might have been inspired by the isolation of Archie’s last home.
George broke the silence, jerking Murray back into the moment and the empty corridor that smelled of books and learning.
‘So have all the big boys been covered then?’
It was a question he’d been asked before, most notably by Fergus Baine, Murray’s head of department when he’d submitted his request for a sabbatical. He’d pulled out the stops then, explaining his perspective on the poet’s neglected place in the canon, how his story crossed boundaries not simply of literary style but of a country divided by geography, industry and class. He’d dampened his love of Lunan’s poetry from his voice and presented an argument based on scholarship and fact. Murray had been as passionate as a commission-only salesman about his product, believing every word of his own spiel, but the hours spent in the small room with Archie’s slim legacy had left him dispirited. As if the salesman had opened his sample case in the privacy of a hotel room and been confronted with the flaws in his merchandise. He felt a sudden stab of anger. Who was this guy, anyway? Stalwart of the stacks, a glorified janitor with his old man’s cardigan and wilted features.
‘I don’t get you.’
‘Archie Lunan. I’d have thought you’d have better folk than him to spend your time on.’
‘I still don’t get you.’
George turned his face towards Murray, his expression unreadable.
‘He wasn’t much of anything, was he? Not much of a poet and not much of a man, as far as I could tell.’
‘And you’d be the one to judge?’
‘I’m not a professor of English literature.’
Murray doubted his promotion had been an accident and didn’t bother to correct it. He remembered his joke of the night before.
‘But you know pishy poetry when you see it?’
‘I know a big poser when I see one.’
The words could have been directed towards Murray, Lunan or both. The corridor stretched ahead of them. He didn’t need the guidance of this misery. He knew where he wanted to go, could put on some speed, step quickly ahead and leave the old bastard to ferment in his ignorance. Instead he kept his voice cold and asked, ‘So did you see a lot of Lunan?’
‘You could see Archie Lunan propping up the wall of an Edinburgh pub any night of the week in the seventies.’
‘And you were out in the street with your nose pressed to the Christian side of the window when you saw him, I suppose?’
George Meikle’s laugh was harsh.
‘No, I wasn’t. But it’s not me we’re talking about, is it?
Murray felt weary with the weight of defending Lunan, a man who he suspected was probably as big an arsehole as George was implying. But it wasn’t the man he needed to defend. He said, ‘Archie Lunan may not have been Scotland’s favourite son, but he produced one of the most remarkable and most neglected collections of poetry ever to come out of this country.’
They had reached the foyer now. George turned to face him.
‘And you’re going to right that?’
‘I’m going to try.’
The older man’s voice was sweet with sarcasm.
‘A big thick book about a wee, skinny poet and his one, even skinnier volume?’
‘If I can.’
George shook his head.
‘And the greater part of it about how he went.’
‘It’ll be a part of it, but not the main part. I’m writing for the Edinburgh University Press, not the News of the World.’
‘Aye, that’s what Mr Moffat said.’ George hesitated, as if making his mind up about something. ‘You asked where I was when I spied Lunan in the pub. Half the time I was sitting opposite him, the other half I was sitting on the bench beside him.’
‘You were friends?’
‘Drinking pals, for a while.’ Meikle took a deep breath. ‘Why do you think Tuffet was bringing me along to meet you? You could find your own way to the request desk fine. He thought I might be able to fill in some gaps.’
‘And can you?’
‘I doubt it. All we ever did was hang about pubs talking pishy poetry. The kind of thing you no doubt get paid good money for.’
Murray grinned against the unfairness of George Meikle’s first-hand contact with Lunan.
‘I’d like to hear your memories of Archie, they could be a big help. Maybe you’d let me buy you a drink?’
‘I don’t drink.’
He wondered if anyone had conducted a study into the link between being teetotal and being a depressing bastard. But then the old man gave his first genuine smile.
‘You can stand me a coffee in the Elephant House when I knock off.’
Murray bought a ham and tomato sandwich from the newsagents opposite the library and ate it standing in the street. The bread was soggy, the tomato slick against the silvered meat. He forced half down then consigned the remainder and its plastic box to a bin. He’d turned his mobile off when he’d entered the library that morning, now he switched it on and checked for messages. There were two. He pressed the menu button and brought up Calls Missed. Jack had rung once, Lyn twice. He killed the phone and went back into the library. He had a lot of work to do before he met George Meikle.
The Elephant House was jam-packed, but Meikle had managed to bag the same seat that an insecure Mafia don would have chosen, near the back corner of the second, larger room commanding a good view of the café and ready access to the fire escape. Murray eased his way through the tables to greet Meikle and check on his order, then retraced an apologetic route back, past the glass cabinets stuffed with elephant ornaments to the front counter and the long queue to get served. When his turn came he asked for an Americano, a café latte and two elephant-shaped shortbreads, then negotiated his way back to the corner table, holding the tray carefully, praying he wouldn’t upset it, and if he did that it wouldn’t be over an occupant of one of the three-wheeled buggies that were making his journey so perilous.
Meikle folded the Evening News he’d been reading into a baton and slid it into the pocket of the anorak hanging on the back of his chair. Murray lowered the tray onto the table then unloaded the cups, slopping a little of the black coffee onto its saucer.
‘Sorry that was so long, there’s a big queue.’
Meikle gave the shortbread a stern look. ‘If one of those is for me, you’ve wasted your money.’
‘Watching your figure?’
‘Diabetes. Diagnosed three years ago.’
A vision of his father flashed into Murray’s head. He
