FIVE

The Good Provider

Most of all it was their ferocity that surprised her. There were two of them, sisters, one not much above twelve and the other no older than fifteen. Their attack was sudden, an ambush near the gate of Oswalds’ in the early morning hour. It was a dry dawn and the oblong puddles in the gutters had at last drained away, which was just as well for the girls’ rush bowled Kirsty over and she sat down hard upon the pavement, arms wrapped instinctively across her belly.

The younger of the little harridans swiped a kick at her.

‘Bitch, so ye are. Bitch, bitch.’

Kirsty struggled to rise but the elder had danced around behind her, grabbed her by the hair and pulled her back. If she had not been so afraid of straining herself Kirsty would have fought back but her pregnancy made her vulnerable and the spitting fury of the girls had about it a tone of moral outrage.

‘Because o’ you, my daddy’s deein’.’

Understanding flared like a gas jet; they were the daughters of one of the villains, Skirving or McVoy.

Kirsty reached out and caught the younger girl a stinging slap upon the cheek. The child’s rage turned at once into self-pity. She burst into tears. Wailing like a she-cat she stepped back from the affray while her big sister renewed her efforts to drag Kirsty on to the ground.

Letty came to the rescue. She had just turned into Vancouver Street – late too – when the commotion started. She came haring up the street, grabbed the assailant by the arm, yanked her away from Kirsty and, for good measure, administered a good round slap on the face that changed rage into hysterical tears.

The girls backed away.

Letty helped Kirsty to her feet. ‘Who the hell’re they?’

‘What do you want wi’ me?’ Kirsty shouted.

‘Your man done it. He done for ma daddy.’

‘Their daddy? What’re they bletherin’ about, Kirsty?’

Kirsty did not answer Letty’s question but shook her fist and advanced on the pair. Tears stained their faces and their noses ran. They looked pitifully dishevelled as they backed away from her, still mewing. When Tam Alexander, the Oswalds’ gateman, came out of his shed into the street the girls turned tail and ran off around the corner and out of sight.

Solicitously Letty brushed Kirsty’s skirt with the flat of her hand. ‘Are ye hurtit?’

‘No, just winded.’

Tam Alexander had come over too, not to enquire after Kirsty’s welfare but to chase the young women into the sheds to their work.

‘Who are they, Mr Alexander? Do y’ know?’

‘The McVoys,’ the gateman told her and, by his grim expression, indicated that he too knew of the night’s arrests.

Kirsty limped into Oswalds’, hanging on to Letty’s arm.

Letty was all agog but Kirsty told her nothing.

At the tables, though, the girls swung round when she entered the room, glowered at her or shunned her with broad, obvious gestures. Kirsty could hardly believe that it was possible for news to travel so quickly, before shops were open, before men congregated at their lathes or benches or on the slipways of Hedderwick’s yard. It was as if the tenements of Greenfield were connected by some sort of invisible wire along which news of Malone’s arrest had throbbed, news too of Nicholson’s treachery.

‘Get on wi’ your work,’ Mrs Dykes barked.

Tommy Dykes brought two bakers to the door of the flour store and pointed out Kirsty as if she were a specimen in a cage.

‘Oh-oh!’ said Letty. ‘You’ve been up t’ somethin’ naughty.’

‘Husband,’ said Mrs McNeil curtly. ‘Her husband’s a nark.’

‘What?’ said Letty, eyes like saucers. ‘A nark?’

‘Sold Danny Malone an’ Billy Skirvin’ t’ the coppers.’

‘Kirsty, is that true?’ said Letty.

But Kirsty just shook her head and withdrew to the end of the packing-table. She was disgusted by the injustice of the situation and the community’s reaction to it, a persecution, she reckoned, that would get worse before it would get better.

 

Broken glass was stashed in a tin bucket and Craig was perched on a chair by the window attempting to fit a piece of plyboard over the gaping hole. He had put the half brick, like a trophy, on the mantelshelf and had untied the surgeon’s bandages to give himself more freedom of movement. He glanced round when Kirsty entered the kitchen.

‘Happened about half an hour ago. Near took my bloody head off,’ he informed her.

‘But why, why are they doin’ this to us?’

‘Because I got off,’ said Craig.

‘Malone was a criminal. Surely everybody knows that.’

Craig said, ‘Everybody hates the polis.’

‘Are you sure it’s not a mistake?’

‘Does it look like a mistake?’ Craig nodded at the half brick. ‘We’re on the bloody top floor, Kirsty. It took a man to throw that, not a mischievous wean. The bastards have it in for me.’

‘Me too,’ said Kirsty.

‘What d’you mean?’

She told him about McVoy’s daughters and their assault upon her person, about the silent treatment she had received from the girls in the Cakery. Craig climbed carefully from the chair and put his good arm about her to offer a modicum of comfort.

‘Are you injured?’

‘I’m hurt,’ said Kirsty, ‘but not injured. How long will they keep it up, Craig?’

‘Christ knows!’

‘I’m beginnin’ to see why Sergeant Drummond urged us to get out o’ the Greenfield.’

‘Bugger Drummond. Bugger them all,’ said Craig. ‘We’re not leavin’ here – an’ that’s flat.’

Shortly after seven o’clock that same evening Colin McCoig turned up. He did not come alone. He was accompanied by a hulking brute of a man in a half-tile hat and Gladstone coat who, though not formally introduced to the tenants, was clearly another cousin of the landlord.

‘What are you doin’ here, Mr McCoig?’ said Craig. ‘Our rent’s no’ due until next Friday. Have you made a mistake?’

‘No mistake,’ said Colin McCoig. ‘Broken window.’

‘How did you know—’

‘Damages must be made good or paid for.’

‘It’ll be repaired,’ said Craig.

The sheer size of the man in the Gladstone overcoat frightened her and Kirsty retreated to the sink.

‘Repaired by next Friday at the latest,’ said McCoig.

‘Next Friday?’ said Craig. ‘It’ll be done tomorrow.’

‘Next Friday: I’m servin’ notice,’ said McCoig.

‘Notice?’

‘To quit.’

‘What!’ Craig shouted. ‘What reason have you got for tossin’ us out? We’ve aye paid the rent on time.’

‘Landlord’s privilege,’ said McCoig. ‘Read the lease agreement.’

‘Christ!’ Craig shouted. ‘You’re another one o’ Malone’s toadies.’

‘I don’t know what you mean,’ said Colin McCoig stiffly.

Livid with rage, Craig stepped towards him.

The cousin shuffled quickly forward to interpose himself between landlord and tenant. Fists planted on hips he flipped back the folds of his overcoat. Stuck in his broad leather belt was an iron bar similar to the one that Danny Malone had wielded. Surreptitiously Kirsty put her fingers around the handle of the frying-pan. The cousin frightened her in a way she had never been frightened before.

Craig checked but did not back away. He folded his arms and squared up to the big man.

‘I suppose you’re another o’ Malone’s chinas too?’

‘Danny’s got your mark, sonny,’ said the cousin. ‘Danny knows it was you got him nicked.’

‘Danny got himself nicked.’

‘You’re in thick wi’ the blue boys.’

‘Beside the point,’ said Colin McCoig. ‘I need this room for – for other tenants. You’ve got seven days’ grace, Nicholson. I’ll be here to check the inventory next Friday.’

‘Stuff your bloody inventory,’ said Craig. ‘We’re no’ goin’.’

‘Aye, but you are, sonny,’ said the cousin. ‘By God, you are.’

 

Craig took the tobacco tin from under the board under the bed and prised it open with a knife. He spilled coins on to the table, stirred them with his palm and immediately began to separate silver from copper.

Kirsty was seated at the table, hands tucked into her lap to hide her trembling.

‘Well,’ she said, ‘at least we’re not penniless.’

‘How long d’you think this lot’ll last?’

‘I’ve still got my pay from Oswalds’.’

‘Six bob a week’ll no’ even feed us, Kirsty, let alone put another roof over our heads,’ said Craig. ‘Besides, it wouldn’t surprise me if Malone managed to put the arm on somebody at Oswalds’ an’ you wound up bein’ sacked.’

‘How can Malone—’

‘It’s no’ just Malone. He’s got powerful friends.’

‘Craig, I’m—’

‘Christ, woman, don’t tell me again that you’re sorry.’

‘I’m sorry.’

‘Jesus!’

‘How much have we saved?’ said Kirsty.

‘Sixty-six shillin’s.’

Eight months ago such a sum would have seemed like a king’s ransom. Living in Glasgow had taught her the value of money, however, and two months and a town rent would soon gobble up their savings.

‘We could pawn things?’ she said.

‘What things?’

‘The clock?’

‘The clock would hardly raise the price of a pint,’ said Craig. ‘What I need is another job, one that pays better than cartin’. And I need it quick.’

‘Craig, are you certain that Maitland Moss will pay you off?’

He laughed. ‘Pay me off? God, I’ll be lucky if he doesn’t string me up.’

‘It’s not right.’

‘It’s the way the world wags, though,’ said Craig.

‘Perhaps we should go home, back to Carrick.’

She was testing him, the strength of his determination to stick it out, to stay with her here in the city. His hesitation suggested that he had not entirely put the idea from his mind. He frowned.

‘Look, Kirsty, there’s no sense in steppin’ backward, is there?’

She shook her head.

He went on, ‘Or in lettin’ ourselves be pushed. I’m man enough to resist that, at least. There are things I miss about Dalnavert, a lot o’ things, but it’s a dull life there wi’ your feet in the mud an’ little prospect of change.’

‘At Bankhead, though, you could—’

‘I could be a head ploughman, aye, in ten years. Nah, nah.’

She felt relieved, vastly so, though her anxiety about the future remained.

Craig said, ‘Here we are, Kirsty, an’ for better or worse it’s here we’ll stay.’

‘But what’ll we do for money?’

‘Leave all that to me,’ said Craig.

 

It was no sort of day to fire the blood. Rain drizzled from gelatinous clouds and the city and its suburbs lay grey and still and sullen as Craig trudged up Kingdom Road towards the gates of Maitland Moss carriers’ yard. He kept his hands out of his pockets and his chin up, though rain beaded his hair and formed a drip on his nose and he felt anything but aggressive and determined.

Nothing appeared to have changed in the yard. There was no visible activity and most of the carts had gone out. Indeed the only sound came from the forge where old Willy and a lad were repairing a set of springs. Craig marched boldly to the shed, marched boldly inside.

The reek of burnt hoofs and coke fumes caught at his throat. It was all he could do not to cough. He closed his throat on the choking sensation and waited, arms by his sides, until the lad spotted him and nudged old Willy.

Tongs in hand, bulky leather pad strapped to his forearm and a scarred apron covering his nether region, Willy turned.

‘You, Nicholson!’ he exclaimed. ‘By Jove, you’ve a brass neck showin’ your face here.’

‘I’ve come for my wages.’

‘It’s no’ Sunday.’

‘I’m not waitin’ for Sunday,’ said Craig. ‘Who’s in charge now Malone’s gone?’

‘If you’re caught here, son,’ said the horse-man, ‘they’ll bloody flay you, so they will.’

‘Let them bloody try.’

‘Danny made money for half the men here,’ Willy reminded him.

‘By theft, by robbery, by smashin’ old widows in the mouth.’

‘He was pals wi’ everyone, was Danny.’

‘How many o’ Danny’s pals did the coppers lift?’ Craig asked.

‘Och, the blue boys come wi’ warrants all right, but they found not a blessed thing. Danny was too smart for them. Danny would never shop his pals.’

‘I want my wages,’ said Craig.

‘Did the polis no’ pay you, eh?’

‘So you think I’m a nark, Willy; well, I’ll tell you, I got nothin’ from the coppers,’ Craig said. ‘Not a damned penny.’

‘You’ll get nothin’ from Maitland Moss either.’

‘Mr Moss?’ said Craig. ‘Is he managin’ the yard himself?’

Behind the horse-man, stuck in the jaws of the forge, a length of iron had turned from dull red to molten white. Craig stared at it, expecting it to melt completely and drip into the bed of hot coals even though the lad had ceased to pump the foot bellows and there was no draught to create heat.

‘Mr Moss has t’ do it until he can find somebody else,’ said Willy. ‘He’ll never get nobody like Danny Malone, though.’

‘So Mr Moss had to get out o’ his bed, did he?’ said Craig. ‘Where is he, Willy?’

‘Upstairs.’

‘Right,’ said Craig turning.

‘Aye, you’d better get what you can an’ clear out o’ the Greenfield, son,’ said the old horse-man. ‘Word’s out that Danny intends t’ get you.’

‘How can he get me?’ said Craig. ‘He’ll be in the bloody clink for ten years at least.’

‘I wouldn’t be so sure o’ that,’ said Willy.

It was not Malone that worried Craig, but Malone’s influence. The brick through the window, the attack on Kirsty, the landlord’s cousin in the daft tile-hat; his betrayal had become public knowledge and it would serve no purpose at all to deny it.

Craig turned and, without another word to the horse-man, left the shed and crossed the yard to the stairs that led up to the rackety wooden office. He climbed them quickly, before his nerve could fail him, and knocked upon the door.

‘What is it?’ a voice called out.

‘I’ve come for my wages.’

‘Who are you?’

‘Craig Nicholson.’

The door flew open.

Craig had half expected to be confronted by the sporting gent he had glimpsed at the Belltree that April morning in Renfrew but Maitland Moss, though out of the same drawer, had no whiskers, only a small bristling moustache. His jaw was blunt, his nose aquiline, his eyes as cold and grey as the Glasgow sky. He wore chequered tweeds of fine wool and finer cut and a high hard collar with a red silk cravat in the vee.

‘Are you Nicholson?’

‘I am, sir.’

‘What the devil do you want?’

‘My wages, sir. Four days.’

‘By God, you’ve got gall!’

‘My tally will be recorded in the day book, sir.’

‘I know where the tally will be,’ said Maitland Moss. ‘You’d best step inside.’

He was younger than Craig had supposed him to be, not much over thirty. The office appeared unchanged, except that there was more paper scattered about and, in an ashtray on the desk, a slender cheroot smoked where once Danny Malone’s fat Delmonico had rested. A gill bottle of Glen Grant whisky and a single glass were on the desk too. The fire and an oil-lamp were lighted. Maitland Moss did not invite Craig to sit down. He poured a dram into the little glass and drank it in a swallow. ‘Do you know what you’ve done, Nicholson?’

‘I haven’t done anythin’, Mr Moss.’

‘How do you know my name?’

‘Old Willy told me.’

‘Have you not seen me before?’

‘No, sir, never.’

Moss went on, ‘Not only did you cost me the services of a most excellent manager but you brought a gang of policemen to my house in dead of night and thoroughly frightened my wife and children.’

‘I did no such thing, Mr Moss.’

‘You were responsible for it.’

‘Am I not to get my wages?’ said Craig.

‘I’ve no stomach for your sort, Nicholson.’

‘My sort?’

‘An ingrate. Mr Malone was generous enough to make you a place here and you reward him by telling some tall tale to the police.’

‘Tall tale! Malone was a thief.’

‘Yes, I thought you’d try to put the blame on Danny.’

‘He brought it on—’

Maitland Moss poured another dram and drank it too, taking it like a swift indrawn breath, hardly pausing in his harangue. ‘Look, Nicholson, I’m not interested in your sorry story. The truth is that you do not comprehend the delicate balance that exists between a man trying to earn an honest crust of bread and the tyrannical forces of a government that wishes all men to be made slaves to the state.’

Craig shook his head in bewilderment. He had heard such stuff spouted around the yard but had not expected the master to uphold the same philosophy as his men.

Craig said, ‘What makes y’ think I narked on Malone?’

‘You were there on the night in question,’ said Maitland Moss, ‘yet you are not behind bars. Why would you be allowed to walk free unless you co-operated with the police?’

Craig said, ‘Have I been sacked, Mr Moss?’

‘By God, Nicholson, you are a fool. Danny Malone liked you. He would have made a great deal of money for you if only you’d trusted him.’

‘Aye an’ bashed old women on the head.’

‘You exaggerate.’

At that moment Craig realised that he had no awe of Maitland Moss, only a certain cold contempt for the toff. He felt quite proud of himself and, with swelling confidence, heard himself say, ‘I’m here for my wages, sir, at Superintendent Affleck’s suggestion.’

Without even looking down, Maitland Moss yanked open a drawer in the desk, lifted out a cash-box and placed it before him. He flung open the lid.

‘How much?’

‘It should be about eleven shillin’s, but the day book—’

Maitland Moss selected coins from the box and tossed them on to the desk where they rolled and flattened; four half-crowns and two sixpences. ‘Take your damned money and clear out.’

Craig hesitated. He had been enjoying a feeling of equality with the toff, the novelty of being backed by a powerful authority. It was almost as if Mr Affleck and the Highland sergeant were in the room with him, standing silent but approving just behind his back. It was strange that he should think of them now without resentment or bitterness. This man, this rich man, was afraid of the police and, by inference, a little afraid of him too.

‘Take it, damn you,’ Moss cried.

Craig smiled and slipped the coins from the desk and pocketed them. He had gained more than cash from this visit, though. Moss had yielded to him, had crumpled before his threat. It was beginning to seem that he was not so alone as he had thought himself to be.

Moss said, ‘Oh, yes, you think you’ve been smart, don’t you? But you haven’t heard the last of it. Danny won’t forgive and Danny won’t forget. Not all your pals on the police force will be able to protect you when Danny or Billy comes for you.’

‘More bricks through my kitchen window, eh?’

‘That treatment will be very mild compared to what will happen when Danny and Billy are released.’

‘I’m told they’ll be put away for years,’ Craig said.

‘What did they promise you?’ said Maitland Moss. ‘A wage, a house, a job? Was that the bargain? God, you’re just the type; a sly young devil, wet behind the ears.’

‘I’m no copper,’ said Craig.

‘Oh, don’t lie. You didn’t co-operate with Affleck for nothing. You’re not that much of a fool.’

‘I just did what I thought was right,’ said Craig.

‘God Almighty,’ Maitland Moss exploded. ‘Get out of my sight.’

Craig was filled with a most peculiar sense of confidence, an arrogance that made him bold. He pointed his forefinger at Maitland Moss. ‘I think you’d best keep your nose clean, Mr Moss. It could be you that goes to clink next time.’

‘What the devil do you—’

Craig gave no answer, let the threat hang. He turned and left the office, went downstairs and crossed the empty yard. He hesitated at the gate, glanced back. He felt light-headed, almost faint with the thrill it had given him. He had got the better of a man like Maitland Moss, had made ‘right’ triumph. He needed no justification for his behaviour and had not had to prove that he was other than a daft country boy. Connection, however tenuous, with the forces of law and order had given him stature and strength. The more he thought of it, the better he liked it.

What had Moss said – a wage, a house, a job?

These were acceptable realities, things that he wanted and needed, things that would serve without question as motive and explanation for what he was about to do. The other aspects of it he did not dare dwell upon, though they, perhaps, were the factors that really steeled him to call his dues from Hugh Affleck, that gave form to his desire to ‘get on’, respectably, in life.

Strutting a little, Craig quit the carriers’ yard and set out at once for Ottawa Street.

 

It had been one of those nights and, without doubt, it would be one of those days too. Hector Drummond had allocated himself extra shifts as Duty Sergeant for he could not afford to miss the visits of the big-wigs from the Burgh Watch Committee and high-rankers from Greenfield’s Police Headquarters. The nabbing of Danny and Billy had set the cat among the pigeons with a vengeance and the sergeant was glad that they were being held in cells in Glasgow and not here, for he could not be quite sure that there would not be some sort of minor riot, a protest against ‘police methods’, though he doubted if it would come to that. In any case Skirving and Malone were housed in the big jail in the city and McVoy, under police guard in the Royal Infirmary, was in no fit state to make a dash for it.

Everybody was afraid that Danny and Billy would turn canary, would sing their black hearts out and bring scandal to the burgh and the force. Sergeant Drummond did not believe that corruption ran deep. Nonetheless two of his constables had failed to report for muster that morning and two more were acting very shifty. If they were wise they would resign rather than sweat out the weeks in the hope that Danny and Billy would not divulge their names as receivers of bribes. It was the bribery that had the place buzzing.

Lieutenant Strang, acting directly for Chief Constable Organ, had turned up late last night and asked a number of pointed questions. He had warned Sergeant Drummond and his cohort, Sergeant Stevens, that he would not be surprised if the individuals who comprised the Watch Committee decided to inspect the station in the next day or two and to keep all ‘the lads’ on their toes. Lieutenant Strang had not been wrong. Councillors had been in and out all morning, nosing and poking about, fishing for information on the arrests, even though Sergeant Drummond told them emphatically that the whole thing was being handled by the City of Glasgow and had nothing to do with Greenfield Burgh.

Though it had been almost thirty-six hours since young Nicholson had limped away, swathed in bandages, from Ottawa Street, in that time Sergeant Drummond had spared not a thought for the boy whose courage or duplicity – depending how you looked at it – had put the fat in the fire in the first place. He was surprised, and not a little dismayed, to glance up from work on the night-shift roster to find Nicholson standing before him, minus the bandage and with a simpering sort of grin on his face.

‘Aye, young man, and what is it that we can be doing for you?’

‘Tell me,’ Nicholson said, ‘am I to be charged with any crime?’

‘I have heard nothing to that effect.’

‘Will I have to appear in the court?’

‘Court?’

‘To speak out against Malone?’

‘I doubt if it will come to that,’ said Sergeant Drummond cautiously. ‘Superintendent Affleck would not be wishing it.’

‘So,’ said Nicholson, ‘there’s nothin’ against me.’

‘Pardon?’

‘I want to join.’

‘Join?’

‘I want to join an’ be a policeman.’

Sergeant Drummond drew back, as if the lad had threatened him with violence. ‘But – but—’

‘You just said there was nothin’ to hinder it.’

‘Why do you want to be a policeman?’

‘Because it’s secure.’

‘Secure?’ Sergeant Drummond was aware that he was beginning to sound like a poll parrot. ‘I mean, what makes you imagine that it is secure?’

‘I’m nobody’s pal out there,’ said Nicholson. ‘Mr Affleck neglected to mention that fact when he conned me into shoppin’ Danny Malone. Everybody seems to think I’m a bloody copper’s nark – so I may as well be a real copper an’ get paid for it.’

‘There is,’ said Sergeant Drummond, ‘a small matter of aptitude and basic educational requirements.’

‘I’m not scared o’ hard work,’ said Craig Nicholson. ‘Anyway, I helped catch some criminals already, did I not?’

‘Can you read?’

‘Aye, of course.’

‘Write?’

‘Aye.’

‘Add up sums?’

‘Arithmetic; certainly,’ said Nicholson. ‘Even fractions.’

‘Are you sound in wind and limb?’

‘Except for temporary cracked ribs, aye.’

‘No infectious diseases, lung trouble, bad feet, madness in the family?’ said Sergeant Drummond hopefully.

‘No, nothin’ like that.’

‘Still, there are procedures.’

Nicholson said, ‘How do I go about it?’

‘You fill in a form, and send a letter.’

‘Have you got the form here?’

‘Hold the cuddy a wee minute, son,’ said Sergeant Drummond. ‘First you must write to the Chief Constable and request an interview.’

‘I’ll be doin’ that,’ said Craig Nicholson. ‘Would it help me if I got a recommendation?’

‘A reco—’ Sergeant Drummond bit his lip.

‘If Superintendent Affleck was to write a letter sayin’ he thought I’d make a good copper?’

‘Does Superintendent Affleck know you well enough?’

‘He should,’ said young Nicholson.

‘That nice young wife of yours,’ said Sergeant Drummond, ‘is this her idea?’

‘Nah, it’s my idea. I’ve tried it the other way an’ it’s not for me,’ young Nicholson said. ‘Now I feel I should try it your way.’

‘What are all these blethers?’ the sergeant said, scratching his ear.

‘It’s honest employment, well enough paid, with prospects.’

‘That much, at least, is true.’

Sergeant Drummond leaned his elbows on the counter and studied the young man thoughtfully. Perhaps it was not such a daft idea after all.

He sighed. ‘It is not an easy job, though.’

‘No job’s easy,’ said young Nicholson.

‘It has its own special difficulties.’

‘Such as?’

The sergeant sighed again. It was incumbent upon him to try to put the boy off, to tell him of the grinding monotony of the beat, of the routines of the station, spit and polish and self-discipline. Perhaps he should take him by the arm, lead him down to the holding-cells, show him old Tommy Watts who had not been sober in thirty years and who turned up regularly every Friday night to vomit all over the station floor, who would be charged at the Police Court come Monday, would vanish for thirty days, and would be back vomiting, cursing and pissing within twenty-four hours of release.

Perhaps he should put on his helmet and walk the boy along to the mortuary in Percy Street, show him the corpse that Constable McCrae had scraped off the railway line in the dismal light of dawn, a body without a head or feet, victim not of murder but of despair, just another suicide. Perhaps he should make young Nicholson camp on the bench for the rest of the day and observe the parade of grotesque and pitiful creatures that would shuffle through the station; men, women and children twisted by drink and violence, bigotry, poverty and neglect. But Sergeant Drummond knew that he was no good advertisement for any preaching that renounced the police force and, in lieu of sermons and lessons, he gave Craig Nicholson a copy of the application form and jotted down the address of Burgh Headquarters and the name of the lieutenant to whom he must write for interview.

‘Now, it all depends whether there are vacancies,’ the sergeant warned, knowing perfectly well that recruits would be required within the week. ‘And it all depends on whether you are considered a good candidate. We only take the best in Greenfield, son.’

‘A letter from Mr Affleck, that would help, wouldn’t it?’

‘It would, it would – if he’ll give it.’

‘I think he should,’ said young Nicholson.

‘My, but you’re bold, young man.’

‘I have to be bold,’ Nicholson said. ‘I’ve a wife at home, with a wean on the way. I’ve been sacked from my job and turned out o’ my house, all because I assisted the polis.’

‘Because you got into bad company,’ said the sergeant.

‘Maybe,’ Nicholson said. ‘If that’s the case, I want into better company. What better company than the Burgh Police?’

At that moment, out of the corner of his eye, Sergeant Drummond caught sight of Mr Green, the Watch Committee’s most vociferous critic, as he emerged from the corridor, beady and alert as always, saw too the braid of Lieutenant Strang behind him.

Sergeant Drummond straightened, said brusquely, ‘That’ll be all, Mr Nicholson. We will be in touch in due course.’

‘Not too long, I hope,’ young Nicholson said.

‘Not too long,’ the sergeant promised and directed him towards the exit door.

 

Craig lay on his back on top of the bed with a Gold Flake stuck in his mouth. Comfortably full of dinner, he had removed his boots and unbuttoned his trousers and he watched Kirsty lazily as she moved about the kitchen.

‘They won’t dare turn me down if I get a reference from a superintendent, from Affleck,’ he said. ‘If he snaps his fingers I could be in uniform an’ drawin’ a wage in a fortnight.’

‘I can’t quite see you as a policeman,’ Kirsty said.

‘Can you not? By God, I think I’m perfect material for a copper; tall, dark, fearless an’ handsome – eh?’

‘What does the job pay?’

‘For the first month only fourteen bob a week but as soon as I’m out o’ probation an’ on to a beat then it earns twenty-three bob. Boot allowance on top, free uniform, a police house at a fiver a year rent.’

Kirsty paused and glanced round. ‘Are you sure?’

‘If you don’t believe me, read the print on the back o’ the application form.’

‘But the hours? The shifts are terrible, aren’t they?’

‘No worse than they are for a farm hand in the height o’ the season.’ Craig propped himself up and grinned. ‘I’ll be part of a fine body o’ men, Kirsty. What’s more I’ll soon climb the ladder. You’ll see, I’ll soon get promotion.’

‘You talk as if it’s all cut and dried.’

‘It is, near as damn it.’

Kirsty experienced the lure of the job through him, could understand its attraction for her husband. But she was just glad that he had wrested, somehow, eleven shillings from Maitland Moss. Added to her wage from Oswalds’ it gave them an extra seventeen shillings in the kitty, money that might come in useful in the weeks ahead, especially if Mr Affleck would not agree to propose Craig for the Burgh Force.

‘Come over here.’ Craig held out one arm, beckoningly.

She crossed the kitchen to the bedside. The bruises where he had been struck by Danny Malone were dulled now but still extensive, spreading across his shoulder and upper chest, tan and purple. He did not seem to feel the pain, however.

It was three weeks since last they had made love. She did not know how to explain to him that her need for loving had waxed not waned with the changes in her body. Doctor Godwin had informed her that there was no danger to health in ‘that sort of thing’ until the fifth month. She looked down at Craig, at the bare flesh of his belly, at hard muscle and soft dark hair.

He slipped an arm about her waist, grinning.

‘I want you to go an’ see her,’ Craig said.

‘What?’

‘Your pal, Mrs Frew. Go an’ call on her tomorrow.’

‘Is she not in hospital?’

‘I expect she’s out by now,’ Craig said. ‘Malone didn’t hit her all that hard. Anyway, it’s worth a try.’

‘She may not want to see either of us ever again, after what happened,’ said Kirsty.

‘That’s what I want you to find out,’ said Craig. ‘Butter her up a bit.’

‘But why?’

‘So she’ll persuade her bloody brother to write that letter.’

‘Why don’t you just write to him at the Glasgow Police Office?’

‘Nah, nah; a letter like that could easily get lost, if you see what I mean. I want to be sure I get that recommendation. God, our whole future hangs on it.’

In his present cocksure mood there was no trace of apprehension, yet Kirsty sensed it at the back of his eagerness to be incorporated into the police force, to be protected by the rank and file of the law.

She said, ‘I’d intended to go to St Anne’s tomorrow. I’ll call in at Number 19 on my way home.’

‘Good,’ he said, nodding.

He eased himself down a little on the bed, resting the bruised arm and side. For a moment she thought that he was dropping off to sleep. She did not, however, seek to slip away, to return to her chores at the sink. To her surprise he placed his hand upon her stomach caressingly.

‘I – I thought you didn’t like that,’ she said.

‘Slip your hand down an’ you’ll see whether I like it.’

Kirsty hesitated then did as he requested. She touched the crisp black hair, the stem of his maleness which was both stiff and soft at one and the same time.

She said, ‘Do you want me to take my clothes off?’

‘No.’

‘It’s safe, Craig. The doctor told—’

‘Just – just touch me.’

Again she hesitated, but she could not refuse him, could not resist. She shut off her own need for tenderness and did all that he asked of her, wondering where he had learned these sexual tricks, until he quivered and gasped and expended himself.

‘God!’ he groaned. ‘You did that well, Kirsty. Must be in the blood.’

A sudden sick feeling gripped her in the pit of the stomach. She stiffened, swung round, a moistened towel in her hands. ‘What did you say?’

‘Nothin’, dear. I enjoyed it, that’s all.’

‘What did you mean?’

‘Nothin’, nothin’.’

‘You meant – you meant my mother.’

‘Nah, nah. I wasn’t thinkin’.’

‘You never think,’ she shouted. ‘You just open your fat mouth an’—’

‘God, what’s wrong wi’ you now?’

He turned on his side, drew the blanket modestly over his bare backside. Kirsty pitched the towel into the sink. The pot that had contained the dinner-time potatoes was there, half filled with cold water. Before she quite knew what she was doing she had hoisted it up by the handle, had taken four quick angry steps towards the bed and had hurled the contents over him in a great cold wave.

Craig yelled, shot to his knees as if he expected the pot to follow. He clutched the soaking blanket to his loins and shook water from his hair. ‘You bitch!’

‘So you think my mother was a whore, do you?’

‘She bloody was,’ Craig shouted. ‘It’s the bloody truth.’

The pot struck the wall above his head and thudded on to the bedding. Dragging the blanket with him Craig sought shelter in a corner of the recess, crouched, ready to leap away if she attacked him with another utensil.

What wounded Kirsty most of all was the fact that Craig did not realise how much he had hurt her. She did not know him at all; this was not the boy with whom she had left Carrick, with whom she had lain down in love on that sunny spring Sunday.

She stamped into the hallway, yanked open the cupboard.

Craig shouted, ‘What the hell is wrong wi’ you, Kirsty Barnes?’

She stamped in from the hall again, buttoning a clean blouse over her breasts.

‘Nicholson,’ she cried. ‘My name is Nicholson.’

Relieved, Craig sank back against the wall. The lack of motive behind her attack had disturbed him. Now he thought that he understood.

‘So that’s what all the song an’ dance is about,’ he said.

‘What song an’ dance?’

‘You’re mad because I haven’t married you yet.’

She stepped into the powder-blue skirt, hooked it up, thrust herself into the bolero jacket. She reached for the hat she had put upon the table, a frivolous item, relic of daft April days, days that had been put behind her and would never be redeemed.

‘If that’s all it is,’ said Craig, ‘I’ll marry you next week.’

‘No, you will not,’ Kirsty said, flatly and without heat.

‘Why not?’

‘Because I don’t want to marry you.’

‘But – but you’re expectin’.’

She flung open the kitchen door, almost striking him.

‘You should have thought o’ that before.’

‘I’m thinkin’ of it now, damn it, Kirsty.’

‘Well, you’re too damned late.’ She kicked her shoes out from under the table and hopped into them. ‘An’ change that bed before I get back; it’s soakin’.’

‘Where – where are you goin’?’

‘Out,’ she said. ‘Out for a walk – by myself.’

 

She went straight from Canada Road to the Kelvin Tea Room, invested a penny in the ladies’ convenience there, seated herself on the pedestal and had a good cry in private; then she dried her tears, washed her face, tidied her hair, bought a cup of tea and a coffee bun, finished them and went out into bustling Dumbarton Road once more.

She knew where she was going, though it was not Craig’s command that turned her towards Walbrook Street but bad conscience.

In response to Kirsty’s tug upon the bell, the door was opened by a stranger, a woman of forty-two or -three, plump, with lustrous dark eyes and a small sensual mouth touched with a cherry rouge. She wore a tight-fitting Chesterfield coat that showed off her full figure and a stiff white shirt with a string bow tie in the collar. In one hand she carried a hat, a tiny ‘French brimless’. It was apparent that she had either just arrived at Mrs Frew’s house or was just about to take her leave.

‘Yes?’

‘I’ve called to enquire after Mrs Frew,’ said Kirsty.

‘Oh, she’s not so bad, not so bad.’

The woman spoke with a trace of soft Irish.

‘May I – may I see her?’ said Kirsty.

‘Are you Kirsty Nicholson, by any chance?’

‘Yes, I am.’

‘Thought you might be,’ said the woman. ‘Do step into the hall. Nessie’s havin’ a lie down.’

‘Is she hurt badly?’

‘Not so bad as all that,’ said the woman. ‘She’s more shocked than injured, I’d say. She has a hard head, has Nessie. It runs in the family. I’m Beatrice Affleck, by the way. I believe you’ve encountered my husband.’

‘Superintendent Affleck?’

‘The one and only.’

‘Oh, yes, I know him.’

The woman smiled warmly. ‘Have you got a touch of conscience about all this?’

‘Yes, I have,’ Kirsty admitted.

‘It wasn’t your fault. It was that daft husband of mine. He should never have got Nessie involved with criminals.’

‘Where’s Cissie?’

‘It was all too much for Cissie, poor soul. She handed in her notice without even collectin’ her wages.’

‘Who’s lookin’ after Mrs Frew?’

‘I am,’ Beatrice Affleck said. ‘Sort of.’

‘Does she not need constant nursin’?’

‘She’ll not have a stranger in the house. You know what she’s like.’

Encouraged by the woman’s friendliness, Kirsty smiled. ‘Only too well.’

‘I suppose you do want to see her?’

‘If it’s convenient.’

‘Wait here. I’ll “announce” you.’

Bea Affleck went into the ground-floor bedroom which lay to the right of the private parlour. Kirsty waited nervously in the hall. From within the room came the frail murmur of voice, a little cough, a little cry.

Mrs Affleck returned. ‘You’re honoured. Follow me.’

Agnes Frew was propped up in bed by a pile of lace-edged pillows. The room was as gloomy as the rest of the house. The monolithic window that overlooked the backcourt was partly curtained by a dark velvet drape and, through its folds, Kirsty glimpsed another glass-painting, not a saint but a sailing-boat. The bed was as narrow as a coffin. It floated on a sea of shadow, for the fire had only just been coaled and gas- and oil-lamps not yet lighted. The room was so funereal that it might have been the setting for a wake and not a convalescence.

‘Go closer,’ whispered Mrs Affleck. ‘She won’t bite.’

The lace-trimmed bed-jacket and the lace cap that covered the widow’s hair had the ivory hue of shroud linen. Her pinched features were bloodless, motionless hands were folded on the sheet that covered her bosom. Her eyes were closed.

‘Mrs Frew,’ said Kirsty. ‘Mrs Frew, it’s me.’

There was no response, not a flutter of lids, not a purl of breath. She might have been dead.

‘I’m real sorry to see you like this.’

Under the bed-cap’s lace edge a bandage was visible.

In a loud voice Beatrice Affleck said, ‘Nessie, say hello to your visitor.’

On the bedside table were a fluted crystal wine glass, a silver pillbox, a jug of water, a Bible, spectacles, a bottle of yellow medicine and a sepia photograph in a scrolled silver frame; Mr Frew, big and solemn, posed against a Grecian urn in a jungle of potted plants.

‘Come along, Nessie,’ said Mrs Affleck. ‘You’re not deaf.’

An eyelid flickered, opened; an eye surveyed the world.

Agnes Frew said, ‘Oh, so you came, did you?’

Beatrice Affleck sighed. ‘I’ll make some tea, Nessie, shall I?’ Without awaiting a reply she left the bedroom.

Kirsty stood her ground, though she was sufficiently intimidated to wish to follow Mrs Affleck out of the room too.

She cleared her throat. ‘Does it – does your head hurt?’

Mrs Frew managed to say, ‘One gets used to sufferin’.’

Now that she had both eyes open, she seemed rather removed from ultimate martyrdom. ‘We are all born into the world to suffer an’ I have had my fair share of it.’

‘Doesn’t the medicine help the pain?’

‘It cannot soothe the pain in my heart, the pain of bein’ deceived by my own flesh and blood.’

‘It wasn’t really Mr Affleck’s fault,’ said Kirsty.

‘Did she tell you to say that?’

‘The man who hit you was a savage, Mrs Frew. He might have killed people if your brother hadn’t caught him.’

‘He might have killed me.’

‘Craig – my husband – wouldn’t have let him do that.’

Mrs Frew struggled up on the pillows. ‘Tell me the truth, Kirsty; did Hughie deliberately send your husband in with the villains to protect me?’

Kirsty did not hesitate. ‘Aye, of course he did.’

‘That was brave.’

‘It was fortunate,’ said Kirsty.

‘Did Hughie tell you to come here today?’

‘I came of my own accord,’ said Kirsty, ‘because I was worried about you.’

‘Cissie’s left me.’

‘So I heard.’

‘I don’t want her lookin’ after me.’ Mrs Frew jerked her head towards the door.

‘Perhaps you could employ a nurse.’

‘You could come an’ look after me.’

‘I have my work to go to, Mrs Frew.’

‘It’s so difficult to find somebody you can trust.’

‘I’d like to, but—’

‘For a week or two. With your husband. Free room and board.’

For all that her job at Oswalds’ contributed Kirsty knew that they would be better off here with a roof over their heads and a guarantee of two square meals a day. She saw at once that it would be a mutually beneficial arrangement and wondered if Hugh or Beatrice Affleck had put the idea into Mrs Frew’s mind; wondered too what Craig would have to say about it.

Kirsty said, ‘My husband’s hopin’ to join the police.’

‘What?’ said Mrs Frew. ‘Is this more of Hughie’s nonsense?’

‘No, but Craig would like Mr Affleck to sponsor him, give him a letter of recommendation.’

‘Kirsty, come and look after me.’

‘We’d need a place to store our possessions, such as they are.’

‘I thought you had a house?’

‘We’re bein’ thrown out,’ said Kirsty. ‘The landlord was a pal of the man who biffed you.’

Mrs Frew nodded as if the connections that bound them into their present situation had been destined from the beginning. ‘Every man’s hand is raised against the righteous.’

She raised herself upright in the bed and the lace cap slipped over her brow, giving her a tipsy appearance. She could not disguise her desire to have Kirsty come back to Walbrook Street.

Kirsty said, ‘If we do come, Mrs Frew, it would only be until you’re better. If Craig is accepted as a constable we would hope to be allocated a police house in the not-too-distant future.’

‘Did our Hughie put you up to all this?’

‘No, Mrs Frew, I swear he didn’t.’

‘I don’t blame your husband.’

‘Well, I’m glad of that.’

Mrs Frew leaned forward, eagerly. ‘Did Craig punch that rascal on the snout?’

Kirsty, surprised, answered, ‘Aye, he did, as a matter of fact.’

‘David and Goliath; the Lord was on Craig’s side.’

‘Perhaps He was at that,’ said Kirsty.

‘He’ll make a good policeman, your husband.’

‘I hope Mr Affleck shares your opinion.’

‘When can you come, Kirsty?’

‘Tonight, I suppose.’

‘Good. In that case, I’ll make sure that Hughie calls tomorrow.’

‘Do you think you can persuade him to help us, Mrs Frew?’

The widow adjusted the lace cap and reclined upon the pillows, assuming once more a pose of pale martyrdom, spoiled by a wink.

‘Just watch me, dear,’ she said.

 

She had not forgotten and would not forget his hurtful words but she knew that she could not enjoy, as rich women did, the luxury of sustaining anger. It, like so many things, had to be subsumed into the business of ‘getting on with it’, of settling and resettling, of finding shelter and food, earning a wage, taking another step on the road towards a better life. She entered the house fearful that Craig would have allowed his anger at her to smoke and smoulder but he, like her, had put their horrid quarrel behind him and did not refer to it at all. He had ‘something to do’, something to be at, and he seemed delighted at her proposal that, for a time, they move back into Walbrook Street. He was not contrite but appeared willing to sweep her along with him, to make enthusiastic bustle stand in lieu of apology.

‘Will she chin her brother about writin’ the letter?’ Craig asked.

‘She seems sure she’ll manage to persuade him.’

‘Is it a condition? That we go to stay there for a while?’

‘I think it is,’ said Kirsty.

‘Right. It’s fair enough.’

By half past six o’clock Craig had them packed and ready to quit Canada Road. It was too whirlwind for Kirsty and she voiced her doubts and reservations. ‘But what about my job? What about Oswalds’?’

‘Bugger that,’ said Craig. ‘We’ll be fed and housed until such times as I’m signed on to the force. We don’t need much money, at all, so the pittance you earned at the Cakery isn’t going to matter.’

‘What about the McCoigs?’

‘Told to get out, weren’t we?’

‘The inventory?’ Kirsty protested. ‘The broken window?’

‘McCoig won’t be round until Friday. I’ll have the window sorted by then. I’ll be here when he comes.’

‘What if you don’t get into the police?’

‘Kirsty!’ Craig exclaimed. ‘They wouldn’t have the brass neck to refuse me.’

Craig ‘borrowed’ a broken-wheeled barrow from a sweep’s yard, carried their meagre possessions down to it and loaded them on board. With the homely items gone the single-end looked bare and dismal and Kirsty felt no tug of regret at leaving it.

Neighbours, of course, quickly became aware that something unusual was afoot and Daddy Mills was curious enough to pad out on to the landing.

‘Are you doin’ a flit?’ the old man asked.

‘Nah,’ Craig answered.

He locked the door, pocketed the key, lifted the canvas grip and tucked it under his uninjured arm.

‘Looks to me like ye are,’ said Mr Mills.

‘Holiday,’ said Craig.

‘Does Mr McCoig know you’re goin’?’

‘None o’ his business.’

‘But it is, it is.’

From the turn on the stairs Kirsty watched. By comparison with the slow-witted, sententious old man Craig seemed as bright as quicksilver.

‘Be back on Friday,’ Craig said.

‘Where are ye goin’?’

‘Never you mind.’

‘You have to tell me.’

‘Why?’

‘In case – in case the place goes on fire.’

Craig laughed. ‘On fire, for God’s sake!’

‘What’ll we do if your house burns?’

‘Blow on it,’ Craig said and, wasting no more time on old man Mills, hurried down the stairs and escorted Kirsty into the street.

Neighbours peered, scowling, from front windows and half-open doors as Craig dumped the grip on to the long barrow, shafted it on to its limping wheels and, with Kirsty at his side, fairly raced away from Number 11 Canada Road with its ghosts and dreams and stillborn memories; and its lingering threat of revenge.

 

Rather to Kirsty’s surprise everything that Craig had planned came to pass, though not quite at the fast lick that her husband had predicted. Weeks accumulated into months. Autumn gave way to the fogs and bristling frosts of winter and the boarding-house in Walbrook Street came to seem less gloomy and oppressive and more cosy with each passing day.

Kirsty polished banisters and scrubbed steps, washed the glass-paintings with a chamois cloth, blackleaded the elegant fireplaces and kept the appointments of the dining-room agleam. She would not have minded living here for always, raising her children in the kitchen, being half-friend, half-servant to the lonely widow. Mrs Frew, however, had been true to her word. She had browbeaten her brother into writing a brilliant letter of recommendation to the Chief Constable of Greenfield Police. Mr Organ was nobody’s fool. He knew fine well what rôle the lad had played in the capture of Skirving and Malone but he could not ignore a glowing testimonial from such a senior officer as Hughie Affleck and had no hesitation in interviewing Craig Nicholson and, finding him smart, in accepting him as a probationary constable.

Craig’s progress into the Greenfield Police meant that their days in Walbrook Street would surely be numbered; burgh policemen were committed by regulations to reside within the parish to which they were appointed and to be part of the community they served. If Craig had been a bachelor he would have been obliged to stay in barracks with other recruits and unmarried constables but, as a married man, he was permitted to dwell with his wife until such time as the burgh found a house for them. Craig did not talk much about his training. He was not lax, however, was punctual on all parades and insistent that his uniform, helmet and boots be kept in immaculate condition. He even showed Kirsty how to iron the heavy knee-length shorts and half-sleeved vest that he wore for gymnastic exercises and, in the evening, no matter how tired he was, he would apply himself to study the Police Constable’s Handbook upon which he would be tested and examined.

In due course, Craig Nicholson was inducted as a fully-fledged constable, was marched around the parade-ground behind the Percy Street drill-hall and had his hand shaken by the Chief Constable, the Lieutenant and several councillors. The following morning he made his first muster in Canada Road police station and was shown, by no less a person than Sergeant Hector Drummond, the extent of his beat and how to patrol it. Craig’s confidence was undiluted by modesty and doubt.

Kirsty could not deny that he looked every inch a policeman, standing tall and dark and poised in uniform and helmet. She was pleased enough to have him settled and to regard herself as a policeman’s wife.

If Craig and Kirsty had been forgiven by Nessie Frew for their part in the robbery, Hugh Affleck had not. He no longer came for supper on Thursday nights and turned up only once in that season to reassure his sister that she would not be summoned to appear as a witness in the Crown’s case against Skirving, McVoy and Malone. Written testimony would be enough, particularly as poor Cissie had been put through the mill at Glasgow Headquarters and had even been subjected to the hair-raising experience of having to identify Skirving and Malone through a grid in the cast-iron doors of the holding-cells.

Those members of the public, in and out of Greenfield, who waited with bated breath for scandalous revelations of graft and corruption were in the end doomed to disappointment. Danny Malone and Billy Skirving, even the beleaguered McVoy, spiked the authorities’ guns by electing to keep their secrets to themselves. They pleaded guilty to all charges and thus carried the can for the toffs and sporting gents who had profited from their labours over the years.

A day was fixed for the hearing before sheriff and jury but the panel, all three, signed minutes and the Crown moved, therefore, for immediate sentencing. No mitigations were offered, no witnesses called. McVoy was given four years of penal correction. Skirving and Malone were sentenced each to twelve years’ hard labour.

This sudden great weight of days was enough to cause even the indomitable Danny Malone to gasp and turn white as a sheet. He was taken down struggling, roaring, ‘Bastards, bastards. You’ll never hold me,’ which gave press reporters one hard fact to salt their columns of priggish moralising.

Sergeant Drummond was the first person in Greenfield to receive the news from court. He did not wait for Constable Nicholson to tramp in from his relief point at the corner of Halifax Street and Wharf Road but put on his helmet and gloves and walked through the gathering dusk to meet the young man coming in.

‘Twelve years, the pair of them,’ said Sergeant Drummond.

‘How long did McVoy land?’

‘Four.’

‘Did Malone say anythin’, make any statements?’

‘He said not a word, except to curse.’

‘Is Superintendent Affleck pleased with the result?’

‘Pleased enough, no doubt,’ said the sergeant. ‘But I expect he would have liked more.’

‘To net Maitland Moss?’

‘To see Danny hanged.’

Constable Nicholson nodded.

‘Next time,’ he said, without the trace of a smile, ‘next time, Sergeant, eh?’

 

For Kirsty the days rolled pleasantly by. Leaves drifted from the trees that flanked the bowling-green, the long window of the pavilion was shuttered against winter storms and the flagpole dismantled. Autumn harvests brought shop prices down. In spite of the wet summer greengrocers’ tables spilled over with an abundance of fruit and vegetables. On Sundays Kirsty and Mrs Frew, now fully recovered from her ordeal, walked to St Anne’s to sing praise to the Lord and receive spiritual balm from Mr Graham’s sermons. Business at the boarding-house picked up. Every post brought letters from ministers and elders requesting rooms for such-and-such a night. Mrs Frew would record the names in her Guest Book and Kirsty would make sure that the rooms were spotless, the sheets fresh, that there was water in the jugs, oil in the lamps and kindling and coal in the scuttles.

To Kirsty, Craig also seemed contented with his lot, though he remained uncommunicative about his work. He said nothing at all about his first arrest, for instance, or his first appearance as a witness in police court.

It was Mrs Frew, a furtive reader of the Partick Star, who discovered Craig’s secret. She let out a shriek that brought Kirsty running from the kitchen to the parlour where she found the widow on her feet and waving the newspaper above her head.

‘Craig, it’s our Craig. He’s got his name in the paper.’

‘Where? Let me see.’

‘Did he not tell you?’

‘No,’ said Kirsty, frowning.

She took the newspaper from the woman and read: Greenfield Police Court: Assault: On Monday, before Bailie Wrayburn, James Reid was fined 30s, or 21 days, for assaulting Thomas Clark and a constable named Nicholson, on Saturday evening.

‘Was Craig not hurt?’

‘He didn’t appear to be,’ said Kirsty.

‘He must have been in court.’

‘I don’t know. He said nothin’ to me about it.’

‘Still, it’s very gratifyin’ to see his name in the papers,’ said Mrs Frew. ‘Our Hughie’s name was never out of the papers when he was on the beat in the Greenfield.’

‘Why didn’t Craig tell me?’

‘Too modest,’ said Mrs Frew.

Kirsty challenged him soon after he returned from work that evening. She showed him the item in the Star as he seated himself at the kitchen table in expectation of supper.

‘Ach, that!’ said Craig dismissively. ‘It wasn’t important.’

‘Mrs Frew wants to know what happened.’

‘Old Reid was stottin’ drunk,’ said Craig. ‘He’s an old josser, about sixty, who got booted out o’ the railway service for habitual drinkin’.’

‘Go on.’

Craig sighed. ‘Am I not to get fed?’

‘In a minute. Go on.’

‘I heard a commotion outside the Vaults. Tam Clark is Reid’s boozin’ chum but they’d had some sort o’ argument an’ Clark was on the ground, Reid kickin’ him.’

‘What did you do?’

‘Requested him to desist.’

‘Did he?’

‘Nah,’ said Craig ruefully. ‘I had to stop him.’

‘It says you were assaulted.’

‘I wasn’t sharp enough. The old bugger crowned me wi’ a bottle.’

‘Craig, why didn’t you tell me?’

‘It was only a wee cut, treated at the station. It’s healed now.’

‘An’ the court?’

Craig shrugged. ‘Two minutes on Monday. Reid’s son shelled out the thirty bob an’ lugged the old josser away cursin’ him an’ threatenin’ to send him to the Inebriates’ Reformatory if it happened again. It wasn’t anythin’ special, Kirsty.’

Kirsty ladled soup from the big pot into a plate and put it before him. ‘What else has been happenin’ that you haven’t told me about?’

Craig blew gently over the surface of the broth and, lifting his spoon, shrugged again.

‘Not a bloody thing,’ he said.

 

Chief Constable Organ was an innovative chap who had not only formed a Police Athletic Association but had even squeezed enough money from the Commissioners to build and equip a gymnasium in Cape Breton Road. He had also ‘borrowed’ Partick’s new shift system which would shorten each man’s duty to nine hours per day and allow more regular time off. Diehards were against the change but the Greenfield Commissioners had the proposal under review and were keen to move for its adoption in an attempt to reduce, if possible, the high incidence of drunkenness that the long shifts encouraged.

Craig heard talk about the station. He even discussed the proposal’s merits with his fellow recruits in the locker room. He had not, however, been on the Force long enough to have strong feelings one way or the other. As a green hand – Constable Third Grade – he was not yet summoned on the beat during the hours of darkness, a nice refinement peculiar to Greenfield and one which recruits and raw young constables appreciated.

Filling off-duty hours, collected into a straight two and half days every seven, was a problem in itself. On a Saturday a man might take himself to the terraced steps of the football park to watch Greenfield Rovers play Linthouse or Morton or arch-rivals Partick Thistle; but an off-duty Saturday came around only one week in nine and, for the rest, there was such irregularity of hours that the majority of policemen found off-duty service even more tedious than pounding the beat and did what other loafers did, which was to hang about public houses and billiard halls in the dead of daylight hours, sleep their heads into engine oil or bicker incessantly with their wives.

Craig, however, had already seen evidence of the havoc that idleness could wreak to a copper’s prospects. Being ambitious he was quick to seek other ways of occupying free time. He took advantage of a scheme that Mr Organ had set up for the improvement of the proficiency of his men, booked in as a beginner with a qualified instructor at Cranstonhill Baths and, shivering and unsure of himself, stepped reluctantly into the freezing pea-green water two or three times a week while boys half his age larked about with abandon and plunged in and out of the pond like porpoises.

Craig did not like it. He did not like being told what to do by the muscular man in the striped bathing-suit who seemed impervious to the cold and who would stand by him and cup his chin in a big unshivering hand and, holding him suspended, would shout, ‘Kick, kick, Constable Nicholson. You’re not a wee puddock, man. Kick, kick, kick.’

On his fourth morning on the beat Craig had been called to a ramp at the old ford at the bottom of Wharf Lane and had seen a corpse being dragged from the river. He had been obliged to stoop close, to grip the thing’s swollen, suet-soft arm and help drag it up the steps, all dripping and sexless and unreal. So he kicked and kicked and spluttered out the water that got into his nose and promised himself that within a year he would earn three swimming certificates and would be ready to go for a life-saving medal, would be able to dive off the high dale that wee boys were forbidden to use, would not be afraid of plunging into the Clyde’s coiling brown currents to save some poor soul from drowning.

Later, with skin wrinkled and eyes smarting, he would soak for ten minutes in a hot tub, knees to chin, and wish that he had already gone through it, had learned everything, knew all there was to know, was not young and uncertain any more, afraid of shouts in the street and dark closes and of what he might find, in the first foggy hour of his shift, lying dead and decaying in a midden or vennel or on the steep cinder slope of the railway embankment.

If only he had his own house, if only Kirsty had been as she was and not all fat and fussy with the baby in her, if he had his mam and his brother and sister close at hand, his dad to talk to, he might not feel as he did, might not prefer the cold pond or the gymnasium and the company of Archie Flynn, a big simple lad only six months down from the Isle of Harris who had joined the same week as Craig and who lived in the barracks in North Ottawa Street; he might not feel more kinship with Archie and with Peter Stewart, another shy Highlander new to the burgh, than he did with Kirsty, his woman, his wife.

Now that she had pulled the trick of womanhood and slipped from him into pregnancy Craig felt that he had nobody to look after him; he must learn to look after himself. Being a man, a policeman at that, he could not tell Kirsty of his fears, could not come close to her because of her swollen belly and swelling breasts, close enough to admit his weaknesses. At the end of the long shift he wanted to go home to his own fireside, to intimacy and fondness. But, though the grub was good, the bed clean, and they were saving money hand over fist, Walbrook Street offered none of these things. He experienced that vague sense of dispossession for which there is no name and for which, unreasonably, he blamed Kirsty.

With Archie or with Peter, in company with the lads at the station, he had no need of her. In the cold pond at Cranstonhill, in the gymnasium in Cape Breton Road, shivering or sweating it out, he could be free of the need of her, of the obligation to tell her where he went and what he did, and might blame his reticence, then and later, on the nature of the job.

What else has happened that you haven’t told me about?

Not a bloody thing.

‘Kick, kick,’ the instructor would shout. ‘Kick, Constable Nicholson,’ and Craig would thrash the freezing water and, within a month, had the hand away from his chin.

 

It seemed later than it was, for the boarding-house had no guests that night and Mrs Frew had retired to the back parlour, not in any mood of pique or unsociability but to apply herself to making up a list of friends to whom she must send a card at Christmas or New Year. It was, apparently, a procedure that required methodical concentration and the fortification of a large glass of port wine.

Craig had not arrived home and would, he had indicated, be later than his usual hour of nine, though for what particular reason Kirsty did not know; only the appearance of a wet bathing-costume wrapped in a sodden towel or of his gymnastic vest soaked with sweat would give her a clue.

The wave of energy that had buoyed her up over the past few weeks had ebbed since the weekend. She was concerned lest her tiredness presaged a fever or some dreadful turn in the course of her pregnancy that would impair the health of her child and, incidentally, ruin the little celebration that Mrs Frew had planned for Christmas in a fortnight’s time. New Year would follow and she would be past the mark, into that spell which would end in birth and motherhood and another change in the tenor of her life. Somehow she fixed on New Year, on 1st January, 1897, as a magical date and convinced herself that nothing unpleasant would happen before that date.

If she had thought it through logically Kirsty would have realised that her fatigue stemmed from a long Saturday ‘in town’, an early tour of the departments in the Colosseum Warehouse whose advertisements in the Star had lured Mrs Frew and from whose laden counters she purchased the gifts required to appease the sensibilities of relatives she hadn’t seen in years. Kirsty and Mrs Frew had wandered too into Johnston’s Corner to admire the Dolls’ Palace and keek at old Santa Claus as he dished out toys to good little girls and boys.

Mrs Frew had nudged Kirsty. ‘You’ll be queueing up there with your wee ones before you know it, dear.’

Kirsty had felt a strange warm glow at the prospect.

The day had been wonderfully rewarding but it had tired her physically and, with energy low, she had become depressed and imaginative.

Craig was out and Mrs Frew was seeking seclusion in the back parlour and, before she knew it, Kirsty had taken herself into the bathroom. She locked the door and brought out the framed mirror which Mrs Frew hid modestly in a cupboard and, with mirror propped on the bathrail, studied herself with furtive attention in search of a rash, a ruddiness or change in pallor that would confirm her belief that she was sickening for something horrible and would be lucky to survive the week.

She was swollen, fat as a piggie. Her eyes, she thought, seemed dull, her hair lacking in lustre. Even her freckles seemed to have expanded and become more prominent.

Kirsty swallowed and bent closer to her image in the glass.

‘Oh, dear,’ she murmured. ‘What’s wrong wi’ me?’

She stuck out her tongue.

At that moment the doorbell rang and, thinking that it would be Craig and that he had forgotten his key, Kirsty hastily put the mirror back into the cupboard and, relieved to be thus diverted from contemplating her own demise, hurried out into the hall.

‘I’ll get it,’ Kirsty called, though Mrs Frew did not seem to have heard.

After nightfall fog had thickened rapidly in the valley of the Clyde. It had been lurking all afternoon, not the damp ectoplasmic mists that often filled the glens of the Carrick grazings in winter but a dour, ochre substance that was as dry and acrid as chimney smoke – which, Craig said, was what it really was. It was Kirsty’s first sight of a Glasgow ‘pea-souper’. It startled her. Street-lamps were obliterated, the bowling-green fence sunk, the railings, even the pavement, had all been absorbed. It lapped against the step and crept past Kirsty into the hallway in sinister swirls. She had an almost overwhelming impulse to slam the door to close it out, to close out the man who stood before her on the step.

He said, ‘You’re not Cissie.’

‘No, I am not.’

‘Is my aunt not at home?’

‘Your aunt?’

‘Mrs Frew, I mean.’

‘Who are you?’ Kirsty said.

‘A lost soul,’ he answered.

He was not so tall as Craig, not quite so young. He wore a dark grey Cheviot overcoat and a long flowing scarf, a Greenlander travelling-cap tilted on his head, the cloth brim pearled with moisture. He was fair, with blue eyes, and when he smiled he showed even white teeth.

‘I’m not really a lost soul,’ he said. ‘I’m David Lindsay Lockhart and I should have been happily rattling back to my digs in Edinburgh except that all the trains have been cancelled.’

‘You’d better come in.’

He was not assertive, not thrusting, though she could tell by his voice and by the quality of his clothing that he was a high cut above her in standing and education. He took off the cap at once. His hair was smooth and dark blond, worn longer than was fashionable. He carried with him an old Bullion bag in scarred brown hide, held bag and cap in his hand while he waited, patient but amused, for Kirsty to do something.

She did not know why she felt so suddenly shy and awkward, tongue-tied and hesitant. From the moment that he had smiled she had sensed that there was no deception in him and that she need have no fear of him.

‘Wait,’ she said, and carefully closed the front door, blotting out the swirling ochre fog.

Mr Lockhart seemed to be in no hurry to move out of the hallway, to find and greet his aunt. He swayed lightly on the balls of his feet and smiled again at Kirsty. It was the most candid and expressive smile that she had ever seen, a smile of sheer amiableness that reached into his eyes and made them twinkle.

Kirsty found her voice. ‘Is – is Mrs Frew really your aunt?’

‘Actually she’s a relative so distant that I do not know what to call her,’ David Lockhart answered. ‘My mother was her father’s cousin; whatever that makes us. Aunt will have to do, don’t you think?’

‘I’ll tell her you’re here.’

‘Are there rooms?’

‘Aye, lots of rooms.’

‘Good,’ said David Lockhart. ‘I’ve travelled from London today and I’m quite exhausted.’

‘Have you stayed here before?’

‘Many times,’ said David. ‘What’s your name?’

‘Nicholson, sir.’

‘Sir? Oh, no, Mrs Nicholson, you mustn’t call me that.’

‘How – how do you know I’m married?’

‘Your wedding ring,’ he said. ‘In addition to which you are some six months gone with child, if I’m not mistaken; and my dear old terrible auntie wouldn’t have you in her house if you didn’t have a husband.’

Kirsty wanted to laugh at his judgement of Mrs Frew but was at the same time embarrassed by his acknowledgement of her pregnancy.

David said, ‘Don’t be put out, Mrs Nicholson. I’m a doctor, you see, and have delivered so many babies that I can spot an expectant lady at a thousand yards. What’s your real name?’

‘Real—’

‘Christian?’

‘Oh! It’s Kirsty.’

‘I shall call you Kirsty, if you don’t object.’

‘No, sir. No, Mr Lockhart.’

‘Now – where’s Nessie?’

‘In the parlour. I’ll announce you, if you like.’

‘What a good idea.’

 

Craig crouched over the fire and shivered. In cupped hands he held a mug of hot cocoa spiced with ‘Bonnie Scotland’, a cheap whisky that he had purchased, half-bottle size, from a late-night wine merchant’s on his way home from the baths. He wore only lamb’s-wool combinations. A blanket draped his shoulders and he looked chilled and miserable. Kirsty suspected that he was nursing a virulent cold that had swept through the ranks in Ottawa Street and had felled even the stalwart Sergeant Drummond. She had already filled a hot bottle and put it in the bed, had offered him Jeffe Powder which he had gruffly refused. She dried the supper dishes as quietly as possible, racked them and set out the plates that would be needed to serve Mr Lockhart breakfast in the dining-room.

Mrs Frew had welcomed the young man with open arms, had taken him into the parlour and had told Kirsty to serve supper there. She had had a sausage hot-pot on the go and had divided it between Craig and Mr Lockhart, skimping on her own portion, and a rich damson pie which she had coated with thick yellow custard. Mr Lockhart had thanked her kindly for ‘doing him the honours’ at such a late hour but Mrs Frew did not encourage Kirsty to join the conversation. The old lady clearly wanted Mr Lockhart all to herself; Kirsty could hardly blame her for that.

Out of the coat and scarf, relaxing by the parlour fire, Mr Lockhart was a handsome man, easy and affable in his manner and quick with his charming smile.

Craig said, ‘Who the hell is he?’

‘I told you,’ Kirsty said. ‘He’s a relative of Mrs Frew.’

‘Is he still in there wi’ her?’

‘I haven’t heard him come out.’

Craig said, ‘Aye, maybe he’s her lover.’

‘Craig! For God’s sake!’

‘I’ve seen stranger things.’ Craig supped from the cocoa mug, reached behind him, took the half-bottle of ‘Bonnie Scotland’ from the table, poured liberally. ‘You’ve no idea what these old birds get up to.’

‘You’re talkin’ daft,’ said Kirsty, offended. ‘Anyway, he’s a doctor.’

Craig snorted. ‘So was Barret Deanes.’

‘Who?’

‘The Partick Poisoner.’

‘How can you be so – I mean, you haven’t even met Mr Lockhart.’

Craig did not answer. He drew his chair closer to the grate.

In silence Kirsty finished her chores. The clock on the shelf told her that it was almost eleven. In seven hours she would have to be up again. Craig, if he was well enough, would be off by a quarter past seven.

Craig said, ‘What’s the weather like now?’

Kirsty peered from the window. She could see only a grey swirling substance that seemed to have replaced the darkness by something almost alive. She drew back.

‘Well? Is it still foggy?’ Craig snapped.

‘I’ll go to the door an’ look,’ said Kirsty. ‘I want to lock up properly, anyway.’

Craig nodded, got up, shivered, stretched and put down the empty mug. He lifted the whisky bottle. ‘I’d better hide this. I wouldn’t want her drinkin’ it.’

Drawing the blanket about him he left the kitchen and padded wearily along the corridor to the servant’s room where, in a big double bed manhandled down from the second floor, he and Kirsty slept.

‘I hope you feel better tomorrow, dear,’ Kirsty said.

‘I feel fine,’ said Craig.

She watched him go. She felt sorry for him, but also irritated. She picked up the iron poker, carefully stirred the coals in the grate, added a few lumps from the scuttle and a shovelful of dross, closed the iron doors and locked them in the hope that the fire would still be alight come morning.

For four or five minutes she pottered about the kitchen, making everything spick and span before she turned off the gaslight. In the half dark she could feel the fog envelop the building but it did not make her uncomfortable now. In fact all the worries that had beset her earlier in the evening seemed to have melted away; no accounting for her moods these days. She brushed her hands over her stomach to smooth her skirt, tidied her hair and went out into the corridor. St Andrew, back in place on the half-landing, glowered luminously down at her. She gave him a wink and paused near the parlour door, listening. Hearing no sound she went down the hallway to the main door, opened it and peered out into the fog.

It was thicker than ever, dense, mobile, all-enshrouding. The only hint of animate life came from deep within it, the muted lowing of a foghorn and, a moment later, the answering wail of a tugboat’s hooter. She thought she heard a goods train tiptoeing over the rails behind the bowling-green but she could not be sure. Eyes smarting, she squinted into the grey-brown bank of fog in which nothing but the fog itself moved.

‘Kirsty?’

Kirsty turned. Mr Lockhart – David – had slipped out of the parlour. He came towards her, smiling.

‘Is it still bad out there?’ he asked.

‘Aye; worse, if anythin’.’

‘Is your husband safe home?’

‘In his bed. He has a cold, I think.’

‘Does he walk to work?’

‘Yes.’

‘That’s just as well,’ said David. ‘I doubt if there will be much movement of traffic tomorrow morning.’

‘Are you hopin’ to return to Edinburgh?’

‘I must. I have a class at ten.’

‘A doctors’ class?’

‘No,’ David said. ‘Medicine’s behind me, for the time being.’

He leaned on the doorpost and looked at the invisible street then touched her gently on the shoulder. ‘Perhaps you should come inside, Mrs Nicholson. This stuff can be very sore on the lungs.’

Kirsty stepped back. She did feel a little breathless, come to think of it.

‘Let me do it,’ David said.

Kirsty watched him bolt the big main door and affix the safety-chain. He had fine hands, long-fingered and delicate.

‘Do you require a lamp, Mr Lockhart?’

‘To light me upstairs?’

‘Aye.’

‘No, Kirsty. St Andrew will guide me.’

‘What time do you want your breakfast?’

‘Early,’ David said.

‘I’ll serve at seven, will that do?’

He looked at her, one foot on the stair, one hand on the knob of the banister.

‘Perfect,’ he said.

 

Craig felt as if he had swallowed a lighted blowtorch. The lining of his throat was raw and when he coughed, which he tried not to do, that rawness spread like fire down into his chest. He had no fever, fortunately, only an ache in the head and a general shiveriness that he tried to pretend was nothing more serious than a response to the weather, a dank grey-white day fog with spider-trails of frost in it. When he entered the muster room at Ottawa Street he was not surprised to find that two constables had not turned up and that another, Bill McFarlane, had staggered in from his beat in the wee small hours, very sick indeed.

It had been a quiet night at Greenfield, however. Villains were no fonder of being out in such foul weather than were ordinary God-fearing citizens. Whatever toll the fog would take in lives – and down-and-outs would die in droves before the blanket lifted – the discovery and carrying in of ragged corpses had not yet begun. Along the river reach few folk were to be seen. Hedderwick’s stood silent long after the opening hour. On Ottawa Street and along Dumbarton Road the fog hung so thick and clinging that horse traffic moved about as silently as ticks in wool.

Sergeant Drummond did not report for duty. He sent a message with a lad to say that he hoped to return tomorrow morning, all being well. Sergeant Stevens, on extra duty, delegated Craig to relieve Constable Cropper at the junction of Kingdom Road and Grace Street. Here the Burgh Sanitation Department had dug a great gaping trench in the cobbles which would in due time contain a new main drain but which, with fog down, presented a serious hazard to life and limb. Tommy Cropper was damned glad to see his relief emerge from the fog. He gave Craig a nod and muttered a few words of instruction regarding the duty before, coughing too, he trudged off into the murk to sign himself off to breakfast and to bed.

Six iron cans marked the limits of the trench. Each had a duckbill snout and a trailing wick of teased cotton which burned with a great soft yellow flame. On the pavement close at hand was a tap-barrel from which the cans were refuelled with oil and a bucket which held several pine torches, cloth-headed and soaked in tar. The burned-out stobs of the flares that had seen Tommy Cropper through the long watches of the night had been stuck in the mound of clay that banked the trench. The stench of smoke wicks and tar, added to the reek of the fog, disorganised the senses thoroughly just as the whole routine of the burgh had been disorganised, with trams and cabs, carts and trains, mails and cattle and bakers’ drays all lost and immobilised, and pedestrians stumbling about like shades in purgatory.

Craig hefted up a fresh flare, lit it from one of the cans and rolled the pole in his hands to make the tar burn evenly. Holding the flare away from him he patrolled the perimeter of the trench and called out, ‘Mind your step. Take care. Take care,’ until his throat ached.

He peered north up Kingdom Road towards Dumbarton Road, head cocked. He could see nothing, hear little. He did not even know if it was dawn yet and listened for the chime of the Burgh Hall clock.

Bong. Bong. Bong. Booonnng  . . .

The notes wavered, distorted and were lost as a draught of air stirred the fog and made the flare hiss and sizzle. Craig swung round. A cart was crawling up Kingdom Road towards him. He raised the flare high and shouted, ‘Go cautious, carter. Hole in the road. Hole in the road.’

It was only when the horse coughed, a barking sound, that Craig realised that the cart was close to the pavement on the left of the road. He still could not see it. Behind him was the knee-high mound of clay and cobblestones that had been excavated; behind that was the trench, four or five feet deep.

The cart loomed suddenly out of the fog, cutting the corner.

‘CAREFUL, MAN, FOR GOD’S SAKE,’ Craig roared.

He ducked to one side, staring up at the wheel, saw on the board old Bob McAndrew, pipe in mouth, a monk’s hood of sackcloth draped over his shoulders.

‘STOP,’ Craig shouted. ‘DAMN YOU, STOP.’

His whistle was buttoned into his pocket, his baton in the holster at his side. He did not dare use the flare to protect himself in case he frightened the horse and made it flyte away; a runaway in the blind streets would be a dreadful danger to women and children. He swung the flare down like a flag of surrender and the cart jerked to a halt inches from him.

‘Huh!’ Bob McAndrew said. ‘So it’s you, is it?’

The old man took the pipe from his mouth and spat a gobbet of saliva forcefully on to Craig’s chest.

Rage surged up in Craig, a narrow burning hatred of the old fool. He would have flung the tar pole at him if he had not been in uniform, on duty. The discipline of the past weeks saved him. He stabbed the pole into the mound and swung round again, spittle like lace on his breast.

He said, ‘Do you want to spend the bloody day in a cell in Ottawa Street?’

‘An’ who’ll take me there? You?’

‘Fog or no fog,’ Craig said, ‘I’ll take you there an’ I’ll see to it that you stay.’

‘On what bloody charge, son?’

‘Malicious assault on the person of a constable,’ said Craig, making it up without hesitation. ‘Fifty shillings or twenty days.’

He stepped on to the wheel and hauled himself up until he was close enough to Bob McAndrew to snatch away the reins. He could not believe that he had once ridden on that cart, had chatted to this old josser and thought him a friend.

‘I heard you were on their side,’ Bob McAndrew said. ‘I heard how you’d joined the bloody polis.’

‘Drive slow, carter,’ said Craig. ‘An’ if you ever as much as look at me again—’

‘You’ll what?’

‘I’ll have you.’

Bob McAndrew shrugged. ‘Malone knows. He knows.’

‘Knows what?’

‘That you’re in the polis.’

‘I don’t give a monkey’s curse what Malone knows. He’s servin’ a stretch o’ twelve.’

‘Maybe he is,’ said Bob McAndrew. ‘An’ maybe he isn’t.’

Craig raised himself higher, thrust his chest out.

‘Now, wipe it off,’ he said.

‘What?’

‘You heard me. Wipe it off.’

‘I’ll be buggered if—’

‘Nobody spits on my uniform.’

‘Wipe it off wi’ what but?’

‘Your hand.’

The old man hesitated; his defiance crumbled. He put out a mittened hand and rubbed away the stain of spit.

He apologised. ‘I – I shouldn’t have done it. You’ll no’ take me in, Craig, will ye?’

Craig looked down at his uniform and then sharply up at the old man. He felt cool and level and satisfied, more satisfied than he had ever been, even with Kirsty in the bed in Canada Road all those weeks ago.

Balanced on the wheel he craned forward until the brim of his helmet dunted Bob McAndrew’s brow and he could smell the strong moist tobacco odour of the old man’s breath, see the shrivelling in the old man’s rheumy eyes.

‘Tell them down at the yard, tell Moss too,’ said Craig, ‘that I’ll have my eye on them. One wrong step an’ I’ll book them. Got it?’

‘Aye, aye; right.’

Craig leaned back. ‘Now get this rig on the proper side o’ the highway an’ drive with due caution.’

‘I will. I will.’

‘What are you carryin’?’

‘Nails.’

‘Where’s your porter?’

‘Got none. We’re short-handed.’

Craig nodded, stepped to the ground. He put his fists on his hips. ‘Get on with you then, carter.’

The old man flicked the reins and the horse plodded forward. Craig did not step back, did not yield an inch as the wheel rolled close to him and the cart crawled past.

‘Remember what I told you,’ Craig shouted, and found that his throat did not ache any more.

He watched the cart vanish swiftly into the fog then turned, jerked the flare from the bank of clay, held it aloft and, strutting, resumed his morning watch.

 

When Kirsty brought the hot dish into the dining-room she found that David Lockhart had his head bowed in prayer. It seemed fitting, somehow, that he should give thanks to the Lord. He did not start up guiltily or curtail his devotions, was not in the least embarrassed by her intrusion. Kirsty waited by the door until he unclasped his hands and opened his eyes.

He looked up, winked, smiled. ‘And what have you brought me, Kirsty?’

‘What you asked for – sausages.’

‘Pollock’s finest, no doubt. Made by the mile; sold by the ton.’

Kirsty laughed. ‘You’ve been here before, I see.’

‘The finest sausages in the kingdom. Aunt Nessie cooked them with her own fair hand, I suppose.’

‘She insisted on it. I think she spoils you.’

‘She always has done; my brother and I.’

‘Oh, you’ve a brother.’ Kirsty put the plate before him. ‘Is he a doctor too?’

‘Almost,’ said David. ‘He’s a medical student here in Glasgow.’

‘What’s his name?’ said Kirsty. ‘If you don’t mind me askin’.’

‘Jack; John Knox Lockhart to be exact. John Knox, can you imagine?’

Kirsty said, ‘Is he younger than you?’

‘Absolutely; a mere boy, in fact,’ said David. ‘Tell me, has your husband gone?’

‘Yes.’

‘Aunt Nessie tells me he’s a policeman.’

‘Yes.’

David reached for the cruet and ran a neat little pile of salt on to the side of his plate. Kirsty noted the sign of good manners; not like Craig who would sprinkle the seasoning all over his food.

David said, ‘I really would have preferred to breakfast in the kitchen.’

‘Aunt Ness – I mean, Mrs Frew would never hear of it.’

‘She used to let me, in the old days.’ David cut one of the four brown bangers into slices with his knife. ‘Of course, she didn’t take in guests when Andrew was alive.’

‘What was he like?’

‘Fun,’ said David. ‘And funny.’

‘Funny?’

‘Very hearty. I liked him.’

‘Will you have tea or coffee?’ said Kirsty.

‘What’s in the pot?’

‘Tea.’

‘That’ll do nicely, thank you,’ David said. ‘Are you leaving, Kirsty?’

‘I – I’m not supposed to—’

‘Oh, come on! I’m not a guest. I’m not stuffy old Vass.’

‘Do you know Mr Vass?’

‘I’ve been lectured by that august gentleman several times.’

‘He’s very clever, isn’t he?’

‘Very educated, certainly,’ said David, eating. ‘Does your husband like being a policeman?’

‘He doesn’t say much about it. It’s a good secure sort of occupation, though.’

‘I’ve a great admiration for “the polis”,’ said David.

‘Why?’

‘Nobody loves them but everybody depends on them.’

‘I don’t understand,’ said Kirsty.

‘They tell people what to do and stop people doing what they want to do.’

‘Criminals?’

‘Society would soon go to pot if it wasn’t for policemen.’

‘Are you, by any chance, a lawyer as well as a doctor?’

David laughed. He wiped his lips with the linen napkin. ‘I have a medical qualification. Now I’m studying Divinity at Edinburgh University.’

‘Divinity? To be a minister?’

‘Of sorts.’

‘I expect that’s why your aunt favours you so much.’

With mannered efficiency he had put away the sausages and allowed Kirsty to pour him tea. He drank it, she noticed, without sugar or milk.

Rising, he turned to the window that overlooked Walbrook Street.

‘I’m not going to make it, I fear,’ he said.

‘Why don’t you just stay?’

‘Alas, I can’t. I must make the effort. If it thins about lunchtime I’m sure the company will try to squeeze a train through.’ He turned. ‘Are you – will you be here for long, Kirsty?’

‘Until we’re allocated a police house.’

‘Perhaps I’ll see you again.’

‘Yes,’ said Kirsty. ‘Perhaps.’

‘I wish—’ he began, then gave a little shake of the head as if to censor any indiscretion that might have popped into his mind. ‘Jack and I are off to Inverness for Christmas but in the New Year I’m sure I’ll be in Glasgow again.’

She held the warm teapot in both hands. It had been a bitsy conversation but it had seemed, to Kirsty at least, to be charged with a rapport for which there was no sensible explanation. Clearly Mr Lockhart came from a stratum of society far above her own. There should have been no common ground between them, yet the old attitudes and responses did not seem to count – perhaps because David was a doctor and a minister in the bud. Kirsty tried to convince herself that it was only Christian charity that lay behind his interest in her. She fervently hoped that she would see him again, talk with him again before she became ensnared in motherhood and the setting up of a proper home in Greenfield.

‘I must be on my way,’ David said. ‘I wish you well, Kirsty.’

She stood like a daftie, teapot in her hands, tongue-tied as he hurried from the dining-room to kiss his aunt, put on his coat and hurry out into the grey, enfolding fog. It was strange, strange and troubling, this sudden new surge of feeling.

From the window she watched him hasten down the steps to the pavement. She wanted to call out to him, make some gesture, leave some mark or memory that he could carry away with him, but she felt coy and shy, and discovered, to her chagrin, that to this man as to no other she did not know how to say goodbye.