The Tin-Kin (25 page)

I could dare myself.

Dawn

There were cuts on Maeve’s palm from the old lady’s fingers, but she said they didn’t hurt her. Only Dawn could feel a sort of pain, a digging in.

She imagined Ma Batchie felt that too, hands grasping, clutching at her loose skin and deeply buried bone, lifting her from the chair to her bed, from her bed to the chair, from the chair into the ambulance. They passed it on the way home. The ambulance was speeding up Maisondieu Road, calling on chaos with its sirens.

Heelabalow! Maeve said from the back seat. She was suddenly full of energy.

Dawn gave her a funny look. Maeve didn’t normally make up words. Do you mean hullabaloo?

Maeve shook her head and put a thumb in her mouth. Dawn was worried about her. It wasn’t nice for a child to see a thing like that. Ma Batchie’s turn had been pretty violent, and she’d looked pale and wrung out when it was over, even if she was smiling.

Will she make it? Dawn had asked a nurse quietly.

Who’s to say? said the nurse. She’s been that way before, if that’s what you mean. Usually she gets worse afterwards, poor thing, but she’s always made it.

Ally came out the front when she pulled up. Dawn straightened in her car seat and lifted a hand to him, expecting him to wave back. He didn’t. Instead he waited, shuffling his feet the same way Warren used to do. It made her nervous. The feeling of him standing there went right up her spine, strummed her ribs like guitar strings. When was the last time she’d felt that? Maeve had fallen asleep in the back and Dawn was hoping to get her into
the house gently, without making a sound, but with Ally there she felt clumsy and bound to wake her.

She got out.

Nice afternoon, he said.

She nodded and looked up at the sky as though she hadn’t noticed before. It was unbroken blue.

You okay? he said. He moved a step closer.

She wondered if she could tell him about Ma Batchie.

Yes. Well, no. Something strange just happened.

Ally lifted a hand and let his palm scuff her shoulder.

Do you want to come in? I’m alone. We can have a drink. You look like you need one.

His other hand took hers now and she felt him squeeze her fingers, once, twice. It felt like a code. Once for no, twice for yes.

She took a breath.

I’ve got to get Maeve in.

Right, that’s okay.

He watched while she opened the back of the car and leant down to unbuckle Maeve.

She’s sound asleep, Dawn whispered, standing up.

He smiled and gently put a hand on her. It felt good and she let him keep it there while she just breathed. She reached behind him and put a hand on his shoulder, leaned a bit into his side. Her palm was flat against the fabric of his T-shirt and her fingers touched his skin at the neckline.

The wind was coming in from the sea and she could smell the salt, the cleanness of it. The smell reminded her of summer bonfires on the beach, and that phrase, warming the cockles. What were cockles? Some kind of shell? They were something cold and in need of heat and she liked the sound of them. This was the feeling she got from Ally, something essential seeping in, like walking with bare feet on warm stone.

Shall I carry her in for you?

No. She smiled. I can manage.

Another time, then?

Dawn nodded. Maybe she would see him another time and she would tell him about Ma Batchie; get it off her chest. He took her hand again and squeezed her fingers.

Once. Twice.

But she knew already she would never say yes.

The flat was stuffy and quiet. Dawn opened the windows and went to the fridge for a drink. Maeve had woken on the way in from the car. She came through to the kitchen, rubbing her hand where Ma Batchie had clawed her.

Is it hurting? Do you want special cream?

No.

What do you feel like for tea, sleepyhead? Dawn asked.

Cloodie tumpling.

Dawn laughed. Where did you learn about cloutie dumpling?

Maeve gave her a guilty look.

The old lady, she said.

Are you all right? Did Ma Batchie hurt you? Dawn said.

No.

Maeve pulled Blue Scarfy from her belt loop and swept it through her fingers like a magician.

She told me a story.

What sort of story? Dawn said.

Maeve just yawned.

Dawn made pasta. Maeve liked the unusual shapes, the ones that were hard to find. Wheels were the best. Dawn used to send Maeve to a daycare centre in the city, and she’d come home one day with a picture made of pasta shapes. It had bows and twists and spaghetti all glued onto sugar paper, and the pasta pieces had made the shape of a train, a dozen wheels clacking and rolling along the bottom. Dawn had put it up on the wall in their old kitchen. She’d kept it there till the pasta started falling on the floor and leaving tacky bits behind on the paper.

Maeve didn’t eat much.

Are you not hungry? Isn’t it good?

Maeve shook her head.

We can see Grandpa tomorrow, if you like?

Normally that would do the trick, brighten her up a little. Dad always spoiled her. But Maeve shook her head again.

We could go for a picnic.

NO! NO! NO! Maeve huffed, kicking her legs backwards and forwards under the table and catching Dawn on the shin with her heel.

Ow!

Dawn decided to put Maeve to bed early. She’d been acting funny since the visit to Ma Batchie, probably the shock of it. A good night’s sleep and she’d be right.

Later, she ran herself a bath and switched on the radio. They were reporting a drowning. Old news. It had happened some time the week before, but Dawn hadn’t paid much attention. A woman had been found floating face down, eyes clouded, the lapping waves dunting her against the hull of a small sailing boat. Thud, thud, thud.

The man on the radio insisted it was nothing suspicious. Drunks often toppled like skittles over the edge of the harbour, attracted by the moon on the water, like moths. A fatality was nothing unusual, especially given the season. The sun was up late and folk tended to drink more. The water was still icy cold.

Dawn put her feet by the taps and tipped her head back to wet her hair. She opened her mouth to feel the water on her tongue, ran her fingers over her wet lips. They felt soft, swollen as if from kissing. As if. She remembered hearing how water caused a dead body to swell. Tenderise. It was a word her grandfather had used with his customers at the butcher’s.

She couldn’t sleep that night. Maeve’s mood had unsettled her. That and the way she’d taken a shine to Ma Batchie. Dawn
wasn’t sure about the old fortune-teller. It was the way she’d laughed with her one tooth, and when she’d moved, that sound like sticks snapping somewhere inside.

Normally when she couldn’t get tired, Dawn would sit up and read something, but tonight she didn’t do that. She wondered if she could fit everything together if she thought about it really hard: the photograph, the things Ma Batchie had said, Jock and Lolly, splinters of other stories. The old woman must have known them well once. She must have seen the photo and gotten confused. That was the only \ fortune-telling. That was the answer – something simple. Dawn tried to push Ma Batchie to the back of her mind, and instead she wondered if Ally was awake. He’d said he was alone. It was only just gone ten.

Dawn’s last nights with Warren had been sleepless. He’d begun going to bed in his clothes, too drunk to take them off. He splayed out on the bed, never even bothered taking his boots off, great dirty boots that looked way out of proportion. Him and his stupid big feet. Him and his daft smile. Dawn had often thought of tying his laces together, just for a laugh. But he’d have killed her in the morning. Not that anyone believed it other than Shirley. Dawn and all her nonsense.

She’d always taken his boots off herself, hated putting her hands on him, his trousers that reeked of smoke and sweat. Clammy socks, always one with a hole in. A big toe would poke through, prune-like and pasty, a fleshy pad. The nails were always too long. It made her feel sick. That one pinkish bit of him sticking up in the air. His tongue lolled like a sloppy butcher’s cut when he tried to speak.

Dawn thought about kissing Ally. She wondered what it would have been like, if it would have felt good like his hand on her waist. But she couldn’t remember anyone’s kiss except Warren’s.

It’s the strongest muscle in the body, the tongue. She’d heard that somewhere. And it can do the most damage.

Eh, hen? Gie’s a cuddle.

Warren’s hand would crawl over like a crab, creeping from round her back, fingers reaching her breast. And the reek of him! Stale beer and hot, dank breath. His woollen jacket sleeves itched her bare skin, but her disgust at him was quiet; anger muffled under the duvet. Even when he’d drunk too much to get hard, something of him was still up there, on top of her. It was in the stench hanging. His voice. The weight of that arm.

Somehow the wee things could press down the hardest.

If she thought too much about those times, she’d end up wanting to wake Maeve just to hold her. She turned away from her sleeping daughter and watched the digital clock flicking through the minutes, the tiny green broken lines that configured the numbers.

22:21 became 22:22.

One. Two. Buckle my shoe. Maeve and Ma Batchie’s numbers. She couldn’t get the old crone out of her head.

   WOLF   

Wee Betsy, 1955

Nothing good happens to wee girls in stories who go off in the dark on their own. For a minute I’m stuck on the corner of the Lane wondering which way to go. I scuff my toes into the dust and stones, and a breathful of wind sends some dry curly leaves rolling and crackling towards me. Some of them settle round my feet. I think of Hansel and Gretel, and look to see if there are any white stones nearby so I could make a trail, but most of the stones are the same pale grey.

I walk a few steps towards the Lane, remembering Uncle Jock’s angry voice. I have to swallow hard. Then I walk back to the spot I was in before and take a few steps along the river, away from home and into the dark. My heart leaps like a salmon at the dare. I’m feeling brave.

Soon my eyes are dry and I’ve sniffed till I can breathe properly again. I cross the river at the next bridge and turn back towards the cathedral on the other side, darting from tree to tree just in case Uncle Jock is still slouched there against the wall and sees me. The shadows of the branches are a bit scary. They reach out like charred fingers with long witches’ nails and I stamp hard on every one. I imagine them pulling back, suddenly feart of me. ‘I’m a tinker! All the paths are mine!’ I shout at them inside my head. I’m careful never to peer back over my shoulder, just in case.

It’s much easier being on the road again when I reach the park. The lights are still on in Peter’s Café, and from the patch of grass where I choose to sit I can see the waitress pushing in
the chairs and wiping down the tables. I sit cross legs to pull my knees under my coat, and stuff my hands in my gloves to try and keep warm, but I’m already freezing. I rip up handfuls of grass from all round me, making a circle and telling myself it will keep me safe. I make a heap of cuttings on my skirt. I wish I could light some sticks and have a campfire all to myself. I remember the night when the showies came and Granny lit a fire outside. She started singing and clapping in a funny way which made the bairns dance and the grown-ups all hush. Everyone’s faces glowed orange from the flames.

Elgin Cathedral’s just a shadow across the park, jagged like a tooth. Most of it got destroyed when the Wolf of Badenoch came in the dead of night and burned it. That was a very long time ago in history, further back than Granny or anyone else remembers. I imagine the Wolf of Badenoch like the wolf in Red Riding Hood, but bigger. He walked on his hind legs, tall as the McPhee twins, and he had thick black hair. He stood in the woods and howled with laughter while the sky lit up from the cathedral’s flames.

Once I hid Rachel’s teddy in the coal hole and told her the Wolf of Badenoch had taken him. Granny said that was a sin, and not to be silly, that the Wolf of Badenoch was just a nickname for Alexander Stewart, who was an earl or a lord, or something boring like that.