Heartland Page 4

  Later that day, she went through my suitcase, tutting and muttering under her breath. She separated my clothes into piles: those that could be worn for a while, those which had to be thrown away. I played with Action Man. He swung from the sofa. Dived into deep pools. Flew.

  Then I got dressed. Mum and I went for a walk. On Dalry Road, we caught a maroon and cream bus. I watched the stony buildings go past. We got off the bus at Princes Street.

  It was a long, straight road. Along one side were large shops. The other side took an oceanic plunge into the gardens, then rushed up again to the craggy, volcanic plug on top of which squatted Edinburgh Castle. It looked as if it had been carved from a single, ancient meteorite. Clouds rushed behind it.

  We took a walk in the gardens. We went to a little playground. I swung on the swings. The castle glowered like a god. Mum sat on a bench and watched me, her bag on her lap.

  5

  Evenings in the flat on Duff Street were always the same. Derek came home from work and we ate tea from the little tables that nested in the corner.

  We watched TV. But we were only half-watching it, because we spent our time in conversation. Usually, it was Derek who decided on the subject. Mum and I waited expectantly, wondering what he’d be in the mood to discuss.

  Sometimes he was funny, and the three of us sat with our knees jammed under the little tables, laughing as we ate. Or he might talk about his day at work, problems with staff or stupid things some customer had said. He might comment on the day’s big news story, or tell us what he called a yarn from his boyhood. He knew everything. There was nothing he couldn’t talk about.

  On the nights when I wasn’t in the mood to talk, he’d be quiet too. He liked to watch me as I read. It seemed to make him happy, just to have me in the room.

  Usually, I didn’t like being looked at. It made me drop things or bump into furniture. Sometimes, it made my speech come out strangely. A word hooked in my throat and I had to wait until it came unstuck, like the stylus on a record player. If I was walking down the street and someone glanced at me, my legs went numb. Feeling drained from them. It was like I’d forgotten how to walk, the way I forgot how to breathe when I noticed I was doing it. But when Derek watched me, I didn’t feel like that. It was relaxing.

  Sometimes, he said, ‘How many times are you going to read that bloody thing?’

  I’d look up from the comic and feel pleased and embarrassed at the same time. I shrugged, and we both began to laugh.

  But mostly we sat and watched TV. Derek liked wildlife programmes with David Attenborough, and so did I. And he liked programmes about the Roman Empire, and so did I.

  I told him that I wanted to be an archaeologist. He said he’d wanted to be an archaeologist, too, when he was my age. He said we could go camping along Hadrian’s Wall, if I liked. He’d show me some Roman sites. There were good Viking sites, too; I liked Vikings.

  Mum didn’t quite know what to say to me. Sometimes she spoke to me as if I was still five, the age I’d been when she left us. But it didn’t matter, because Derek was there. We never ran out of things to talk about.

  After I’d read and re-read my comics many times, Derek took me to Bobby’s Book Shop. It stood on Dalry Road, not far from the cobbled corner with Duff Street. It was just across the road from Dalry Primary School.

  One side of the shop was packed high with second-hand paperbacks. Most of them were science fiction and spy books. And there were war books by Sven Hassel, the covers of which made my stomach pitch. One showed an unshaven German soldier staring into the middle distance, while behind him stretched snow and endless battle carnage: burning half-tracks and tanks. And there were many slim cowboy books by a man called Louis L’Amour.

  Derek took one of these from the shelf.

  I said, ‘Do you like cowboys?’

  ‘Louis L’Amour is very good,’ he said, and I was flattered by the gravity of his confidence. He put the book back. He said, ‘What are you looking at?’

  ‘Wheels of Terror. It’s about German tanks.’

  It was subtitled The book no German publisher dared print! Derek took it and flicked through the yellowing, musty pages, a good smell. He scanned them.

  He said, ‘I think this might be a tiny bit old for you. Why not have a look round the corner?’

  The other half of the shop was given over to second-hand American comic books. They were pinned to the walls, ranked in cardboard boxes on the floor, packed face-forward on shelves. Everything was there: Spiderman, the Fantastic Four, the Avengers, and some I’d never seen before: Deathlok, Manwolf. Each of the comics had the top, right-hand corner of its cover neatly snipped off. A price was marked in felt-tip on its front page.

  Derek gave me 50p. And he waited with something like pleasure while I searched through the hundreds of comics. They were priced 6p. I built a pile of possibles, then sat on the floor sorting further. Finally, I made my selection. I was aware of Derek watching me. Sometimes, he idly flicked through a chapter of Louis L’Amour, rocking on the balls of his little feet. He wasn’t impatient. He’d have waited all afternoon, if need be.

  I was tempted to see if that was true. But I was too excited by the pile of comics, of Spider Man grappling with Doctor Octopus, Dr Strange weaving psychedelic spatters round the lightbulb-head of the Dread Dormammu. So I passed the comics I’d chosen to the unsmiling man behind the counter, who perhaps was Bobby.

  Derek bought a cowboy novel and we walked home together. Outside, the light had changed, had moved through several notches towards darkness. I hadn’t noticed. I didn’t think Derek had, either. But Mum was anxious because we’d been gone so long.

  Derek sat in his deckchair and flicked through what I’d bought. The attention made me tense. I watched him. In the end, he passed me the comics spread in his hands like playing cards. He said, ‘Goodness gracious me’, and that was good.

  He opened his book and read while Mum made the tea, and I read my comics and the TV was on in the background. We sat there like that until it was time to eat. It was my job to separate the three little tables from their nest. We had a table each; they were teak.

  I watched Derek salt his food. He would not allow me to read while we ate, but the TV stayed on, so I watched that instead, and we talked as we ate. I was always careful not to speak with my mouth full. I wasn’t allowed.

  You could tell when Derek was due home, because Mum became more animated. She laughed more easily. She moved more quickly. When Derek walked in, it was like a flare had ignited inside her, which shone out through her eyes and teeth.

  But he always took care to say hello to me first: before he’d even taken off his camel-coloured coat and sometimes–when it rained–his little Homburg hat, made of greyish tweed.

  He didn’t ask where I’d been or what school had been like. Adults who asked that question were never interested in the answer. He just kissed my forehead and patted my shoulder and said, ‘How are you?’

  I said, ‘Good,’ and he ruffled my hair. He went to give Mum a kiss and a cuddle, then took off his overcoat. He draped it over his forearm and went to the bedroom, to hang it. Mum began to sing. She always sang when Derek came home.

  One Friday afternoon, I ran to the door when his key scraped in the lock. It was the weekend and I was excited to see him. He stood in the open doorway, surprised by the speed of my approach. I ran into his arms. He was still cold with the outside and the prickly wet strands of his coat tickled my face. He’d set his briefcase down on the cold stone floor. There was a carrier bag next to it. It was lumpy with corners.

  I said, ‘What’s that?’

  He said, ‘Go on inside and I might show you.’

  I hesitated.

  He said, ‘Go on. Chop, chop.’

  So I ran to the front room, where Mum was waiting.

  Derek came in. He was carrying his briefcase and the carrier bag. He said hello to Mum and then he sat down. He was still wearing his coat. He sat on the sofa, not on the deck
chair, and patted the seat next to him. I sat.

  Mum stayed in the kitchenette behind us. I looked at the bag.

  I said, ‘What is it?’

  ‘Well,’ said Derek, ‘it’s a present.’

  I’d already guessed that. I said, ‘What sort of present?’

  He opened the bag. One by one, he began to remove books from it: The Three Musketeers, Treasure Island, Kidnapped, Little Men, The Adventures of Tom Sawyer.

  He passed them into my hands. I looked at the covers. I flipped them over and scan-read the back cover. I piled the books next to me.

  Derek was grinning.

  He said, ‘Well? What do you think?’

  I hugged him, a quick hug because I wanted to get back to the books. He sat there, laughing at the slapdash haste of it. It was a good laugh, happy for my happiness.

  I picked up a book and began to flick through. It was all words. Page after page of them. Sometimes there was a sketchy ink drawing.

  He said, ‘Comics are all very well and good. But I think you’ll find you enjoy these just as much.’

  I said, ‘There’s a lot of words.’

  He said, ‘Yes. I think perhaps they’re a bit too much for you to tackle on your own. So, how would you like it I were to read to you? Just a little bit, every night. A chapter or two.’

  I said, ‘Yes, please.’

  It started the same evening. He perched on a little stool next to my bed. He sat very still and upright. His voice was precise and clipped, but unhurried and relaxing: it made me think of the voice doctors used when they looked in your ear. It made the stories real. The first book Derek read to me was Tom Sawyer.

  He did all the voices. Even Becky Thatcher and Injun Joe. But Tom and Huck were his favourites: Tom and Huck Finn, those best, most adventurous of friends.

  On Saturday night, he bought himself six little cans of lager. He sipped from them as we watched TV: The Two Ronnies, The Generation Game, Saturday Night at the Movies. The lager made him talk. While we were watching the Saturday film, he told me he came from a place called South Africa.

  I turned away from the TV.

  I said, ‘Have you seen lions and tigers? Not in the zoo. In the garden.’

  ‘I’ve seen lions, yes,’ he said. ‘But not so many of them in the garden.’

  He glanced at Mum.

  ‘What about tigers?’ I said.

  ‘You don’t get tigers in Africa. Tigers live in India.’

  ‘Then how come Tarzan fights them?’

  ‘I’m not sure he does.’

  ‘He does, I seen him.’

  ‘“I saw him.”’

  ‘I saw him. He was fighting a tiger and it was in the jungle.’

  He told me it was just a film. Tarzan was played by a man called Johnny Weissmuller, who was the best swimmer in the world. Derek always knew who’d been the best at things. The Romans had been best at civilization. Elvis had been best at singing. Johnny Weissmuller had been best at swimming and diving.

  Then he stood up and made a little groan. He always groaned when he stood up, and grimaced and dug his knuckles into his lower back. Then he put his hands in his pockets and smiled. He had a very wide smile, like a child’s drawing. And brown eyes that crinkled nicely at the corners.

  He went for a wee. Sometimes when he did that, he paused in the doorway–his hands were still in his pockets–and he lifted one leg off the floor and farted. It made him laugh every time, and it made me laugh, too.

  When he came back, he was carrying a tiny guitar. He sat in his stripy deckchair and put the guitar on his lap. He strummed it.

  He said, ‘This is called a ukulele.’

  I leaned close, to watch his fingers.

  He said, ‘And this is called a chord.’

  He moved his finger-tips, then strummed another chord. It took fierce concentration because it was such a tiny guitar. It made me sad, to see him bent over it. Then he began to sing;

  Irene, goodnight Irene.

  Irene, goodnight

  Goodnight Irene, goodnight Irene.

  I’ll see you in my dreams.

  An old feeling swelled up inside me. It was a memory of before I was born. It was a sad song and I was sad for the man in it. When I joined in, singing a melancholy goodnight to Irene, I felt myself becoming the man in the song. I felt weary and beaten by the world and I felt the weight of all that heartbreak and all those years.

  It grew darker. The blackness pressed in from the corners of the room. We were sitting in a shrinking bubble of blue light that sometimes flexed, shuddering in time with the silent pictures on the TV screen.

  As Derek and I sang our long goodnight to Irene, wherever she had gone, Mum watched, smiling. Then a mouse poked its head under the pantry door. It watched us. Mum threw her slipper. The mouse whipped its head inside so quickly it seemed to disappear.

  Mum said, ‘Cheeky bugger.’

  She looked at me. She had tears in her eyes.

  She said, ‘He’s a cheeky bugger, that one.’

  On Sunday, the three of us went walking in the Pentland Hills. On the bus, Derek pointed out a practice ski-slope, like a milk-spill down the side of a hill. Up close, you could see it was a thick plastic waffle, a carpet laid over grass.

  Derek wore a rucksack and hiking boots in caramel brown, with knee-length socks. Along the way, he picked up a sturdy stick to walk with. I copied him. I found a fallen branch, nearly as tall as me. It made a difference. We walked a long way, like shepherds.

  I felt different, walking up the hill. We passed free-grazing sheep. They were unperturbed by our presence and by the corpse of one of their flock. It lay eviscerated and mummifying in a dip, close by a loose-hung, barbed-wire fence. Bits of fleece fluttered in the barbs like cotton wool. The sheep’s legs were stiff and wide and its belly cavity was open and empty. An eyeless skull protruding from the fleece. There was no smell. A few flies crawled over it, but there were no maggots. I stared at it for a long time, leaning on my stick.

  I said, ‘What killed it?’

  Derek leaned on his stick, next to me.

  He said, ‘A dog, probably. Some people can’t control their dogs.’

  It was a sunny day but the wind was cold and I shivered. I leaned more heavily on my own stick. I felt old and wise, like a man in a song.

  I said, ‘Are there wolves?’

  ‘There used to be. But not any more. All the wolves have gone.’

  ‘Where?’

  ‘People killed them. Farmers. Because they killed sheep.’

  ‘And boys and girls.’

  ‘Sometimes, I expect. But if they did that, it was a long time ago.’

  I nodded.

  We trudged up the hill. At the top we sat down and looked at Edinburgh. It was the colour of the moon, thunderhead grey, even under the bright sun. Derek opened his rucksack and took out the little picnic Mum had packed: egg sandwiches, made with Heinz Salad Cream, some biscuits, tea in a tartan flask. I watched the clouds race over the city, the play of sunlight on the Firth of Forth. I strained to see the bridges which spanned it, passing into the kingdom of Fife.

  I ate the sandwiches and the biscuits, but I didn’t want the milky tea. It tasted of the plastic cup that screwed to the top of the flask. It wasn’t an unpleasant taste, but a few metres downhill was a spring, a braided rope of clear water spilling from some black rocks. It was as if, many years ago, a wizard had struck this point with his staff. And that was what I wanted to drink, water from the wizard’s spring.

  ‘It’s called a burn,’ said Derek, and he rolled his R’s and tried to sound Scottish. But he sounded like a man from a war film, a Spitfire pilot. Not the hero, who was a decent man played by John Mills, but the hero’s friend. And that thought made me ache for him, that if Derek was in a film, he wouldn’t be the hero of it.

  The way the water gobbeted from the split rock, undeviating, was hypnotic. I kneeled and prodded the water with the tip of my finger. I watched it run over my knuckles. The
n I stuck in my hand. It was shockingly cold, and it made my hand look pale. I watched the flux of light reflecting on the egg-shaped pebbles at the bottom.

  I cupped my hands and lifted them to my mouth, to drink. Most of the water spilled, wetting my shirt and thighs. I looked up. Mum and Derek were laughing. There was a spike inside me. I blushed for being clumsy and strange. But they were just happy.

  I lay flat on my stomach. I got muddy. I scooped the water into my mouth with both hands. It was good water, and the effort of getting it made it better. I drank until my stomach cramped.

  I sat next to the burn until the sick feeling passed. I was looking down on the city. It spread like mould round the green node of Arthur’s Seat and the black crag of Castle Mount. It sent out questing tendrils, Edinburgh’s roads.

  I watched birds and wandering sheep. When the sickness had gone I stood, feeling the miles walked behind my knees and in my thighs, and we gathered our things and walked down the hill, past the fake ski-slope, and we waited at the bus-stop. On the bus my head nodded and I fell asleep, resting on Derek’s shoulder, and the mud dried on the front of my shirt. At home I brushed it away; it had turned to dust.

  Derek showed me how gentlemen looked after their fingernails. They cut them off square and used a file to round the edges: a gentleman should always have square, clean fingernails.

  That was one sign of being a real man. There were many others. You were always polite. You were always clean and tidy. If you wore a tie, you made sure it was straight. Even more importantly, your shoes should always be clean. The only way to get them clean was spit and polish and good old elbow grease. (‘To get a really good shine,’ said Derek, ‘you set fire to the polish. But I’ll show you how to do that a bit later on.’) You looked someone in the eye when they were speaking to you: not out of the window or at your shoes. You always said please and thank-you. You never started eating until everybody was seated, and you never left the table without seeking permission. On buses, you offered your seat to old people and pregnant women. If they thanked you, you replied, ‘You’re very welcome.’