Dad and the woman danced past. Aunt Maureen smiled seeing them. Ruthie Lawrence, she said.
Later Aunt Maureen was still smiling. It was another tune by then. Just that way she was looking at the people on the floor, that smile, smiling to see them. Murdo could have drawn her, if he had had a pen or a pencil, to try and get how she was looking, this way she was watching the dancers like even she wasnt watching them at all but over the tops of their heads, and her eyes and just below the lines there, that was the lines from smiling, she did smile, worrying too. She didnt dress up much but tonight she had.
And this necklace she was wearing. She had on this necklace and it was like sparkling, really sparkling. Murdo hadnt seen it before. Maybe she hadnt worn it before. Not during the day anyway. Definitely not. Maybe it was diamonds? It could have been. Murdo leaned to her. Aunt Maureen, he said, that’s a brilliant necklace.
She squinted round at him.
It’s really…it’s just, it’s really really nice.
He still gives the presents Murdo, he still manages to do that. Aunt Maureen smiled, fingering the necklace.
Do ye fancy a dance? he said.
Huh? You want to son?
Please, yeah, if eh…
I dont mind. Aunt Maureen stood to her feet carefully.
That’s great, he said. She put one hand out to him and he held it, walking with her onto the floor. Ye’re looking great, he said, I think ye’re just…
Aunt Maureen frowned.
No, he said.
Oh yeah you can flatter huh! It’s a family trait I reckon.
Murdo laughed. When they were on the floor they stood by the edge. He put his hands to Aunt Maureen’s upper arms. She glanced at the other dancers. What is this one? she asked.
I think it’s a jig.
Huh, I thought it was too.
Aunt Maureen I’ve got to say, I’m a hopeless dancer.
She nodded. We’ll try a two-step Murdo, a fast one. One two shuffle, one two shuffle but kind of fast. You wont fall down. Jigs is kind of tricky.
She adjusted his hands and waited, looking to see a space; they set off. Aunt Maureen slowed to a stop. Now Murdo you’re going backwards, she said, dont you go backwards: you got to lead me; you are the man here.
Okay.
Dont watch the floor too much.
Yeah but if I kick ye?
Dont worry about that, she said. Where I come from people wear boots and it dont stop them. Throw the sugar on the floor and off they set. You know what a clod hopper is?
No.
You dont huh. They got them clogs and go hop hop hopping along.
People were coming and Murdo was going to side-step away but Aunt Maureen kept him on the same track. She was good at dancing. He had expected that. They danced a path round the edge of the dance area but were not going as well as all that. They seemed to be then lost the rhythm. It was Murdo’s fault. Aunt Maureen smiled. You just got to concentrate Murdo, that’s what it is.
Murdo felt his hands sweaty and was aware of them on her dress, his hands maybe gripping her so they creased the material instead of just holding her, palms and fingers. He wasnt sure if Aunt Maureen noticed. She was humming under her breath. Murdo kept going, one two shuffle, not thinking too much, one two shuffle, one two shuffle.
*
Late night on the road home, the 4x4, Uncle John driving, Dad in the front passenger seat, Aunt Maureen and Murdo in the rear. Murdo was awake but must have been dozing. Silence but for the hum of the car engine. Uncle John and Dad talking, they were talking. Not now, and no radio. Murdo yawned. Aunt Maureen had noticed and smiled, then gazed back out the window. The silence continued until Uncle John said, Of course he’s Irish…
I thought he was American, said Dad.
Talking family, he’s a descendant.
I thought his mother was from Glasgow.
Aw yeah, from way back but Declan! Know what I mean that aint Scottish. Who’s called Declan? It’s Irish. A name like that. Oireesh. He’s Oireesh. I dont know about her; the woman he came with.
Linda, said Dad, I think she came with other people.
Mm.
Aunt Maureen called: Lives in Springfield Missouri Tommy; same as your cousin John. I know Linda, she is one nice girl, and she knows young John too.
Dad twisted on the seat to see round at Aunt Maureen. Aunt Maureen winked at Murdo then was staring out the window again.
Cousin John was Uncle John’s elder boy, the one he didnt talk to. But Aunt Maureen talked to him. Two days ago Murdo had come out the bathroom after a shower and she was on the phone to him. Murdo heard enough to work that out.
Uncle John had started talking again but more quietly now and Murdo had to shift on the seat and strain to hear.
We saw a television programme, said Uncle John, Irish-Scotch or whatever the hell, Scotch-Irish! I was angry watching it Tommy, so would you have been. King James and all his rebels right enough. Dont call me Scotch. I tell them that in the bastard work, ye want Scotch go to the bastard pub. Excuse the language, he said. Uncle John sniffed, but an angry sniff. Call me Scottish, that’s what I tell them, I’m not Scotch, dont call me Scotch. I get a bit annoyed the way everything here’s Irish, know what I mean — Oireesh!
Dad spoke quietly. The guy’s from Alabama but Uncle John. He only works in Texas.
I’ve got nothing against him — whatever he is, dont get me wrong. Only it aint a thing to talk about; not in that company. You got to know who you’re talking to. Religion like that! He’s a bloody singer! He’s paid to sing! That Billy Boy stuff, Protestants and Catholics and all that. In the name of God Tommy what century is he living in! Know what I mean, it’s insulting. Uncle John glanced at Dad. How does he know anyway?
He works beside Scottish guys. Dad said, Offshore, there’s a lot of Scottish guys work offshore; he hears the banter.
Banter! Uncle John shook his head.
Murdo looked to the rear-view mirror but couldnt see his eyes. He sat back on the seat now. Dad knew he was listening. Uncle John was silent. That was something how he didnt like Declan. And other people didnt too. That was what upset Linda, and she got angry. Declan just laughed. He took buses everywhere and made jokes about it. He said he appreciated buses because he wrote songs traveling on them. Nobody wrote songs driving an automobile. Declan said that, if they did they would crash! Everybody has a laugh but Declan had a good one. There was a quality to it; the same when he was talking between songs. It fitted in with that stagey growl he did, kind of macho but like a kid-on, dont take it serious.
Aunt Maureen was dozing.
They were passing through a built-up area. Uncle John was doing his cheery wee whistling now, hardly making a sound other than the breath escaping, how it escapes sometimes like how with the pipes the bag expels air, the breaths, huh hih huh hih huh hih, and the drone, that drone
FOUR
On Sunday afternoon Dad came out to the patio carrying a book and a coffee. Murdo was sunbathing at his usual spot in the garden but closer in to the hedge for shade. The hi-fi and US Road Atlas were closeby. He lowered the volume and exchanged a wave with Dad then returned to the book he was reading, one about a guy who came back to the town of his birth after years in an army stockade for a crime he did not commit. The sheriff of the town hated him because of a thing from childhood. It was good, set in the state of Arizona.
Dad hadnt opened his book, he was just sitting there. Usually he would have been reading in the house before coming out and was carrying on where he left off. Sometimes he read while he walked. That was Dad, a major reader. Murdo reached to turn down the hi-fi volume again but would have been as well turning it off altogether. Ye wasted brain energy trying to listen and this interfered with the music. It was worse than frustrating. It seemed a lack of concentration but it wasnt concentration at all. Ye did concentrate. It was just some of it went in the wrong direction. Or else it was a different concentration; concentrating to concentrate. Real concentration was where ye didnt have to think about it, yet took it all in.