Can't Stop This Gun From Crying (2012) by Bobby Stevenson

It had been welcomed by the scientific community as a life saver, as the next step in metal technology and a new generation of those shining babies was about to be unleashed on the world.

The team that had developed the idea at Los Alma had received the Nobel Prize that year and were ready to be courted by every large manufacturing company.

They had no need to worry where their next research dollar was coming from, indeed none of the team had any need to work for the rest of their lives. 

The principal was simple although the actual practical solution had taken decades of research: 

A material that repaired itself. 

You see it wasn’t so terrible when you put it down on a piece of paper like that. It seemed so innocent, beneficial almost.

The plan was that one day, aircraft while in flight could self-medicate, a nut or a bolt here would be re-grown and replaced. However that was still some way off and the actual exposure of the general public to SeRep (Self Repair), as it was christened, was minimal.

It was planned that cars too would have the ability to repair themselves - although there had been several showdowns at government level between the makers of the materials and the car manufacturers. The way things were looking, it meant that after you purchased a new car, and with a good headwind, it could last you a lifetime (and the rest). 

As you can imagine, the automobile industry was readying for a fight - big time. 

The first public structure to be made of SeRep was a bridge in Illinois, chosen by some wise guy at Los Alma who had stuck a pin in a map of the Ohio river. 

A Bridge had been selected as a structure that could suffer wear and tear, be exposed to public use and certainly be enhanced safety-wise by the use of the new material. 

The Tamaroa bridge was the one chosen and it crossed the Ohio at the southernmost tip of Illinois. 

As with all great ideas there were teething problems. The material, for instance, had to be guarded because of theft. The ‘bridgits’ as they became known would hack off a piece of SeRep meaning the bridge would have to repair and replace and then they'd sell it (or at least try to) on the 'Net.

Sometimes the material that had been stolen was so large that the bridge displayed a permanent scar. Just like human skin. 

At night when there was less traffic going over the bridge (that’s not to say it was totally quiet as people came from all over to see the wonder – day and night), but at night when the bridge was repairing itself it sounded like a muffled cry and this caused the bridge to be nicknamed the Bridge of Sighs. It almost sounded like a child in pain.

There had been the odd accident, the biggest of which was the General Custer, a tourist boat hired by some big corporation, packed with sweaty, drunk salespersons on a free trip to see the Bridge.

At the inquiry it had been shown that the Captain had been more than a little drunk and had almost destroyed the bridge supports on the Illinois bank. The damage was so severe that the SeRep guys decided to give the bridge a helping hand and assisted in the repairs. 

Yet anytime the bridge was left alone it would still continue to do the work it had been created for and it could always be heard to sigh. 

Janus Jones was a mid western boy straight out of college and about to set off for the Florida panhandle in a car his Pappy had bought him. The present was not for finishing school but for staying out of jail unlike Kevin, his older brother. Janus could have flown pretty cheaply but he wanted to follow the Mississippi all the way south and then cut across to Tallahassee. 

So it was a surprise when he found Kevin loading a bag into his new car on the morning of his trip.

“Coming with you Bro’. No arguments, I got nothing from Paw but aggravation and you get this brand spanking new car – so the least you can do is take me as far a New Orleans.”

Then Kevin jumped in the car.

And so the two Jones brothers (you’d have sworn they’d had different fathers) set off on a trip that would shake their worlds forever. 

At the trial Kevin, although missing most of his left arm, was still able to act as a credible witness. The way he told things it was as if the brothers had been the innocent victims. That wasn't totally true.

Just before the incident Kevin had driven for several hours south which had let Janus sleep, although with Kevin at the wheel Janus tended not to sleep too soundly. They’d stopped at the very last bar in Illinois going south to allow Kevin a few beers, Janus drank cola and several of the witnesses had told the court that Kevin had forced Janus to stay, and that Kevin had drank too many beers. That was just Kevin. 

As they left the car lot, instead of Janus driving, Kevin jumped into the driver’s seat and was beginning to move off. Janus had no choice but to jump in over the rear of the car. Chances are Kevin would have left him for cold, just standing there and let him make his own way home – Kevin had done it before.

“Where you at?”

Kevin ignored Janus and continued down the narrow road.

“This ain’t the way.”

“Tis, if you’re going to the Tamaroa. I wanna see the magic bridge.” 

The traffic started slowing about a mile from the bridge as there was a queue of cars taking their time crossing. At one point, due to the weight of cars on the bridge and regardless of its properties, the cops had stopped the cars coming north, to allow the south bound queue to clear. 

As Kevin approached the bridge he swerved over to the left hand lane and drove down the wrong side. Some of the cops started giving chase on foot but Kevin put his foot on the accelerator and then started hollering and whooping. 

“Yee-haa, little bro’, yee-haa. Let’s just see how good this thing is at rebuilding.”

Kevin drove the car so close to the edge that sparks flew from the girders. Janus’ new car was badly damaged down that side. Not satisfied with this, Kevin started to run the car into the supports causing them to buckle and bend. 

It was just as Kevin was ready to inflict a fatal blow on the bridge that the road beneath them opened up and Janus, Kevin and the car plummeted to the river below.

The cars behind, seeing what had just happened, had managed to swerve around the hole. Kevin swam to shore leaving Janus to sink with his new car. The older boy was way too drunk to try any heroics and was probably lucky just to save himself. 

Janus’ father grieved for his good son and wasn’t going to let something like the Bridge of Sighs or its owners or the Los Alma scientists get away with their responsibilities and so he took them all to court.

I guess it would be more accurate to say he put the bridge on trial. Janus’ father claimed that the bridge had opened up the road to dump the car in the river in order to protect itself.

The newspapers had a field day – ‘The Bridge that kills’ 

What the father attempted to prove in court was that the bridge, or at least the material, was self-aware and that it had made a positive decision to break a hole in the road in order to rid itself of an irritant. 

Of course the court over-ruled the claim and declared the accident as death by misadventure. Whatever was fully known was never put in the public domain, the bridge manufacturers were ordered to dismantle the structure and the material SeRep was banned from use in any public construction. 

It wasn’t the end of SeRep however, the armies of NATO built tanks and weapons from the material. They’re using them at this very moment in the wars out east. 

I hear tell that the soldiers talk of the weapons that cry in the night.

Leaving Traces

Don’t think you are never seen, dear friend,

You leave a trace wherever you wander -

A smile, a laugh, a hope.

Don’t think you are never heard, my pal

There is always someone listening -

A song, a word, a joke.

Don’t think you are ever forgotten, old friend,

For when we passed each other

In that briefest of time,

You left a piece of you with me

That I'll carry wherever I go.

bobby stevenson 2017

Painting:  http://www.davidpott.co.uk/blog/2009/11/finished-painting-whitby-sunset-two-friends/

At The Cracking Of The Heart

I woke just as the clock chimed five and the smoke from the evening fires was welcoming the dusk.

As I lay there, happier than I would ever be again, I could hear the laughter of next door’s children – conversations, words, shrieks but never really sure what was being said except that all of life was out there.

The smell of dinners on tables up and down the street slipping under the window and dancing in the room.

I looked at you my love, my own, sleeping peacefully - still not aware that I would be leaving soon.

I remembered all of it for later: the way the setting sun cast shadows on the flock wallpaper, a souvenir of another time, the way your face smiled in sleep, the smell of the end of the day.

By seven, I would be faraway and heading for a war.


bobby stevenson 2015

The Electrician's Story (2012) by Bobby Stevenson

There was a time during the war when Coldharbour was neither one thing nor the other. The permanent part of town consisted of the main street, the harbour and the muddy road that led to the old castle. Yet, in the spring of 1942, a tented village grew that stretched all the way back to the McKenzie Falls and increased the size of Coldharbour by three fold. 

Most of the incomers were American soldiers waiting to go to war but there was also a scattering of British, Dutch, Polish and Free French commandos, added to this mix were several of the allied naval ships nestled in the bay; Coldharbour was considered a safe berth. 

Looking back, there are some who might say that these were Coldharbour’s most exciting days. 

If it was particularly exciting or busy at Mrs Huckerby's, then that would depend on whom you talked to. She had turned over the house to the government at the start of the War with the proviso that only a better class of gent would occupy the rooms. As Edith would tell you herself, it was seldom the case.

In Fort William, in the 1920s, Edith had been used to a very superior type of clientèle - those who took golfing tours of the Scottish Highlands - until her husband, Mr Allan Huckerby, ran away with a housemaid and all the money Edith had deposited in Fort William’s superior bank. Mrs Huckerby felt she could no longer hold up her head in social circles and so, on a dark night, she took her son Donald and the emergency money she had secreted under the bed and escaped to Coldharbour. 

Through hard work and sheer determination, Edith built up a nice little business where travellers could find good food and a clean, spacious room  but in the war years the military now allocated bunks and so space was very scarce indeed. 

Mrs Huckerby had moved Donald into the attic as a temporary measure, expecting him to move out and go to war like all the other men in Coldharbour. What neither of them knew, was that Donald had a heart defect from birth and was found to be unfit to fight. "He might drop dead at any moment" said the doctor, leading Donald to sleep on Mrs Huckerby’s bedroom floor when the house was full.

Although the army had its own boffins for electrical wiring and such like, Coldharbour didn’t have an electrician to speak of. The last one had been shot in Belgium and most of the houses were still lit by oil  and heated by the peat bricks from Ewan’s fields. 

But, one way or another, electricity had arrived in town and Mrs Huckerby insisted that her house was to be the first to have electrical light, even if it did mean Donald having to work day and night to achieve this. She had a ‘Switching-on of the lights’ ceremony (or soiree as they liked to call it in these parts) to which only Coldharbour’s good and great citizens were invited. Within a couple of months, both Mrs Huckerby’s house and the castle had been appropriated for war work which didn't stop Edith reminding everyone that the castle wasn’t fully fitted with electrical power unlike her bed and breakfast. 

Due to the friendly invasion of Coldharbour, the Duke of Inverkeith and his wife had vacated the castle in favour of a gamekeeper’s cottage, which stood high above the village and was handy for spying on poachers. The problem was that Lady McFonal, the Duchess, had become used to what little electrical power they had at the castle and insisted that Teddy, the Duke, install it without fail in the cottage before she would set foot in the blasted place. Teddy, being a man who liked a quiet life, immediately employed Donald Huckerby for the job. The Duke and Duchess moved to their flat in Edinburgh while the work was being carried out. 

Donald was only twenty-two and refused to let a little thing like dropping dead at any moment get in the way of living. He enjoyed the days spent at the gamekeeper’s cottage and it kept him away from his mother’s gaze. The only downside to the work was the cottage itself. There was a particular atmosphere about the place, that gave you the feeling you were being watched by someone or something. When Donald reluctantly told his mother his feelings, she told him to grow up and be a man and insisted the story about the gamekeeper’s ghost was just an old wives' tale.

“What gamekeeper’s ghost?” was Donald’s immediate reaction.

It seems that the old, old, old Duke – Teddy’s great grandfather - had married an Austrian girl whose beauty was renowned as far away as Oban. The downside was, that when the old, old, old Duke found her in the arms of the gamekeeper he shot them both, right there in the cottage.

“That’s the story?”

“That’s it” insisted Mrs Edith Huckerby “Isn’t that enough, Donald?”

Donald was now sorry he had asked the question because he knew where it was going to lead.

“If I had a gun, I would have shot your father and that scarlet woman before they had a chance to run away with all our money” and this discourse repeated itself all the way through their evening meal.

Donald had judged it would take him about four weeks to complete the wiring of the cottage, however with a little help from a couple of the American army guys he had finished it in just under three. The Duke and Duchess were happily informed, in their town flat, that the gamekeeper’s cottage was fully wired for electricity and ready for them to move in.  

The Duchess decided that the Christmas season would be the perfect time to invite the locals and some of the selected armed forces who would join them in a Christmas Evening soiree. This would let the Duchess show  her new lighting and, according to her, give a boost to the village morale.

The Duke of Inverkeith’s entourage consisted mainly of young boys, too young for war, and of old men. So when one of them contacted the Duke to inform him that there was no electrical wiring actually in the house and asked whether they should bring more candles, the Duke immediately assumed that the man was a fool. This was a judgement hastily made. On closer inspection, no wiring of any sort could be found in the gamekeeper’s cottage. 

Constable McKelvie was called away from his normal war duties in Fort William to investigate this most serious of cases. He, too, quickly came to the conclusion that no wiring existed or had ever existed inside the cottage. 

Donald Huckerby swore an oath on a stack of bibles that the wiring had been installed and that most certainly he was out of pocket and required immediate paying. Whatever double dealing had been involved, it was nothing to do with him. The constable could not locate the two Americans, who had kindly helped Donald, as they were already on their way overseas.

Edith Huckerby took the whole episode as a slight against her family and wondered why the police force weren’t chasing real criminals; hadn’t they seen the behaviour of Agnes Addlington, wife of Stanley and friend of a particular American soldier? Edith called in ‘The Old Wifey’s daughter’ who lived just outside Dalmally to investigate if a poltergeist or a similar spirit could be responsible for the disappearance of the electrical wiring. Although the daughter felt a presence in the cottage, she was sure it was the ghost of some long clan chief who was not that particularity interested in electricity.

Donald felt aggrieved and decided the only way forward was to re-wire the cottage in its entirety and at his own expense; that way, it would stop his mother’s constant references to their loss of status in the community and stop the locals referring to him as the ‘Wire Liar’.

So not only did Donald pay for all the new materials himself, he managed to re-wire the house in just two weeks. This time he brought the locals in to see the place and to observe the lights going on and off. This attracted a spontaneous round of applause that caused Donald to make a spontaneous speech; his mother was very proud.  

The Duke and Duchess ( Teddy and Lady F as they were known to friends in the United States) were far too busy with their social lives in Los Angeles to return home to see the wiring installation. They would return in the spring of ‘43.  

They eventually returned home in July of that year and again they had organised a large function to welcome colleagues and family from around the Coldharbour area to join them in a little Summer soiree.

And again, when the staff arrived to open up the house for cleaning and airing, the wiring had completely vanished. Not a trace of electricity was to be found for love nor money in the gamekeeper’s cottage.   

People couldn’t call Donald a liar this time as they had all been present when the lights went on and off. As the church minister had quite rightly stated  - it would have been foolish for a man, such as Donald, to remove all the wiring that he himself had paid for, so surely there had to be another explanation that did not involve poltergeists . 

No one in the village could think of any way to explain the phenomena, especially Constable McKelvie who had kept the supernatural at the top of his list of suspects. Mrs Huckerby grew ever more desperate as she was no longer invited to high tea at the Big House at Tyndrum, nor was she even asked to help with the first aid in the village hall. So desperate times meant desperate measures and she decided to bankroll Donald in one more attempt at re-wiring the gamekeeper’s cottage.

By now the Duke and Duchess had grown bored of Coldharbour and decided to wait out the war in a large rented property in Guelph, Ontario in Canada. 

Donald was to re-wire the cottage and this would be celebrated by an Electricity soiree thrown by Mrs Edith Huckerby. Everyone, who was anyone, would be invited including those in the Big House at Tyndrum but not the women who organised the first aid in the village hall. 

Donald re-wired the house in a record time of eight days and he allowed any passing party, who were nosey enough to ask, to inspect his work and watch the lights going on and off. On the night of the soiree, Mrs Huckerby led the convoy of goods that were to be prepared for that evening’s party. The first thing she did, when she entered the gamekeeper's cottage was try the light switch - the second thing she did was shout “Donald!”  

Once again, the wiring was completely stripped from the walls but this time it looked like whoever had done it, was in a hurry.Sergeant McAllister from the Inverness branch of Her Majesty’s police force was called upon to solve the mystery once and for all. He noted - and was surprised that no one else had mentioned it - that there was no sign of a break-in at the cottage. Whoever had removed the wiring had not broken into the property. So did they have a key? Was it the work of a ghost? Or was there a more obvious answer? 

The following night, Sergeant McAllister asked that Constable McKelvie and Donald meet him in the village hall at 11.30 pm exactly. They were to wear dark clothes and, in case of emergencies, bring a blunt instrument with them. 

Donald decided it was for the best not to mention anything about this to his mother and met the two policemen in the village hall at 11.30pm, prompt.  

The Sergeant asked the two to be silent until he told them otherwise.

“Do not make a sound unless I tell you to, or make a movement unless I tell you to.” 

They were ordered around the back of the gamekeeper’s cottage and, with the use of a key from Donald, they entered via the rear door. 

“There was no sign of a break in, and no sign of damage of any sort. So maybe whoever it was wasn’t trying to steal the wiring but maybe they were attempting to stop anyone moving in.” whispered Sergeant McAllister. 

“Why would you do that?” asked Donald.

“Good question – probably due to the fact they didn’t want anyone to know they were there.”

“Why would they do that?” asked Donald again.

“That is what we are about to find out.” 

As they quietly climbed the stairs they could hear talking in one of the upper rooms.

“That sounds foreign.” whispered Donald.

Sergeant McKelvie nodded it was indeed and then signalled that they should enter the room on his count of  three.

"One...two....three" and then, with a joint effort, they battered down the door with their shoulders. The two men with the binoculars were totally surprised, making it easy to overwhelm them. 

“Job well done” said a satisfied Sergeant McAllister as he led the two handcuffed men down the stairs. Donald seemed particularly pleased with himself and when he told his mother of the adventure, she was already thinking of  ways to organise a Hero soiree for a few selected friends. It wasn't to be however, as the man from the Ministry told them that if it was known that two spies had been watching the movement of troops and ships it could cause widespread panic - it was all better left unsaid.

It didn’t stop Mrs Edith Huckerby informing everyone that her son had been decisive in ending the War. Our hero Donald moved to Inverness and married a local girl, where they had two sons. 

Donald didn’t drop dead at any moment, as the doctor had warned him, instead he died in his sleep one night, after telling his grandson all about the time he caught the foreign spies. 

The Very First Short Story (Coldharbour)

Agnes could smell the winter fires as she stepped across Princes Street for the umpteenth time that day. Somewhere high above the whispering smoke the sky was an azure blue. Agnes knew that for a fact even although she might not always see it; just like she knew that things were about to change and no one had bothered to tell her.

She had been christened Agnes Lily on the first day of the War. She didn’t meet her father until she was nearly a year old as he had suffered some sort of breakdown in the early days of the fighting. To be honest, her father never really recovered and even as he was approaching his fortieth birthday his left hand would still shake and shake until Agnes was certain that it would fall off. When he thought no one was looking he would grab the wild arm with his right hand and hold on it until it surrendered and shook no more. When her father did return to the bank in the spring of 1918, he walked past his old desk and sat in the chair of the former manager, Mister Stephen Andrews, who now lay undisturbed in a field in Northern France.

In the year of 1927, The Edinburgh Linen Bank was struggling.  Not that it was the fault of Agnes’ father , this poor soul worked every hour that God allowed him, even roping in Agnes to deliver pamphlets to the good folks of the city as they strolled along admiring the castle. Agnes would stop off at Nancy’s Sweet shop for a quarter of pineapple chunks bought with the money she’d earned. It was on one of those days while walking home and enjoying the chunks that she realised she’d never seen her father smile.

The War had stolen her father’s sleep along with his happiness which meant most nights watching the daylight bleed in from the Firth.  God knows he tried, but being a complete man was just beyond his ability these days; he could no longer carry his head high nor look after the business and his family, he was just too tired. So on the day that he walked out of the Edinburgh Linen building it was to be for the last time and as he strolled through the Saltmarket, Peter, father of Agnes Lily, broke down and wept.

To Agnes, home had been a strange landscape for weeks; doors were always being closed leaving her on the wrong side. It was weeks of whisperings and of quickly swallowed conversations as she walked into a room - then the day came when her father stopped going to the bank altogether.

 “Maybe he’ll try next week, we’ll just have to see how things are sweet pea” her mother would say but next week would come and go and her father would be sitting so still as to be almost invisible. Agnes had her own worries; no father at the bank meant, no pamphlets, which meant no income earned meaning no visits to Nancy’s.

 Then one night just after Easter, her mother came to Agnes’ room to tell her that the family were moving.

“Time for a change sweet pea, indeed it is, time for a change” and by June the family had moved lock, stock and barrel to a strange little village by the name of Coldharbour, nestling in the West Highlands.

As they arrived on the charabanc, Agnes considered the village to be ‘fabulous’, everything in Agnes’ life was fabulous these days, ever since she’d heard a rather absurdly dressed woman use it when she was handed one of the bank’s pamphlets.  

Now as luck would have it, the little school that Agnes was to attend had stopped for the summer holidays and would not restart until August; a whole blooming summer to herself, blooming fabulous.

 Coldharbour had two shops, a church and a small hall which doubled as a library. Monday to Saturday were the working days and in this village everyone had at least two jobs. Sunday on the other hand was a day of rest which allowed the villagers a time to let their belts out and breathe a quiet sigh. 

Alexandra McMillan was petite and bright and lonely. Known as Alex to most of the village, at 51, she had no family to speak of, least not since her brother Ian had passed away a couple of years back. Alex ran the library every second Tuesday and every Saturday in the village hall when it was not needed by the council for something or other. She may have been small but she could fight her corner especially when the library’s needs were being overlooked by the council. It wasn’t a permanent feature, meaning that each time the library had to be set up and dismantled; an arrangement which suited Alex as she loved being busy. It wasn’t so much that the devil finds work for idle hands so much as Alex had far too many thoughts blowing through her mind and possibly too many secrets. 

On the morning that the new family arrived in Coldharbour, Alex had been searching out of the window for a sign to lift her spirits when she noticed the strange little girl with whom Alex assumed were her parents. The mother had a healthy ruddy complexion where as the father was ghostly pale with that same demeanour her brother had brought home from the Front. The woman and the strange little girl were doing all the carrying of cases as the man seemed to have enough of a problem shifting himself and every few steps would let out the most heart breaking sigh.

The family moved into the old dairyman’s house. It had sat empty for over a year, ever since Stuart Mills had moved to Canada. It would be nice to see a light in the window again - Alex could look across the hill and imagine Stuart was still there. She missed him; the way they always ended up together at the dances, the way they were always discussed in the same breath as if they were destined to spend what was left of their lives together - but it wasn’t to be. Stuart had met the young Canadian girl on one of his trips to Inverness and that was that. Never make plans, thought Alex. 

She didn’t think any more of the new family until the young girl came to the library on the following Tuesday. Alex saw that strangeness again – the little girl was blessed with a beautiful face topped off with wild blond hair, but the eyes - they belonged to another - someone whom God had put on the earth without giving them instructions on the rules of life.  

Agnes loved books and the library was her kind of place. When she went missing in Edinburgh her family always knew to look in the nearest book shop; to Agnes they weren’t just books, they were people sitting on shelves waiting to tell you about their lives, their loves, the universe and everything in it. How could you possibly not love books?  Agnes took her large selection to the old lady who stood behind the counter.

“I’m sorry dear but you’re only allowed two books at a time, otherwise there wouldn’t be enough to go around”. Agnes felt this couldn’t possibly be true but nonetheless returned four of the books. 

“My name is Miss McMillan. What is yours?”

“Agnes”

“Well Agnes, why don’t you come with your family to tea on Saturday at my house? I live in that little yellow one across from you. I have shelves of books there I’m sure you would appreciate.” Agnes carefully lifted her two books and ran off. Alex smiled.

On the next Saturday, Agnes’ mother dropped her daughter off at the librarian’s house. Agnes’ father was still too sick to visit or entertain anyone or be left alone and since they only lived across the way, her mother didn’t see what harm it would cause for Agnes to visit Miss McMillan on her own. That is how Agnes and Alex became the best of friends. 

All summer long, Agnes would either be carrying books to or from the little yellow house across the street.

To Alex, Agnes was a light in an otherwise dull life but to Agnes, Alex was a mystery. She knew little except that Alex McMillan had taught English in France prior to the War. 

Looking back over those years from the distance of her retirement home in Hastings, Agnes, the great grandmother, finds it difficult to remember when she first set eyes on Isaiah. She is almost sure it was as he stepped off the bus from Inveraray but even her, as an Edinburgh girl in 1927, had seen very few black people but now there was one standing in Coldharbour and all eyes were upon him. Some stared unashamed, others held conversations but never fully listened as their attention was spent looking over their companions’ shoulders probably feeling this was polite. One little boy ran up to him and kicked him. This was the day that Isaiah, twenty three years on this planet and as black as coal, turned up on the steps of Miss Alexandra McMillan. 

Mrs Edith Huckerby told anyone who would listen that Mac  - for that is how she referred to Alex - had taken a lover, and a black one at that, and he was inferior in years and therefore Mac would most certainly burn in hell. Agnes thought she detected a hint of jealousy in Edith’s scrupulous face as she was casting Miss McMillan into the fire and brimstone.

The following Saturday the library was closed as Alex was preparing a tea party. Many of the villagers had tried to ingratiate themselves in order to partake of a scone and a wee cup of tea but Alex was having none of it and only Agnes and Isaiah were guests.

Agnes marvelled at the light that reflected from such a black skin. Isaiah glowed, she could think of no better way to put it and the glowing made him seem constantly happy. He laughed a lot, mostly at things he has said himself. Agnes wasn’t sure if this annoyed her but she was willing to put up with it to find out the story. Was Agnes nosey or just full of a healthy curiosity? To be honest she didn’t care as this was all far too interesting to let it slip through her fingers. 

“There is something I should tell you Agnes. Isaiah is my son.”

“But he’s...”

“I met his father in France. He was such a kind and brave man who marched into my life.  I had never seen such an exotic sight, I was swept away. He was the only man I ever loved, apart from my beautiful boy Isaiah - who has indeed his father’s eyes. I saw those eyes in so many people through the years. I can never seem to forget them.”

“I discovered I was carrying Isaiah on a wild Christmas day in 1905, but the baby was taken away from me shortly after he was born and given to his father’s family. I could never bring a child, much less a black one, back to Coldharbour.”

“Why did you not stay in France?” 

“His family did not want me there and I was no longer allowed to teach.”

“Where is he now?” inquired Agnes. 

“He died in France two days before the war ended” said a sorrowful Isaiah. “He joined the Buffalo Soldiers, as they called themselves, all American and all black. I only discovered my mother was alive after my father died. When I found out that fact I arranged that we meet in Glasgow, that is, if she was willing....”

“and I was.”

 “...but no one had told me my mother was white. It was a shock but she is beautiful, is she not?”

Agnes nodded.

“Isaiah is to be married in the autumn in London and I am to be the guest of honour” said a very proud Alex. There was a warm wind blowing through her hair as Agnes headed back home with her head spinning.

Now all these years later in her retirement home, Agnes’ thoughts drift back to remembering how Alex went to Isaiah's wedding and never returned to the village; Agnes kept the village library going in hope and she remembers how her own father never really existed properly in that room again and on one lonely Tuesday he died of a broken heart.

Agnes closes her eyes knowing that war can change lives forever.


bobby stevenson 2015

That Gregory Peck Incident

She’d been living in the city long enough to remember to call an elevator - the lift, and the place where she was standing right now was a bookshop not a store.  

London was a million miles away from northern Virginia but home was where God had placed her whereas this big city was her current choice in life.

She had been born in the town of Herndon, right under the flight path to Dulles airport. That was when the place was little more than an oversized village, but now each of the towns had grown to touch the next  until there were buildings all the way to the Potomac river and into Washington itself.

Nancy had never really seen D.C. as a city, to her it was just another small town where everyone knew everyone else. She had worked in administration at William and Mary College in Williamsburg but when her mother remarried and moved out, Nancy needed more money and took a job at Georgetown University. It was a bit more travelling but boy was it worth it.  

Although Washington had always been on her doorstep, it was only when she started working there that she appreciated how beautiful the place was. Her father had been employed in the tax offices on Pennsylvania Avenue and at weekends the last thing he wanted to do was take the family back into the city. So for a long time she remained ignorant of what it had to offer.

Her father was many years older than her mother and died when Nancy was still relatively young. Eventually her mother married another government official and moved a few miles away to Great Falls, a more upmarket estate on the edge of the Potomac. Nancy very rarely visited her mother until her second husband also passed away and then she found herself visiting on a weekly basis.

Nancy and her mother grew closer during those years, walking in the Great Falls Park everyday and watching the great and the good of Washington riding their horses through the woods. When her mother began to lose her battle with ill health, Nancy sold own her flat and moved in with her. She eventually gave up her job to nurse her mother full time and over the next three and a half years she did so, until her mother quietly passed away.

Nancy found herself with no family to speak of, no partner, no job and very few friends who weren’t married - in fact nothing but a huge empty house overlooking a river. It was then that the idea came to her to sell up and travel the world. There would be enough money from the sale to keep her comfortable for a few years.

What she didn’t expect was to arrive at her first stop on the itinerary and stay there.

Eighteen months she had been in London and now she was employed at a branch of a well known American magazine. Someone she had known at Georgetown had recommended her, one quick interview and the job was hers.

The work was hard, the hours were long and initially, to Nancy, it seemed that the city was indifferent to most. Unlike D.C. she felt that no one really knew anyone in London or for that matter really cared whether they did or not.

She had rented a decent sized apartment   (or flat as she now called it) just off of Kensington High Street. Her wages as a personal assistant would have never covered the cost of her living there alone, so until she decided what her next move was, she subsidised the rent with her own savings.

The folks in the office were mostly from back home and would socialize on occasion; the 4^th of July, Christmas holidays, Hanukkah and New Years. She had hooked up with a couple of boyfriends but nothing to make her stay. If she was being honest with herself, she had been already thinking of moving on to Paris or to Prague. She had been to check out both places over several weekends and liked what she saw. Air travel within Europe was so cheap these days that almost anywhere was within easy and inexpensive reach.

Her office was in a prestigious building on Piccadilly which meant at lunchtimes she could take in art galleries, sunbathe in Trafalgar Square, see the movers and shakers in Downing Street, or just take a wander through the West End and people watch.

She’d developed an odd little hobby, one that she would most definitely keep to herself. In D.C. there were never that many interesting buildings with elevators, at least not ones which were open to the public. So when she came to London she was fascinated with riding in lifts, something she had loved since she was a kid.  Nancy felt that if something was meant to be then it would happen, so when she discovered an interesting building with a lift, she would take it and get out on the top floor.

It always led her to some adventure or another but she was wary that one day it might get her into trouble - it never did; she played ‘Elevator Lottery’ and she always won.

On this particular day she was in her favourite bookshop, at the far end of Piccadilly, looking at nothing in particular yet at the same time watching the British at leisure. She noticed something she had never seen before - a lift over in a dark corner of the shop. There was no point in resisting as she was determined to find out what on the floors above.  

She pressed the call button and when the doors opened, she stepped inside discovering it was empty. She then selected the highest number - ten - and pressed it. Sometimes it was nothing more than the administration floor full of accountants and managers and on those occasions she would make her excuses and take the stairs down. Even under these circumstances she would find forgotten floors. 

The doors opened at the top and delivered her into the most charming of tearooms, one that was open to the public but, by the looks of it, was a well kept secret. This was a place for those who knew. The tables by the window had the most marvellous views of Westminster , Pall Mall and the parks.

Some sat at tables reading their latest purchases, some wrote on computers, some talked to lovers while holding hands. Nancy couldn’t understand why in all the months she had been working in London no one had told her of this place. Perhaps if you stumbled upon the tearooms it was because you felt it was meant and there was no need to make its existence widely known to those who were not so deserving of such a prize.

Nancy took the last table for two beside the window and ordered a pot of Earl Grey tea and two scones. These arrived at her table very quickly and were delivered with a glass of water which she appreciated. She looked around the room and saw contentment on the faces of her fellow tea drinkers and made a mental note that she too would keep this place a secret.  As she bit into the crumbling scone she realised just how British she was becoming.

“May I?”

His question pulled her away from her thoughts.

Her eyes met a well dressed man in his twenties, who had a kind face and who was looking around as if to say, this is the last seat in the room.  It wasn’t of course but it was easier to join another single soul than push into a table of three or four.  

“Of course, please sit.”

He pulled the other chair from under the table and sat.

“You’re American?”

“Virginian.”

“How splendid, I’ve been there, a wonderful State.”

He passed his hand above her cup and took in the aroma, “Earl Grey?”

“Mmm”

“Waiter, same please.”

She had loved the first scone but didn’t dare lift the second until his also had arrived. People couldn’t help it and were usually unaware of it but when only one person was eating, the other one at the table normally watched as their companion ate every mouthful. It was what we humans did.

When his tea and scones arrived they both got stuck in.  Nancy told that him this was all part of her world tour, that was if she ever left London. He told her that his name was Alfred and that he worked in public relations.


"Sometimes I just walk away for a shirt while, when it all gets too much. I find this a nice place to think, to get things clear in my head." He said.

She smiled and felt as if she recognized his face, perhaps from television but was too afraid to mention it.

When they had finished their tea, he asked if she would like a walk or as he put it ‘a perambulation’ which she laughed at and he seemed to enjoy.  They walked down Lower Regent Street and across Pall Mall, down the stairs and into St James’ Park.

By this time the sun was shining and the park was awash with wild life, they sat on the grass and watched the world going by.

“I never get a chance like this.”

“What to sit in the park?” asked Nancy.

“I suppose, I am always busy and if not, someone always finds something for me to do.”  

And talking of working , Nancy suddenly realised that she had to get back to work.

“If you must” he said, sadly.

“Oh, I must, I must.” And she wished him well giving him a kiss on both cheeks. Yes she was becoming European.

“Perhaps if you are ever in the tea room again, we might meet.”

“Perhaps” said Nancy.

And with that Nancy walked back towards Piccadilly even though she was sure he was still staring .
As she was perambulating  up Lower Regent Street, she realised that she did indeed hope she would meet him again in that secret tea room.

Twice a week she went back for several weeks but he never turned up.

Then one afternoon, as she sat down for her usual Earl Grey and scones, she started reading an early evening newspaper that had been left on the table and there he was in a photo on the front page.

Prince Alfred off to Afghanistan, it continued, the Queen’s grandson is off to fight for his country.....

Now there was a story to tell one day.

She took the stairs back down to the ground floor and went to the film section where she bought a copy of Roman Holiday - that one where Gregory Peck plays an American journalist who runs into a beautiful girl who happens to be a princess.

That night she poured a glass of wine, watched the movie and felt, for the first time in a very long time, that everything was going to be okay. 


bobby stevenson 2015