The Complete McAuslan (36 page)

‘We got your lad,’ said Charlie. ‘Not in the Suk, not in Puggle Alley, not on the harbour – guess where? Out on the beach, looking at the wrecks, for God’s sake. Talk about eccentrics.’

‘Thanks, Charlie. How is he?’

‘Tight as a coot, but past the fighting stage – now. We had a little trouble. He should be arriving at your rest home any minute. O.K.?’

I thanked him and hung up, quite unreasonably relieved. Then after a few minutes I went round to the guardroom, and Sergeant McGarry admitted me to a cell to view the remains.

Even by McAuslan standards, his condition was deplorable. He had evidently got extremely wet, and thereafter spent the night on a well-nourished compost heap, his sporran and one boot were missing, his matted hair hung over a face that looked like a grey-washed cathedral gargoyle, and he had a new black eye. He was also three-parts drunk, and swayed to and fro on the edge of his plank-bed, making awful sounds.

Becoming aware of me he tried to focus, made an effort to get up, and wisely desisted.

‘Ah’m – Ah’m awfy – sorry, sir,’ he said at last, articulating with difficulty.

‘So am I,’ I said, and he groaned.

‘Ah’m gaunae – gaunae be sick,’ he announced.

‘Sergeant McGarry!’ I shouted. ‘He’s going to be sick. Get a bucket, or something —’

McGarry’s face appeared at the grille in the cell door, scowling horribly.

‘Spew on my floor, ye beast, and I’ll tear the bones from your body.’

‘Ah’m no’ gaunae be sick,’ McAuslan decided, and McGarry vanished. Psychologists take note.

I doubted if there was much to be accomplished in the prisoner’s present condition, but you have to go through the motions. He would be before the Colonel in the morning, and if by previous inquiry you can discover some extenuating circumstance, or even coach the accused in what to say – or what not to say – it all helps.

‘McAuslan,’ I said, ‘this is the fourth time this year. You’ll be for detention, you realise that? Maybe in barracks, maybe in the glasshouse. You got fourteen days last time. You don’t want to go to the Hill, do you?’

No reply. He was gargling to himself, staring down at his hands in a bemused way, giving occasional small hiccups. I didn’t seem to be getting through.

‘McAuslan, you were absent nearly a whole day. That’s serious. How are you going to explain it to the Colonel?’

He looked vacantly at me, and began to mumble, at first incoherently, but then words began to come out. I don’t know what I expected – I’ve heard guardroom depositions that you wouldn’t believe, including a confession of murder, and poured-out grievances going back in harrowing detail to infancy – but none that astonished me more than McAuslan’s. And yet, it was perhaps perfectly natural — but I’d never have heard it if he hadn’t been deep in drink.

‘. . . no good enough,’ he muttered. ‘No’ good enough. It’s no’ bluidy fair, so it’s no’. Never done nuthin’.’ His eyes were unnaturally bright, but didn’t seem to be seeing anything. ‘Ah’m – no’ good enough. No’ bluidy fair. Lot o’ bluidy snobs. Thinkin’ Ah’m jist a yahoo. Ah’m no’. Thought she wiz different, but, no’ like the rest o’ them bluidy snobs. See her mither, an’ her sang-widges – bluidy awfy, they wiz.’ He gulped resoundingly. ‘Auld cow. No’ good enough for her. Jist a yahoo. Sergeant Telfer says Ah’m jist a yahoo – a‘body does. And her, she thinks Ah’m no’ good enough. And Ah’m jist — jist . . .′ He began to sob, deep in his chest, ‘. . . no′ good enough. No’ good enough.’

I just stood listening; there was nothing else to do.

‘Never got made lance-corporal – an’ Boyle did, an’ him’s scruffy as – as – as me. Wisnae fair – wisnae my fault – no’ bein’ good enough. Ah didnae think she mindit, though – an’ Ah sortit that wog oot, doon the bazaar. Ah did. “You leave the lassie alone, ye black bastard,” Ah says, “or Ah’ll banjo ye. Git up tae me, son,” Ah says, “ye’ll git the heid oan ye.” That sortit him, right enough. Aye, but Grant an’ MacKenzie an’ them, bet ye they couldnae ‘a sortit him. But they’re good enough – toffee-nosed an’ talkin’ posh – good enough, aye. Ah’m no’ good enough – Ah’m a yahoo – no’ good enough. Sno’ bluidy fair, so it’s no’ – no’ bein’ good enough!’

Maybe I’m soft, but I felt my eyes stinging. I squatted down in front of him as he rocked on the bench, working his hands between his knees. Self-pitying drunks are ten a penny, but what was coming out of him wasn’t just ordinary self-pity. All right, he was abysmally stupid, and by exhibiting a phenomenal degree of wooden-headedness he had got himself hurt. So what do you do – tell him to get hold of himself and not be a fool? Perhaps. But when someone has spent a young life-time getting hurt, in ways which most of us can’t imagine, then when he commits a really outstanding folly, and is reduced to utter abject misery, it may be as well to go easy.

‘Of course you’re good enough, son,’ I said, and presumably he heard, for he shook his head.

‘Ah’m no’ like Grant an’ MacKenzie an’ them. Bluidy wee snobs – her an’ her sang-widges. Thinkin’ Ah’m jist a yahoo – Ah’ll show them – Ah’m no’ jist a yahoo – mebbe Ah didnae go tae a posh school, an’ talk toffee-nosed, but Ah’ll dae a’right. When Ah git oot, Ah’ll dae a‘right – there a fella in the Garngad – wi’ a haulage business – gimme a job. Ah’ll be fine, nae fear. Ah’ll no’ be oan the burroo —′ that is, unemployed. ‘See Grant an’ MacKenzie, but, bluidy wee toffee-noses, see them oan the burroo. Thinkin’ Ah’m no’ good enough. An’ Ah’m no’! She disnae think Ah’m – Ah’m – good enough. Oh, Goad, Ah feel awfy! Oh, Goad, Ah’m awfy ill!’

He clutched himself and rolled around for a moment, but then steadied up, called on his Maker a few times, and observed fearfully that he was for the hammer the morn.

‘Darkie’ll nail me. He’s a bastard, yon Darkie, so he is. He’ll dae me. He’s done me afore. They – they like daein’ me!’

Since I
was
Darkie, this was slightly disturbing. It also suggested that McAuslan was well beyond the bounds of comprehension, so I decided to take my leave. I kicked on the door for Sergeant McGarry, and as he was opening up, I looked at McAuslan, crouched on his bench, sunk in dejection. It always comes as a shock when you see into someone’s mind – it can be terribly corny, and trite, and obvious, and yet totally unexpected. It never seems quite real. It wasn’t, I could agree with him, bloody fair.

‘No’ good enough,’ he muttered again, as the door closed.

The Colonel evidently agreed with him, for next morning he heaved the book at him – twenty-eight days’ cells, which was the maximum he could do in the guardroom, without being sent to the military prison at Heliopolis. Sensibly, McAuslan took it without comment, beyond a mumbled apology, and that was that. He laboured, for the ostensible good of his soul and the damage of the battalion gardens, for his daily eight hours, and McGarry locked him up at night. I kept an eye on him, to see how he was bearing up, but beyond the fact that he got filthier by the day – which was absolutely normal — there was nothing to report. No signs of unhinged personality, or anything, although with him it was always difficult to tell. Whatever had been working in him that night, he seemed to have got over it.

It must have been in the last week of his sentence, and I was in company office late in the afternoon, when the battalion post clerk brought in the mail. It was a big batch, because there had been some mix-up at the airport that had delayed things for several days; I sent for one man from each platoon to help sort it, splitting it into platoon bundles. The man from my platoon was Daft Bob Brown; he carried off a great heap of letters for his barrack-room, and as I was leaving the office I met him going down the company steps, a bundle of envelopes still in his hand.

‘Where away with those?’ I asked.

‘Guardroom, sir. McAuslan’s mail.’

I was surprised. ‘He gets plenty, doesn’t he?’

‘No kiddin’, sir. If it wisnae for him, postie wid be oot o’ a job.’

‘But —′ I said. ‘How’s that? He can’t read or write.’

‘That’s right, sir. Ah write his letters for him — me an’ the fellas.’

‘And read them, too – the one’s he gets, I mean?’

‘Aye, sure. It’s a helluva job, too. Ye should see the amoont he gets – shake ye rigid.’

‘Well, I’m damned.’ This was intriguing. ‘Who writes to him – his people?’

Daft Bob guffawed. ‘No’ on yer nelly. It’s the birds.’

‘The birds?’

‘The talent, the hairies, the glamouries.’ He took pity on my ignorance. ‘The women.’

‘Women? You mean young women? Girls? Writing to McAuslan?’

‘No hauf. He’s a helluva man for the lassies, yon.’

‘I don’t believe it,’ I said. ‘Now, look, hold on. Let’s get it straight. You say that women write to McAuslan – and he writes to
them
? Or rather, you and the others write for him? What about, for heaven’s sake?’

‘Oh, Goad, the passion,’ said he. ‘It’s like somethin’ oot the
Sunday Post
, no kiddin’. “Ah-love-ye, Ah-love-ye, Ah’m-pinin’-away-fer-ye,” a’ the time. Me an’ the boys is hairless, keepin’ up wi’ it.’

‘Come off it, Brown,’ I said. ‘You’re telling me that McAuslan exchanges love letters with — with hordes of women? Don’t give me that – I mean, look at him. He isn’t Tyrone Power, is he? What woman in her right mind —′

‘Ach, they don’t know ony better. Look, sir, ye know the addresses that turns up in greatcoat pockets, frae wee lassies that works in the packin’ sheds in Blighty? Ye know, they pit their addresses in the pockets, so that fellas that gits the coats’ll write tae them? Some fellas diz, but no’ often. Weel, McAuslan collected a whole lot o′ these addresses, and gits us tae write tae the women for him.’

Freud, you should be living at this hour, I thought, someone hath need of thee.

‘What for?’ I demanded.

‘Ah dae ken. It’s a good baur, though. He tells us whit tae say – Goad, ye should see it. He’s gaun tae mairry them, an’ tak’ them tae his place on the Riviera when he gets his demob, and Goad kens whit else. There’s nae haudin′ ′im in. An’ they believe it, too.’

‘You’re having me on, curse you,’ I said. ‘It isn’t true.’

‘Ah’m no’, sir, honest tae Goad. Ask Forbes, or Chick, or onybody.’

‘But – how long has this been going on?’

‘Oh, months, sir. Och, it′s jist a baur. Ah postit a couple for ′im the ither day – while he was on jankers. One tae a wumman in Fife, an’ one tae Teeny Mitchell in Crosshill, an’ one tae —’

‘Stone me!’ I exclaimed. ‘The – the – trifler! I could wring his unwashed neck! You mean he’s pouring out his revolting heart to all these unsuspecting females —’

‘Oh, he’s daein’ a’ that. A right Don Joo-an.’

‘And I was sorry for him. No, nothing, Brown. All right, take our lousy Lothario his billet-doux, and just hint to him, gently, from me, that – oh, what’s the use? Carry on.′

I went on my way to the mess, reflecting with mixed feelings on Private McAuslan, demon lover extraordinary. I gave up; life is too short, really. And as I went up the mess steps, I found running through my head the words and music of:

Ah wis walkin’ doon the Garscube Road,
Ah wis taken unawares –

Fly Men

I had the Padre trapped and undone, helpless in my grasp; the rocks were about to fall and crush him. In fact, he was snookered, with the white jammed in behind the black on the bottom cushion, and pink masking the blue at the top end of the table. Also, he was twenty-five points behind.

Reluctant to admit defeat, as the Church of Scotland always is, he played for time. He stood there sweating and humming Crimond, a sure sign of his deep disturbance, fiddled with his cue, dropped the chalk, ran a finger behind his dog-collar, wondered irritably when the Mess Sergeant was going to announce dinner, and finally appealed for help to the M.O., who had been offering him gratuitous advice throughout the game but now, in the moment of crisis, had retired to the bar and was tying salmon-lures. (The M.O. did this habitually, carrying the tackle in his enormous pockets, and fiddling with bits of thread and feather at the slightest excuse.)

‘Now Israel may say and that truly, we’re stymied,’ said the Padre. ‘Lachlan, will you look at this situation. What’s to be done?’

‘Put up a prayer,’ said the M.O. irreverently, with his mouth full of red worsted. He glanced at the table. ‘Left-hand side, a bit of deep screw, and come off three cushions.’ And then, just as the Padre had resigned himself and was preparing to attempt his own patent version of the massé shot, which in the past had necessitated heavy stitching in three different parts of the cloth, the M.O. added artlessly:

‘Here, did you know that Karl Marx was related on his mother’s side to the Duke of Argyll?’

‘Is that so?’ said the Padre, feigning interest and glad of any respite. ‘I never —’

‘Lay off,’ I said firmly. I had been here before. When it came to gamesmanship the M.O. and Padre could make Stephen Potter look like a girl guide. I knew that the M.O.’s irrelevant interruption at a crucial stage of the game had been perfectly timed so that the Padre could delay his shot until dinner intervened, or I forgot the score, or a new war broke out, and I wasn’t having it. I had been pursuing the Padre across the snooker table for weeks, and now I had him gaffed at last.

‘Take your shot, you fugitive from the Iona Community,’ I said. ‘Play ball.’ And as he sighed and stooped over the table, remarking that there was no balm in Gilead, I added some gamesmanship of my own. ‘You’re twenty-five behind, bishop, and dead, dead, dead.’

‘The poor soul, have some respect for his cloth,’ said the M.O., and it was at that moment, with the Padre poised on the lip of destruction, that the Adjutant came in to announce that we had smallpox in the battalion.

‘Smallpox?’

The M.O. ran a hook into his thumb in his startled reaction, and swore luridly, the Padre’s cue rattled on the floor, and I suspect I just stood and gaped. And then the Adjutant, who was normally a slightly flustered, feckless young man, given to babbling, took things in hand.

′Hunter, C Company, is in base hospital under observation. They suspect it’s smallpox —’

‘Suspect? Don’t they know?’ said the M.O., sucking his injured thumb.