Idea in Stone

by Hamish Macdonald

“I don’t see why he needs us,” said Stefan.

  “I think he wants someone to know he did this, since he can’t exactly go telling people.” He turned to Stefan. “Besides, I want to be there. I don’t agree with what they’re doing, either.”

  They reached the construction site. Peter pointed up at the gauzy floodlit sign that clung to the front of the building. It read “Morton: The face of tomorrow”.

  “See, that offends me,” said Peter.

  “It’s just an ad,” said Stefan. “They paid to put it there. It’s their building; they can do what they like.”

  “Well, that’s arguable,” countered Peter. “I’ll give you the fact that they’ve bought the building. But that message doesn’t just hang on the building. When you look at it, it goes into your head. They didn’t pay you for that space. It’s an invasion, a violation of your mind. Besides that, they should have worked with the amazing building that was there and done something decent. Do you think the developer was thinking about how their plans fit in with the surroundings, or whether the work they do is going to last more than ten years? No, they don’t care about any of that. They just want a big, fat contract.”

  “Okay. So this is why Rab wants to change the sign?”

  “Yeah.”

  “And we’re supposed to help him.”

  “Yeah. Hey,” said Peter, pointing at Iain, who walked toward them. “Alright, Iain?”

  “Heya,” he answered, looking ruffled. “Do you guys know what Rab is up to?”

  “More or less,” said Peter. “What’s wrong?”

  “All sorts of things, as a matter of fact. For starters, this is illegal in I don’t know how many ways.”

  “And you don’t like heights.”

  “And I don’t like heights. But that’s not the point.”

  Stefan interjected. “We’re supposed to go up there with him?”

  “That was the idea. He’s got the equipment, but he can’t operate it and paint at the same time.”

  Iain grabbed Peter’s shoulder. “Can’t you talk him out of it, please.”

  “No. I’m not going to do that.” Peter looked around. “Where’s Calum?”

  “He didn’t show up. We were at a pub earlier, and he got to chatting up this bird. You know how he is when he’s on the pull.”

  “He just left you? Nice friend,” said Peter. He turned to Stefan. “See, didn’t I warn you about Calum?”

  “Yes. Yes, you did. I’m just finding your sense of right and wrong rather interesting at the moment.”

  “Come on, Rab’ll be waiting for us. Coming, Iain?”

  “I—I can’t, Peter. You know I’d do anything for you guys, but I don’t see what—”

  “It’s okay, Iain. You shouldn’t do it if you don’t feel right about it. But I do. I’ll tell Rab something or another. Don’t worry about it.”

  “Thanks, Peter. Goodnight. I’ll see you guys. Be careful.”

  “Will do.”

  Iain walked away. He was soon blurred out of focus by the fog, then totally erased.

  “Same goes for you, Ste. Don’t feel like you have to do this just because I am.”

  “No, I—” Stefan started. But he couldn’t finish the thought. It was a lie. He shook his head. “I’m with you.”

  Peter put his arm around Stefan and they walked down a side road that led to the back of the building. Two panels of high metal mesh like the sides of shopping trolleys had been pried apart. Peter and Stefan slipped through the opening. The wall facing them had been battered open, a crumbling cave-mouth. Stefan gawked at the ruin: the building’s innards had been scooped out entirely. Work-lights illuminated the rubble, the windows, the pillars, and the ruin of it. An enormous crane rose to an impossible height in the sky. Beside it rumbled a diesel generator the size of a camper-van.

  Peter saw the expression on Stefan’s face. “This is what they do. First they gut out the buildings. They throw away all that history and style and pour in something completely bland and whitewashed. After that, they claim that it’s unsteady or something, and knock it all down to put up a block of concrete and glass and steel.”

  “I come from the place where they grow those buildings,” said Stefan. “But they belong there, because most of the time they’re just replacing an earlier version of the same thing. But I see what you mean about this.” He stepped over the desolation on the ground, all of it covered in beige dust. He stared up through the open roof at the downy feather of a moon. “Whatever goes in here, I just feel like it’s going to be—less.”

  “Okay,” said Peter, sitting down on the raised outline of a former wall, “imagine there’s this ship sailing, and as they go, the sailors throw out old parts of the ship and replace them with new plastic ones that won’t wear out. What’s even better, they’re standardised, exactly the same parts that every other plastic ship in every other port uses.”

  “Okay,” said Stefan.

  “How much of it has to be replaced before it’s no longer the original ship?”

  Stefan looked distressed. “And if it’s the same as every other plastic ship—”

  “Exactly. Soon you wouldn’t even be able to tell them apart. They’re all essentially the same ship. And if all the plastic ports all looked the same—”

  “There’s no point sailing anywhere.”

  Rab came into view, clambering over some rubble toward them. “Alright?”

  “Heya,” answered Peter, standing.

  “You boys ready?”

  “Yup,” said Peter, offering a hand to pull Stefan up from his seat. They followed Rab to the front of the building, where the window-washer’s scaffold he’d acquired lay on the ground, surrounded by cans of paint and some sign-maker’s equipment.

  “They’ve already done half the work for us. All we have to do,” said Rab, “is get these ropes through those winches up there.” They looked up to the tiny points above.

  “Yeah, piece of cake,” quipped Stefan.

  “You don’t have to scale up the wall, Ste. There’s all kinds of metalwork on the back of the wall holding it up.” Rab tied a rope around Stefan’s waist. “You and Peter will climb up that, feed the ropes through those winches, throw the ends down to me, and I’ll meet you up there with the platform.”

  “Why are we doing this? Couldn’t we just mount another protest? A better one?”

  “You saw what that did,” said Peter. “Nothing. These people have to get the message that everything isn’t for sale. There are limits to what we’ll take.” He took Stefan’s hand and led him around to the rear face of the wall, which was reinforced with a honeycomb of scaffolding. The metal pipes formed triangular shapes all the way up. Having left Rab behind at the front of the building, Peter put his hands on Stefan’s shoulders. “If you don’t want to go up there, that’s okay. I can do it in two trips.”

  “This is a totally stupid idea. Isn’t there some other—?”

  “You’re not talking me out of this Ste.” He put his hand on Stefan’s chest. “Don’t you feel that? Like you’re really alive. Isn’t that why we’re here?”

  “No, Peter. I totally believe it’s why you're here. I’m here for—” He saw an elegant ballroom spread out, overlaying the wasteland inside the building's walls. Instead of dust and crumbled brick, there was a marble floor with a mesmerising pattern laid into it. He looked up from the floor at Peter, who stood floodlit by a work-light, back in the middle of desolation. “I’m here for something else,” said Stefan, “even if I can’t say exactly what that is.” He craned his neck to look up the wall. “But you are part of why I’m here, and I’m damned if I’m going to let you risk your neck going up there twice. So let’s get this done.”

  “We’ll start here,” said Peter, moving to the wall, getting a handhold on a pipe, “and we’ll stick together till we get close to the top, then we’ll split off to either side.” Stefan nodded and placed both his hands on a pipe over his head, raised a foot onto a pipe, then wedged his oth
er foot against an opposite pipe. The metal lattice was tight, and he found it easy to climb up it. In moments he’d moved what he figured was about fifteen feet off the ground.

  Looking down to check was a bad idea, he realised, and he decided not to do it again. The pipes were cold, but his body was growing warm. His jacket, which barely kept out the damp cold earlier, now seemed too heavy. He turned to Peter and leaned back, swinging out an arm with a thumbs up. Peter smiled and returned the sign.

  They were soon close to the top of the wall. Stefan’s arms were sore, as much from nervous tension as exertion. Peter pointed to indicate that Stefan should head to his right. Stefan nodded and climbed away in that direction. The movement was awkward, not like the easy passage up the tunnel of shapes he’d been following before. He had to place both knees on one bar and reach across to move further over.

  Feathers and fluttering wings burst from the wall, brushing Stefan’s face. The startled pigeon made him miss the pole and he tumbled forward. With a loud tear, his jacket caught on the screws holding together a trio of pipes, and yanked him to a halt before he fell. He watched as his house-keys and a packet of gum dropped into the fog below. The bird landed on the bar in front of him. Stefan lunged forward for a handhold, and the pigeon beat its wings noisily, flying upward then sailing easily away. Stefan felt a pang of envy for something so free of gravity.

  He established a firm grip with one hand and a secure hold for both his feet, and wrenched the jacket free, tearing away part of the front and exposing its mottled fluff innards. Sorry, Peter, he thought, I’ll buy you a new one when this is all over. Then it occurred to him that he still didn’t have a job. What the hell am I doing? he wondered.

  Confirming that he still had his rope, he started back upward. He moved slowly and carefully, making his way to the top of the building. A sizable chunk of the original masonry was intact here, necessitating an awkward climb over the lip of the old roof. Once on top, he looked across to see Peter, who stood up, raised his arms over his head, and let out a whoop. Stefan waved from where he hunkered, and crawled to the large mechanical winch he’d been assigned.

  With the ropes in place, Rab quickly got the platform working. Stefan cringed every time Rab pressed one of the large buttons in the heavy yellow box that controlled the winches: the sound of the motors seemed excessively loud in the otherwise empty night. But in just over an hour of painting and adjusting the platform, Rab was finished.

  Back on the ground, Rab admired his handiwork. Stefan tried to enjoy the thrill of being “bad”, but was relieved it was all over. Peter, he noticed, vibrated with the excitement of it. Badness was a way of being for him, but this was a new high.

  They helped Rab load the platform and the paint into the van he’d borrowed for the occasion, then followed the trail of extension cables back to the enormous generator.

  “Oh, my keys,” said Stefan, “I dropped them while we were climbing.” He indicated his exposed fluffy side.

  “Don’t worry about it,” said Peter. “I’ve got mine. I think it’s time we got home.” Stefan could tell by the sound in his voice that the evening’s excitement made him feel even more amorous than usual.

  “Right then,” said Rab, eying the generator. He put his hands on it, searching for an opening. Without looking back at them, he said, “You guys head on home. Thanks for all your help. I’m just going to stay here for a bit. I’ve got one more thing to do.”

  Stefan and Peter said goodnight to him and walked back into the fog.

  ~

  Morton was not much of a physical presence, just a small, pale man in a black suit with expensive-looking glasses and a combed-back head of dark hair over a high, blank forehead. But he had an air of importance that made him take up a lot of space. Perhaps it was the fawning of the aides, managers, and consultants who surrounded him that created this atmosphere, but that didn’t seem to account for it. As Stefan eyed him from the crowd, he imagined that the man had possessed this quality all his life, which now made him seem to exceed his size, to have more gravity than the other human beings around him, even to absorb and reflect more of the morning’s sunlight.

  One thing was undeniable: he was fuming. His flagship building, which he was to dedicate today, now sported the words “Morton: Defacing tomorrow”. As a flourish, Rab had changed the words “To let” into “Toilet”.

  The members of the media who’d been assigned this routine piece of ribbon-cutting and self-congratulation were ecstatic at the development of a real story. The Lord Provost did his best to placate the businessman, but it wasn’t working. Peter whispered into Stefan’s ear, “He looks like he’s about to have a tanty.”

  On the contrary, though, the man straightened his tie, took a deep breath, and gave an inhumanly wide smile. He raised his hands, and silence fell. “I guess not everyone appreciates our work. But I thank you, and I thank the Lord Provost, for joining me in our commitment to make this city into a vita—”

  An explosion went off behind him, sending jets of black and orange from the windows of the empty building. The crowd dropped to the ground.

  Except for Rab. Stefan and Peter looked at him, but he was transfixed by what he’d created. His reverie was broken by the sound of twisting metal. The crane listed. The crowd watched, dumbstruck and helpless, as the enormous ninety-degree angle of metal tipped, slowly at first, then gaining speed, and its point drove like a tack-hammer into the shopping mall across the street.

  While the onlookers shrieked and gasped, Rab ran, shoving his way through them. Peter ran after him, catching the attention of the one policeman next to Morton who had his eye on the crowd. Stefan saw this and ran after Peter. The policeman, in his black uniform with a fluorescent yellow vest, spoke into a radio at his shoulder then chased after the three men.

  They ran down the pavement along a main street, then Rab bolted across traffic, his lanky legs making huge strides and his skinny arms windmilling about. Cars honked and screeched in his wake, forcing Peter and Stefan in turn to stop and zigzag to get across without being hit.

  “Rab!” yelled Peter, but they’d lost him.

  “Policeman!” panted Stefan as he reached Peter. He pushed him forward and they started running again. The officer was not far behind.

  They headed down a side street, an underbelly where old and new parts of the city met. A second officer stepped into the street ahead, not yet seeing them. Peter gave Stefan a shove, sending him reeling down a tiny brick close that ended in a triangular point. “Here I am!” yelled Peter. Stefan saw the first officer run past the close’s opening.

  Stefan sat for some time. Not knowing how or where they would take Peter, he ran back to the shopping mall, which lay under the arm of the crane whose point was buried deep in the modern structure. Its length hadn’t yet broken through the roof.

  He didn’t know anything about first aid, but joined with those who helped to get people out of the building. Ambulances arrived, and an emergency medical crew took over. There was nothing more he could do, so Stefan slipped away.

  He walked home in a daze, but realised on the way that he didn’t have a key to get into the flat. A minute away from the tenement, he heard sirens and saw police cars converging on their front door. He wondered if his father had anything to do with the pigeon who made him lose his keys.

  Unsure where to go, Stefan kept walking. He was hungry, and headed toward the grocery store, where he was sure he’d find something he could afford with the money in his pocket.

  He stopped in front of a pair of tenement buildings. There was nothing unusual about them, but he couldn’t shake the feeling that something was missing. He turned his head, and it occurred to him: The church.

  The little church with the ornate gables was gone. The neighbours walked past, none of them noticing the change. Stefan was sure he’d seen a church here earlier, but now it was gone. The space between the other buildings where it once stood was stitched up as if it had never been there.

/>   The sun slid away behind the distant hills, and the doorways of the street filled with shadows. Stefan thought of the Matholics. This is what they’ve seen. First the statues disappearing, now the buildings. And they think I have something to do with it.

  For all I know, he thought, I do.

  Twenty

  Rent Asunder

  Stefan sat in Princes Street Gardens enjoying the green of the grass, the last colour left in the city as it moved into winter. The sky hung low and threatening, and soon it opened, releasing big, soaking drops. He had to go somewhere, but for three days he’d been afraid to go home in case the police were there.

  Stefan ran through the rain toward the art gallery. It would be free to enter, and he could spend some time there. He ran along the pavement, which was wet and beige, and peopled with umbrella-carriers. The Old Town towered above at the top of the hill, its spires blacker and more sinister in the gloom. The damp cold penetrated his jacket as if he wasn’t even wearing one. He marvelled at the locals, walking in suit-jackets or light coats.

  He smiled as the man posted at the gallery entrance opened the door for him. Stefan felt shabby in his torn coat and with three days’ stubble on his face, but the man didn’t seem to mind.

  As he walked into the main floor of the gallery, Stefan was enthralled with the huge old paintings, and happy that the place was busy, even though it was a weekday afternoon. Free admission to national galleries seemed to him a wonderfully egalitarian policy, an investment by the nation in the civilisation of its people.

  The longer he stayed, though, the more he realised that the paintings were not to his taste. Portraits of nobles, and countless chubby and very Caucasian baby Jesuses made him feel weary. He decided to investigate the floor above, where the modern art was.

  In the hallway leading upstairs was a semicircular staircase split into two. The wall opposite the stairs was filled with white plaster heads on Ionic platforms—the heads of emperors, some bearded, some young. As Stefan climbed the stairs, the heads chattered nonsensically. Before he was halfway up, he had to cover his hears to shut out the din. The heads’ mouths were wide now, shouting at him, at each other, at the empty space above. He changed direction and ran back down.