Ken McClure - Fenton's winter

It now seemed obvious to him that there would be a pause in the deaths for a pause would be bound to occur when all the susceptible people had died leaving a stable immune population. No one else would die until a susceptible person appeared on the scene again, a new member of staff perhaps or, much more likely in the case of a hospital, a new patient. He blamed himself for not having predicted this earlier.

Jenny put a stop to his self recrimination by pointing out that it would not have made the slightest difference, a fact he eventually had to agree with. But should he tell Tyson? Predictions made after the event, he decided, were about as useful as three pound notes. He would say nothing, besides, with Jenny in the clear he felt so much better, more able to concentrate, much sharper. He would find the link.

Jenny looked up from the newspaper she had been buried in and said, "Listen to this, someone…a James Lindsay, aged forty three, committed suicide after being dismissed from Saxon Medical for alleged theft. He threw himself under a train."

"Poor devil."

"Where is Saxon Medical?"

"On one of these industrial estates in Glasgow."

"That would fit, it's a Glasgow address." said Jenny.

Fenton took the paper and read the story for himself. He finished by saying, "He wasn't an executive with that address."

"You know it?"

"It's near where I was born."

"Is that the mist of nostalgia I see in your eyes?"

"No it isn't. They should have pulled that place down years ago."

"Then what were you thinking?" asked Jenny.

"I was thinking that I might go to see Mrs Lindsay."

Jenny was aghast. "Whatever for?" she gasped.

"Anything to do with Saxon Medical…I am interested."

Fenton went to Glasgow on the following Tuesday. The Honda ate up the forty odd miles or so between the Capital and Glasgow in as many minutes and Fenton weaved his way expertly through the derelict buildings and cratered sites that defaced the east side of the city until he found the street that he was looking for. He pulled the bike up on to its stand and walked towards the tenement block pulling his gloves off.

There was garbage everywhere, fish and chip wrappers, potato crisp bags, rotting fruit and the inevitable red McEwan's Export beer can. He flicked it aside with his toe, thinking that one of these cans should be in any time capsule as a universal artefact of Scottish life. There seemed to be one lying on the foot of every river and on the top of every hill.

The entrance to the close was stained with dried vomit, the protest of a belly too full of beer being asked to accommodate take-away food. Fenton thought of his father and his nights 'on the bevy.' As always when he thought of his father, he experienced mixed feelings of guilt and regret for he had never really known him at all, had never understood what had gone on in his head.

To all intents Joe Fenton had appeared to have been a simple, rather uncommunicative man who had spent all his adult life labouring in the shipyards of the Clyde. He would work Monday to Friday, drink himself into oblivion on Saturday and lie in bed all day Sunday. His routine had never varied.

Although by no means untypical of the lifestyle of the area Tom Fenton had always believed that there had been more to his father's behaviour than the blinkered following of macho tradition. There had been something missing in his father's make up, something he had often tried to define in the past but always without success. He had never known his father to display any kind of enthusiasm for anything in all the years he could remember. It was as if he had lived his entire life on a pilot flame fuelled with enigmatic sadness.

Even when drunk Joe Fenton's thoughts, if any, had been concealed behind a moist eyed smile. The burning political issues of 'red Clydeside' had left him cold as had the titanic struggles between Rangers and Celtic football clubs. It was as if, at some early stage in his life, he had discovered some deep, dark secret, some awful truth, so terrible that it had straightened out the parallax of optimism and forced him to view his existence as one long inconsequential tunnel from birth to grave.

Tom Fenton had never discovered what his father's secret had been, whether he had found out the meaning of life or that there was no heaven or hell or whether there was just no point. The last possibility seemed the most likely. Joe Fenton had lived his entire life as if there had been no point, no point at all. He had died in the year that Fenton had graduated, never having said much more to him than an occasional, 'Aye son,' in passing, a 'guid fur you,' when he had done well or, 'We'll hae nae mair o' that,' when he had done wrong.

To Fenton's mother Rose, a simple, kind hearted woman, Joe had been a 'good man' but, within the parameters of marital behaviour in the area, this had simply meant that he had not physically abused her and had handed over his wage packet unopened on a Friday night. Conversation and companionship had been alien notions from another world.

For some reason, not totally clear to him even now, Fenton hoped that his father had been proud of him when he had graduated, perhaps because he feared in his heart of hearts that it had really not mattered a damn, it probably hadn't rated a mention in the pub. Maybe it had even been an embarrassment.

Fenton edged deeper into the mouth of the close to be assailed by the competing smells of fried onions and cats' urine. As his eyes adjusted to the gloom he saw the iron gate that barred the way to the back passage and drying greens and was forced to smile at the nostalgia it evoked for it had been down one of these dark passages that he had received a great deal of his street education.

Levoy had been a popular game among teenagers in the area, a variation on hide and seek that had involved a great deal of hiding in dark closes with members of the opposite sex and not too much seeking. One girl, some two years older than himself, and whose name he now desperately tried to remember, had taken it upon herself to see that he had not wearied during the long dark vigils. He recalled with fondness his early sorties into Betty McAlpine's underwear, his discomfort at being unable to unhook her bra, his ecstasy as for the first time a female hand had unzipped his fly and ventured inside. He remembered his bewilderment at being stopped when he had moved his own hand under her skirt to explore a magical maze of underskirts and suspenders. "Sorry," she had said, "The flags are up." Failing to understand and construing this as obligatory feminine modesty, part of the etiquette of back-close loving, he had pressed on to find his hand taken in a vice like grip. "Are you bloody daft or somethin'?" the girl had hissed. The harsh admonishment had dampened his ardour to the point where his proud member had begun to wilt but then the girl, realising his complete ignorance of female menstrual matters, had launched into a kindly explanation as to why he could not go 'all the way.'

With both his confidence and his erection restored he had rewarded her by having an orgasm all over her dress.

Fenton climbed the dark stone spiral stairs, stooping down as he came to each door to examine the name plates. He was half way along the landing of the second flat before he reached 'Lindsay'. He paused for a moment to listen to the sounds of the close, harsh laughter from female throats conditioned by cigarette smoke and endless bawling at errant children, that self same bawling as yet another woman screamed her frustration and inadequacy at her offspring. He pulled the door bell and found it unconnected to anything. He replaced the handle and knocked instead. The door opened a few inches to reveal the haggard eyes of a woman about five feet tall and those of a child some three feet below. "I've told you, “she began, "I'll pay you when I can; I just haven't got it right now."