Docherty (42 page)

Instantly, both felt how tired they were. Angus sat heaving. Conn bent over, retching for air. They had to finish it soon. Looking up, Angus was enraged at the injustice of Conn standing. He got up and charged.

Conn came into his best phase of the fight. Faced with Angus’s self-neutralising anger, he was given an extension of life. He backed and dodged, leading Angus on to his punches. But his temporary success was a guarantee of his ultimate failure. Time and again, he set up perfectly the mechanics of the kill and couldn’t effect it. He was like a matador who had everything that was needed except a sword. And then, without preliminary, Angus hit him once above the temple and the inside of his head distended like a balloon. His feet went into a strange vaudeville routine and he travelled an astonishing distance, a drunk man going for a walk. But he wouldn’t go down because if he did he could never get back up. He stood, shaking his head and peering patiently among the splinters of his vision, looking for Angus. When he finally saw him, Angus was waiting at the end of several badly lit corridors.

They started towards each other. It was a long journey. Both seemed caught in separate currents, so that they circled out of distance and started all over again. Conn was aware of a badge of blood fastening painfully to his upper lip. Angus’s arms weighed on him like a couple of corpses. He felt as if he might need help to lift them. Finally, they were level but still some way apart. Heads drooping, they looked across at each other, like men on opposite sides of a street.

The sweat frosted on their bodies. Conn was prepared to go on but knew at the same time that it would only be a matter of going on. Angus sensed that he could stay with it forever but he would only be the servant to Conn’s own exhaustion, and his victory would be like the action of a bystander. The fight was reducing them to ciphers, like swimmers caught in a storm. Whatever positions they were finally beached in would prove nothing about them. Nobody had won. But the fight had lost.

Their breathing gradually subsided, admitting the other sounds around them. A cow mooed. The river was still there. They turned together to pick up their clothes and in doing that they acknowledged more than the futility of one fight. Like the retiring champions of a way of life, they felt the pointlessness not just of their own actions but of their father’s and their friends’. All they had achieved was to pay homage to a dead ethic. What they had done had courage and dignity and even a kind of grandeur but no relevance. In a last defiant gesture, Angus stopped and held Conn by the shoulder.

‘Holy Christ!’ he said. ‘Ah’ll say wan thing. Let them come a hundred-fuckin’-handed, an’ we’ll eat them. Bring ony ten men intae this park, an’ you an’ me wid punch them intae the grund. A’ richt, then?’

They stood swaying slightly, drunk with exhaustion, as if waiting for an answer. Only the wind ruffling the grass around their feet. They went back to searching for shirts and jackets. As they stumbled around the field, astonished at how far from their clothes their crazy pilgrimage had taken them, the total oppressive failure of it gelled. Their white shivering bodies, mapped with a scuffle but enlisted in a war, hunted for covering. Holding their clothes at last, they looked vaguely round the field where they had buried some family ghosts.

They went down the banking and drank at Moses’ Well. But the water only added to the pain of Conn’s mouth. Angus scudded on down from the well to the river’s edge and Conn went after.

‘Ah’m fur a soom,’ Angus said.

He stripped buff and hit the water like an avalanche. Watching him, Conn wanted the water round himself. As he took off the rest of his clothes, his body became a crowd of pains. He drowned them in the searing cold of the black water, where it ran deepest under a ledge of rock. They splashed and lolloped and lay, while the leaves made patterns on them.

They dried themselves with their vests, which they afterwards put in their pockets. Walking back down the road, they were very quiet, almost drugged with the day. Like Siamese twins who had wrenched themselves apart, they were each in pain, but at least the wounds of each were unmistakably his own.

In the town Angus wanted to buy cigarettes. Standing beside him in the shop, Conn watched him buy two copies of the
Sunday People.
He gave one to Conn.

They walked to the corner where they would separate. Conn watched the people passing in the street. The bells were ringing, inviting some of them to church. Conn looked at Angus.

‘Well,’ he said, ‘Ah’ll be seein’ ye.’

Angus held up his palm in a salute. As they walked away, a few yards broke between them like an ocean. Each held the paper tucked under his arm, a flimsy rudder.

15

Conn was alone with Mick in the house. Jenny and Kathleen had gone with the weans and Old Conn to the park. The book lay across Mick’s knees as usual, his forefinger sifting through it. Empty of the others, the place seemed oppressively still to Conn, even the sun motes suspended. He felt that if he spoke, his voice would reverberate. He thought of going out but couldn’t think of anywhere to go.

Instead, he crossed to the partly open window and looked down at the corner. A haphazard group of men stood and crouched there. The sun shone full on them and their postures – back-tilted head, splayed hand, minutely tapping foot, chin crutched on palm – were shadowless, like a mural. They seemed stunned by the sunlight.

Conn walked back and forth in the room. Everything oppressed him, looked ugly. He sat down beside the empty hearth, gnawing the back of his hand.

‘Hoo did ye make oot against Angus?’

Mick’s head was still lowered to his book. Conn wondered if Mick meant what he had thought he meant.

‘Whit?’

‘Aw, come oan,’ Mick said. ‘Ye can maybe kid ma mither oan aboot a gamey catchin’ up wi’ ye. But Ah ken ye had a go wi’ Angus. Hoo did ye get oan?’

‘Ach, it just kinna petered oot. A guid thing fur me.’

‘Whit’s the oadds, onywey?’ Mick said. ‘It wis a no-contest.’

‘Hoo d’ye mean? Dae ye think he’s that guid?’

‘Conn, be yer age. That’s no’ whit Ah’m talkin’ aboot. Ah mean who cares which wan o’ you two can punch the ither yin’s heid in. Whit did ye want tae fight wi’ Angus fur onywey?’

‘Whit fur? Because o’ whit he did tae ma feyther.’

‘Och, Conn. Dae ye no’ unnerstaun’ yit? Don’t waste yer time worryin’ aboot whit Angus does. He’s gave up the joab a while ago. He disny ken whit it’s a’ aboot. He’s like a man shapin’ up tae his mirror.’

‘Hoo can ye be so cauld?’

‘We leeve in a cauld place. Maybe Ah’ve jist adaptit.’

‘He’s oor brither,’ Conn said. ‘Ken? The fella that used tae stey here.’

‘Aye, he’s ma brither,’ Mick said. ‘Ah like ‘im fine. But don’t ask me tae take ‘im seriously.’

‘Jesus Christ!’ Conn stood up. ‘Whit’s happenin’ here?’

He started to walk. Mick stayed still. Only his mouth had moved. Conn stopped again at the window, looking out. Mick was staring at the floor.

‘Whit’s happenin’?’

‘Whit’s happenin’ is that folk don’t ken whit’s happenin’. They jist want wages an’ they canny accept that they’ll hiv tae tak’ mair. Tae get whit ye want, ye’ve goat tae settle fur mair, that’s a’.’

‘But ma feyther,’ Conn said. ‘Is that him by, jist like that?’

‘So whit? He did the joab the only wey he kent. He did a joab a’ richt. Ye mind the fight wi’ Angus because he went tae work in Number Eicht? He wis richt aboot that. Nae won’er he wis liked. Every time he went tae the pit-face he turned up as a man. Nothin’ less.’

‘That’s great,’ Conn said. ‘So that’s it feenished. Jist like that.’

‘That’s
him
feenished,’ Mick said. ‘
We’re
no’ feenished. This is jist a beginnin.’ Folk like ma feyther wur oor Winter Palace.’

‘Whit does that mean?’

‘Ah’ll tell ye sometime. Ye see, this wis us trying it wan wey. An’ it didny work. We came an’ stood in a line wi’ oor bunnets oot. An’ a’ we goat wis a bunnetfu’ o’ air. Ah mean, we’ve been waitin’ in a queue for hunners o’ year. An’ by the time we get tae the front, the shoap’s shut. So whit dae ye dae?’

Conn said nothing, watching him.

‘Ye hiv tae brek in. Because ye ken there’s grub in there a’ richt. They’ll jist no’ gi’e ye it. Whit we’re daein’ the noo is hingin’ aboot ootside, tryin’ tae make up oor minds. Because it’s no’ legal tae brek in. An’ that worries folk. But whit’s legal? Legal is whit they need tae keep whit they’ve goat. We hiv tae brek in. An’ we hiv tae batter onybody that gets in oor road oot o’ existence.’

Conn studied his brother. Watching him, he understood that out of all the talk that had raged for so long in this house Mick’s voice had emerged as the strongest. It was a fact which surprised him. Conn remembered how he had almost patronised Mick as somebody on the edge of things, his presence frequently all but erased. But his silence had been a gathering of speech. His stillness had been making bombs. He was so sure. Conn was impressed.

Yet Conn was also disturbed and suspicious of him. What Mick said was too simple. What had been a dialogue had turned into a pronouncement. It was as if Mick hadn’t heard a lot of what had happened, had just missed out so much that was important – their father’s respect for people, no matter who they were, their mother’s patient persistence, the fact that they had only been able to reach this place because they had all loved one another. But the only voice left that could thaw Mick’s icy certainty back into argument was Conn’s own. He couldn’t find it.

‘Naw,’ he said. ‘Naw. That’s too easy.’ He hesitated and said the only thing he could think of. That’s only hauf an answer. Ye ken whit Ah think, Mick? Ah think maybe whit’s happened tae you his made it easier. It maybe makes life easier only hivin’ wan airm.’

‘Maybe,’ Mick said, and smiled. ‘But no’ as easy as it is bein’ in twa minds. Like you, Conn. That wey ye never hiv tae make wan o’ them up.’

‘But maist folk mean weel.’

‘Ah’m no’ fussy whit they mean. Jist whit they dae. An’ nae rulin’ cless ever gave its power awa’. It has tae be ta’en. Always.’

‘Naw. Ah don’t want tae smash folk. Ah jist want them tae see hoo guid folk like ma feyther were. Tae gi’e us room tae leeve.’

‘Ye use yer hert like a hearse, Conn. Fur collectin’ the deid. As long as the wans that ruined them take aff their hats, ye’re happy. Ye should be mountin’ the pavement tae rin the bastards doon.’

Mick’s stare was uncomfortable. It had the same fire as his father’s look but under steady control. Conn turned towards the window. He spoke without looking round.

‘Ah canny hate folk the wey you dae, Mick.’

‘Well, ye’d better learn. Tae hate a certain type o’ folk.’

‘Onywey. Whit can you dae aboot it?’

‘Ah’ve jined the Communist Party.’

‘When?’

‘A wee while ago.’

‘But ye didny tell onybody?’ Conn turned back towards him.

‘Who wis there tae tell? Ma mither wid jist worry. She’s hud enough worry. Whit’s it tae Kathleen? She’s goat the weans tae contend wi’. Angus widny ken the difference between the Communist Party an’ the Freemasons.’

‘Why are ye tellin’ me then?’

Conn knew the answer in just looking at Mick. He knew that this was what survived of his family – this new division, this argument between Mick and himself. It was the legacy they shared. He heard his brother confirm it.

‘Because you an’ me’s whit’s left o’ ma feyther, Conn. It’s between you an’ me. Me wi’ wan airm an’ you in twa minds, eh?’

16

It was more than a year after Tam Docherty’s death that somebody said, ‘Ah hear somebody doon the Foregate’s been pestered wi’ a Peepin’ Tom.’

He was among the men at the corner. It was late at night, cold. Most had gone home. Only a few remained against the wall of the Scotia. Jacket collars were up, hands were in pockets.

‘Lucky fur him Tam Docherty’s deid,’ Andra Crawford said.

They laughed, reflecting.

‘Aye,’ Tadger said, the fag bobbing in his mouth as he talked past it. ‘Ye mind o’ yon? Dear oh dear. Ah’ve seen angry men. But yon wis different.’

Slowly, as they stood shrugging off the night wind, they began to realise that they had a clear view of Tam. Their sense of him had hardened. They began to talk themselves towards it.

‘Jesus Christ. A hellu’ a man fur the size o’ ‘im.’

‘Aye.’

‘Aye.’

‘Mind ye,’ Dan Melville said. ‘Ah don’t think he wis as hard as they said he wis.’

‘Aye, that’ll be richt,’ Tadger said. ‘He wis harder.’

‘Naw. Listen, Tadger ...’

‘Lusten nothin’. Talk comes easy. If the wee man walked doon that street the noo, you wid ken. The wee cauld bit in the pit o’ yer stomach.’

‘He wis a’ hert.’

‘Aye. Ask Hammy Mathieson.’

They began to go over stories about him. Tadger told about the hand-wrestling match with Angus. Dan Melville talked about the time Tam had come looking for him. ‘No’ again,’ Dan said. ‘No’ if Ah’d had a gun.’ Somebody told of money given to him by Tam to get a drink. Somebody mentioned how he had dealt with the priest. Tadger said how much Tam had loved weans. Andra Crawford related for the first time in his life what he had overheard on the stairs at Tam’s mother’s wake.

They were the right men to judge him – his peers. They knew the hardness of his experience, because it was theirs too. They could appreciate what he had contrived to make of it. With their words they sketched out some sense of a life built out of all those small moments. Only they could come near to appreciating the architecture of it, its monumental quality. They grew excessive.

‘A hert like a bell.’

‘Tae him his wife wis the only wumman in the world.’

‘Ye had tae come tae the line wi’ that wee man. Don’t worry aboot it. Nae shite from naebudy. Nut accepted.’

‘He died wi’ his balls on.’

Their talk was as much a definition of themselves as it was of Tam. Normally taut with understatement, they loved to be given licence to be generous, to inhabit hyperbole. Tam had given them that chance. They felt the gratitude always owed to those who enlarge our sense of ourselves. When they contemplated Tam Docherty, he helped them to define themselves.