He had never been a great singer, but now he filled the cell with his voice, and it seemed to him melodious and powerful, drowning out the shouts and bangs of others in the building, who were already far distant from him. He sang the psalms of his childhood, not the newer versions that had come in in Cromwell’s time, but the ones he had learned as a boy from the minister who had held him on the bridge at Linlithgow all those years ago, whose language, that of the reforming fathers of Knox’s day, was sweet and unchanging and came from an age when Scotland had been smiled upon by God. In their simplicity they outstripped even the wisdom of Samuel Rutherford. He did not know what language he would speak in Heaven, but he hoped that when he finally limped in through the yett, one of Christ’s good bairns, he would not have to change one word of them for all eternity.
The Lord is only my support,
And he that doth me feed:
How can I then lack any thing
Whereof I stand in need.
He doth me fold in coats most safe,
The tender grass fast by:
And after driv’th me to the streams,
Which run most pleasantly.
And when I feel myself near lost,
Then doth he me home take:
Conducting me in his right paths,
Even for his own name’s sake.
And though I were even at death’s door,
Yet would I fear none ill:
For with thy rod, and shepherd’s crook,
I am comforted still.
Thou hast my table richly decked,
In despite of my foe:
Thou hast mine head with balm refreshed,
My cup doth overflow.
And finally, while breath doth last,
Thy grace shall me defend:
And in the house of God will I
My life for ever spend.
Edinburgh, 1 May 1997
There was no guarantee that he would find her. The homeless lass, Karen. It would be a week or more since he’d disturbed her sleep. She’d probably got fed up being disturbed by the tour going past her every night, and moved on. But he still thought it was worth looking.
He was early though. It was a few minutes before nine o’clock when he walked up Stevenlaw’s Close – she’d hardly have gone to her bed yet, surely. There was no sign of her at the patch of concrete, not a blanket or a plastic poke in sight. He was wasting his time. She could be anywhere. Maybe she wasn’t even in the city any longer. Maybe she’d headed off into the country, now that spring was here. If he was homeless, he wouldn’t want to hang around in the hard, dirty streets when he could be living out in the hills or down by the sea. He had that thought, and as soon as he had it he saw what a romantic, fake version of someone else’s life it was. The hills were big and splendid for a day’s walk, or a winter trek in the right gear, but they were cold and brutal most of the time. The city was where there was shelter from the rain, money to be begged or borrowed, food to be cadged or bought or stolen. In the city there were others like you. Life was there. Outside it, a person could starve or freeze to death and nobody would know.
He walked up through the square and onto the High Street. Quite often there were folk hanging out behind the Iron Kirk, in Hunter Square. People like Karen that she might be among or that might know her. He laughed out loud and a couple who looked like tourists passed him with frightened stares. The way he was thinking of her. People like Karen. It was rich coming from him.
A wee bit up the street was where the tour started. He could see some people milling about. He didn’t want to be around these parts very long. He didn’t want to run into Hardie.
But there was nobody at Hunter Square. The daytime crew had gone. He sat on a bench there and wondered what to do. He could always vote: there was still an hour left; but this wasn’t about a vote. It wasn’t about anything much – he could just chuck the stuff away if he wanted. He didn’t owe Hardie anything, and Hardie didn’t owe him.
He didn’t want to meet Hardie, have to explain things that the tosser wouldn’t understand anyway. He didn’t want to have to tell him about Weir, who he really was, and then leave the cloak, stick and rat so that Weir could become Hardie’s puppet again. And behind Weir there was Mitchel. Carlin felt in some way he had set them both free and that they didn’t need somebody going around play-acting on their behalf. But if somebody who knew nothing about Weir, made no pretence of knowing anything about him, could make use of his trappings, maybe that would be different. History would just go on then, run into the present unwittingly. And Carlin could walk away from it.
That was why he had thought of Karen. But how was he going to find her?
He found a biro in his pocket, settled the carrier bag on his knee, smoothed a clear white portion of it over the bulk of the cloak inside, and began to write.
Dear Karen, this stuff is for you. There’s a ghost tour comes by here every night about 10. You can earn £5 every night before you go to sleep by wearing this gear and jumping out at them. Talk to the guide. His name is Gerry.
A. Carlin.
He went down Blair Street to the Cowgate and back along to where he’d found her before. He tried to picture where she’d been lying, how far in, how well concealed. He placed the carrier where it was visible but only if you were looking closely, and laid the staff beside it. The message was face up but you couldn’t read it in the darkness.
He wasn’t fooling himself. She might never find the stuff and even if she did she might just think it was garbage. But he would leave the things anyway. They might stay there or they might not. Karen or somebody else might recognise them or they might attach their own new story to them. It was the best Carlin could do in the circumstances.
He walked away slowly and headed for home. He wasn’t carrying anything any more. That was his vote. You had to leave things behind. You had to shed the guilt and start again. You had to stop thinking everything was your fault or you’d not ever be able to go out and make mistakes again.
He went by the familiar sights and ticked them off in his head. He felt better about himself than he had done in a long long time.
Edinburgh, May 1997
This happens later. In a few days, after everything else is over. We don’t really see this, it is beyond the last page, but then again, it would be a pity to miss it.
Hugh Hardie is not a happy man. He is trying to train a new ghost, and the ghost is slow to learn. It is a bright, warm afternoon, but Hugh is not impressed with the change in the weather. He just wants to get his show on the road again, by this evening if possible.
The ghost is a student, the younger brother of a guy he knows that he bumped into in a pub. The student needs some extra money. Hugh needs a ghost and he can’t afford to be choosy. But he can’t help thinking of Carlin as the new Major Weir trips over his cloak, walks too fast, pulls the rat too soon, keeps breaking into smiles. Carlin the natural weirdo, the born spook. Carlin the magnificently eerie. Carlin the disappearing, the unreliable. Carlin the bastard who made off with Hugh’s gear, which has cost considerably more than twenty pounds to replace. Carlin whose absence for nearly two weeks has robbed the tour of its essence, its magic, and forced Hugh to reduce the ticket price by a pound.
He tries not to dwell on the past. It’s over, he and Carlin are finished. It was a mistake getting him involved in the first place and Hugh should have seen the likely problems a mile off. Jackie warned him but he paid no attention. He’s blown it with her too, she’s not been back in touch and why should she?
A guy like Carlin was always going to be trouble – too eccentric, too resistant, too determined to question and query and not just shut up and get on with the job in hand. And yet, and yet, he had the touch. He could have been perfect, but he wasn’t. He was untrustworthy, irresponsible, a time-waster. Hugh just has to forget about him.
But he can’t. He watches the boy’s amateur dramatics attempts at looking ghostly and he almost despairs. Carlin didn’t even tr
y, for God’s sake. He just was. If Hugh can only find out where he lives … No, there’s no point, the only reason he wants to see him now is to give him abuse and get the props back. But he doesn’t even need those now. One thing’s for sure, this new kid’s getting his first pay docked, by twenty pounds at least. Maybe thirty pounds. He looks docile enough, looks like he’ll accept that that’s the way it goes these days if you want cash in hand, no questions asked.
A few times in the last week or so, Hugh thinks he’s seen Carlin. A sudden movement glimpsed out of the corner of one eye. He’s turned quickly and there’s been no one there. It might be in a crowd, or in a shop, and once it was as he was walking along Nicolson Street, and he thought he caught a glimpse of a bald, cloaked figure vanishing into a side-street. A lot of crap really, he knows. There are no such things as ghosts, not even of the Carlin variety.
He takes the boy up Stevenlaw’s Close and brings him out onto Tron Square. He explains the stage that the tour has got to. ‘Meanwhile,’ he says, ‘you’ll have gone on ahead. Into one of those closes over there. Gerry will tell the party a few stories at this point, and then bring them round and along at the back of the buildings. That’s when you emerge from whichever entry you’re hiding in and scare the life out of them.’
There are two women sitting over from them on a bench in one corner of the square. They are watching the toff and the young lad in the funny outfit. Both of them are smoking. Occasionally one passes a comment to the other.
‘And what do I do?’ says the boy.
Hugh explains, grinding patience in his teeth. ‘You are Major Weir, you are terrifying, Gerry has wound them up like springs, all you need to do is put on your ghastliest expression and come out at them. It’ll be dark, remember. I want you to extract the maximum volume scream when you confront them.’
‘Oh,’ says the boy. He thinks about this for a minute. ‘Like this, you mean.’ He emits a hysterical shriek that ends in a parody of demoniac laughter.
‘No,’ says Hugh. ‘I don’t want you to scream. I want you to make them scream.’
‘Oh, right,’ says the boy. ‘I thought you wanted me to extract a scream.’
‘From them,’ says Hugh. ‘What did you say you were studying again?’
‘EngLit,’ says the boy.
‘Right,’ says Hugh. ‘Well, anyway, let’s try it. You go up there, and I’ll walk you through it.’
One of the women gets up. She throws her fag-end on the ground and stands on it. She looks about fifty. She’s wearing a cardigan over a tee-shirt and a bulging pair of leggings. She waddles over to Hugh as the Major wanders off.
‘Is this you practisin then, is it?’ she asks.
‘Yes, it is,’ says Hugh. ‘I’m training him.’
‘Ma daughter there,’ says the woman, jerking her thumb back – the other woman gives Hugh a brief wee wave of her hand, then stands up and goes into one of the tenements –’ was jist wonderin, ken. Are you one o thae ghostie tours then, that comes by here maist nights?’
‘That’s right,’ says Hugh.
‘Aboot ten o’clock?’ The woman is eyeing him steadily.
‘About then, yeah. Is that a problem?’
‘No for me,’ she says. ‘I dinna stey here. It’s ma daughter that steys here. We were jist wonderin.’
‘Well, then,’ says Hugh. He steps past her. ‘If you don’t mind, I’ve got work to do.’
He doesn’t mean to be rude, but he’s aware it probably sounds that way to her. The intonation is all wrong. He tries again. ‘T mean, if that’s all you were wanting.’ He knows he is making it worse.
‘Aye, that’s fine, son,’ she says. ‘On ye go.’ She stands aside, gets out another fag and lights it.
Hugh calls up to Major Weir. ‘Ready?’ There is a muffled cry in response.
‘All right.’
He starts to walk across the square. He feels self-conscious with the woman watching him. Then he puts her out of his mind. ‘I’ve finished the talk,’ he says loudly. ‘I’m leading them up towards Assembly Close. Now I’m directing them along this path. It’s dark, remember, they can’t see exactly where they’re going. You can hear them stumbling along towards you. Here they come. Now, any second now-’
Major Weir steps out of his hiding-place. As he does so, there is the sound of a window being opened above them. Hugh glances up. He sees a bucket held out over the window-sill, upside down, directly over his head. A bucket-shaped quantity of wetness is falling, spreading into a shimmering sheet in the sunlight. Major Weir steps smartly back under cover. Hugh Hardie is baptised in a gallon and a half of cold water.
The woman in the square marches past his dripping figure. ‘That,’ she says, ‘is whit they uised tae dae in the aulden days. Ma daughter’s had it up tae here wi yous. Every night, every bluidy night, jist as she’s got her bairn aff tae sleep, you come along here and wake it up wi aw yer daft screamin. Have ye nae consideration for others? I mean, whit the hell dae ye think this is, a fairground or somethin?’
She doesn’t wait for an answer. She marches on inside. A few moments later droukit Hugh and dry Weir hear a door slamming and a loud peal of female laughter.
Major Weir comes out but stands well back while Hugh shakes himself like a dog.
‘That was amazing,’ says the Major. ‘A direct hit.’ He is looking at his employer with a new awe. ‘But,’ he says, ‘I don’t suppose that happens every night. I mean, does it?’
Edinburgh, 2 May 1997
A strange figure was coming down North Bridge towards the east end of Princes Street. It was too small for itself. It was an old man’s head on a young woman’s body.
The woman was thin and frail-looking and was shuffling a little awkwardly, as if unused to the clothes she was wearing. The black cloak around her was too big and kept catching under her feet. She had to hoist it up and grip it in a bunch at her waist. She also had to manage the long black stick with the knuckle-ended top, which was as tall as herself and seemed to be conspiring with the cloak to make life difficult for her. And there was the baldy-heid wig that sat too loosely on her head: the brow of it was forever slipping forward, cutting her vision in half. The grey wisps of hair stuck out crazily above her ears, and from below the wrinkles of the false head her own brown hair escaped in dirty-looking straggles. It was ten past nine in the morning and the sun was shining as she made her way uncertainly past the queuing cars and buses to the junction at the foot of the bridge.
Aye, the sun was shining. The wee figure waited for the green man, then stumbled across Princes Street. Folk were going to work, in the same direction as her and in the opposite direction. Shops were opening or already open. Folk were late but few of them were running and many had smiles on their faces. The woman didn’t know why they looked so pleased with themselves.
She’d been asleep, more or less, all night in a close deep in the Old Town. She’d woken and sat smoking her last roll-up in the early morning sun. When the baccy started to burn her fingers she’d nipped it and flung it away. That was her quit, she’d thought, the way she always did when she smoked her last, just to make herself feel positive about the loss. Then she’d decided, if it was going to be a fine day, to head for the shore. She couldn’t quite think why but she always liked it down there in the sunshine, even though she couldn’t afford to sit drinking wine or coffee at the tables outside the expensive new cafes. She’d packed her blanket and the few other items she wasn’t wearing in a plastic poke, and stashed them in a recess where they were safely hidden. Then she’d considered the new rig-out she’d acquired, and decided to put it on.
She’d found it in another poke which she’d thrown away. At first she’d thought the stuff was from a theatre. Then she’d minded the guy from the ghost tour: it looked like his outfit. Funny, until she’d pulled out the wig she’d almost forgotten about him; he’d been like something out of a dream. The wig was like one of those things folk brought back from other worlds in fairy tales: proof th
at they must have been there. There’d been a rat in the poke too. She’d not much liked the rat, and halfway up the close she left it sitting at the bottom of a rone-pipe, to give someone a start. But the rest of the gear, she quite fancied it. It made her want to laugh. Plus it might be worth something; she wasn’t going to just leave it lying around.
She picked up speed on the slope past the St James shopping centre. It was a monstrosity that place, but she didn’t really notice it too much because the weather was good – the first really good day for a week or two. She did notice the big bronze Paolozzi sculptures, though – the foot with its smooth toes you could slide on if you were a wean, which just polished them smoother, the ankle like a tree-stump, the outstretched hand with the huge grasshoppers, or locusts or whatever they were, mating in its palm. She made a figure-of-eight around the sculptures because she liked their outsizeness. And she liked the fact that you could come from Leith and be called Eduardo Paolozzi; or be called Paolozzi and come from Leith. She said it aloud a few times, enjoying the sound of it: ‘Eduardo, Eduardo, Eduardo.’ There was a man in four overcoats lying asleep in the lea of the muckle hand.
She breenged on. When she crossed at the next set of lights, she noticed that Mr Sherlock Holmes, up on his plinth in his Inverness cape and holding his curly pipe, had had a wild night and was wearing not one but two traffic cones on his head. And here were more people smiling, as they went late to their work. Some of them looked tired, a wee bit hungover maybe. Some of them looked drunk.
The faster you went, the less the cloak tripped you, that was what she found. You could let it go and it just swirled out behind you like a steam-train’s plume of smoke, only black. And the big stick, you could manage it by letting it run through your hand like a pole-vaulter’s pole, plonking the end down a couple of feet in front of you, your hand going down, then up, lifting the stick and repeating the movement. It was all in the rhythm. And it made a satisfying tapping noise every few steps you took. And the bald head, you just pushed it back a bit, so that your own hair escaped and held it up. You looked a bit mad probably, but you couldn’t see yourself and anyway you didn’t care what people thought.
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