Grouped tightly together, the planting squad retreated down the road past the cantonment of eight houses, their pace quickening as in a tight group they stepped into clear air near the hutments. Reaching the hardstanding area the men slowed then halted. They sucked cooler, cleaner air.
Behind them, bituminous felt roof covering at No.1, had finally ignited. Daggers of flame ran over the pitched roof and flickered above upstairs windows. Minutes later the timber frame of the building was enveloped by fire.
Neither Roland nor Guy spoke. No1, the furthest bothy in this remote place, had welcomed their arrival from London eighteen months before. They stood and watched it burn, throats closing in emotion, unable to speak. Two large suitcases resting in the storeroom contained all their possessions.
Alex and Noel sat down, coughing, pulling off face coverings. Ruairidh, George and Blue leaned backwards on their haversacks. Silas straddled his motorcycle parked in front of the huts, his head bent forward, hands fumbling to remove the scarf tied over the nape of his neck.
Robbie entered the office, his vision blurred. He rubbed his eyes with the back of one hand and croaked “Iain, could you take some water out to the boys?”
“Are you ok?” the logistics ganger asked anxiously.
“I’m fine,” Robbie said hoarsely and became aware of the unconscious man on the floor. He bent over him, unable at first to recognise the man. “He’s taken a knock as well as being burned,” the ganger said. “I don’t want to move him.”
Young Iain brushed past carrying a glass pitcher brimful of water. He dragged the door wide open with one foot and disappeared outside. A draft of hot air blew through the gap. Robbie pushed the door shut and knelt beside the comatose body on the floor.
“He’s well out of it. Still in shock, that’s no bad thing.” He picked up the plastic beaker and rose to his feet . “I’ll get more water to pour on those burns. Let you stay beside the phone.”
“Doctor Wilson is coming,” the ganger said. Then, “Difficult to tell how bad he is. I called Belford. An ambulance is on its way.”
“Where’s Euan Mackinnon?” Robbie had returned with the beaker.
“Still at the bothies. Just a minute.” The telephone was ringing and the logistics ganger picked it up and began to speak “Not a chance. We are losing the houses. Number One and number Two are already burning. The rest will go the same way … too near the wood…Mackinnon is still up there…”
From the window Robbie looked to where his men were getting to their feet. Members of the squad were passing around the water jug Iain had brought, thirstily gulping from it in turns. Ruairidh, George and Blue opened their haversacks. They handed out bottles of water and biscuits, cheese, and cartons of hummus that George had swept from refrigerator and kitchen shelves.
They could hear nearby cries of pain. The burned man on the office floor had regained consciousness. His body began to convulse and the brawny ganger kneeling beside the seared figure repeated that the Doctor Wilson was surely now only minutes away. The man’s body continued to twitch uncomprehendingly.
More men arrived from the nearer bothies, defeated. No1 had become a torch; Nos2 and 3 were well alight. The roofs of Nos4, 5, and 6 streamed smoke. The remaining two timber buildings stood forlornly. Flame leapt from a bedroom window at No4. Shortly afterward, the adjacent building showed bright yellow streaks. Fire progressed steadily along the row.
No1’s roof collapsed with a crash, showering sparks upwards and into the grey-black canopy that hung over the cantonment and within thirty minutes every bothy was burning. Unrestrained, fire raged and roared among the clinker structures and plumed from the forest behind them. Red embers whirled brightly through the smoke.
The water tank had long since emptied and the group entrusted with hose and pump, having brought the equipment with them, trudged wearily past the burgeoning crowd at the hutments. The massive woodsman led them into the office to pay their respects to the burned man lying on the floor over whose upper body Robbie continued to tip cold water.
Mackinnon with the two Archies were the last to withdraw, visible in snatches before they finally emerged through hanging drifts of smoke, walking towards the hutments.
A car drove up and Doctor Wilson hurried into the office to attend to the casualty. A strand of smoke eddied past him as he entered.
At the open hardstanding, crowded beside Commission vehicles, some stood and others sat. Their eyes were bleared, red rimmed, and fixed in fascination at the cantonment now blazing from end to end. Calor gas canisters in the coal compound exploded with a crash.
Everyone in the office, excepting the doctor kneeling beside his patient, was at a window. Young Archie entered and went into the washroom for several minutes to run cold water over blistered hands.
The doctor injected the quivering casualty who sighed and lay still. The younger Archie diffidently held out his arms, palms open for inspection. It was the doctor’s turn to sigh as he peered at the patches of burnt skin.
Outside, all were on their feet now, impassive and riveted to the sight of flaming buildings.
“Delenda est Polloch,” Ruairidh muttered to Blue beside him.
Twenty kilometres to the north east, the activist swung his Ducati into a layby that gave a prospect of the Glenfinnan monument and Loch Shiel stretching beyond. He lifted his goggles and let them snap back over his helmet. To the west, a distant smudge hung above the long austere ridge that dominated that shore of the loch and for a moment he saw a broken ship, burning and sinking in blue tropical waters.
The activist braced both feet on the ground and rocked on the saddle of his motorcycle. He folded his arms on his chest and smiled triumphantly.