Site Works

by Robert Davidson

  Harry put his head through the door and went away again. I would have liked to speak to him. He has his difficulties with the Resident Engineer. Harry stands for quality in workmanship, standards. He takes a stand on all these things. I know, I’ve watched. Time after time the RE makes his compromises and pays out on crap. The job moves along, eventually it will be built and it will work. It always does. The public will judge on what it sees on the surface, a gardening job, a paint job, whatever. The public couldn’t care less about what it can’t see.

  Yes, I would have liked to talk with Harry over a few pints. The times we’ve spoken on the scaffolding, the things he’s said about Healey, hinted at about the RE, tell me he’s a craftsman and a true believer in craft. We could get on all right, talking about jobs we’ve been on – that big pyramid contract in Egypt. I want to know how he handles the humiliation of working for lesser men. Does the Engineer speak to him like he was dirt? Does Swannie? Mac is okay. The two of them, Harry and the agent, get on okay. They have cups of tea and jammy buns at their Thursday meetings. I guess the both of them are prisoners just as much as Malky and me. They can say what they like, agree what they want, it’s Swannie and the Engineer, the guy in Glasgow, the guy above the RE, doing the business.

  Two pints is the usual limit, but it was Friday and we were working on. I took another Whitbread. Malky didn’t want any. He hardly touched what he had. As I say, he knows the score. Half way through this third I wanted more, but I was all bagged up with gas. I left the bottle about a third full but, while Malky was calling Sandra to say we’d be late, took a vodka at the bar, trebled it with lemonade and threw it down. Outside, the cold air was like a slap across the face. The clouds had closed up and there was a bitter wind. We checked the road both ways, if the worst came to the worst Malky could drive. No police. We drew our jackets in tight and hurried to the van.

  Swannie’s beamer was away from the compound when we got back. He would be off to another site to give another Agent a late, surprise visit. This is his way, he turns up at odd times to keep them on their toes. He walks his Agents and foremen at breakneck speed around the sites, questioning everything, criticising every decision, listing everyone’s inadequacies, pushing anger out all the time, turning on his heel, suddenly rearing up like he’s about to do violence. As far as I know he’s never landed a blow. Through the office window we could see the Agent tidying his desk. Friday afternoon, soon he would be away. Probably he would drop in on the Saturday to see what was doing. We would be here, along with maybe a few of Healey’s men. Derek would be at the football. That was why he had the mobile crane down at the Pumping Station when we got back, unloading reinforcement to make a quick start on Monday morning.

  The crane was covering most of the gateway with the flat lorry just in front. Derek was up on the flat, tying on the steel for the lift. His boy was in the compound, organising the landing and doing the untying. They were going to take at least a half hour. In that time all we could do was lay out the tools, break open another palette and throw more bricks down on to the staging. After that we were standing.

  Half the day had disappeared this way and now the wind was cutting through us. Across the Firth there was cloud half way down the hill above Beauly and wisps of snow were drifting across the water and on to the site. Seeing how it was going the pipelayers wrapped up for the day. So did Healey’s men, calling out to Malky as they walked past. Malky turned his back on them. Sooner or later there would be trouble. Probably it would not come on the site. Most likely it would burst out of nothing in a pub. Sooner or later, though, it would come.

  Healey’s men hadn’t set out the lights as they should. They’d just dumped them. As soon as Derek’s lorry was rolling along on the ruts in the access track, back to the compound, we put them up ourselves. Malky filled the genny with diesel and pushed the button. The lights flashed once and came on first time. Now we were ready to go. I took my frozen arms and legs on to the staging and set up the string lines again. My fingers were stiff and clumsy but that would pass when the work started properly. Harry’s presence had prevented Healey’s men from doing any damage to the morning’s work. It was only after Malky had shovelled sand and cement into the mixer we discovered what they had done. The starting handle was missing. They had taken it, or dropped it down a hole somewhere, or buried it, or whatever – but it was gone.

  Already the natural light was fading. Snow was blowing in more steadily. I manhandled the mortar board on to its edge on the staging and leaned it over in Malky’s direction. He got his hands out wide around the edge and lifted enough for me to get my hands round it down below. Together we managed to heave it over the gangway without dropping it into the cofferdam.

  Malky mixed the mortar by hand, shovelling three of sand on to the board, then two of cement, forming it into a doughnut. Water he measured in from the bucket. It was all judgement anyway. He could both tell from the look and the feel of it as the light faded whether the mortar was good. By the time the first brick was down the natural light was almost gone. I struggled against the cold for rhythm and eventually it came and my mind went where it always went, to the nooky. I have a class number on hand, a teacher. I guess she has herself a bit of rough. She’s married. Doesn’t matter. It’s sex she wants from me. The husband sits around all day, behind a desk, in a car. Things like playing squash, going for runs, don’t harden a body like building does.

  Sex is where my head wanders when the body works by itself. Malky clicked the safety helmets together. Harry was coming back. I looked up and shook my head. Harry isn’t daft. There was no one else working, nothing but snow was going to fall. What could happen? No one could see us from the road. Better with the woolly hats on, it was warmer. I was into my rhythm by now, didn’t want to stop – mortar the wall head, mortar the brick edge, lay the brick, check the string. Again. Again.

  I could hear Harry talking to Malky, trying to get sense from him. He was asking what time we would work to, how we were measuring the mortar mix, if we had enough deisel for the genny. Malky sent him to me for answers. There’s no telling what’s in Malky’s head when he’s not actually shovelling. He has a great capacity for waiting. I waved up with the trowel and Harry came across the gangway and dropped on to the staging. By now the wind was whipping snowflakes across the top of the cofferdam. Harry was coated white down one side. I took a step back to make room for him and hit the kickboard.

  I almost went over into the chamber. Harry grabbed my arm and started to speak. Half way through whatever he was saying he stopped and looked into my eyes. His own eyes closed and I could almost read his thoughts through his eyelids. Oh no, he was thinking. Oh no. He went back up and spoke to Malky, pointing in my direction and shaking his head. Then he went away. There was nothing more to be said.

  Soon all the natural light was gone and it was black as tar except for our little theatre of light on the side of the hill. I checked my watch; it was past 5:00. We drank Sandra’s tea; Malky as he stood in the snow, me between picking up bricks. Mortar the wall head and the brick edge, lay the brick, check the string; another brick laid. I checked my watch again. It was 6:00.

  At 7:00pm I looked up for more mortar. Malky was thick covered with snow. I had some little shelter from the brickwork behind me and from the cofferdam wall. Also I was moving all the time. He was out in the open with no cover at all. As I watched he shivered again, hugely and violently. I called him over into the light. His hands and face were both blue. I got him to pull the hap over from the corner of the compound and we covered our work. There was still tomorrow. We filled the pump with diesel to keep it going through the night. I packed my tools onto my back and turned off the genny. The lights flickered and went out.

  We locked the compound, left the padlock key under its stone at the corner and made our way back to the van by torchlight. When we got back to the office compound we could still hear the pump roaring in the sump, but not the ground water pishing through the pile clutches on t
o the cofferdam base. These had been the ground notes of our day from start to finish.

  It was only when we were back at the van, out of our wellies and inside that I realised how deeply the chill had bitten into Malky. Under the window light his hands were still blue. They trembled so much when he tried to light a cigarette I had to strike the match for him. I was frozen but Malky was worse and he was soaked through as well. I drove us back down to the Islander and put a whisky and lemonade into him. I took nothing myself. Soon he’d stopped shivering and was running his hands up over his face and through his hair, shaking his head and grunting. We got back into the van and drove back to the Muir. It being Friday I stopped off at the pub. Malky took another whisky and I had a couple of vodkas.

  There was never any doubt about him turning out the next day. I don’t pay him so much he can go past the o/t. Sandra was on my side so long as I kept him in work. Whatever else, she didn’t want him back in the slammer – and without a job it would only be a matter of time. It would be another story if she saw him frozen, or if she knew the sort of heights we sometimes work at, or the state of some of the holes. The Pumping Station wasn’t as bad as most, thanks to Harry.

  Malky got involved in a futile discussion about the Rangers with one of the bartenders. These are things I don’t talk about too deeply with him. He gets too excited. I like football but mostly what I care about is work and women. Transfers, results, league positions occupied Malky’s mind when it wasn’t full of horror comics. You’d think the work he did wasn’t horror enough. Sandra still didn’t know we were going out the next day. I got him to call home and tell her, this way she would be settled to the idea by the time I got him home. Of course I would be invited to eat. This was good. I bought him another and, weighing up the drive back to the farm carefully, had another myself.

  The two boys met us at the door. Washed and pyjama’d they were ready for bed. It’s always good to see Malky with his family. A different man, he’s responsible, caring. When I’m over I always make a point of giving him his place, of not being the boss. He worships his wife, as well he might. She’s the anchor on his life. Of course seeing them together always stirs up bad thoughts but these have to be lived with and can’t be dwelt on. I accept. With women I am what I am, not capable of respect never mind worship.

  Sandra came out of the kitchen to meet us in the living room. The smile fell from her face when she laid eyes on him, caked in mud. When he tried to speak I realised he was drunk and thought it better to say nothing. Although I can hold my drink better than Malky I wouldn’t be far behind. Sandra sat us down and put the boys to bed. She went back into the kitchen and took the dinners out of the oven. The two of us ate in silence. Already Malky was falling asleep. He was eating on automatic pilot by the time we finished. Sandra had the bath running as I went to the door. I tried to kiss her but she was having none of it, and then I was back out in the cold again. Twenty minutes from home, I had two police stations to pass, one further along in the Muir, the other in Conon, before I got to Dingwall. Some day they’ll get me.

  How else can I live? Working the way I do, living on my own as I have to, drink is central to the whole thing. Sometimes it’s like it’s what I live for. Monday afternoon, when it was out of my system, I would phone round the architects. One way or another I would get some decent work. I don’t want to spend the rest of my life freezing down holes in the ground.

  As I drove I could feel the weight of a good facing brick in my hand. I was colouring the mortar in my head. This is the work I’m trained to do, the work I can talk about all day. Harry knows. Harry respects me the way I respect him. These are the things my mind plays on when it should be on the road. I gave myself a shake and checked the speed, not too fast, not too slow.

  At night I drive with my heart in my mouth. Once a prowler fell in behind me, shadowed me from the Muir to Conon, then it put its light on, swept past and away. Some emergency, somewhere else, or I’d have been locked up. It could happen any night, most mornings. I got back to the farm, bounced up the track and climbed out. The beasts were sounding off but that was because the van had disturbed them. Soon they would settle. I wish I could say the same for me.

  I took my jacket and trainers off, the only clean things about me, and hung my trousers behind the door. They could be brushed more or less clean on Sunday. There would be no job to go to on Monday. I would wash them then, spend the day on the phone. Inside I switched on the electric fire, threw my underwear into the basket and went directly into the shower.

  This was when I discovered how tired I was. With the cement and the mud trickling down into the tray I put my head against the wall and shut my eyes. It felt like they might never open again. At home I wear tracksuit bottoms and an old pullover with elbow patches. I took a bottle of vodka and a bottle of lemonade out of the cabinet before falling onto the settee and jabbing on the TV remote.

  This was it. This was it. This part of the day was for me alone. In two hours, maybe less, I’d be in bed. I poured a big one and doubled it with lemonade, flicked across the channels. It was all junk, so I left it where it lay – hospitals, one for the ladies. The vodka went down and I poured another. I had to hold back. There was no point rushing for oblivion, and I had to get out again next day.

  I couldn’t settle though. For all I was exhausted, my legs were stiff and my shoulders hurt, I had to get up and walk about. Who the fuck did Swannie think he was? He’d treated me like dirt. He had spoken and I had jumped. For all I had put on a straight face and said little, I had jumped. I knew it and he knew it. There was no hiding it. We both knew. I would be off the job on Monday, never wanting to come back, and I had taken it in silence. He had kept going until he was sure that I was buckled, and sure that I knew it.

  Why take it? Because I know, in my heart of hearts, that this is where I am now. This is what I have to do to make any kind of living. There won’t be many more big houses. This is where we were going from now on, Malky and me, down these holes. No more quality work, quality drawings, quality clients, this was another world we had landed in.

  In this world the Pat Healeys write the rules. Get it done quick, defend your ground. Get in with the right Contract Managers. Which Contract Managers are the right ones? The animals. I remember something stupid, something about having to operate now, being said on TV while I was running my hands across my face. This was despair. I couldn’t go it for long, not like this. I had to adjust somehow.

  I thought about rolling a joint but I know my moods and this one wasn’t right. What I really wanted was to call the girlfriend, to get her over here, but Friday night her husband would be in. There were the kids. What if one of them answered? No, I’d have to wait for Tuesday afternoon like we agreed. It wasn’t sex I wanted. By this time I just wanted to rest my head between her breasts, put my hand between her legs and go to sleep. Just that.

  So you’d think I’d sleep well, go out like a light – black velvet until the alarm goes. Not so. The vodka kept me awake. There were all the usual flash memories that won’t give me peace, all with hurt in them – site agents, contracts managers, women, police – the most recent was Sandra crying in the kitchen after I took Malky home.

  All night the Pumping Chamber kept coming back, how I’d kept those walls square and plumb from the base right up to these last courses below the roof slab and, damn, I hadn’t checked the diagonals last thing. Through the night the determination grew in me to keep it right all the way to the top, not to compromise. If it took until Tuesday, so be it. If Swannie barred me from all of his sites, that was okay too. I would do it. Then I would never work with these bastards again. I’d get back into buildings, quality buildings, or I’d get out.

  Some hope. There’s rent to be paid, money to the wife – and I know from the past that I can’t face the long empty hours being out of a job brings. I’m a worker. Malky and me are both workers. We do it because we do it. There’s no more explanation. We’re workers. So are Swannie and Healey
, although they’re animals as well. I’m a master builder. Rest, my God, I needed rest more than I needed money. It was in one of those in-and-out-of-sleep moments I had to face the truth. No, the architects don’t want me any more. Too much drink.

  Next day I felt worse, less because of the lack of sleep than because of the vodka. I got up, washed, fed myself. I put on those cold wet clothes again. Malky and I are so close now I can almost feel Sandra pushing him out of bed. He would be at the Muir garage, same as usual. He’s reliable. Sandra and the boys make him that way. They’re his purpose.

  The cold hit me again as I was locking the door. It feels like it shrinks your face. The moon sent its white light across the patchy snow in MacRae’s fields. In the corner of the door lintel a cobweb shone like silver. Like me the spider works through instinct. It just gets up and gets on with the job without thought. Every so often it turns out something perfect.

  They say there’s no labour without dignity. I don’t see it. Better to be like the spider and not think in those terms. It’s just life, an endless round of work, loneliness, humiliation and drink. The beasts with their frozen snotters have as much dignity. I have a past. I guess I have some kind of a future. The present is in finishing off this chamber with Malky. That’s it. There’s no more.

  2

  Extracts from the Water Authority’s Report on Tenders for the Ness and Struie Drainage Project

  This Project is the latest in a series to be undertaken in sequence along the Ross-shire, East Sutherland and Caithness coast and is programmed to follow on from the Black Isle (Beauly Firth) Project now approaching completion and preceding three more located further to the north, Lochdon, also in East Sutherland, and Dunpark and Fishertown in Caithness.