A Scots Quair

by Lewis Grassic Gibbon

  Robert teased, Choosing a place for your coffin? and Chris said Just that, but don’t plant me deep; and he said with a queer, sudden fear in his voice, he startled Chris and she turned to look, Lord God, how I’d hate to be ‘planted’ myself! If I die before you, Christine, see to that: that I’m sent for burning to a crematorium. I’d hate to be remembered once I am dead. Chris thought in a flash how Segget would take it, should he die and she get him a funeral like that, They’d say, most likely, that I’d poisoned you, Robert, and were trying to get rid of the evidence, you know. He laughed, So they would! and then laughed again, a second laugh that was dreary, Chris thought. My God, were there ever folk like the Scots! Not only them—you and I are as bad. Murderous gossip passed on as sheer gospel, though liars and listeners both know it is a lie. Lairds, ladies, or plain Jock Muck at the Mains—they’d gossip the heart from Christ if He came, and impute a dodge for popularizing timber when He was crucified again on His cross!

  Chris said That’s true, and yet it is not. They would feed Christ hungry and attend to His hurts with no thought of reward their attendance might bring. Kind, they’re so kind…. And the lies they would tell about how He came by those hurts of His!——

  And yet you don’t believe in a God. I’ve never asked you, but do you, Chris?

  She bent her head as she answered, No, not looking at him; but his laugh was kind. You will sometime, however you find Him.

  Then he looked at his watch, it was nearly midnight; and suddenly Chris forgot the sad things. She ran away from him and he came after, playing hide and seek, daft bairns both, in the play and wisp of the moonlight’s flow, till Chris lost breath and he caught her up: and she suddenly yawned and he said, Bedtime. And Chris minded now the thing she had planned, and lingered a minute behind his step, shy as a bride to go with him.

  The room was in shadow, for the moon had veered, Robert moved about quiet and lighted the lamp, his close- cropped hair lay smooth on his head till his clothes ruffled it up as he pulled them off. He looked over at Chris, I’m not sleepy at all. And said in that voice that he sometimes used You look very sweet, Christine, to-night. Did you know?

  She reached up then and put out the light, and changed in the dark though he laughed and asked why. She answered nothing, slipped in beside him between the cool sheets; and lying so, still, she heard her heart hammer.

  He lay quiet as well, then the curtain flapped and bellied in the breeze, and you saw like a shadow the smile on his face, it was turned to you and you turned to him; and he said in a minute, Why, Christine! solemn, and his hands came firmly under your chin to hold you so and to kiss you, stern. And you knew that you stood on the brink of that sea that was neither charted nor plumbed by men, that sea-shore only women had known, dark, with its sailing red lights of storms, where only the feet of women had trod, hearing the thunder of the sea in their ears as they gathered the fruit on that waste, wild shore ….

  So: and his lips were in yours, and they altered, and you were gladder than you’d been for years, your arm went round his bared shoulder quick … and suddenly you were lying as rigid as death. Robert said, Tired out, after all, Christine?

  For months after that she remembered that moment, her voice hadn’t come from her lips for a minute; then she said, Just a bit, and heard him draw breath, and she said again, soft, Not too tired, Robert, and had set her teeth fast after that, for an age, the thunder of that sea cut off by a wall, as she herself was, by a wall of fire; but she said not a word of either of these, stroked his hair where it clung to his brow; and he put his head on her breast and slept, after a while: and the house grew still.

  She’d sleep soon herself, she’d put that dream by, the dream of a bairn fathered by Robert—not now, maybe never, but she could not to-night, not with memory of that scar that was torn across the shoulder of this living body beside her, the scar that a fragment of shrapnel had torn—but a little lower it would have torn this body, grunting, into a mesh of blood, with broken bones and with spouting blood, an animal mouthing in mindless torment. And she’d set herself to conceive a child—for the next War that came, to be torn like that, made blood and pulp as they’d made of Ewan—Oh, Ewan, Ewan, that was once my lad, that lay where this stranger’s lying the night, I haven’t forgotten, I haven’t forgotten, you’ve a Chris that lies with you there in France, and she shan’t bring to birth from her womb any bairn to die as you, for a madman’s gab….

  Quiet, oh, quiet, greet soft lest he wake, who’s so kind and dear, who’s so far from you now. But you’ll never have a bairn of his for torment, to be mocked by memorials, the gabblings of clowns, when they that remained at home go out to praise the dead on Armistice Day.

  FAITH, WHEN IT came there was more to remember in Segget that year than Armistice only. There was better kittle in the story of what happened to Jim the Sourock on Armistice Eve. He was aye sore troubled with his stomach, Jim, he’d twist his face as he’d hand you a dram, and a man would nearly lose nerve as he looked—had you given the creature a bad shilling, or what? But syne he would rub his hand slow on his wame, It’s the pains in my breast that I’ve gotten again; and he said that they fairly were awful sometimes, like a meikle worm moving and wriggling in there. Folk said he fair did his best to drown it, and God! that was true, the foul brute would go home, near every night as drunk as a toff, and fall in the bed by the side of his wife, she’d say You coarse brute, you’ve come drunken again; but he’d only groan, with his hand at his stomach, the worm on the wriggle like a damned sea-serpent.

  Well, the Sourock and his mistress kept a pig, and the night of November the tenth Dite Peat closed up his shop and came over to kill it. He fair was a hand at a killing, was Dite, and the pig looked over its ree as he came, and knew fine what the knife and axe were for. So it started to scraich, and Dite grinned at the brute, Wait a minute, my mannie, I’ll let that scraich out. And the Sourock’s wife, that was standing by, felt queer as she saw that look on his face, she thought him a tink, but he fair could kill, not useless entirely like that gawpus Jim.

  So she asked Dite in for a dram ere he started, and down he sat with his dram and his cake, and he drank down the one like a calf with its milk and ate up the cake like a famished dog. Syne he said it was over late to-night to cut up the beast out there in the ree, he’d come over the morn and see to that, Armistice Day would be a fine time to do a bit cutting about among flesh—Fegs, mistress, I’ve seen humans carved up like pigs, like bits of beef in a butcher’s shop, and it fair looked fine, as I often thought, you couldn’t wonder at those cannibal childes——

  The Sourock’s wife asked if he’d like to see her sick, Dite said, Be sick as you like, I won’t mind; you’ve an uneasy stomach for a potman’s wife. And she broke down and grat then and said what a fool she had been to marry a creature like Jim, her that was a decent bit parlour-maid once, with her wages her own and her fine new clothes, Jim had sworn in those days he was fair tee-tee, now he drank like a drain and stank like one, too, he wouldn’t care a fig though he came of a night and found her lying dead in her bed. Dite thought, B’God, if he’d sense he’d dance! but he didn’t say that, he didn’t care a damn for the Sourock’s wife or the Sourock’s troubles, why should you care about any man’s troubles, there were damn the few that had cared for yours—not that you’d asked them, you could manage them fine.

  So he rose up and said, Well, then, I’ll go out and have a bit play with that beast in the ree.

  She asked if he’d manage the thing by himself, she was off for the night to her sister in Fordoun, soon’s she’d laid his supper for the Sourock: not that she supposed the sot would eat it, he’d come home and just stiter to his bed, as usual. Dite said he would manage fine on his own, and went out, and the Sourock’s wife a bit later heard the grunt of the pig turn into a scream, nasty to hear, and then it came shrill, and she put on her hat and took her bit bag and went out and down by the ree as she went, not wanting to look and see Dite at his work of killing he
r pig for the winter dinners. But something drew her eyes in over the ree, there was Dite Peat, he was covered with sharn, he’d tripped in a rush he had made at the pig, now he’d cornered it up at the back of the ree. Its mouth was open and its bristles on end, and it whistled through its open jaws like the sound of the steam from an engine in Segget station. So she didn’t look longer, went hurrying on, it had been a fine beast, the pig, she remembered, would stand on its trough with a pleased-like grumph as she scratched the bristles on its back and lugs, fair a couthy beast, though scared at the rats, it had once near tripped her as she stood in its ree, she thought the creature was making at her: but instead it had caught a glimpse of a rat and was trying to get behind her for safety. So she turned the corner by Moultrie’s shop and heard up in Segget the pig scream again, and she found herself hoast, like a fool of a bairn, with water in the nose—where was her hanky? And she suddenly thought of Dite Peat as a rat, a great rat with its underhung jaw and cruel eyes, creeping on the pig that was frightened at rats and had run once frightened to hide behind her—och, she was daft or soft or just both, and damn it! she couldn’t get at her hanky.

  But Dite had cornered Jim’s pig at last, as it swithered its head he saw it set fine, and swung the bit axe, the blade of it up, the pig screamed again and fell at his feet with a trickle of blood from its snout and its trotters scraping and tearing at the sharn of the ree. So Dite turned the brute over, slow, with his axe, and took out his knife and cut its throat, slow, and held the throat open to let it bleed well. Syne he slung it on his shoulder and took it to the kitchen, and hung it on a hook and left it to drip.

  It was fell dark then, as he slung the brute up, its flesh was still warm, and it minded him well of the bits of folk that a shell would fling Feuch! in your face with a smell of sharn, out in the War—He had liked it fine; there was something in blood and a howling of fear that kittled up a man as nothing else could. So he left the pig to drip in the dark, and it moved quick once, when the sinews relaxed, and Dite gave a laugh and gave it a slap.

  ’Twas near to ten when he took a bit dander back again to the Sourock’s house, a blatter of rain was dinging on Segget, sweeping and seeping up over the Howe, lying at night on the winter’s edge with its harvests in, its potato-crops with dripping shaws in the rigs of red clay. Dite pulled down his cap and lifted the sneck and went into the house of Jim the Sourock. He cracked a match and looked at the pig, it was getting on fine, had near finished to drip, he would leave it now till the morn’s night. And then—he was aye a coarse brute, was Dite Peat, though you couldn’t but laugh when you heard the tale—a grand idea came into his head, and he sat down and thought it all out and syne laughed, and took down the pig he had killed from its hook and slung it over his shoulder and went, ben to the bed the Sourocks slept in, a great box-bed that was half-covered in.

  Dite threw back the blankets and put the pig down, the near side of the bed where the Sourock’s wife slept—all the wives of Segget slept at the front, a woman aye sleeps at the front of the bed where she can get quicker out than a man, that’s sense, for the lighting of the morning fire or getting up in the dark to be sick, as a woman will, when she’s carrying a bairn, and not disturbing her man from his rest.

  So Dite dumped down the pig in the bed, and covered it up, careful and canny. And he took a bit dander up through Segget, to freshen himself, as he said, for the night; and syne he went home, for he was fell tired.

  ’Twas an hour or so later ere the Sourock came home, he’d had to clear up the bar in the Arms, and lock the doors and hand over the silver, and stoke up a fire for a traveller childe that was spending the night in the Arms’ best room. What with one thing and another that night, the drinks he had ta’en and the heat of the Arms, Jim came through Segget with a head fair spinning. As he crossed the Square he keeked at the angel, and damn’t! there were two of the things up there, he stared at the fairely stern for a while; not decent for angels to cuddle like that. But then he decided he was fell drunk, and shook his head, two angels still there, and went slithering up through the lurching East Wynd.

  Well, he got home at last through the drift of the rain, there was hardly a light to be seen in Segget, it cuddled up close in its beds and slept, with its goodmen turned to the wall and its wives wearied with a day of bairns and of claik, the bairns lying three-four in a bed, though five or six among the tink spinners, they bred like lice and they slept like them, too, Ake Ogilvie said—an ill bit speak, a man couldn’t help the bairns that came, sometimes a woman was just of the kind that would take if you gave her no more than a squeeze, the next was cannier: you just couldn’t tell.

  Well, Jim the Sourock had been lucky so far, a fell good thing, one Sourock enough; but he wasn’t thinking of that or aught else, for a while he couldn’t lay hands on his sneck. But he got it at last and let himself in, and sat down on the chair that stood by the door, and gave a great paich and rubbed at his middle.

  Syne he loosened his boots, not bothering with a lamp, he knew better than that, he might fire the damned house; so he got his boots off and left them lie there, and made for the bedroom, holding to the wall, he would know the way in his sleep by now. Then the first thing happened that jaggered his night, his knees went bang ’gainst the side of a tub; he tumbled half-way into the tub, the bottom was full of some sticky soss, the Sourock swore and lurched up to his feet and wiped his hands on the seat of his breeks, he supposed that the wife had been washing fell late—the careless bitch to leave the tub there!

  Well, he edged round about it and got to the door, and stitered inside and grumbled out loud, Do you know you’ve near broken my neck, eh, woman?

  His wife said nothing, that wasn’t surprising, considering that she was a five miles off. But the Sourock had forgotten all about that, he went shoggling and stitering about the room, pulling off his breeks and his socks, nothing else, he aye slept in his drawers and kept fine and warm. Syne he made for the bed and went in by the foot, his left hand on the hump he took for his wife. So he pushed back the blankets and got in below, and felt about with his feet awhile to lay them on his wife and get himself warm. But damn the warmth could he find the night, so he reached out to give the creature a joggle—Jean, are you wake?

  Well, the hump said nothing and the Sourock by then had his head a bit cleared through the fall in the tub. And he felt in a rage—Here, answer me, can’t you? What’s wrong with the like of you, eh, the night? And he put his hand under the blankets to feel her, so he did, and nearly shot out of the bed. Jean—God, Jean, but you’re awful cold!

  She said nothing at all and he sudden felt ill. He put out his hand, she was cold as a stone—worse than that, the hair frozen hard on her skin, the Sourock was dribbling and yammering by then, Jean, Jean, waken up; you’re near frozen stiff! And at last he could bear the thing no longer, and got from his bed and found a match and lighted it up and pulled back the blanket. And he saw a great gaping throat in the light, and the spunk went out, his yell maybe blew it.

  That was the story he’d tell to folk. For the rest, you gathered he pulled himself together, and went out to get some body go for the doctor: he was maybe a bit fuddled, but he knew what he wanted and was keeping quite calm, or so he would swear. That maybe was so, and maybe it wasn’t, ’twas strange anyway if he felt like that, that when Peter Peat heard a bellow and yammer and somebody beat on the door of his house like the angel of God on the Judgement Day—and Peter got from his bed and looked out, there was no angel but Jim the Sourock, in his sark, with no boots or breeks on either, his face and neck all covered with blood. And he yammered in the light of Peter Peat’s candle—Let’s in, Peter Peat. Oh, Christ, let me in!

  But Peter wasn’t near such a fool as do that. Go home to your bed, he said, and keep quiet. Is this a time to disturb decent folk? Go home and sleep by your goodwife’s side—— And he couldn’t say more, the creature of a Sourock was fairly daft, he decided, for he yelped like a dog hard-kicked, and vanished from the
range of Peter Peat’s eyes; and Peter closed down the window and went back, canty, to sleep by his meikle wife’s side, like a calf cuddling up to a haystack, folk said.

  The Sourock was fair demented by then, he tried the house of old Hairy Hogg, and the Provost came down and keeked through the slit that was set in the door for letters, fair gentry. And the Sourock cried Let me in, oh, I’m feared. And old Hogg said In? To your sty; you drunkard! You’re a fair disgrace to Scotland and Segget. Go home like a decent man to your wife. The Sourock vanished so quickly at that that the Provost was fair convinced he’d obeyed—ay, there still were folk had the power to rule, them that came of the Burnes blood.

  Well, where do you think that Jim ended up? Down in the house of MacDougall Brown. MacDougall let him in and heard his bit story, Cis got from her bed and came down to hear. MacDougall cried on her to go back, but she wouldn’t, she said All right, I won’t look—not decent for a lassie to look on a man when he hadn’t on breeks, or not at least till she’d married one herself, syne she’d think, said Ake Ogilvie, his breeks were fair the best bit of the bargain, and the Scythian childe that invented the things the greatest benefactor of the human race.