The Kellys of Kelvingrove (13 page)

Paul looked thoughtful. ‘I wonder if our pal Bashir knows more about him and those two women. Bashir’s a great one for the gossip about everybody.’

‘I don’t think he’ll have succeeded with the two women. Remember he said he got a right brush off from them. And he, like us, was just trying to be friendly.’

‘I could always ask him anyway.’

A time schedule for his writing was arranged, with Paul getting up at six o’clock in the morning to write for a couple of hours before breakfast and setting out for his work at the school.

Before long, he was happily wreaking his revenge on not only the Reverend Denby, but on the double-barrelled character and Mrs Jean Gardner as well.

Clive and Paul strolled through the galleries, admiring the latest exhibition.

‘Certainly original,’ Paul said. ‘I’ve never seen the like of it in my life – anywhere. Have you?’

Clive shook his head. ‘It’s a really wonderful and original place all together. They call the Kelvingrove Art Gallery and Museum a portal to the world, and rightly so.’

‘I was glad the Reverend Denby didn’t get a sympathetic audience when he was giving his ridiculous sermon in the park. Fancy condemning such a beautiful place as evil. I suppose he was thinking of all the pictures and sculptures of naked women. Anyway he won’t be able to do it now.’

‘Surely he hasn’t really been inside,’ Clive said. ‘The paintings are so beautiful. One of my favourite things is actually a sculpture. That heart-rending plaster called
Motherless
– the one with the child in the arms of a distraught father. But everyone, even the Reverend Denby, must sure admire and be moved by Salvador Dali’s
Christ of St John of the Cross
.’

‘Not nutters like the Reverend Denby. Probably it was him that attacked it.’

‘God, yes.’ Clive rolled his eyes. ‘I forgot about that. It was attacked twice. Once the canvas was punctured with a sharp stone and then ripped open. The other time it was attacked with an air gun.’

‘I’ll never be able to understand the thinking behind that,’ Paul said, ‘and as a writer, I’m supposed to understand what makes all sorts of people tick. What motivates them. I keep trying to work out how the Reverend Denby can believe he’s a Christian. What Jesus is he acting on behalf of?’

‘It’s the Old Testament he keeps quoting and raving on about.’

‘I know, but he claims to be a Christian and a Christian is supposed to be a follower of Jesus Christ.’

‘Och, let’s try to forget about that nutter and enjoy the Gallery.’ Clive liked the painting
Old Willie – The Village Worthy
by Paul Guthrie. Paul admired Cadell’s masterpiece
Interior – The Orange Blind
.

‘That orange blind in the background,’ he said, ‘provides the picture with a dazzling focal point and contrasts so starkly with the bold expanses of black and green. And of course, we’re left with the puzzle of who is the man in the background playing the piano and who is the mysterious lady in the foreground taking tea. The whole thing has a sense of nervous energy and expectation.’

‘It’s a bit like
Lady with a Red Hat
in a way,’ Clive said, going over to stare at the portrait by William Strang. ‘The bold colours and elegant posture make it, for me, one of the most striking portraits in the collection.’

‘It’s Vita Sackville West,’ Paul said, ‘aristocratic poet, novelist and lesbian. Her lesbian affair with Virginia Woolf was immortalised in Woolf’s novel
Orlando
.’

‘Yes, I read that years ago. I remember reading about the stir it made at the time. And just you wait and see, Paul. Your book about gay men will make just as big a stir.’

‘It’s not written yet, Clive.’

‘Not finished yet, but you’re getting there, Paul. It’s wonderful that you’ve been able to do so much as you have, when you’re working at teaching full time.’

Neither of them were all that keen on Lowry’s busy pictures of matchstick men but both stopped to admire Avril Paton’s
Windows in the West
. They had both lived in tenements in the past and could relate to the glowing interior of the tenement with glimpses of people going about their everyday lives inside.

It was while they stood admiring
Windows in the West
that they noticed a young couple walking nearby. Clive nudged Paul.

‘That’s Mirza Shafaatulla and Sandra Arlington-Jones, isn’t it?’

‘Yeah. If that horrible snob of a woman saw her daughter just now, she’d have a fit. Sandra looks really besotted with Mirza, doesn’t she. And he with her.’

‘Real love birds, they look. Poor things. They don’t stand a chance.’

Mirza and Sandra were walking along with arms entwined around each other and Sandra’s head with its thick cap of red gold hair was resting against Mirza’s shoulder.

Suddenly, the young people stiffened with shock and fear as they stared over at Clive and Paul.

‘Don’t worry,’ Clive called over, but quietly, ‘your secret is perfectly safe with us.’

‘Thanks,’ both of them mouthed in reply.

Clive and Paul moved away to study some sculpture but as they did so, Clive murmured, ‘God help them’ and Paul said, ‘They’ll need plenty of help. Mirza’s Muslim parents will be against them and Mrs Arlington-Jones would, I bet, rather see Sandra dead that hitched up with Mirza.’

Suddenly Clive laughed. ‘Look at that. If the Reverend Denby has been in and seen that, no wonder he’s been preaching hell and damnation outside.’

‘What’s it called?’ Paul stared at the sculpture of the naked woman.

‘
Syrinx
. It’s by William McMillan. One lady visitor apparently stripped off and was photographed beside it by her companion. I don’t know if it was a lady companion or not. Even more interesting is Rodin’s
Age of Bronze
. It had its penis stroked by so many visitors, especially lady visitors, that the bronze patina wore off. It’s been restored to its originally glory and it’s now at the Burrell Collection.’

Paul said, ‘The reverend gentleman would definitely be horrified at that. I can just see his dashing straight from the gallery to the park and roaring out his sermon denouncing all the evils he’d just seen and heard about in here.’

Clive suddenly remembered about Mirza and Sandra. ‘I hope he doesn’t come across the young love birds. He’d immediately report them to Mrs Arlington-Jones. Then all hell would be let loose.’

‘It’s pathetic, isn’t it? Why can’t people live and let live. They’re not doing anyone any harm by loving each other. It’s the same with us.’

Clive said, ‘We’ve had to live with unfair attitudes for a long time. But at least we’re mature adults. We’ve had time to harden ourselves to protect ourselves from it. They’re only children. Their hurt and suffering will be so much worse.’

‘I know. God, talk about suffering. Look at that sculpture.’ Paul pointed over at Pierre Bracke’s
Wives of Fishermen
. It was a sculpture in dull grey marble of four tragic-looking women clinging close together, waiting anxiously for the return of their husbands from a storm at sea, hope fading.

‘That just shows that artists don’t always choose physical beauty when searching for a subject. A painful or difficult side of life can result in a more moving work of art. That’s what I’m trying to do, I suppose. There’s much in my book that’s painful and difficult but I’m hoping the end result will be a work of art that will touch everyone.’

‘And I’m sure it will be, Paul. If only you could afford to give up teaching and concentrate on writing it. You know what my wages are – not enough to keep both of us. Otherwise I’d gladly support you.’

‘I wouldn’t want you to be worried like that. No, I’ll just carry on the way I’m doing. At least I’m happy with what I’ve managed to write.’

‘What’s bothering me, Paul, is the fact that you haven’t made him a minister – the Denby character, I mean. Why are you making him a two-faced bully of a husband in the book?’

‘It’s the emotional truth that matters, Clive. Our writer friends would agree about that, I’m sure. It’s the same with the gay characters in the book. They’re not teachers like us. They don’t live in a place like Waterside Way. But their suffering is true to life – our life – and that’s what matters.’

‘I suppose you know best. You’re the writer, not me. It’s certainly proving to be a gripping read anyway. Oh look, there’s Bashir.’ Clive waved at their Muslim friend who seemed somewhat agitated.

‘I’ve just seen the two old biddies walking towards the Gallery and I know Sandra and Mirza are there. I wanted to warn them in case they came out and bumped into the pair of old horrors.’

‘We saw them just a few minutes ago.’

‘Where?’

Paul pointed. ‘Over there.’

‘Thanks, pal. See you.’

‘Aye. OK.’

After Bashir had raced away, Clive said, ‘He’s a really good guy, isn’t he?’

‘Yeah. If only everybody was like him. OK, he’s Muslim, not Christian like us. But he’s a good Muslim and it’s how people treat one another that matters. He treats people in a caring and loving way. What could be better than that?’

‘You’re right. I’d rather have him than the Christian Reverend Denby any day.

Jack Kelly said, ‘I haven’t even had time to do the shopping, what with all the extra work at the station.’

Mae shrugged. ‘You’ll have more time from now on, won’t you?’

‘No, I won’t.’ Jack’s voice hardened angrily. ‘You’ll have to do the shopping.
And
come in and cook the meals.’

‘I’ve told you, Jack. I must stay here with Doris.’

‘And I’m telling you, you must come back to where you belong.’

‘You can’t tell me what to do.’

‘I
am
telling you. And if necessary, I’ll tell Doris as well. From now on, you’re only going to work part time seeing to her.’

‘Doris is ill and needing taken care of. You’re perfectly strong and healthy.’

‘You can take care of her part time after you do the shopping and while I’m at work. Once I’m at home, your duty is to come home and see to my meals.’

‘And those of all your police friends?’

‘Yes. It all worked out perfectly happily before.’

‘Perfectly happily?’

‘Yes. And there’s no reason why it should not work out perfectly happily again.’

‘Jack, how many times must I repeat myself? Doris is ill and needs to be taken care of day and night, and that is what I’m being paid to do.’

‘You’re forgetting something, Mae.’

‘What?’

‘I’m not in fact as perfectly strong and healthy as you’ve just said. I have an injured hip and I confess now, although you must have seen it with your own eyes, that I suffer constant agonising pain.’

She couldn’t deny this and for the first time, she wavered. She might have tried to make whatever concession she could but seeing her hesitate and waiver, he immediately became aggressive again.

‘So stop all this bloody nonsense, pack up your things and come home.
Now
!’ he shouted at her, ‘before I completely lose patience with you.’

Wasn’t that so typical of him. He was a stupid, selfish bully and always had been. He’d never change. All right, she missed his passionate love-making. There was no denying he was good at sex but that couldn’t, and shouldn’t, make up for all his faults, and all the other things he was totally ignorant about.

‘No,’ she said, in the nearest to shouting she’d ever managed in her life. ‘I will not pack up my things and come home. Forget it. From now on, you’ll have to manage on your own.’

‘Don’t you dare talk to me like that.’

‘I’ll talk to you any way I like.’

‘Did you not hear me?’ His voice and facial expression turned incredulous.

‘Yes, I heard you. You were shouting loud enough. It’s a good job Doris has had her sedative or she would have heard you as well.’

‘You will
not
talk to me any way you like. You will show me some respect, do you hear me? You’ll behave at least like a half-decent wife. That means you shut up now and do as you’re told.’

She nearly laughed. It was so ridiculous.

‘Oh, Jack!’

‘Oh Jack what?’

Did he expect her now to go down on her knees and apologise to him?

‘You’re being ridiculous.’

‘What?’ he yelled. ‘
I’m
being ridiculous?’

‘Yes. Almost Victorian. In case you haven’t noticed, women are free now, Jack. They are not slaves to their husbands.’

‘The bloody trouble with you is, you don’t know how lucky you are.’

‘Oh yes?’

‘Yes. I’ve provided you with a lovely home. Never kept you short of money …’

She nearly gave a howl of hilarity at that.

‘Never been unfaithful to you. Don’t even smoke or drink. What more could any woman want?’

‘I want you to try doing what you expected me to do.’

‘What the hell are you talking about now?’

‘Do the shopping for a start, Jack. That’ll be an eye opener for you. Come back and speak to me again after you do that.’

‘You’re raving, woman. What’s so difficult about shopping? If that’s all you’ve had to worry you, you really have been lucky.’

‘That’s what you’ve always thought, despite what I tried to tell you over and over again. I’ve tried to tell you the truth, Jack, but you’ve always refused to listen. I’m sick of telling you. I’m sick of talking to you. Just go away.’

‘Maybe you’d rather have action than talk. Maybe that’s what you need.’

And with that he grabbed her and dragged her across the room, his fingers digging painfully into her arms.

‘You’re coming home right now.’

‘Let go of me, or I’ll scream the place down until every house in Waterside Way hears me. I’ll report you to police headquarters. What will all your precious police pals think of you then?’

He loosened his grip.

Mae felt sad. Jack, for all his faults, had never been a violent man. He had always been kind and helpful to everyone. And of course he’d always thought he was kind and helpful to her. Despite the constant agony he suffered, he never complained or allowed the pain to keep him from going to any lengths to help neighbours or friends. Normally he was a patient man too. He had never lost his temper in the past. Was it her fault that he had changed to much? She struggled to be fair.