The Museum of Doubt (23 page)

Aye, said Gordon. Did you draw this yourself?

Of course I fucking didn’t. It comes from the general staff.

Here, said Gordon. I’m warning you, I won’t tolerate that kind of language from folk your age.

It’s about how white people like us are getting murdered and AIDS-infected and our women raped by pakis, yids, chinks and niggers. The boy took a sharp step back and lifted his hand in front of his face and ducked his head like he thought Gordon was going to hit him and then giggled like a lassie.

Gordon looked at the leaflet again and sure enough one of the grinning men had huge lips and a bone through his nose. Right, said Gordon. We do get a lot of that round here. He nodded and handed the leaflet back to the boy, who flinched again, blinked several times and snatched it out of his hand.

Eh? said the boy.

Niggers, said Gordon. There’s refugees in the church hall.

The boy’s mouth pinched together. You’re Special Branch, aren’t you? he said.

My brother wanted to get in but it’s all stitched up with Oxbridge, isn’t it? So is this what you do, son, hand out leaflets? Must be very boring work. That’s why you were jumping off the bridge, eh?

The boy put his hand on the parapet and looked out over the edge. He turned back. His lower lip was trembling. What was it about young folk these days? Christ it was hard not to laugh.

The boy sniffed and tears came out his eyes. My girlfriend said I was a fascist prick, he said.

Is that right? said Gordon. He looked at his watch. He’d never get to the garden centre at this rate.

And she calls up the commander and tells him it was me tipped off the plods about the petrol bombs, and how I was working for the Bangladeshi secret service, and now they’ve put my picture in last week’s newsletter saying I’m a traitor.

It’s terrible what they’ll do to you. I know. They’re like – you know what they are? They’re fascists. Wee Hitlers the lot of them. They’ll sell you down the river. Look, seeing as you’re interested in the ethnic business I’ll walk you down the road. It’s on my way. OK?

What’s the point?

You’ve got to keep up your interests.

It’s not worth it. There’s nothing but injustice wherever you go. The boy wiped the tears off his face.

You’re right, said Gordon. You’re right to trust no-one. I don’t. But where’s the guarantee it’s going to be any better after you’re dead? Two young lads, right, two young lads. One of them’s a miserable jessie with a daft haircut and so’s the other one, in fact, but one of them’s alive and the other one’s lying drowned face down in the river. Along comes this wee smasher with fantastic tits. Maybe she won’t fancy either of the young lads, she wouldn’t if she had any sense, she’d go for an older man with some money and an understanding of the world, but supposing she’s thick and fancies one of these boys. Which one’s it going to be? The one still talking and breathing, or the cold one in the river? Eh? She’s not going to go down there and start shagging the corpse, is she? It’s a question of chances. Even when you’re alive you’ve got virtually no chance of getting off with a lassie like that but when you’re dead you’ve got no chance atall.

Not that you know of.

Not that anyone knows of. You’ll get to try being dead in the end. Everyone gets a shot. In the meantime you’ve just got to try to entertain yourself in the queue.

What about faith? said the boy.

Listen, I’ve got to get up to the garden centre, said Gordon. I’ll walk you down the road, and then if you still want to jump off the bridge you can come back. It’s only a few minutes. OK?

The boy wiped the tears off his face and they went off together.

There’s a hell of a lot of foreigners, right enough, said Gordon. You think there’s too many of them here, you should try going abroad. I went to Bangkok once. Just don’t tell Smithie, eh, if she found out there’d be hell to pay. Ach ye bugger Smithie was with me, was he not, so who was it not to tell? The left-footer, the jungle fighter, what was her name, Mary. With breasts, she cooked breakfast for him not half an hour ago, and they slept in the same bed. Have to pick up some of those twigs while he was about it. How did it come about that they were sleeping in the same bed. Marriage, that was the one. Marriage. And old Smithie, he knew better than that, he knew to steer clear of the organisations, the fascists, they shot you in the back of the head the moment you stopped even to take a breath. Mind you what was he about, shooting himself? It wasn’t Gordon’s fault the wee one was a bit slow on his feet in the traffic.

The boy with the leaflets was holding forth about the militias in America.

My brother had some books on the Ku Klux Klan, said Gordon. He said we needed something like that here only there weren’t enough negroes in Scotland and it’d have to be for the Catholics instead.

The door to the church hall was open. They went into the
lobby and passed through a narrow way cleared between two great piles of boots and shoes and coats and through another set of doors into the hall. It was hot and bright and filled with chattering and shouting in a language which was not English. Women were sorting blankets and sleeping bags and trying to make spaces for their families among the others and the grannies were sitting stunned on the floor and kids were hurtling up and down and playing soldiers on the stage and the men were standing up in groups, smoking and talking and waving their arms at each other.

Gordon went up to the nearest group. D’you speak English? he said to a man with his hands in the pockets of a brown leather jacket.

Yes, said the man.

We’re looking for the refugees.

We are the refugees.

Gordon looked round the hall. I mean the other folk, you know, the Africans, he said.

The man shook his head and looked round like he wasn’t sure himself. There aren’t any Africans here, he said. Maybe we look like Africans to you but that’s the fucking Serbs’ fault, excuse me. He spoke a few words to his pals in his language and they laughed.

Gordon told the suicide boy to hang on for a couple of minutes and went outside to look for Shiltie. The minister was in an office round the back of the church. Nice little number. Free house, no work to speak of, tax exemptions all over the shop. Maybe work an angle.

Shiltie was clacking away at the old computer. When Gordon came in he swivelled round on a chair and took his glasses off and didn’t get up.

Good morning, he said.

Aye, morning, said Gordon. Here I thought you were supposed to be getting refugees for your church hall. Did you know the place was full of hundreds of folk standing around smoking and chatting and dossing, kids and grannies and everything?

Those are the refugees, said Shiltie.

Oh, is that them, is it? I thought they were going to be more coloured.

They’re from Yugoslavia.

Right, there’s a war on there, isn’t there, right enough.

Shiltie sighed. You would have thought God would have singed him across the chops just for that sighing, one of his own. What do you want? he said. We’ve got permission. They’re not doing anyone any harm.

I found this boy trying to jump off the bridge, and you know they’re trying to keep the river clean, said Gordon. He was depressed about the eh, racial … ethnic …

Ethnic cleansing, said Shiltie.

Aye. That was the phrase he used. It was just I was on my way to the garden centre, right, and I thought if I dropped him off here in passing seeing as he was interested in darkies, and you with the refugees.

You make me sick, said Shiltie, getting up. He was trembling. I can turn the cheek with every other old bigot in the parish but there’s something about you that makes me want to commit violence.

Nancy boy. The feeling was mutual. Wait till he got to heaven and had to work his ticket in front of God. That’d be funny, watching the minister crawling round in the clouds looking for his specs and God saying I’m sorry, did you lose your specs? Oh look Gabriel, I’m standing on them. I’m awful sorry, Shittie, they’re broken. D’you see that, Gabriel, I’ve broken Shittie’s specs. And I was wanting to ask him to read off the sizes on the soles of our
boots. And Gabriel and all the angels would laugh and hitch up their rainments and piss in a bucket and Shiltie’d have to drink it while they did the slow handclap. Could you rely on angel piss not to taste good, though? It was going to be no joke up there till you got in close with the chief. Need to have a word with the bank about it. Christ, the minister was still havering away.

I think it’s quite encouraging – who cares what you think? – that the attitudes of some members of your generation haven’t infected all young people, said Shiltie, getting up. And I think – Christ, there he was, thinking again, he had to tell you each time – it’s terribly sad that boys like this have been so disillusioned by the legacy of greed and hatred you’ve left them in the world that they’re ready to kill themselves. The West bears a heavy share of responsibility for the tragedy in the former Yugoslavia. I suppose it’s to your credit that you stopped him jumping. Where’s the young lad now?

They went to the hall and found the boy standing bent double, weeping with laughter in the middle of a group of young male refugees. They were all laughing. One tapped the boy on the shoulder to make him look up and mimed a gesture of cutting something between his legs and stuffing it into his mouth. He made his cheeks bulge out and his eyes pop. They all roared. One of the refugees saw Shiltie.

Oh! Mr Shiltie! he shouted, putting his hand round the boy’s shoulder. Why didn’t you tell us before there were such people in your country? He kissed the boy on the cheek.

Is this him? said Shiltie to Gordon.

Aye, said Gordon. You seem to have cheered up a wee bit.

Are you homeless? said Shiltie to the boy.

No, I live with my mum and dad in Portobello.

You seem to be getting on famously with our guests from the Balkans.

He’s one of us! said the refugee, squeezing the boy’s shoulders. He’s a patriot. He’s not a communist like you, Mr Shiltie. If everyone here was like Julian you never would have lost your empire.

Julian grinned.

Maybe you should go home, said Shiltie.

No! shouted the refugees. Let him stay! We’ll teach him how to fight, then we’ll all go and fuck the Serbs together, eh?

Julian grinned.

Now just hold on, said Shiltie.

That’s me away to the garden centre, said Gordon.

Wait, said Shiltie.

Gordon walked over to the door. Before he walked out he looked back and saw Shiltie picking up one of Julian’s leaflets and frowning. Julian was lying prone on the floor, squinting down the length of a broom handle while one of the refugees instructed him in the art of sniping.

Gordon hadn’t been to the garden centre on foot before. It was a fair haul across the car park to the entrance and coming on to rain too. What was he doing letting Smithie go off with the car like that, it was his, he’d paid for it. These wee laddies with their fancy motors, red Jap Dinky boxes-on-wheels for folk who never learned to tie their laces and wore slip-ons, there should be a law that they had to stop for their elders and let them take the wheel. I’m sorry son, I’m going to have to take this vehicle off you for a few days, looks like we’re in for a wet spell. I understand, sir, you’ve earned the right, here are the keys. Spot on, son. Cheerio!

He went in, released a trolley and cruised the aisles. He put in a power drill, a baseball cap saying Team Bosch and a shiny steel tool in a fold-out case with forty different attachments. He didn’t know what it was for but it looked like you could have fun with it. Christ, look at that fountain. You just plugged in the hose and it started burbling away. Classy. Could have it in the front room, run the pipe under the rug. Marble-effect plastic. An absolute miracle, a gem. Probably from China right enough but who was it bought it, eh? Who had the taste and the spending power? Not old Charlie Chan, that was for sure.
Could buy one for Smithie. Ach, not Smithie, the other one, with the breasts. How did she know Smithie was dead? They never told you anything. One thing was sure: Smithie would’ve wanted his pal Gordon to have the shotgun. That was agenda item number one at the next meeting.

Past the sun loungers again, that was the third time. There was a boy in a white shirt and black breeks and a badge with his name on in case he forgot who he was in the midst of a transaction. They had it easy, there’d been times when Gordon could have done with one of them, quick glance in the window to get the reflection and read it off, but he’d always had to wing it.

I’m looking for autumn leaves, said Gordon.

Eh? said the boy, pushing his face into Gordon’s.

Autumn leaves, said Gordon, you know, for scattering round the garden, and bonfires.

Aw we don’t do them mate, sorry. Need to try somewhere else. He was turning away.

You always used to do them. There were big wooden barrels and you’d lift them out with tongs and sell them by the pound.

The boy narrowed his eyes and scratched his head. His name was Mr Campbell Ferrier. No, he said. I’ve worked here two years and we’ve never done autumn leaves. He was beginning to have his doubts though.

I’ve been coming here all my life and you could always get autumn leaves, said Gordon. Heaps of them. They’re in season just now. It’s autumn.

I think most folk just gather their own, sir, really, said Mr Campbell Ferrier. I’m sure you’d get some from the council. Anyhow this place only opened two years ago.

You should ask your supervisor, said Gordon.

Honestly sir, he’d say the same as me.

You’ll be telling me next you don’t do twigs.

No, we don’t do twigs. What kind of twigs? Plastic twigs like?

What would I want with plastic twigs? Real twigs! The kind that snap when someone steps on them.

Campbell! Another man came up. He looked exactly like Mr Campbell Ferrier except his moustache looked real and his badge said Mr Fairlie Cochrane. They’re needing more shrubs in area 10.

Do we do autumn leaves and twigs? said Mr Campbell Ferrier.

What kind of twigs? said Mr Fairlie Cochrane.

The kind that snap when you step on them.

So you can hear when someone’s coming, said Gordon. You used to sell them in packs of ten.

Mr Fairlie Cochrane gazed at Gordon and his trolley for a while with his jaw jutting out and his mouth just slightly open. He put his hand on Gordon’s shoulder and pointed to the far end of the warehouse. See up there where it says Home Security? he said softly. You can try up there for the twigs. I can’t promise, mind you. If you’ve no luck there try going through that wee door at the back. OK?

Home security had a ring to it right enough, but no twigs. Gordon went up the back and rammed the door open with his trolley. Raw November air rushed in. Gordon passed through. There was a stretch of tarmac, some rolls of green twine, a van and sacks of fertiliser. The tarmac was surrounded by a high barbed wire fence and the open gate had a fibreglass bothy watching over it. Beyond the gate there was a road and fields and farm buildings.

Gordon pushed the trolley up to the gate and peered through the window of the bothy. It was empty. He went out the gate and
up the road towards the farm buildings. The racket the trolley made on the road, you’d think they’d have got round to tiling it and roofing it over by now. That was a grand smell of dung, though. Gordon breathed in the damp grey air with the sweet smell of cow shite. He’d been shopping here a long time.

He found the place after about fifteen minutes. There was no sign hung over it. Nothing to hang a sign from except the sky and the trees themselves. The trees were the same trees. What were they beech trees, aye? After all this time you’d think they would have got more modern trees, in keeping with the rest of the garden centre. A fire would be good. The smell of burning leaves and the smell of dung. The corbies looked like flakes of charred paper coming off a bonfire just started, the way they rose and fell like that. The trees came down both sides of the road, an avenue, and a little way into the fields on one side. Between the copse and the field was a stone dyke. There were cows in the field.

Gordon dragged the trolley on to the verge and walked in among the trees. He picked up handfuls of wet beech leaves and put them in the trolley. Sure enough, some of them slipped through the mesh. It was a bad business and a hard life. Gordon wandered away towards the dyke. Snap! Christ, there you were. Would you have to pay for the twigs you used? They shouldn’t leave them lying in the dirt like that. He bent down and picked up a few lengths of twig. A crow called and the tops of the trees rustled. Gordon looked up. The trees were so much bigger than he was. Supposing they fell? It was a cold, wild, unloving place. Gordon looked over his shoulder. A feeling like waking up from a nightmare in the darkness touched him. If anyone had been there to ask him what it was, he would have held on to them and asked them if he wasn’t a burglar who’d broken into his own mind and found
it was a terrible fearful place but that he couldn’t get out or do anything about it.

Gordon reached the dyke and stood with his hands in his pockets looking at the half-dozen cows in the field. One of them was lying on the ground, not like they usually did, but on its side, like it was drunk. While he watched, another one started to keel over, just as there was the sound of a shotgun going off. The cow tottered forward a few paces, shook its head from side to side, and buckled. The remaining animals shifted their ground and made faint mooing sounds and looked at the woods nervously out of the corners of their eyes.

Gordon walked along the wall and saw a farmer slotting cartridges into a broken shotgun. The farmer snapped it shut, took aim with his elbows resting on the top of the dyke and fired. A third cow toppled. Gordon broke into a trot and called out: Give’s a shot, eh!

The farmer looked round, shook his head, and let off the second barrel.

Ach, now look what you’ve away gone and done, he said. Blown its fucking nose off. He began to reload as the cow galloped around the meadow, screaming. Gordon had never heard a cow scream before. It was a bad sound.

Sorry, he said. Let us do it, eh. Go on.

Ever used one of these before? said the farmer, locking the gun shut.

National Service!

The farmer hesitated and frowned. No, he said. It’s my gun and they’re my cows. He let loose with both barrels and the screaming stopped.

Ah, I remember you, said Gordon. Mind how we used to come and build dens here and kick seven kinds of shite out of the teuchters?

Aye, I mind very well. I was one of the teuchters. You were one of the snotty heathens from Heriot’s.

It wasn’t Heriot’s, said Gordon. Give’s a shot, eh.

No. The farmer broke the gun and crooked it in his arm. He leaned on the dyke with his free hand. As far as I remember it was us used to do the kicking.

How come you’re shooting all your cows?

BSE.

What, are they all mad, then?

I don’t really know, said the farmer. I get compensation though.

Shame, eh.

Aye.

Give’s a shot, go on.

No. You might be from the cruelty people for all I know.

Fair point, said Gordon. I’m not though.

Mad farmer’s disease, that’s what it is, said the farmer. I was daft not to have got rid of the livestock years ago and move on to setaside. You know what the clever money is in these days? Ostriches. That’s where they say the future is.

Ostriches? said Gordon. For the feathers?

The meat. The meat’s very tasty, they say.

Aye but how could you even get one in the oven.

That’s a good question, said the farmer. Another point is precipitation. If you compare African scrubland and Central Scotland bogland, there’s a world of difference.

You’re right there.

The ostrich is going to notice, isn’t he?

Uhuh. They stopped talking for a while. The ostrich in the rain. And the snow, and the wind. Blinking. Greeting. Unable even to complain.

If it’s ostriches they’re wanting, said Gordon, why not pandas? They’re always saying how short they are of pandas.

The farmer wrinkled his nose. They can never get them to breed, he said.

That’s because they never give the pandas enough choice, said Gordon. Put yourself in the panda’s situation. You’re sitting in some wee room and suddenly this door opens and you go scampering through because there’s nothing else to do and there’s this naked female sitting there eating bamboo shoots. And you’re expected to jump on her and give her a poke. Only she’s not some dolly bird, she’s old and fat and horrible and besides she’s not into it. And they don’t give you any choice, it’s her or nothing. And they’re surprised when nothing happens.

Bollocks, said the farmer. They deserve to be extinct if they take that kind of an attitude towards breeding. I’m telling you, I’d give her one, if there was no-one else, whatever she looked like. You think the way the youngsters do today.

I do not!

Aye you do. If you can’t have a skinny young lassie, you’d be better not having a hump at all, or abusing yourself. That’s what everyone thinks. That’s why the sperm count’s going down, if you ask me. They blame farmers. They blame fertilisers. You know what it’s really all about? Too many pictures of perfect skinny lassies all over the place, in TV and the magazines and the adverts. If it goes on like this we’ll all die out like pandas cause we’re too fucking choosy.

Gordon leaned back against the wall. The wind was getting up and the great black bare trees waved like kelp in a spring tide, hissing.

Are they set to roof this area over, then? he said. It’s a bit rough on the trolleys out here.

Haven’t heard anything, said the farmer.

I mind when that garden centre wasn’t roofed over either, said Gordon. They didn’t have trolleys or checkouts. There was just stuff growing in a field. You helped yourself. There was dirt and thistles and sometimes they got hedgehogs in, and eggs.

The farmer followed his eyes to the corrugated hangar, painted grey and scarlet. It’s an eyesore, right enough, he said. It’s a shame. And they paid me almost nothing for the land.

How much do you want for the gun?

The farmer held out the gun and spun it slowly in his hands, pursing his lip. Not for sale, he murmured.

I’ll give you 200 for it.

Cash?

Uhuh. With the cartridges, that is.

Gordon gave the farmer the money and clasped the heavy gun in his hands. He placed it in the trolley and stuffed the cartridges the farmer gave him into his pocket.

You’ll need the cover, said the farmer.

It’s OK, said Gordon. I’ll come and fetch it later. They’ll give me a bag at the checkout. He shook the farmer’s hand and forced the trolley back onto the tarmac. The castors squealed and shook down the road back to the building. Gordon went through the same back door and rolled up to the till.

The lassie at the checkout held the laser poised in the air in her right hand and pulled the mesh of the trolley towards her with her slender white fingers, shiny crimson nails like blades. She peered down into the layers of damp leaves and twigs. Her name was Miss Caitlin Fernie.

Where’s the packaging? she said.

There’s no packaging. They’re sold by the pound, said Gordon.

They’ve got to have a barcode on them, else they won’t go through. What is it?

There’s autumn leaves, and twigs.

The girl leaned into a microphone and her voice calling for help echoed through the building.

I’ll just take this for you in the meantime, she said, reaching for the gun. Shegrippedthe barrel and lifted it out of the trolley, frowning and wrinkling her nose with the effort. She held it with the butt resting on the conveyor and swivelled it, stroking it with the laser.

I paid for it already, said Gordon.

Oh right, said Miss Caitlin Fernie. What department?

Back there where the trees are.

I’ll just need to check. She swung the weapon back into the trolley and rang up his other items. She clasped her hands with the laser on her lap and looked around impatiently. Gordon started packing his purchases into plastic bags. He found a good big bag for the gun and wrapped it up while the girl was looking the other way. A supervisor called Mr Forbes Cameron sloped up.

There’s no barcode on these assorted leaves and twigs, said the girl.

Ach, they’re selling them loose again, said Mr Forbes Cameron in disgust. Just enter it like compost.

How much though? The customer says they’re selling it by the pound.

They never tell us anything. Enter it like a two-kilo bag. I’m sorry, sir, it’s the reorganisation, it’s just chaos.

Chaos, said Gordon. He nodded. Mr Forbes Cameron walked away and Miss Caitlin Fernie rang up a two-kilo bag of compost while Gordon stuffed the twigs and leaves into a bag. He put it on Visa and strolled out through the automatic doors. The sky had darkened and the storm was throwing rain horizontally across the car park.