Fear Death By Drowning

FEAR DEATH BY DROWNING

Lucky was pregnant again. Paul always knew first. He stroked her and
felt her distended belly. "Mum, Lucky's having kittens again." He was
always right. He wondered if she should be neutered. He wasn't quite
sure what 'neutered' meant but he knew it would put an end to the
endless cycle of birth and death by drowning. He'd overheard his mother
in the Steamie.

It was amazing how women ignored you. You were invisible to them. They
laughed, they gossiped, tidied each other's lipstick, shared fags,
hitched bras, straightened stockings, pulled at the crotch of their
knickers. You might not as well have been there. Women together were
rude, crude, raucous and irresistible.

Only when a man came on the scene, and there were few men in the
Steamie, did their voices drop, as their eyes, expressionless and
intimidating, saw the intruder off the premises. But a boy could sit
unnoticed and unregarded for an hour as long as he remained
expressionless. The least hint of interest in the conversation brought
a quick rebuke and summary dismissal: "Hey, cloth ears, what are you
hingin' aboot here fur? Awa ye go and have a bath. Here's thruppence.
Share it wi' anither lad. It's a sin to waste watter."

Attached to the Steamie was the Lochee Public Baths and Swimming Pool.
There were ten cubicles, each held a huge cast-iron bath that took
fifteen minutes to fill. Plenty of room for a couple of boys. Rumour
had it that the O'Donnells sneaked in five of their brats at a time,
three boys and two girls, including the popular Mary O'Donnell. Rumour
had it that Mary would share with any boy who had a spare thruppence.
God forgive the Catholic Irish; the strait-laced Presbyterian Scots
never would.

"Spayed? No, I'd never do that to her. Lucky deserves a bit of fun out
of life."

Paul's ears tingled. They were talking about his cat.

"You're richt. We had Blackie neutered; she's never been the same
since."

"Blackie? I thought Blackie was a tom," said his mother.

"So he is. That's why he's never been the same."

A burst of laughter.

"Awa ye go, ye daft bugger."

That was his mother. Although she did not put on airs, she rarely
slipped into broad Locheese. Paul risked a smile.

"Whut are you sittin' doon there for? Hav' you got nuthin' tae dae? Do
you want thruppence for a bath?" That was Mary Doherty, his mother's
Steamie partner.

"Leave him for now, Mary," interrupted his mother. "We're nearly done.
He can help feed the sheets into the mangle. Anyway, Lucky's his cat. I
don't think he'd like it if the vet turned her into a big fat
lump."

"I've already got my grannie," chirped Paul. Dangerous, but he got away
with it that time.

"And he helps droon the kittens," said his mother.

"Cathie Bosquet, dinnae tell me you're still droonin' the kittens?"
Mary Doherty protested. "You're a hard-hearted wuman."

"I am not," said his mother briskly. "It's the humane thing to do. The
pet shop doesn't want them. The vet charges sixpence a time to put them
to sleep. I'm not going to stick them in a bag and dump them in the
bins. The council can get you for that. So I drown them. And Jean-Paul
helps. Don't you, son."

He did help. He never liked drowing the kittens, but it had to be done.
The bucket was filled with water. He lured Lucky into the bedroom and
closed her in. She knew what was happening. She meowed and mourned, and
squealed and screamed, and clawed at and scratched the door.

He brought the kittens to his mother, one by one, nipping the scruff of
the neck to carry them so that no fragile bones were broken. He dropped
each one into the bucket, and his mother pushed them under with a
forked stick. She let him do it. The kittens bobbed around, meowing
pathetically, only their heads above the water. He forked a kitten's
neck and pushed it under.

He held it under and watched little bubbles rise to the surface and
burst. Sixty seconds did most of them, but there was one that had
lasted nearly two minutes. He was proud of that one. Then the kittens,
like drookit rags, were retrieved from the bucket and tenderly wrapped
in newspaper. The bundle was wrapped, popped in a carrier bag, then
dropped in a half full dustbin. A load of warm ashes completed the
funeral ceremonies.

Lucky, released from the bedroom, ran frantically around the living
room, poking into every cranny. She ran around Paul's legs, frantically
brushing her body against them. Then she disappeared under the settee
and lay there crooning for a couple of hours. Towards evening a dish of
Kit-e-Kat tempted her back into public, and by eight o'clock, she was
out the window and off for a night on the tiles.

"Have yu nivir kept eny o' the wee mites?" asked Mrs Doherty.

"Only once," said his mother. "Only once."

Paul jerked himself up from the damp step. "I'm going to find Joe," he
said. "He'll still be in the pool. I'm going to watch from the
gallery." He knew his mother would tell Mrs Doherty about the kitten.
They'd have a laugh at his expense. He minded that, but not too much.
He deserved it. But he didn't want to be reminded of the story; only he
knew everything that had happened, and he didn't want to be reminded.
Though it was already too late for the kitten and for him.

Lucky always had her kittens in the same place. The wardrobe in the
'boysroom'. Paul padded out a corner with a soft pillow. For a few days
after the birthing he placed warmed milk and dishes of fresh Kit-E-Kat
at the door. Lucky would slip out and eat, then slide like a shadow
back into the dark warmth of the wardrobe.

At intervals she would carry out her kittens and deposit them in the
catbox. Their business done, she'd nip them around the back of the neck
and transport them back to the wardrobe. Joe protested the room stank;
it did, but his protests went unheeded. Nobody was allowed to open the
door and peek inside until the cat emerged to wander the house again.
The boys bet on the colour and markings of the kittens.

Lucky herself was sooty black with a white flash on her chest, three
white paws, one black. This was rarely a guide to her kittens. She
roamed far and wide, selected mates indifferently, and dropped kittens
who ranged from fluffy grey to tiger stripes.

Once, when the mother-to-be was upset, Paul skipped afternoon school.
"To help Lucky," he explained. "And did you watch her having her
kittens?" his mother asked. "Some of them," Paul blushed. "Good, now
you know where babies come from," his mother said; if he'd known the
word 'laconic', he might have used it to describe the delivery of her
remark.

Was it from this litter that Paul 'stole' a kitten? It was certainly
from a litter whose father was peculiarly handsome. Even Madame Bosquet
paused before shrugging, "No, they've got to go, we can't keep them.
No. Do I have to say it twice? Joseph, take your sister to see your
grandmother. Paul, get Lucky out. I'll fill the bucket."

Paul got Lucky out, but then slid out of the bedroom window with a
kitten stuffed up his pullover. He made for the air raid shelters and
deposited the kitten in an orange crate lined with two old pillows. He
climbed back in through the window and helped his mother do what had to
be done. Lucky, distracted and demented, ran along the window sill,
throwing herself up to try and pull the window down. It was snibbed
shut on her.

The sodden little bodies, securely wrapped in an 'Evening Telegraph'
and carrier bag, were dumped in the bins. On went the ashes. Lucky was
allowed in. History completed its predictable cycle. Birth, death, and
an extra helping of Kit-E-Kat. Paul prayed, after all he was an altar
boy, for divine collusion until he could smuggle Lucky to the air raid
shelter and unite her with Ratso.

The Lord was in a listening mood. Ratso survived.

The next three weeks were fraught with danger. Lucky, despite lectures
severe and several insisted on returning her kitten to the wardrobe;
Paul insisted on returning the kitten to the air raid shelter. Here be
rats, might well be the case, but Ratso's chances of survival would not
be improved by an unprepared encounter with Madame Bosquet.

Paul made his preparations. He was polite. He paid attention to what
people at home said to him. He took his sister to the Rialto cinema
twice without coercion - "making up for Bessie," it was assumed. He
raked the ashes and set the fire on time. He stopped reading and came
to the table at first asking. He did extra early morning Masses (that
was for Father Bone). He kept his hands above the blanket (that was for
God). He did his homework on time (that was for Miss Watt).

Conscientiously he went to the toilet, outside, upstairs and in the
dark, every night before going to bed and peed on his brother only
twice in three weeks (that was a record). He couldn't think of anything
else he could do except give up the Wizard, but there is a limit to any
sacrifice.

Ratso was handsome. He had his mother's dark coat slashed with a grey
that could only have come from a prince among tomcats. He was lively,
independent, curious, and wilful. He would grow into a king among cats
unless he was a she in which case some revision would be needed.
Whichever he was, he couldn't stay in the air raid shelter forever. It
was now or never.

It was never.

"I know you took a kitten," said his mother. "I may be only a weaver
but I can count. We've been wondering what you were doing in the air
raid shelter."

"Maybe he was with Mary O'Donnell," laughed Joe.

"You shut up. Jist you shut up."

"Joseph."

"Yes, mum."

"Shut up."

"Yes, mum."

"Let Paul keep it, mum. It's a lovely wee kitten. It won't do any
harm." Ratso was ripping lines down the rexine of the settee. Kathleen
ignored reality. Her mother blew clusters of smoke across the
conference table, and ignored Kathleen.

"You've got two days to find someone in Whorterbank who really wants a
kitten. If you haven't found anyone by Saturday one o'clock, you will
take the kitten down to the RSPCA and hand it in. Hand him in. He's a
tom. I've checked. He's a good-looking beast, somebody will want
him."

"Where's the RSPCA?"

"In Dock Street."

"Dock Street, Dundee?"

"There is only one Dock Street, and it is in Dundee. Don't look so
worried. You can take the bus. You're going to be travelling back and
forwards across Dundee twice a day when you go to the Harris. You might
as well start getting used to it."

"Eh'm no goin' ti the Harris. They're a' bampots there."

"Are you arguing with me?"

"No," slid ungraciously out.

"Then you're going to the Harris next year, and you're going to Dock
Street on Saturday unless you can find a home for that... Ratso! Stop
it."

The kitten was clawing his way vigorously up the table cloth; he hung
there for a few moments while Lucky circled anxiously below. Joe jerked
the table cloth. Ratso lost his grip and fell, hitting his mother
squarely on the head. Lucky grabbed her kitten by the scruff of the
neck and hauled him protesting under the settee.

"Who's for a game of cards?" asked Joe.

"Get my purse," said Madame Bosquet.

"Can I deal?" asked Paul.

"You always cheat," said Kathleen.

Normality was restored.

The bus lumbered to a halt at the bottom of Gray's Lane. Paul swung
himself and the basket on board. For a moment he was tempted to bundle
the basket up the narrow stairs to the top deck, but drivers often
rammed on the brakes at the junction of Loons Road and Muirton Road. He
knew how to swing himself safely round the grab-rail, but the basket
was awkward and he heard Ratso protest indignantly about the roughness
of the ride. He settled for a seat inside and edged open the basket. A
paw, claws unsheathed, flashed at him. He snapped the basket
shut.

"Terminus, please."

He stuffed his ticket in his back pocket and leaned against the window
to enjoy the ride. The view was not spectacular from the lower deck but
it was still a thrill to go to Dundee alone. He had no worries about
getting lost. The bus terminated, like so many of her sisters, behind
the Caird Hall. The docks were directly opposite. His mother had given
him directions to Dock Street but he hadn't paid much attention. If he
found the docks, and he could hardly miss them, someone would show him
Dock Street and the RSPCA.

As his mother predicted, no one had wanted a kitten. Whorterbank
swarmed with enough cats to make a Pied Piper redundant, and people
spent more time getting rid of their own rather than taking on another
little hungry mouth to feed.

The bus swung into Reform Street, crossed the Overgate, and barrelled
down Commercial Street into the terminus where thirty-odd busses
disgorged their cargo. Paul held the basket tightly, jumped down from
the platform and gazed around him. The Royal Arch gave him his
bearings.

The Royal Arch was just that and only that. A huge dirty-brown arch set
down and abandoned by a giant's hand. Known throughout Dundee as the
Doos' Palace, it led into the docks and the harbour but was entirely
disconnected from everything else around. Paul side-stepped two or
three double-deckers and crossed the road to the harbour.

A flurry of filthy pigeons, the celebrated doos, scattered before his
feet. He knew from a class project Dundee had once been a centre of the
whaling industry.

In time that had given way to the ships which hauled in the raw jute
from India; jute that sustained the mills and the workers of Dundee. He
wondered if similar ships brought in the oranges and newsprint that fed
the city's other industries of note: jam and journalism. He reached the
docks and looked up river, past the steam ships that lolled like idle
beasts in the silvery-grey waters of the Tay.

He saw the rail bridge that spanned the river; he'd crossed it twice,
and, head hanging out of a carriage door, shuddered at the stone stumps
of the first rail bridge that had collapsed on a stormy December
night... He struggled to remember the year. 1878. No. 1879. And seventy
five souls, passengers and crew, gone down into the deep, dark waters
of the river.

He was frightened of water. He hated the swimming pool at the Lochee
Baths, and not only because Joe and his pals threw him in, laughed and
told him to swim for it. He was not able to swim; he didn't imagine he
ever would be. In summer he loved the warm sands at Broughty Ferry
beach, but he hated the water.

There was something impermanent, insubstantial, insecure about water;
it clung to him with a familiarity he found disgusting; it lapped and
slapped; it bleached his pale skin; it caressed and sucked at him
obscenely; it was false of face, pretending to bear him up but always
ready to drag him down, to wrestle him under, to clog his mouth and
nose until even the exercises Dr Heinreich taught him would fail. Above
all else, Paul feared death by drowning.

He wandered downriver. Clouds blotted the sun. The silver of the Tay
turned to grey. The submarine pens had been in these docks; the
submarines were long gone. What had his father been like? The dark,
thin-faced, sleek-haired, sailor-suited young man from France who had
sailed his submarine up the North Sea to the safety Dundee harbour. He
had seen photographs.

The man, his mother's husband, looked like his brother Joseph, but
remained a stranger, an intruder. He, too, had been Joseph, but he had
no right to be part of them now; in death he had forfeited his rights.
How could his mother have married this deeply stupid man? Deeply
stupid, he had allowed himself to die even as the war ended. Deeply
selfish, he had left behind children who would never know him. And Paul
burned to know him. Burned to have a father.

Most of his friends had fathers; they, too, had foreign names like
Labessa and Dissell and Maronski; they spoke forms of English
unintelligible outside Dundee. But they were there. His father was not,
and he could not forgive his mother for that.

Sourness filled Paul's mouth. As if he'd crammed too many raspberries
down his throat and felt them bubble back like bile. His breathing
shortened into bursts and he leaned back against the damp wall of Shed
31. Not an attack, not here, not now. A rustling in the basket reminded
him he was not alone. Ratso meowed and reminded him he was not alone.
He slid the catch, reached in, and pulled the little bundle of life to
his heaving chest. Was it Ratso's heart or his he felt throbbing
against his fingers?

He lifted the small bundle to his face. The bright eyes. The pointy
ears. The twitching whiskers. The tiny lips curling into a smiling bow.
He loved the kitten so much it hurt. And yet... and yet...

The small body soared through the air, curved in an arc, and was
falling, falling, falling into the dark oily rainbow-stained mirror
that lapped against the brickwork of the dock.

There was hardly a splash.

For a moment the kitten disappeared, then resurfaced, scrabbling
frantically at the treacherous surface that gave no hold. The kitten
was looking directly at him. Did he look the same when he surfaced from
the blue-green waters of the Lochee Public Baths, scrabbling
frantically at the surface, looking for help that only came when hope
was gone?

Why didn't anyone appear? Someone. Anyone. To grab him and shout in his
face, "You bastard, you rotten wee bastard? What did you dae that fir?"
Why wasn't he being held to account for an act that should have filled
him with horror, but only left him with an aching void.

Where was the God that suffered when a single sparrow fell, yet ignored
a tiny kitten bobbing in the slimy waters of Dundee docks? Where was
the God that ignored him when he suffered, when His own son
suffered?

"O, father, father, why hast thou forsaken me?"

Paul turned, kicked the basket away, and headed briskly for the Royal
Arch, the bus terminus, and home.