Complete New Tales of Para Handy (69 page)

R
OTHESAY
H
ARBOUR
— The view across the town's outer harbour, as seen from the pier, looks towards a seafront silhouette which has been much altered in relatively recent years. Many of the buildings to the right of the picture have now been demolished, and the landscaped and pedestrianised spaces of Guildford Square have been created in their place.

The Cunarder
Campania
was built at the Fairfield Yard on the Upper Clyde in 1893. The largest (620' overall) and fastest (23 knots) of her brief generation of Transatlantic liners, she held the Blue Riband for four years from 1893 till 1897, losing it in that year to the Norddeutscher Lloyd liner
Kaiser Wilhelm der Grosse
, fore-runner of the next generation and, again, the world's largest ship. From that date mastery of the lucrative North Atlantic passenger trade rested with the Germans till Cunard in 1906 put into service those two incomparable sisters,
Mauretania
and the doomed
Lusitania
.

In retrospect, in a quite unexpected way,
Campania
exemplified the breathtaking pace of maritime development by breaking new ground both at the beginning and at the very end of her career.

When launched she was the first Cunarder to be fitted with twin screws and the first of that company's ships, therefore, not to have been provided with some form of auxiliary sail-power (an extraordinary anachronism from our standpoint, but the norm in the Victorian era) and thus the first designed to be wholly reliant on her engines.

But just 25 years later, when she was lost at sea following a collision in the Firth of Forth with the Battleship
Renown
, she had passed her last four years of life (after conversion in 1914)
as an aircraft-carrier
, the maritime base and mobile platform for a form of transport so undreamed-of at the time of her launch that even to have put it forward as a possibility would have been to invite the ridicule reserved for dabblers in science fantasy.

58

The Rickshaw and the Pram

T
he papers had for days been full of nothing but increasing speculation about the impending confrontation between the Russian and Japanese Imperial Fleets in the Far East, and loud and long had been the argument and debate, involving our politicians as readily as our naval strategists, as to the relative strengths (and weaknesses) of the two participants.

Encountering Para Handy seated on a bollard on Princes Pier on a fine evening in late May, I determined to canvass the opinion of a mariner of so many years experience as to the merits or otherwise of the opposing forces.

“What is your opinion of Admiral Rojdestvensky's strength in terms of capital ships, Captain,” I enquired. “Do you think he is capable of outgunning Togo's forces sufficiently to overcome their superiority in range?”

“Eh?” asked Para Handy.

“Well, let me put it another way. The humiliation the Russians suffered at Port Arthur last year must weigh heavily upon their commanders at this juncture. Do you see that as a ‘plus' — an incentive to greatness: or a ‘minus' — a collective millstone round their necks?”

“Pardon?” said Para Handy: “I really do not have the furst idea what you are talking aboot, Mr Munro.”

“Good Lord, Captain,” I exclaimed, astonished. “Have you not been following the news? Is it possible that you do not realise that — even as we speak — the naval forces of Japan and Russia could well be locked in battle in the greatest confrontation in the history of war at sea: a battle which could well determine future sovereignty and autarchy across the whole Far Eastern political and social theatre, with devastating consequences for the rest of the world? That right now, the first shots could well be bracketing the ships in the van of the two fleets and determining the course of history for decades to come?”

Para Handy twisted on his bollard and squinted up at the blue sky and the golden glow of the evening sun.

“Well,” he said, “they're certainly getting a grand day for it!”

As we made our way into the railway station and headed towards its convenient Refreshment Rooms I endeavoured, but with scant success, to explain to the Captain just why the eyes of the world were anxiously turned towards the Sea of Japan.

“I have neffer had much time for the Chapanese,” he confessed as we carried our glasses to a table set in the fresh air and affording fine views across the Firth to the Gareloch, “running aboot in rickshaws ass if that wass a fit occupation for a chentleman. Or iss that the Chinese? No matter: and ass for the Rooshians, well Macphail wass in among them several times when he was goin' foreign, and he hassna a good word to say for them. Durty duvvles, by aal his accoont of them, livin' on raw fush and potatos, and nothin' to drink but some kind o' fulthy firewater that would rot your boots.

“What iss the hairm in lettin' the pair o' them knock aal seven bells oot of each other, and then step in and pick up the bits and pieces that we want for oorselves?”

Reflecting that British Foreign Policy over several generations had often followed that particular stratagem, I felt it best to change the subject.

“What have you been up to of late,” I asked. “And what is the news on the river?”

“Little enough,” said he, “though there wass that wee bit of excitement we got involved in at Crinan basin last week, you maybe heard aboot it, when Callum MacAndrew the lock-keeper's wife had the truplets.”

I confessed that this was all news to me, and asked for some more details. “Triplets are certainly real cause for celebration,” I said. “A rare event indeed!”

“Chust so,” said Para Handy: “and the celebrations wass nearly an even rarer event. If it hadna been for Dougie's agility and a bit o' quick thinking from Sunny Jim then there chust wouldna have been ony celebrations at aal. This was the way of it.

“Callum MacAndrew's wife iss a second cousin of my ain, from Strathshira, and of course the news o' her truplets had been trumpeted the length and breadth of the west. We was on oor way to Colonsay wi' coals, and ass soon ass we put into the first of the locks at Ardrishaig, Fergus McKay the lock-keeper wass down to the shup to give me the good news and ask us a favour.

“Callum's brither works as a cooper at Glendarroch Distillery at Ardrishaig, and wheneffer he got word aboot the truplets he had a confabulation wi' wan o the men in the still-room and he promised to divert a wee firkin' o' spurit to help wet the heids of aal the weans. ‘Wi' three o' them to be toasted it's a terrible expense for Callum if we dinna make a wee contribution and onyway it's no' really costing the dustillery,' said he firmly, ‘but chust the Excisemen. And who cares aboot them at a time like this.'

“The question wass, wance the spurits had been liberated oot o' the warehoose, how wass they to be taken to Callum's hoose at the Crinan Basin up at the ither end o' the canal? This wass what Fergus hoped that the
Vital Spark
could do for the faimily — and of course I said no bother, no bother at aal.”

At that point I felt I simply had to make some comment. “Really Captain,” I observed, “I am disappointed in you: I thought that you had foresworn this sort of high-jinks. You have had all too many close calls with the law in the last year or two.”

“Blood iss thicker than watter,” said Para Handy firmly. “Would you have had me desert my cousin and her man in their hour of need? Forbye, I am firmly of the opeenion that effery Hielan' chentleman is entitled to a dram o' his native spurit withoot the unwanted intervention of Excisemen, for I am sure that the spurits have been around a lot longer than they have.

“So we waited in the basin for Callum's brither to appear wi' the wee firkin.

“Weel, he finally did appear — but empty-handed.

“ ‘Issn't this the calamity!' he cried. ‘You will have to tell Callum that there will be no whusky, the Excisemen spotted us takin' the firkin oot o' the Warehoose and we had to throw it into the Darroch Burn and mak' a run for it! It wass either that or the jyle for us, but I am aawful vexed, for there wull be no spurits to toast the bairns up at the Crinan Basin!'

“It wass Dougie who saved the day. He minded that the Darroch Burn, efter it had passed by the side waall of the dustillery where it provided the power for the watter-wheels that drove the enchines for the paddles in the mash-tubs, ran on doon the glebe and
under
the Crinan Canal by way of a kind of a tunnel before it spult oot into the Loch.

“ ‘There iss a a sort of an iron grill in the tunnel under the canal,' said he, ‘which stops aal the broken bits of barrels or whateffer from blockin' the watter channel. If the firkin wass thrown into the Darroch, then that iss where she wull be.'

“And you know, Dougie wass quite right! We went up the canal as far as the Darroch Burn and he chumped oot onto the towpath and doon the side to the culvert o' the stream and sure enough half way through it, and stuck at the metal grill, wass the firkin o' whusky, chust ass good ass new!

“I can tell you that Callum's brither gave Dougie a real hero's welcome when he got back aboard the vessel wi' the firkin under his oxter!

“We took it on board and hid it well under a loose plate in the hold, chust in case of ony maraudin' Excisemen chumpin' the shup on passage, and off we went.

“It wass when we reached the Crinan Basin that we realised that oor troubles wass chust beginning.

“The Excisemen wass not goin' to give up aal that easy! Pert of the problem of course wass that the Glendarroch wass the only dustillery in that pert o' the country and so they had nothin' else to do wi' their time but poke their long noses into her business. And the rest of it wass that they were dam' sure they knew why the whusky had been taken, and chust exactly where it wass bound for — for they knew fine aboot Callum's truplets by noo, and indeed so did the hauf o' Argyllshire — and they were determined not to lose the firkin withoot a fight.

“When we tied up at the Crinan basin we could see Callum's hoose chust a few hundred yerds along the towpath and hear the sounds of celebration coming from inside — though they wass aal a bit muted, withoot the whusky necessary to get them properly under way. And between the
Vital Spark
and the hoose there were four or five Excisemen from Glendarroch, aal trying to pretend they wassna there, but keepin' a very close eye on the fowk that went in and oot o' the hoose.

“ ‘My Chove,' I said to Callum's brither. ‘they chust dinna give up, do they? But I cannot see how we can get the firkin past them and up to the hoose for the perty.'

“Then Sunny Jim appeared at the wheelhoose door.

“ ‘Captain,' says he: ‘Am Ah no right in thinkin' that Callum and your kizzin have a wean already?'

“ ‘Right enough, Jum' I said: ‘a laddie of 16 months. But what has that to do wi' it?'

“ ‘Weel,' said Jim: ‘I wis jist thinkin', if wan o' the Aunties or Wives in the hoose wis to tak' that wean oot in its pram for a hurl. And if they wis to come doon here to the shup. And if the pram wis taken on board and — when the Excisemen wisnae lookin' — if the wean wis taken oot for jist a meenit and the wee firkin shoved underneath the mattress on the pram…

“ ‘Weel,' he concluded. ‘I think it wud be a brave Excisemen who wud try to inspect a wean's pram for a wee barrel o' whusky if ye chose the right sort of Auntie or Wife. For if they are onything like some o' the wans Ah've seen in this pert o' the world then I maybe dinna ken what they wud do to the enemy but by the Lord, they frichten me!'

“ ‘Jum', I said, ‘again you are chust sublime. There iss nobody can touch you for cheneral umpidence and sagiocity, unless it iss Hurricane Jeck himself, and he has mony years of advantage over you!'

“And that is chust exactly what we did. Dougie strolled along to the hoose and had a word wi' Callum, and he got his Great Aunt Agnes (her that looks ass if she had fell oot o' the tap of the Ugly Tree and hit aal the brenches on the way doon) to tak' the elder bairn oot for a hurl in his pram, and we put the wee firkin in under him chust like Jum suggested.

“It would have taken the Brigade of Guards to have the courage to interfere with Great Aunt Agnes and the whusky got to the hoose wi' no problem at aal. We waited about 30 meenits chust for the look of the thing afore we made our move, then we got Macphail to dampen doon the furnace, locked up the wheelhoose, sent Sunny Jum to collect hiss melodeon from the fo'c'sle, and set oot along the towpath to the lock-house.

“The Excisemen hung aboot for anither hour or thereby and then admutted defeat and went aff to sulk somewhere else, for wance they heard the soond of singin' comin' from inside the hoose they realised they'd been duped again: but there wassna wan thing they could do aboot it by then because wance whusky is in the gless it disnae have a name tattooed on it and the drams we wis drinkin' could have come from anywhere — even though we aal knew fine what the true facts o' the matter might have been.