The End of the Line by Gillian Galbraith

Author:Gillian Galbraith
Language: eng
Format: epub, mobi
Publisher: Birlinn

FOURTH NARRATIVE of

ANTHONY SPARROW

My mind full of the murderous Whitadder hussy, I clattered across the city in my battered blue Polo to meet the carriers at Anstruther’s house in Duddingston. Needless to say, throughout my entire journey, I saw nothing of Stockbridge, George Street, the cobbles of St Mary’s Street, the Pleasance or anywhere else. One minute I was outside my flat in Dean Street, the next I was halfway across Holyrood Park. The knowledge of that complete blank both scares and mystifies me. Fully conscious and alert, I am a bad driver, have nearly been put off the road twice, and confess, to my shame, to killing a giant Schnauzer. However, few would dispute (I’d wager) that attending to one’s toilet on a blind summit is unwise. Red lights, give-ways, roundabouts, pedestrian crossings? How I do not have more blood on my bonnet, I will never know. I saw and heard nothing, because that woman, and nothing but that woman, filled my mind. I argued with her, or myself, questioned her aggressively, wondered, shivered at her brutality, cold bloodedness, pictured the old man’s frailty and his end. I did not even feel my thumb and first finger, both burnt when I flung the blackened, smoking bagel into the kitchen sink.

Finally, I came to, you might say, with my seatbelt alarm penetrating my eardrums, my eyes registering the sight of a family of ducks, a mother and five infants, waddling across the road in front of me. I jammed my foot down. The brakes squealed like a banshee but, mercifully, the sextet reached the other side in safety, bodies and souls together.

Automatic pilot or not, I hit my destination at the appointed hour. Were the eager tradesmen awaiting me there? Were they buggery. The next five minutes were spent examining my damaged digits, one already blistered, and muttering to myself about Messrs Reed and Stenton. From my parking spot overlooking the loch, I further whiled away my time watching the waterside life: a few desultory walkers and one youth staring fixedly at the summit of Arthur’s Seat as if expecting an imminent eruption. To my left, a gaggle of Chinese geese were terrorising a little girl, hissing, stretching their necks like snakes in her direction, making her scream so piercingly that the noise penetrated my cocoon. As the mother, a sylph in a lilac scarf, suddenly realised what was happening, she began to clap her hands, advancing on the birds as a human shield. One thick-necked gander, up for the fray, advanced towards her, wings outstretched. Unexpectedly, I heard myself starting to hiss in chorus with him.

As at that exact moment, the Carrier’s rusty Pan Technicon crunched its way over the gravel, unfortunately I never saw the final act in that little drama. My money, however, would be on the gander. Punctuality being well above Godliness as far as I am concerned, I had already decided that, however cheap their quote was, Reed and Stenton would not get the job.

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