Naming the Bones

by Louise Welsh

  ‘I remember your face, but not when we met.’

  Cressida laughed again.

  ‘You’re a terrible liar. Jack’s up the stairs, his pictures are amazing. Have you seen them yet?’

  ‘No.’ He recalled something Lyn had said and repeated it. ‘I find openings aren’t the best time to see the exhibition. I just pay my respects then come back when it’s quieter and I can explore what’s on show properly.’

  To his own ears the spiel sounded as stilted as one of his students tripping out a half-understood argument they’d read in a book, but Cressida nodded.

  ‘I see your point. But all the same, you must be keen to get a glimpse of them, especially with the subject matter and all.’ She’d gone serious, but now she rewarded him with another smile. ‘You know what might help?’

  ‘What?’

  ‘Do you mind?’ She reached up and took his specs from his nose, placing him back in a landscape of lights and smearing colour. He heard the quick exhalation as she misted his lenses with her breath then caught the orange flare of her dress as she rubbed them against its hem. ‘Now you can really see what’s going on.’

  She returned them and the world slid back into focus just as a man in artfully distressed jeans and a blue and white striped shirt that for all its lack of red put Murray in mind of the Union Jack emerged from the press of people and wrapped an arm around Cressida.

  ‘Steven.’ She lifted her face to him and he kissed her on each cheek, his lips making contact with her skin, his arms pressing her into a clinch that made one of her feet leave the ground.

  ‘You clever girl. It’s amazing, by far the best thing you’ve done.’

  Murray took the bundle of leaflets from his pocket, cursing his own ignorance and giving the couple the chance to escape. The exhibition guide was sandwiched between an advert for Richard the Turd, an adaptation of Shakespeare’s classic set in a toilet, and a flyer for the Ladyboys of Bangkok, the name Cressida Reeves printed just above Jack’s. Why hadn’t it occurred to him that this woman in her spectacular dress might be one of the trio on show?

  Cressida extricated herself from the hug.

  ‘Steven Hastings, this is Murray Watson, Jack Watson’s brother.’

  ‘Jack?’

  Steven rolled the name in his mouth, as if tasting it for the first time and unsure of the flavour. Cressida met his vagueness with a stab of irritation.

  ‘You know Jack. He’s one of my fellow exhibitors, we were at college together.’

  ‘Ah yes, Jack. The flayed corpse.’

  Murray winced at the memory of Jack’s degree show, but he could remember Cressida now. Her hair had been shorter then, her thrift-shop-chic outfit tighter and darker than what she was wearing today. Jack had been impressed and maybe a little jealous. She’d won a prize, a big one, though Murray couldn’t remember what. He steadied his gaze at Steven.

  ‘He’s moved on since then.’

  ‘Glad to hear it.’

  Murray felt an urgent need to knock Steven Hastings’ head from the high collar of his jaunty shirt. But he stifled the impulse and instead gave an awkward stiff bow that he couldn’t remember ever performing before.

  ‘I’m looking forward to seeing your work, Cressida.’

  He turned towards the bar as Steven put an arm around the woman’s shoulders, guiding her towards the exhibition space and commanding, ‘Now, you’re going to explain everything to me in minute detail.’

  Cressida rolled her eyes, but she allowed herself to be led away, giving Murray a last smile. He raised his hand in goodbye, then swapped his empty glass for a fresh red and went to look for his brother.

  The paintings at the front depicted massive, candy-coloured Manga cartoon characters collaged into pornographic poses. Murray sipped his drink, taking in a doe-eyed schoolgirl in congress with an equally wide-eyed black and white spotty dog. The image was imposed onto a background of a devastated landscape, Nagasaki after the H-bomb. Murray checked the artist’s name, relieved to find it wasn’t Cressida or Jack, then headed towards the staircase. It was busy here too, the traffic going in both directions, people clutching their drinks as if they were vital accessories. He didn’t see Lyn until she was in front of him.

  ‘Hey.’ She stopped on the step above his so that their faces were almost level. Murray kissed her, smelling wine, cigarettes and fabric softener.

  ‘How’s the wee man?’

  ‘The wee man.’ She shook her head. ‘The wee man, as you call him, is doing very well, considering he’s been working till three in the morning practically every day for the last month and only finished hanging ten minutes before the doors were due to open.’

  Murray grinned.

  ‘He should have given me a shout. I would have held the ladder for him.’

  ‘Rather you than me.’

  Lyn was smiling, but there was an unaccustomed flatness in her tone that made Murray wonder if she and Jack had argued.

  He asked, ‘And how are you doing? You’re looking well.’

  His brother’s girlfriend had pale freckly skin that couldn’t endure sunlight. Maybe it was the contrast between her fairness and the unfamiliar red lipstick she was wearing, but Murray thought she looked a shade whiter than usual.

  ‘I’m doing great. Glad this has come round at last.’ She smiled hello to a couple going up the staircase then turned back to Murray. ‘You get yourself up there. Jack’ll want to see you.’

  ‘Jack will have a lot of people to talk to. I just came to show my support, I’ll not stick around getting in the way.’

  Lyn raised her eyebrows comically.

  ‘And you’ve got a lot of work to be getting on with.’

  ‘A fair bit, aye.’

  ‘Well, you’d better go and pay your respects then.’ She slid past him. ‘I was about to get some wine before it’s all sooked up. Do you want a refill?’

  Murray looked at his glass, surprised to see that it was almost empty.

  ‘Why not?’

  ‘Give it here then.’ She hesitated. ‘Murray, Jack talked to you about the show, didn’t he?’

  He knocked back the last dreg of wine and handed his empty glass to her.

  ‘I think so, maybe a while ago.’

  Lyn pushed a stray curl away from her eyes.

  ‘You’ve no idea, have you?’

  He grinned, embarrassed at being caught out.

  ‘Maybe not.’

  ‘You might find it …’ She hesitated, searching for the right word. ‘… challenging.’

  Murray laughed.

  ‘Aye, well, that won’t be a first.’

  Lyn gave a weak smile.

  ‘Just remember it was done with love.’

  ‘No blood this time?’

  ‘No blood, but it was still painful for him, so be kind.’

  ‘When am I not?’

  ‘Never.’

  She touched his arm gently as she descended the stairs to the bar.

  Jack was at the centre of a small knot of people, but he saw Murray and broke away, flinging an arm around his brother’s shoulder. Murray wondered where it came from, this physicality. He couldn’t remember them ever touching as boys except when they were fighting.

  ‘Hiya.’

  ‘Hi, Jack.’ He put his arm round his brother, feeling the heat of his body through the fabric of his suit. ‘Congratulations.’ Jack’s face was shiny, his forehead beaded with sweat and his eyes bright. Murray could hear his brother’s voice coming from somewhere else too, a voiceover on a video installation he guessed. The words were indistinct, but Jack’s soft tones were cut through with another wilder, higher voice. The Jack in front of him looked anxious. He squeezed Murray’s shoulder and said, ‘I was keeping an eye out for you. Have you been round everything already?’

  ‘No, I just got here. All I’ve seen are those Japanese cartoon-collage things.’

  Jack gave a quick scan of the room then whispered, ‘Pile of pish, eh?’

  Murray la
ughed.

  ‘I don’t know about art, but I do know a pile of pish when I see it.’

  ‘Don’t let them put you off. Anyway, don’t congratulate me till you’ve seen my stuff. You might not like it.’

  ‘I’d better go and have a butcher’s then.’

  The walls behind him were lined with photos. They looked more muted than Jack’s usual sharp-focused colours, but they were too far away for Murray to take in their detail.

  ‘Wait a moment.’ Jack took his sleeve as if worried that his brother would escape. ‘Murray, it’s all about Dad.’

  Murray pulled himself gently from his brother’s grip. He nodded, not trusting himself to speak, and walked into the heart of the exhibition.

  Their father looked pretty much as he had when Murray had last seen him. He was propped up in the high-backed chair, wearing a pair of brown paisley-patterned pyjamas. His hands clutched the armrests. His head was thrown back, his old face lost in the crazy smile of another man. Jack’s camera had caught him mid-word, his mouth open, the wetness of saliva coating his lips. His eyes dazzled.

  Murray shut his own eyes then opened them again, the vision of his father remained in front of him, exposed to the wine-drinkers. He could hear his father’s voice now, chatting to Jack. He walked to the curtained darkroom in the corner of the gallery, ignoring the display cases and trying to blinker himself to the other photographs. The two long benches inside the blacked-out cubicle were full, so he stood at the end of the row of people leaning against the back wall. The close-up of his father’s face was six foot high.

  Jack’s voice came from somewhere off-camera asking, ‘Mr Watson, can you tell me if you’ve got any children, please?’

  Their father grinned.

  ‘I’ve got two boys, terrific wee fellas. Six and eleven, they are.’

  ‘Great ages, and what are they up to the now?’

  The old man’s face fogged with confusion.

  ‘I don’t know. I’ve no seen them in a long while.’ He was getting distressed, his pitch rising. ‘They telt me they were fine, but how do they know? Have you seen them, son?’

  ‘I’ve seen them, they’re absolutely fine.’

  ‘Are you sure now?’

  ‘I know for certain.’

  ‘Aye, well, that’s good. On their holidays, aren’t they?’

  ‘That’s right. Away with the BBs.’ The old man on screen nodded, quickly comforted, and Jack asked him, ‘Do you remember who I am?’

  The mischief was back in his father’s face.

  ‘If you don’t know, I doubt that I can help you out.’

  The old man and Jack laughed together.

  ‘No idea at all?’

  Their father stared at the Jack-off-screen intently. He stared at Murray too, his broken veins scoured and red. There was a patch of grey stubble on his chin that whoever had shaved him had missed.

  ‘I don’t think I know you, son.’ He hesitated and a ghost of something that might have been recognition flitted across his face, bringing a smile in its wake. ‘Are you yon boy that reads the news?’

  ‘Poor auld soul.’ The woman standing next to Murray whispered to her friend. ‘He doesnae ken if it’s New York or New Year.’

  Jack-on-screen told the old stranger who had taken up residence in his father’s body, ‘You’ve rumbled me.’ And the old man slapped his knee in glee.

  Murray pushed through the black curtains and out into the brightness of the white-painted gallery. Jack was standing where he had left him. Murray shook his head and jogged quickly down the stairs. Lyn was coming towards him, chatting to another girl, both of them clutching brimming wine glasses. She said his name, ‘Murray’, but he continued down onto the street, then further down still, towards Waverley Station and the train that would take him home.

  Chapter Three

  MURRAY LOOKED AT the neat piles of papers he’d assembled, then surveyed the list that he had made.

  Jotters - 3

  Address Book - 1

  Loose Papers - 325

  Newspaper Cuttings - 9

  Bus Tickets - 13

  Train Tickets - 8

  Drawings/Doodles - 11

  Tarot Cards - 3

  Letters - 6

  Photograph - 1

  The jotters and address book were his biggest prizes, but the photograph pleased him more. Archie and Christie sitting on a rock laughing together, their hair caught in a bluster of wind, eyes screwed tight against the weather. Archie was wearing an old Harris tweed jacket that looked too broad for his thin frame. His hair was long and stringy, his laugh topped by an unkempt moustache. Christie’s blonde hair was long too, parted carelessly in the centre. Her wide-lapelled coat looked Edwardian, but it had been a period of retro and revivals, and maybe it had been the latest fashion. She’d stuffed her hands into her pockets, pushing them together through the fabric so it looked like she was hugging herself. Archie had one hand on his knee. His other hand was hidden. Clasped around Christie’s waist or lost in the closeness of the pose? It was difficult to tell. Archie’s face was half-obscured by his hair and moustache, but he looked alive in a way that none of the other photographs had shown him. Murray wondered when it had been taken. That last summer up on Lismore? The look was right, the seventies hair and careless clothes, the treeless scrub of heather in the background. He would take a copy with him when he went to meet Christie Graves. Perhaps she would remember the moment it was taken, and maybe that memory would prompt others.

  He pulled the jotters towards him. They were similar to those he recalled using in primary school, with boxedin lines on the front cover for the owner’s name, subject and class, which Archie had left blank. He lifted one in the air and shook it gently. A couple of dried leaves slid from between the pages. Murray laid them carefully to one side and added them to his list.

  Leaves - 2

  The words looked stupid. He scored them out then took one of the leaves between his thumb and index finger and held it up to the light, seeing the veins still branching beneath the crisp surface. There was no secret message scratched on its desiccated flesh. He placed it gently back on the desk and opened the notebook. A list of words ran close to the margin on the left-hand side of the page, vocabulary or notes for a poem cramped in Archie’s now-familiar script.

  Dune

  Dawn

  Dream

  Dome

  Diadem

  He could see no connection between the words and any of the poems in Moontide. Murray leaned back in his chair and started to read, making notes in his own Moleskine notebook as he went along. He was a third of a way through the jotter when he came across the entry made in another hand.

  I love you and she will love you too.

  Beneath, Archie had added:

  She loves me! But how can she be so sure that my

  new love will be a she?

  Murray made a note of the exchange, wondering if it offered some kind of insight or was simply a joke. He’d assumed Archie’s sexuality was confirmedly heterosexual, but then the seventies had been a time of challenged boundaries, even in Scotland, and Archie’s love affair with the drink had frequently placed him between berths. Maybe he’d occasionally flopped into men’s beds in the way that he had so frequently flopped (Murray imagined that the word was often appropriate) into women’s. It was worth considering. At this stage almost anything was worth considering.

  Murray had propped the photo against the desk lamp. He looked at it again, the grinning face and flying hair. How long after it had been taken had Archie drowned?

  He worked until two, then decided to take some requests for reference books to the front desk. He supposed he should eat something. He’d woken with a sore head and mild nausea, remnants of the wine he’d drunk at the opening and of the semi-sleepless night that had followed. He should phone Jack, tell him … tell him what?

  Murray filled in his request form neatly and went out into the corridor, closing the door gently behind him. H
e heard Mr Moffat’s jovial tones just before the man himself hove into view. The senior librarian was wearing his customary politician’s suit and tie. His sparse, white hair was cropped short in a style that might have looked thuggish on a less amiable countenance, but which lent Mr Moffat a jolly, monkish cast. He was walking fast, talking animatedly to an older, thinner man dressed in khaki trousers, a checked shirt and saggy cardigan.

  Murray would have been content to let the pair pass with a friendly nod of the head, but the librarian hailed him warmly, his round face a testament to the pleasures of books and extended lunch breaks.

  ‘Good afternoon, Dr Watson.’ He shook Murray’s hand. ‘Everything working out okay?’

  Murray’s voice felt rusty. He’d been in conversation with the remnants of Archie Lunan all morning, but this was the first time today that he’d opened his mouth to speak to the living.

  ‘Good, yes. I’m not sure what I’ve got yet, but it looks promising.’

  ‘Wonderful.’ Mr Moffat turned to his companion.

  ‘George, this is Dr Watson, through from Glasgow for a look at some Archie Lunan ephemera we didn’t know we had.’

  ‘Oh, aye.’

  The older man looked unimpressed, but he held his right hand out anyway. Mr Moffat stood over them while they shook. For a bizarre moment Murray thought he was about to clasp their two hands together like a minister at a marriage ceremony, but the librarian confined himself to his usual easy grin.

  ‘George Meikle is our head bookfinder.’

  Murray wanted to tell the bookfinder to call him by his first name, but the action seemed too awkward. Instead he indicated the request forms in his hand.

  ‘I was just heading in your direction.’

  Meikle’s face remained dour.

  ‘I’ll take you along to the desk then.’

  George’s surliness was at odds with his offer and Murray wondered if he was grabbing the opportunity to escape the weight of Mr Moffat’s cheerfulness.

  ‘Excellent.’ The librarian couldn’t have looked happier had he introduced Lord Byron to Percy Shelley. ‘Still, it’s a pity we don’t have more for you, Dr Watson. I often wish some poets had been more assiduous with their legacy.’