Complete New Tales of Para Handy (54 page)

And through the passing years and the ups and downs he lost no opportunity, when their paths crossed, to sneer at the chosen career of the skipper of the
Vital Spark
, belittle his status, and contrast their circumstances to his own imagined advantage.

Late one Friday evening Para Handy guided his command gently through the narrow dock entrance at Rothesay and into the outer of the two harbours which lay sheltered by the great length of the town's main steamer pier.

Apart from a few small fishing smacks lying against its inner face for the weekend and a couple of skiffs bobbing to moorings in the centre of the basin, the only other occupant of the harbour was a handsome, yellow-funnelled steam yacht of similar length to the Vital Spark, but with a much narrower beam and a graceful look about her which the unfortunate puffer could never hope to emulate.

“Ready when you are, Dan,” the Captain called down the speaking tube to the engine-room, and Macphail cut the power to the propellor and the
Vital Spark
drifted the last few feet onto the quay wall.

The accident was the merest trifle, the result perhaps of a sudden, slight flaw of wind catching the port quarter of the puffer — for she was in ballast, and riding high enough in the water to present a sail-like profile to a surface breeze: but whatever the reason, as the way came off her she gently — ever so gently — nudged her bows against the stern of the yacht and tipped that vessel just fractionally to starboard so that her fenders squeaked against the stone quay, and her main halyards slapped softly against her mast.

There were two immediate and contemporaneous results of this quiet coming-together.

From beneath the awning stretched across the fore-deck, where the owner and his party sat contemplating the peaceful charm of Rothesay over the rims of their cocktail-glasses, a tall figure rose to his feet and, glancing towards the wheelhouse of the
Vital Spark
, enquired in concerned tones: “Is everything all right with you Captain — no problems, I hope?”

At the same time a small, white-jacketed figure came hurtling out of the stern galley shaking his fist in the direction of the
Vital Spark
and mouthing a torrent of abuse. It was Donald Anderson.

Para Handy, ignoring him completely, doffed his cap with a nod of the head to the owner, and apologised for the mishap. “I am chust anxious aboot the yat,” he concluded.

“Please don't concern yourself, Captain. The
Carola
is a sturdy little ship. I should know — I built her myself! And she has taken much more punishment many, many times when I've misjudged my approach to a jetty!”

And with a smile he turned away — and to Para Handy's relief and satisfaction sent Anderson (who had recognised the Captain and now stood glaring malevolently at him) back down below with a curt word and an angry gesture.

The following afternoon the
Vital Spark
came bucketing round the north end of Arran into Kilbrannan Sound in a strong south wind. The barley she had loaded at Rothesay was destined for one of the Campbeltown whisky distilleries.

Dougie caught Para Handy's arm and pointed towards the Kintyre coast. “Is that no' that yat we saw in Rothesay?” he suggested anxiously. “And does it no' look as if she's in trouble of some sort?”

Indeed the
Carola
it was, and — plainly drifting uncontrolled and without power — she was rolling alarmingly in the rising waves that came marching up from the stormy Mull to the south.

Fifteen minutes later the
Vital Spark
had passed a line to the yacht and begun to tow her back across the Sound to the shelter and safety of the bay at Lochranza.

At the yachtsman's insistence the crew of the
Vital Spark
(after a toilet supervised by her Captain, a toilet as thorough and as demanding as any they had ever inflicted upon themselves) dined on board the yacht that evening.

Para Handy had at first been most reluctant to accept the invitation and excused himself on the grounds that he and the steward of the
Carola
were acquaintances of long-standing but that they “didna get on”.

“Don't concern yourself about that,” said the yachtsman. “The man was only taken on temporarily for this one week, my regular steward being sick. And in any case, he's not on board any longer. I'd had more than enough of his insufferable behaviour before we reached Rothesay, and when I heard and saw how he treated you after that little incident last night, I sent him packing. I am used to having nothing but gentlemen on the
Carola
whether as guests or as crew, whatever their background may be.
Gentlemen
!” he repeated with emphasis.

“In fact,” he observed at dinner, “I am absolutely certain that Anderson was responsible for the engine failure this afternoon and my engineer agrees. Somebody loosened one of the connecting rods so that after an hour or two it was bound to shear. It did not do that by itself.”

“I think I might know where the polis could get a haud of him…” Para Handy began.

“No, not at all,” said the yachtsman firmly. “There are some people not worth bothering about even to see them getting their due deserts. Some people are beneath contempt. And that man is one of them.”

Para Handy could only nod in agreement.

F
ACTNOTE

The career of MacBrayne's
Grenadier
was a perfect illustration of just how far-ranging that company's operations were.

She spent several years on long-haul services out of Oban to the far North West Highlands, and latterly she was employed on the day-trip business of the bread-and-butter Oban money-maker, the excursion to Iona, for the Abbey and a touch of the mystery of the Celtic Church: and on to Staffa, for Fingal's Cave.

In winter she was often brought down to the Clyde to take over the daily Ardrishaig service from the
Columba
and she was the only MacBrayne paddle-steamer to be requisitioned for service in the First World War. Returned to the Oban station in the 1920s she came to a tragic end, burned out at the South Pier in 1927.

Donald Anderson's grudging service at the Mitchell Library would probably have been deployed in the second building which that institution occupied, in Miller Street, from 1889 to 1911.

The Library moved in that year to the purpose-built premises which it has occupied ever since. The Mitchell was originally endowed by a Glasgow tobacco merchant and has become one of the largest Libraries in Britain — despite not having the right of the British Library or Trinity College Dublin to a free copy of every book published in the U.K. Its Glasgow Room is a goldmine of information, from the trivial to the earth-shattering, about the West of Scotland: and the staff the most knowledgeable and user-friendly in the business.

The steam-yacht
Carola
was built (possibly as an ‘apprentice piece') in the yard of Scott of Bowling for the family of Scott of Bowling in 1898. 70ft long, and powered by a two-cylinder compound engine, she was used by the family for day excursions on the Clyde. Despite the fact that she had no cabin accommodation she was also used for longer excursions, sometimes as far as Oban by way of the Crinan Canal. She would undertake those journeys in a series of day-long stages, the family and their guests going ashore each night to sleep in a local hotel while the crew bunked down on board.

Derelict and abandoned in the River Leven, she was about to be broken up when she was rescued and taken down to Southampton to be restored by an English enthusiast.

Subsequently purchased by the Scottish Maritime Museum and brought back to the Clyde, she offers the opportunity for quiet contemplation of the river, in summer, from the decks of what is perhaps the oldest remaining sea-going steam yacht afloat.

46

On His Majesty's Service

I
t was a pleasantly sunny May morning, but Para Handy watched the Postman coming along the quayside at Bowling Harbour with some distaste, for he could see, clutched in that worthy's right hand, a buff-coloured envelope obviously intended for delivery to the
Vital Spark
and, in all probability, addressed to her Captain. Para Handy's experience with buff-coloured envelopes was that they were usually the harbingers not of good or welcome news but of unwanted ill-tidings, most usually of a monetary nature.

“What iss it this time,” he demanded petulantly, “another bill from Campbell's Coal Ree? Ah've only jist paid for the last lot of assorted stanes he delivered in April.”

The postman, handing over the envelope, shrugged apathetically and made off without a word.

Para Handy watched his wiry figure step briskly out along the quayside and back towards the village.

“You would think,” he observed to the Mate, “that Lex Cameron would treat me wi' chust a little more respect, given what I know aboot him that his bosses at Post Office headquarters up in George Square dinna: and what they might want to do aboot it if they did!”

“What's that, Peter,” queried Macphail, joining the other two on the main-hatch.

“Last Chrustmas Eve it wass,” said the Captain, “right here in Bowling. You two — and Jum — had gone ashore for a refreshment while we wass waiting to go up the canal to Port Dundas, but I had stayed on board in the fo'c'sle wi' a mutchkin of spurits to make up a hot toddy for myself, for you'll mind that I had a terrible dose of the flu at the time, and wass feeling pretty sorry for myself.

“Onyway, Lex Cameron came alongside up on the quay wi' the mail, and gave a bit of a whoop to see if there wass anyone on the shup, so I shouted on him and doon he came. Since it wass Chrustmas the least I could do wass to offer him a dram, ass any Chrustian chentleman would do, and he perched on the end of Dougie's bunk and drank it, and then made such a production oot of banging his empty gless doon on the table that I had to gi'e him anither.

“That wass when I realised that the man wass fairly in the horrors wi' the drink, and he had aboot ass much spurits aboard him aalready ass would have filled a bucket, but he didna have Hurricane Jeck's agility when it cam' to carryin' them.

“ ‘Are you aal right, Lex?' says I, ‘I think maybe you should get yourself hame before you do yourself a mischief.'

“ ‘Ah canna dae that,' says he: ‘the wife'd kill me if she saw me in this condeetion, Ah'll be a' right, jist help me up the ladder, Peter, and Ah'll get on wi' the roond. It's aye the same at Chrustmas, my regulars a' have drams waiting for me for the sake o' the season, and if Ah dinna drink them they would think Ah've taken offence at them.

“ ‘Jist see me ontae the quayside and point me at the vullage and Ah'll no' tak' anither drap o' spurits, Ah'll jist get the roond feenished and go and sleep it aff at ma brither's hoose.'

“I neffer saw Lex for a month or more after that,” the Captain continued, “and when next I did I asked him how he'd got on that Chrustmas Eve, had he got the mails aal safely delivered and made peace with his mustress.