It did her heart good to see the boys together on those weekends and she was genuinely sorry every time Fergus went away. He always kissed her goodbye and said, ‘Look after yourself, Mum.’ She smelled the mixture of tobacco and sour sweat from him but controlled the urge to tell him that he should wash more often. She didn’t want to spoil the loving moment. Then Andrew would go back to school, and she felt alone, with little else but the hated treadmill of housework to fill her days.
She hurried down Byres Road, not taking time to look at any of the shop windows and only taking a quick glance along Vinicombe Street to see what was on in the Lyceum. Not that she managed to go very often. In fact, she’d only been once to the cinema since Melvin had bought the television. Melvin said that it was a waste of money going to a cinema when there was plenty of entertainment in his own house. It was always his house, his television, his shop, his everything.
Her headache tightened like a band of iron around her skull. She resolved to make herself a cup of valerian or lemon balm tea as soon as she reached the shop. She always kept a stock of these herbs both in the shop and in Botanic Crescent. Herbs had been one of the things she’d become interested in in her desperate attempt to find something that would help her get off the drugs that the doctor had given her. Antidepressants and tranquillisers could be addictive, she’d been told. Not by the doctor but by a customer in the shop who’d seen her swallowing some. She believed it and was trying her best to cut down with a view to stopping altogether.
The shop was busy when she arrived and redolent with the smell of new-baked bread and spicy buns. It was the smell that attracted so many customers.
Catriona made her herb tea in the back shop and took it through to the front to sip at it in between serving. Sandra McKechnie was off again. One of the customers, a Mrs Mulvaney, said, ‘What’s that you’re drinking, hen? It looks a funny colour.’
‘Herbal tea.’
‘Herbal tea?’ The echo sounded incredulous. ‘What’s wrong wi’ a good cup of Co-op tea?’
‘Nothing. It’s just this is what helps me relax when I feel worried or have a tension headache.’
‘Huh!’ Melvin snorted. ‘Would you listen to her? What’s she ever had to worry her?’
Often Catriona remembered with infinite pity and understanding how poor Sarah Fowler murdered her mother-in-law. Many’s the time, and this was one of them, when she could have committed murder herself.
‘Here,’ Mrs Mulvaney laughed, ‘it’s time you sold some of that in yer shop, hen. There’s plenty folk around here that’s got worried and sore heads. Ye’d make a fortune.’
Melvin glared at the woman. ‘Aye, well, it’s just as well it’s not her shop. Selling dried grass could soon pull the plug on any business and it’s just the sort of stupid thing she’d do.’
He didn’t seem to know the meaning of the word loyalty and had never had any compunction about making a fool of her in front of people. He was the stupid one. He had no idea how much he kept tempting her, forcing her down the path of murder. He’d enjoy a right good laugh if she told him. He never gave her – or anyone else for that matter – any credit for anything. He was always the clever one. Well, maybe he wasn’t all that clever.
The thought of Mrs Mulvaney and what she’d said about herbs stuck in her mind. She gave Mrs Mulvaney credit for what might be quite a good idea. There might well be a market for herbs and herbal remedies. Perhaps not to sell in a baker’s shop but, if not in McNair’s bakery – where? She didn’t know the answer to that but the idea gradually formed into a dream. She began reading more and more, not only about herbs and herbal treatments, but about other alternative therapies too. It was a fascinating subject. There was such a wide variety of therapies, including aromatherapy, acupuncture and homeopathy.
‘Your nose is never out of a book these days,’ Melvin complained. ‘I’ve spent a fortune buying a television for you to watch and you sit there with your nose in a book.’ He snatched the book from her, looked at it and jeered, ‘You’re getting a right hypochondriac, reading all this weird stuff. It’s a shrink you need to see. You’re going off your nut.’
She dreamed about getting premises of her own one day and perhaps renting out consulting rooms to various therapists at the back and selling herbs and pills and potions in a shop at the front.
Oh, what a wonderful dream it was. But she could never make it a reality unless she had capital. She needed money. The only way she could think of was if Melvin died and she inherited the house and the bakery. She’d immediately sell the house. That would give her enough capital and also enough to buy a cosy wee place like the one she’d had before. She could become successful in her own right, she felt sure. In her dreams, she saw herself getting the capital and becoming successful. In reality, she knew that Melvin would insult her even from the grave. Years ago, he’d told her that he meant to leave everything to Fergus. And he would.
But there was bound to be some way. And if there was a way, she’d find it.
9
‘Get that bloody animal out of here while there’s food on the table,’ Hodge Hunter’s coarse voice sawed through the shadowy room. ‘Do ye want to poison us all with the filthy beast?’
‘Now, now,’ his wife said, half laughing but in obvious distress, ‘wee Patch is just as clean as you or me.’ But she lifted the dog into her arms and hurried with it out of the room.
Sammy kept his head down and made a pretence of enjoying his food.
‘You’re a great cook, Mother,’ he told her when she returned. ‘Every Sunday you surpass yourself. I don’t know how you manage it. This is absolutely delicious.’
The old woman’s face lit up with pleasure and gratitude.
‘Oh, I’m so glad you’re enjoying it, son.’
‘He’d say that even if it tasted like shit.’
‘You know I mean it, Mother. I always look forward to your cooking.’
He wanted to say a lot more but his mother always pleaded with him beforehand to try his best to keep quiet and not anger his father.
‘It only makes him worse, son. He just takes it out on me after you’ve gone.’
For her sake, he did his best to keep quiet. He sometimes remarked to Catriona that his father and Melvin were a right pair. Melvin was one of the few people he’d ever seen his father get on with. They sometimes met at the ex-servicemen’s club in town and reminisced about the war and their time in the forces. His father was also a Mason and always on his best behaviour at his Masonic meetings. There he was on good terms with one of the local ministers, a local doctor, a councillor and a lawyer. His father took great pride in being well thought of and respected by those he regarded as the local ‘big-wigs’. He judged Melvin, as a successful businessman, to be in this category, even though Melvin was not a Mason. Ordinary working men, his father despised. Unless they had been in the forces or had ‘fought for their country’, as he liked to put it.
The weekly Sunday visit was a terrible strain on Sammy. It upset him deeply to see how his father treated his mother, but there was nothing he could do about it. His mother refused to allow him to do anything about it. The only compensation was the stolen time his mother spent with him during the week when she was out for her shopping. Instead of going to the Co-op in Balornock, which was nearer, she’d hurry down to Springburn, do her shopping and then come to his house. He’d cook her lunch and they’d talk. Sometimes he even managed to make her laugh. She always brought the dog with her now and she would proudly show Sammy the tricks she’d taught it to perform.
As he watched her lavish love on the little terrier, he blessed the day he had given it to her. She spoke to it as if it was a true friend and it obviously gave her comfort as well as company. He had never seen her so happy, so content.
On his Sunday visits, he put up with his father’s boasts about his important Masonic friends with as much patience and good grace as he could. This was somewhat easier to do as he didn’t have such a critical opi
nion of the Masons as he had of the Orange Order. At least, as far as he could make out, the Masons weren’t religious bigots. There were Catholics, Protestants and even, so he’d been told, Jewish Masons.
However, the mere fact that his father went on and on so much about the Masons made Sammy vow never to have anything to do with them. The mere fact that his father was one of them soured his view. There must be something wrong with them if they accepted his father.
He escaped from the house and strode thankfully and speedily away, nearly forgetting to turn round and wave to his mother. Usually the sight of her thin, bent figure and pale, sad face at the window haunted him for the rest of the day, but now, clutching Patch in her arms, she waved back at him quite cheerily.
‘That dog,’ he thought to himself, ‘is causing a transformation in her. I wouldn’t be surprised if she begins to find enough strength to stick up for herself and tell the old man where to get off.’
He chuckled to himself. The way things were going, it seemed a real possibility. That made him happy. He began to whistle to himself as he strode along.
In Broomknowes Road, he bumped into Julie Vincent. She had been visiting Madge and was now on her way to see her mother-in-law. As they walked along together, Julie said, ‘I enjoy having lunch with Madge and her crowd. It’s a terrible contrast at my mother-in-law’s. It’s noisy and a bit chaotic at Madge’s but …’
‘A bit?’ Sammy laughed.
‘Well, OK, but my mother-in-law’s place is like the grave in comparison. It always depresses me. And she still goes on and on about Reggie. Never mentions her late husband. It’s always Reggie. It’s not that I want to forget Reggie, or ever will forget him, but it’s awful the way she lives in the past so much. You’d think her father and mother would tell her to snap out of it. Well, not snap out of it, not using those words exactly, but you know what I mean. Her father’s a minister. He lives next door to Catriona.’
‘Yes, I know.’
‘At least I managed to get out of lunch there today and settle for an afternoon visit. You must feel the same about Ruth. You loved her, but you don’t still go on and on about her, do you? What good does it do?’
‘No good at all. We’ve just to get on with our lives the best we can. They wouldn’t want us to be stuck in the past and made to feel miserable.’
‘No, that’s exactly what I feel, Sammy. I’ve tried to tell Mum that, but she just doesn’t listen.’
‘You’ve been good to Mrs Vincent, Julie. I don’t know how you survive these Sunday visits. The minister and his wife are usually there as well, Madge tells me.’
‘Yes. Talk about depressing? He says a long gloomy prayer when I arrive and then another one before he and his wife go away. I can’t stand Holy Willies. Oh, I’m sorry, Sammy. I forgot. You’re religious, aren’t you?’
‘Not a Holy Willie, I hope,’ Sammy laughed. ‘And I know what you mean about gloomy Sunday lunches. I’ve just come from one. My father is a regular church-goer and before every Sunday lunch, he murders Robert Burns’s ‘Selkirk Grace’. Sammy mimicked his father’s loud, coarse voice:
‘Some hae meat an’ cannae eat,
An’ some nae meat that want it.
But we hae meat,
An’ we can eat,
So let the Lord be thankit.’
Julie laughed. ‘If you don’t mind me saying so, he sounds pretty awful.’
‘I don’t mind you saying so because it’s the truth. He’s monstrously awful.’
‘I suppose you put up with your Sundays for the sake of your mother.’
‘Exactly. I’d never go near that place if it wasn’t for my mother.
‘You’ve brothers, haven’t you?’
‘Yes, but they got as far away as possible as quick as they could and I don’t blame them.’
‘Sometimes I’m tempted. To get away from Glasgow, I mean. But, apart from Mrs Vincent, I like living where I am. She tried to persuade me to move in with her. Can you imagine it? Me buried in that atmosphere all the time. I’d go stark raving bonkers. She still tries, you know.’
‘Oh, don’t, Julie. Enjoy life. Make the most of it.’
After a minute, Julie said, ‘You’re a strange man, Sammy. A real puzzle. I’ve never known what to make of you.’
‘How do you mean?’
‘Well, you belong to some religious sect like the McKechnies who live upstairs from Madge. But you don’t seem like them.’
‘I should hope not! I don’t belong to any religious sect.’
‘What is it you belong to then? Madge has told me but I’ve forgotten.’
‘The Society of Friends. Quakers.’
‘Isn’t it religious, then?’
He shrugged. ‘Not in the way you imagine.’ He thought, as he often did, of the nearest thing to dogma the Society of Friends had. It was a list of what was called ‘Queries and Advices’. One came to him now: ‘Let your life speak.’ It was the one he found most difficult.
He and Julie had to separate abruptly because Julie saw a tram car coming. ‘I’ll have to go. Nice talking to you, Sammy.’
‘And you,’ Sammy called after her. He stood for a minute watching the stylish figure in the calf-length tapered coat and flat, wide-brimmed hat race along to the tram stop, catch the pole and swing on to the tram like a seventeen-year-old girl. Yet she must be in her thirties or near enough. Unexpectedly, Sammy experienced a surge of loneliness. He was tempted to turn back and seek the noisy companionship of Alec’s place. With some difficulty, he controlled the urge. There surely must be a limit to Alec and Madge’s hospitality – for him anyway. He took advantage of their kindness far too often.
Reaching Springburn Road and his close, he took the stairs two at a time, plunged his key into the lock, then was suddenly weighed down by the silence inside the house. He could have wept. He longed for his wife. He remembered with startling vividness her loving caress. It was as if it was only a few minutes ago they’d been entwined in each other’s arms before being wrenched apart. He felt the physical pain of it. Then the anger. Anger at the bomb that had killed her. Anger at the stupidity and the cruel waste of war. Rage at his father for epitomizing all that he hated about the military. It was men like him who refused to think, who only obeyed orders, who believed in force as the only method of solving any problem.
‘A good soldier isn’t paid to think,’ he used to bawl at Sammy and his brothers. ‘A good soldier obeys orders.’
‘I know what I’d do with all your bloody Quakers,’ he was in the habit of sneering now. ‘Put them up against a wall and shoot the lot of them, as we did in the First World War. Bloody cowards!’
He knew nothing about Society of Friends, of course. Very few people did. That was the worst of not going around publicising oneself or trying to convert anyone. The fact was, right back from the time of Elizabeth Fry, members of the Society of Friends had been working on all sorts of reforms behind the scenes. Elizabeth Fry, for instance, was determined to do something to improve the lot of women prisoners in the hell-holes of jails at the time. With great courage she went in among the prisoners and worked with determination and patience to help them in every practical way she could. Eventually, she succeeded in setting in motion the reform of the whole prison system. Quakers had never lacked courage. In the past, they had been persecuted, imprisoned, tortured and killed. The authorities had forbidden them to hold their meetings, but they went on meeting together and, when all the adults had been flung into jail, the children continued, even the youngest going along. But nothing stopped them. When they were banned from universities, the legal and other professions, they went into business, becoming renowned for setting a fair price and sticking to it. People were surprised and suspicious at first but then began to trust them. Their businesses grew as a result. Firms like Cadbury’s, Fry’s, Clark’s Shoes, Horniman’s Tea, Huntly & Palmer’s biscuits, to name but a few, were all started and made a success by Quakers. Most of the Quaker firms put their profits to
good use, often building whole villages of decent, attractive houses for their employees – in stark contrast to the abysmal slums of the time.
Sammy blessed the day he had found the Society of Friends. It was the only place he felt he belonged. Not that he felt good enough, or courageous enough for that matter, to join. He had been what was called an ‘attender’ for years and, as far as the members were concerned, it seemed he could go on being an attender for the rest of his days. Nobody put any pressure on anyone to join. He wanted to become a full member and maybe one day he would. Meantime he was just grateful to be able to sit in the quiet meetings every Sunday morning. There he gained the strength to enable him to face his father across the lunch table, in the gloomy house on the rough track that led to Auchinairn. He tried to bring the peace of the meeting to his aid now in the empty silence of his house. But, in a meeting, any silence was meaningful and comforting because of the people there. And because of Christ’s words, ‘When two or more of you are gathered together in my name, I will be in your midst’, he could believe that Christ was with him and the others in Meetings. But no one was with him here. Nothing helped here, in the home he and Ruth had shared and had been so proud of.
He sank down on to a chair and angrily cradled his head in his hands.
10
Sandra McKechnie dreaded being off work. She even felt apprehensive about going home afterwards. Sleeping all night in the bakery would have been far, far better. She had come to dread every hour in the gloomy flat in Broomknowes Road, where she felt unbearably oppressed by the crush of huge Victorian furniture, a legacy from her father’s family, who had once lived in a large villa in Pollokshields. She felt overwhelmed by the dark-brown moquette settee and armchairs that sucked her into their cushioned depths. The brown chenille tablecover, with its heavy fringe and tassels, and matching curtains, that cut out the light, depressed her.
The New Breadmakers Page 6
