O Caledonia (3 page)

 

*

 

In the evenings now, when Janet and Francis were tucked in their white iron beds in the nursery, with the sea wind clamouring against the windows, Vera would come in and read to them. She read from Hans Andersen and from the Brothers Grimm, looking herself like some gold-haired and icy princess who might dwell in the depths of aquamarine waters. In the basket chair she sat reading, impersonal and feline, and then she would hear their prayers, ‘Gentle Jesus, meek and mild, look upon a little child, Pity my simplicity, suffer me to come to thee, God bless Mummy and Daddy and Grandpa and Francis and Rhona and Nanny and all the animals and the birds and Mr Churchill.' In a perfumed drift she would vanish from the room, leaving cold and darkness behind her.

Francis fell asleep quickly, making little chewing noises to himself, but Janet lay awake and thought of the great black forests and the lone knight swinging his horse through their pathways, the poisons and perils and the witches. When she thought of the witches she was very frightened. She saw them floating upon the night wind off the sea, hovering in flapping black outside the window, clawing at the panes, clambering and clinging on the house walls. She sucked her thumb so hard that her jaws ached. But then the lighthouse beam came in mercy, revolving its reassurance over the ceiling and down the walls, round and out again, and she was safe enough to return to the forest, the knights and the princesses and maidens and their bleeding hearts. When she was older she intended to be a princess. Almost as much as its image she loved the word, with its tight beginning and its rustling, cascading end, like the gown a princess would wear, with a tiny waist and ruffles and trains of swirling silken skirts. Purple of course. On such thoughts she slept.

One Saturday afternoon in waning November light Nanny took Francis and Janet to the village hall; they were going to a party, a party for everyone, to celebrate Saint Andrew
'
s Day. Down the lane from the manse they went and into the street, past the draper
'
s shop, the grocer
'
s, the butcher
'
s, the greengrocer
'
s, all with their blinds down to prevent the sin of weekend covetousness. Then round the corner to fearful Institution Row, where the war-wounded lived in grim pebbledashed houses with big square windows. If you looked in, you could see them, sitting mournfully by small electric fires or limping on crutches about the room. One lay propped upon a great heap of pillows staring unforgivingly at those who could pass by. Janet used to duck down and run past his window in case he saw her; she was afraid of his hard angry face and the shapeless shrouded rest of him. It was worse in summer when they would sit outside in the mean front garden, a strip communal to all the houses, a length of gravel punctuated by wooden benches constructed from the timber of sunken enemy ships. Some were crazed from shell shock and nodded and muttered to themselves, others displayed the magenta stumps of amputated arms and legs. One sat in a wheelchair and the bright sea breeze whisked about his empty trouser legs. But this November afternoon their windows were dark; there was not one to be seen. Janet
'
s spirits rose; she looked forward to the party. Nanny and Vera had made carrot cakes and jellies and little pies and they carried these in wide wicker baskets covered with white cloths. Janet saw herself, a good kind little girl, bringing her provisions through cold and darkness to the needy, very like Little Red Riding Hood. She banished the thought of the wolf.

The village hall was an ugly desolate building, surrounded by high iron railings; it was the source of the disgusting wartime orange juice that children were forced to take from sticky urine-coloured bottles. But today all was changed. In they went to a glowing haven of Tilley lamps and magical candles. Tables of glamorous food stood all along one wall; chairs were arranged round the other three sides. There were bunches of balloons and there were jam tarts and Mr McKechnie was playing his accordion and Mr Wright the blacksmith accompanied him on the fiddle. The children played games, Ring-a-Ring-o
'
-Roses and Blind Man
'
s Buff, then In and Out the Bluebells and Who
'
s Afraid of Black Peter? Janet became wildly excited and hurtled back and forth. Her hair had been allowed loose from its usual pigtails and was crowned by a blue satin Glamour Girl bow, firmly attached to an elastic string; in her stiff blue organdie dress she felt almost like a princess. Even the sight of the war-wounded, gathered with their helpers in a cheerless group at the far end of the hall, did not check her glee. Other children joined her, skidding and shrieking,
‘
Who
'
s Afraid of Black Peter?
' ‘
NOT I. NOT I,
'
they yelled, colliding, tumbling, fleeing the length of the room, too far, too near the grown-ups. Nannies and mothers sprang to their feet.
‘
You
'
ll all sit down and have your tea.
'
A solemn silence came, suited to the serious ingestion of food.

Janet finished first. Watching Francis, with bulging eyes and bulging cheeks spooning quivering green jelly into his gap-toothed mouth, she felt the fatal tide of merriment rise again. Up on to her chair she leapt.
‘
Francis!
'
she cried,
‘
Tins of jam! Tins of jam! TINS, TINS, TINS of jam!
'
Francis choked; shards and globules of glancing emerald shot across the table. Janet ran. Beside herself, with flying skirts and hair, she careered down the hall; she was chanting her favourite nursery rhyme,
‘
Hink, minx, the old witch winks, The fat begins to fry; There
'
s no one at home But Jumping Joan, Father, Mother and I.
'
As she neared the war-wounded she saw that they were laughing; they were laughing at her. She had made them laugh. Aglow with power she postured in front of an amputated arm,
‘
Hink, MINX,
'
she began again,
‘
The old witch WINKS.
'
The man was mouthing at her; fearless she stepped up to him and curtseyed deeply.
‘
You
'
re a braw wee lassie,
'
he said.
‘
What
'
s your name?
' ‘
Janet.
' ‘
That
'
s no name for you. I
'
ll call you Beth.
'
Beth. A beautiful name, a velvet name, brownish mauve.

Nanny was bearing down with a face like the North Sea. Janet had one thing to do before doom cracked above her.
‘
Please may I touch your arm?
'
she asked. The man stared at her, still smiling. Her knees were shaking but she stretched her fingers up and gently she stroked his puckered stump; it was like paper, dry and smooth, even where the violent scar lines twisted and rippled and enlaced it was smooth like the bark on branches. Nanny seized her and dealt her a resounding swipe on the backs of her calves.
‘
Your father will hear of this when he
'
s home. You
'
ll sit with me now.
'
She dragged her up the hall again.
‘
Showing off. Talking to men. I never saw the like. Your poor grandfather.
'
Janet
'
s eyes stung and her legs burned and stung, but she was filled with happiness. She had rid her life of one haunting fear. And she had known the toxic joy of power.

Now she sat, thumb in mouth, eyes glazed, quiet and good. The other children were dancing to Oranges and Lemons and The Grand Old Duke of York but she might not join them. Nanny was talking to Miss Pettigrew, one of two ancient sisters. The other sister was having tea in the first sitting of grown-ups, the very old, the war-wounded and the men. Nanny and the younger Miss Pettigrew would have their turn in a more refined company. The men ate with intense absorption; some of them had tucked handkerchiefs into their collars for bibs. They were like the little children at tea, even the ones whom Janet had seen come lurching and ranting out of the Ship Inn on a blast so pungent with smoke and whisky that for a moment she could not smell the sea; even those wild tattooed men were as homely and douce with their scones and jam as the fat-bellied tea cosies clothing the brown teapots. O Caledonia.

Very old Miss Pettigrew came trembling up, leaning on her stick.
‘
Here you are then, Annie,
'
she said to her sister. Her jaw dropped loose, her mouth hung limp and open; in went her black-veined claw; out came a set of pinkly glistening false teeth. Her sister grabbed them; with no ado she popped them into her own mouth. She paused for a moment, sucking noisily.
‘
Macaroons!
'
she cried,
‘
Och, that
'
s braw!
'
She and Nanny headed briskly for the tea table. Janet and the ancient sat silent together, both dribbling a little.

 

*

 

Now that Janet and Francis were older, Grandpa would let them visit him in his study, where the parrot lived. Grandpa came from a long line of parrot-keeping men, and Polly
'
s predecessor, a white cockatoo, had fought with Wellington
'
s armies in the Napoleonic Wars. Janet
'
s father
'
s earliest memories were of the astonishing oaths known to this bird, who was then a hundred and two years old and spoke in ripe gamey accents long since gone from the world of men. Grandpa believed there must be a fair number of such long-lived birds in Scotland
–
even perhaps in England
–
and it would be a fine thing to have them all gathered in a great dining hall, invoking ghostly midshipmen and dragoons, violent drinkers and merry rhymesters, perhaps even occasionally an elderly lady of refinement. This, he said, would afford a historical experience of rare value; indeed, ancient parrots should be feted and cultivated as true archivists.

The current parrot was unfriendly but interesting, with his black tongue like a neat sea-smoothed stone and his sarcastic sideways stare. If they sang
‘
Away in a Manger
'
to him he would dance, swaying from side to side, lifting his feet high and raising his wings. Janet tried chanting
‘
Hink, minx
'
but it was too fast and drove Polly into such a frenzy of action that he collapsed palpitating on the floor. Francis laughed a lot, but Janet was appalled. She fed him toast in placation and he bit her finger. Blood spurted disgustingly on to his gravel floor, but Janet was glad. Justice had been done. This Polly, too, had lived for a long time and much of his enigmatic utterance was addressed to a host of invisible dogs, cats and visitors.
‘
Go to your basket, Donald
'
, he would yell, and
‘
Wipe your feet
'
,
‘
Goodnight, Miss McPhail
'
,
‘
Wet dog
'
. His two favourite sentences were,
‘
Would you care for a dram?
'
and
‘
Mr Baird has a short beard
'
, both compellingly effective. He could also reproduce the sound of whisky being poured into tumblers and one day Janet discovered a great secret, to be known only to herself and Grandpa. He could imitate Grandpa
'
s typewriter in busy action, so that people knocking on the study door would steal away again, finger to lip,
‘
We mustn
'
t disturb him; he
'
s writing his sermon.
'

Grandpa and Janet would sit by the fire and he would tell her stories of the Seven Champions of Christendom, and the Angel of Mons. On his wall were huge steel engravings of soldiers dying on far battlefields among charging, rearing horses and smoking cannon, consoled by the visionary cross which hung in the sky, or the benediction of a brooding angel. Grandpa
'
s God, like Nanny
'
s, was all-seeing, all-powerful, but, unlike Nanny
'
s, He was protective and compassionate, not vengeful. In His dealings was great glory and nobility. Janet tried to imagine one of His angels visiting the war-wounded in their desolate concrete dwellings, softening their hard, hurt faces, wrapping them in loving warmth, bestowing that nobility on their mutilated limbs and lives, so that they, too, shone in glory. It was impossible. She wanted to ask Grandpa about this, but she could not find the words. She was left with a sense of agonised pity, a powerless pity which made her cry sometimes when she was alone and looking out of the nursery window at the unforgiving sea and the seagulls, who lived nowhere but on air and water, floating free and comfortless above it.