Mungo slumped on a lichen-covered rock. He could walk, he could run, but in which direction? He wondered what Mo-Maw had told Gallowgate, he wondered what would make his family take this stranger’s word against his own. As his face burned and his guts throbbed with pain, he pulled his knees up to his chest and rested his good eye on his kneecap. He suddenly felt alone again, not in the magical way he had yesterday, but in a way that stripped all the heat from his body. He had a feeling then, a fear that he might never go home, never see Jodie or James again.
“Cheer up, son. It might never happen.”
He found himself watching St Christopher gouge tiny minnows with the hook and drop them into the loch. His nervous nature meant that he barely left the rods alone long enough for any fish to come near them. The man was hunched and searching for prey, his face too close to the surface. “Fuck it! There’s no one single fish in this whole scunner of a loch.” He was complaining to no one in particular. “Ah used to fish the Cart River every Saturday wi’ ma faither. We used to take home big buckets full of perch, stinking wriggling fat buggers they were. We’d catch that many ma da would send me door to door, practically givin’ them away.” The man took off his bunnet and scratched at his bald head. “This loch must be fuckin’ broken.”
It would be a long time till Gallowgate would return and Mungo couldn’t listen to this moaning. He thought to send the man away from him; it would give him a chance to think about what he should do next. “There’s a river over there. It’s teeming with some kind of fat fish.” He held his hands shoulder width apart.
St Christopher’s eyes grew wide. “That’s where the buggers are hiding.” He reeled in his line. “Show us, eh?”
It took longer to lead St Christopher through the forest than it had to explore alone. The man couldn’t climb over fallen tree limbs, he had to stop, sit down on the tree, and then swing his legs over one by one. It was odd to see this man in his old working suit stumble through the thick carpet of ferns. Every now and then his fish hook would get caught on a branch or a leaf and Mungo would have to pick it out for him. The third or fourth time it happened Mungo studied the man’s face for a long while as his dextrous fingers worked the knotted fish gut. Under the dappled canopy, the sunlight refracted off the man’s eyes and they had a filminess to them Mungo had not noticed before.
Mungo knew now why the man lowered his face so close to the water, why he slipped on every single rock. His eyes were dying. St Christopher could hardly see.
As he followed Mungo to the river he talked non-stop. Mungo wasn’t listening and didn’t stop to consider the quiet magic of the dell. It had been ruined for him. Now he kicked the heads off fat bluebells and ran his hand spitefully up the fern stems, stripping them of all their fronds and leaving them to die.
They came to the river and found a spot where it was deepest. There was a widening where Mungo could see lazy fish eat skimming bugs. He pointed at the fish and watched St Christopher follow the arc of his arm. But the boy knew he couldn’t see the fish for himself, not anymore. The man cast his rod downstream and secured it between two boulders. He took out a cigarette and lit it, then he thrust his hands in his pockets and waited like he was at a bus stop.
Mungo waded across the river. He wanted to be far from the stink of the man. He had been damp since that first rainfall, but this water did something for him; it distracted from the stinging in his face, and from the low throb that was now spreading across his ribcage. If you forged slowly, the footing was good, there was only one boulder that was unbalanced. Mungo felt it teeter under his weight and he quickly adjusted himself, careful not to topple over into the current. It was childish, but he made up his mind not to tell St Christopher about it.
On the far side there was a fallen log sitting in the wet mud. When Mungo stood on it the ground let out a wet fart. He rocked on it for a while, pressing and releasing the sinking wood while he dreamt of bolting into the understorey, wondering how fast he could run through the ferns.
“It’s no fuckin’ use,” said St Christopher eventually. “None o’ these fuckers are biting.”
Mungo could see where the fishing line bounced in the current. The man had missed the place he had pointed to and the coloured weight was bobbing too violently in the eddy. “Why did you do it?” Mungo asked.
“Ah thought that’s where ye pointed.”
“No. That’s not what I meant. I meant why did you do that to me last night.”
St Christopher was only a short distance away, the river being only twenty feet wide at this point. Still, Mungo could tell the man was not looking directly at him; he thought he was, but he was not. “Have ye never been a Boy Scout?”
Mo-Maw had never been able to afford the uniform; what use were knot-tying and astronomy badges on the streets of the East End?
“Well, they’re aw at it. It’s what us boys do when we’re alone. A bit of fun. ’Asides, it’s like a tradition to some folk. You’re jist no supposed to mention it when you’re poor, but when ye’re rich, haw, haw, haw. It’s what all they posh boys do the gether. Oxford is full of it. Aw they boarding schools. They all love a bit o’ casual buggering down there.” St Christopher took out the toddler’s chocolate and held it out to Mungo.
Mungo wondered how many times St Christopher had told that story to boys. It slithered off his tongue so easily. How many times had he held out a chocolate bar to a greetin’ wean? It made his head throb.
“You weren’t in the jail for vaykri …” Mungo stumbled over the word.
“Vagrancy?” offered St Christopher quickly. “Naw. Ah wisnae inside for that.”
Nobody said anything after that. The river rushed between them.
Mungo was afraid of Gallowgate. There was a swing to his head that reminded him of a fighting pit bull; there was a ragged muscularity to his body that made him look like he had been whittled with a dull knife without being sanded smooth afterwards. But St Christopher did not frighten him, not anymore. Now he was angry at what he had let the old man get away with. He swallowed once, shouted as loud as he could with his battered throat. “Why don’t you take that chocolate and shove it up your arse.”
The man laid the chocolate on the riverbank, as though Mungo was a dog he could tempt to inch closer. “Suit yersel. Besides, you should come to enjoy it. It’s safer than getting a lassie in bother.”
That lie again. Mungo thought of Jodie and her bother. He thought of her small, distended belly and he wondered if the man in the caravan had forced that into her.
St Christopher sighed. He scratched at his stubbled cheek and changed the subject as though they’d been discussing the weather. “Mungo son, where are these fishes ye promised me?”
Mungo was on the far side of the river. He could have turned then and slid into the tall ferns and been gone, St Christopher would never be able to follow him. But where would he go? For all he knew he was a thousand miles from home. Or the tenements could be just on the other side of the Munros.
Above them the leaves sounded the first tap-tap-tap of a heavy rain. Gallowgate would get soaked. Mungo pointed at the school of fish near his feet. They were not brown after all, but an iridescent shimmer of multicoloured scales. “You’ll not get them from over there. Your lure will be carried downstream. If you use those big stones you can cross and catch them from here.” He turned away, not certain he wouldn’t cry again.