The Bone Yard (4 page)

I grabbed a refill and caught sight of my father with another former guardian. The Council usually ignores ex-members but it invites them to the Hogmanay reception to keep them sweet. Hector didn't use to turn up, but since my mother died he's been more assertive. I went over.

“Hello, old man.”

“Hello, failure.” The skin around my father's eyes creased and he nodded to me slowly. “I wasn't sure you'd come, Quintilian.” He loves to use my full name. He should do. It was his idea.

“I wouldn't miss a chance to network with the city's movers and shakers,” I said ironically. “How are you, William?”

The shrivelled figure at my father's side quivered as if the force of my breath was almost enough to knock him over. He used to be science and energy guardian when my mother was in charge, but it didn't look like he had a lot of energy reserves left now.

“William,” he repeated in a querulous voice. “I'd almost forgotten my name. They still call me ‘guardian' in the retirement home. William Augustus McEwan,” he said slowly. Then he seemed to revive. “I'm still going, Quintilian. Hector has been telling me about your exploits.”

“Uh-huh. Don't believe everything the old man says.”

“But I do, Quintilian, I do.” William McEwan smiled sadly. “The city needs more like you.” He looked around blearily at the mass of people. “The new guardians, they're going to throw everything we worked for away.” He shook again and held on to my father's arm. In their faded tweed jackets and worn brogues, surrounded by loud-mouthed drinkers gabbling away to hard-faced young auxiliaries, the pair of them had the appearance of time travellers who'd got stuck in the wrong millennium.

I tried to inject a light-hearted note. “The Council has about as much desire for more citizens like me as it has for an outbreak of AIDS among the city's nightclub staff.”

William McEwan shook his head weakly. “You're wrong, my boy. They're going to need you, all right. They don't know what they're letting themselves in for.”

I've rarely seen anyone look more solemn. Even Hector, never one to keep his feelings about the boyscouts to himself, looked dubious. “Have another whisky, you old misery guts,” he said. “You don't get this quality of dram in the home.”

But his companion was peering round the room again, apparently looking for someone. As he was doing that, I caught the medical guardian's eye and raised my glass. Despite her sober black dress and flat-heeled shoes she stood out, her short, silver-blonde hair and high cheekbones a striking combination even among a gaggle of ambassadors' wives in expensive outfits. She raised an eyebrow at me. If she hadn't been a guardian, and therefore sworn to celibacy, I might have tried to forget Katharine by having a go. As things are, there's no chance.

Hector started mumbling about some less than fascinating discovery he'd made about Juvenal's sexual peccadilloes. My father's spent years combing the pages of the old Roman misogynist, presumably because it keeps him close in spirit to his wife. A waiter in a pair of tartan trews came up with a silver tray full of canapés that ordinary citizens wouldn't have recognised as food. As a representative of that body, I did my duty and grabbed as many caviar, lobster and
foie gras
dainties as I could.

“Here, William,” I said, turning to the ex-guardian. “Have some of  . . .”

But he was off, piling across the hall like a man with a mission. I almost choked on my vol-au-vent when I saw who he'd approached. Then he started waving his arms about with surprising force.

“Oh, Christ,” said my father.

“Oh, Christ is right.” I handed him my evening meal and went to rescue William McEwan. The person he'd chosen to give a piece of his mind to was the senior guardian; and although the senior guardian is supposed to be a leader among equals, the present one's more like a deity than a servant of the city. He'd been groomed for the top since the day he started the auxiliary training programme. He had the kind of record that other auxiliaries would sacrifice their closest colleagues for – triple As in every exam he ever sat, four bravery commendations during border duty and numerous prizes for his knowledge of Plato. His calm authority seemed to inspire worryingly mindless levels of devotion in his supporters. The tall figure in an immaculate powder blue suit turned to William like he was an irritating insect, smiling apologetically at his guests. But as I approached, it seemed that the guardian's brow furrowed and it even looked like he was being shaken by what he was hearing. His eyes, pale blue between the black of his hair and wispy beard, held the old man in an unwavering stare. Which meant that young blue eyes didn't register my arrival.

“And what about the Bone Yard?” William McEwan demanded, all traces of querulousness vanished from his voice. “What about those poor—”

He broke off and gasped as the senior guardian gripped his wrist.

I put my hand on William's shoulder and pulled him gently away. That broke the senior guardian's flinty gaze and he swung his eyes on to me, briefly stopping to take in my missing right forefinger.

“Citizen Dalrymple.” The deity favoured me with a thin-lipped and very brief smile. “I'm afraid the former guardian is not very well. I suggest you remove him before he makes a spectacle of himself.” He turned back to the men in suits he'd been addressing and ushered them away from us.

“What was all that about, William?” I asked as I led him and Hector to the nearest corner. “What's the Bone Yard?” But he was shaking, all the energy he'd summoned up now spent like a battery's last surge, and I didn't get any answers to my questions. Not long afterwards I put Hector and him into a guard vehicle and sent them back to their retirement home. What a way to spend Hogmanay.

It didn't get much better. I hung around and consumed as many canapés and as much whisky as I could manage. And I chatted up a few foreign businessmen's wives, but never got beyond them telling me how much they liked shopping in Edinburgh because of the low prices. When midnight came, I joined hands and sang “Auld Lang Syne” like the rest of them. It was worth staying that long to see how awkward some of the guardians looked when they tried to be spontaneous. Machiavelli in particular had the horrified expression of a snake that's just slithered into a convention of secretary birds. That's when I decided I'd seen enough.

Outside by St Giles I took in a few deep breaths to clear my head. Bad idea. My lungs tensed up like they'd just been injected with ice water. For a moment I even thought I was going to pass out. It was the idea of landing on the frozen pavement that made me get a grip. I headed home, the distant singing of revellers in the suburbs echoing in my ears like it did when I was a kid and Scotland won the rugby Grand Slam. Tonight was the only night of the year when the curfew isn't enforced. I suddenly felt wide awake, the whisky only a faint throb in my temples, dead certain that I wasn't going to sleep for hours. I stopped at the corner of George IVth Bridge and Roddie Aitken flashed into my mind. I wondered if he was all right. I even considered walking down to Drummond Street and knocking him up. Then I remembered he had a girlfriend. I'd be really popular if I turned up at this time of night.

So I wandered back to my place and shivered through the wee small hours listening to the blues at low volume. When I eventually crashed out, Katharine Kirkwood and the medical guardian refused to keep me company, even in my dreams. That was a great start to 2022.

Chapter Three

It was still dark when I came to. Workmen seemed to have been round during the night and poured a ton of gravel down my throat. My feet had made an abortive break for freedom but hadn't got any further than six inches from the edge of the bedcover. They were so cold that I was forced to get up and knead the circulation back into them. After that I was wide awake and there was no point in going back to bed, despite the fact that New Year's Day is one of the few official holidays recognised by the Council.

I worked at what the Supply Directorate describes as my “desk, plywood, ordinary citizen issue” – more like a picnic table with rickety legs that I've had to shore up with volumes of ancient philosophy – and brought some of my missing persons reports up to date. Most of them were just people who'd been called up for extra duty in the mines or on the farms. The Labour Directorate is supposed to notify their next of kin but the paperwork is for ever going astray. And then there are the citizens who get sick of the Garden of Edin and cross the border without having the nerve to let their family know. I've lost count of the number of times I've had to tell tearful mothers and disbelieving partners that their loved ones have done a runner. I try to do it with a bit more delicacy than the City Guard.

I gave Roddie Aitken until eleven to do what he had to do with the girlfriend he was so bashful about, then headed off to his flat. There was no point in trying to call him since the only phones available to citizens are the public ones at the end of every third street. In the early days of the Enlightenment it was claimed that the telephone system was too expensive to maintain and that the mindless nattering it encouraged wasted time which could be put to more productive use. Everyone knows the Council just wanted to control the flow of information.

It was still cold enough to make deep breathing a hazardous occupation, the sky clear and deceitfully bright. I walked along Lauriston Place, the soot-stained granite of the City Infirmary on my right and what used to be George Heriot's School on my left. Its flag-topped turrets and octagonal dome now house a hotel dedicated to the wealthiest of post-communist China's businessmen and women. No prizes for guessing which building is better looked after. I walked on through what used to be university territory. The Medical School is an auxiliary training centre, while the McEwan Hall is now called the Edinburgh Enlightenment Lecture and Debating Hall – the dialogues of Plato which underpin the city's constitution are analysed on a daily basis here. The D-shaped building's former name reminded me of the ex-science and energy guardian and his performance at the reception last night. What the hell was he on about to the senior guardian? And what the hell was the Bone Yard? I didn't like the word much. It made me think of graveyards, cities of the dead, tombstones canting over as the corpses beneath decomposed and the earth subsided. Very cheerful on the first morning of the New Year.

Drummond Street is across the road from the university Old College, a great Adam building around a quadrangle topped by a dome high above ground level. They still light it up at night. Since the university was the spiritual home of the Enlightenment – a lot of its early leaders were professors like my parents – I suppose the current Council feels it's worth the electricity to commemorate the place, although most of the iron boyscouts fancy themselves more as hard-nosed enforcers than intellectuals. But they still aren't practical enough to sort out the city's bureaucracy, as my missing persons files show.

I wandered down Drummond Street towards number 28. There was no one about; even the kids seemed to have hangovers. I stopped and cocked an ear. Dead quiet for a few seconds, then in the distance the raucous cries of the gulls desperately hunting for scraps in this underfed city. It struck me that I had nothing in the flat to eat and the food shops were closed for the day. Maybe Roddie Aitken would have some bread. He seemed like the kind of guy who'd be organised enough to stock up on provisions.

I pushed open the shabby street door and let out the usual reek of disinfectant failing to mask sewer gas and citizens who only shower once a week. It was tempered with the acid stink of vomit, as you'd expect after Hogmanay. Flat f was on the second floor. Someone across the landing from Roddie had defied Housing Directorate regulations and put a pot on the floor containing a gigantic plant with wide leaves so shiny they looked plastic. The branches had almost reached the filthy skylight. I didn't blame them for trying to find a way out of the dingy staircase.

I went up to Roddie Aitken's door and knocked. Not too hard – I didn't want to sound like the City Guard – but hard enough and long enough to wake him even from a sex-induced slumber. No answer. I knocked again. While I waited, I looked at the faded blue door. Down by the keyhole there were some recent scratches, quite deep. He probably couldn't get the key in last night while pissed. I pressed my fingers on the panel. It swung open on hinges that badly needed oiling.

“Roddie?”

Still no answer.

“Roddie, where are you? It's Quint, Quint Dalrymple.”

Like most flats, mine included, the door opened straight on to the living room. Chaos. I'm not the most tidy person, but even when I'm arseholed I don't wreck the joint like Roddie had done. The standard-issue armchair and sofa were upside down, their fabric torn and cushions shredded; the books citizens are encouraged to read (philosophy texts, classic novels, that sort of thing) had been scattered around the floor; the kitchen cupboard had been emptied, cereals and potatoes all over the place. Even if Roddie had invited the city rugby champions round, he wouldn't have had this much cleaning up to do.