Read On the Island for Free Online Page A

If you want to know about the sky you come to me. I know all about it. And I’ll tell you something else, the more I see of the sky the more I get puzzled. When you see it’s green, that’s because the earth is green. And there are caves in the sky too, and there are roads. The sky is a country of its own. You can turn a corner in the sky though you might not think it. I’ve made a study of the sky. Sometimes it seems to know what you are thinking. Have you ever noticed that? I don’t suppose you have. That’s because you’re not sitting here like me. But it can. Sometimes when you’re happy the sky is happy and sometimes when you’re sad the sky is sad, and sometimes when you’ve nothing to do the sky has nothing to do. That’s the sky for you.”
    As if he felt that he would never get away from the Cook if he didn’t get an answer immediately, Iain rushed out the words, “What kind of day will it be tomorrow, sir?”
    â€œSir, eh,” said the Cook. “That will be what they’re teaching you at school, eh. Sir, eh?” But he seemed pleased just the same. Then with a keen look at Iain that penetrated right through him, he said, smilingly, “I’ll tell you, Iain, it will be a good day tomorrow. It will be a very good day. It will be hot and there will be no clouds. Are you listening to me?”
    â€œYes,” said Iain.
    â€œAre you hearing me?” And his face came closer and closer so that Iain could see the red network of veins in his eyes. “It will be a good day tomorrow, boy. You remember that.”
    Iain stood up. “Thank you, sir,” he said, and ran away as quickly as he could, only looking back once to see that the Cook was still sitting on his bench, the pipe back in his mouth, and staring straight ahead of him at the corn which was not so yellow as it once had been in the past.
    Yet he was quite confident that the Cook would sort the sky out for him one way or another, for he was old enough to do that, and wise enough too.

7
    I AIN AND K ENNETH stood at the plank waiting for the bus to appear over the brae. It was nine in the morning and there was a blue haze over the ground though the grass was still wet. They were both dressed in brown woollen suits which their mother had knitted for them and there were tie pins at their throats. Their stomachs were uneasy with excitement which they relieved by kicking at the little stones of the road with their highly polished black shoes.
    Suddenly Iain saw the big red lumbering bus appearing over the top of the brae and he ran up the path to the house shouting to his mother to come, for he was desperately frightened that the bus might leave without them. She appeared slowly, dressed in black and carrying her black handbag in her gloved right hand, while Kenneth was shouting from the foot of the path, “Hurry up hurry up,” and dancing on the road with frustration. Their mother shut the door behind her, though she did not bother to lock it (for no one ever stole anything from the village houses), and then was walking down the path, Iain running ahead of her, as if escorting her, and now and then turning his head to see if she was still there. She had arrived at the plank when the bus stopped with a great creaking of brakes, the driver looking down from his seat, his foot still on the clutch. Their mother climbed into the bus first, followed by Kenneth and Iain, and then the bus set off, leaving the village behind it.
    Iain sat in a seat by himself while in front of him his mother and Kenneth sat together. He was watching through the window everything that he could see, the scarred peat banks near the road, the houses which were still quiet and sleepy, the people waiting at the side of the road at the bus stops, the fields of corn which were golden under the sun now beginning to break through the haze. Now and again he would put his hand in his pocket to make sure that