Household Ghosts

by James Kennaway

  ‘Och, you shouldn’t have done that. Lassie, when I was your age I was a Corporal-Piper; you’ve plenty time. C’mon, we’ll make you write it again. C’mon.’ He touched her tenderly.’

  ‘Not for anything.’

  ‘Och, well,’ he said with a little kick of his head. ‘I’ll sign it for you. And shall I put mine by it?’ He got out a pencil. ‘Eh? Maybe I’ll play Hamlet yet. Hamlet it is; is it not? That’s for me, eh?’

  ‘No,’ she tried to stop him but he was determined and he reached high above her. She took it all seriously.

  ‘What’ll I put, eh?’

  ‘I’ll never talk to you again,’ she said angrily as he paid no attention to her.

  ‘What about this, eh?’ He wrote down something and then he stood back with a great grin. Pretending to be very angry she looked gloweringly at what was written. ‘Rex Harrison and Mary Titterington.’

  ‘Is that not good eh?’ He said, ‘Sexy Rexy: does that not fit the bill? Is that not me, eh?’ He waited.

  She clenched her fists, and she was shaking.

  ‘Oh, Jock,’ she said and she was suddenly in tears. ‘Christ alive, you’re a lovely man.’ She shouted out loud, ‘Oh, Jock. Jock, man, you’re a bloody king.’

  ‘Mary, Mary.’ He opened his arms and comforted her. ‘Come away with you. You mustn’t cry.’ He spoke tenderly and he held her close to him. ‘You’ll have me greeting too, and that’ll never do. That’ll never do, lassie.’

  ‘It’s not Charlie that I love,’ she said hopelessly. ‘Not Charlie at all.’

  ‘But you turned me away.’

  ‘I never, I never. I’d never turn you away. You’re too good for them all.’

  Suddenly it all seemed to frighten Jock. She was hugging closely to him and he pushed her back gently, to look at her, but she kept her face downcast.

  ‘I’m a mess,’ she said. ‘Don’t look at me, Jock. I don’t want you to look at me now.’

  He held her stiffly, and with hard lips he kissed her brow, by the border of her hair. He asked innocently, ‘Are you saying that you love me, Mary?’

  It was agony for her. ‘Jock, of course I am. Of course I am. Like any other woman that’s ever known you,’ she said and she looked up at him for a second. ‘And I’m no sure it isn’t every man, too.’

  He laughed at that. He tried to make it all a joke. ‘Here, here, now. That’s a very sophisticated sort of notion. That’s too complex for me.’

  ‘I used to be a very sophisticated girl.’ She dried her eyes.

  ‘In London.’

  ‘And Edinburgh. And here. Until I knew you.’

  ‘Did I drag you down?’

  ‘You could drag me anywhere. I’d burn at the stake – so there; that’s love for you.’ Jock let her burrow her head in his shoulder, pushing at him so his weight fell back on his heels. She clasped him tightly.

  ‘I love you, Jock; I love you: I’ve said it.’

  ‘No, no,’ he said upset, but still holding her. ‘No you mustn’t say that, lassie.’

  ‘But I do.’

  ‘You don’t really. You’re just upset.’

  ‘I do, I do.’ Her hands were clasped tightly on his arms. He soothed her again, with hands and arms, looking anxiously over her shoulder.

  ‘I tell you what, Mary. We’ll have supper tonight, eh? Morag’s left me now. Morag’s gone away. So we’ll have supper just for old times’ sake. I’ll pick you up here and we’ll go across to the Welcome. That’s what we’ll do. I’ll choose a good menu, and we’ll have a wine too, the whole thing. Just you and me, late on.’

  ‘Not just for old times’ sake.’

  He nodded, ‘No, not just for old times’ sake.’

  ‘Jock, whatever they do to you …’ but he wouldn’t let her go on. He patted her back.

  ‘I know, I know. I know you’d be good to me … Will you have supper, eh?’

  ‘Mm.’

  ‘And the wine?’

  She nodded vigorously, swallowing to control herself again.

  ‘Mm.’

  ‘Smoked salmon and the whole lot, eh?’

  ‘And coffee.’

  ‘Aye, and Drambuie too.’

  She said, ‘Then will you come back?’

  He looked at her solemnly and cautiously as she dabbed her eyes.

  ‘Mary, I’ve done you enough harm as it is. I’ve done enough damage. I’m down on my luck, but there’s no need for you …’ He couldn’t go on. He just shook his head.

  ‘I want you to come home with me.’ Her face hid nothing now. She stared at him with a sort of blank passion.

  ‘Oh, lassie, you’re kind …’ he said and he took hold of her again and hugged her tight. He closed his eyes for a moment. ‘Aye well, to hell with them all,’ he said with a great sigh, and he whispered to her, ‘and all their bloody enquiries, we’ll forget all them. We’ll make love, like the old times. Maybe again and again, after our supper. We’ll make love, lassie, we’ll make love.’

  But even as he spoke, and patted her, his mind wandered away. She seemed to sense this and she pushed closer and closer to him in despair while he looked over her shoulder into the long mirror at the sad soldier there.

  SIX

  WHEN HE REACHED the hotel he nearly turned back again. There was a giggling girl wheeling the revolving door, and her partner was chasing after her, rocking forward on his toes as he walked, with the sort of totter that irritated Jock. The girl was in a long tulle dress of grey and pink, and she had a travelling rug wrapped round her. That was the joke: she’d forgotten her coat, or thrown it out of the car window. When she arrived in the hall people turned to her. She said she was so poor she had to use Johnny’s car rug to cover her now. She thought she was rather fetching as a peasant.

  ‘Excuse me,’ Jock said. ‘If I can get past.’

  They were holding some sort of dance and the hall and lounges were crowded with people talking at a high pitch. The older men looked well polished, the younger men looked arrogant, and the middle men seemed to be searching for their parties. There was a sound of a band coming from the ballroom at the back, and people were preparing to waltz. The ladies were dragged away to the dance floor, still looking back and talking, while they searched for somewhere to leave their handbags. All the available sills and shelves were already covered with handbags of sequins and brocade.

  Amongst the white shirts and the black coats, squeezing between the bare shoulders of the women, Jock felt self-conscious in his khaki and he did not enjoy the sensation. Two or three people he knew nodded as he went through, and others a little farther away talked in urgent whispers: ‘My dear, look. There’s Jock Sinclair. What do you suppose?’

  ‘A-huh,’ Jock said, and ‘A-huh,’ as he passed.

  He got as far as the cocktail bar, but it was full of dancers. Macmillan was there, draped against the bar, talking to a lady torpedo with eyes like a fish. The dress she had chosen was salmon-pink, but she flushed a deeper colour than that when she recognised Jock.

  ‘Sandy, tell me. How absolutely awful. D’you suppose he heard? D’you suppose?’ She straightened. ‘My dear boy, I don’t care a rap if he did. Not I. But do tell me.’

  Sandy shook his head and took a sip of his drink. He nodded politely to Jock.

  ‘Not dancing?’

  Jock shouted across two heads and a torpedo’s back.

  ‘Not me. What’s the caper?’

  ‘Spinsters of the district. Spinsters’ ball.’

  Jock did not find a reply. He turned away, and the effect was of rudeness.

  ‘What was I saying?’ the torpedo said, pleased that her description of Jock’s manners should have been demonstrated so accurately. ‘Sandy, what did I say? What did I? No manners at all!’

  ‘Yes, quite,’ Sandy said, nodding, glancing sideways in search of relief.

  ‘Of course. But of course. Just what I was saying. Now Barrow Boy’s very different, but well, I always say if a man …’

 
‘He was sorry he couldn’t come tonight.’

  ‘Nonsense. He refuses everything.’

  ‘He’s awfully busy.’

  ‘Pooh, to that! My dear, let me tell you that before the war officers at the Mess – officers and gentlemen, isn’t that what they say?’

  ‘That’s right.’

  ‘Sandy, of course, you’re a gentleman. You’re always the same. Now what was I saying?’

  ‘I beg your pardon?’

  ‘Sandy, I do believe you’re not attending to me.’

  ‘Isn’t the band noisy?’

  ‘Yes. Look at that awful man now.’

  ‘Who’s this?’

  ‘That’s Sinclair, leaning over whispering to the barman like that. What a big sit-upon he has, Sandy. Not a well-bred sit-upon at all, no. I suppose the barman’s his best friend. I suppose that’s it.’

  When she looked round, Sandy had turned away.

  ‘Carol,’ he was saying. ‘How glorious to see you.’

  The torpedo just pounced on the nearest person. ‘I do think that Sinclair man is frightful, don’t you?’

  ‘Too awful.’ So the music went around and around.

  Jock went upstairs to find the manager, but he was to be disappointed. The head waiter was the only person he could find, and he quickly confirmed that there was no possibility of supper after ten-thirty. It would have to be a very special arrangement in the ordinary way, but with the dance on, it was out of the question.

  ‘Ah well,’ Jock said, apparently resigned and the head waiter was all napkin and coat-tails as he bowed good-evening. As he turned away Jock heard his name called, and there beside him was the red-haired Rattray, dressed in a kilt and tweed jacket.

  ‘Jock, it’s fine to see you,’ he said and he had had one or two. Rattray only needed one or two to set him off. Jock screwed up his eyes and nodded.

  ‘A-huh,’ he mumbled.

  ‘I’m bloody chocka with all this carry-on down the stairs. Have you ever seen the likes? I saw Simpson there, and some o’ the others. What are you up to, Jock? Eh, man?’

  Jock seemed to be far away.

  ‘Just a minute,’ he said, and he went back to the head waiter. Rattray saw him take out a pound and offer it to him but the head waiter shook his head and refused it. He looked like a professional football player: he had blue, outdoor eyes. He smiled and said ‘no’ again while Jock talked harder and harder. It might have been a matter of life and death, but the waiter shook his head. Jock was disappointed. Looking rather dazed by his failure he wandered back to the top of the staircase, where Rattray awaited him.

  Rattray started asking questions, and when Jock didn’t answer, he just asked them again. Jock shook his head.

  ‘Och, it was just about supper.’

  ‘Have you not had your supper? Man, you didn’t have lunch, I saw that. You need food. You looked washed out. Aye, you do.’

  When they came to the bottom of the stairs something else caught Rattray’s attention and he said, ‘Oh for pity’s sake look at the way that puppy’s wearing the kilt. It’s a bloody crime.’

  They had to pass this boy as they walked to the door and Jock wandered round him without difficulty, but Rattray pretended he could not get past. He braced his shoulders and he said, ‘If you’ll excuse me.’

  The young man looked round surprised.

  ‘I said if you’ll excuse me.’

  ‘I’m so sorry.’ He stepped to one side, and Rattray flicked his head like a Nazi, and marched squarely to the door. Jock was already outside and had nearly escaped him, but Rattray was soon at his side. When he was in this mood he talked right into people’s faces and now he suggested a plan of campaign to Jock. They would get a sandwich at the Palace Bar, where men were men. Jock looked wearily at the freckled face, green in the street light, the crinkly hair and the uneven teeth, and eventually he allowed himself to be taken along. He was only vaguely conscious of Rattray’s hand on his elbow and he hardly listened to his talk at all. This was probably a good thing, as Rattray was the world’s worst comforter. He kept saying how he would never have ruined Jock in the way the others were doing. He said what he would do if he were Brigade.

  ‘But we’ve got to face the facts. Brigade’s not like that. And Brigade’s no friend of yours, I’m sure: and more’s the credit to you, Jock. But we’ve got to face the facts.’

  Jock nodded and Rattray said, ‘Believe me, Jock lad, if Barrow’d called me in and not Charlie and Jimmy I’d have given him a funny answer.’

  For the first time since they had met, Jock was interested. He stopped and he said quietly:

  ‘Who did you say Barrow saw?’

  ‘Christ, did you not know?’

  ‘Who?’

  ‘Jock, I thought you knew, man.’ Rattray looked alarmed. ‘I’m no the lad to tell tales. I thought it was common knowledge.’

  ‘Who did you say?’

  ‘You’ll no tell them I told you, Jock?’

  ‘I’m not interested in telling anybody anything.’

  ‘Charlie Scott.’

  ‘Aye, I heard that.’

  ‘And Jimmy Cairns.’

  ‘Not Jimmy. You made that up. You made that up, eh?’

  ‘Jock lad, I swear …’

  ‘You can’t be right.’

  ‘Jock, I’m right enough.’

  ‘For Christ’s sake. Oh, for Christ’s sake,’ Jock said, then very suddenly he walked on. Tears were running down his cheeks. But as they walked and as Rattray went on, he recovered. Rattray did not see his tears.

  ‘Aye, Jimmy too. The both of them. They were in together. Douglas Jackson got it out of Simpson who was outside the door and I got it from him.’

  Jock said no more, but he looked and felt very cold and weary now, and he wondered if he was maybe going to collapse.

  He said once or twice that he ought to go to the theatre to leave a message but Rattray said they could do that later. Now Rattray was explaining what was wrong with the Regiment.

  ‘It’s recruited from all over. That’s what’s the matter with it. I say we ought to stick to the old way. D’you know that? Look, Jock,’ the face loomed in front of Jock again, pink-eyed and fanatic. ‘The Regiment was based on the clan system, and Scotsmen have always fought in clans. If we got back to that, then you wouldn’t be in the muck you are now. But you mustn’t worry, Jock. We’ll find a way. Here’s the Palace now.’

  ‘I don’t want to go in.’

  ‘You’d be better for something to eat.’

  ‘I don’t want anything to eat.’

  ‘Och, you will. We’ll have a wee dram first. C’mon, Jock, it’ll pull you together.’

  ‘You go in. I’m going on.’

  Rattray braced his shoulders. ‘Alec Rattray’s no the lad to desert a comrade. No, no. I’ll come in with you.’

  ‘I’ll manage on my own.’

  ‘I said I’ll come with you, Jock. Did you hear, man? I can see you’re in a state, and Alec Rattray’s not the lad to leave you. D’you follow?’

  Jock followed, and further, Jock followed his own foot-steps. He persuaded himself that he was walking home although he knew the house would be dark and cold. He would rest a while, recover, and return to the theatre. And he could get rid of this Rattray. It was a strange night now, half frosty and half damp. There was fog on the river and it crept through the streets. The cold was penetrating and depressing at the same time. When they had walked as far as the same hotel that Jock had visited an age before, just twenty-four hours before, he stopped on the threshold, and looked into the lighted hall.

  ‘Aye, here’s a place,’ Rattray said. ‘C’mon in,’ and he led the way through the same little private bar, where the same people were sitting, except for Morag and the Corporal. There was no sign of them.

  Conversation died on the lips when Jock appeared, but he seemed quite resigned to that. He made no qualifying gesture. He unbuttoned his coat, like a man shown into a sickroom, slowly, as if the buttons h
urt the tips of his fingers. He looked sadly round while Rattray gave a hearty welcome, mentioning a couple of the sergeants by name.

  ‘We’ll have two big drams,’ Rattray said, poking his head under the glass, where the landlord was crouching, like an anxious ferret.

  ‘No, we won’t,’ Jock said quietly and flatly. ‘I’ll just have a round of ham.’

  The landlord seemed satisfied by that. He looked relieved and he disappeared, repeating the order again and again to himself, as if it were a word of comfort. ‘And a round of ham; aye, and a round of ham.’

  The others resumed their conversations with the same air of studied normality that the Mess had assumed that morning, and Jock hung up his heavy coat. When he looked at them, each one looked away, but in spite of that they did not seem unfriendly. Jock smiled when he recognised that there was pity in their eyes, then he moved through the tables, slowly, touching chairs and tables as he went, in a shy and longing sort of way. His hands seemed to linger where they touched: even his eyelids seemed to pause when he blinked and turned his eyes from one group to another. He found a place in a corner and there he watched one of the sergeants who had sat down on the piano-stool and opened the piano lid. But for a while the Sergeant did not begin to play. He stared at the keys as the room grew quiet, and Rattray said, ‘Give us a tune.’

  Rattray carried the sandwich across and Jock took a bite of it, then he looked at it as if it were made of paper. He put it back on the plate and put the plate on the glass top of the table. He began to chew, and people started to talk again.

  The Sergeant at the piano let his fingers run down the scale.

  Gently he played Kelvin Grove, and then another ballad. Soon they were calling out the names of tunes, and he was playing them. Then a drink or two later, they began to sing. Jock himself did not take a drink all evening and he did not sing, but he began to look quite happy as they went through some of the favourites. To Rattray’s chagrin – ‘That’s a Sassenach tune, for Christ’s sake’ – the Sergeant played some English tunes too, but they did not sing to those, so he soon returned to the Scottish ones. Like all drunk men, they got round to the sad tunes, and they sang all the Jacobite songs with sweating vigour: The Skye Boat Song, Will ye no come back again?, Charlie is my darling, my darling. They returned for a second time to We’re no awa’ to bide awa’ and I belong to Glasgow.