Alasdair Gray - Old Men in Love

He stopped, stared and began blushing, but as long as I stood there he could not bring himself to look away. This gave me confidence. I said, “In my opinion none of that stuff is very wicked — I buy some every week. My people don’t care what I buy with my pocket money. Will I buy you some?”

He shook his head slightly, meaning no, and perhaps even whispered “No”. I kept bullying him until at last he admitted interest in a photographic publication called Health and Nudism , with a cover advertising an article inside called Eves on Skis . More boldly than I had entered such a shop before I went in and emerged with Health and Nudism and much more in my briefcase. I handed over two magazines in a quiet corner of Victoria Park. He pushed the lower half of them down his trousers and covered the top half with his jersey, saying miserably, “My mum will murder me if she sees any of this.”

“Have you a bedroom to yourself?” I asked, suddenly worried. He had. I suggested he hide them under his mattress or a carpet. He said, “Maybe they could go behind the coal bunker on the landing. But then I couldn’t get looking at them. Please take them back John!”

I said implacably, “Certainly not”.

“Alright, I’ll try the carpet.”

We resumed our theological discussion and separated before reaching a conclusion. Stewart’s last sad words, “Are we going a walk next Saturday?” were answered by a lofty, “I’ll think about it.” O I was nasty, nasty, nasty. And when the aunts later asked (as usual) about Stewart I said, “Frankly, I’m finding him a dreary soul. I can’t stand the Old Testament religion he goes on and on and on about.”

Nan sighed and said, “Yes, religion does have a dreary side.” She went on to say something about the state of Israel being founded by modern Socialists, people nothing like the old Children of Israel because centuries of persecution by Christians and others had taught the Jews tolerance, so they would eventually treat Muslims within their national boundaries as equals, despite the enmity of those outside it.

This was on Saturday evening. I was only slightly worried when Stoory Doig did not come to school on Monday morning because he was often off sick. But he joined the class after lunch break and alarmed me because I saw he was avoiding me. The subject was science which split the class into groups of four or less at separate benches. Stoory and me had always shared a bench by ourselves, but today the teacher (we called him Tojo because he looked slightly Japanese) said, “Make room for Doig here,” and put him on the far side of the room so I had a bench completely to myself. This was unprecedented and noticed by the rest of the class. A little later Tojo, passing near, murmured, “Feeling lonely, Tunnock?”, with a glance that may have been whimsical but made my blood run cold. For the rest of the afternoon I expected every moment to be summoned to the headmaster’s office and receive half a dozen strokes of his Lochgelly tawse, 32three on each hand. I had never been belted but had seen it done to others, and hoped the pain of the first stroke would make me faint. Nothing of the sort happened. As I left to go home some boys overtook me and asked what was up between Doig and me? I said, “Ask him.”

They said, “We did and he won’t tell.”

I hurried away from them saying, “Neither will I,” and one shouted after me, “Don’t worry, we’ll find out!”

I passed that evening sick with fear and dread, refusing to answer my aunts’ anxious questions but finally yelling, “I can’t tell you anything.”

I locked myself in the study, removed my paper harem from Cruden’s Concordance , masturbated furiously several times, burned all of it while drinking the final bottle and a half of grandfather’s sherry, then managed to put myself early to bed without falling down. I slept so soundly that I either outslept a hangover or was still drunk when I wakened at the usual hour, for I felt bright and cheerful. I had no memories of the previous day until halfway through dressing they recurred like an ugly dream. At breakfast with Nan and Nell I tried fooling myself into thinking the whole business might have no further consequences, especially since the aunts said nothing about my queer conduct the night before. In the 1950s an efficient General Post Office delivered letters twice daily, the first delivery before breakfast. Between porridge and boiled eggs (ours was always a two course breakfast) Nan took a letter from an envelope, read it more than once then said, “John, your headmaster asks me to visit him at eleven o’clock this morning. Do you know why?”

This plunged me again deep into a nightmare that made intelligent thought and connected speech impossible. I muttered over and over with increasing violence, “I can’t tell you anything” or “I will NOT go to school today,” which alarmed them. Nell, the youngest, pled with me and wept, whereupon Nan said loudly and sternly, “Very well! You will NOT go to school today as usual, but you WILL come to school and see the headmaster with us!”

She had never spoken severely to me before. I could not argue back and later, sick at heart, walked drearily school-ward between them. On one side Nell attempted some feeble, encouraging chirps but Nan stayed grimly silent, gathering her forces for a conflict whose nature she could not even guess.

The headmaster had always been remote from boys he did not punish, always austere with those who were not good at sports. He greeted my aunts with grave politeness, leaving his office desk to do so and offering them chairs before it. I was not greeted at all and left standing. He sat down and told them, “I am sorry I have had to ask you here. We have never had trouble with John before, but he has now done something that the mother of a fellow pupil brought to my attention yesterday, denouncing it as downright wicked. She provided me with such evidence that I was reluctantly forced to agree.”

He paused. Nan said coldly, “What evidence?”

From a drawer in his desk he produced and laid on top Health and Nudism with its cover photograph illustrating the Eves on Skis article, and a number of Sheena the Jungle Girl with Sheena on the cover in a state that made me shut my eyes tight. I heard him explain that according to Mrs Doig, Stewart always told the truth when confessing his sins before going to bed, and had confessed that John Tunnock had led him into temptation and had thrust these vile publications upon him. The dreadful silence following these words was broken by Nan asking crisply, “John gave these as a present to poor Stewart Doig?”

“Yes, John persuaded Doig to accept this unmitigated filth.”

“Is that all?” cried Nan in a voice so loud with gladness and relief that I opened my eyes wide and saw her lean forward and lift Health and Nudism . After glancing quickly inside she put it back saying, “My dear sir, when we received your letter this morning John became so speechless with shame and horror that I feared he had made a girl pregnant, or been discovered in some act of adolescent homosexuality, or had publically exposed his genitals. Do you really believe pictures of undressed female bodies are unmitigated filth?”

“Of course not, but trading in pornography is filth.”

“John did not trade in these publications. You admit he gave them as presents.”

“It is no mitigation for a rich boy to gain no money while deliberately using his own to corrupt a very poor boy!”

“My dear man, you are in charge of a teaching establishment founded in Queen Victoria’s reign but this is 1954. You surely know that boys over the age of twelve have adult sexual organs and appetites. My nephew John is thirteen. In a tribal society he would be earning his living and selecting a mate in a year or two. Civilization makes that impossible. Our schools must fit young adults for modern life by suppressing their natural instincts, but you cannot expect to completely suppress them, especially when they are outside your school.”