Shoes Were For Sunday (4 page)

Sometimes, after our hilarious exercise on the slides, we’d make our way to the ‘park’, as we called the piece of waste ground behind the houses. We’d clamber up the ‘mountains’ to our rendezvous at the top, where somebody had run on ahead to start the fire. We were pretending we were gypsies, so we pitched our voices to a low whisper, in case the law was after us. ‘Hiv ye brought yer totties?’ a hoarse voice demanded. Silently we’d produce one or two potatoes, as many as we could sneak from the shopping, and lay them on the hot glowing embers. As we sat solemnly round in a ring, gazing into the bright heart of the fire while the totties roasted, our eyes were wide and frightened. We dared not look at the darkness pressing at our backs. Oh, but how delicious it was to cup the burning potatoes in cold fingers, and stab with our sharp teeth the blackened curling skin to reach the soft, steaming flesh inside.

When we couldn’t get potatoes we occasionally had an orgy with cinnamon stick. This had the very aroma of the sweet spices of the East, although I didn’t really like it very much. But it felt so wicked to be sitting in the dark, round a fire, actually smoking this scented tube, that I fully expected the heavens to fall upon me for my wanton ways. I’d been very thoroughly warned, both at home by Grannie and at Sunday School by my teachers, of the penalties of sin. To my amazement, the first time I indulged my baser instincts in this way the heavens stayed just where they were, quite indifferent to
my evil behaviour. The absence of heavenly vengeance amazed me, and I wondered if maybe the angels were having a night off themselves.

Another fierce joy was to fill an old pierced tin with rags, set the rags ablaze, and run with this fiery torch into the ‘forest’, to help my master, Robin Hood. The smouldering rags gave off a fearful stench which clung to everything I wore, but which I didn’t even notice, for I was far too busy robbing the rich and helping the poor. I was genuinely amazed when Grannie guessed the minute I came into the house exactly what I’d been up to. ‘My heavens,’ she’d exclaim, recoiling and seizing her nose, ‘your claes are stinking! It’s been thae burnt cloots again, you varmint. Into the sink wi’ every one o’ them. You’re no’ gaen into ma clean bed wi’ a sark smellin’ like an auld boot.’

She was deaf to the romance of Robin Hood and I was scrubbed into a state of scarlet cleanliness.

As she picked up the offending clothes she’d stripped off me, Grannie would sigh: ‘My goad, we’ll never get that smell oot. Ah doot if even the Candy Rock man wid tak’ them.’

The Candy Rock man! How we loved him. We’d be in the midst of a game of peever, or ball-beds, or high-speewigh (our name for hide-and-seek), when some courier from another gang would come up panting, ‘The Candy Rock man is in Bedlay Street.’ Games were abandoned, with never a care as to who was ‘het’ or
who was winning, and we’d stream towards the magic address with one thought in our minds – ‘Candy Rock’. When we got there the barrow would be surrounded with wide-eyed children licking eager lips, ready to answer the chant rendered in a high falsetto by our benefactor: ‘Who likes Candy Rock, Candy Rock, Candy Rock? Who likes Candy Rock?’ Lungs bursting, we would answer with the long-drawn-out ‘Me-e-e-e-e-e-e-e-e’ which he liked, and then there would be a waving sea of arms and legs as we scrambled for the thin strips of pink and white rock he scattered amongst us. One school of thought inclined to the view that by shouting ‘Not me’ they’d establish their characters as unselfish, and that this noble state would be rewarded by all the rock being scattered in their direction. But the other sweets-starved children, of whom I was one, couldn’t believe he would think all that out, and we just
knew
he would scatter it in the direction of the loudest and most enthusiastic ‘Me-e-e-e’. What fun it was, and what boasting there was afterwards as we compared notes on how many pieces we’d managed to grab and swallow in the short time the sport lasted. It was years, it seemed, before I realized that we were supposed to bring rags in exchange for this lovely striped rock. I had thought it an act of simple generosity, sent to us by the same mysterious Providence who had invented Father Christmas.

But we couldn’t rely on getting our sweeties for
nothing very often, for the Candy Rock man’s visits weren’t nearly frequent enough for our liking, and many a happy hour was spent gazing into the window of Mrs Frame’s wee shop, spending our imaginary money. The variety, the colour and selection of good things in those jars and boxes held us spellbound as we squashed our noses against the cold glass. There would be a sharp rat-tat from the inside of the shop, for Mrs Frame wouldn’t stand for the steaming up of her spotless plate-glass window, so, reluctantly we’d draw back a little, and resume our discussion as to what we would buy if we had a ha’penny. Seriously we would scan the glittering jars with the boilings and the chocolates at the back of the window, then rake down to the front where sugar mice and dolly mixtures mingled with jelly babies and toffee balls, sherbet dabs and sugarally straps.

And when the time came for me to spend my ha’penny, given to me by Grannie as a reward for some task well done, such as cleaning shoes or drying dishes or sweeping the lobby, I never dreamt of spending all of it on one thing. My plans had been laid, and I sped down to Mrs Frame’s on winged feet. ‘A faurden’s worth o’ chewing nuts and a faurden sugarally strap,’ I panted. The chewing nuts weren’t nuts at all, which seemed perfectly logical to my childish mind, where everything masqueraded as something else and all was make-believe, and these ‘nuts’ were really tiny pale brown toffees, soft on the outside, with a delicious hard button of a centre, dusted gloriously with sugar and
quite, quite irresistible to my palate. For a farthing I got three or four, screwed into a twist of paper, and they lasted me all the way to the grocer’s where I was bent on earning my next ha’penny if I was lucky.

The sugarally strap at a farthing hadn’t quite the rich quality of a ha’penny nailrod, but that was only just, for it was but half the price. Truly the nailrod was worth a ha’penny, for this piece of liquorice, with its four square sides, like a toothsome pencil, gave a lovely satisfying chew. It was thicker and firmer than the strap, but not so hard as the real liquorice. Still, for a farthing the sugarally strap was quite good value and made most satisfactory make-believe tobacco spit, which was always great fun, even if it outraged Grannie when she heard of it.

Speaking of tobacco, Wee Jeanie’s, farther down the road, sold a specially luscious caramel at four a penny, and when the rare mood of luxury was upon me I would toddle into her shop with my farthing, ask for my single caramel, then politely request that she halve it with the tobacco knife so that I could make two bites of it. This knife, which was really intended to cut the men’s thick black tobacco into ounce plugs, and half-ounce pieces, was a fascination in itself. I’d watch, spellbound, as Jeanie laid my toffee on the stained board, then brought it forward on its hinge in one swift stroke to smite the sweet exactly in half. My mother used to make a face when told of this transaction, and seemed to think there was something off-putting in mixing the flavours of tobacco and toffee, but if any
tobacco was absorbed with the caramel I, in my blissful chewing, never noticed it.

What a choice of goods we had for our farthing! There were tiny sugarally pipes, with little scarlet dots inside the bowl, pretending they were burning tobacco. There were sweetie cigarettes at five for a penny, so naturally a farthing bought one, although it was a bitter disappointment to me that Jeanie wouldn’t break the odd one into bits to give me exact justice for my farthing. I wasn’t really convinced when she told me, ‘Ye aye loss a wee bit, hen, when ye don’t buy in bulk,’ and I dreamed of the day when I would spend a whole penny and buy
five
cigarettes at once, ration myself carefully over a few days, and gain an extra sweet smoke.

Sweeties had been very expensive after war No 1, and tumbling prices came along in the nick of time for me to enjoy them. Never will I forget the day when the number of aniseed balls went up to forty a penny. There were queues at the wee shop that day, and it was indeed a land of plenty to be given ten balls, hard as iron, for a farthing. I nearly sucked my tongue raw until, with dawning disbelief, I realized I’d have to leave some over for next day. For sweeties to last more than a few minutes was outside my experience until that moment, and it was a marvellous feeling to tuck that wee poke with the three remaining aniseed balls behind Grannie’s hankies in the bottom of the chest of drawers, where my brothers couldn’t make a raid without either Grannie or me spotting them.

My purchases were always made with farthings and ha’pennies, with maybe a penny when I was going to the Saturday matinée, but beyond those sums I never ventured to think. I never thought of my precious ‘savings’ as spending money. I put them away and they were as safe as if they were in the Bank of England. But one dizzy day when we were playing ‘guesses’ in front of Mrs Frame’s window a drunk neighbour came up and surveyed us solemnly, blinking as he swayed, listening to our excited ‘guesses’ and stumbling in exasperation as we rushed past him across to the edge of the pavement when we had made our guess. The edge of the pavement was the finishing line for the winner. When we played guesses with shop goods like this we gave the initial letters of an article in the window, say JB for jelly babies, or
WCB
for whipped cream bon-bons, and the first to yell out the correct answer leaped for the pavement edge to win. A flight of fancy now made me give
PARTW
as mine, and when nobody guessed it, my triumphant yells of ‘Putty all round the windows’ brought a glimmer to the drunk man’s face.

He fumbled in his pocket and brought out a handful of coppers. We stood silent, watching him. We were forbidden to talk to strangers, and certainly to drunk men, but we knew this one, alas, for he was a fairly new neighbour. ‘Here’s a ha’penny for each o’ you,’ he said ponderously. ‘And you, the wee lassie that made the putty guess, here’s tuppence for you.’
Tuppence!
For nothing! It was a miracle. It was a fortune.

As I looked at the two coppers, a daring thought sent my head spinning and twisted my stomach with excitement. This money had come for nothing. I hadn’t earned it, so I needn’t spend it carefully. It was riches galore. I determined to enjoy the thrill of real spending. I drew a deep breath. ‘Can I spend it a’ on one thing, mister?’ I asked. ‘On whit?’ he said, puzzled. ‘On one thing,’ I repeated patiently. ‘Instead of a faurden’s worth of this and a ha’penny worth of that.’

‘Spend it ony wey ye like,’ he replied grandly as he turned unsteadily towards his house. ‘Enjoy yersel’, hen, ha’e a real burst.’

I turned to the window and examined every single thing slowly and deliberately. It must be something really wickedly extravagant. Something which wouldn’t last, a luxury that would have to be eaten all at once if its flavour and filling were to be fully enjoyed. Suddenly I saw what I wanted.

The others had spent their ha’pennies by the time I went inside the shop, and were chewing happily, waiting for me. There was an awed silence as I demanded imperiously, ‘A whipped cream walnut, please.’ Mrs Frame smiled and turned to the box. A burst of excited whispering broke out from my chums. ‘She’s spendin’ her hale tuppence on
one
thing.’ ‘Fancy buying a walnut, and it’s that
wee
.’ Don’t buy it, Molly,’ urged one chum. ‘It’ll a’ burst when you bite it, an’ ye’ll no’ be able to keep any till the morn.’

I smiled, deaf to reason, and my teeth fell exultantly on my whole tuppence-worth. It was a glorious moment. I enjoyed every extravagant bite, and I included that drunk man in my prayers for quite a while afterwards.

Even in our asphalt jungle, summer was very noticeable. Windows would be thrown up and left that way all day, instead of being closed tightly against damp and cold. Fires were kept just high enough to do the cooking, and the long days seemed always to be warm and golden. This was the time for our running games and our singing games. These songs were surely handed down from generation to generation, and we acted and chanted them, following a ritual which came from we didn’t know where. But every movement and gesture was as exact as though it had been choreographed. It seemed as though we had always known words, tune and movement, and I only remember consciously learning one song during my entire childhood. This was ‘Ah loast ma hurl on the barra’. It was after Sunday School when I learned it. The big boy and girl who lived in the next close took me home with them to get a taste of their mother’s baking of pancakes. As we waited for the hot pancakes to be lifted off the girdle and spread with margarine, the boy started singing, ‘Oh the bonnie wee barra’s mine’, and my ears pricked with interest. For ages I’d sung, ‘The barra broke at ten o’clock an’ ah loast ma hurl on the barra’, and I thought that was the
entire song. Now it seemed there was more. ‘Sing it again, Henry,’ I begged him with great excitement. ‘Oh sing it again, I want to know the rest of it.’ And by the time we’d finished our pancakes we were all three lustily singing:

The barra broke at ten o’clock

An’ ah loast ma hurl on the barra.

Aw the bonnie wee barra’s mine,

It disnae belang tae O’Hara,

The fly wee bloke, stuck tae ma rock,

But ah’m gonny stick tae his barra.

I remember teaching a wee English boy, who was on a summer visit to his grannie, to sing:

Missus MacLean had a wee wean

She didnae know how to
nurse
it,

She gi’ed it tae me, an’ ah gi’ed it some tea,

An’ its wee belly
burstit
.

I was enchanted to hear this old Glasgow song rendered with a prissy English accent, and kept making him sing it for me. I was astounded one day when he refused. ‘But why?’ I asked him, ‘I thought you liked that wee song.’ ‘My grannie says I’m not to sing it any more,’ he said primly. ‘She says it’s vulgar.’ Vulgar! I’d never heard the word before, and didn’t know what it meant. When I asked my grannie, she laughed and said,
‘Och well, you ken whit the English are like. Butter widnae melt in their mooths, to hear them. The word “belly” will likely be too coorse for them.’ Belly too coarse! But it was in the Bible, and we called our navels our belly buttons without shame or thought. I wondered what else I said that was vulgar. I’d have to be careful. Maybe I was constantly being vulgar without knowing it. Grannie dismissed my fears, and said there was nothing wrong with the wee harmless songs we sang, and I was to go out and play and not to be so daft.