It was impossible to talk; the massed ranks of flutes and drums had rendered conversation obsolete. They were marching now through the city centre and the canyon of multi storey office buildings echoed with the booming cannon shots of bass drums and the massed singing of drunk men. The air shrilled with flutes and the … Continue reading No Surrender
West Highland Way
Life force: (noun) ‘the spirit which animates living creatures; the soul.’ It’s a powerful thing this life-force; a term we’ve adopted to compensate for that bridge between the rational-scientific and the spiritual, because there is undeniably something other than mere existence that drives us forward. That beyond the biological mechanics, chemistry and physics that make … Continue reading West Highland Way
Lockerbie
They could all see it, the grey flesh luminous with decay, in stark contrast to the dark earth beneath. Alec composed himself and let his breath out slowly, the vapour forming a thick column past his eyes as he crouched lower, thighs burning with the effort of holding still. With a gloved hand he teased … Continue reading Lockerbie
Brief Encounter
The following five days were spent in bed. Alec had swallowed the contents of the canal during the rescue of the boy and a bout of gastroenteritis followed. It took another week before he could reasonably claim he’d recovered and it was a thinner Alec MacKay who reported at Corsair Street in time to begin … Continue reading Brief Encounter
Saturation
If the incident with McGroarty had provided some unexpected excitement it was short lived. There’d been some subterfuge in their attempts to execute more warrants, but the remainder of the week proved an anti climax. It wasn’t altogether fruitless. Alec had learned new tricks. The art of whistling bird calls as they entered each common … Continue reading Saturation
Last Man Standing
March 2016 A cold wind is blowing. Spring is around the corner, but winter is having a final hurrah. The boat is supported high on its cradle and twenty feet up, standing on the deck, I can see the inner basin of the harbour, marina pontoons bobbing around and, beyond that, the churning Firth of … Continue reading Last Man Standing
Snowflakes & Bayonets
Sometimes I receive unbidden, a childhood memory so clear and real that I believe myself to be my nine year old self, living in a three storey maisonette on a hillside overlooking a wide expanse of sea to a mountainous island. It is night time. The sky is the colour of paper-ash. Snow, falling in … Continue reading Snowflakes & Bayonets
A Legacy of War
I am a child of the sixties, reared on an incongruous mix of hippy ideals and World War II action movies. It was a period submerged in technicolour and viewed in Panavision. A childhood filled with the glory of war, a celebration of the the courageous, of rugged handsome men, calm under pressure, hoodwinking the … Continue reading A Legacy of War
Cherry Tree
It is Autumn. I am in her garden, raking heels through the leaves beneath the cherry tree. I am in dumb retreat as she tells me things I do not want to hear. A symposium of platitudes. She tells me that her love, once as wild as liquorice and peaches, has become altogether more platonic. … Continue reading Cherry Tree
Doubts and Procrastination
So I’m home. Back to the old routine. The girls are off to school, the eldest having stomped off in tears because a school concert to be given in honour of the departing head mistress (newly announced) falls on the date of a planned trip to New York. First world problems... That old enemy, procrastination, … Continue reading Doubts and Procrastination
The Absent Minded Scribe 