John Buchan - The Collected Works of John Buchan (Illustrated)

It was Mr Norie, the editor, who brought me into the discussion.

‘Our South African friend is very blate,’ he said in his boisterous way. ‘Andra, if this place of yours wasn’t so damned teetotal and we had a dram apiece, we might get his tongue loosened. I want to hear what he’s got to say about the war. You told me this morning he was sound in the faith.’

‘I said no such thing,’ said Mr Amos. ‘As ye ken well, Tam Norie, I don’t judge soundness on that matter as you judge it. I’m for the war myself, subject to certain conditions that I’ve often stated. I know nothing of Mr Brand’s opinions, except that he’s a good democrat, which is more than I can say of some o’ your friends.’

‘Hear to Andra,’ laughed Mr Norie. ‘He’s thinkin’ the inspector in the Socialist State would be a waur kind of awristocrat then the Duke of Buccleuch. Weel, there’s maybe something in that. But about the war he’s wrong. Ye ken my views, boys. This war was made by the cawpitalists, and it has been fought by the workers, and it’s the workers that maun have the ending of it. That day’s comin’ very near. There are those that want to spin it out till Labour is that weak it can be pit in chains for the rest o’ time. That’s the manoeuvre we’re out to prevent. We’ve got to beat the Germans, but it’s the workers that has the right to judge when the enemy’s beaten and not the cawpitalists. What do you say, Mr Brand?’

Mr Norie had obviously pinned his colours to the fence, but he gave me the chance I had been looking for. I let them have my views with a vengeance, and these views were that for the sake of democracy the war must be ended. I flatter myself I put my case well, for I had got up every rotten argument and I borrowed largely from Launcelot Wake’s armoury. But I didn’t put it too well, for I had a very exact notion of the impression I wanted to produce. I must seem to be honest and in earnest, just a bit of a fanatic, but principally a hard-headed businessman who knew when the time had come to make a deal. Tombs kept interrupting me with imbecile questions, and I had to sit on him. At the end Mr Norie hammered with his pipe on the table.

‘That’ll sort ye, Andra. Ye’re entertain’ an angel unawares. What do ye say to that, my man?’

Mr Amos shook his head. ‘I’ll no deny there’s something in it, but I’m not convinced that the Germans have got enough of a wheepin’.’ Macnab agreed with him; the others were with me. Norie was for getting me to write an article for his paper, and the consumptive wanted me to address a meeting.

‘Wull ye say a’ that over again the morn’s night down at our hall in Newmilns Street? We’ve got a lodge meeting o’ the I.W.B., and I’ll make them pit ye in the programme.’ He kept his luminous eyes, like a sick dog s, fixed on me, and I saw that I had made one ally. I told him I had come to Glasgow to learn and not to teach, but I would miss no chance of testifying to my faith.

‘Now, boys, I’m for my bed,’ said Amos, shaking the dottle from his pipe. ‘Mr Tombs, I’ll conduct ye the morn over the Brigend works, but I’ve had enough clavers for one evening. I’m a man that wants his eight hours’ sleep.’

The old fellow saw them to the door, and came back to me with the ghost of a grin in his face.

‘A queer crowd, Mr Brand! Macnab didna like what ye said. He had a laddie killed in Gallypoly, and he’s no lookin’ for peace this side the grave. He’s my best friend in Glasgow. He’s an elder in the Gaelic kirk in the Cowcaddens, and I’m what ye call a free-thinker, but we’re wonderful agreed on the fundamentals. Ye spoke your bit verra well, I must admit. Gresson will hear tell of ye as a promising recruit.’ ‘It’s a rotten job,’ I said.

‘Ay, it’s a rotten job. I often feel like vomiting over it mysel’. But it’s no for us to complain. There’s waur jobs oot in France for better men … A word in your ear, Mr Brand. Could ye not look a bit more sheepish? Ye stare folk ower straight in the een, like a Hieland sergeant-major up at Maryhill Barracks.’ And he winked slowly and grotesquely with his left eye.

He marched to a cupboard and produced a black bottle and glass. ‘I’m blue-ribbon myself, but ye’ll be the better of something to tak the taste out of your mouth. There’s Loch Katrine water at the pipe there… As I was saying, there’s not much ill in that lot. Tombs is a black offence, but a dominie’s a dominie all the world over. They may crack about their Industrial Workers and the braw things they’re going to do, but there’s a wholesome dampness about the tinder on Clydeside. They should try Ireland.’

Supposing,’ I said, ‘there was a really clever man who wanted to help the enemy. You think he could do little good by stirring up trouble in the shops here?’

‘I’m positive.’

‘And if he were a shrewd fellow, he’d soon tumble to that?’

‘Ay.’ ‘Then if he still stayed on here he would be after bigger game—something really dangerous and damnable?’

Amos drew down his brows and looked me in the face. ‘I see what ye’re ettlin’ at. Ay! That would be my conclusion. I came to it weeks syne about the man ye’ll maybe meet the morn’s night.’

Then from below the bed he pulled a box from which he drew a handsome flute. ‘Ye’ll forgive me, Mr Brand, but I aye like a tune before I go to my bed. Macnab says his prayers, and I have a tune on the flute, and the principle is just the same.’

So that singular evening closed with music—very sweet and true renderings of old Border melodies like ‘My Peggy is a young thing’, and ‘When the kye come hame’. I fell asleep with a vision of Amos, his face all puckered up at the mouth and a wandering sentiment in his eye, recapturing in his dingy world the emotions of a boy.

The widow-woman from next door, who acted as house-keeper, cook, and general factotum to the establishment, brought me shaving water next morning, but I had to go without a bath. When I entered the kitchen I found no one there, but while I consumed the inevitable ham and egg, Amos arrived back for breakfast. He brought with him the morning’s paper. ‘The Herald says there’s been a big battle at Eepers,’ he announced.

I tore open the sheet and read of the great attack Of 31 July which was spoiled by the weather. ‘My God!’ I cried. ‘They’ve got St Julien and that dirty Frezenberg ridge… and Hooge… and Sanctuary Wood. I know every inch of the damned place… ‘

‘Mr Brand,’ said a warning voice, ‘that’ll never do. If our friends last night heard ye talk like that ye might as well tak the train back to London … They’re speakin’ about ye in the yards this morning. ye’ll get a good turnout at your meeting the night, but they’re SaYin’ that the polis will interfere. That mightna be a bad thing, but I trust ye to show discretion, for ye’ll not be muckle use to onybody if they jyle ye in Duke Street. I hear Gresson will be there with a fraternal message from his lunatics in America … I’ve arranged that ye go down to Tam Norie this afternoon and give him a hand with his bit paper. Tam will tell ye the whole clash o’ the West country, and I look to ye to keep him off the drink. He’s aye arguin’ that writin’ and drinkin’ gang thegither, and quotin’ Robert Burns, but the creature has a wife and five bairns dependin’ on him.’

I spent a fantastic day. For two hours I sat in Norie’s dirty den, while he smoked and orated, and, when he remembered his business, took down in shorthand my impressions of the Labour situation in South Africa for his rag. They were fine breezy impressions, based on the most whole-hearted ignorance, and if they ever reached the Rand I wonder what my friends there made of Cornelius Brand, their author. I stood him dinner in an indifferent eating-house in a street off the Broomielaw, and thereafter had a drink with him in a public-house, and was introduced to some of his less reputable friends.