A Scots Quair (86 page)

Then Ewan and she had climbed through the Links and up the railings to the desolate front, wet-shining, with hardly the glimmer of a light. Here the rain caught their faces in swaths, warm rain, like corn felled in a reaper's bout, some Reaper high in the scudding lift. Ewan said
There's a shelter further
along. Let's run for it
, and caught her hand and they ran together, both hatless, both wet, and gained its lithe and sat on the bench, panting, staring out at the dark.

Ellen closed her eyes and leaned back her head and stretched out her nice legs, she knew they were nice, and lovely and tingly, and put her hands up behind her wet hair. That run was fun, hard to believe that this was Duncairn, here in the darkness with the forgotten sea.

She peeped at Ewan, sitting near, queer Scotch boy, solemn and not, wonder if he's ever kissed a girl? And she thought not likely and was angry with herself behaving just like an idiot shop-girl. She'd been tired and drowsy tonight with that long, stuffy meeting of the League, Semple had come and talked for the Reds, she'd thought him a catty and smelly bore. So when it finished and they came out into the rain flooding the Crossgate she'd said to Ewan
Let's go a walk
before we go home
, half-expecting he'd snub her, he could do
that easily. But instead he'd said
Yes, if you like, where'll we
go?
and she'd said
The Beach
and he'd said
Right-o
, not thinking her silly as any other would, Duncairn had stopped going down to the Beach now that Snellie Guff and his Funny Scotch Band had finished their season assassinating music. So down through the squelching Links they'd come and here they were, and there, a creaming unquiet, the sea.

And Ewan said suddenly out of the darkness
This would be
a splendid night for a bathe
.

Ellen turned to the glimmer of his face:
What, now?—Why
not? The rain's warm enough and I'm sticky still with the
Crossgate heat
. The glimmer grew blurred:
I'm going to.
Shan't be out long
.

Ellen said
You can't. You haven't a bathing-dres—or
towels—or anything
.

—That's the beauty of it. Nothing at all
.

And supposing he caught cramp down there alone? Ellen swallowed:
It might be fun. I'm coming in as well
.

As she threw off her coat and unbuckled her shoes she saw him about to go out of the shelter. Funny the tingle that touched her then, cool enough though she was:
There's plenty
of room for both of us, isn't there?

He called
I suppose so
, and stripped in like haste with herself, it was cold in the shelter, a long pointer of wind stroked Ellen's back as she wrenched off her stockings, Ewan asked suddenly out of the dark if a girl always took off her stockings last?

Ellen raised her head and saw him a white glimmer, goodness, shouldn't look; but why shouldn't she? He was looking at her, she supposed, thank goodness couldn't see much. She said
Yes, I think so. I've never noticed. Oh, hell, it's
cold!

Ewan said
It's not. Come on. Can you swim?
And Ellen said she could or was trying to say it when the rain-laden wind whipped the words from her mouth, on the promenade they were caught and twirled, she thought in a sudden panic,
This
is mad we'll never get back
, and next minute found Ewan had caught her wrist:
Down together. I know the way
.

They ran. The way lay over the sand, soft and wet and slimily warm, the pelting on the water drew their feet, they forgot Duncairn and the lights behind, all the hates and imaginings that drowned those sad children lost from the winds and tides, rain at night, sting of flesh smitten under rain. Suddenly Ellen's legs seemed stroked with fire: they ran out into the play of the sea.

Beyond the shore-beat they met a great wave, Ewan tried to cry something, failed, dived, vanished, Ellen felt herself lost, laughed desperately, dived as well. Ewan suddenly beside her:
Let's get back. Over-rough
, and she turned about, she seemed sheathed in fire, saltily grainily slipping through water, she fought off cramp, struggled, and found her feet abruptly on the shore again…. Idiots! Goodness, what idiots!

Next minute, wading, she gained the wet sand, saw a glister beside her, Ewan Tavendale, head bent and wiping the water from his hair. Then he whispered
Sh—look at that!

Ellen peered up at the promenade and her heart peered up in her throat. The shelter had squatted dark on the slope but now it was lighted with a moving light: Some man or other had gone in there and found their clothes, he'd switched on a torch—

Ewan whispered there was nothing else for it but to tackle him, and they ran up, the wind in Ellen's hair, she thought
I
don't care, it's fun
, she felt warm, suddenly tingling from head to heel. Ewan glimmered in front: at the sound of the pelt of their feet on the sand the light switched about and Ellen for a moment saw Ewan, she thought
He's nice hips
, and at that the light vanished, Ewan had caught it and flung it down the Beach.

Now then, now then, what's this that you're up to? Do you
know you're assaulting the police, my lad?

Ellen nipped past and caught up her clothes, struggled into her vest, into her knickers, the bulk of the bobby hiding Ewan from her. He was saying
You'll come along to the Station
with me, the two of you, there'll be a bonny bit charge, public
indecency down at the Beach
.

Ellen gave a gasp, Ewan said nothing, she could see him move quickly and dimly, getting in his clothes, he was dressing more quickly than she was, she knew, her shift stuck to her, it didn't matter, yet she felt cold now, her mind a tumult. Oh, they couldn't charge anybody with that, just for nothing—

Come along, you're all ready. Mind, none of your tricks. Here
you
—this to Ewan—
have you matches on you?

Ewan made on that he hadn't heard, the bobby swore and made to come between them. It was then that Ewan acted, Ellen saw the play, an instant, dim as a bad-made film, the bobby vanished, there came a crash and a slither from below, Ewan had said
There's a match for you
, and flung him from the top of the high Beach steps.

He grabbed her hand
Run like hell!
and they ran like that till she gasped that she couldn't do more, else she'd burst. He told her not to do that, it would be a mess, and released his hold, and halted beside her.

Out in the Links they stood listening: Nothing, nothing but the far cry of a seabird desolate about the turning tide, forward the glimmer of Duncairn in the rain warm and safe and all unaware. Ellen asked with a sudden catch of breath:
What if the bobby has been badly hurt?
and Ewan said
Let him
hurt, it will do the swine good
, cool and unperturbed, she felt sick a moment.
It was only that half-wit Sergeant Sim Leslie
who used to dig with my mother, you know
.

Things were fair kittling up at Gowans and Gloag, a lad had to keep nippy with the new tools that came, packing and storing and wondering about them, damned queer frames for new castings, too, nobody kenned what the bits were for. But there were orders enough to hand and the management was taking on folk again, it just showed you the papers were right what they said—that the Crisis was over and trade coming back.

And meeting Ewan Tavendale outside the office you cried to him,
Ay! Ewan, what about the collapse of capitalism now?
Doesn't look very much like it, does it?
He said
No? D'you know
what the new orders are for?
You said you didn't and you didn't much care as long as it gave a bit work to folk, better any kind of a decent job than being pitched off on the bloody Broo.

Ewan said
And better getting ready stuff to blow out another
man's guts in his face than starving yourself with an empty guts?
Is that what you think? Then your head's gone soft
.

You'd never seen him look angry before, you felt angry yourself and damned hurt as well, you asked who the hell he was calling names and he said
Clean your ears and you'll hear
quick enough. Bob, be up at the League room tonight. There's a
meeting on of all the chaps I can bring
.

Who the hell did he think he was ordering about? But you went to the meeting all the same, a fair birn of the Gowans and Gloag chaps there, half the young lads from Machines and Castings and that thin-necked Bulgar who worked in the Stores, Norman and Alick and wee Geordie Bruce. No League folk and thank Christ no queans, Ewan sat behind the chairman's table alone and banged it and stood up and began to speak: and afore he'd said much there was such a hush you'd have heard the wind rumble in the belly of a flea.

He said they'd all noticed the new orders coming into Gowans and Gloag's. Did they know what the orders were for—the new machinery, the new parts they made? Especially had they noticed the new cylinders? He could tell them: he'd found out that morning. They were making new ammunition parts, bits of shells and gas-cylinders for Sidderley, the English armament people.

Somebody cried up
Well, hell, does it matter?
and Ewan said if a man were such a poor swine that it didn't matter to him he was making things to be used to blow Chinese workers to bits, people like himself, then it didn't matter. But if he had any guts at all he'd join the whole of Gowans and Gloag in a strike that would paralyse the Works. Gas-cylinder cases: he hadn't been at the War, none of them had, but they'd all read and heard about gas-attacks. Here was an account by a hospital attendant that he'd copied from a book:

There was plenty more, but that gave you a taste. Well, that's what he'd summoned this meeting for. What were they to do about it in Gowans?

Christ, you'd felt sick at that stuff he'd read, but then wee Geordie Bruce at the back of the hall sounded a raspberry and everybody laughed, high out and relieved, you laughed yourself, only Norman and Ewan didn't. Ewan said if the chap at the back had anything to say let him get up and say it, and at that wee Geordie Bruce stood up and said
Ah, to hell
with you and your blethers. What do you think you're trying to
do?—play the bloody toff on us again? It doesn't matter a faeces
to us what they're going to do with the wee round tins. If you're a
Chink or a Black yourself, that's your worry
. And other chaps called out the same, who the mucking hell did Tavendale think he was?—daft as all the bloody Reds. And afore you could wink the place was in a roar, Ewan you could see sitting at the table, listening, looking from this side to that. Then he stood up and said that they'd take a vote—
those in favour of a
strike hold up their hands
.

The noise quietened away a bit at that, you looked round about, nobody had a hand up, and och to hell suddenly you minded the stuff that Ewan had been reading about chaps caught in gas, and you felt fair daft, up your hand shot, and so did Norman's, and so Alick's, and Ewan was counting:
For—three. Those against?
—But there was never a real count, chaps started whistling and stamping, raspberrying
and banging out of the room and knocking over the chairs as they went. You sat where you were feeling a fair fool, in a minute there was only the four of you left.

Syne Ewan called out:
Bob, close the door. We've to make
ourselves into a Committee of Action
.

At half past five it happened again. Running down the stairs Chris met Ake Ogilvie who'd newly letten himself in at the door.
Ake, Ma Cleghorn's ta'en ill again. Will you run for the
doctor?
and Ake said
Eh? Oh, ay, I'll do that
, and asked the address and nodded and went stamping out into the dark, Chris glanced from the window and saw it coming down, dark early now the winter was near. Syne she turned and ran up to Ma's room again to ease her out of her stays, poor thing, lying black-faced and gasping and swearing like a soldier.

The doctor came as he'd done before, had another look, gave another sniff, and said that Ma must be kept fell quiet. Chris told him she'd found out the relative's address, should she send for her? The doctor pulled at his lip and said
Oh no,
just keep the address by handy-like. And don't worry too much,
Mrs Colquohoun. I'll send up medicine
, and off he went. Chris went down to the kitchen to get ready the tea, Ma ill or Ma well folk would need their meat.

She went to bed dead tired that night. But she couldn't sleep, getting up every hour or so to look in Ma's room, after midnight the breathing grew easier. It had grown cold and looking out of the window Chris saw that snow had come on, soft-sheeting, the early soft seep of November snow whitening the roofs in a spilling fall. And she stood and looked at it a little while in the still, quiet house above the stilled toun, in a cold no-thought till the clock struck three—suddenly dirling beside her head.

Far away through the snow beyond Footforthie the lighthouse winked on the verge of the morning, and a feeling of terrible loneliness came on her standing so at that hour, knowledge of how lonely she had always been, knowledge of how lonely every soul was, apart and alone as she had been surely even at the most crowded hours of her life. And she
went up the stairs in a sudden fear and listened outside Ewan's room a minute and heard his breath, low and even. In the next room the door hung open unsnecked, she'd have to see to that lock tomorrow. Closing the door she saw Ellen Johns a dim shape curled like a baby in sleep, and stood, the snow-hush upon the panes, looking at her in a kind of desperation, half-minded to waken her up to talk.