The Good Provider (36 page)

‘Malicious assault on the person of a constable,’ said Craig, making it up without hesitation. ‘Fifty shillings or twenty days.’

He stepped on to the wheel and hauled himself up until he was close enough to Bob McAndrew to snatch away the reins. He could not believe that he had once ridden on that cart, had chatted to this old josser and thought him a friend.

‘I heard you were on their side,’ Bob McAndrew said. ‘I heard how you’d joined the bloody polis.’

‘Drive slow, carter,’ said Craig. ‘An’ if you ever as much as look at me again—’

‘You’ll what?’

‘I’ll have you.’

Bob McAndrew shrugged. ‘Malone knows. He knows.’

‘Knows what?’

‘That you’re in the polis.’

‘I don’t give a monkey’s curse what Malone knows. He’s servin’ a stretch o’ twelve.’

‘Maybe he is,’ said Bob McAndrew. ‘An’ maybe he isn’t.’

Craig raised himself higher, thrust his chest out.

‘Now, wipe it off,’ he said.

‘What?’

‘You heard me. Wipe it off.’

‘I’ll be buggered if—’

‘Nobody spits on my uniform.’

‘Wipe it off wi’ what but?’

‘Your hand.’

The old man hesitated; his defiance crumbled. He put out a mittened hand and rubbed away the stain of spit.

He apologised. ‘I – I shouldn’t have done it. You’ll no’ take me in, Craig, will ye?’

Craig looked down at his uniform and then sharply up at the old man. He felt cool and level and satisfied, more satisfied than he had ever been, even with Kirsty in the bed in Canada Road all those weeks ago.

Balanced on the wheel he craned forward until the brim of his helmet dunted Bob McAndrew’s brow and he could smell the strong moist tobacco odour of the old man’s breath, see the shrivelling in the old man’s rheumy eyes.

‘Tell them down at the yard, tell Moss too,’ said Craig, ‘that I’ll have my eye on them. One wrong step an’ I’ll book them. Got it?’

‘Aye, aye; right.’

Craig leaned back. ‘Now get this rig on the proper side o’ the highway an’ drive with due caution.’

‘I will. I will.’

‘What are you carryin’?’

‘Nails.’

‘Where’s your porter?’

‘Got none. We’re short-handed.’

Craig nodded, stepped to the ground. He put his fists on his hips. ‘Get on with you then, carter.’

The old man flicked the reins and the horse plodded forward. Craig did not step back, did not yield an inch as the wheel rolled close to him and the cart crawled past.

‘Remember what I told you,’ Craig shouted, and found that his throat did not ache any more.

He watched the cart vanish swiftly into the fog then turned, jerked the flare from the bank of clay, held it aloft and, strutting, resumed his morning watch.

When Kirsty brought the hot dish into the dining-room she found that David Lockhart had his head bowed in prayer. It seemed fitting, somehow, that he should give thanks to the Lord. He did not start up guiltily or curtail his devotions, was not in the least embarrassed by her intrusion. Kirsty waited by the door until he unclasped his hands and opened his eyes.

He looked up, winked, smiled. ‘And what have you brought me, Kirsty?’

‘What you asked for – sausages.’

‘Pollock’s finest, no doubt. Made by the mile; sold by the ton.’

Kirsty laughed. ‘You’ve been here before, I see.’

‘The finest sausages in the kingdom. Aunt Nessie cooked them with her own fair hand, I suppose.’

‘She insisted on it. I think she spoils you.’

‘She always has done; my brother and I.’

‘Oh, you’ve a brother.’ Kirsty put the plate before him. ‘Is he a doctor too?’

‘Almost,’ said David. ‘He’s a medical student here in Glasgow.’

‘What’s his name?’ said Kirsty. ‘If you don’t mind me askin’.’

‘Jack; John Knox Lockhart to be exact. John Knox, can you imagine?’

Kirsty said, ‘Is he younger than you?’

‘Absolutely; a mere boy, in fact,’ said David. ‘Tell me, has your husband gone?’

‘Yes.’

‘Aunt Nessie tells me he’s a policeman.’

‘Yes.’

David reached for the cruet and ran a neat little pile of salt on to the side of his plate. Kirsty noted the sign of good manners; not like Craig who would sprinkle the seasoning all over his food.

David said, ‘I really would have preferred to breakfast in the kitchen.’

‘Aunt Ness – I mean, Mrs Frew would never hear of it.’

‘She used to let me, in the old days.’ David cut one of the four brown bangers into slices with his knife. ‘Of course, she didn’t take in guests when Andrew was alive.’

‘What was he like?’

‘Fun,’ said David. ‘And funny.’

‘Funny?’

‘Very hearty. I liked him.’

‘Will you have tea or coffee?’ said Kirsty.

‘What’s in the pot?’

‘Tea.’

‘That’ll do nicely, thank you,’ David said. ‘Are you leaving, Kirsty?’

‘I – I’m not supposed to—’

‘Oh, come on! I’m not a guest. I’m not stuffy old Vass.’

‘Do you know Mr Vass?’

‘I’ve been lectured by that august gentleman several times.’

‘He’s very clever, isn’t he?’

‘Very educated, certainly,’ said David, eating. ‘Does your husband like being a policeman?’

‘He doesn’t say much about it. It’s a good secure sort of occupation, though.’

‘I’ve a great admiration for “the polis”,’ said David.

‘Why?’

‘Nobody loves them but everybody depends on them.’

‘I don’t understand,’ said Kirsty.

‘They tell people what to do and stop people doing what they want to do.’

‘Criminals?’

‘Society would soon go to pot if it wasn’t for policemen.’

‘Are you, by any chance, a lawyer as well as a doctor?’

David laughed. He wiped his lips with the linen napkin. ‘I have a medical qualification. Now I’m studying Divinity at Edinburgh University.’

‘Divinity? To be a minister?’

‘Of sorts.’

‘I expect that’s why your aunt favours you so much.’

With mannered efficiency he had put away the sausages and allowed Kirsty to pour him tea. He drank it, she noticed, without sugar or milk.

Rising, he turned to the window that overlooked Walbrook Street.

‘I’m not going to make it, I fear,’ he said.

‘Why don’t you just stay?’

‘Alas, I can’t. I must make the effort. If it thins about lunchtime I’m sure the company will try to squeeze a train through.’ He turned. ‘Are you – will you be here for long, Kirsty?’

‘Until we’re allocated a police house.’

‘Perhaps I’ll see you again.’

‘Yes,’ said Kirsty. ‘Perhaps.’

‘I wish—’ he began, then gave a little shake of the head as if to censor any indiscretion that might have popped into his mind. ‘Jack and I are off to Inverness for Christmas but in the New Year I’m sure I’ll be in Glasgow again.’

She held the warm teapot in both hands. It had been a bitsy conversation but it had seemed, to Kirsty at least, to be charged with a rapport for which there was no sensible explanation. Clearly Mr Lockhart came from a stratum of society far above her own. There should have been no common ground between them, yet the old attitudes and responses did not seem to count – perhaps because David was a doctor and a minister in the bud. Kirsty tried to convince herself that it was only Christian charity that lay behind his interest in her. She fervently hoped that she would see him again, talk with him again before she became ensnared in motherhood and the setting up of a proper home in Greenfield.

‘I must be on my way,’ David said. ‘I wish you well, Kirsty.’

She stood like a daftie, teapot in her hands, tongue-tied as he hurried from the dining-room to kiss his aunt, put on his coat and hurry out into the grey, enfolding fog. It was strange, strange and troubling, this sudden new surge of feeling.

From the window she watched him hasten down the steps to the pavement. She wanted to call out to him, make some gesture, leave some mark or memory that he could carry away with him, but she felt coy and shy, and discovered, to her chagrin, that to this man as to no other she did not know how to say goodbye.

SIX

The Fostering Breast

Four days before Christmas Craig brought her the glad tidings.

‘Guess what,’ he said, ‘we’ve been allocated a police house.’

‘Where?’

‘Canada Road; the upper end,’ said Craig, grinning. ‘The building’s only six years old.’

‘How big is the house?’ said Kirsty.

‘Kitchen an’
two
bedrooms, would ye believe.’

‘When do we take possession?’

‘Well, it’s supposed to be ours from the first o’ the year but I’ve agreed to hold off entry until the end of January.’

‘Why?’

‘Because o’ the circumstances.’ Craig studied the buttons of his tunic and carefully began to unfasten them. ‘Because o’ the family that’s there at the moment.’

‘What family?’

Craig said, ‘Oh, some constable from Percy Street. I don’t know him at all. Macgregor’s his name.’

‘Dismissed?’

Craig shook his head. ‘Dyin’.’

The kitchen was full of steam. She had put out washing on the lines in the backcourt that morning but there had been rain and she had brought it in again, draped it on the high pulley where, in the heat from the stove, it had given off a soft haze of steam for hours on end. If Craig had not been uncommonly prompt she would have had the place tidied and ventilated. As it was he had caught her unprepared. She felt a sudden wave of anxiety and seated herself at the table, her hands in her lap.

Craig said, ‘It’s no’ our fault. About Macgregor.’

‘No,’ Kirsty said.

Craig draped his tunic on a chair and seated himself too. He stooped to unlace his boots. They were caked with mud which, Kirsty had learned, indicated that he had made a patrol along the railway embankment late in the afternoon. She had an irrational fear that he would be mown down by a train, though Craig had assured her there was not the slightest danger of that happening.

He looked up, squinting. ‘I thought you’d be pleased, Kirsty.’

Kirsty said, ‘I am.’

Craig said, ‘You won’t even have to meet him, y’know.’

‘Who?’

‘Macgregor.’

‘I – it’s not that, dear.’

‘They’re goin’ home, back to Islay where they came from. Maybe he’ll get better in the sea air.’ Craig paused. ‘If it’s not that, what is it?’

‘Everythin’ seems to be happenin’ at once.’

‘We’ll have a couple of months to settle in the house before the baby arrives. I’ll do all the heavy work, never fear.’

‘Aye,’ said Kirsty. ‘It’ll be grand when we’re in.’

Craig removed his other boot, set the pair against the fender, not too near the fire. When the mud had dried he would take the boots out into the back yard and scrape off the caked dirt with an old penknife, bring them back for Kirsty to polish to a high black shine.

He did not draw his chair back to the table but remained by the grate, toasting his brow and his hands at the coals.

The stewpot bubbled.

‘You don’t want to go at all, do ye?’ Craig said.

‘Of course I do.’

‘You don’t want to go with me.’

‘Craig—’

Three months ago she would have flung herself from the chair, would have wrapped her arms about his neck, would have fussed over him and given him reassurance. But tonight, now, she felt too selfish and too uncertain to play the comforter with conviction. Besides, Craig no longer seemed to need her.

Craig said, ‘You’d rather stay here, wouldn’t you?’

‘No. I’m your wife an’—’

‘You’re not my wife, Kirsty.’

‘I am,’ she said. ‘Everybody thinks I’m your wife.’

‘That doesn’t make it a fact.’

‘Tell me about the house,’ said Kirsty. ‘Have you seen it yet?’

He turned his head and glowered at her. His dark eyes were sullen and secretive but there was no animosity in them. He seemed to see her now with disciplined control, that dispassion with which he observed the denizens of Greenfield’s meanest streets and hovels, not with pity or disgust but with patient calculation.

‘Aye,’ he answered. ‘Hector Drummond took me up there when the note came down from Headquarters that the house was for us.’

‘Tell me,’ said Kirsty, feigning enthusiasm.

‘Top floor, of four. Eight families in the close. All burgh employees.’

‘Policemen?’

‘Six lots of coppers at least.’