Espedair Street

FIVE

I woke up in a panic. I didn't even know what was causing it at first, but there was an alarming, erratic whirling and chopping noise filling my bedroom in the folly's tower. I got my eyes open at last and sat up — head pounding after an afternoon, evening and night drinking with McCann — to discover a pigeon fluttering madly about the room. It careened from wall to wall like a fly in a jam jar, scattering feathers behind it and making bewildered, terrified cooing noises. It headed towards the window and thumped against the glass, losing more feathers and leaving a long stream of shit sliding down the glass. It bounced back through the air, circled briefly and then had another go, cracking its head against the glass.

The pigeon repeated this manoeuvre three times while I was still trying to focus properly and untangle myself from the bedclothes. Each time it missed the opened top section of window — which it must have flown in through — by a few centimetres. I fell out of bed and knocked over the loudspeaker that serves as a bedside table, spilling a glass of water and a silvery container full of some sluggish brown mess allover the sheepskin rug. I lay staring at the debris for a moment or two, wondering what it was, then saw the chunks of meat and the plastic fork sticking out of the glutinously spreading pile of food; I could smell it, too; curry. Must have gone for a take-away last night.

The pigeon slammed against the glass again. 'Cretin!' I shouted, and heaved a pillow at it. The pillow hit the opened top window and wedged in the gap. The bird increased its frantic efforts to smash the glass. I struggled off the floor, dragging most of the bedclothes after me, hauled the pillow out of the top window and started waving my hands about to try and guide the bird through the gap. The main part of the window wasn't designed to open, so there wasn't much else I could do.

It was like trying to catch a small feathered explosion. The bird twittered, crapped on my bed, thumped into a wall and started circling round the light fixture in the centre of the ceiling. It swooped towards me, veered away again, then made for the window once more. I looked at the mess it had left on my bed, and the mess I'd left on the rug. I thought about heaving the loudspeaker through the window so the animal could escape that way, but the window looked onto St Vincent Street and I didn't want to brain a pedestrian. I decided to leave the stupid beast to it. With any luck it would get out on its own, or break its neck. My hangover required attention.

The bird shot over my head and down the tower's spiral staircase the instant I opened the door. I stood breathing heavily, then followed it downstairs.

It was nearly one by the time I felt sufficiently rehydrated to face the outside world. The Griffin was the place to go; if McCann was there he might be able to tell me what I'd done the previous day. My memory entered a sort of grey area sometime round about the middle of the evening, after we left the Griff. We'd gone for a meal then, hadn't we? ... in fact I thought we'd gone to the Ashoka for a curry, and not a take-away either. I also had a vague recollection of stumbling about in the darkness on a curiously deserted piece of roadway, but that was about all that came back to me. The question was, where had my body picked up all these aches and pains?

I had a shower and inspected myself for signs of damage. I already knew about my grazed hands and barked knuckles, but my knees were bruised and cut too, and there was a big bruise forming on my left hip. My face showed no signs of damage beyond that inflicted by my genes. Looked like I hadn't been in a fight (not that I normally get into fights, but barked knuckles always make you wonder).

My coat was hanging over the large samovar in the choir. The rest of my clothes were missing. A cooing noise came from somewhere overhead, but the pigeon wasn't visible anywhere amongst the plaster scrollwork and dark wood beams of the roof, sixty feet overhead.

The place was cold. I have an industrial space heater which looks like a small jet engine on a large wheelbarrow and runs on paraffin; I lit it and stood twenty feet downwind, keeping warm and drying my hair at the same time, while I dug some new clothes out of an old trunk. I chose a pair of trainers that matched, just for a change.

I felt okay. Coffee, orange juice and most of a bottle of Irn Bru (not the diet version), seemed to have restored my body's fluid level. A handful of paracetamol had blasted the headache, and a couple of seasickness tablets dealt with my queasy stomach. And, no, I was not set for another day's hard drinking; I'm not that stupid, not these days.

McCann wasn't there but Wee Tommy was. Tommy is seventeen or eighteen, tall and thin, and sports a shaved blond head. He is always dressed completely in black. Style; New Austerity. My other occasional accomplice.

Just as McCann is too old to have heard of me in my Weird incarnation, so Tommy is too young. Too young to care if not to know about; to him even Punk is something from the bright and distant past, and anything before that is from some almost mythical age. He regards bands like Frozen Gold as the musical equivalents of multinational corporations; big, efficient, heartless, impersonal, profitable, and with interests and values either irrelevant to his, or opposed. Don't entirely disagree myself. Anyway, he too thinks I'm just the folly's minder, not its owner. He's shown even less interest in Weird than McCann, he just thinks St Jute's is a cool place to hang out, man. (That's almost a direct quote by the way. Don't ask me what's going on; fashions in language have always confused me, too.)

'Drink?'

'Aw, it's yerself Jim ... Aye, I'll take a wee voddy.'

I got Tommy a large vodka. I was on English shandies; half and half beer and lemonade. 'Aw, Jim,' Tommy said, 'could I have a half a heavy for TB?'

'Aye,' I said, looking round. I'd thought Tommy was alone. 'Who?'

'The dug.' Tommy pointed to his feet. Under the table there was a large black dog lying with its massive head resting on its sphinxed legs; looked like a cross between an alsatian and a wolfuound ... or maybe just a wolf. It lifted its head and growled at me; I growled back and it snorted, lowered its head onto its arm-thick forelegs, probably going back to the contemplation of which of the regulars to gnaw on first.

'In an ashtray, that all right, Jim?'

'What?'

'The heavy; could ye get Bella to put it in an ashtray?'

'Dyae waant a straight ashtray, aye?' The wee wifey behind the bar said as soon as I turned back to order the hound's bevvy.

I admired Bella's toothless smile for a moment and couldn't think of a smart reply. ' Just as it comes, Bella,' I told her.

'That thing yours?' I sat down with Tommy between me and the beast's teeth and watched it lap enthusiastically at the beerfilled ashtray. Damn hound spilled less than I normally do.

'Naw, it's ma uncle's. I'm lookin after it while he's in the hospital.'

'What bit of him did it eat?'

'Na; he's in tae get his piles done.' Tommy grinned. 'He'll only be a few days. You wouldnae bite anybody, would ye, TB?' He reached down and scratched the animal vigorously behind its neck. The dog didn't seem to notice. 'That you on the shandies, big yin?' Tommy looked at my glass.

'Aye. I'm looking for McCann to tell me what we did last night.'

'You up to no good, aye?'

'Probably.' I looked at my barked knuckles.

Drink is bad for you. It's a drug. A poison. Of course I know that; don't we all? It just so happens it's legal and available and accepted and there's a whole tradition of enjoying it and suffering the consequences, even boasting about the consequences, and that tradition is especially strong here in Scotland, and especially in the west, and especially in Glasgow and surrounding areas...

I drink too much but I enjoy it, and I've never once woken up needing a drink; water, orange juice, something fizzy like lemonade, yes... hundreds and hundreds of times, but never the hard stuff. If I ever do I just hope I can catch it there and stop it going any further. All the best alkies start out this way, I'm sure.

But of course I'm different.

Ah, dear God... many a good man ruined by drink...

The only person I ever saw ruined by drink was my father, and he wasn't a good man in the first place.

'Your YTS scheme finished, or what?' I asked Tommy. He'd been providing cheap labour for a furniture manufacturer over the past few months.

'Aye; finished early. Got ma cards.'

'How come?'

'Ah, Ah was sniffin the glue, ye know? This foreman caught me in the bog wi a plastic bag over ma heid.'

I shook my head. 'You're a mug.' I tried not to sound too much like just another adult.

'Aye, yer right; wiznae even the right glue.'

'What?'

'Water based, or sumthin. Ah'd been there sniffin for about an hour. Ah got sumthin at first like; a sort aw buzz, ye know? But nothin spectacular. Ah'd wondered how that wiz; Ah'd a big enough tin a glue. Smelled horrible too.'

'Water based...' I shook my head, and felt too much like an adult. What had I been like at his age?

'Ach, ye've got tae try these things, ye know?' Tommy told me. 'Ye never know.'

'You know/ You never know' ... no, it wasn't worth mentioning. I marvelled at Tommy's attitude. When I was his age I was paranoically careful. I used my flatmates as guinea pigs, I sought out people who'd been using drugs for years and carried out my own covert psychological examination on them, I even read medical journals to find out what the side effects of the most popular drugs were. Tommy seemed to approach things from exactly the opposite direction; when in doubt, try it out.

I'd survived, but would Tommy? I could just hear him: 'Strychnine? Aye, gie us a wee dod a that...' Holy shit. Babes and innocents.

Little ding bat had even tried smack. I'd surprised him when he told me that; I took him by the collar and pushed him up a wall and told him if he touched the stuff again I'd shop him to the polis. Didn't mean a word of it, but it seemed to impress him. 'Aye, okay then big yin, don't get in a fuss. Ah like glue better anyway, apart from the headaches.' (To which my reply was 'Oh, for God's sake...')

Oi! These kids today!

But was I just jealous? H was about the only drug I'd never tried; the one substance I was genuinely frightened of, because I knew I had an addictive personality and one taste might be too many. Crazy Davey had tried it and given it up, though not without a struggle, and not without losing Christine for a while, but I didn't think that I'd be able to stop. So, did I envy Tommy his experience? I didn't know.

And what was I supposed to say to him? Don't try all the things I've tried? Stay off grass and cultivate the weed? Holy shit; there's logic for you.

Peddle one of the least harmful drugs humanity's ever discovered, and you get twenty years. Peddle something that kills a hundred thousand a year... and you get a knighthood.

Hell no, I don't know what to say to kids like Tommy. It wasn't until I talked to him I even knew what sniffing glue did. You hallucinate, is it, basically. A cheap, nasty, short-lived acid substitute that gives you pounding headaches.

This is progress?

The dog looked up from a dry and empty ashtray, and growled. 'I think he's wantin another one,' Tommy said, digging into one black trouser pocket.

'Nothing for me,' I told him as he got up, taking the ashtray with him. The dog watched him go, then lowered its head onto its paws again. 'When's it his round?' I shouted to Tommy.

'It's his next,' he told me, quite seriously. I looked at him. 'Naw, really; ma uncle gied us a tenner tae buy the dug's drink while I'm looking after him.'

'I bet he leaves before it's his shout.' Tommy brought the ashtray back full of beer and put it down in front of the dog. It sniffed at the beer then looked up at him silently. 'Hmm,' Tommy said, scratching his head. 'Doesnae eem to want it.'

'Maybe he wanted a clean ashtray.'

'Aye... it's a fussy beast sometimes.' He knelt down and risked his right hand again, chuckling the dog under its chin. Its jaws looked like a fur-lined mantrap. 'Yer a fussy beast, aren't ye, TB?'

The door opened and McCann came in, looking a little grey.

He looked down at Tommy on his way to the bar. 'Ma Goad, Tommy, Ah've seen ye with some right dugs in here, but that yin takes the biscuit.' He winked at me. ' Aye, big yin, how's yer heid? ... Mornin, Bella; usual, please.'

'Hi, Mr McCann.' Tommy is strangely deferential to those older than me.

'My head's fine,' I told McCann. 'How's yours?'

'It'll be better by the time I get this down me,' McCann said, bringing a pint of heavy and a whisky to the table. He shifted a canine leg out of the way with his foot as he sat down opposite, and ignored the resulting snarl.

'Hair of the dog?' I suggested.

'Just maintaining an even strain, James; just maintaining an even strain.' He supped his beer. Wee Tommy sat down again. Sounds of lapping came from under the table.

McCann drained half of each drink, then looked under the table. 'That your dug, Toammy?'

'Ma uncle's,' Wee Tommy said. 'It's name's TB.'

'Disnae look ill...' McCann said, looking puzzled.

'Whit were you two up tae last night then?' Tommy asked McCann.

'Ho, you no remember, big yin?' McCann winked at me.

'Dancing in the road,' I said. ' And I know we went for a take-away.

'McCann started laughing. 'That aw?' He found this highly amusing. 'Dancing on a "road"! Ho ho ho!' He finished the whisky, shook his head. 'Ho ho ho!'

'It's Santa,' I said to Tommy.

'Ye remember leavin here?' McCann said.

'... not exactly.'

'Ye made a date with Bella.' He smiled widely to show us his yellowing teeth and much more healthy-looking falsers.

'Oh,' I said. 'Well, she'll understand.' I looked for her at the bar, but she wasn't there.

'We went to the Ashoka; remember that? But no for a takeaway. Dae ye remember sword fightin with the manager?'

'What?'

'Ye dinnae, dae ye?' McCann's grin widened to take in his farthest rear molars.

'McCann, if you're making this up...' This was serious. The Ashoka was my favourite Indian. A swordfight?

'Ah, it wiz only with kebab skewers; Ah think ye'll get back in. Ye were havin a laugh.'

'Yeah, I'll bet I was, but was he?'

'Aw, aye.'

'Thank God for that.'

'Ye remember dancin on the... "road", aye?' McCann winked at Tommy.

'Vaguely.'

'D'ye no remember whit bit a road it wiz?'

'Not exactly. Wasn't outside the police station, was it?'

'Naw.' McCann winked at the grinning Tommy again, then took a long, slow drink of heavy. I waited.

'How about do in the striptease?' he asked, stage-whispering.

'... Oh dear...' I said.

'Ye still no remember?'

'No,' I said miserably. Was that what had happened to my clothes?

'Ye know,' McCann began slowly, leaning forward over the table to me and Tommy, 'the sawn-off flyover?'

Tommy was silent for a second, then sniggered loudly into his vodka and lemonade. I gazed in horror at McCann. I could feel my eyes bulging. McCann's smile threatened to lift the top of his head off.

'Oh shit,' I said.

'Yes,' McCann said, rapping the table with one hand.

'Oh, dear God, dear holy shit.' I buried my head in my hands. I brought it out and looked up at McCann. 'How did we get away with... ? oh no... no... no...' I buried my head in my hands again. McCann laughed; Tommy laughed. I think Bella laughed. I wasn't too sure I couldn't hear the dog laugh.

The M8 motorway plunges straight through Glasgow; it loops round the northern extent of the city centre and swoops down between the centre and West End, before curving over the Clyde via the Kingston Bridge and completing the bottom half of its S shaped journey through the city by curving west for Paisley and Greenock. It destroyed a great deal, but the city survived nevertheless, and it was left with what's probably the fastest city-centre to airport car journey in Europe.

But there were planning errors, bits where they left slip-roads that don't connect with anything, exits that end in earth banks, forks in the elevated section that only go one way; the other ends in mid air. One of these little motorway follies consists of a third level of roadway, just north of the Sauchiehall Street flyover. The elevated roadway crosses the motorway beneath, but doesn't go anywhere; it's only as long as the motorway is wide, and stuck up in the air all by itself. At some point, the town planners must have thought they could use the stubby relic as a pedestrian footbridge, because there are wide steps at the North Street end. However, these are fenced off, and there are no matching steps at the Newton Street end, so that idea must have fallen through.

This useless flyover is protected from the attentions of children and idiots by sheer concrete legs, overhangs, and those black steel gates across the North Street steps. None of which, it turned out, had stopped me. I'd climbed over the gates and danced on the plant-choked road surface, God knows how far above the motorway traffic. Did a strip. According to McCann I dropped or threw about half my clothes over the edge, trying to hit passing trucks and so distribute my clothing around the country — or even the world — on the tops of containers... I just hoped I'd thrown the trainers down and not left them up there; how many people in this city wear one size eleven and one size twelve? At least I knew now why my feet had been so dirty in the shower this morning.

Then a police car had pulled up at the steps, and McCann had shouted to me to get away. I'd dreeped (suspended myself over the drop by my fingers and then let go) into the bushes at the Newton Street end, and run off, dripping and cackling, into the night.

I'm a crazy man. I admit it. I try to act responsibly, but ever now and again I totally surprise myself and just go haywire.

It's the drink that does it, I swear.

'Who's this guy Tumbler that's comin tae see ye anyhow, eh?' McCann said later, when the three of us were sitting in St Jute's;

they were sampling some Hungarian brandy and washing it down with Bud. I was still being good, on orange juice and fizzy spring water. I froze when McCann mentioned — well, more or less mentioned — Tumber's name.

I must have said something about Rick when I was drunk last night. This was something I'd always worried about; getting drunk and giving the whole game away to somebody like McCann; letting them know I was this immensely, disgustingly rich rock star. McCann wouldn't be my friend any more; I have about a million times too much capital to play with. Wee Tommy would resent the fact I'd been the driving force behind one of those glitteringly narcissistic, monolithic seventies' rock groups ... and both would resent the fact I'd lied to them. I wish I hadn't, but... well, it's too late now.

What had I said? I tried to think of something that might fit.

When in doubt, tell something close to the truth. 'He's from the record company that put out your man's songs,' I told McCann. 'Why, what was I saying about him?' I was distracted from McCann by the sight of Wee Tommy's dog loping slowly past the end of the pew carrying something in his mouth that looked like one of my trainers.

'Ye were goantae park the bulldozer on his Porsche.'

Oh, God. I bet I said 'my bulldozer', too. I gave a little laugh.

'Did I say that?' I took a nice long drink of Bud. Tommy belched. Chewing noises came from the north transept. 'Well,' I said, 'he's coming to have a look round, so... I'm just hoping he doesn't find anything... he doesn't like.'

'What,' Tommy said, 'like five hundred empty Budweiser bottles in the bulldozer?'

'Well... no, I was told I could have the drink, but... I don't know. I suppose I'm just resentin anybody coming to check up on me...' I shrugged, took another long slug. I wondered how I was doing. 'Not to worry. He's not coming until... aahm ... the twenty-first, I think he said.'

'Izzy cumin up for Christmas, like?' Tommy said.

'No, just the day, I think.'

'So he'll no bring his car then?' McCann said.

'Probably fly,' I agreed.

'Take ye a while tae get the 'dozer tae the airport,' McCann said helpfully. 'Better start noo.'

'Forget the bulldozer. No licence for it anyway, and it's lefthand drive. Maybe I'll just clean the place up a bit and make him a cup of tea.'

'Ye'll need tae hire a skip tae clear the empties.'

'Aye, right enough.' I cleared my throat and turned to look in the direction of the north transept, where the chewing noises had ceased, to be replaced by what sounded like canine vomiting. Tommy looked over too, briefly. The dog had bought its round in the Griffin, and kept pace with us for the next hour or so. Bella even let Tommy take it to the gents with him; his uncle had trained it to pee into toilet gutters. We'd all had some food, but the dog had turned its nose up at the plate of pie and beans I'd bought him. 'He's on a high fibre diet these days,' Tommy had explained.

'Beans are high fibre.'

'Aye, but there's too much sugar in the sauce, like.'

'Spoilt brat,' I'd told the dog, then divided the pie and beans up between the three of us. We'd come back to the folly when the dog's money ran out. The hound walked straight but kept stopping at lamp posts, and tried to pick a fight with a great dane on Bath Street. Tommy didn't have a lead for the beast, so it was a matter of forming a defensive wall between the snarling great dane (and its terrified lady owner) and the crouching, quietly growling TB. Suddenly I knew how footballers felt facing a direct free kick. I kept my hands over my crotch.

When we got to St Jute's I suggested the dog might want another drink too. 'Oh.' Tommy shook his head. 'Ah don't know if he's really developed a taste for these continental lagers. Ye don't have any stout at all, dae ye?'

'No.'

'Ach well, try him on the Bud then.' TB liked Bud. He was drinking it faster than McCann, who's no slowcoach himself. Of course, TB wasn't having to cope with brandy chasers as well. We'd left him in the kitchen, standing over a Tupperware bowl I'd poured three bottles into. I wondered if he'd eaten my trainer.

'So we better no come round on the twenty-first, then, naw?' McCann said. I nodded.

'Better not to. But it'll be all right. I can handle it.'

'Fair enough, pal.' McCann finished another glass of brandy, belched, then lit a fag. I refilled the brandy glasses then went for a pee. On the way back, I passed the hi-fi gear stacked at the front of the pulpit. I'd left a Tom Waites record lying on the turntable: I thought I noticed something on it. I went over to look. It was a pale splatter of pigeon shit. I looked up at the nave roof, thinking about shotguns.

When I got back, Tommy was sitting at the end of the pew, scratching TB behind the ears. The dog was swaying slightly and looking at McCann's cigarette. I wondered if it smoked. Probably didn't like tipped. 'Think we could fix the dug up wi some food?' Tommy asked. 'Ah think it's gettin hungry. Wid that be possible, maybe, aye?'

'Sure. Does it like pigeon? Can it climb?'

'What?' Tommy said, then the hound turned and loped off, heading for the kitchen in the south transept. Tommy just shrugged. 'Aw, never mind then. Cannae be that hungry.' I watched the beast go, and worried about where it would pee. This building was turning into a menagerie, and I don't even like animals.

Well, I don't mind them, but I don't miss them if they're not around. I don't have a pet, and I don't have any plants in the place either. Just not that sort of person, I guess. Inez never did understand me; she had to have plants and animals and people around her all the time. Maybe it was being brought up on a farm that did it, I don't know. She loved animals; she even ended up loving her baby armadillos, which I thought was either saintly or perverse. She got on well with people, she was a natural with animals and she could make any plant flourish. She even had plants that she took on tour with us, to make the dressing rooms feel more human (not that that made sense to me). She had a cat that came with us when we toured the UK, and on the very first date of the European tour, in Amsterdam, she found some cruffy, ragged-eared little black kitten on the way from the hotel the gig; took it all round Europe for three months and had it quarantined for six months when we came back to Britain. I'd suggested when we first started going together that I might represent a sort of subconscious compromise for her; half-human, half-animal. She'd looked puzzled and said, 'Human?'

I breathed in the slipstream smoke from McCann's cigarette and thought of Inez. Not because she smoked, but because she was an addiction. I found it hard to give her up. I still think of her. I gave up smoking at the same time, and it tempts me back every so often too. Just one more wouldn't make any difference...

'What's this guy Weird like anyway?' Tommy said.

'Eh?' I said. 'Oh... quiet. Very quiet. Tall dark silent type. Doesn't have much to say for himself. He's got a bad stutter, which I think is why he doesn't like talking. I mean, I hardly ever see him, but... anyway, he pays all right though... umm.'

'Izzy weird like, though?'

'Well ... yeah, a bit.' I pretended to think. 'Like, he only hires people taller than him. He's six-five; sensitive about his height. Only takes people on who make him look small. You should see his chauffeur; he's bigger than me; six-eight. Even his girlfriend's over six foot. You, ah... never seen any photies of him?'

I'm always nervous when the conversation gets round to Weird. All Tommy would have to do is go into a record store and pick up that first album and he'd see a photograph of the band on the back, with me staring over the top of the others, big-eyed and grinning. I don't know if I'm recognisable or not; I don't think so, but how can I be sure? Nobody's run up to me in the street wanting my autograph, not for half a decade, but what does that prove?

Thank God for changing hairstyles. I look totally different now (apart from the height, the physique, the wild staring eyes...); I used to have a fuzzy bush of long hair, which I wore in something close to an afro style when we were offstage, and had slicked back with old-fashioned hair oil and tied in a blood knot at the back when we were on stage. I had a big bushy beard too; first of all because I still had spots for the first two years of our fame, then because I liked hiding behind it.

And I always wore mirror shades. They became a trade mark. I was hiding behind those too, but they also looked good on stage and they put photographers off; the flash tended to reflect back into the cameras. I spent a lot of time annoying photographers by not removing the shades, and pissing off interviewers by hamming up my stutter and not having a lot to say anyway. Probably just as well; on one of the few occasions I did give a straight interview, it caused us terrible problems.

On the whole, I communicated best when I didn't say anything. Thanks to Dave and Chris, I got away with this anti-social behaviour. Either one was photogenic enough for an entire band; together they were stunning. They took the heat off me. I'd just have gotten embarrassed, having my big baw-face plastered all over album covers and posters and music papers.

Anyway, I have short hair and I'm clean-shaven now. According to the record company's publicity department, Weird now lives in seclusion on a Caribbean island. Because ARC never say which island, it's a perfect cover story; at least one journalist wasted two months trying to find me, to get an 'up-date on the reclusive life of the mysterious figure behind seventies mega rock band Frozen Gold, the man they called "The Eminence Grease"' (that was the hair oil. Thank you, NME). ARC and I started another two back-up rumours; the first is that I'm not living on a Caribbean island at all, I'm dead; and the second is that that too is just a ruse, and I'm living in a ruined monastery in Ladakh.

'He's a tax exile, anyway; doesn't come back much,' I told Tommy.

'Ha!' McCann said. 'Ah dinnae ken why he bothers; this fuckin country's practically a tax haven these days.' He drained his Bud bottle disgustedly. He was right, of course; I knew quite a few tax exiles who'd come back to Britain since the Tories dropped the higher tax rates. I didn't say anything.

There was a ragged thumping noise from the stairwell which led to the tower; TB the dog appeared, half-falling, half-running down the steps. He staggered as he hit the tiled floor of the nave, then wobbled upright, and padded off towards the choir , snuffling.

'Parasitic bastard,' McCann said. I thought this was being a little hard on the dog, but then he added, 'Bloody pop stars.'

'Aw well,' Tommy said. 'Ah suppose he was only tryin tae make a bit a cash like.'

'"A bit a cash",' McCann said, scornfully. 'How much is this bastard worth, dae ye know, Jim?'

I shrugged, frowning. I could hear some funny noises coming from the choir. Heavy breathing, it sounded like. What was that animal up to? 'No idea,' I said. 'Millions, probably.'

'There ye are,' McCann said. 'Millions. Probably invested in South Africa and British Telecom and British and American Tobacco and the so-called " Aerospace" and "Defence" industries. Ha!'

Well, Scottish forests and Swedish Government Bonds, actually. Could be a lot worse.

But what do you do? Real soon now I'm going to give it all away to the Labour Party and progressive charities... or the ANC or something... I don't know. Just as soon as I've decided who's right, just as soon as I think I can give up what I do have... I'm as generous as I can be without becoming conspicuous. Specific things for leftish causes, and not a few Glaswegian tramps have been stunned to ask for the price of a cup of tea and be given the price of a bottle of malt whisky. All salves for my own conscience, of course, but it's not always easy to be generous, damn it. There was a time, with me and Balfour and a Rolls Royce...

'Ye cannae just condemn the man like that,' Tommy said, very reasonably I thought. He seemed to catch the odd noises from the choir too, and looked round. 'What's he supposed tae dae with aw that money?'

'Why make it in the first place?' McCann said indignantly, apparently perfectly serious. 'His own class no good enough for him, eh? If he had any talent at all — an get tin millions a teena-gers tae buy yur records is no guarantee whatsoever that the buggir did have any talent, let me tell ye — if he did have any talent, then he should have devoted it to the advancement of his own people.' McCann pointed at Tommy with the neck of his Bud bottle.

'Whit, Paisley people?' Tommy said. Shit, I thought. I didn't know he even knew that much about Weird. How much more?

'Naw naw naw, son,' McCann said exasperatedly, screwing his face up. 'The workers. The working people of the world, the toilers.

'Aw.' Tommy nodded, standing on the pew and looking down to the choir, where the panting noises had become louder.

McCann's face was stern, severe, decided. The workers; the toilers. Oh, God yes, I wanted to write something that would make a difference to something other than my bank balance and the state of the charts. I tried; there was some socially relevant stuff in there; I even had a couple of Vietnam war songs ready, but the thing ended before we could get them out. I wanted to write anthems for the working class, marching tunes for disaffected youth and oppressed minorities, but... I never got round to it.

'Ah... Jim...' Tommy said. 'I think TB's get tin a bit overaffectionate with your coat.'

I got to my feet. 'What?'

Tommy set off for the choir. 'Naw! TB! Stop that! Bad dug! Get away from that!' He disappeared behind some packing cases.

McCann and I followed him. TB was in the choir, near the still blowing space heater, bent across a chest I'd thrown my old naval greatcoat over. He was trying to mate with it. His rump, supported by two wobbling, tile-skidding legs, was still pumping away enthusiastically at the dark blue mass of the coat when Tommy came up behind him and kicked his backside.

TB dismounted instantly and didn't even stop to growl; he ran off past the pulpit and towards the pile of crates, knocking over a free-standing lamp cluster as he did so; it crashed across my Charles Rennie Mackintosh chair and whacked one of the security monitors, which fell to the tiles and imploded.

'TB!' Tommy yelled, then ran after the beast as it disappeared between unopened cases of Bulgarian sewing machines and boxes of Russian ear-muffs.

McCann and I doubled back and started running, keeping to the east aisle. McCann was laughing as he ran. 'TB!' Tommy shouted again, hidden by crates of Czech televisions. 'Heel, boy. Sit! Sit!'

'Some dug that, eh Jimmy?' McCann panted as we neared the main doors.

'I'll kill it.' We rounded the corner by the dump truck and skidded to a 'top at the same time as Tommy, coming from the opposite irection. 'You see him?' he asked. We shook our heads. Tommy scratched his. 'Shit. I lost him. Sorry about this, Jim. He's not usually like this. I thought he could hold his drink.'

'Never mind,' I said.

'Tell ye what,' McCann said. 'Open one a they big doors and we'll go back tae the pulpit, form a line, and flush him oot. He'll head fur the door when he sees it's open.'

Tommy was indignant. 'He might run away! He might run into the street an get run over!'

I said nothing. McCann snapped his fingers. 'We'll put a big empty packin case just the far side aw the opening, so he'll run into that.'

Maybe I'd had more shandies than I thought, but this sounded like a good idea. We opened one of the St Vincent Street doors by a couple of feet, put an empty tea chest on the top step outside, then ran back to the pulpit. I thought I could hear the sound of running water somewhere inside the piled crates; about level with the boxes of Polish jam. We formed a line with Tommy in the middle and started down the floor of the building, McCann and I taking an aisle each and Tommy clambering over the mountains of cases and boxes. I found the remains of a trainer as we passed the kitchen in the west transept.

'Got him!' Tommy shouted, from somewhere in the middle of the pile. There was the sound of wheezing, scrabbling claws, and glass breaking. Then Tommy said, 'Aw ...'

'Did ye get him?' McCann shouted from the other aisle.

'Naw, but Ah must have givin him a hell of a fright. Jeez ... this is honkin. Whit a pong. Sumhin wrong wi that dug's guts...

McCann's quiet laughter echoed from the far aisle. Tommy said, , Ah really am sorry about all this, big yin. I'll clean all this up after we've caught him, okay?'

'There he is!' McCann shouted. There was a noise of claws skidding on tiles from the far end of the folly, near the doors, and McCann's running feet. I started running too.

I got past the bulldozer in time to see TB's rump and hind legs fly over the packing case we'd positioned outside. McCann tried to follow the dog, but hit the case and sprawled, cursing. Tommy ran up behind me and we pushed the door open to get out.

TB stood at the bottom of the steps, on St Vincent Street, breathing heavily and looking rather unsteady on his feet. He was staring at us. I helped McCann to his feet; he was rubbing his skinned palms with a grubby hanky. Tommy started down the steps, slowly, holding one hand out to the panting beast. 'Good boy, TB; here boy...'

TB stood looking at him, saliva dripping from his mouth, tongue lolling, flanks pulsing, then leaned forward, opened his mouth and threw up onto the pavement and keeled over, flopping sideways onto the sidewalk in front of a young couple walking past. He lay there, flat on the ground, legs straight and eyes closed.

Tommy straightened, stuck his hands in his pockets. 'Aw, shit.'

'Is he all right?' McCann asked, putting his hanky back in the breast pocket of his jacket.

'Aye,' Tommy said, going down to the recumbent hound. 'He's just drunk.' He shook his head. The beast was still breathing. 'Ah suppose Ah'd better get him back to ma maw's. She'll no be very happy.'

'I'm going for my coat now " I told Tommy. 'If I find anything in the pockets...' I pointed at the dog, which had started to snore. I left the phrase hanging and went back into the folly for my greatcoat.

'Is that curry Ah can smell?' McCann said as I kicked the tea chest back through the doors.

Apart from a few hairs, the dog had left nothing on or in the coat. I turned the power off to the smashed TV monitor and closed the door leading to the tower. There was a smell of dogshit in the nave.

Tommy's mother expected him and the dog home for their tea. She lived about quarter of a mile away, on Houldsworth Street. McCann was nursing his grazed hands, and limping. Tommy took TB's front legs, I took the rear. The dog was as limp as a sack of potatoes, but heavier. We tramped through the darkening street, getting the occasional funny remark, but nobody stopped us. McCann sniggered every now and again.

'Must have been the curry,' Tommy said. 'He was obviously hungry or he wouldnae have eaten the wee fork as well.' The dog grunted as though in agreement, then resumed its snoring.

'Aye,' McCann said. 'Some dug that. Can ye rent it oot? Gie it tae people ye dinnae like?'

'Never thought of that, Mr McCann,' Tommy admitted. My shoulders were getting sore. I took a better grip of the animal's legs and looked down distastefully at it; the dog was quietly pissing itself.

The urine was soaking into its belly hair and running down its flanks and round to its back, to drip off there, onto my latest new pair of trainers.

'What does "TB" stand for anyway?' I asked Wee Tommy.

He looked at me as though I was an idiot, and in an almost resentful tone said, 'Total Bastard.'

'Oh, yes,' I said. 'Of course. Obvious really.'

'Ye mean there's nuthin wrong wi its lungs after aw?' McCann said, disgustedly.

'Not compared to its bladder,' I muttered, trying to keep my feet clear of the dribbling canine pee.

'Naw, it's perfectly healthy,' Wee Tommy said. 'It's just...' he shrugged, shaking the totally relaxed and snoring hound '... it's an animal.'

'Fair enough.' McCann said.

We tramped across the motorway by the St Vincent Street flyover; the rain came on.

We all got wet.