again.
‘This is really very good of you, sir,’ said Tupac.
‘Holy shit, don’t call me that!’
‘Och sorry. It’ll make you feel like your father, eh?’
If he’d done that, he’d have a sore face right now. There was little on this earth likely ever to make me feel like the late Cannis Dury.
I said, ‘Call me Gus — it’s my name.’
‘Are you a Fergus or an Angus?’
I rolled that one over, said, ‘Well, officially I’m an Angus… but only one person calls me that.’
‘That would be your mother.’
‘Spot on.’
‘Mothers are precious things. Mind her well.’
I knew what he meant; it put shards of ice in my veins. I’d been far from mindful of my mother since my father had passed. Sure, I never saw eye to eye with the man — he was a tyrant, the ogre of my boyhood — but my mother had given her life to him and now that he was gone, well, it didn’t bear thinking about.
Tupac’s eyes moistened. ‘I remember my own dear mother… sweet, sweet lady she was.’
‘We all have an affection for our mothers, us lads.’
The jakey crossed his fingers together, uncrossed them. Started to fiddle with an old watch strap on his arm. There was no watch to be seen. ‘My mother was an equestrian.’
The word shocked me, seemed to be too eloquent for him. ‘She was?’
He glowed as he remembered his mother. ‘She won prizes, rosettes.’ He smiled. ‘We had a room of the house full to the rafters with them, all colours they were — red, blue, yellow, green.’
His image stung me. My own father had medals and trophies galore. And what a price we’d all paid for them. My mam especially. She’d been hurting when I last spoke to her; I knew I’d neglected her since my father died. The thoughts mashed about my insides, forced black hurts into my mind. Jesus, Gus, what a terrible son you have been to her. A terrible son and husband both. I thanked the heavens I had never been a father as well.
The waitress brought the soup, laid it down on the table. A plate of bread, pan loaf, was sat beside it. The bread had been spread with margarine, nice and thick. ‘I’m so sorry, we’ve finished the soda bread,’ said the girl.
The old boy smiled, said, ‘Nae worries at all. Thank you from the bottom of my heart, love!’ As the girl blushed and retreated, Tupac rose from the table and blew her a kiss. ‘You bring a rare presence to a room, my dear,’ he announced.
She dropped her head, but her eyelids shot up.
‘Take it as a compliment,’ I said.
‘That’s how it’s meant, lass,’ said the old jakey, ‘that’s how it’s meant… It’s a blessed talent to move an old man’s heart by just being there.’
I though this fella was some character. He had a warmness and sociability that’s rare these days. I thought to pry, ask his name, his story. I knew it would only depress the shit out of me, though. He’d have some yarn about how he was once this or that and then there’d be a dreadful incident, a fall from grace. I’d heard it all before. It was too depressing to hear again. In this city, there are thousands of stories just like it.
He fired into the broth, tipping up the bowl. His thumb touched the rim, dipped in the soup.
‘Now, Angus, won’t you join me in a bowl of this fine broth?’
I shook my head, said, ‘No thanks.’
‘But you have the look of a man who has missed a few meals of late.’
Here we go, story of my life. People wanting to fatten me up. It would never happen. I have what they call a fast metabolism. The jeans I wore were thirty-twos… and loose. ‘I’m fine, really. I’ve got very little appetite.’
‘Your appetites are elsewhere.’
Now he had my number.
‘Look, eat the soup. Enjoy it. You have appetite enough for the two of us,’ I said.
That seemed to do the job. He slurped away, finished the lot, mopped it up with the bread.
‘A fine repast, my good son.’
When he called me ‘son’, my heart kicked in me. My own father never referred to me that way. When he used the word it appeared in the phrase no son of mine.
‘Are you still hungry?’
‘No, no. I am sated… but you, I believe, sir, are not.’
I couldn’t deny it. ‘You know why I wanted to talk to you, Tupac?’
His narrow shoulders seemed to creep closer together as he pushed the plate away. He sat facing me like a gargoyle. ‘I have a fair assumption it’s about the murder.’
‘They had you down the station.’
‘Them bastards have had me down there more than once,’ he sparked up, rose from his seat again and hollered to the room, ‘the bastards! Bastards to a fucking man!’
I flagged him sit. He apologised.
‘Not a paid-up member of the constabulary’s fan club, then?’
‘They wanted me to perjure myself. I may have no respect for the bastards that enforce the law of the land, but I’ve a damn sight more respect for the law of this land.’
He scratched his palm, looked at his fingernails. They were black to a one. The Scots have a habit in this situation of blurting, You could grow potatoes in there. I resisted the training, said, ‘What did they ask you to do?’
He twisted in his chair. ‘They wanted me to finger you.’
I took up my pint, drained the last of it. I had a wee goldie waiting, I hit that too. ‘Did they now?’
‘I’d sooner cut my own fucking throat… I played them, though, by God I played them for a power of grog.’
I smiled, it was forced. His revelations weren’t exactly heart-warming. ‘Good on you.’ I gathered myself. ‘But you must have saw me there that night.’
‘That I did, but you showed long after the chaos.’
‘Chaos?’
His face lit up like a gas lamp, the one tooth sticking out over his lower lip. ‘I see things on that hill, y’know.’
‘Like what?’
He grew indignant. His jawline showed through the thick thatch of matted beard. ‘The fella what got killed… he’d been up the hill before, many times, digging out fucking badgers. They pit them against dogs, y’know.’
I’d been up there to catch them in the act myself, but it didn’t stop my insides churning at the thought.
‘Fucking flushed the poor creatures out with terriers, that bastard did. He hit them with a bastarding spade and caged them.’
I was sickened. But my voice trembled for other reasons; I couldn’t get away from the fact that the filth had tried to fit me up. My words didn’t come out smoothly, ‘Our victim, he wasn’t alone the times you saw him, was he, Tupac?’
Head shaking, vigorous. ‘No. He never was. Always had a gang of little shits with him.’
‘What about the night of the murder? Did you see him then?’
He lurched in his seat, slapped a palm on the table. ‘That I did!’
I felt my adrenaline spike. ‘Did you tell the police?’
Again, ‘That I did!’
Another spike, ‘What did you tell them?’
He seemed pleased with himself. ‘That I saw him up there with the gang of boys. They were all coming and going all the night in the car
… what a commotion it was.’
I couldn’t take in what I was hearing, said, ‘Look, did you see the actual…’
His ardour dimmed, his mouth twisted. ‘No. I did not. I’ve seen so much carrying-on up there that I tire of it. I left them to their own devices.’
