once. It was not a gust. It was a condition. A collie sat at the end of the pier watching the ropes. Polly went over to him. "Can you show me the way?"

Morgenbåden kom ind forbi et lavt næs og lagde til i Stromness, hvor husene står med ryggen til vandet og gavlene vendt mod vinden. Polly trådte ud på våde fliser og forstod vinden med det samme. Det var ikke et vindstød. Det var en tilstand. En collie sad yderst på molen og holdt øje med fortøjningerne. Polly gik hen til ham. "Kan du vise mig vej?"

He asked where she wanted to go, and she admitted she did not know yet. That is a reasonable answer here. The islands number close to seventy, about twenty of them lived on, and none sits far from the shore. There is no forest, no shelter belt, nothing taller than a farmhouse chimney. "Could you tell me where I can catch a bus?" she asked, and he tipped his head toward a shelter at the top of the slope.

Han spurgte, hvor hun ville hen, og hun indrømmede, at det vidste hun ikke endnu. Det er et rimeligt svar heroppe. Øerne er næsten halvfjerds i alt, omkring tyve af dem er beboede, og ingen af dem ligger langt fra kysten. Der er ingen skov, intet læhegn, intet højere end en skorsten på en gård. "Kunne du fortælle mig, hvor jeg kan tage bussen?" spurgte hun, og han nikkede op mod et læskur øverst på skråningen.

Then she made the mistake of a bird who has spent a summer in cities. "How long does it take to walk to the city center?" The collie looked along the single flagstone street that runs the length of the town, narrow enough in places for a car to fold in its mirrors. Eleven minutes, he said, if you stop to look in the windows.

Så begik hun den fejl, en fugl begår, når den har tilbragt en sommer i storbyer. "Hvor lang tid tager det at gå ind til centrum?" Collien kiggede ned ad den ene flisebelagte gade, der løber gennem hele byen, så smal nogle steder, at en bil må klappe sidespejlene ind. Elleve minutter, sagde han, hvis du stopper op og kigger i vinduerne.

"Can you tell me if there are any interesting events today?" He took the question seriously. The ferry timetable is the local news, he said, and everything else arrives with it. There was a boat to the seal skerries later in the week. There was a chapel built by prisoners. There was a village that lay under a sand dune for four thousand years until a storm took the dune away.

"Kan du fortælle mig, om der sker noget interessant i dag?" Han tog spørgsmålet alvorligt. Færgeplanen er de lokale nyheder, sagde han, og alt andet ankommer med den. Der gik en båd ud til sælskærene senere på ugen. Der var et kapel bygget af krigsfanger. Der var en landsby, der lå under en klit i fire tusind år, indtil en storm tog klitten væk.