The Dark Side of Pleasure

by Margaret Thomson-Davis

  His heels shot up in the air and he went down with tremendous violence. But he was quick-witted enough, in the second he had before Doberman fell on his abdomen, to tighten his muscles and jerk up his knees to break the full force of the other man’s weight. Had he not done so he would, he realised, have been knocked insensible or been injured enough to lose the power of resisting future attacks. As it was he felt as if his abdomen had caved in and his spine had snapped. He rolled away, dodging most of the blows from the iron knuckles but catching a few on the ear and neck before managing to struggle up. Doberman was slower to rise and Luther’s foot caught him a crack like a horse’s hoof on the face and knocked him off-balance. The fall marked the end of the first round and the beginning of the half-minute interval. During this interval each kneeman squatted down to provide a knee for his fighter to rest on, while the bottleman administered water or ‘prime jackey’ from his bottle. Brandy was kept for emergencies. The bottleman was also ready with the sponge and the orange.

  Luther’s bottleman had barely the chance to douse him with cold water when the umpire’s cool aristocratic voice called:

  ‘Time!’

  Luther got to his feet and set himself at the mark. Doberman did the same and before Luther could harden his arm in defence he had received a couple of facers that covered him in blood. He shifted from side to side, blinking through a crimson haze. The yells of the crowd battered through his head as if the two rings had folded and the multitude had surged in.

  His return blow all but fractured his knuckles against Doberman’s ribs before he was nearly hit down by a vicious jab below the ear. He managed to stagger to one side then regain his balance, only to have Doberman run in sharply with his head and butt him in the stomach. His fingers tore at the man’s face before he went down, vomiting on to the sawdust.

  The seconds hauled him to his corner and stuck out a knee for him. Brandy spluttered into his mouth and at the same time water splashed away the blood and vomit.

  Lord Deerston’s voice rang out again.

  The seconds hoisted Luther to his feet but in a sudden burst of anger he jerked them off. Walking to the centre he toed the line without their help. Pain was a monster devouring him but he strained to ignore it and concentrate only on the massive figure of Doberman posed in threatening attitude before him.

  ‘Shift about,’ he kept reminding himself, and despite the agony when he moved, he managed to avoid the pugilist’s iron fist and to deliver a flurry of punches that succeeded in drawing blood from Doberman’s eyes and nose.

  Doberman’s lunges became wilder as Luther continued to spring backwards and forwards and weave from side to side. Eventually the champion roared in frustration:

  ‘Stand still and fight like a man!’

  Determinedly Luther refused to stand still but exhaustion as well as pain slowed him down. Because of this, Doberman in one of his forward rushes managed to trip Luther then grab him by the hair and batter his head against a corner post.

  The monster completely devoured him and he disintegrated into darkness. He only became aware of splintering light with the bawling of his seconds and the shock of ice cutting his skin.

  He tried to widen his vision but the corner post had bludgeoned one eye until it had disappeared under a massive swelling. Through the slit of his other eye he pinpointed Doberman squatting at the opposite corner, grinning like a giant gargoyle at a shared joke with his seconds.

  The shout of ‘Time’ went up and Luther was manhandled to his feet. He attempted to push himself free but stumbled on rubber legs, was grabbed and dragged across the ring to where Doberman had already taken up the stance. He was still grinning and his smugness and the deafening cheers of the crowd told of everyone’s certainty that the champion had all but taken the purse. The thought of the money forced Luther to make the superhuman effort of standing on his own. The thought of the money lashed him to his feet again after his adversary had butted him down. The thought of the money put the kick of a mule into his fist when he caught Doberman a blow on the kidneys that sent a rush of urine spurting down the man’s breeches. The champion staggered, dropped to his knees grunting with pain then rolled moaning and vomiting in the sawdust. The fall gave both men another thirty seconds’ respite in their corners.

  Luther’s chest was heaving like giant bellows and blood kept spilling from his mouth. He stared intently round, willing his mind and vision to clear, but the outer ring was packed with stovepipes that merged into a blurred mass of colour on the hill. His eyes swivelled down again and found the opposite corner and Doberman’s scarlet-splotched figure just as Lord Deerston’s voice, excited now, exploded with,

  ‘Time!’

  Luther groped up, lurched drunkenly, then by sheer effort of will steadied himself and got his feet to the mark.

  He could smell Doberman’s hate now as well as the sour stench of his body. The kidney punch had given him a forward crouch and made him even more gorilla-like. Small blood-red eyes sought him out and before Luther could move away the other man’s knuckles rocked into his face. Luther staggered but countered almost immediately with a left hook that caught Doberman in the throat and nearly felled him. The champion looked beside himself with rage and the thought penetrated Luther’s dazed mind: ‘He’s going to kill me.’ The will to survive dragged energy to his aid and hardened his muscles. He smashed a blow into Doberman’s face that was immediately returned with such ferocity that Luther was hurled back and fell like a stone. His seconds bawled urgently at him as they half-carried him to his corner but their shouts, like the screaming and cheering of the crowd, were close yet very far away. He didn’t remember being in the corner. He only knew that he was willing himself to stagger out again to toe the line. He swayed there, blindly, impotently thrashing the air with tightly closed fists. Doberman caught him by the hair and gouged at his eyes.

  In a superhuman effort Luther brought his fist round and down. Like a sledgehammer it sunk deep into Doberman’s kidney, making him scream and release his hold on Luther’s head. As the champion staggered screeching and bent over like an old man, Luther made one last effort and brought his fist up to crack against Doberman’s chin.

  Doberman thumped down, shaking the ring to its foundations. His kneeman and bottleman dragged him unconscious to his corner. There they tried every method they could think of to force him back to life including biting through his ear until blood flowed down his neck. But the big man remained inert and they had no alternative but to throw in his colours.

  Luther was vaguely aware of having the colours tied round his neck and then being hoisted from the ring and pushed into his shirt and coat. He heard a voice asking where exactly he lived. Then he was in a carriage and was beginning to recognise the owner of the voice. It was the man called McLure. Now he was counting out money and stuffing it into Luther’s coat pocket.

  ‘You deserve your winnings, Gunnet. It was a good fight. You’re a man of courage and determination, I like that.’

  ‘I needed the money,’ said Luther.

  ‘What do you work at?’

  ‘That’s the problem. I don’t.’

  ‘You need a job?’ McClure shrugged. ‘I can give you a job if you’re that desperate.’ With a wry smile he added, ‘In fact you’d have to be desperate for this one.’

  ‘I don’t care what it is, I’ll take it.’

  Already the other man was writing something on the back of a calling card.

  ‘Here,’ he said, tucking the card into Luther’s pocket. ‘Give that to the ganger at the railway cutting. He’ll start you as a navvy.’ He lit up a cigar. ‘You survived Doberman. Let’s see what you can do with a horde of Irish savages.’

  PART TWO

  Chapter Twenty-one

  The covered wagon waddled from side to side like a woman in a hooped skirt. The reins dangled loosely in Billy’s hands as he whistled in tune to the song of the army of navvies who were crushing in front, behind and all around them.

 
‘I am a navvy bold, that’s tramped the country round, sir,

  To get a job of work, where any can be found, sir.

  I left my native home, my friends and my relations.

  To ramble up and down and work in various stations . . . .’

  Samuel, now a sturdy five-year-old, sat between Billy and Augusta. Three-year-old Alexander was perched on her knee.

  Augusta felt reasonably happy. Indeed, the only thing that hedged in her feelings and made her cautious of betraying them was the enigma of Luther. She glanced across to where, sitting astride his horse, he towered above the navvies.

  After a minute or two she called out to him, ‘What kind of place do you think it will be?’

  ‘For working or living?’ he asked without bothering to return her look.

  ‘Living.’

  ‘Huts with slated roofs, I’ve heard.’

  ‘One or two rooms?’

  ‘Two.’

  Relief as sweet as wine trickled through her veins.

  In the past five or six years they had been forced to live in a variety of hovels from windowless turf erections to huts that had wooden walls. Floorings and windows were without plaster and generally unfurnished.

  She would never forget the first place she had to cope with. She could see it still in her mind’s eye as the wagon wobbled, the horse peacefully plodded, and the men sang:

  ‘Last Saturday night, I received my full pay;

  On Monday morning, I ran away.

  I buzzed up the Tommy shop and stopped the score,

  And swore that I’d never go that road no more . . . .’

  Huts of all shapes and sizes were huddled together in bewildering confusion. Some shacks had windows, some had none. Some had tarred canvas roofs, and some had roofs of turf. Some were covered with rotten grass and when a fire was lit inside they looked like burning hayricks. Some doors faced south, some faced north and everything looked as if it had been tossed into the valley and just left as it fell.

  Rats swarmed at the foot of the hill, feasting on the refuse that had been thrown there. Gulls swooped to squabble over crusts while pigs rooted about in the mud. They had been lucky to get a hut to themselves at that place. Few married men were numbered among the workforce and most of their wives had no alternative but to share one of the dormitories used by the rumbustious army of bachelors. Share these narrow bricklined huts not only with the men but with the dogs they kept chained under their beds during working hours.

  For most of the first year, of course, she had stayed behind in the Briggait and no navvy hell could be worse than that festering sore of Glasgow, especially during the cholera epidemic. Both Rose and Mrs Gunnet had been among the thousands of cholera victims in the narrow closes and wynds that cluttered the heart of the town. Whole families had been wiped out and she had been terrified that baby Samuel would perish with the rest. But after his mother and sister’s death Luther had packed their few pieces of furniture and possessions on to the wagon and taken them away from the Briggait.

  He had shown no emotion at the time but she knew that the loss of his mother and sister had affected him deeply. She could understand how he felt bitter at fate depriving them of the chance of enjoying the fruits of his newfound earnings. She could not however see that he had any justification in blaming her—especially for his mother’s death.

  ‘You never looked after her,’ he said. ‘Never as much as gave her one drink of water.’

  ‘Your mother never wanted me near her,’ she protested. ‘And Tibs managed very well. Anyway, I had more than enough to do nursing Rose and worrying about Samuel.’

  ‘You were as much the cause of my mother’s death as the cholera.’

  It was unfair but nothing she said penetrated this bitterly held conviction of his.

  Tibs had now a place at a farm and Augusta found some consolation in being the mistress of her own household with no other woman to worry about. She didn’t mind the fact that her household was a nomadic one. Moving had added a sense of freedom, interest and even pleasure to her life that had been out of the question in the dark, congested Briggait.

  There was excitement in visiting a new part of the country and facing new challenges. There were the hills and valleys and streams and trees and wild flowers to enjoy on the way.

  As it turned out, there was even satisfaction to be gained from the navvies. Appalled at their ignorance she had made it her business to start a little school in the evenings to teach them to read and write; at least she had at the beginning visualised it as a little school. The eagerness of the men to learn, however, was both rewarding and overwhelming. She had been forced to co-opt Billy into helping with the hordes of giant creatures in clothes so stiff with earth that they cracked against their enormous tackety boots. Like overgrown awkward children they sucked their pencils and drew their letters until, painfully, they managed to copy the moral text she had given them. Some were even able to write a simple message home and were embarrassingly grateful to her for performing this miracle. She believed that her school was the reason this gang of navvies had struck together for so long and were now moving en masse to the next job. Although of course Luther, who was now a ganger, also commanded respect and loyalty. A proud body of men they looked at the moment in their blue bonnets, scarlet neckerchiefs and waistcoats and moleskin jackets. Moleskin breeches were supported not by braces that might constrict the movement of burly shoulders but by a leather strap round the waist. Leather straps were also fastened under the knees to keep out mud. High-laced boots also served this purpose. Some of them sported coats, trousers and waistcoats all in white double canvas. The coats were large and stiff and each had four pockets.

  She had been extremely apprehensive about living in close proximity with the navvies at first. They appeared such coarse creatures and she had kept herself as aloof as possible, at the same time developing a sharp edge to her tongue to cut any man down who had the temerity to address her. But she had quickly discovered that, when sober at least, they were artless, generous, good-natured men. But they could consume frightening amounts of liquor and under its influence could become brutal and absolutely ungovernable. Once they started fighting even the police and the soldiers couldn’t control them. Their rowdiness didn’t seem to bother Luther. They enjoyed a good fight, he told her. Especially the Irish.

  Trying to cure the Irish of fighting was like Canute trying to stop the ocean, although if a fight broke out on the job he made a point of rapidly squashing it by the use of his own fists. She had been horrified to witness Luther doing this. Two giants in tackety boots were brawling over some grievance and battering each other to the cheers of the other navvies who had immediately downed tools to watch until Luther appeared and viciously felled one man after the other. With both navvies sitting dazedly in the mud he warned,

  ‘Nobody wastes time on my job. Fight in your own time. Back to work, all of you!’

  She supposed that incident, coupled with his reputation of having beaten the champion, was why Luther had been nicknamed ‘Big Gun’ although as often as not he was just addressed as ‘Ganger’. Of course all the navvies had nicknames. It never ceased to amaze her how singularly incurious they were about one another’s real names or family or relatives. They would work, eat and sleep beside one another for months without referring to each other as anything except Curly, Ginger, Dry Dick, Tunnel Jim, Sulking Sam, Foxy and so on. She’d witnessed funerals at which hundreds of navvies had marched to the grave to pay their last respects to a comrade—a victim of a fatal accident—who had been buried under the name of Coppernob or Uncle Ned.

  The children loved the men despite their rough ways, and laughed in delight when tossed into the air or if confronted by one of them making either a comical or even a frightening face. There were times when she couldn’t help laughing herself. If Samuel was crying and she was in a bad temper and scolding him and one of these uncouth creatures happened to be passing he would stop, hunker down and pull such a cros
s-eyed ridiculous face that both Samuel and she would burst out laughing.

  She no longer feared them and could, at times, bully them unmercifully. Her small ladylike stature seemed somehow to disarm them, and she felt convinced that they would never willingly do her any harm, though what they were capable of under the influence of alcohol was always an unknown quantity. She kept well away from the nearest town or village on pay day because the navvies were sure to be creating violence or turbulence then. Of course, sometimes it wasn’t their fault; often everything would have been perfectly all right if only they had been left alone. But prejudice was so strong among the indigenous population that the locals felt impelled to interfere even when the navvies were enjoying themselves in a harmless fashion—foot-races or feats of strength were condemned because a few pence was wagered on the outcome. The navvies’ sprightly temper, natural vociferousness, variety of gesticulation and exuberance of argument never failed to shock the sober populace into voicing their disapproval.

  It wasn’t just the men who showed their sort of exuberance, either. It was exactly the same with Maureen, the only wife who had turned up at the school—at least Augusta had thought Maureen was married until the young woman shamelessly informed her that she was not. ‘Ach, is a priest going to make Boozer and me any more married than we are?’ she laughed. Maureen could be disturbingly wild at times, mostly when Boozer had spent too much money on the tommy-shop’s ‘knock-me-down’, as one of the most potent whiskies was called. It was quite common to see Maureen, her long carotty hair flying loose, chasing a helplessly inebriated Boozer around the huts, bombarding him with stones or whatever she could lay hands on. Occasionally Boozer stood his ground, if somewhat unsteadily, and put up a fight. But no matter what he did, he always got the worst of it.