The Kellys of Kelvingrove

by Margaret Thomson-Davis

  ‘That’s a thought!’ Bashir said. ‘And a romantic one. I wonder if they still marry couples over the anvil in the smiddy. Hundreds used to run away from England to be married there. It was the first place over the border, I think, where they could be married at sixteen – the law in Scotland – and without their parents’ permission.’

  ‘Serve the old guy right,’ Paul repeated.

  ‘Here, you might have made a serious point,’ Bashir said thoughtfully. ‘There would be nothing Pop could do if the young couple were legally married by the time he came back from Pakistan.’

  ‘Have a secret word with Mirza,’ Clive said, ‘and see what he thinks.’

  ‘I will.’

  ‘And we’ll help all we can,’ Paul said. ‘We could probably even rustle up a few bob if he needed financial help.’

  ‘That’s kind of you, boys, but money wouldn’t be a problem. I’ve got plenty for a start, and I’ll certainly help them financially, and in every way I can.’

  Clive couldn’t help laughing.

  ‘I bet once you tell him about the Gretna Green idea, you’ll have a job holding him back from immediately rushing away there with Sandra.’

  ‘Oh, but I must. It wouldn’t be safe otherwise. There’s no telling what Pop might do to prevent Mirza running away though. He’s surprisingly ruthless and obsessional about doing things the proper way and being true to their faith, as he sees it.’

  Paul said, ‘Mirza is a kind boy and a good Muslim. He also shows respect to other people’s faiths. He has always shown respect to Clive and me, despite knowing that we are devout Christians.’

  Clive patted Bashir’s shoulder. ‘He’s like you, Bashir. We admire you for being a good Muslim and a good, kind man.’

  ‘Thanks, pal. I’ll try to speak to Pop again. Really plead with him, because I really don’t want to do anything behind his back. But poor Mirza. If I’m forced to, I’ll have to help him. He’s in such a state.’

  23

  Hand in hand, Mirza and Sandra climbed the hill in the park to their usual place behind some bushes. Mirza had brought his binoculars and Sandra also had a pair. They didn’t need them to see the beautiful towering university. It was near enough on the hill behind them. They gazed instead down across the sprawling park and green area, and then the familiar line of houses facing on to Waterside Way and the River Kelvin. Further away they could see the imposing Kelvingrove Art Galleries. Then there were the tenements and shops on Argyle Street, Sauchiehall Street, Dumbarton Road and a plethora of other streets reaching beyond to the River Clyde. They loved this wide view of the city to which they both felt they belonged. Eventually, they lay down on the grass. They cuddled their arms around each other and spoke of the future.

  Mirza was hoping to train as an architect once he left secondary school and that wouldn’t be long now.

  ‘Think of it, Mirza,’ Sandra said with wonder in her voice. ‘Once you’re an architect, you can design your own house.’

  ‘I know.’ Mirza sounded full to overflowing with pride and happiness at the thought. ‘But not my house, our house.’

  His hand began caressing her cheek, her neck and then gradually slid down to cup her breast. She did not resist him and after his hand eased up her clothes, he began to explore every part of her.

  Then suddenly, horrifyingly, a voice bawled out, ‘You black bastard!’

  Both Mirza and Sandra struggled to their feet.

  A white youth was now shouting through the bushes to the other side.

  ‘Come over here. There’s a black bastard needs teaching a lesson.’

  Sandra grabbed Mirza’s hand.

  ‘Come on, run.’

  ‘I can handle myself.’ Mirza resisted her frantic pulling.

  ‘Mirza, for God’s sake,’ she shouted at him. ‘I’ll never speak to you again if you don’t run. Right now. I swear it.’

  So they swooped away like a couple of wild birds.

  Once down the hill, Mirza gasped breathlessly, ‘It’s never any use running away, Sandra. It makes you look as if you’re afraid – a soft mark – and I’m not.’

  ‘I know, darling, but I saw a whole pack of them coming. It was the only sensible thing to do. And did you see who they were? Did you not recognise the uniform they were wearing? They must go to that small private school in the West End. You would have thought they’d know better.’

  ‘You would think a Pakistani Muslim would know better but I bet there isn’t a Pakistani Muslim in Glasgow (except Bashir) who wouldn’t condemn me.’

  Sandra sighed too. ‘Now our lovely meeting place is spoiled. We’ll not be able to go there again.’

  ‘We’ll find somewhere else.’

  ‘It was so lovely there.’

  ‘We’ll find another private place somewhere – just for us.’

  She nodded, smiled up at him and hugged his arm close.

  ‘I thought you were afraid your mother would see us.’

  ‘Oh, I’m forgetting.’ Quickly she withdrew from him.

  ‘Mirza said, ‘I wish we didn’t need to deceive anybody.’

  ‘So do I, Mirza, but believe me, we’ve no choice. My mother would believe it such a disgrace, such a showing-up if she found out. She’d never forgive me.’

  They parted just before they reached Museum Road, Mirza going to the left and Sandra to the right. For a couple of minutes, Mirza stopped to admire Sandra’s slim figure and mass of long, wavy red-blonde hair as she made her way round to number five. Everyone used only their front doors because the ground at the back doors was usually a sea of mud, a rough muddy slope going down to Museum Road. After Sandra had disappeared, Mirza went round to the Waterside Way front entrances and went into number three.

  ‘Where have you been, you wicked boy?’ His father immediately pounced on him. He was always ‘you wicked boy’ now.

  ‘Walking.’

  ‘Walking where?’ Mahmood’s small thin frame bent nearer.

  ‘Walking all this time after school and alone.’

  ‘Are you lying to your father, you wicked boy?’

  ‘Oh, for God’s sake. I can’t stand this. I’m away to the Galleries to meet some pals from school. Anything to get out of here.’

  He banged out of the house and made his way along the river side and then the wide, well-kept path to the back entrance, rather than try to scramble up the slope facing the house.

  He wasn’t meeting any pals from school at the Art Galleries, or anywhere else. Although they all often used to go to the Galleries when they were young lads. But that was before he and Sandra got together. The Art Galleries had always been their magic place. It didn’t dominate the landscape the way that Glasgow University did from its lofty hilltop position. It was only passers-by on Argyle Street or the park visitors who could appreciate the red granite towers encrusted with sculpture. Once you climbed the wet granite steps from the back of the Gallery or from the front, rain-lashed Argyle Street and entered through the doors into the breathtaking majesty of the central hall, you were enchanted. For the duration of your visit, the city outside ceased to exist. Inside, you were in a magic world. Even today, its magic could dissolve away Mirza’s anger and resentment and all he could feel was the delight and the enchantment.

  As a potential architect, he was fascinated by the splendid detail of the building. The stone details inside were crafted as exquisitely as the exterior, representing everything from great Scottish heroes and the ancient Guilds of Glasgow to famous European composers. Then there was the magnificent 602 (City of Glasgow) Squadron Spitfire in the West Court hanging from the ceiling. He guessed it must have been a very difficult job to figure out how it could be hung like that successfully without any danger of either bringing the roof down or the plane diving down and injuring visitors.

  He wandered aimlessly for a time, stopping eventually to admire some pottery by an artist known to archaeologists as the Liperi Painter. In particular, he stared at a very rare ceramic calyx-krater,
a vessel used for mixing wine with water. This collection was donated by Paul Stevenson, and Mirza was familiar with and fascinated by the story about Stevenson. He had bought an island and built a factory next to the island’s live volcano and when it erupted on three separate occasions, Stevenson was blamed for this. They said Stevenson’s Presbyterian beliefs had driven away the island’s Roman Catholic priest, bringing bad luck. By this time, and before he left the island for good, Stevenson had bought the contents of twenty ancient Greek tombs. Their precious contents were donated to the Kelvingrove Art Galleries and Museum on his death. It never ceased to amaze, fascinate and delight Mirza how every part of the building, from its glorious architecture to its fabulous contents, were available for every citizen of Glasgow and the world to admire and be filled with wonder at.

  He went to the portrait gallery and admired his favourite portrait because it was so like Sandra – or how she would be when she was older. It was a portrait study by J W Goddard of a beautiful woman with a mass of thick red-gold hair spilling over her back and shoulders. A gold band held up hair that curled down over her forehead.

  Sandra’s hair was as luxurious and beautiful as the nameless model’s in the painting. But she hadn’t the model’s mature, calm look. Sandra had a tentative innocence in her expression. And an anxiety that often stretched into fear. If they could just keep their love affair secret until they at least got to university, they might be able to enjoy a safer and happier time. Architecture, the course he was going to take, was a very long one and so, if they waited until he was finished university and had taken his degree, and Sandra had qualified too, they would both be well into their twenties. He wondered if they could get secretly married while they were still studying. What could their parents do once they were married? They could cut off their financial help for a start and that might end their chances of staying at university. Even though they both tried to earn money by having evening or weekend jobs, it still might not be enough. Anyway, he’d heard that so many students needed and were searching for jobs, they had become hard to come by.

  Briefly he thought that by the time they were studying at university, attitudes might have changed. But it was only for a second. People like the Reverend Denby and Sandra’s mother and his father did not change. Not ever.

  Once out of the front entrance of the Galleries, he trailed down towards Argyle Street, numbly kicking a stone along in front of him.

  ‘Hi Mirza.’

  Looking up, he saw two Pakistani lads from his class, Maq and Ali.

  ‘Hi.’

  ‘Where’s Sandra?’

  ‘We went out together earlier and a mob of white gits chased us. I’d needed to have been Superman to take on a crowd like that.’

  ‘Christian gits, I bet, going to punish you for being a Muslim. And having the nerve to be with a Christian girl. That would be their excuse, anyway.’

  It was always to do with religion. From his family’s point of view. And Sandra’s. It made him furious. He especially hated all the mumbo jumbo of religion. Not just the Muslim rules and regulations, but the Christian ones as well. The Catholics with their rituals and their priests with their fancy dresses and their unnatural celibacy vows. Where in the Bible did it say that priests had to be celibate? Then there were all the miserable Protestant sects with all their narrow-minded rules, supposedly, according to the Reverend Denby, coming from God Almighty. And what about the Buddhists with their gods? And the Hindus, to mention but a few religious beliefs? They couldn’t all be right, but each of them believed they were, of course.

  Religion had caused more unhappiness, more guilt, more pain, more suffering, more bloody wars, all down through history than anything else.

  Why couldn’t two people like he and Sandra just be allowed to love and cherish each other in peace?

  He felt so much anger and resentment at the stupid unfairness of it all, he was tempted to shout from the rooftops that he loved Sandra.

  He didn’t want to hide their love. He wasn’t ashamed of it. He felt himself teetering on the edge of open rebellion.

  24

  On another day, Clive and Paul had just come out of the Kelvingrove Art Galleries and were walking round the side to take a long way round. They, and any of the other residents, seldom, if ever, slid down the slope and on to the river’s edge to Waterside Way. They’d enjoyed a nice tea and were looking forward to returning home. Then suddenly they heard the Reverend Denby’s raucous roar.

  ‘An abomination in the sight of the Lord. They deserve to suffer. And suffer they must.’ There was a roar of agreement from the crowd who were listening to him. And suddenly all hell was let loose as the Reverend Denby pointed towards them and shouted, ‘There’s two of the filthy poofs. Destroy them! Stamp them out! God says man must not lie with man …’

  Clive and Paul ran. Their first and natural instincts were to head for home and that is what they raced towards. But they were not quick enough and in a matter of seconds, they had been felled to the ground and were disintegrating in agony from kicks to the face and stomach.

  Vaguely, faintly, they heard an urgent voice shout, ‘Phone 999!’ Someone must have done so because the next thing they knew, they were in hospital beds. They could not see each other at first because of the amount of bandages covering their faces and heads. Nor could they speak. It was agony to move their chests to breathe, far less speak.

  It wasn’t until days later that they were able to talk, or rather weakly whisper to Bashir and Jack Kelly when they came to visit.

  Unfortunately, they couldn’t tell their two friends that they would be able to identify their attackers. They thought they remembered hearing the Reverend Denby’s voice but they couldn’t be sure. As far as their shattered minds could recall, he was not one of their attackers.

  ‘I bet it was that evil man at the root of this,’ Bashir said. ‘He should be arrested, Jack, and charged with attempted murder.’

  ‘There’s nothing I’d like better. But without any identification or definite proof, there’s nothing much we can do, other than what we’re trying to do at the moment.’

  Even after Clive and Paul were able to leave the hospital and be taken home with Bashir in Jack’s car, they still couldn’t remember exactly what happened.

  ‘All I can remember,’ Paul said, ‘is somebody shouting “Phone 999”. And thank God they did. Otherwise we’d be dead by now.’

  ‘Well, if anything more does come back to you, let me know immediately,’ Jack said.

  ‘Don’t worry. We will.’

  Jack helped both men back into house number four, before leaving to go to his own house.’

  ‘You’re a pal, Jack,’ Clive called after him. ‘We really appreciate your help. Don’t we, Paul?’

  ‘Yeah, definitely.’

  ‘I’d better get back to Mae but if you need anything else, just let her know. Mae used to be a nurse and if need be, she’ll look after you.’

  ‘Thanks, pal,’ both men cried out as Jack left the house.

  ‘Thank God for Jack Kelly,’ Clive said. ‘And you, Bashir.’

  Bashir made them both a cup of tea and before he left, he said, ‘Just let me know any time you need me.’

  ‘Thanks, pal.’

  Once they were alone, Clive said, ‘I must confess, Paul, my faith has gone very shaky. I mean, where was God while we were being attacked? And who else could have been at the root of such an attack but the devout Christian, the Reverend Denby. I can’t remember though. Can you?’

  ‘No, I’m still completely shattered. But like you, my faith has taken a beating.’

  ‘Yes, what good is it, Paul? I mean, if God made us, why did he make us like this? And if God is love, how can he love us if he allows people to treat us like this?’

  ‘Some people think that people like us make a decision as adults that we’ll be gay but it’s not like that. At least it wasn’t like that for me. As far back as I can remember, I’ve felt the same.’

&nb
sp; ‘It’s not a matter of choice.’

  ‘No, the choice comes in when you choose to hide the fact. So many men have done that in the past. Even got married and fathered children. They lived a lie and were miserable for years. Now it’s gradually getting easier to “come out” – as they say.’

  ‘Well, I’m glad we did anyway.’

  ‘So am I but what are we going to do now, Paul? I’m too frightened to go outside the safety of our own front door.’

  ‘We’re still suffering from shock. We’ll get over it once our bodies and minds have had time to heal properly.’

  ‘You hope.’

  ‘Well, we were all right for quite a while, Clive. We were enjoying ourselves.’

  ‘The Reverend Denby has enjoyed his first real success. What do you bet he’ll try for a repeat performance?’

  ‘If we could just get our faith back, Clive. That’s what made us feel strong and confident.’

  ‘Maybe God was testing us.’

  ‘To hell with that.’

  ‘Now, Paul, remember how Jesus was tested. He never lost faith.’

  ‘I’ve said it before and I’ll say it again. We don’t have his courage.’

  ‘But we’ve always had faith in him.’

  ‘I know, but you said he’ll be with us always, protecting us from all evil. And he wasn’t, Clive. He wasn’t.’

  For a while, they lapsed into miserable and helpless silence, in which the clock on the mantelpiece tic-tocked mercilessly.

  They didn’t know what to do or what to think any more.

  Eventually, Paul said, ‘Mae Kelly was a nurse. She’ll know what to do. Jack said she’d look after us. We’ll get better. We’ll be all right.’

  And as it turned out, Mae did them a big favour. She couldn’t have done anything better for them. She found them a writers’ club and a host of new and wonderful friends.

  25

  Mae wondered if she should lock herself in the house all day while Jack was out, so that the robbers would not be able to discover that some of the money had gone. But then there was shopping to do, food to buy, etc. And there was the hour that she would go next door to sit with old Mrs McIvor.