Orkney Twilight

by Clare Carson

  The noise of Jim moving around in the front of the Cortina snapped her back to her senses. She carefully, very carefully, lifted the haversack to one side. Removed her bag. Closed the lid of the boot. Locked it. Double-checked that she had locked it. Jim was standing by the car, scrutinizing the train’s trailer waiting for its load.

  ‘Motorail,’ he said, talking to the air, ‘I reckon it’s the only way we’ll get from one end of the country to the other at the moment without having our number-plate checked and being stopped on suspicion of travelling to join the picket lines.’

  She glanced at him out of the corner of her eye and had a fleeting image of madness; they were outlaws on the run, fleeing north, dodging police surveillance, road blocks, pulling a crafty getaway move by travelling middle-class Motorail. With a lethal weapon. A Walther. Heading to Orkney for a shoot-out in a holiday cottage. Please leave this cottage as you found it and make sure all dead bodies are disposed of in the rubbish bags provided. But that was nuttiness. Even on Jim’s sliding scale of undercover cop simmering insanity that had to be crazy. Surely.

  ‘Oh the miners’ strike,’ she said. Her comment didn’t sound quite as casual as she had intended it to be.

  Jim raised an eyebrow darkly. ‘It’s a bloody war zone out there. Chaos.’

  He flicked his wrist to check the time, the watch face on the inner side of his left wrist. She had copied his habit, wore her watch on the inside of her wrist too. Just like Jim. He’d learned that one in the army he had once told her, easier for quick time checking when you’re driving. Or using a gun.

  ‘There are a couple of things I need to sort out with the guards,’ he said.

  ‘Right. See you in a bit then.’

  She handed him back his car keys. He headed off towards a huddle of men in blue uniforms, leaving her standing alone by the car. She glared at the Cortina’s boot, pictured the Walther, swaddled in its white cloth, nestling in its pocket on the front of Jim’s haversack. She shook her head disbelievingly, turned and walked away.

  5

  The platform was humming. Passengers were milling around, climbing on board the train, jumping off again, sticking their heads out of the small gap at the top of the carriage windows, shouting at each other to go and fetch that bag from the car before the guards drove it on to the trailer. She checked the slip road. Perhaps Tom had got cold feet. Perhaps she was better off without a travelling companion anyway. After Becky she had drawn a blank, decided she would tell Liz, definitively, that she couldn’t find a friend to accompany her and she certainly was not going with Jim alone. And then Tom had phoned. Tom Spiller; only son of a doctor and a Marxist sociology lecturer at Manchester University. She had met Tom through Becky and Becky had met Tom when he came down from Manchester for a march in London. Becky fancied Tom, invited him down to stay, but it came to nothing because, it turned out, he had a steady girlfriend in Manchester. Let’s be friends, he had said and that was the end of it as far as Becky was concerned. It was Sam who stayed in touch with Tom long after Becky’s sights had shifted elsewhere. Sam didn’t care about the girlfriend. In fact she preferred it that way. She didn’t fancy Tom. He wasn’t her type. He was too porky and ginger. Although he was tall. And he was a laugh. They had fun together. Which was why she liked him.

  He had phoned to find out what she was doing over the summer. His girlfriend had flown to California for a few months to earn some money as an au pair and he was loafing around Manchester looking for an attachment or an internship or a job on a local paper, but he hadn’t managed to find anything yet. She hadn’t realized before then that he wanted to be a journalist; maybe he had told her and she hadn’t really taken any notice. She still wasn’t taking much notice when she asked him whether he’d like to come to Orkney with her to keep an eye on Jim. He had said yes instantly, pleased with the offer of a free holiday and the chance to meet Jim because Tom had always been curious about her dad.

  ‘The thing that’s interesting about you,’ he had said one evening when she was thrashing him at backgammon, ‘is that everyone else I know has grown up with liberal parents, but your dad is an authoritarian.’ It had rankled, his observation that what was interesting about her was Jim, but she had let it drop.

  ‘It would be more accurate to describe him as an authoritarian liberal,’ she had replied.

  ‘How does that work then?’

  ‘He has liberal views about the world. But if anyone disagrees with him, he tells them to fuck off.’

  At least Tom knew the score then, when he said yes.

  As soon as she had put the phone down she suspected she had made a mistake; she felt breathless, panicked. Tom, she reminded herself too late, asked too many questions, he didn’t leave you alone, he didn’t let up, she would have to spend the whole week fending him off, losing him. She wanted a sidekick, a supporter, not an inquisitor. She phoned him back to say Jim had cancelled the trip, but he was already out for the evening and the next day she was out with Becky and didn’t have time to call. After that it was Thursday. Departure day. And as she stood waiting on the platform she reassured herself with the thought that he might ask lots of searching questions, but he never took much notice of the answers because he was always more interested in forwarding his own theories than listening to anything anybody else had to say. Anyway he lived at the other end of the country, so if it all went wrong she would never have to see him again.

  And there he was now, loping self-consciously towards her. Scuffed Adidas trainers, black Peter Storm windcheater, duffle bag slung over sloping shoulder, one hand in pocket. He didn’t look like someone who might have hidden ambitions. Although he did look different from the last time they had met up. He seemed taller, sharper, clothes hanging not clinging. He had lost weight.

  ‘Okay?’ he said. He sidestepped up to her uncertainly, towering over her.

  She shuffled back, feeling small. ‘Fine. You?’

  ‘I’ve lost some weight.’

  ‘I didn’t notice.’

  ‘No chocolate or sweets during the week and no biscuits on long journeys.’

  ‘What’s that then?’ She pointed to the packet of Hobnobs sticking out of his duffle bag.

  ‘Emergency rations.’

  She nodded. ‘Always good to be prepared. Especially if you’re going somewhere with Jim.’

  ‘Where is your dad anyway?’ he asked. Nervously perhaps.

  ‘Behind you,’ said Jim. Tom turned. Startled. Caught unawares by Jim’s sudden appearance from nowhere. He was standing there looking pleased with himself. Victorious. Oh God, he was at it already. Establishing the pecking order. They shook hands, exchanged pleasantries while Jim gave Tom the gimlet eye.

  ‘Shouldn’t we be getting on the train?’ she asked with pointed exasperation.

  Jim shoved a couple of tickets in her hand. ‘You’re in there. The caboose.’ He performed his usual dismissive wave in the direction of the furthest carriage.

  ‘Where are you sleeping?’ she asked.

  He nodded vaguely at the front of the train. ‘I blagged one of the compartments with seats.’

  He set off up the platform at a pace with his haversack on his back. She squinted at the flat front pocket as he walked away, wondering what he had done with the pistol.

  ‘See you in Inverness tomorrow morning,’ he said over his shoulder before he vanished in the crowd.

  ‘We haven’t even left London and he’s given us the slip,’ said Tom.

  Sam’s stomach twinged; he was obviously taking the surveillance of Jim seriously then. That really wasn’t going to help.

  They struggled to negotiate the narrow door into the tiny cabin with its neatly made-up bunks. She felt a sudden flush of awkwardness: too close for comfort. Tom seemed unperturbed by their forced physical intimacy. He dumped his bag carelessly on the bottom bunk. She grappled with the truculent ladder, heaved and pushed herself inelegantly on to the top bunk, tried to sit up, banged her head on the ceiling. Ten minutes ag
o she had felt too small and now she was too large. She propped herself awkwardly on one elbow and interrogated the reflection of Tom in the mirror as he shuffled around in the cramped space.

  The train shuddered to life, jolted, lurched out of the cover of the station into the nicotine-stained evening haze.

  ‘We’re off,’ said Tom. ‘On our journey into the unknown.’

  ‘Your starter for ten,’ she said. ‘Name the song that begins with a summertime train journey into the unknown and ends with a death.’

  He rubbed his chin stubble with a grubby finger, ‘Oh, that sounds familiar. Let me think.’

  ‘I can give you a clue.’

  ‘No, no. I’ve got it. Kenny Rogers. “The Gambler”,’ he shouted. He started singing the first verse. She joined in the refrain. Loudly. Wildly out of tune. Laughing. There was a thump on the compartment wall.

  ‘The walls must be a bit thin,’ said Tom.

  ‘That’s us,’ she said, still snorting. ‘On a train journey to nowhere. Well, not exactly nowhere. Although it is a long way north. Fifty-nine degrees, to be precise.’

  ‘Is it really fifty-nine degrees? That’s almost as far north as Leningrad.’

  ‘Yes, and it’s too late to turn back now. We’re on the run to Orkney.’

  Her own words sobered her. She crawled down to the bottom of her bunk, lay on her stomach and peered out of the window, calculating their coordinates. The train was passing Camden. It had swung round from the west and joined the mainline north. She pinpointed Helen’s bedsit in relation to the tracks, imagined her sister getting ready for a night out at the Camden Palace. A jagged blue flash illuminated the skinny backsides of the grey terraces. The first fat drops of summer rain blitzed the window, hitting her with an inexplicable anxiety, a need to be with her sisters.

  ‘Jim’s good-looking, isn’t he?’ said Tom, ignoring the lightning streaks outside. ‘In a rugged sort of way. That rough look that women always seem to find attractive. But obviously a bit of a difficult old sod,’ he added.

  ‘I did warn you.’

  ‘So what exactly does he do anyway? You said he’s an undercover cop.’

  Sam winced.

  ‘Does he keep an eye on organizations like CND?’

  Jesus, he didn’t waste time. She caught her reflection in the train window, staring at her with its firmly pressed lips. She was losing it these days though, her self-censorship. Her ability to manage a convincing cover-up for Jim.

  ‘He doesn’t talk much about his work,’ she said.

  ‘But what do you think Jim is up to in Orkney then? You obviously think he’s up to something.’

  She shrank back into her bunk so she couldn’t be seen in the mirror, grappled with the urge to confide, wondering what she could say that wouldn’t give too much away, sound too ridiculous. Too alarming. The proclamation of impending death. Operation Asgard. The Walther.

  ‘Maybe it’s something to do with the miners’ strike.’

  ‘What, you think he’s picking up some information on the strikers from a contact to pass on to the Force or something like that?’

  ‘Maybe.’

  ‘But why would he go all the way to Orkney to do it?’

  ‘I don’t know. Maybe that’s where his contact lives. Orkney is full of dropout lefty types who might have some information on the strike. Although I suspect it’s not quite that straightforward.’

  ‘What do you mean?’

  ‘I’m not sure it’s as straightforward as him looking for intelligence on the strike to feed to the Force.’

  She shouldn’t have said that, should have kept her hunches to herself.

  ‘You mean, you think he’s feeding information to someone else?’

  ‘Possibly. I don’t know.’

  ‘Who would he be feeding it to?’

  ‘I’ve no idea really. KGB perhaps.’

  ‘Sounds a bit far-fetched. Why would the Soviets go to a cop for information about the miners’ strike? They can probably get it direct.’

  He pulled a dismissive face, irritating her instantly. What did he know about anything?

  ‘Actually, he used to hang out with the KGB.’

  ‘Did he? The KGB?’

  ‘He worked at the docks. Tilbury. He checked the boats coming from the Soviet Union and he was mates with some of the KGB agents.’

  Well, she had always assumed they were KGB agents. She sensed Tom assessing her disbelievingly; she could tell he thought she was a bit of a fantasist. She tried him with the story about the strange men from the Russia she had seen drinking at their house. Related how she had corrected their English. Tom laughed. She was momentarily chuffed by his reaction.

  ‘But even if they were KGB, they were probably really low level,’ he said. ‘More like security guards.’

  ‘Yeah, probably.’

  ‘And I really don’t see what the connection might be to a trip to Orkney twelve years later.’

  She couldn’t see a connection either. ‘I guess you’re right.’

  Rain-blurred brown semis rattled past, the dog-end of the periphery. They cracked open a couple of miniature bottles of whiskey, purchased from the buffet car. Jameson’s. One of Jim’s pearls of wisdom: if you can’t afford a single malt, buy Irish. It’ll leave you with less of a headache. Some people’s parents steered them through difficult career choices. Jim gave her guidance on what to do when faced with a confusing array of bottles behind the bar.

  ‘What are you thinking?’ Tom asked.

  Why did anyone ever ask that question? As if they seriously believed they would get an honest answer. She searched for something to say. ‘I was thinking that it’s a compulsion. It’s a way of life he’s incapable of giving up. He can’t exist with only one identity; he has to have secrets, somewhere else to escape. Sometimes I think undercover work is little more than a professional licence for men who want to avoid any form of domestic obligation. Whenever Jim is asked to do something tedious or time-consuming, he just disappears and nobody can ever ask him about it. Official secrets. Matters of national security. I reckon that’s the appeal of the spy story to men; it’s not the complexity of the politics that’s the pull, it’s the fantasy of the man with no commitments. Personal betrayal not political betrayal, that’s the draw, that’s what people are really interested in.’

  She broke off abruptly. She was rambling: one of her feminist diatribes.

  ‘Now there’s a possibility,’ said Tom.

  ‘What do you mean?’

  ‘I think that’s the most likely explanation for the sudden trip to Orkney. He’s dodging his domestic responsibilities.’

  She frowned.

  ‘He’s having an affair,’ he said triumphantly.

  ‘I had thought of that,’ she said. Of course she had thought of that. ‘But he asked Liz to go with him, which sort of rules out that theory.’

  ‘Maybe he knew she wouldn’t be able to make it anyway.’

  ‘But if he’s having an affair, why would he let us tag along?’

  ‘To give himself an alibi; a cover story to throw your mum off the trail. She obviously suspects he is having an affair and that’s why she asked you to keep an eye on him. He must have known that she suspected him, which explains why he agreed to let you go too. The double bluff.’

  ‘But why he would go all the way to Orkney to do it?’

  ‘That’s what men are like. Don’t like to crap in their own backyard. So they go on holiday without their partners, arrange to meet their bit on the side. Playing away.’

  He was checking her reaction in the mirror. She scowled. The train plunged into the darkness of a tunnel, the noise of the wheels on the tracks echoing, making conversation impossible.

  ‘At least, that’s what married, middle-aged men do,’ he said as they emerged into the dwindling light.

  She folded her arms across her chest.

  He continued, unperturbed. ‘It’s the hair.’

  She looked blank.

&n
bsp; ‘Older women always go for a bloke who still has all his hair. Do you think it’s screwed you up in any way? Having such a difficult dad?’

  ‘No. I don’t.’

  ‘You don’t think it’s stopped you from forming proper relationships with men?’

  ‘No.’

  Christ almighty. They had hardly left London, hardly passed the Heinz factory, and now he wanted to talk about relationships. She wasn’t sure which was worse – the relationship questions or the questions about Jim. Couldn’t quite tell what he was really after. In which direction his sights were set. How did she get herself boxed into this corner?

  ‘Don’t you ever worry about the repeat patterns?’ he persisted.

  ‘What?’

  ‘The repeat patterns. The cycles you can’t break. Ending up like your parents.’

  ‘I’m hardly going to end up like Jim. I’m not going to turn into an undercover cop.’

  ‘Yes, but do you have a clear idea of where you are going? If you want to move forward, you’ve got to be able to leave the past behind.’

  She shivered, worn down already from the effort of keeping the conversation from sliding off track into the undergrowth. ‘How many people,’ she said, ‘do you think Agatha Christie murdered on a train?’

  He screwed up his face. ‘That’s a tough one. I’m not sure I know the answer to that. I’ll have to work it out.’

  She tried to decipher the black letters of a sign as they steamed through a station. Milton Keynes, she guessed. Milton Keynes: home of the Open University’s headquarters.

  ‘Did I tell you his explanation for his sudden urge to return to Orkney?’ she asked.