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By Root 523 0

the Bertie project, and he had left it to her to make the decisions about the little boy. But beneath this acceptance there was a vague unease on his part that he was not much of a father to Bertie, and Bertie’s distance from him had fuelled this unease. And when that dreadful incident had occurred and Bertie had set fire to his copy of the Guardian he had done nothing; a real father would have remonstrated with his son and punished him – for his own good. He had done nothing, and it had been left to Irene to arrange a psychotherapeutic response.

For his part, Bertie was fond enough of his father, but he wished that he would be somewhat less passive. It seemed to him that his father led a very dull life, with his daily journey to the Scottish Executive and all those statistics. Bertie was good at mathematics, and had absorbed the basic principles of calculus, but did not think that it would be very satisfying to do mathematics all day, as his father did. And what did the Scottish Executive need all those statistics for in the first place? Bertie wondered. Surely there was a limit to the number of statistics one needed.

When Bertie was told that he was going to Glasgow with his father, and on a train to boot, he let out a yelp of delight.

“That means we’ll go to Waverley Station?” he asked. He had seen pictures of Waverley Station but he had never been there, as far as he could remember.

“Yes,” said Stuart. “And we’ll get on the Glasgow train and 166 A Trip to Glasgow in the Offing

go all the way to Queen Street Station. You’ll like Queen Street Station, Bertie.”

Bertie was sure that he would, and gave vent to his pleasure with a further yelp.

“Now remember to wear your duffel coat over your dungarees,” his mother said. “And wash your hands before you eat anything. Glasgow is not a very salubrious place, and I don’t want you catching anything there.”

Bertie listened but said nothing. He would not wash his hands in Glasgow, as his mother would not be there to make him. Being in Glasgow, in fact, would be like being eighteen, the age which Bertie yearned for above anything else. After you were eighteen you never had to listen to your mother again, and that, thought Bertie, would be nirvana indeed.

“Glasgow’s not all that bad,” said Stuart mildly. “They’ve got the Burrell and then there’s . . .”

Irene cut him off. “And the mortality statistics?” she snapped.

“The smoking? The drinking? The heart disease?”

Bertie looked at his father. He would defend Glasgow, he hoped, in the face of this attack.

“They have their problems,” Stuart conceded. “But not everybody’s like that.”

“Close enough,” said Irene. “But let’s not think too much of Glasgow. It’s time for some Italian, Bertie, especially if tomorrow is going to be so disrupted by your little trip.”

Bertie complied, and busied himself with a page of his Italian grammar. His heart was not in it, though, and he could think only of what lay ahead of him. The Glasgow train! He would get a window seat, he hoped, and watch the countryside flashing past. He would see the signals and hear the squeal of the brakes as they neared a station. And then there would be Glasgow itself, which he thought sounded very exciting, with all its noise and germs. They would find their car and he would help his father to get it started. And perhaps on the way back, he might be able to do some fishing with his father, if they went anywhere near the Pentlands. There was always a chance of that.

A Trip to Glasgow in the Offing

167

Bertie reflected on his lot. He felt much happier with his life now. He had settled in to Steiner’s, and he found that he liked it. He had made a tentative friendship with Tofu, and now he was being taken to Glasgow by his father. If this good fortune continued, then he would be able to put up with all the other things that made his life so trying: his psychotherapy with Dr Fairbairn, and, of course, his mother. He had only another twelve years of his mother, he thought, which might be just bearable. Unless, of course, they went over to Glasgow, his father and