by George Friel
‘Bad wee bitch that one was,’ said Yvonne. ‘Letting a drip like that feel her for a couple of bob.’
‘I bet you he’s loaded,’ said Smudge.
‘Of course he’s loaded,’ said Dianne. ‘You can see it in his eyes.’
‘Not drink, money,’ said Smudge.
‘Christ you’re right, pal,’ said Gerald. ‘The enda the month the day. The big bugger’ll have his pay in his pocket. How about rolling him?’
‘That’s what I mean,’ said Smudge. ‘You on, chookies?’
‘Wadyathink, Dianne?’ said Yvonne.
‘Fits okay with you sokay with me,’ said Dianne.
They plotted while they waited for Mr Alfred to finish his two hamburgers and coffee. They paid after he paid, stalled a moment more, and followed him out. The girls accosted him on the pavement.
‘You a teacher?’ said Dianne pleasantly.
Mr Alfred was wary. He always distrusted people who stopped him in the street, especially youths who asked familiar questions.
‘Gotta fag, mister?’
‘Gotta light, mac?’
‘Got the right time, Jimmy?’
The questions were often put to him on his way home at midnight. He didn’t like them. He never liked strangers who tried to speak to him as if they were old friends. He thought it was obvious he wasn’t a man to be spoken to without an introduction. In his opinion youths who asked a man his age for a cigarette or a match, or even the time, were much too egalitarian in their manners, even in a city famous for its democratic way of life, or else they were rascals. He believed if he looked at his watch to tell them the time they would find out what they wanted to know, that he had a watch. Then they would attack him and take it from him. Or if he stopped to take out a box of matches or a packet of cigarettes he would be off guard for just as long as that took, which would be long enough for them to surround him, and rob him. So he never stopped to answer a question.
But this was different. He was warmed to have two lissom lassies, one at each elbow, hanging on to him and flashing a smile. An old desire stretched in him, so long quiescent it had the thrill of novelty. He couldn’t tell a lie. He had to be chatty to girls so friendly, young and pretty. He had to be gallant. He was. They smiled to his smile.
‘And was you ever at Collinsburn?’ said Yvonne.
‘Yes, indeed I was,’ he said, and lurched with good will between the pair of them. ‘But I’m sorry I don’t remember either of you. Of course I didn’t have many girls’ classes.’
He felt sure he had said clashes. He laughed to laugh it off.
‘Aw, you’ll no remember me,’ said Yvonne.
‘Nur me,’ said Dianne.
‘We was at Collinsburn,’ said Yvonne. ‘But no in your class.’
‘Naw, we never got you,’ said Dianne. ‘Wasn’t we unlucky!’
She laughed. He laughed. They all laughed.
Yvonne squeezed Mr Alfred on one arm, Dianne squeezed him on the other. They hung on tight. They made conversation as instructed. They diverted him.
‘But ma wee sister knew you,’ said Dianne. ‘She was in your class.’
‘Oh yes?’ said Mr Alfred.
The press of the girls’ hands on his arms, the feel of their hips against him, the brush of their lips at his cheek as they chattered, so soothed and yet aroused him that he didn’t see he was being led astray from the main road into an empty sidestreet of old tenements.
‘So was mines,’ said Yvonne.
‘Mine,’ said Mr Alfred.
‘Same class as Rose Weipers,’ said Dianne.
‘Dyever see wee Rose now?’ said Yvonne.
‘She’s no so wee,’ said Dianne. ‘You should see the boys that’s after her.’
The thought of boys after Rose made Mr Alfred jealous. He suffered.
‘Rose?’ he said. ‘Do you two know Rose?’
‘Sure,’ said Yvonne.
‘Of course,’ said Dianne.
‘Does she ever,’ said Mr Alfred.
He didn’t get a chance to say ‘mention my name’. Gerald and Smudge came up behind him and bundled him into a close. They acted quickly and efficiently.
Gerald was tall and strong, Smudge was smaller but broad and tough in his teens. Yvonne and Dianne let it go with a muted cry as if they were as surprised as Mr Alfred. They watched at the closemouth while Gerald and Smudge roughed him. His head was forced down, their knees and fists were on him. They shoved him smartly into the back-close where they wouldn’t be seen from the street and went to work on him. They rifled him when they had him flat and got his loose silver and the two pound notes he kept handy. But they missed the rest of his salary hidden in the waistband of his trousers.
‘Was sure he’d’ve had more,’ Gerald panted.
Mr Alfred lay groaning and writhing. He whimpered.
He was in pain. The way they had cracked his head against the wall to make him give in left him seeing flashes of lightning in a granular darkness.
‘Bastard banks it quick maybe,’ said Smudge. ‘They toffs. Pay by cheque all the time. Fly.’
‘Coo-ee,’ called Yvonne.
Gerald kicked Mr Alfred again and spat on him.
‘Quick,’ said Smudge. ‘Somebody coming.’
‘He must have more somewhere,’ said Gerald.
‘Coo-ee,’ called Dianne. ‘Coo-ee.’
‘Ach, leave him,’ said Smudge.
He pulled Gerald away from starting another search and they joined the ladies. They returned deviously to the main road and took the first bus that came. They didn’t care where it was going. In a shop doorway far from the Caballero they shared the winnings.
‘Thought you said he was loaded,’ Yvonne complained at the pittance allotted her.
‘Ach, shut your face,’ said Smudge. ‘Wadyedo to earn it anyway?’
‘Was us took him,’ said Dianne.
‘Wayamoanin aboot noo?’ said Gerald.
‘A’m no moanin,’ said Yvonne.
‘Well don’t then,’ said Smudge.
‘Was worth it,’ said Gerald. ‘Just to get that big bastard. Money’s not everything, you know.’
Mr Alfred stopped groaning and writhing, stopped whimpering. He lay still in the back-close of the tenement where they left him. Fatigue and alcohol and the crack on the skull and the beating and the kicking were too much for him. He gave in. He was unconscious.
His twin stood over him saying, ‘I told you so. You asked for it. Going about the way you do.’
He waited in a dream to be rescued from a nightmare.
CHAPTER TWENTY-NINE
Someone shook him, but not roughly, whispered, ‘Are you all right, old man?’
The voice was gentle.
Mr Alfred moaned coming round, hearing it lean over him.
‘Oh, you poor old soul! How are you feeling?’
The speaker was not yet distinguished. He helped Mr Alfred up, brushed him down with judicious hands, gave him his pubcrawling cap, tidied his coatcollar, straightened his tie for him, patted his cheeks, put him against the wall. At every touch he exuded sympathy.
‘Not know me?’ said the faraway voice.
‘No,’ said Mr Alfred.
He couldn’t see yet, only hear. The close was dim. Everything was dim. He wasn’t sure he was where he seemed to be. His mind seemed someone else’s. So did his feet when he felt himself teetering on them.
The speaker came closer. There was a slight halation of his face, but Mr Alfred could see white teeth smile. The blurred lips moved in friendly speech.
‘You used to teach me. Not remember?’
‘Your face I think,’ said Mr Alfred. ‘But your name I don’t know.’
‘Tod,’ said the speaker. ‘Not remember?’
The gentle voice changed to harsh. The speaker was hurt not to be remembered.
‘No,’ said Mr Alfred. ‘No, I’m afraid I don’t.’
He apologised. He was afraid not to. It seemed to be a youth was
talking to him, and youths he knew were dangerous. They had to be spoken to respectfully.
‘Do forgive me please. I didn’t mean to snub you. Oh no, you mustn’t think that. But see it from my side.’
The young face turned into darkness, not bothering to listen. But Mr Alfred had to explain.
‘When I taught in Collinsburn I had say forty boys in a class, say three classes on my timetable every session. That’sa hundred and twenty boys a year. That’s one thousand two hundred in ten years. Not to mention girls. I had a class of girls once. It’s too many to expect any man to remember. Two thous and fourhundred boys in twentyyears. Plus girls.’
Tod came into the light again.
‘Good at the old mental, eh?’ he said. ‘I thought you was an English teacher.’
‘A teacher of English,’ said Mr Alfred. ‘I myself am not English. But even a teacher of English can do a little arithmetic.’
‘Funny old man, aren’t you?’ said Tod. ‘I’ve been watching you. You’ve got some weird ideas, so you have.’
The voice changed again. It delivered a sneer. It became aggressive. The illumined face of the speaker moved against the unseen face of the listener.
‘For the eye sees not itself,’ said Mr Alfred, ‘but by reflection. Excuse me. I’m too tired to reflect.’
‘I know all about you,’ said Tod. ‘I know what you are all right. I know what you’ve been up to.’
Mr Alfred sagged with guilt. He waited to be accused of corrupting Rose Weipers.
But Rose wasn’t mentioned.
By an abrupt transition, without hanging about for transport, he was in the house where Tod lived. It was a place he had heard of but never seen, a three-roomed house on the first floor of an abandoned tenement, condemned as unsafe, where teenagers of both sexes who had left home lived rough and slept together on the bare boards. It was called The Flat.
Tod pushed him against the kitchen sink.
‘Think you’re the great poet, eh?’ he said. ‘It’s not you, it’s me. I’m the one that’s the poet.’
‘Have you published anything?’ Mr Alfred enquired. ‘That’s the test.’
‘Of course I’ve published something,’ said Tod.
‘Where?’ said Mr Alfred.
‘Everywhere,’ said Tod.
‘What do you mean, everywhere?’ said Mr Alfred. ‘That’s a damn silly answer.’
‘Manners,’ said Tod. ‘You’re not talking to one of your pupils now, you know. You’re talking to me. Tod.’
‘I’m sorry,’ said Mr Alfred.
‘Tell me this,’ said Tod.
He sat at the derelict kitchen table, elbow on the board, a fingertip on his temple. He made it clear he was thinking.
‘Tell you what?’ said Mr Alfred.
‘What have you with all your education ever wrote to compare with Ya Bass?’
‘Your Ya Bass?’ said Mr Alfred. ‘You mean you wrote Ya Bass?’
‘It was me thought it up,’ said Tod. ‘Me and nobody else. All my own work. Alone I done it.’
‘Did,’ said Mr Alfred. ‘Coriolanus.’
‘Did,’ said Tod. ‘An act of poetic creation so it was. Don’t you agree?’
‘Yes, indeed,’ said Mr Alfred.
Tod stood behind the kitchen table, hands pulling lapels, and lectured.
‘The careful student will appreciate the vowel music and consonantal vigour of these remarkable words. He will hear the sublime derision of the street urchin’s Yah, a primitive ideophone, modulated into the polite plural You, pronounced Ya in the dialect of our northern poet. This striking economy of address is immediately followed by the masterly brevity of Bass, a monosyllable with more vehemence and malevolence than the full form Bastard, found in the work of the more cultured poets who wrote in the southern dialect. Only someone with a great poetic talent could have invented such language in a society as yet hardly civilised. It is from such vulgar eloquence that a great vernacular poetry arises.’
‘Very true,’ said Mr Alfred. ‘Dante. De vulgari …’
He was feeling frightened again. He wanted to please the lecturer.
Tod came round the kitchen table.
‘I’m glad you like Ya Bass,’ he said. ‘It’s my best poem so far. But I’ve a lot more coming up.’
‘I’m sure I’ll like them all,’ said Mr Alfred.
‘You’d better,’ said Tod.
‘Yes, I know,’ said Mr Alfred.
Tod smiled. He was pleased.
‘You used to take notes wherever you saw Ya Bass, didn’t you?’
‘That’s right,’ said Mr Alfred.
‘And you cut bits out the paper about all the fights I fixed, didn’t you?’
‘That’s right,’ said Mr Alfred.
‘Ah, you’re a great man,’ said Tod. ‘A real documen- tarian.’
‘Docs, ya bass,’ said Mr Alfred.
‘It was just the last two words I thought up,’ said Tod.
‘I left the rest to the lads themselves. It only needed a few of them to start it off.’
‘Then the sheep,’ said Mr Alfred.
‘That’s right,’ said Tod. ‘I know mine and mine know me. It gave me variety in uniformity.’
‘Unity in diversity,’ said Mr Alfred.
‘All the same only different,’ said Tod.
‘The formula is xYB,’ said Mr Alfred. ‘Where YB is a constant and x has an infinite number of values.’
‘And xYB equals CR,’ said Tod. ‘Where cr is a Cultural Revolution.’
‘Yes, indeed,’ said Mr Alfred.
‘Well, the start of one anyway,’ said Tod. ‘And if I’ve got Cogs fighting Fangs and screaming Ya Bass at each other it’s all in a good cause surely.’
‘What cause?’ said Mr Alfred.
‘Disorder,’ said Tod. ‘You can’t have a revolution with¬ out disorder, now can you?’
‘No, I suppose not,’ said Mr Alfred.
‘What we want,’ said Tod, ‘is liberty. And there’s no liberty in order. And you just think for a minute. The wars of religion were fought with men screaming Ya Bass at each other. In their own language of course. The same with the wars of nationalism. All I’ve did is reduce human conflict to its simplest terms. My boys from the north get killed fighting my boys from the south? So what? Dulce et decorum est pro housing-scheme mori.’
‘The territorial imperative,’ said Mr Alfred. ‘All you’ve done, you mean, not all you’ve did.’
‘I’ll do more before I’m finished,’ said Tod. ‘I’m young enough yet. Who’s going to stop me? Mind you, I’m proud of what I’ve did so far.’
‘What you’ve done,’ said Mr Alfred. ‘You have every reason to be.’
‘Those intellectuals,’ said Tod. ‘Small fry. They misunderstood me. They wrote Brecht Ya Bass and Beckett Ya Bass. I didn’t mean it that way at all. Some folk thought it meant Brecht and Beckett were bastards in my opinion. I never meant no such thing.’
‘Oh no, I’m sure you didn’t,’ said Mr Alfred.
‘I’ve nothing against Brecht or Beckett,’ said Tod. ‘Or any of the big guys. They have their place in literature and I have mines.’
‘Mine,’ said Mr Alfred. ‘Indeed you have.’
‘Another thing,’ said Tod. ‘The intellectuals, they only wrote it once in the one place. That was no use. They missed the whole point of the operation. I wanted Ya Bass to be ubiquitous. Like those bloody young Cratchits in that thing you read to us the week before Christmas one year. I still remember that, you know.’
‘Oh, it’s ubiquitous all right,’ said Mr Alfred.
‘Thanks to me,’ said Tod. ‘These things isn’t accidental. It was me made it ubiquitous. Poets are the unacknowledged legislators of the world. Wordsworth.’
‘Shelley,’ said Mr Alfred.
‘Pedantic old bastard, aren’t you?’ said Tod.
‘I’m sorry,’ said Mr Alfred.
‘I’m a teacher as well as you only better,’ said Tod. �
�I gave a course of lectures to a few of the lads. I told them what to do. Where to do it, like. I don’t mean just writing on walls everywhere. That was only the basic training. No, I mean action. I got Action Groups going. You know, like revolutionary cells. Three principles. Deride, deface, destroy. It was me suggested scattering the catalogues from a library for example. You saw that one yourself. And it was a good one, wasn’t it?’
‘Yes, that was a very good one,’ said Mr Alfred.
‘My lads,’ said Tod. ‘They’re all nice fellows. When you get to know them. Maybe not so bright some of them. But you can teach them. You can organise them. That’s what I done. I put it to them.’
He went behind the kitchen table again, arms waving, voice raised, and put it to them.
‘Do you want to be nobody or somebody?’
‘Somebody,’ said Mr Alfred.
‘Do you want to be pushed around or do the pushing?’
‘Do the pushing,’ said Mr Alfred.
‘Do you want to have nothing or do you want to have power?’
‘Power,’ said Mr Alfred.
‘Destroy, destroy, destroy!’
‘It’s quite safe,’ said Mr Alfred. ‘Nobody will touch you.’
‘The old folks at home will blame themselves.’
‘They’ll say it’s all their fault,’ said Mr Alfred.
‘It’s the fault of society.’
‘They must have failed you somehow, somewhere,’ said Mr Alfred.
‘It’s not your fault, lads.’
‘On my head be it,’ said Mr Alfred.
‘About! Seek! Burn! Fire! Kill! Slay!’
‘Julius Caesar,’ said Mr Alfred.
‘You are the little people,’ said Tod. ‘You are sent to rule the world.’
‘I’ve heard that before,’ said Mr Alfred. ‘Somewhere. I’ve forgotten.’
‘I’m the new Pied Piper,’ said Tod.
‘So long as you’re new,’ said Mr Alfred. ‘That’s all that matters.’
‘It was you taught me,’ said Tod. ‘Remember? In Hyderabad I freed the Nizam from a monstrous brood of vampire bats. But you know what I done when I went to Hamelin. I’ll do the same here. Lead all the weans away from you.’
‘I’m sure you will,’ said Mr Alfred. ‘What you did.’
‘Don’t forget I’m only starting,’ said Tod. ‘Every revolution is brought about by a determined minority. You take the twelve apostles.’
