Love Over Scotland (18 page)

50. Bad Behaviour

When they heard the noise coming from behind Tessie’s closed door, Pat and Matthew, on the point of leaving the flat, stopped. Lowering the two heavy suitcases to the floor, Matthew looked at Pat in astonishment.

“What on earth…?” he began to whisper, but Pat, still holding Sir Ernst Gombrich’s
The Story of Art
under her arm, did not reply. Creeping forward, she inclined an ear to the door. Matthew, embarrassed by such obvious eavesdropping, but curious nonetheless, quickly moved forward to join her at the door.

The howls which they had heard–if they were indeed howls, and it sounded like that to them–had now stopped, to be replaced by a peal of laughter. Then there was a voice, not raised at all, but still audible from outside.

“I wish you wouldn’t howl quite so much.” It was Tessie.

“Why not? If it makes me happy.” There was a pause, and then: “And I know what makes you happy.” That was Wolf.

Matthew glanced at Pat. There was something indecent in standing outside somebody’s bedroom door and listening to what went on within. He was about to gesture to Pat that they should leave, but then Wolf could be heard again.

“And, as you know, I like to make girls happy. It’s my role in life. We all need a hobby.”

Tessie snorted. “You’re lucky I’m not the jealous type. Most people wouldn’t hack it, you know. You’re lucky that I don’t mind.”

“That’s because you know I don’t mean it,” said Wolf. “You know that you’re the one. You know that.”

“Yes,” answered Tessie. “But how are you getting on with her over there? Pat. God, what a name! I’m fed up with acting jealous, by the way. All to keep you amused.”

“I need another week. She’s in lurve with me. Big time. But it’ll be another week or so before…” There was laughter.

It was as if Pat had been given an electric shock. She moved back quickly from the door, reeling, nearly dropping Sir Ernst Gombrich from under her arm. Matthew, visibly appalled, made to support her, but she drew back, humiliated, ashamed.

“Quick,” whispered Matthew, picking up the suitcases. “Quick. Open the door.”

Out on the landing, the flat door closed firmly behind them, Matthew rested the suitcases on the floor and reached out for Pat’s arm.

“Listen,” he said. “Listen. I know how you must feel. But there’s no reason for you to feel bad. It’s not your…” He looked at her. She had turned her face away from him and he could see that she had begun to cry. He put down the suitcases and reached out to her.

“No,” she mumbled, starting down the stairs. “I just want to go.”

There were a few awkward moments at the front door, as they waited for the arrival of the taxi which Matthew had ordered. Matthew wanted to talk–he wanted to reassure Pat–but she told him that she did not want to discuss what they had heard.

“All right,” he said. “We won’t talk about it. Just forget him. Put him out of your mind.”

They stood in silence. Matthew, looking up at the wispy clouds scudding across the sky, thought of something he had read in a magazine somewhere, or was it a newspaper?–he was unsure–of how Jean-Paul Sartre and Simone de Beauvoir had entertained themselves with stories of their conquests. He had been appalled by the story, and it had confirmed his prejudice against a certain sort of French intellectual, who deconstructed other people; who played games with people. One might expect bad behaviour from existentialists–indeed, that was what existentialism was all about, was it not?–but to find this happening on one’s own doorstep was a shock.

Matthew looked down the street, which was quiet and taxiless. A black and white cat was sauntering towards them and had now stopped a few yards away, staring at Matthew. An elderly woman, laden with shopping bags, was catching her breath a little distance away, holding onto a railing for support. It was a very ordinary street scene in that part of Edinburgh, and yet it seemed to Matthew that the moment was somehow special and that what it spoke to, this moment, was
agape
, the selfless love of the other.

Such moments can come at any time, and in unexpected circumstances, too. Those who travel to a place of pilgrimage, to a holy place, may hope to experience an epiphany of some sort, but may find only that the Ganges is dirty or that Iona is wet. And yet, on their journey, or on their return, disappointed, they may suddenly see something which vouchsafes them the insight they had wished to find; something glimpsed, not in a holy place, but in very ordinary surroundings; as Auden discovered when he sat with three colleagues on the lawn, out under the stars, on a balmy evening, and suddenly felt for the first time what it was like to love one’s neighbour as oneself. The experience lasted in its intensity, he later wrote, for all of two hours, and then gradually faded.

Matthew felt this now, and it suppressed any urge he might have had to speak. He felt this for Pat–a gentleness, a cherishing–and for the cat and for the elderly woman under her burden. And he felt it, he thought, because he had just witnessed cruelty. He would not be cruel. He could not be cruel now. All that he wanted was to protect and comfort this girl beside him.

He looked at Pat. She had stopped crying and she no longer avoided his gaze.

“Thank you, Matthew,” she said.

He smiled at her. “You’ll be much happier in India Street. You really will.”

“You must tell me how much rent I need to pay,” said Pat.

Matthew raised his hands in protest. “None,” he said. “Not a penny. You can live rent free.”

Pat frowned. “But I have to pay something,” she said. “I can’t…”

“No,” said Matthew. “No. No.”

Pat was silent.

51. Sun-Dried Tomatoes

Cyril was not accustomed to travelling in a bus–nor indeed in any vehicle. Angus Lordie had no car, and so Cyril’s experience of motor transport was limited to a few runs he had enjoyed in Domenica’s custard-coloured Mercedes-Benz. From time to time, she invited Angus to accompany her on a drive into the country, to Peebles perhaps, or Gullane for lunch at the Golf Inn. Cyril was allowed to come on these outings, provided that he remained on a rug in the back, and he would stick his nose out of the window and revel in the bewildering range of scents borne in on the rushing air: sheep, hayfields, burning stubble, a startled pheasant in flight; so many things for a dog to think about.

But now he was on a bus, bundled under a seat amid unfamiliar ankles and shoes. He did not like the experience at all; he did not like the smell of the air, which was stale and acrid; he did not like the vibrations in the floor and the rumble of the diesel engine; he did not like the young man who had dragged him away from his tethering place. He looked up. The young man was holding the end of his leash lightly in his hand, twisting and untwisting it around his fingers. Cyril began to whimper, softly at first, but more loudly as he saw that the young man was not paying any attention to him.

As the whimpering increased in volume, the young man looked down at Cyril. For a few moments, dog and man looked at one another, and then, without any warning, the young man aimed a kick at the underside of Cyril’s jaw. It was not a powerful kick, but it was enough to force Cyril’s lower jaw up against the upper, causing him to bite his tongue.

“Haud yer wheesht,” the young man muttered, adding: “Stupid dug.”

Humiliated, Cyril shrank back under the seat. He knew that he did not deserve the kick, but it did not occur to him to retaliate. So he simply stared up at this person who now had control of him and tried to understand, but could not. After a few minutes, he closed his eyes and drifted off to sleep. It was at least warm in these strange surroundings and he was now becoming used to the throb of the engine. Perhaps things would be different when he woke up; perhaps Angus would be there to meet him wherever it was that they were going, and they would make their way back to Drummond Place by way of the Cumberland Bar.

He woke up sharply. The young man had tugged on his leash, and now tugged again, yanking Cyril’s neck backwards as he did so. Cyril rose to his feet and looked expectantly at the young man, who now began to make his way towards the front of the bus, pulling him as he went. The bus slowed, and then stopped. The doors opened and there was a sudden rush of new smells as fresh air flooded in.

Cyril followed his captor outside, standing just behind him as the bus pulled away in a swirl of fumes: diesel, burnt oil, dust. The dog closed his eyes and then felt the pressure on his collar as the young man pulled him away from the side of the road. There were human voices; the sudden smell of a cat off to his right; the acrid odour of sweat from a passer-by; so much for a dog to take into account, and now hunger, too, and thirst. He opened his eyes and saw off to one side a building rising up against the sky. It made him dizzy to look at it. There were gulls wheeling in the air, white wings against the grey of the sky, tiny black eyes trained on him, a mewing sound.

He lunged away, pulling sharply on his leash. The young man cried out, a hostile yell which frightened him further, and, feeling the sudden freedom of the slipped collar, Cyril bolted. All he knew was that his collar was no longer around his neck, that he was free, and that he could run. There was a further shout, and a stone, hurled in blind anger, shot past him.

Cyril had no idea where he was going; all he wanted to do was to escape from the young man who had taken him away and put him in the bus. The young man was danger, was death, he thought, although Cyril had no idea what death was. All that he knew was that there was pain and something greater than pain–great cold and hunger, perhaps–which was death. Now, his heart thumping within him, the stones on the path cutting hard on his paws, he sought only to put as much distance as he could between himself and that death that was behind him, shouting. And it was easy to do so, because that death was slow and could not run as a dog could run.

Somewhere ahead of him–he could smell it–was water. His nose led him and soon it was before him, a thin body of water that snaked off to left and right, and beside it a path. He hesitated briefly and raised his nose into the air. Off to the right there was a confusion of smells, of other animals, of emptiness. And to the left there was a similar confusion, but somewhere, deep in the palette of odours, something familiar. He had no name for it, of course, no association–just familiarity. Sun-dried tomatoes. Somewhere in that direction there were sun-dried tomatoes.

Cyril chose the familiar. Aware now that there was nobody chasing him, he set off at a comfortable trot along the canal tow-path. There were many indications of the presence of other dogs, a tantalising array of territorial claims, of warnings left behind on bushes and trees, but he ignored these. He was going home, he thought, although he had no idea of where home might be, other than in this general direction. The hunger pains in his stomach were still present, but Cyril ignored these too. He felt calmer now, quite as calm as he would feel if he were going for a walk with Angus by his side. Angus. Cyril loved Angus with all his heart, and this sudden remembering of Angus, this knowledge that Angus was not with him, made the world as dark and cold as if the sun had dropped out of the sky.

52. Casting Issues

Bertie had told nobody at school about his unwelcome recruitment to the Edinburgh Teenage Orchestra. He had entertained hopes that the proposed orchestral tour to Paris would be cancelled; that war might break out between Britain and France, thereby curtailing all cultural exchange. But none of this happened. He scoured the columns of the newspapers in search of references to conflict, but none was to be found. Cultural relations, it seemed, were thriving and there was nothing on the horizon which would make it impossible for the Edinburgh Teenage Orchestra to venture to Paris.

It was not just the humiliation of being the youngest member of the orchestra which worried Bertie; it was the knowledge that his mother planned to come to Paris with him. He would be the only member to have his mother with him, and he could imagine how that would amuse the other players, the real teenagers. They might even make cruel jokes about it, asking him if his mother had brought his baby food with her. Bertie was under no illusions as to how unkind children could be to one another. Look at Tofu. Look at Olive. Look at the sorts of things they said about other people. Being down there, down among the children, was like living in a jungle teeming with predators.

But there was something else that worried Bertie. At the audition at the Queen’s Hall, he had explained to Harry, the boy to whom he had chatted, that Irene was not really his mother at all but was a deluded madwoman who had followed him in off the bus. Harry had accepted this explanation, but what would he think if Irene came on the trip and was officially revealed as Bertie’s mother? He would no doubt spread the story about, and Bertie would be exposed as a liar. So he would be doubly ostracised: both as the youngest member–not a real teenager–and as a liar, too.

These thoughts had preyed on Bertie’s mind ever since the audition and now, a good week later, they were still there in the background, mixed up with all the other fears that can blight a six-year-old life. Bertie was conscious that not all was well in his world. He wanted so much to be like other boys, to play the games they played. He wanted to have a friend to share secrets with, a friend who would be an ally in the world and who would stand by him. Tofu was all very well–he was a sort of friend–but he left a great deal to be desired. Bertie did not think that Tofu would support him in a tight corner; in fact, quite the opposite. Tofu was your friend if you gave him presents, preferably money, but beyond that he really had little interest in anybody else. And as for Olive, she was completely unreliable in every respect. She had gone round the school telling everybody that Bertie was her boyfriend, and this had led to Bertie’s being mercilessly teased, especially by Tofu, who found the idea particularly amusing. Olive had sent him a Valentine card, which she had tucked into his desk and which Bertie had rashly opened in the belief that it was a party invitation. He had been appalled to see the large red heart on the face of the card and, inside, the message ‘My heart beats just for you’. It was unsigned, of course, but she had given a clue by drawing a large picture of an olive beneath the message. Bertie had quickly tried to tear it up, but had been seen doing this by Olive, who had snatched it back from him in a rage.

“If that’s what you think of me,” she spat out, “then…then you’ll find out!”

She had left the threat vague, and this was another thing that Bertie had hanging over him. It was bad enough having his mother to worry about, but now here he was with Olive to think about, too. It was really hard being a boy, he thought, with all these women and girls making life difficult for one.

Such were Bertie’s thoughts that morning at school when Miss Harmony, smiling broadly, announced that the class had been chosen to put on a play at the forthcoming concert in aid of the new school hall.

“This is, of course, a great responsibility, boys and girls,” she said. “But it is also a challenge. I know that we are a very creative class, and that we have some very accomplished actors amongst us.”

“Such as me,” said Tofu.

Miss Harmony smiled tolerantly. “You can certainly act, Tofu, dear,” she said. “But all of us can act, I think. Hiawatha, for example. You can act, can’t you, Hiawatha?”

“He can act a stinky part,” said Tofu. “He’d do that well.”

“Tofu, dear,” said Miss Harmony. “That is not very kind, is it? How would you like it if somebody said that about you.”

“But my socks don’t stink,” said Tofu. “So they wouldn’t say it.”

Miss Harmony sighed. This was not an avenue of discussion down which she cared to go. It was certainly true that Hiawatha appeared to wear his socks for rather longer than might be desirable, but that was no excuse for the awful Tofu to say things like that. Tofu was a problem; she had to admit. But he would not be helped to develop by disparaging him, tempting though that might be. Love and attention would do its work eventually.

“Now then,” she said brightly. “I have been thinking about what play we should do. And do you know, I think I’ve found just the thing. I’ve decided that we shall do
The Sound of Music
. What do you think of that, boys and girls? Don’t you think that will be fun?”

The children looked at one another. They knew
The Sound of Music
and they knew that it would be fun. But the real issue, as they also knew, was this: who would be Maria? There were seven girls in the class and only one of them wanted Olive to be Maria. That one was Olive herself. And as for the boys, and the roles available to them, every girl in the class, but especially Olive, hoped that Tofu would not be Captain von Trapp. And yet that was the role that Tofu now set his heart on. He would do anything to get it, he decided. Anything.