him, putting down my gear and taking my jacket off. I took up the axe. ‘Very quiet, in fact.’
‘Good,’ he said, apparently convinced, and went into the house. I started swinging the axe at the lumps of driftwood.
After lunch I went into town, taking Gravel my bike and some money. I told my father I’d be back before dinner. It started to rain when I was halfway to Porteneil, so I stopped to put on my cagoule. The going was heavy but I got there without mishap. The town was grey and empty in the dull afternoon light; cars swished through on the road going north, some with their headlights on, making everything else seem even dimmer. I went to the gun and tackle shop first, to see old Mackenzie and take another of his American hunting-catapults off him, and some air-gun pellets, too.
‘And how are you today, young man?’
‘Very well, and yourself?’
‘Och, not too bad, you know,’ he said, shaking his grey head slowly, his yellowed eyes and hair rather sickly in the electric light of the shop. We always say the same things to each other. Often I stay longer in the shop than I mean to because it smells so good.
‘And how’s that uncle of yours these days? I haven’t seen him for - oh, a while.’
‘He’s well.’
‘Oh, good, good,’ Mr Mackenzie said, screwing up his eyes with a slightly pained expression and nodding slowly. I nodded, too, and looked at my watch.
‘Well, I must be going,’ I said, and started to back off, putting my new catapult into the day-pack on my back and stuffing the pellets wrapped in brown paper into my combat-jacket pockets.
‘Oh, well, if you must, you must,’ said Mackenzie, nodding at the glass counter as though inspecting the flies, reels and duck-calls within. He took up a cloth by the side of the cash register and started to move it slowly over the surface, looking up just once as I left the shop, saying, ‘Goodbye, then.’
‘Yes, goodbye.’
In the Firthview café, apparently the location of some awful and localised ground subsidence since it was named, because it would have to be at least a storey taller to catch a view of the water, I had a cup of coffee and a game of Space Invaders. They had a new machine in, but after a pound or so I had mastered it and won an extra space-ship. I got bored with it and sat down with my coffee.
I inspected the posters on the café walls to see if there was anything interesting happening in the area in the near future, but apart from the Film Club there wasn’t much. The next showing was The Tin Drum , but that was a book my father had bought for me years ago, one of the few real presents he has ever given me, and I had therefore assiduously avoided reading it, just as I had Myra Breckinridge , another of his rare gifts. Mostly my father just gives me the money that I ask for and lets me get what I want for myself. I don’t think he’s really interested; but, on the other hand, he wouldn’t refuse me anything. As far as I can tell, we have some sort of unspoken agreement that I keep quiet about not officially existing in return for being able to do more or less as I like on the island and buy more or less what I like in the town. The only thing we had argued about recently was the motorbike, which he said he would buy me when I was a bit older. I suggested that it might be a good idea to get it in midsummer so that I could get plenty of practice in before the skiddy weather set in, but he thought there might be too much tourist traffic going through the town and on the roads around it in the middle of the summer. I think he just wants to keep putting it off; he might be frightened of me gaining too much independence, or he might simply be scared that I’ll kill myself the way a lot of youths seem to when they get a bike. I don’t know; I never know exactly how much he really feels for me. Come to think of it, I never know exactly how much I really feel for him.
I had rather been hoping that I
‘Good,’ he said, apparently convinced, and went into the house. I started swinging the axe at the lumps of driftwood.
After lunch I went into town, taking Gravel my bike and some money. I told my father I’d be back before dinner. It started to rain when I was halfway to Porteneil, so I stopped to put on my cagoule. The going was heavy but I got there without mishap. The town was grey and empty in the dull afternoon light; cars swished through on the road going north, some with their headlights on, making everything else seem even dimmer. I went to the gun and tackle shop first, to see old Mackenzie and take another of his American hunting-catapults off him, and some air-gun pellets, too.
‘And how are you today, young man?’
‘Very well, and yourself?’
‘Och, not too bad, you know,’ he said, shaking his grey head slowly, his yellowed eyes and hair rather sickly in the electric light of the shop. We always say the same things to each other. Often I stay longer in the shop than I mean to because it smells so good.
‘And how’s that uncle of yours these days? I haven’t seen him for - oh, a while.’
‘He’s well.’
‘Oh, good, good,’ Mr Mackenzie said, screwing up his eyes with a slightly pained expression and nodding slowly. I nodded, too, and looked at my watch.
‘Well, I must be going,’ I said, and started to back off, putting my new catapult into the day-pack on my back and stuffing the pellets wrapped in brown paper into my combat-jacket pockets.
‘Oh, well, if you must, you must,’ said Mackenzie, nodding at the glass counter as though inspecting the flies, reels and duck-calls within. He took up a cloth by the side of the cash register and started to move it slowly over the surface, looking up just once as I left the shop, saying, ‘Goodbye, then.’
‘Yes, goodbye.’
In the Firthview café, apparently the location of some awful and localised ground subsidence since it was named, because it would have to be at least a storey taller to catch a view of the water, I had a cup of coffee and a game of Space Invaders. They had a new machine in, but after a pound or so I had mastered it and won an extra space-ship. I got bored with it and sat down with my coffee.
I inspected the posters on the café walls to see if there was anything interesting happening in the area in the near future, but apart from the Film Club there wasn’t much. The next showing was The Tin Drum , but that was a book my father had bought for me years ago, one of the few real presents he has ever given me, and I had therefore assiduously avoided reading it, just as I had Myra Breckinridge , another of his rare gifts. Mostly my father just gives me the money that I ask for and lets me get what I want for myself. I don’t think he’s really interested; but, on the other hand, he wouldn’t refuse me anything. As far as I can tell, we have some sort of unspoken agreement that I keep quiet about not officially existing in return for being able to do more or less as I like on the island and buy more or less what I like in the town. The only thing we had argued about recently was the motorbike, which he said he would buy me when I was a bit older. I suggested that it might be a good idea to get it in midsummer so that I could get plenty of practice in before the skiddy weather set in, but he thought there might be too much tourist traffic going through the town and on the roads around it in the middle of the summer. I think he just wants to keep putting it off; he might be frightened of me gaining too much independence, or he might simply be scared that I’ll kill myself the way a lot of youths seem to when they get a bike. I don’t know; I never know exactly how much he really feels for me. Come to think of it, I never know exactly how much I really feel for him.
I had rather been hoping that I
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