She is, Brianna admitted. And if it was Hilda or Inga, Id say it was no contest. But Sengas got her mothers personality; nobodys telling her what to donot even Frau Ute.
Where did they get Senga, anyway? she added. There are lots of Ingas and Hildas over toward Salem, but Ive never heard of another Senga.
Ah, well, ye wouldntnot in Salem. Its not a German name, kenits Scots.
Scots? she said in astonishment.
Oh, aye, he said, the grin evident in his voice. Its Agnes, spelt backward. A girl named that is bound to be contrary, dont ye think?
Youre kidding! Agnes, spelled backward?
I wouldna say its common, exactly, but Ive certainly met one or two Sengas in Scotland.
She laughed.
Do the Scots do that with any other names?
Back-spelling? He considered. Well, I did go to school with a lass named Adnil, and there was a grocers lad who got in the messages for old ladies in the neighborhoodhis names pronounced Kirry, but its spelt C-i-r-e.
She looked sharply at him, in case he was teasing, but he wasnt. She shook her head.
I think Mamas right about Scots. So yours spelled backward would be
Regor, he confirmed. Sounds like something from a Godzilla film, doesnt it? A giant eel, maybe, or a beetle with death-ray eyes. He sounded pleased at the notion.
You thought about it, didnt you? she said, laughing. Which would you rather be?
Well, when I was a kid, I thought the beetle with the death-ray eyes would be best, he admitted. Then I went to sea and started hauling up the occasional Moray eel in my net. Those are not the kind of thing yed
want to meet in a dark alley, believe me.
More agile than Godzilla, at least, she said, shuddering slightly at the recollection of the one Moray eel shed met personally. A four-foot length of spring steel and rubber, fast as lightning and equipped with a mouthful of razors, it had come up from the hold of a fishing boat shed watched being unloaded in a little port town called MacDuff.
She and Roger had been leaning on a low rock wall, idly watching the gulls hover in the wind, when a shout of alarm from the fishing boat just below had made them look down in time to see fishermen scrambling back from something on deck.
A dark sine wave had flashed through the silver wash of fish on deck, shot under the rail, and landed on the wet stones of the quay, where it had caused similar panic among the fishermen hosing down their gear, writhing and lashing about like a crazed high-tension cable until one rubber-booted man, gathering his self-possession, had rushed up and kicked it back into the water.
Well, theyre no really bad sorts, eels, Roger said judiciously, evidently recalling the same memory. Ye canna blame them, after all; being dragged up from the bottom of the sea without warninganyone would thrash about a bit.
So they would, she said, thinking of themselves. She took his hand, threading her fingers between his, and found his firm, cold grip a comfort.
They were close enough now to catch snatches of laughter and talk, billowing up into the cold night with the smoke of the fire. There were children running loose; she saw two small forms dart through the legs of the crowd around the fire, black and thin-limbed as Halloween goblins.
That wasnt Jem, surely? No, he was smaller, and surely Lizzie wouldnt
Mej, Roger said.
What?
Jem, backward, he explained. I was just thinking it would be a lot of fun to see Godzilla films with him. Maybe hed like to be the beetle with death-ray eyes. Be fun, aye?
He sounded so wistful that a lump came to her throat, and she squeezed his hand hard, then swallowed.
Tell him Godzilla stories, she said firmly. Its make-believe anyway. Ill draw him pictures.
He laughed at that.
Christ, you do, and theyll be stoning ye for trafficking with the devil, Bree. Godzilla looks like something straight out of the Book of Revelationor so I was told.
Who told you that?
Eigger.
Who oh, she said, going into mental reverse. Reggie? Whos Reggie?
The Reverend. His great-uncle, his adoptive father. There was still a smile in his voice, but one tinged with nostalgia. When we went to the monster films together of a Saturday. Eigger and Regorand ye should have seen the looks on the faces of the Ladies Altar and Tea Society, when Mrs. Graham let them in without announcing them, and they came into the Reverends study to find us stamping round and roaring, kicking hell out of a Tokyo built of blocks and soup tins.
She laughed, but felt tears prick at the backs of her eyes.
I wish Id known the Reverend, she said, squeezing his hand.
I wish ye had, too, he said softly. He would have liked ye so much, Bree.
For the space of a few moments, while he talked, the dark forest and the flaming fire below had faded away; they were in Inverness, cozy in the Reverends study, with rain on the windows and the sound of traffic going by in the street. It happened so often when they talked like this, between themselves. Then some small thing would fracture the momentnow, it was a shout from the fire as people began to clap and singand the world of their own time vanished in an instant.