Greyhound for Breakfast (19 page)

A man walked out of the sea one February morning dressed in a boilersuit & bunnet, and wearing a tartan scarf which had been tucked crosswise under each oxter to be
fastened by a safety-pin at a point roughly centre of his shoulder blades; from his neck swung a pair of heavy boots whose laces were knotted together. He brought what must have been a waterproof
tobacco-pouch out from a pocket, because when he had rolled a smoke he lighted the thing using a kind of Zippo (also from the pouch) and puffed upon it with an obvious relish. It was an astonishing
spectacle.

Hastening over to him I exclaimed: Christ Almighty jimmy, where’ve you come from?

Back there, he muttered oddly and made to proceed on his path.

At least let me give you a pair of socks! I said. But he shook his head. No . . . I’m not supposed to.

Sandy had been leading me around all morning in a desire to impress – to interest me in him and in this place where he earned his living, also to show his workmates that
here he was with his very own learner. He explained various workings and techniques of the machines and asked if I had any queries but not to worry if I didnt because at this stage it was unlikely
though I would soon become familiar with it all, just so long as I took it easy and watched everything closely. Gradually he was building to the climax of his own machine. Here I was to learn
initially. Up and down he strode patting its parts and referring to it as her and she as if it was a bus or an old-fashioned sailing ship. She wont let you down Jimmy is the sort of stuff he was
giving me. The machine was approximately twenty-five feet in length and was always requiring attention from the black squad; but even so, it could produce the finest quality goods of the entire
department when running to her true form. Placing me to the side in such a way that I could have an unrestricted view he kicked her off. He was trying hard not to look too pleased with himself.
Every now and then he shifted stance to ensure I was studying his movements. His foot was going on the pedal while his right hand was holding the wooden peg-like instrument through which he played
the coiled wire between the middle and forefingers of his left hand out onto the rolling section of the apparatus. At one point he turned to make a comment but a knot had appeared on the wire,
jamming on the wooden instrument and ripping off the top end of his thumb while the machine continued the rolling operation and out of the fleshy mess spiralled a hair-thin substance like thread
being unrolled from a bobbin somewhere inside the palm, and it was running parallel to the wire from the coil. Sandy’s eyes were gazing at me in a kind of astonished embarrassment until
eventually he collapsed, just a moment before one of his workmates elbowed me clear in order to reach the trip-safety-rail.

That moment after sunrise I saw the troop of figures appear, then round the head of the loch, the Red Cockatoos. I was totally enraptured of the scene, unable to even reflect
on how my own feelings were. The morning was so mild, so very mild and clear, perhaps the most mild and most clear of the entire summer. There too was the strange purity of air, almost an emanation
from the pure loch water. If this scene could have reminded me of anything it could only have been of the Horsemen of Harris as witnessed by Martin Martin more than two hundred years ago. And yet,
perhaps I speak only of the day itself, the actual atmosphere, the light and aural texture, for what could ever be likened to the figures I was now seeing? I was an intruder, and beholding a vision
so awful that at once I myself had been transformed into victim. I could see them distinctly, the troop of almost thirty, the red circles of their faces, the unquiet, seeming to contain a frenzy.
And a figure had moved too quickly and bumped into the figure in front and the laughter of the pair was immediate, and nervous too, scarcely controlled at all, revealing the anticipation of an
event so horrible that hackles arose on the back of my neck, the hairs rising, on the back of my neck; and a shiver crossed my shoulders, I was having to fight hard to resist it, this terror. And
were they now moving in single file? They were; rounding the head of the loch still, their hats prominent, and their old-fashioned frock-coats. I was seeing them from the rear, their voice-sounds
muted but already having taken on a new air, a new sense of something, some unknown thing perhaps and yet known too, as though from the depth of a folk memory, the metamorphosis now reaching the
later stages. When they vanished I had to jump onto my feet and twist and turn this way and that in my effort to find them; but they were there, they were there, only behind some foliage, not by
intention hiding, being unaware of we watchers.

I relaxed and prepared to wait, sitting now with my elbows resting on my knees, gazing lochwards, away from the retreating figures. And gradually my mind had discovered its own
concentration. I remembered Miller’s tale of the loch wherein lies an island and on that island is a loch wherein lies an island and on that island is a loch wherein lies an island and so on
and so forth to that ultimate island. And I envisaged the ancient female seer on that ultimate island’s throne squinting at the world with – yes, her irreverent twinkle but also a
coldness there too, for the fallibility, the presumption. When I arrived in the glade an elderly woman was there amongst us who did remind me of the ancient seer for she too had a coldness about
her that might well have taken my breath away on a different occasion; and lurking there too was an amused expression which I did not like, I could not have liked. This elderly woman was a person
set back a pace from the main body, preferring to allow others to take the floor.

But take the floor we did. There was a beautiful girl to the side, modest, her gaze downcast, to the grassy mounds on the edge of the area. She would be mine. Her hair had the
sheen and her breasts the concealed manner I knew so well, her body lightly lined beneath the loose cotton dress, and the breeze to her, the lines of her knees and thighs. I could hold her so
gently, my hands touching the small of her back, her forehead to my shoulder, dampening my shoulder. There is a life there, a life strong and not to be spent. I put my hands to the small of her
back, my palms flatly now to her kidneys, a body of flesh and blood, the warmth of her breasts and the warmth of her breath through my shirt onto my shoulder. And too the others, the others being
there too – for now she was thrusting me back from her and laughing quietly; but as excited a laugh as could ever be imagined, as ever could be imagined; and in the laughter a mischievousness
there for me, a mischief, I would try to be catching her and always be missing her by a hairsbreadth. And the others dancing now, the figures of humans, men and women, from the young to the old,
all dependent on such as myself and the elderly woman whom I could see seated beside an old man with a brosy complexion, his fine head of pure white hair, listening to her animated chatter with
great attention, his hand to the crook of her elbow as though to steady her, to pacify her. Was the elderly woman like me?

But the girl wanted me. She urged me on, urged me on. And I was dancing her on a circle, a reel; and our laughter amidst the laughter of the others, the couples,
indistinguishable. It was a rage. It was a fire. We were on fire. We were clinging together. I was holding her so tightly, to keep her now, to keep her safe forever. For it was time, it was the
time. And my memory is of a total rapture: the memory of such a moment but without the moment’s memory for I cannot recollect that moment, only of having had such a moment, of our total
rapture, the girl with the dark hair and myself.

We were apart now, inches, inches and feet and then yards, and her hands upraised in a question, her frown being followed by a look of an almost sickening resignation;
uncomprehending, she cannot comprehend why this is to be, why they are to be in this way, that she is here for this one day, this only day, forever, this poor Red Cockatoo. And I can stare and
stare at her, the tears tucked behind my eyes now as they seem always to have been since first I glimpsed the troop at sunrise, my chest and throat of an acidulous dryness.

The others were with her. They were standing to the rear of us in their own grouping, fidgeting, muttering unintelligibly. But soon they were become silent and those who had
been staring at the ground now raised their heads. We humans were the interlopers, myself and the elderly woman, the others. And we were having to stand there in our own isolation, watching this
heartbreak, these poor Red Cockatoos, their moment having come and now gone, concealing nought from each other, not now, not any longer. And we must continue our watching as this further stage
advanced, their thin arms stretching out to one another; and they cling hand to hand in a curious, orchestrated fashion, not looking to one another, as though a certain form of mutual recognition
might destroy some very remote possibility of staying the process. And the process cannot be stayed. Even then were their hands tearing from each other as they fought to control their faces, and I
searched for my girl but could not distinguish her, for the faces were now all of the uniform red circles, this bodily transformation seeming to induce a mental calm; but even so, there was an air
of bewilderment amongst them, and a vague self-consciousness, their feet twitching uneasily, twitching uneasily. I had to turn my face away, glimpsing only the hurried movement of the elderly woman
as she did likewise. But for an instant were we looking into the other’s eyes? I do not know, for the screeching had begun and it was all to be over, within a brief few seconds these poor Red
Cockatoos would cease to exist.

Whereas the drop appeared to recede into black nothingness I deduced each side of the chasm to taper until they merged. Each falling object would eventually land. And if
footholes were to exist then discovering them could scarcely be avoided. The black of the nothingness was only so from the top: light would be perceived at the bottom, a position from where even
the tiniest of specks would enable the black to be quashed. And should a problem arise, groping an ascent via the footholes would be fairly certain.

I jumped.

The sensation of the fall is indescribable.

Much later upon landing I faced black nothingness. I had been mistaken about the light. That speck was insufficient. I could distinguish nothing whatsoever. But it was
impossible to concentrate for my boots were wedged into the sides and my knees were twisted unnaturally. My arms had been forced round onto my back, with my shoulders pressed forward. The entire
position of my body was reminiscent of what the adept yogi may accomplish. I ached all over. Then I had become aware of how irresponsibly conceived my planning had been. It was as if somehow I had
expected the bottom to be large enough to accommodate an average-sized, fully grown male.

For a lengthy period I attempted to dislodge myself but to no avail. I panicked. I clawed and clawed at the backs of my thighs in an effort to hoist up my legs until finally I
was obliged to halt through sheer fatigue at the wrists and finger-joints. Sweat dripped from my every pore; and the echo consequent upon this was resounding. Beginning from the drips the noise
developed into one continuous roar that increased as it rose and rose and rose before dying away out of the top. An awful realization was presenting itself to me: the more I tried and tried to
dislodge my body the more firmly entrenched I would become. Think of the manner whereby a mouse seals its own fate within that most iniquitous of adhesives it has entered to search out that last
scrap of food. Yes, an immediate reaction to a desperate situation may well be normal but it is rarely other than misguided. My own had resulted in a position of utter hopelessness. And the
magnitude of my miscalculations seemed destined to overwhelm me. That failure to anticipate the absurdity of bottom.

No, not a mouse, nor yet a flea, could enter into that. Total nothingness. A space so minute only nothing gains entry. Not even the most supremely infinitesimal of organisms as
witnessed through the finest of powerful microscopes can disturb the bottom, for here absolutely nothing exists but the point in itself, the vertex.

This whole business is getting on my nerves. I was ploughing my way through these St Machar legends when right in front of me appeared what can only be a reference to that
bastard Brendan O’Diunne. I dont like calling him that. Up until recently I reckoned him the greatest Scotchman to ever live and the greatest Scotchman who ever could live, in a logical
sense. If writing this a couple of years back I would probably have been beginning in a manner approaching the following:

A load of shite. Pointless carrying on from an opening like this because it leads to greater expectations of consistency and coherence whereas the entire thing is an utter
mishmash, a shambles. This is why I discontinued the project when I did. It also explains why the old George fellow finally, and not too reluctantly, allowed his own welter of research to
‘slippit intill the muddis of auld annallis’. Of course he hesitated for ages but it has to be remembered the sort of person he was. And then as well, any writer as disciplined as that
must readily – Ach. Who cares. And Boswell! Not to be spoken of in the same breath I know, but how come he fails to even rate it a mention? Especially when that English sidekick of his allows
a reasonable sized paragraph to ‘the peculiarly Scotch game’? It could be he just wasnt present while the shepherd was recounting the tale. Perhaps Johnson had refused him attendance,
lest he made the shepherd so nervous he might have been unable to communicate. Or maybe it is simply the case he had gone off on his own to ferret a dinner invitation from one of the local highland
bigwigs. The point being that had he been there in the bothy we could have found ourselves in the possession of a genuine exposition of the game’s mechanics. As matters stand it would appear
that either Johnson received a full and proper oral account of the game which for some reason best known to himself he neglected to record, or else he did not receive an account at all, and I am
inclined to plump for the latter. The actual odds about the shepherd’s having had any detailed knowledge of the game’s mechanics are very very long indeed. And even if he did have such
knowledge, so what? Does that really suggest he would have felt the need to pass it on to the good Doctor? Apart from anything else, as far as the shepherd was concerned, the whole point of the
carry on lies not so much in the game itself but in its extraordinary and magnificent termination, for without that there is almost nothing at all – and certainly no rational explanation of
how come the memory of an ancient game should yet be lingering in the mind of a people. And that to me is the crux of the problem. Other aspects are of interest but to regard any as crucial seems a
psychological nonsense. Obviously to gain an understanding of how the game was played would be interesting for its own sake, and I for one would travel a long distance to find such a thing out, but
that is as far as it goes. I used to take it for granted that the old commentators were assuming a working knowledge of the game’s mechanics, but I now know differently – and
that’s being kind about it. The simple fact of the matter is that they didnt have a clue. It was always total guesswork – the slippery slopes of inference, some of the more common
theories deriving from that astonishingly scientific premise that games in antiquity were much more liable to be of a physical nature. And even supposing that to be true, so what? Success at
physical games need not entail having the build of an ox. It is certainly the case that by all accounts Brendan was a ‘greit baist of a man’ but this type of stuff is banal and leads to
all sorts of wild conjecture, and I would prefer not to be involved in that. A quick instance of what I’m talking about, a ‘mathematician’ of early last century (whose name it is
nicer not to mention though he seems to have accomplished some pioneering work in the science of phrenology) makes a grand case for O’Diunne’s having been a weedy individual because of
the startling rigidity of the game’s rule-structure. Fine, is about all you can say to that. But it is a truism that the game’s limits were rigidly defined. There again though, insofar
as this concerns the nature of Brendan’s skull, the guy makes the elementary error of confusing termination with inception, always a risk when somebody in that field strays beyond the somatic
hedge. No wonder you start getting involved in discussions on the nature of the cranium! Too much. And yet to some extent he has to be given the benefit of the doubt; he was truly seeking after a
disciplined approach and once that is begun every pathway, no matter how shady, seems an obligation. It would have been interesting to see his notes though, I have to confess. Better still but,
seeing old George’s. What I really would like to know is where his first written reference comes from. I have always thought it would turn out to be via the Achnasheen Monk which if true
presents us with quite an irony. There again, I just dont have the patience any longer. I’m also beginning to believe those who handle it in a quasihumorous way have got the right idea. But
Buchanan couldnt manage that and neither can I. And why bother criticizing the likes of Achnasheen? Is it really an accident that he appears not to feel the need of dwelling at length on the famous
exhortation? In fact, I’m beginning to think it might be a bit unhealthy to do so. In saying this I’ve got to remind myself there would be very little without it, at least nowadays. My
own interest is well on the wane. Sometimes I just think, leave it to the linguists. But no. Definitely not. So much of it is just – Who cares. There again, I know that when Brendan leaves
the field of play Achnasheen has him crying: Dum vivimus. It is all fine and good but the fascinating question here is not so much whether the ‘vivamus’ had already been dropped from
the popular saying without affecting its sense but whether Latin was used at all. Did the Monk simply translate O’Diunne’s utterance from the Gaelic? Yes, and it would be nice to know
what old George’s thoughts were on this specific point. Perhaps especially to know if he would have considered such thoughts as valid. Obviously too, it is worth bearing the matter in mind in
regard to Boswell’s absence during the interview with the shepherd. And here I refer to his sidekick’s notorious rejection of the very possibility of Gaelic as a literary form. My own
gut reaction is to oppose the good Doctor at all costs but on this particular issue I have to say no. I reckon Achnashseen was recording what he saw as a fairly amusing albeit minorish local legend
and that he was recording it as roundly as he could, in other words, no translation. I am well aware that it has become a more controversial aspect than previously but I have to stick with it at
this late stage, otherwise – who cares about the otherwise. I’m just sticking with it and that’s that. And how in the name of heaven anybody can accept that silly theory now being
pushed by those taking a lead from Ghrame and the Latheron X11 I dont know. It just seems to me daft. As far as I can make out it hinges almost completely on the Abbot of Tain and his ‘dulce
est desipire in loco’. And I know fine well that the existential mark of the ‘dum vivimus’ has to appeal to one and all. But surely that is the very strength of the argument? When
O’Diunne leaves the field of play he does so in such a manner that the game terminates, never to be played again. I say this, that if he really had gone off in the huff then he would have
been met by scorn. It is as simple as that and as basic as that. And never, not in ten thousand years, could such a legend have come about. For one thing, the game would have continued – if
not on that selfsame day then the next one, or the next one, but certainly at some future date. And to so much as even suggest that the action might have been premeditated is a nonsense. No
premeditated act could ever effect such a consequence. Ordinary people just arent so readily impressed. It had to be something else altogether. For what we are here dealing with is very close to a
sort of universal appreciation of an absurdity; an immediate and absolute recognition of the validity of one individual’s action: a revelation. And revelations are by definition irrational.
According to Martin the final day’s play occurs somewhere in the Caithness region and although his evidence is based on the same sources nobody raises any serious objections. I think this is
the correct approach and I have nothing to criticize in it. Several months ago a Gaelic-speaking pal of mine spent a few days in Barra and got speaking to a very old lady. Out of it came the
following, that her people hailed from a small island which has been formally uninhabited since the late seventeenth century, and that to the best of her knowledge the ancient Gaelic saying for
‘fair play’ on this island was always
cothrom na Dhiunne
and not ‘cothrom na Fiunne’, as it is elsewhere. Now at the time I was less interested in this than my pal
because of course the great Finn had a cousin whose name was Dhiunn. Then this latest turn-up in these St Machar things. I’m still not going to get involved either. I feel like wrapping the
lot up in a brown paper parcel and dropping it off the Kingston Bridge, except with my fucking luck it would land in a rowing boat. But fair enough I suppose.