Capital Union, A Read Online Free PDF Page A

windows were dark and bare of curtains, and it made me feel mair lonely. Jeff was at another evening talk at the university so he would be late. As I stared at the black trunks of the trees they seemed to twist themselves into figures , standing with their arms raised up to the sky or pointing fingers at their neighbours. Some of their faces looked like they were greetin’; others kept a calm sough.
    There was a small movement at the foot of the largest witch elm and it gave me a shock when a figure detached itself from the trunk and sat down with its head resting on its knees, acoat pulled over its head. The rain was so heavy that it bounced off the fabric, and was falling in such grey gusts that I could barely make out the figure any more. It stopped moving altogether and I was less sure it was human and not some trick of the gloomy half-light. I put my hand under the dishes I was washing to look for the last piece of green soap, and when I looked back, a person was nearing the tree, their arm stretched out as if they were approaching a stray that might bite. For a moment I thought it was Mrs MacDougall in her green mackintosh , but she was sure to have her feet up in front of her fire, knitting socks for servicemen and listening to the latest list of casualties on the wireless. I could imagine the thick, white wool slipping round the knobbly joints of her hands. Then Jeff burst into the kitchen, much earlier than I expected, shaking his coat and hanging it near the range. He kissed me, sat down and opened his paper. ‘Fancy the latest?’ he asked, smoothing out the creases. ‘Here’s one for you: “Plan for Action. Wars are won by planning. This is as true whether you are fighting Germans – or germs. Each harmless, tiny drop of Milton – as it slips into the water – carries within it a scientific plan for action that would be the envy of any general.”’
    I was concentrating on the figures walking towards the gate and didn’t answer him. When I looked round he was bent over the pages, peering at the print, with the towel from the range over his shoulders.
    ‘There are two people out there, Jeff. They’re drookit.’
    ‘Nonsense,’ he replied, ‘no one would be out there on a night like this. I got a lift and that was bad enough.’
    ‘Come and see for yourself.’
    He stood beside me, his reading glasses sliding down his nose. It was raining even harder than before.
    ‘I can’t see a thing. Your window is all steamed up. Mother always kept hers crystal clear. I expect it was an ARP warden, if anyone.’
    ‘Well, if it was, there were two, and one of them was sitting down.’
    ‘That’s unlikely,’ he said. ‘Perhaps you have been peering at too much sewing?’
    ‘Why don’t you believe me?’ I banged the plate onto the draining board.
    ‘Mind you don’t break that,’ he said. ‘It’s china. None of your old crocks here.’
    ‘My mother has china, too.’
    ‘Must you be so shrill?’ he asked, and, folding his paper under his arm, he walked towards the door. ‘Call me when you’re finished. I’d like to read you a bit of my address for tomorrow night at the university, see if it resonates with a true native speaker.’
    I stuck my tongue out when he left the room. I hadn’t done that since I was ten but his high-falutin’ ways made me cross. I took longer than I needed to dry the dishes, remembering how much he seemed to value me when we first met at the farm. I had been so shy of him when he set up his recording machine on the kitchen table, a real university man, and I hid my hands as the nails were broken. Mother had agreed to let him record me speaking as part of his research. He said it was important to capture Scots words now as they were disappearing like sna’ aff a dyke and I laughed at the way he said it, all posh as if he wasn’t really Scottish. He was a man of two voices, his town voice and his country voice. I only had one then, and it disappeared into the desert of