CHAIRMAN: Involving enormous sums of money and the delivery of sophisticated, lethal weaponry, which your company was introducing into an extremely volatile political situation.
WITNESS: The political situation was not of our making. We did nothing illegal in fulfilling that contract, if that is what you are implying.
CHAIRMAN: I am not implying anything. You must admit, though, that it seems strange that you, as CEO of a very large organisation, having responsibility to the board and your shareholders, should have neither knowledge nor curiosity as to where several million dollars of the organisation’s money should end up.
WITNESS: I don’t admit that at all. It was good for business, good for our shareholders. In that region of the world, you have to cut your middlemen some slack. We knew where the money was going.
CHAIRMAN: I don’t understand. A minute ago you said you did not know.
WITNESS: I mean, we knew in a general sense. We made the payment. If you have to make a payment to secure a contract and the payment is made and the contract is secured, well then, you needed to make the payment. Which part of that do you not get?
FEBRUARY
1 February
Coping with It
Biology had not been one of his strong subjects at school. In fact most of his understanding of how the brain and body worked was based on ‘The Numskulls’, a cartoon in The Beezer, which he had read avidly as a boy. He thought the Numskull approach to neuroscience was really pretty sound: it made sense to him that a bloke in the eye department controlled whether he bumped into walls or not. Nor was it beyond his comprehension to think of workers in overalls shovelling food down his throat while he was eating. In fact, to make their lives easier, he used to eat slowly, taking only very small mouthfuls, and chewing well before swallowing. If he showed them respect, he reasoned, there was a fair chance they’d reciprocate.
As a boy he had also believed that when he put a record on his parents’ gramophone miniature musicians would start playing behind the fabric of the loudspeaker. These guys were very versatile. They could play the Beatles or Beethoven with equal accomplishment. But if you opened the lid you couldn’t see them. They were down there in the workings of the machine but they were shy and modest.
Of course, he didn’t believe that about the gramophone any more. The advent of smaller record players, followed over time by cassette recorders, CD players, iPods and digital downloads had pretty much put paid to the notion of tiny guitarists hiding in big wooden music chests. Pure fantasy. But the Numskulls, well, it was harder to shift them from his thinking. So when the surgeon said, ‘I’m really sorry, but there’s not much we can do, it’s so advanced,’ it was easier, rather than listen to the surgeon’s technical information, to picture a whole section of the brain department having to close because of dry rot or concrete failure or something. He thought of energetic wee men becoming lethargic, wheezing and coughing, stretching their aching backs, taking longer and longer tea breaks. Not being able to function any more. Sick-building syndrome. Conceptually, he could just about cope with that.
That was it then. Sick-building syndrome. What a bastard. He felt so sorry for the wee guys.
2 February
A Bad Dream
The garage door ajar, the van backed up to it. Something was not right. I walked up the drive. My shoes made no noise on the gravel. It was my parents’ house even though they did not have a drive or a garage. Even though it did not look like their house.
My mother was not at the window. My father did not come to the door. The van had its rear doors open. I walked down the driver’s side and looked in the back: a lot of old furniture, junk mostly, as far as I could tell. They were having a clear-out, and why not? They had collected enough over the years, but would they not have told me, asked me to help? It was not inconceivable, however, that my mother had organised it, although ‘organise’ was not a word I associated with her of late. The previous week she had been about to post a wad of £10 notes to some animal charity when I arrived. I’d said, ‘If you want to give them something, that’s fine, but let me send a cheque for you.’ ‘But I want them to have this money,’ she’d replied.
‘Hello?’ I called. A man emerged from the garage, rather quickly. A bulky man, middle-aged, unshaven, in dirty overalls: he looked a bit shifty, but he smiled pleasantly enough.
‘What’s going on?’ I asked.
The man said, ‘We’re clearing the garage, like the old lady asked us to.’
‘This is my parents’ house,’ I said. ‘Where are they?’
A second man appeared from the garage. The first man might have been his father. The younger one had a mean, devious face.
‘I’m not sure that they really want to get rid of all of it,’ I said.
‘Have a look yourself,’ the older man said. ‘If there’s anything that shouldn’t be going, it’s no problem.’
I turned to inspect the van’s contents more closely. There was a lot of wood. The furniture seemed all broken. I saw a pile of my father’s sweaters.
Something was definitely not right. Just as I was thinking that I should not have turned my back on them, the blows began to fall.
3 February
The Brownie
‘In the daytime he lurked in remote recesses of the old houses which he delighted to haunt; and, in the night, sedulously employed himself to discharging any laborious charge which he thought might be acceptable to the family, to whose service he had devoted himself.’ So wrote Walter Scott of the Brownie, that strange, thin, shaggy, domestic spirit, who loved to stretch himself by the fire when no one was about, but did not perform his drudgery for that or any other recompense. In fact, if anyone sought to reward him with comfort or food, he immediately took offence and disappeared from the place for ever.
That was in an age when such superstitions found ready believers in young housemaids, old menservants and credulous farm labourers. I am not so sure, however, that the Brownies have altogether departed. There is one, at least, in our house, who tidies away so thoroughly at night that in the morning pairs of spectacles, keys, pens and suchlike are impossible to locate. And he is active during the day too. Put something down for a minute when distracted by the telephone or doorbell or a song on the radio, and when you come back it will be gone. Then the hunt begins. You retrace your steps, carefully re-enacting the last five movements you made, but the thing is away. Hours or sometimes days later, it reappears, either in the most obvious place, where you looked ten times already, or in some obscure location – in a drawer you never open, inside a book you’ve not read for months – where somebody must deliberately have hidden it. It cannot be proved, but suspicion must fall on some reincarnated species of Brownie.
But why the switch from drudge to idle mischief-maker? It’s obvious. There’s nothing left for him to do. Domestic appliances have made the Brownie redundant. So he wanders the house, cunning and evasive, lifting something here, putting it down there. It’s not housework any more, it’s a game. He is beset with lack of purpose, with ennui. His ancestors, if they could only see him, would be dismayed at his delinquency. The truth is, he no longer knows why he exists.
4 February
Jack Seeks a Wife
‘Jack, I’m aye runnin efter ye and I’ve had enough,’ his mother said. ‘Away and find yersel a wife.’
‘Och, Mither,’ Jack said. ‘I could never get a wife that would look efter me like you.’
‘Nae doot,’ she said, ‘but ye’ll need tae try. Whit ye need’s a wife that can spin, and that’ll dae ye.’
So Jack goes out and he finds a spider spinning a beautiful web, so he catches the beastie and brings it home. ‘Mither,’ he says, ‘I’ve found masel a wife, the finest spinner I ever saw. Will she dae?’
‘Jack,’ she says, ‘she can spin but she canna gie ye yer breakfast every mornin. She’ll no dae.’
So he goes out and he sees a hen that belongs to his neighbour. ‘Can I borrow yer hen?’ he
says. ‘I’ve a notion tae marry her, tae please ma mither.’
‘Aye, on ye go, Jack, ye daft bastard,’ the neighbour sighs. So Jack takes the hen home. ‘Mither,’ he says, ‘I’ve found masel a wife that’ll gie me a egg for ma breakfast every mornin. Will she dae?’
‘Jack,’ she says, ‘she can gie ye a egg every mornin but she canna gie ye a blanket for yer bed. She’ll no dae.’
So he goes out and takes a sheep off the hill and brings it home. ‘Mither,’ he says, ‘I’ve found masel a wife that’ll gie me a blanket for ma bed. Will she dae?’
Just then the laird’s man comes to the door. ‘Jack’s been stealin,’ he says. ‘He’s taen a yowe aff the hill and I’m here tae arrest him.’
‘Jack, steal a yowe?’ says his mither. ‘Dinna tell such lies. They’ve been courtin, that’s all, but she’s no guid enough for him, so ye can hae her back.’
Well, the laird’s man doesn’t fancy taking on Jack’s mother, so he grabs the beast and hurries away.
‘Mither,’ Jack says, ‘I’ve tried and tried, but I canna seem tae please ye. I doot I’ll just need tae stay single.’
‘Jack,’ she says, ‘ye’re right. If ye took a wife she might gie ye a bairn, and there isna room in this world for anither eejit like you.’
5 February
The Ethical Dimension
CHAIRMAN: The last time you came before this committee, Sir Richard, you eloquently described some of the practical and ethical issues surrounding the negotiation of defence contracts in certain parts of the world.
WITNESS: I am sure I said nothing about ethics.
CHAIRMAN: Well, it was some time ago.
WITNESS: I reread the transcripts only yesterday. I am quite clear that I did not talk about ethical matters.
CHAIRMAN: Do you not think that there is an ethical dimension to the making and selling of armaments?
WITNESS: There may be an ethical dimension when it comes to the use of armaments. If we are discussing ethics, every country has a right and indeed a responsibility to defend itself, its interests and its citizens against aggressors, would you not agree?
CHAIRMAN: With respect, Sir Richard, we are asking the questions here.
WITNESS: Ask away, but I doubt I can help you with your ethical dimension.
CHAIRMAN: So you don’t see your company’s activities ever being limited by any moral sanctions that you or your Board might choose to impose?
WITNESS: If a man wants to protect his house by installing a burglar alarm, is the man’s morality of any concern to the hardware store where he buys it? I think not.
CHAIRMAN: Surely you are being disingenuous? Would you not agree that a burglar alarm and a gun are two quite different devices? You cannot take a burglar alarm from the house and go down the street and kill somebody with it.
WITNESS: Neither can a gun kill anybody unless somebody fires it. There is no ethical dimension to a gun.
CHAIRMAN: So, in short, you don’t care to whom you sell armaments?
WITNESS: It is not a matter of not caring. We are bound by law. If the law does not allow us to sell armaments to certain countries or in certain circumstances, then we do not sell them. Your ethical dimension is covered by statute and by government policy. Do not look to me for moral guidance on this issue. Look to yourselves.
CHAIRMAN: Thank you, Sir Richard. We appreciate your giving up your valuable time to be here.
WITNESS: You are very welcome.
6 February
Possibility
There is life in the margins of all our lives – life moving in light and shadow. And sometimes it grants us a view – the blackbird taking a bath, the toad in the herb garden, owl calling to owl in the moonlit trees of the park, the mouse scurrying for cover.
But what is it, that life? Why should it bring such glad beatings of the heart, such tears to our eyes? What can those creatures possibly have that stirs our love, our envy, our grief ?
Imagine this: on the phone one night, a woman in a block of flats in the middle of a city, talking to one friend about another who was found dead only that morning. He has gone out of the world far too early, this man, and in circumstances unnecessarily sad and painful. As she is speaking, the woman looks out of her kitchen window, down into the parking area in front of the building. A hedge borders the car park, and between the hedge and the building is a shared garden, composed of a lawn and some flowerbeds. Suddenly she sees, running along behind the hedge, a big, healthy-looking fox. It crosses the lawn, slips between two cars, trots across the car park illuminated by streetlight, and gracefully leaps over a fence into the darkness.
Nothing special about that, you might say: there are urban foxes everywhere. But the woman has only ever seen a fox here once before, months earlier, and on that occasion she was also on the phone, speaking about another friend who had died that day. And because of this coincidence – which is in all probability no more than that, a coincidence – she cannot help but tell her friend on the phone what has happened, and ask aloud, but also into herself, what the significance of seeing the fox might be. What can it possibly mean?
Maybe just that: possibility. To be the fox in the streetlight, the owl in the moonlight. To be the toad beneath the sage bush, the mouse running for its life. Nothing else. To be the blackbird, most beautiful of singers, and not know of what or why we are singing.
7 February
Simon of the Peat Bog Moor
Simon Stoblichties was not like other men. Some said he was mad, others that he was the only sane man in a world of madness. Whatever the truth, Simon retreated from society and went out onto the peat bog moor to commune with God, if He was there, and with the mystery of the Universe if He was not.
An old tree that had been struck by lightning stood on the moor, stark, solitary and without its crown. Aided by a carpenter from the nearest village (three miles away), Simon built a small wooden platform. They hoisted it to the top of the tree and fixed it there, and then Simon climbed up, to ‘wait out the bad times’ as he put it.
The carpenter, impressed by Simon’s single-mindedness, promised to send his son to him every few days with food – whatever scraps could be spared. The boy duly came, and Simon would lower a rope and pull up a basket containing the gift, and also send down a bucket containing his waste, which the boy disposed of in a deep part of the bog. Water Simon would not take, relying on heaven for his supply, which meant that for ten months of the year he rotted and during the other two almost died of thirst.
Day after day, through all the seasons, Simon stood on his platform, facing now north, now south, now east, now west. He habitually turned towards the most inclement weather, from whichever direction it came, and seemed glad to suffer its depredations. Only in the very severest conditions would he wrap himself in some old blankets and animal skins supplied by the villagers. Usually he eschewed all coverings, and stood naked before rain, wind, hail and snow. But he never complained, not even on rare summer days, when the scorching sun combined with ferocious biting insects to torment him.
For thirty-seven years, Simon Stoblichties watched sentry-like over the moor. His beard grew to his knees, he outlived the carpenter, and the carpenter’s son was a middle-aged man before Simon died. But whether the bad times were past by then, and whether he ever communed with God, nobody could be certain.
8 February
The Testing of Simon
‘See that Simon Stoblichties,’ the villagers said, ‘he’s aff his heid, a total bampot.’
The carpenter said, ‘Maybe, but he does us no harm, and he’s three miles away. Let him be.’
Some of the village children went to throw stones at Simon. But it was a long walk, and no matter how often or how hard they hit him they could not make him cry out. He received their missiles as he received the weather, almost joyfully. The children grew bored and went home.
Then came the minister. He was not happy having Simon in his parish. He saw him as a rival, a trespasser, a
mad vagrant who should be moved on. Or he might not be mad, but a servant of the Devil. The minister consulted with his elders, and they decided to put Simon to the test.
‘We will go out to the peat bog moor,’ the minister said, ‘and I will order him to come down from his perch and acknowledge my authority. And God’s, of course. If he refuses, we will chop down his tree, and drive him from the parish.’
‘What if he obeys?’ one doubter asked.
‘That is unlikely,’ the minister replied. ‘We’ll take an axe anyway.’
So he and five elders picked their way across the moor like six black crows in a line, and when they reached the place where Simon was, the minister called up to him.
‘Simon Stoblichties, in the name of the one true God, I command thee, come down from thy perch and acknowledge my authority. And God’s too.’
To their surprise Simon, having tied a sheepskin around his waist to make himself decent, came down the tree like a squirrel. Without hesitation he said, ‘I acknowledge the one true God and His minister. Will there be anything else?’
‘Oh,’ the minister said. ‘Well, no, that’s grand, thank you very much. Goodbye.’ And the six crows hopped away, confused and disappointed.
However, by the time they were back at the manse, refreshing themselves with tea and whisky, they were congratulating themselves on their triumph.
‘It’s as well he submitted,’ the doubting elder remarked. ‘The blade on this axe wouldn’t chop butter.’
9 February
The Tolerance of Simon
The village was proud of Simon Stoblichties. He might be a bampot, but he was their bampot, and what was more he was valuable. As his fame had grown, so had the crowds who came to gawp at him. To them he was some kind of prophet, even though he hardly ever uttered a word unless alone with the carpenter or the carpenter’s son. People treated his tree as a shrine, tying articles of clothing to its bare branches and placing offerings of food, wine, jewellery and money at its base.
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