Читать книгу Between You and Me - Sir Harry Lauder - Страница 4

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The lad I've in mind I'll call Andy McTavish, which'll no be his richt name, ye'll ken. He could ha' been the best miner in the pit. He could ha' been the best liked lad in a' those parts. But he was not. Nothin' was ever good enough for Andy. I'm tellin' ye, had he found a golden sovereign along the road, whiles he went to his work, he'd have come to us at the pit moanin' and complainin' because it was not a five pound note he'd turned up with his toe!

Never was Andy satisfied. Gi'en there were thirty shillin' for him to draw at the pit head, come Saturday night, he'd growl that for the hard work he'd done he should ha' had thirty-five. Mind ye, I'm not sayin' he was wrong, only he was no worse off than the rest, and better than some, and he was always feeling that it was he who was badly used, just he, not everyone. He'd curse the gaffer if the vein of coal he had to work on wasn't to his liking; he knew nothing of the secret of happiness, which is to take what comes and always remember that for every bit of bad there's nearly always a bit o' good waitin' around the corner.

Yet, with it all, there wasn't a keener, brighter lad than Andy in all Lanarkshire. He had always a good story to crack. He was handy with his fists; he could play well at football or any other game he tried. He wasn't educated; had he been, we all used to think, he micht ha' made a name for himself. I didn't see, in those days, that we were all wrong. If Andy'd been a good miner, if he'd started by doing well, at least, as well as he could, the thing he had the chance to do, then we'd have been right to think that all he needed to be famous and successful was to have the chance.

But, as it was, Andy was always too busy greetin' over his bad luck. It was bad luck that he had to work below ground, when he loved the sunshine. It was bad luck that the wee toon was sae dull for a man of his spirit. Andy seemed to think that some one should come around and make him happy and comfortable and rich—not that the only soul alive to whom he had a right to look for such blessings was himself.

I'll no say we weren't liking Andy all richt. But, ye ken, he was that sort of man we'd always say, when we were talking of him: "Oh, aye—there's Andy. A braw laddie—but what he micht be!"

Andy thought he was better than the rest of us. There was that, for ane thing. He'd no be doing the things the rest of us were glad enough to do. It was naught to him to walk along the Quarry Road wi' a lassie, and buss her in a dark spot, maybe. And just because he'd no een for them, the wee lassies were ready to come, would he but lift his finger! Is it no always the way? There'd be a dozen decent, hard working miners who could no get a lassie to look their way, try as they micht—men who wanted nothing better than to settle doon in a wee hoose somewhere, and stay at home with the wife, and, a bit later, with the bairns.

Ye'd never be seein' Andy on a Saturday afternoon along the ropes, watchin' a football game. Or, if ye did, there'd be a sneer curling his lips. He was a braw looking lad, was Andy, but that sneer came too easily.

"Where did they learn the game" he'd say, turning up his nose. "If they'd gie me a crack I'd show them——"

And, sure enough, if anyone got up a game, Andy'd be the first to take off his coat. And he was a good player, but no sae good as he thought himself. 'Twas so wi' all the man did; he was handy enough, but there were aye others better. But he was all for having a hand in whatever was going on himself; he'd no the patience to watch others and learn, maybe, from the way they did.

Andy was a solitary man; he'd no wife nor bairn, and he lived by his lane, save for a dog and a bantam cock. Them he loved dearly and nought was too good for them. The dog, I'm thinkin', he had odd uses for; Andy was no above seekin' a hare now and then that was no his by rights. And he'd be out before dawn, sometimes, with old Dick, who could help him with his poaching. 'Twas so he lost Dick at last; a farmer caught the pair of them in a field of his, and the farmer's dog took Dick by the throat and killed him.

Andy was fair disconsolate; he was so sad the farmer, even, was sorry for him, and would no have him arrested, as he micht well have done, since he'd caught man and dog red handed, as the saying is. He buried the dog come the next evening, and was no fit to speak to for days. And then, richt on top of that, he lost his bird; it was killed in a main wi' another bantam, and Andy lost his champion bantam, and forty shillin' beside, That settled him. Wi' his two friends gone frae him, he had no more use for the pit and the countryside. He disappeared, and the next we heard was that he'd gone for a soldier. Those were the days, long, long gone, before the great war. We heard Andy's regiment was ordered to India, and then we heard no more of him.

Gi'en I had stayed a miner, I doubt I'd ever ha' laid een on Andy again, or heard of him, since he came no more to Hamilton, and I'd, most like, ha' stayed there, savin' a trip to Glasga noo and then, all the days of my life. But, as ye ken, I didna stay there. I'll be tellin', ye ken, hoo it was I came to gang on the stage and become the Harry you're all so good to when he sings to ye. But the noo I'll just say that it was years later, and I was singing in London, in four or five halls the same nicht, when I met Andy one day. I was fair glad to see him; I'm always glad to see a face from hame. And Andy was looking fine and braw. He'd good clothes on his back, and he was sleek and well fed and prosperous looking. We made our way to a hotel; and there we sat ourselves doon and chatted for three hours.

"Aye, and I'll ha' seen most of the world since I last clapped my een on you, Harry," he said. "I've heard much about you, and it's glad I am to be seein' you."

He told me his story. He'd gone for a soldier, richt enough, and been sent to India. He'd had trouble from the start; he was always fighting, and while that's a soldier's trade, he's no supposed to practice it with his fellows, ye ken, but to save his anger for the enemy. But, for once in a way, Andy's quarrelsome ways did him good. He was punished once for fighting wi' his corporal, and when his captain came to look into things he found the trouble started because the corporal called him, the captain, out of his name. So he made Andy his servant, and Andy served wi' him till he was killed in South Africa.

Andy was wounded there, and invalided home. He was discharged, and said he'd ha' no more of the army—he'd liked that job no better than any other he'd ever had. His captain, in his will, left Andy twa hunder pounds sterlin'—more siller than Andy's ever thought to finger in his life.

"So it was that siller gave you your start, Andy, man?" I said.

He laughed.

"Oh, aye!" he said. "And came near to givin' me my finish, too, Harry. I put the siller into a business down Portsmouth way—I set up for a contractor. I was doin' fine, too, but a touring company came along, and there was a lassie wi' 'em so braw and bonnie I'd like to have deed for love of her, man, Harry."

It was a sad little story, that, but what you'd expect. Andy, the lady killer, had ne'er had een for the lassies up home, who'd ha' asked nothin' better than to ha' him notice them. But this bit lass, whom he knew was no better than she should be, could ha' her will o' him from the start. He followed her aboot; he spent his siller on her. His business went to the dogs, and when she'd milked him dry she laughed and slipped awa', and he never saw her again. I'm thinkin', at that, Andy was lucky; had he had more siller she'd maybe ha' married him for it.

'Twas after that Andy shipped before the mast. He saw Australia and America, but he was never content to settle doon anywhere, though there were times when he had more siller than he'd lost at Portsmouth. Once he was robbed; twa or three times he just threw his siller away. It was always the same story; no matter how much he was earning it was never enough; he should always ha' had more.

But Andy learned his lesson at last. He fell in love once more; this time with a decent, bonnie lass who'd have no dealings wi' him until he proved to her that she could trust him. He went to work again for a contractor, and saved his siller. If he thought he should ha' more, he said nothing, only waited. It was no so long before he saved enough to buy a partnership wi' his gaffer.

"I'm happy the noo, Harry," he said. "I've found out that what I make depends on me, not on anyone else. The wife's there waiting for me when I gang hame at nicht. There's the ane bairn, and another coming, God bless him."

Weel, Andy'd learned nothing he hadn't been told a million times by his parents and his friends. But he was one of those who maun learn for themselves to mak siccar. Can ye no see how like he was to some of them that's makin' a great name for themselves the noo, goin' up and doon the land tellin' us what we should do? I'm no the one to say that it should be every man for himself; far from it. We've all to think of others beside ourselves. But when it comes to winning or losing in this battle of life we've all got to learn the same lesson that cost poor Andy so dear. We maun stand on our ain feet. Neither God nor man can help us until we've begun to help ourselves.