I could see from the crowd dispersing outside the hall that the dance had ended and, at the same time, saw her come out. Lowering the window I called out her name. She turned, an enquiring look on her face, and came over towards the car.
“It’s me. John,” I said.
The street lighting was poor.
“John Grant,” I shouted.
“John Grant,” she repeated, in recognition at last.
I scrutinised her features as she came towards me, seeing only the inquisitive look that was to be expected.
“Did you enjoy the dance?” I asked her cheerily.
“I didn’t see you there” she replied, a look of surprise on her face. This didn’t tell me much either, and I wasn’t sure if I should even own up to having been in the hall.
“How’s the Pastor?” I asked, to change the subject.
“Dad’s fine,” she said, smiling softly. “Have you come to see him?”
‘Did the smile go with the question?’, I wondered. Was she hoping that I had come to see her father and not her, making our meeting friendly and undemanding? If so, things weren’t getting any better.
‘I’ve come to see you’ was what I wished I could say, but what had there been in her response in these first few minutes that encouraged me to say this?
“Can I give you a lift?” I offered.
“I think I’d better walk,” she replied hesitantly, increasing my overall fear of being rejected.
Glancing back in the direction she had come from, she straightened up and waved to someone I could make out in the side view mirror to be her partner at the dance.
“Anybody I know?” I asked, not happy at the appearance of a would-be rival.
“Jim Robertson. No, you won’t have met him. He’s assisting at the Church,” she explained. “A mature student in his last year at University. Could you give him a lift, too?”
I followed her gaze, watching the figure draw nearer until, leaning further out of the car window, I was introduced to him as an old friend.
This was better than just being an old acquaintance, I thought, grasping the friendly hand now being extended to me by a man with neatly combed dark hair and pleasant features.
“Which way are you going?” I asked him, not pleased that I was addressing them as a couple.
Why had I not considered this possibility before? I asked myself as they got into the car. Since I had had no intention of visiting the Pastor on this occasion, the issue that I had come here to settle had seemed straightforward. It was to determine the nature of her feelings for me. But whatever these feelings actually were, might no longer be the sole issue, I could see. What were her feelings, not just for me, but for this other man?
“Second on the right for Jim please,” she said politely.
Whatever her relationship was with this man, I couldn’t detect anything in the way she spoke to him in the car which might confirm that it was more than friendship. Although they had hardly said anything, I still felt relieved. Even more so, when he got out.
Too soon after that we had stopped outside the Manse. Thanking me for the lift, she caught my eye politely, or was it meaningfully, before she turned towards the gate.
I had to say something. But what? It didn’t seem right to ask her for a date. It was too risky at this early stage. It was safer to be a friend rather than a suitor, I decided.
“Church in the morning?” I asked casually.
“Jim’s taking the service,” she replied, stopping and turning towards me. “Dad will be away.”
“Oh right.”
“Why don’t you come.”
So friendship had worked. It wasn’t to be the brush off. Far from it. She had taken the initiative. At least in a sense she had. But I had noticed how her eyes had lit up at the mention of the other man’s name. This had to be more than just admiration for his speaking ability, more than just friendship, I feared. But no, it didn’t have to be, I finally persuaded myself.
“Can I meet you for coffee after the service?” I asked, making the most of the opportunity that had at last come my way.
“I’d like that. Of course you can.”
Driving back down through the town, I began to feel good about things, although I knew that since catching that first glimpse of her at the dance I was no further on with regard to how she felt about me. But, and it was the usual big ‘but’ that the world depended on, things might improve at our next meeting. I would, of course, do my best to see that they did.
But how many times had I said something like this? I asked myself, exasperated. To make the most of an opportunity implied that you had some control over the outcome. But the outcome depended on her feelings, not mine. I had come all this way to find out what these feelings were, not to change them. Meeting her after the service on Sunday wasn’t so much an opportunity to make the most of, it was more an occasion on which I was likely to find out if the relationship was going to go any further, or if she was going to become no more than a sad memory, only coming to mind now and then in the picture on the Sales Office wall.
chapter six
Sitting beside Andy at a corner table in the Old Toll Bar were two young women. I guessed that they would come up to a certain standard as far as their looks went, and I was right.
As I drew nearer I saw that one of them had auburn hair and as she turned and caught my eye in a friendly way I knew instinctively who she was. This was Karen, Andy’s girl. With a fair complexion and quite delicate, clearly-defined features, she made a strong impression on me right from the start.
“My friend and colleague, John Grant,” Andy informed them, with affected and light-hearted pomposity. The other girl looked up, too, and smiled. “How do you do, John?” she said warmly.
She had short, dark hair, a fuller face than Karen, and was attractive in a different way – pretty too, but slightly less sophisticated.
“What are you having, John?” Andy asked, pushing playfully against the dark-haired girl to make room for me at the table.
“Whisky,” I told him, in the clipped tone of a seasoned drinker, hoping that I had got it right.
I was glad to hear Andy coax the dark-haired girl to stay with us for the evening. I had thought at first he might have brought her along secretly to make up a foursome, but apparently not. That I was here, in unfamiliar surroundings, in the company of not just one but two such nice-looking women, surely made me rightly suspicious of my good luck, I told myself, feeling streetwise, as many a seasoned drinker was inclined to be.
“This is Karen,” Andy said, in a timely introduction. “And this is Liz”.
“So you work beside Andy?” Liz asked me, continuing to smile warmly and directly at me.
“At Bartons, yes.”
“I thought you looked too intelligent to work in there”, she declared, her apparent bluntness taking me by surprise, but her still warm smile at once taking the edge off the remark.
“Now, Liz,” Andy scolded. “John might think you don’t like him.”
“Here’s Steve and Big Tom,” Liz then exclaimed, looking towards the doorway.
The big man, walking a little in front of his companion, at first glance seemed chubby, but where a paunch might have been expected I could see there was none, only a broad waistband supported by heavy thighs that bulged through his jeans. He didn’t seem in the least bit overweight, just big and heavy.
“Everyone move round three places,” Andy ordered light-heartedly.
“Watch it,” said Tom, grinning at Andy as he took his seat.
“This is John,” Andy said to the two newcomers. “John, this is Steve. You’ve probably seen him in the workshop, and this is Tom.”
“Nice to meet you,” said the small, dark-skinned man with a neat build and black, wavy hair. “You’re in the sales office, aren’t you?”
“John,” greeted Big Tom, smiling broadly and extending his hand.
I felt distinctly out of place, although no one was treating me as if I was. They just weren’t the kind of people I was used to, although not in the sense that they were any better than my friends at the Food Importers and certainly not in the sense that they were any worse. In fact, I couldn’t see anybody looking down on them. But I couldn’t quite place them in any social group I had encountered before.
“You think I’m overweight?” I heard Big Tom ask Liz.
“No. You’re just well-fed and irresistible” she had replied soothingly.
“You’ve got it wrong Liz.” Steve cut in. “Tom’s not an irresistible force, he’s an immovable object.”
“A bit of both, maybe,” Liz answered thoughtfully and then, “So you work beside Andy?” she asked me, repeating her earlier question and turning towards me.
“Well, if you’re Andy’s friend I suppose you must be OK” she declared.
“I don’t like the way you said that,” I returned, smiling in what I hoped would seem to be a friendly challenge.
“How did I say it?”
“As if you found it surprising that I’m OK.”
“I take it back,” she said, putting her arm round my shoulder. “Are we friends? Please.”
At once I liked Liz a lot. Strangely, in spite of her forthrightness, there was a gentleness about her that reminded me of Linda, although I supposed she wouldn’t have much else in common with her. The thought of Linda sitting at the table drinking whisky was ridiculous. She came from a completely different background, another dimension, a place that I felt, especially right then, was far away and out of my reach.
“Who’s for darts?” Big Tom shouted a few rounds later, during which time I had been smiling and nodding enthusiastically, not saying much, but trying my best to fit in.
Darts weren’t for me, I realised, as I stood up to join him. Three double whiskies sipped slowly would maybe have been all right but I had gulped them down to keep up with everyone else and to make matters worse the beer had multiplied their effect. I had to sit back down.
“Anybody else?” Tom asked.
“Oh sit down and be quiet,” Liz scolded, coming over to sit closer to me.
“We’re all pissed”, Andy told Tom. “Give the darts a miss tonight big man. Come on. Finish your drink.”
Smiling at Andy in agreement, Karen pushed Tom’s half empty glass towards its owner.
“And where do you come from with an accent like that?” Liz asked, turning towards me again. “It’s nice. Really nice.”
“From somewhere else.”
“And what are the people like there?” she asked in the same tone. “Are they as nice as us?”
“Nowhere near it,” I assured her, with drink-induced enthusiasm.
She punched me playfully. “I like your friend,” she said to Andy.
The others laughed and Big Tom leaned over and patted me on the back.
“I like you too,” he said. “You’re a good bloke.”
It felt great that they were treating me like this, even if it was partly due to the effects of the whisky. I knew, of course, that Andy would have played a part in it too. He had probably told them I had passed some very good sales leads to him and that I was all right, a good bloke, as Tom had just said, although I had hoped it was a bit more than that.
Coming from Andy, I knew, as I sat there almost feeling at home now, such an accolade would carry weight. Coming here for a drink with him and meeting his friends had been a success. Not that the Pastor would see it this way, I hazily reflected. Always able to express his disapproval of things in a way that registered, the Pastor had early on given me the clear impression that he thought getting drunk was wrong. I looked about me at my companions who, in spite of this, seemed to be reliable and well-meaning people. Were they all to be assigned to the Pastor’s spiritual rubbish heap? I asked myself, irritably.
But I knew in my heart it wasn’t as simple as that. Even membership of the Church didn’t guarantee anything, the Pastor had once pointed out. On the other hand, allowing membership of the Church to people who plainly, or even not so plainly, didn’t subscribe to its basic teachings, undermined its witness and effectiveness, he had contended. And so it was only in a narrow alcohol-related and difficult to understand way that we might not qualify, I concluded, feeling a bit better about things.
That merely ‘being born’ wasn’t sufficient to get you into the Church was another of his pet ideas. As he put it, ‘your acts, your disposition and your state with regard to the moral law of God were of crucial importance’. There was a kind of entrance exam to get you in, at least into his one.
“Another drink?” Steve asked.
According to the Pastor, I thought even more hazily, unable to change my subject, a right relationship with God didn’t come automatically, as if it was your birthright. And the unrestricted access afforded to the users of a bus shelter shouldn’t be thought of as a criteria for admitting new Church members. But if you keep all kinds of people out, I couldn’t help asking myself, what did this say about the people you actually let in? Weren’t they a bit like the joggers who ran past you, because they were able to? Wasn’t an activity of this kind mainly for those who were already fit, and membership of certain churches for those who were already in? That no one could be halfway in or halfway out, according to this way of looking at things was a problem, as I saw it.
*
As Andy waved over to someone and went to speak to them at a nearby table on the other side of the bar he left a gap, that had an almost gravitational pull, beside Karen. As I settled down next to her, I thought she looked even better from close up and that she was absolutely right for Andy, definitely in the same class. They both had something about them.
As she lifted her glass I saw she had thin, well-manicured hands and thin wrists, an observation I felt at home with, one that Andy wouldn’t be inclined to object to. When I combined these pleasant rather than exciting features with some of the other things I found appealing about her I began to feel a little uncomfortable. But it still seemed all right to notice that she looked intelligent and capable.
“And where do you come from?” she asked me. “You’re not from around here, are you?”
That she had a soft voice and pronounced her words clearly was also a legitimate observation, I knew, but feeling that I was beginning to run out of suitable words to describe Andy’s girl.
“You mean my country of origin?”
“Not exactly”, she replied, a hint of coldness in her voice.
“I’m only joking,” I assured her, aware that my remark seemed to have struck a wrong note. I wanted her to like me, even if it could only be in a certain way, because of Andy. But I wasn’t succeeding. She was being far too polite and formal with me. I had to find some way of changing this.
“All right. I’ll tell you anything you want to know. In fact, I’ll tell you my mother’s maiden name, too.”
“You don’t have to go as far as that,” she said, the look on her face telling me that this remark hadn’t gone down too well, either. She didn’t seem to understand me, not the way Liz did.
“What am I missing?” Andy asked, squeezing back in between us.
“Sorry Andy, I’ll need to go,” Karen said abruptly, standing up, waving over to Liz, and smiling warmly at Andy.
*
“Enjoying yourself?” Andy asked, putting an arm round my shoulder affectionately, just like Liz had done.
“Very much,” I lied cheerily. It would have been the truth, but for the awkwardness with Karen. And she had left at the worst possible moment, just when I had needed to say something that would please her, anything!
“How do you like the crowd?” he asked.
Since my companions, by Pastor Mackenzie’s standard
s, were a bit suspect, I felt I had to assure Andy that I liked his friends. I didn’t need to convince myself.
“A great bunch,” I told him. “They’ve taken my mind off things.”
“Off fire extinguishers?”
“Off Sears, I suppose.”
“He’s getting to you?”
“I suppose he is,” I admitted reluctantly.
“The world’s crawling with people like him,” Andy said, looking at me thoughtfully.
“One’s enough for me.”
“One’s more than enough,” he returned. “That’s if you can’t do anything about it.”
“How do you mean?”
I sensed he was making a point, something that was cutting across my line of thought, but I wasn’t sure what he meant.
“I suppose we could always put a bullet in his head, or something like that,” he suggested.
“Good idea,” I returned with a conviction I didn’t feel happy about. “I maybe wouldn’t go quite as far as that,” I added quickly, not sure how serious he was.
“Well, maybe not that,” he conceded. “But something along those lines. Pressure of some kind or another.”
I still wasn’t sure if he was serious but I could tell from his manner of speaking that he was much more at home with the idea associated with the bullet than I was.
“Don’t worry, John,” he said, sensing the shakiness in my response. “It’s not a serious consideration, certainly not right now. Come on, drink up.”
“And are we going to see more of you?” Liz asked, putting her arm round my shoulder again, reminding me of the light heartedness that had begun to wear off when Karen had left, and which had almost gone as I had tried to come to terms with Andy’s remarks.
“You’re certainly going to see a lot more of me, I hope” I replied in a loud voice.
“We hope so, too,” Tom said, patting me on the back again.
Later, at the flat, my head began to clear a bit, enabling me to look again at the letter from the building society. The threat of repossession remained, undiminished, but my response had changed. Was there really nothing I could do?
Am I Being Followed? Page 5