by George Friel
‘Take the Bolsheviks,’ said Mr Alfred. ‘Lenin and Trotsky.’
‘Take John Knox and the Scotch reformers,’ said Tod. ‘Think what they done to bonny Scotland. Nothing to what I’m doing.’
‘I’m sure,’ said Mr Alfred. ‘What they did.’
‘I’ve got friends,’ said Tod. ‘Friends in high places. You know that. You’ve met them. Your bosses. This is a New International, so it is.’
‘We’ve had four already,’ said Mr Alfred. ‘All failed.’
‘Ah, but this is the best yet,’ said Tod. ‘This one won’t fail. From Aberdeen to Vladivostok. From Omsk and Tomsk to Kirkintilloch, you’re all on the way out. All you literary bastards. It’s the end of the printed word.
Everything’s a scribble now. The writing’s on the wall. I know. I got it put there.’
‘Yes, I’ve seen it,’ said Mr Alfred.
‘You wait,’ said Tod.
‘I’ve no choice,’ said Mr Alfred.
‘I’ve got a new campaign coming up,’ said Tod. ‘I’m starting a League Against War. I’m going to call it law.’
‘An acronym,’ said Mr Alfred. ‘Like poise.’
‘I’m working on a monogram for it,’ said Tod. ‘Something simple the lads can slap up quick wherever there’s a blank space.’
‘There are still a few left,’ said Mr Alfred.
‘Even if there’s not I can do a palimpsest, can’t I?’ said Tod. ‘law everywhere. Suddenly appearing overnight. That’ll fox the public, eh? For a while anyway. I’ll let out later on what it means.’
‘I saw law somewhere,’ said Mr Alfred. ‘A great while since, a long, long time ago.’
‘Not so long,’ said Tod. ‘I tried it out on a couple of my fellows. But they didn’t take to it. And I was too busy with Ya Bass to follow up. But I’m getting on to it again now. I’m finished with yy.’
‘I never understood that one,’ said Mr Alfred. ‘Why yy?’
‘If the world belongs to the Young,’ said Tod, ‘then still more it belongs to the Young Young. I get them at school. Train up a child in the way he should go, and when he is old he will not depart from it.’
‘Proverbs,’ said Mr Alfred.
‘But I’m more interested in my League Against War now,’ said Tod.
‘I’m glad you’re against war,’ said Mr Alfred. ‘That’s always something.’
‘I’m against everything,’ said Tod. ‘To end war you’ve got to fight. I’ll get the yungins to fight against war because the aldyins are past it. You’ve had the war to end war. It didn’t work. I’m going to give you a League Against War, a law to end law. Instead of Cogs and Fangs and Tongs and Toi you’ll be seeing law everywhere you go. I’ll have a new wave of destruction in the name of law. I’ll have law ya bass and law ok and yy law. The poor public won’t know what’s going on. They never do till it’s done.’
‘What good will it do you?’ said Mr Alfred.
‘I’m not a do-gooder,’ said Tod. ‘I believe in the dialectic. The unity of opposites. Law is anarchy. That’s what I’m after. I’ll do it the way I done Ya Bass. Just a scribble here and a scribble there to start with. Nobody’ll bother. But it will spread and spread till the whole city’s covered with it. That’ll be something. The quantity becomes quality. You said that yourself.’
‘But not necessarily a good quality,’ said Mr Alfred.
‘Who said anything about good?’ said Tod. ‘It’s new.
That’s all that matters. You admitted that a minute ago. And that’s how I’ll get revenge.’
‘Why do you want revenge?’ said Mr Alfred.
‘Badness is all,’ said Tod. ‘You made me what I am today, I hope you’re satisfied.’
‘If they had slapped down Gerald Provan the first time he stepped out of line this would never have happened,’ said Mr Alfred.
‘But you don’t know it was Gerald Provan rolled you,’ said Tod. ‘You saw nothing, you heard nothing. They came up behind you. You’re only guessing. You’ve got a spite at Gerald Provan. You’re aye picking on him.’
‘The way they ought to have stopped the young ruffians in Germany,’ said Mr Alfred. ‘Before Hitler came to power at all. Terrorising decent people in the street. But no. They even said Hitler himself was all right. He just needed sympathy.’
‘The Hitlerjugend weren’t ruffians,’ said Tod. ‘They were good lads. They were organised. I could organise my lads like that. As a matter of fact I’m doing something better. Because you can’t pin a thing on me. I’ll destroy Europe without a war. You wait. You won’t get me in a bloody bunker waiting for a bomb. I’ll live to laugh.’
‘Who do you think you are?’ said Mr Alfred. ‘A new Schickelgruber?’
‘Who?’ said Tod.
‘Skip it,’ said Mr Alfred.
‘You talk the slang of the thirties,’ said Tod.
‘How do you know?’ said Mr Alfred. ‘You weren’t born then.’
‘Was I not?’ said Tod. ‘I was, I am, and I always will be.’
‘You think you’re God perhaps?’ said Mr Alfred.
‘No, the other One,’ said Tod. ‘The Adversary.’
‘The devil seeking whom he may deflower,’ said Mr Alfred. ‘Der Geist der stets verneint.’
‘That’s me,’ said Tod. ‘I say No to you and your likes.
I’m nibbling away at the roots of your civilisation. I’ll bring it down. The felt-pen is mightier than the sword.’
‘You’ve made my city ugly,’ said Mr Alfred. ‘Apart from all the stabbings and fighting in the street, this writing on the wall everywhere – it’s an offence against civilisation.’
‘Civilisation means class distinction,’ said Tod. ‘To hell with it. Life is more important than civilisation. Life is a comprehensive school. Every child is equal.’
Mr Alfred raised his hand for permission to speak.
‘May I say a poem, please?’
‘If you like,’ said Tod. ‘So long as it’s not one of yon there was a young lady of things. Can’t stand them.’
Mr Alfred elocuted.
‘My heart sinks down when I behold the boys and girls go by.’
He stopped.
‘I’m sorry,’ he said. ‘That is all I can remember.’
‘You’re getting past it, mac, that’s your trouble,’ said Tod. ‘You should be like me. Young, keen, eager. Accept the challenge. Always learning. I’ve been thinking I might even learn something from China. You know, the Red Guards. They’re fairly knocking the old ones. Taking over the trains. Go where they like. Causing alarm and dismay.
I must ask the International Secretariat for more information.’
‘You really believe you have an international movement?’ said Mr Alfred.
‘You can see I have,’ said Tod. ‘Don’t you ever read the papers, mac? I can’t lose. I’ve got a fifth column. You know that. What folk say about me and my lads, it’s like what you were saying they said about wee Adolf and his lads. They feel rejected. Give them love. Treat them nice and they’ll be nice. Treat them nasty and they’ll be nasty.’
‘It doesn’t work out that way,’ said Mr Alfred.
‘Yes, you know that and I know that,’ said Tod. ‘But you mustn’t ever say it.’
‘They made that mistake about Hitler,’ said Mr Alfred.
‘It wasn’t just wee Adolf,’ said Tod. ‘Don’t forget there was Poor Old Joe as well. He was a great pop figure too in his day before folk decided he was as big a bastard as wee Adolf. You’ll remember the pair of them were aye having their picture took with a wee lassie in their arms. You know, cuddling her. They were fond of wee girls, just like you.’
‘Excuse me,’ said Mr Alfred. ‘One only, if you don’t mind.’
Tod conceded the correction with a placatory bow and resumed his argument.
‘They failed to conquer Europe between them because they were too crude. But see me? I’m subtle. They were there to be named. Not me. I’m nowhere.’
&nb
sp; ‘Everywhere,’ said Mr Alfred.
‘They’ll never catch me,’ said Tod.
‘No, they won’t, will they?’ said Mr Alfred.
‘Those two stupid bastards wanted a State,’ said Tod. ‘I don’t. I don’t want a thousand-year Reich. I don’t want a New and Higher Form of Civilisation. I don’t want to be the Big Führer Brother Secretary-General. I don’t want to conquer Europe. I want to destroy it. Destroy its schools and libraries and public telephones. You can fight an army invading your territory. But you can’t fight me. I’m not invading you. I’m already inside. And I’m nobody.’
‘Everybody,’ said Mr Alfred. ‘When I look at what you’ve done to this city!’
‘Go thou and do likewise,’ said Tod.
He faded rather than went away.
Mr Alfred found himself out of The Flat as abruptly as he had found himself in it. He teetered at the closemouth.
‘How are you feeling now?’ said the gentle voice.
‘I’ll be all right,’ said Mr Alfred.
‘Now are you sure?’ said the young man. ‘Are you sure you’ll manage?’
‘I’ll manage fine,’ said Mr Alfred.
‘It gets worse every night,’ said the young man.
‘Yes, indeed,’ said Mr Alfred.
‘Will you get a bus all right?’ said the young man.
‘I can get one round the corner,’ said Mr Alfred.
‘I’ll leave you then,’ said the gentle voice. ‘I go this way.’
‘I go that way,’ said Mr Alfred. ‘Good night. And thanks very much.’
‘No bother,’ said the young man. ‘Good night then.’
‘Good night,’ said Mr Alfred.
CHAPTER THIRTY
When Tod left him Mr Alfred wasn’t sure where he was. He was with himself but outside himself, as if there were two of him. He looked up at the nightsky like an ancient mariner trying to take his bearings from the stars. But he couldn’t see any stars in the narrow vault between the buildings. All he saw was a crescent reflector hanging in the dark void.
‘A falcate moon,’ he said.
He repeated the words. They seemed to promise the start of a poem, but the promise wasn’t kept. He was distracted from the abortive lyric by a fear he had lost his way. When he went round the corner to get a bus there wasn’t a bus to be seen. There wasn’t even a bus-stop. He tried another corner and wandered into a hinterland of mean streets. He veered, and got into a tangle of lanes and pends. At that point he wasn’t just afraid he was lost. He knew he was lost. He was tempted to panic, but the man with him said it didn’t matter, there was always a way out.
The coffee and hamburgers he had taken in the Caballero were meant to sober him. But now he felt drunk again, and always he had the idea he wasn’t walking alone. Perhaps it was the crack on the head when he was rolled in the close. Perhaps it was his alarm at losing his way. He thought of going back to the close and starting again from there. But he had zigzagged so much he didn’t know if he was walking towards the river or away from it, going east or going west. He plodded on and round about and back again, looking for a main road, one man in him trying to hear the tape of a conversation another had recorded.
Yet for all his confusion he remembered his money. He searched every pocket three or four times. But there was no change. They were all empty. He felt he had been insulted rather than robbed. That most of his month’s salary was still safe in his hidden pocket was only what he expected. Had it been gone too he would have groaned in agony. It would have meant the end of his little private world of self-esteem, a mockery of his boast that nobody could ever rob him. The loss of a couple of pounds and a handful of silver was no hardship. It was the degradation of being a victim hurt him.
Now he had a problem. Even if he found a bus going his way he had nothing but fivers to pay his fare. It took him some time to see a taxi was the answer. He wasn’t much given to taking taxis. But it had to be done. Instead of looking for a bus route he began to look out for a cruising taxi. Nothing passed.
He tripped at a dark corner and fell on his knees. He got up shakily. He was frightened. But the other man didn’t mind in the least.
The tenements he passed looked shabby, the closes looked slummy. Peeling paint, litter, and dim lights. Everything was dim. Dim and dirty. He longed for the sun and a blue sky and a clean city. He searched his pockets again, still unwilling to believe he hadn’t even been left his bus fare. All he found in one pocket was the thick cylinder he had felt before. The felt pen, he remem¬ bered. And a thin cylinder his fingers recognised as a piece of chalk. He was always finding bits of chalk in his pocket.
‘Talk and chalk,’ he said. ‘That’s me. Out-of-date. The child is master of the man. New methods. Visual aids.
Projects. Research. Doesn’t matter half the bastards can’t read. Do research just the same. Discover Pythagoras’ theorem for themselves. Could you?’
He stumbled. The flagstones of the city’s pavements were seldom flush. He reeled.
‘Oh no! Not again!’ he cried as he lurched, head down, arms out.
But he didn’t fall. He straightened just in time and kept going. And more and more sharply as he wandered through the empty night he was aware of being outside himself, watching himself, listening to himself, not owning himself.
He twisted and turned, corner after corner. He prayed for guidance. Suddenly he came round to shops and neon lights. Then there were hoardings on one side and on the other desolate tenements with all the windows broken, a shuttered pub left standing as the stump of a demolished block, and bulldozers parked in the backcourts of vanished closes. There was nobody about. He went on. And everywhere he went he saw it.
The writing on the wall.
The writing on the wall.
Everywhere he went he saw the writing on the wall.
The writing.
The writing.
The writing on the wall.
TONGS YA BASS GOUCHO PEG OK
FLEET YA BASS YY TOI
TOWN OK
HOODS YA BASS CODY YYS
SHAMROCK LAND
TORCH RULE OK YY HAWKS MONKS YA BASS
On his right in an all-night urinal cogs ya bass.
On his left as he rocked YY FANGS ok.
Outside again, still no taxis. No buses. No people. Noth¬ ing but the writing on the wall. On every phone box, junction box and pillar box, on every shop front, bus shelter and hoarding, on every board and paling, on every bridge and coping stone there was the writing. Scrawled, scribbled, sprayed, daubed. Yellow, red, green, white, black and blue. Six, eight, ten and twelve inch letters. More writing.
REBELS YA BASS YY GRINGO TIGERS
BORDER RULE OK
YY TOON TUSKY
UZZ RULE YY CUMBIE GEMY TOI LAND
Some old inscriptions too he saw in passing, the weather-faded lettering chalked by children in ancient times.
FUCK THE POPE
SHITE
CELTIC 7–1
1690
FUCK KING BILLY CUNT
But since they seemed as out-of-date as himself he accepted them without complaint.
He saw a bus-stop with a route number that would suit him. On the metal frame of the windowless shelter there was slapdashed priesty toon tongs. priesty he identified as the name of a housing scheme the bus crews refused to service on Saturday nights because the passengers either showed a knife when asked for their fare or kicked and butted the conductor when they jumped off without paying. He swayed and grued.
He had an idea. He would phone the Lord Provost, the Daily Express and the University Principal, Mrs Trum- bell, the Curator of the Art Galleries and the Secretary of State for Scotland, he would even phone the President of the Educational Institute of Scotland. He would lodge a formal protest. He assumed he could speak to them all at once on the same line. He was all set to ask them for a start, ‘Do you folk know what’s going on?’
But the first pho
ne-box he went to was out of order. The phone was there in its cradle, sleeping peacefully, never to waken. The cord had been ripped away. His brilliant idea left him. He edged out of the box and waited on the pavement for something to happen. The Muse visited him and he recited aloud impromptu under an arc-lamp.
Was it the same in Carthage, Rome,
Babylon and Ephesus?
To hell! I might as well go home,
If only I could get a bus.
He moved on, wearied. He longed to see again what he had seen as a young soldier with the British Army of Liberation, the gilded buildings of Brussels, the Meir in Antwerp, the Dyver in Bruges, any handsome street in any gracious city. He was no countryman. He liked cities. He longed to live in one.
He forgot he was looking for a taxi. He didn’t know where he was going. He wasn’t going anywhere. He was standing still. He found that piece of chalk in his pocket again. He fumbled for it. Then he remembered the felt- pen. It was a better instrument. He took it out, unscrewed the cap, held it ready for writing. He heard Tod.
‘Go thou and do likewise.’
On a wall he wrote. Carefully, a good scribe. In bold block capitals. Four inches high.
MENE MENE TEKEL UPHARSIN
He stepped back and looked at it. He looked at his work and he thought it was good. He walked along the site, looking for another empty space. But not unnoticed. Two policemen in a patrol-car had seen him. The driver stopped at the kerb. With his mate he watched. They both watched. Frowning one. The other smiling.
‘The old bastard’s drunk,’ said King.
‘A foreign bugger,’ said Quinn. ‘What lingo’s that?’
‘No idea,’ said King. ‘He’s not a Paki, is he?’
‘Doesn’t look like one,’ said Quinn. ‘What’s he up to now?’
‘Go thou and do likewise,’ said Mr Alfred.
He wrote on the wall again.
GLASGOW YA BASS
‘Ah, now,’ said King.
‘We can’t have that,’ said Quinn.
‘It’s the first time I’ve seen anybody right in the act,’ said King. ‘I mean seen him write.’
