A Scots Quair (89 page)

She knew he was being only sensible, pity rather, and said she was sorry, and they didn't stand over-close after that, the weight of the rain was seeping through the branches and now a great low gust of wind swept up the park, driving the soft ground-spray in their faces. Ewan began to talk of the strike, he said that Selden and Trease and himself had already a good
strike fund in hand though the Union had been trying to force the men back. Ellen said it was rather a pity to have to work so closely with the Communist leaders, they'd a horrible reputation, both of them liars and not to be trusted; and Ewan said perhaps, he didn't know, anyhow their tactic of rioting for rioting's sake was pure insanity, it got nowhere, if a revolution were properly organized it should be possible for a rising class to take power with little or no violence. But Trease and Selden were handy in the strike, stiffening it up. And laughed:
Anyhow, whoever goes back, I shan't. The
manager made that plain enough. Doesn't sound bright for our
marriage, does it? You should have left me alone that day on the
Barmekin and I might have been good and respectable now, not
mixing up with this mess of a strike, but a gent in a bowler,
smoking cigarettes in spats
.

She said if he was sorry he'd mixed up with Socialism he need never mix up with her, either, then…. And flushed dark in the darkness, but he hadn't tumbled, innocent as a babe, nice babe. He sat down against the bole of the tree and patted the dry ground there, and caught her ankle in a gentle hand:
Sit by me a minute before we go back. You never know
what'll happen to a striker tomorrow!

As the dozen bobbies cleared the way for the scabs coming out of the Works, the dark was falling, there came a hell and pelt of a rush, you were all of you in it, young chaps and old, one bobby struck at you with his truncheon, missed, you were past him, slosh in the kisser the scab; and all about you, milling in the dark, the chaps broke in and hell broke out, the bobbies hitting about like mad, tootling on their whistles, scrunch their damned sticks.

And then the fight cleared from its stance by the gates and went shoggling and wabbling over to the Docks, the dozen scabs held firm enough, the bobbies bashing to try and get at them and rescue them. Old man though you were, you wouldn't have that, you pushed a foot in front of one of the bastards, down he went with a bang on the calsays, somebody stepped on his mouth and his teeth went crunch. And there,
in the heave and pitch of the struggle, were sudden the waters of the Dock, dirt-mantled, greasy in oil from the fisher-fleet, the lights twinkling low above it, folk cried
In with them!
Dook the scab sods!

And in they went with a hell of a spleiter, one of them, the foreman old Johnny Edwards, crying
Lads, lads, I can't
swim!
Alick Watson beside you gave him a kick:
You can't,
you old mucker? Now's the chance to learn
, over he went, your heart louped in your mouth. Then some body cried to look out and run, the bobbies were coming in a regiment, near.

And you looked round and there b'God they were, the calsays clattering under their feet, waving their sticks, Christ, never able to face up to them. Around to the left was the way to take nipping by the timber yard over the brig. All the chaps running helter-skelter you scattered, the bobbies wouldn't spare pickets now except to bash in their brain- caps, maybe, after seeing one of their lot on the ground. B'God, this would be a tale to tell when you got back safe to Kirrieben.

And then the lot of you saw you were trapped, in the flickering light and the scud of the water, a gang of the bobbies had raced across and cut you off, big and beefy, they were crying
We've got you, you sods!

And you all half-halted a minute and swore and ebbed back a bit, you couldn't see the bobbies' faces or they yours, they wouldn't mind, bash down and bash till their arms grew tired and then haul a dozen of you off to the nick.

Then two of the chaps cried
Come on, lads!
and ran straight for the line of running bobbies, all of you like sheep at their heels, gritting your teeth, nieves ready for the crash. Then you saw the foremost of the running chaps throw up his hand and wave it in front of him right in the bobbies' faces, swish, the other did the same and a yowl went up, bobbies dropping their truncheons and clutching their eyes, you got a whiff running and staggered, and near sneezed your head off. Christ, that was neat, whoever thought of it.

But there'd be a bonny palaver the morn!

And next day the
Daily Runner
came out and told of those
coarse brutes the Gowans strikers, and the awful things they'd done to the working folk that were coming decent-like from their jobs. And all Craigneuks read the news with horror, every word of it, chasing it from the front page to the lower half of page five, where it was jammed in between an advertisement curing Women with Weakness and another curing superfluous hair; and whenever Craigneuks came on a bit of snot it breathed out
Uhhhhhhhhhhhh!
like a donkey smelling a dung-heap, delighted, fair genteel and so shocked and stirred up it could hardly push down its grape-fruit and porridge and eggs and bacon and big salt baps, fine butter new from the creamery, fresh milk and tea that tasted like tea, not like the seep from an ill-kept sump. And it said weren't those Footforthie keelies awful? Something would have to be done about them.

And the Reverend Edward MacShilluck in his Manse shook his bald head and pursed his long mouth and said to his housekeeper Ahhhhhhhhhhhh, what they needed in Duncairn were folk like the Fascists, they knew how to keep tink brutes in trim. And this nonsense about the keelies being on strike because Gowans were making shells and gas-cases— well, wasn't a strong man sure in defence? Wasn't it the best way to avoid a war for a country to keep a strong army in the field?

The housekeeper simpered and said she was sure, that must have been why the last War had happened, those coarse brutes the Germans and Frenchies, like, had had hardly an army to their name, would it be, and that was why the war had broke out?

The Reverend MacShilluck gave a bit of a cough and said
Not quite, you wouldn't understand. Ahhhhhhhhhhhh, a fine
thing the War in many a way. Did I ever tell you the story of the
nurse and the soldier who was wounded in a certain place, my
Pootsy?
And the housekeeper, who'd heard it only a hundred times, standing and sitting and lying down, upstairs and downstairs and ben in the kitchen and once in the bathroom, shook her bit head and made out she hadn't, she'd her living
to look after and she'd long grown used to that look that would come in MacShilluck's eyes, a look she'd once thought in a daft-like minute that
stank
with the foulest of all foul smells….

Bailie Brown said it was that damn fool the Chief Constable, why hadn't he kept enough bobbies on hand? The workers were all right, though misled by the Reds, if they'd trusted their natural leaders, like himself, they wouldn't be in the pickle they were in, drowning a foreman that had aye been a right good Labour man, and throwing pepper in the bobbies' eyes. They should wait till the next Labour Government came—

The Chief Constable said it was that bloody Inspector, he'd told him to look out for trouble at Gowans. Pepper flung in the eyes of the men—by God, you'd find it revolver-shots next. He was to tell the Council that unless he had powers—

The Provost motored out to his sawmill to get away from the stir and stew, and wandered around, with his long dreich face like a yard of bad milk, till he lighted on Ake level-testing a lathe. And he said
Seen the news in the Runner this morning?
And Ake asked what news, and the Provost said about the murder down at the Docks, the strikers drowning the old foreman Edwards and then throwing pepper in the police's eyes. Ake said he'd seen it and hadn't wept, a scab was a scab wherever you found him though 'twas swollen water-dead in the Duncairn docks or bairning a quean that screamed in a hedge…. And the Provost gave a bit hurried hoast and Ake thought if ever he was walking alone on a dark-like night and Jimmy came on him, he with his bare nieves and Jimmy with a knife, he'd stand as much chance of getting home safe as a celluloid cat that had strayed into hell….

The sub-editors' room gave a yawn and a grunt Piddle had done a nippy bit work stealing the photo of that drowned Edwards bloke. Any chance of a few of the bobbies being
coshed good and proper in the next few days?—half a dozen of them drowned would make a good spread. Damned neat stunt that pepper-throwing, the Chief would blame it on the Reds for sure. Tell the boy to get out Trease's photo, bet he was under arrest by now—

Chris read the news and thought, far away,
Awful…. Three
more days to decide on this house
.

The Cowgate read it and a queer sound started, in tenement and wynd and went wriggling on like the passage of a flying train of powder, twisting and glistering and louping to and fro, back to Footforthie, up to Kirrieben, a growl of laughing and cursing, Christ, some Bulgar had dealt with the bobbies fine. And hungry Broo men that had made up their minds to sneak down to Gowans and into the gate and try and steal one of the striker's jobs gave a bit rub at their hunger-swollen bellies—ah well, they must try the pac again—

 Jim Trease the Red leader gave a roar of a laugh and called to his wife to bring him his boots.
They'll be coming for me in an
hour or so. Get on with the breakfast, will you, lass, I'll ll be hungry
enough before they finish their questioning down at the Station
. His mistress said
What, are they after you again?
placid as you please, he'd had so much arresting off and on in his life that she thought no more of him marched off to jail than when he marched off to the wc.
And what have your gowks been doing
now?

He told her and she said that sounded gey clever, that pepper business, and Jim Trease puffed
Clever? Some idiot
loon has been reading a blood. What we need are the masses with
machine-guns, not pepper…. To hell, and I suppose if they
heard me say that they'd chuck me out of the Communist Party!

Ewan said to Alick Watson he thought he'd more sense— who'd bought the pepper, Alick himself or that dirty little swine Geordie Bruce?

Ellen met in with Ewan after dinner that day, he'd come up
from watching the pickets at Gowans, the bobbies were keeping them aye on the move, a great birn of folk had been there all forenoon. He told Ellen this as they went out together, she to her school and he back to Gowans, in the clearing weather she looked up in his face, he down at hers— queer what a thrill that faint line of down sent through one, funny biological freak, thought the old-time Ewan that wasn't quite dead—

You can kiss me inside this nook
, she said, light-heartedly; and when he'd finished kissed him in return in a sudden terror:
Oh, Ewan, be careful down at the Docks. I'm—I'm
frightened for you!

Making early tea in the kitchen next morning Chris looked out and saw that the rain had cleared, Spring was coming clad in pale saffron—the sun hardly seen all the winter months except through the blanket of Duncairn reek. She stood and looked out an un-eident minute till she heard the sound of feet on the stairs, Ake Ogilvie, big, with his swaying watch-chains and his slipperless feet, swinging into the kitchen:
Ay then, mistress
.

She said absently, her thoughts far away, still looking out at that blink of sun,
Morning, Mr Ogilvie
, her worries forgotten for a lovely minute. Ake sat down and tamped out his pipe on the range:
Well, what are you doing about the bit house?

She'd told him something of her plight before, and he'd listened, douce, with his ploughman's face, his stare of impudent, grey-green eyes.
Ay, a gey bit fix
, he'd said, and no more, he wasn't much interested; why should he be? Now, she thought with a twinge of resentment against him, did he think it light gossip to be taken through hand in the early morning to pass the time? Pouring him a cup of tea she said shortly
I've no idea. Sell it up, I suppose
.

—
And after that?

—
Oh, something'll turn up
. She turned away with the brimming tray.

He said
Well, just gi'es a minute of your crack. Let the sweir
folk wait for their tea a while
.

Chris put down the tray.
Well, a minute. What is't?

He sat and looked up at her, drinking his tea, a man from the farms and the little touns, the eternal barbarian Robert had once called him. Now he laid down the cup and gave his mouser a dight:
Ah well, this is it: I've a bit of silver saved
myself—about enough to buy the share of the place that Mistress
Cleghorn left to her niece. And I'm willing to come in as your
partner, like
.

—
Ake! Oh, Ake, you really mean that?

He said Oh ay, he meant what he said—a habit of his, like. Mistress Colquohoun was willing to take him on, then? He'd look after this lad of hers, Εwan, all right.

Something queer about that:
Ewan—what'll he have to do
with it?

—
Well, damn't, as his stepfather I suppose I'll have more than
a bittie to do with him
.

Chris stared:
One or other of us has gone daft. You were
proposing to share my house, weren't you, Ake?