One of the ferry’s crew recognized Stark and gave him a friendly wave. Stark waved in return, then cut the engine’s revolutions to slow his boat until he had a better sense of what lay ahead in the harbor. After a year of working these waters, shuttling back and forth between Ullapool and the training facility, he knew every local craft and most of their owners. He knew their schedules and how they operated their boats. It was the occasional visitor unfamiliar with the local traffic scheme that he had to watch out for. The rain slowed as he approached the boat slips. To the northeast he could see An Teallach, the mountain’s Torridonian sandstone dimmed to brownish gray in the late-afternoon light. A break in the clouds covering the mountaintop exposed the sun, still a couple of hours from setting, and rays of light streamed onto the white stone buildings along the quay. To the west were tall pines, vestiges of the once-extensive Caledonian forest. To the east, the machair plains, filled with yellow rattle and orchids, glowed in the evening sun which momentarily broke through the clouds.
