MY PLANE followed the darkness as it lowed westwards over Europe. I’d let Riga at 7 pm, and by ten I’d be back home in the depths of Ayrshire. What might happen then I did not know.
But the story started several months before that. When I retired as Professor of History at the Unfiversity of Falkirk, I decided to go back to my roots. My great-grandfather had worked in the shoe factories in Maybole before moving to Glasgow to seek his fortune. I’d only ever passed through that area, but I’d recently inherited, from a greataunt, a cotage not far from the town, near the village of Kirkmichael. I sold of my lat in Falkirk and moved in.