Boswell's Bus Pass Part 11

Reading between his lines Boswell also found the novelty of the journey wearing thin, 'I recollect nothing of the country through which we pa.s.sed ... I remember but little of our conversation.' His depression was returning.

At least our day was dry. On the summit of one of the many hills the sun broke from the sky and landed on our path in welding arcs of sparks and bouncing light, a blinding exhilarating encounter with an extraterrestrial force. The transient warmth activated the scent from an adjacent mountain of freshly sawn logs.

Even this Damascus moment would not have saved David from being garrotted and dumped in a ditch if the bus had not been ten minutes late.

Across the aisle an elderly couple slept holding hands.

Dr Johnson declared that the inn at Inveraray, now the Argyll Hotel, was 'not only commodious but magnificent'. Boswell concurred, 'a most excellent inn' though he notes ruefully that 'even here Mr Johnson would not change his clothes.' Given his thrall to superst.i.tion and magical thinking Johnson may have struck a deal with his psyche, the terms of which guaranteed respite from some unspecified torment if he kept his clothes on. Perhaps he was just a manky old tosspot at heart.

Although the receptionist had not heard of the earlier guests she helpfully pointed us towards the ma.s.sive leather bound visitors' book that covered at least the last three years.

'The proximity to the water and the attentive servility of the staff have greatly contributed to a creative indolence conducive to intimations of conviviality not often encountered in such a primitive country.' Sam Johnson 25th October 1773.

Instead we read, 'Thank you for sending on my gold ear ring' and 'Thank you for looking after us when my sister collapsed unwell.'

Every pa.s.senger on the Campbeltown West Coast Motors bus (Bringing people together since 1923) stepped down and returned fifteen minutes later having looted every garage and corner shop in Inveraray of every last copy of the Daily Record, Daily Mail, and Daily Express not to mention all bakery products and confectionery. They had after all been travelling since 1923, deprived of all food and reading materials. As the smell of bacon and belches wafted down the aisle we negotiated the summit of the Rest and be Thankful.

It was here that we caught our next glimpse of the party travelling very slowly on the track a hundred feet or so beneath us. There were four very small horses, or shelties, as Johnson called them. Joseph led the way, a tall aristocratic figure staring straight ahead. Dr Johnson followed, a hill of a man, all in black, his feet almost touching the ground. Boswell was third in line, head bowed, perhaps nodding off, and a baggage horse at the rear. In an instant they were gone.

Dr Johnson described the same section of the journey. 'After two days stay at Inverary we proceeded Southward over Glencroe, a black and dreary region, now made easily pa.s.sable by a military road, which rises from either end of the glen by an acclivity not dangerously steep, but sufficiently laborious. In the middle, at the top of the hill, is a seat with this description, Rest, and be Thankful. Stones were placed to mark the distances, which the inhabitants have taken away, resolved, they said, "to have no new miles''.' An instinctive glance at the overhead storage racks showed no heavy stones smuggled aboard.

As we pa.s.sed down the side of Loch Long David pointed out the remains of the pier that housed the Second World War torpedo testing site. In an instant everything was transformed into black and white, calibrated cross hair wires appeared on our periscoped eyes and shouts of Achtung! filled the bus. There were no survivors clinging to the debris on the ominously calm waters of the loch, just floating copies of The Daily Record and sweet-wrappers.

As Boswell and Johnson had enjoyed the hospitality of Sir James Colquhoun at Rossdhu House we left the bus at the start of the Luss by-pa.s.s. We stepped into the decidedly up-market gift shop. No clan tea towels or ceramic Nessie poos here. For only 120 (reduced from 150) we could be the proud owner of a fully cured reindeer hide. In case we were anxious about how to clean our hide were we to purchase it all was made clear. 'Place the hide on the wall, use a vacuum cleaner but choose the lowest power, Vacuum hide from head to heel. Please avoid stepping, sitting or walking on the hide to prevent shedding.' David pointed out that such hides were still prized trophies among the Special Forces who would split them and use them as sleeping bags. Presumably shedding was not a problem for the SAS. If we were inclined to really show off we could purchase a zebra-print cow hide for the bargain price of 399.

We were soon lost in Luss which is an achievement given the size of the village more notorious as the location for Take the Highway. But Lost in Luss we were, bit players in a hastily t.i.tled, misspelled oriental p.o.r.no movie, the sequel to Big Lock Suckers and several more. The consequences of our lost state were in fact more edifying as we had strayed into a pilgrimage trail dedicated to St Kessog, the patron saint of breakfast cereals.

We learned that the sixth century monk's main claim to fame was averting war by raising various princes from the dead. He was killed abroad by some very bad druids and brought back to Scotland wrapped in a blanket of sweet-smelling herbs which promptly took root and made medieval Luss smell much better. Druids; sectarian sc.u.m. His name was evidently roared at Bannockburn to rally the troops. At this point David, a Richard Dawkins acolyte still recovering from the pope's visit, was apoplectic with agnostic fury. An unfortunate consequence of his indignation was that he refused to ask directions to Rossdhu House, now the exclusive Loch Lomond golf course, and strode off in the wrong direction.

Hours later we crawled towards the electronic gates of the golf course. We were spotted by the security guard nonchalantly reading his paper one hundred yards from the entrance who phoned ahead to warn the lodge keeper that two bedraggleds were approaching. The warning was effective as the gate flunky flailed his arms in a doomed attempt to shoo us off the path. He listened sceptically as I explained that as the result of an earlier phone call the manager had agreed to grant us temporary access.

As we waited to be driven to the clubhouse David reminded me that the term 'exclusive' means keeping people out. After all its website makes clear that 'It is a singular place to meet on the world stage ... it is a sanctuary not just for golf aficionados but for world thinkers.'

Looking at the world through the tinted gla.s.s of the 4x4 was a novel experience. For one thing the manicured greens looked more like manicured greys and it was difficult to work out the colour of the helicopter parked on the lawn or the livery of the caddies' vests. By a subtle process of spectrum a.n.a.lysis we worked out that they were probably dressed in red. There were so many of them they would easily outnumber the entire Vatican Guard, whom they resembled and whom they would in all probability thrash at arm wrestling. As we pa.s.sed, several golfers stared at the Range Rover, aching to spot celebrities even more celebrated than themselves.

'Grant Oh Great G.o.d of Golfers that today I will stand in the gents next to someone truly famous; may our splash-guards be adjacent while, staring ahead in a manly sort of way, we exchange a few words. May I be able to drop his name into subsequent conversations with my bank manager, my annoying neighbour over the barbeque and the woman from the escort agency who I know likes me for being me.'

We were warmly welcomed into the club house by a courteous, enthusiastic PA called Vicky who showed us places normally only seen by those who have spent 55,000 on their membership fee and 1,900 on their annual subscription. In one of the lounges the settees still had collapsible ends to accommodate 'ladies with bustles'. They would equally suit the morbidly obese. Our attention was drawn to a monstrous portrait of Sir Alan Colquhoun whose left foot, bizarrely, pointed at us wherever we stood in the room. We had been rumbled. Forget those Mona Lisa eyes, get a creepy foot.

What would Johnson have made of all of this? Arrested for debt in his early days and deeply ashamed of the holes in his shoes while at Oxford he would neither have applied for membership nor indeed would have been accepted; after all how would he have fared in the 'world thinker' examination?

The clincher for Johnson would have been the fact that he once met a man who had lost a leg as a result of a golf injury.

Vicky invited us to visit the Colquhoun family chapel, a cold place to spend all eternity, and the ruins of the 18th century laundry which never got to grips with the doctor's smalls as presumably he never removed them.

Despite the warmth of our welcome we were sternly warned not to take photos of golfers. The prohibition left me initially confused. Could my name really be added to some sort of register for downloading pictures of golfers?

'Hi Golfperv, I've got a lovely pic of a fat one in a checkered sweater, it'll cost you though. How about a swap for the one in the Macdonald's cap with the love handles?'

I was quietly tempted to compile a small illicit alb.u.m of world thinkers.

Daunted by the long walk back David waved down the first bus that pa.s.sed. 'Drop us off at the nearest pub' he commanded. 'There isn't one,' came the illogical reply from the driver who sped away.

Eventually a 501 arrived to take us to Cameron House Hotel, the posh stately home next on Boswell and Johnson's itinerary. The only other person on the bus was a distressed woman, clutching a stick and staring at us through over large red eyes. She felt obliged to apologise for her slightly disheveled state and blurted, 'I've got a six month old dog and it's filthy.' David gently told her there was no problem and asked about the dog. She clammed up and looked away.

We pa.s.sed an improvised roadside shrine, an ever-growing feature of our byways; triangular bunches of fading flowers still in cellophane wrappers pinned to the fences or lamp-post nearest to the violent death; football scarves and, unbearably, children's teddies. As councils are understandably reluctant to remove them they must in time join up until every inch of the road network bears witness to unimaginable human loss.

Sir James Colquhoun provided a coach for this leg of the jaunt. The joy of lowering saddle-sore bottoms onto upholstered seat after the trials of being on horseback for many weeks can only be guessed at. Boswell emerged from his depression just long enough to reveal his true feeling about the journey so far, 'Our satisfaction of finding ourselves again in a comfortable carriage was very great. We had a pleasing conviction of the commodiousness of civilisation, and heartily laughed at the ravings of those absurd visionaries who have attempted to persuade us of the superior advantages of a state of nature.'

The ubiquitous blue helicopter parked on the hotel lawn prompted the thought that it was a rich man's trompe l'oeil, a cardboard cutout calculated to set the tone of opulence. This impression was reinforced by the falconry lesson being conducted on the gra.s.s. David foolishly expressed interest but not having paid for the pleasure of watching a bird the size of a turkey perch on an asbestos glove, he was ignored.

Cameron House was the home of Lord Smollett, a relative of Boswell, and allegedly 'a man of considerable learning, with abundance of animal spirits'. How the latter attribute was apparent we have little clue. Perhaps he would swing from the chandeliers with a f.a.g in his mouth, waving a bottle of gin. The chandeliers in Cameron House Hotel were consistent with the dead animal motif. In each lounge whole forests of antlers twisted towards the ceiling providing cover to a seemingly random plague of light bulbs. Those animals whose antlers were not lopped off to enhance the illuminations have been mounted at intervals along the walls. Part of me wanted to look at the rooms on other side of those walls to see if the s.p.a.ce was dominated by deers' rear ends. Perhaps poorer but aspiring people had to be content with an array of b.u.t.tocks from which single candles protruded.

After waiting for a small but very expensive eternity drinking coffee from an ostentatious silver pot we were greeted by Grant the urbane concierge who had been consigned to answer our questions. Despite being hara.s.sed by the endless demands on his time and skill he patiently outlined the history of the house with undisguised enthusiasm. We learned that Bill Clinton had been told that he and his entourage could not be accommodated as this would have meant inconveniencing loyal guests.

At the other end of the phone in the Oval Room the president smiled wryly and resumed his under-the-table activities. Had George Bush been similarly rejected he would have launched a full amphibious a.s.sault from the loch with Tony Blair's total support. Every member of staff would have been waterboarded and Grant would have found himself kneeling in an orange jumpsuit, his feet tied to his black hood by a thin wire.

Yes, there was a ghost. A young girl had been frequently spotted wandering a corridor in the recent 32m refurbishment. On cue a pa.s.sing tradesman interjected with his corroboration; his mate had seen it.

We asked Grant about the stuffed things on walls, in particular the badger with a pipe in its mouth and a fairground bear, its jaws clamped on a limp salmon. 'Talking points, Sir, talking points' he muttered with a breathtaking display of brand loyalty and tact.

In the reception area an ugly red-faced guest with a bad taste jumper was berating an obviously innocent member of staff, 'I didn't appreciate the way you brushed past me in the car park,' he fumed. 'I do apologise,' replied the young woman demurely.

Boswell describes how Dr Johnson took advantage of his captive audience at Cameron House to deliver a spontaneous sermon on the nature of evil. It is odd though that neither account of the original journey mentions the tragedy that befell one of Lord Smollett's ancestors. It is a cautionary tale for all teachers who even think of taking kids on a school outing. In 1603 Tobias Smollett, a Baillie of Dumbarton, took a party of 17 schoolboys to witness the battle of Glen Fruin between the Macgregors and the Colquhouns of Luss. Unfortunately they encroached on the battlefield and were ma.s.sacred.

In some way Cameron House seemed more true to itself than Rossdhu. It was still a very lively building full of guests getting away from things, eating, celebrating, making love, falling out.

We watched a new bride and groom running in slow motion towards the helicopter, their faces suffused with joy, secure in the knowledge that their mutual good fortune would without question simply last forever.

We proffered our bus pa.s.ses more in hope than expectation at the water-taxi man who looked as if he had been waiting for a pa.s.senger since Loch Lomond had first filled with water. He explained that as concessionary fares were still subject to ongoing negotiation we would have to pay 3 each.

Boswell and Johnson had also taken a boat onto the loch. Johnson remembered how 'The heaviness if the rain shortened our voyage, but we landed on one island planted with yew, and stocked with deer, and on another containing perhaps not more than half an acre, remarkable for the ruins of an old castle, on which the osprey builds her annual nest.' We couldn't persuade the taxi man to land on either Inchlonaig or Inchgalbraith; he was en route to Sh.o.r.e Lomond, and that was that.

David mentioned how in his previous life he had paddled in a Canadian canoe to one of the islands where he camped for the night. In the morning as he cooked his sausages he heard something snuffling through the undergrowth. Hopeful of an amorous encounter with a mermaid or loch sprite but equally fearful lest he and Ben Gunn would be stuck with each other he was confronted by a blind black Labrador. The dog had swum to the island but couldn't get back. After sharing his sausages he bundled the beast into his canoe and took him to the nearest village where it was recognised and reunited with its disbelieving owner. According to David the dog sent him Christmas cards for many years.

At first we were the only pa.s.sengers on the 205 from Balloch to St Enochs in Glasgow. Despite or perhaps because of the small poster near the driver showing a squashed juice can improbably uttering the words, 'Please take us with you, it's rubbish being left behind', the bus was filthy.

Prominent among the detritus was a small tide of shrink-wrapped plastic packaging recently ripped from newly bought children's toys. Had the toys been bought as a bribe for restless kids with a hatred for fresh air and a desperate need to get home to the Xbox? Were they symbols of the inexpressible guilt felt by the single father who had invested so much in this infrequent access to his boy who already treated him like a stranger? The kids may have just stuffed the toys in their jackets and run out of the shop.

The bus lurched into the ground of the Vale of Leven Hospital where we seemed to have a stark choice between the mortuary and the Elderly Mental Health Clinic. I looked at David. The former hospital building on the main road had reinvented itself as a factory outlet, an odd claim given the one dimensional nature of its red stone faade.

The Levenvale estate specialized in wooden clad bungalows with front doors shaped like pentangles for residents with oddly shaped heads.

A once proud church stood roofless in Renton, burned by evangelical flames of religious fervour or torched by bigots with a petrol can. The a.n.a.logy may have been with rural crofts whose roofless state precluded having to pay council tax.

The granite-faced Victorian Inst.i.tute stood alongside the Healthy Living Centre and the Learning and Development Shop, silent witnesses to 120 years of munic.i.p.al aspiration to nurture self-esteem and hope where these had been disabled by poverty.

Without exception all pa.s.sengers over the age of thirty joining or leaving the bus lavished thanks and good wishes on the driver. The drunken punter in his fifties with a huge and dripping moustache overdid it with 'Good night, driver, G.o.d bless, much obliged' as he lurched off into the early evening. The 'Thanks pal, see you later,' said out of habitual politeness by the woman in an overlarge coat, hinted too at her need for company.

ALL ANIMALS AND CHILDREN TO STAY IN CARS. The sign had been erected after several small children and numerous family pets, including on one occasion a midget pig, had wandered into the waste-disposal crushers never to be seen again.

GET WATERED NOT SLAUGHTERED H2O! would have presented a challenge to those who had missed their standard grade general science exam.

The SHELTER DEFECT HELPLINE remained a source of linguistic irritation for those who preferred the term Shelter Challenges.

OFF LICENSE (sic) 'Ave spelt it wrang!'

The ANIMAL RESCUE AND REHOUSING CENTRE operates a points system that allegedly favours unmarried dogs with a penchant for bungalows.

FIRE REDUCTION PARTNERSHIP SAVE A LIFE Evidence strongly suggests that this particular bill board has given many a young arsonist pause for thought.

The WOMEN ONLY GYM offered respite from the growls of criticism and the endless demands while offering the real possibility of operating a TV remote control.

SCOTS GRANNY KEPT KIDS IN CAGES All good ideas develop their own currency.

And the over familiar TWENTY'S PLENTY ... FORTY'S NAUGHTY ... FIFTY'S NIFTY ...

The bus bowled through Bowling past long rows of red tenements blighted with black wall-mounted pizzas all pointing towards the Skye. A young Down's syndrome girl in a pink sweater sat on her doorstep talking into her mobile phone.

A pack of feral youths burst onto the bus pummelling each other and using language that would have graced a medieval flyting compet.i.tion. Their glazed eyes suggested that those monks at Buckfast Abbey have a sin to answer for, as do the manufacturers of Tippex and Domestos. They were wired to the moon, howling and spitting abuse without focus. David and I both adopted the brace position as they menaced their way down the aisle. The driver, schooled in survival methods, said nothing. Likewise the shaven-headed body builder with gold ear rings big enough to support a full, heavy drape.

St Margaret's Hospice faced the six floodlit football pitches in front of Clydebank college seething with energy and movement; another example of ironic architectural juxtaposition. The sign over an empty betting shop was being changed to G.o.d Is Love. 2/1 on the existence of angels, fixed odds on h.e.l.l fire. A young couple seemed to be enjoying full s.e.x in a bus shelter. No one could have cared less.

STAGE 10.

GLASGOW AND AYRSHIRE.

A Gratuitious Reference to Brentford A Discussion with a Learned Professor A Brief Visit to an Inn and an Account of its Astonishing Array of Arms The Bus Station from h.e.l.l A Tiny Castle A Dreadful Argument decided on the Toss of a Coin An Uplifting Display of Fireworks an Odd Incident with a Dead Bird.

Johnson was underwhelmed by Glasgow. 'To describe a city so much frequented as Glasgow, is unnecessary.' Not Smiles better then. He was a tired old man. He just wanted to get home to his own bed, see how Frank Barber, his black servant was doing, resume his anguished flirtation with Mrs Thrale and generally bask in the unqualified adulation which was, after all, his due. Perhaps he was just scunnered with his travelling companion who had spent the entire journey recording every fart, every mouthful of mutton chewed, and every word spoken in those hideous black notebooks. He strongly suspected that he had also written down things that had not been said. How many more evenings would he have to spend in the company of a man whose whole raisons d'etre were the pursuit of women and falling down drunk. He was fed up being ushered to an early bed so that the arrogant young Scot could indulge his vices. Oh Fleet Street, where are you?

Boswell too had little to say about Glasgow. He had started to have doubts about the doctor. He was still smarting from being called a eunuch. He of all people who had forced himself on more women than Johnson could conjure in the wildest of his twitching dreams. Hung like a horse. Despite his philandering, he was missing his Margaret and little Veronica. At least he would see his dad in a few days. He shuddered. That too could go horribly wrong though Johnson had promised to behave and steer clear of all controversial topics. To make matters worse something had shifted between himself and Joseph who had started to show a previously unsuspected surly side to his nature. It was so difficult to get good staff. What had possessed him to hire a Bohemian for goodness sake? Meanwhile they had to traipse round another university and listen to yet more boring professors.

Johnson enjoyed recalling how years previously he had demolished Adam Smith who had innocently boasted about Glasgow, 'Pray, sir, have you ever seen Brentford?' That had put his gas on a peep, a bon mot to cherish. Witty or what? Brentford, ha!

It seems that Professors Reid and Anderson had the measure of Johnson. 'Though good and ingenious men, they had that unsettled speculative mode of conversation which is offensive to a man regularly taught at an English school and university. I found that, instead of listening to the dictates of the sage, they had teased him with questions and doubtful disputations. He came in a flutter to me and desired I might come back again, for he could not bear these men.' How dare anyone ask Johnson difficult questions? The marketing department had clearly failed to brief the professors. Watch my lips, do not ask the doctor anything, keep shtum and look impressed.

David and I walked along University Gardens looking for number 4. Professor Nigel Leask had willingly agreed to meet us in his office to discuss the original journey. We climbed up to the third floor making our way past gloomy clumps of impossibly young students waiting for the previous seminar to finish. Johnson had also noticed the age of the Glasgow students, who 'for the most part, go thither boys, and depart before they are Men; they carry with them little fundamental knowledge ... men bred in the universities of Scotland cannot be expected to be often decorated with the splendours of ornamental erudition, but they obtain a mediocrity of knowledge, between learning and ignorance ...'

We chose not to interrogate the students about their levels of ornamental erudition, preferring, on balance, not to be beaten up.

Nigel Leask could not have been more welcoming of two geriatric eccentrics. The professorial office exuded a faded academic chic. The bookshelves were intentionally disordered to foster unlikely connections between tomes whose authors only realized they had much in common when they found themselves squashed together. At night they would revert to type, tumble themselves from their allotted place and line up to fight on the floor; Neo Romantics v Feminist perspectives, Structuralists v the Post Moderns. At the first sound of the cleaners' early morning footsteps they would fly through the air and snuggle down for the day ahead. The cleaners themselves had long stopped wondering why there were so many torn pages resting under the comfy seats. Toy Story Three has a lot to answer for.

Through the large bay window the autumn trees seemed especially conducive to the study of Keats.

Nigel thought it extremely unlikely that Boswell remained celibate for the duration of the hundred day tour especially given his fixed belief that masturbation led inexorably to madness. I could tell that David was pondering the connection with a degree of incredulity.

Recent professorial research into Burns' background had cast light on the connection between the wealthy mansions where the travellers had stayed in Ayrshire and the slave trade that funded them. Many of the established families had unsavoury links to the Caribbean. Johnson cannot have been oblivious to this connection yet the matter is never raised. Perhaps they had agreed to differ, Boswell being pro-slavery and Johnson a confirmed abolitionist. He spoke too of the economic background to the journey pointing out that the entire banking system had collapsed the previous year in a manner ominously reminiscent of our current predicament.

We considered the irony of Johnson's reputation as the quintessential embodiment of intellectual Englishness having been fostered by a fawning Scot and how in many respects Boswell's Journal of a Tour was a dry run for the Life of Johnson.

We said that our next port of call was The Saracen's Head in the Gallowgate which was directly opposite the site of the original inn where Boswell and Johnson stayed. Nigel Leask then told us that a rumour had persisted that Adam Smith actually went to confront Johnson in The Saracen's Head and called him a 'son of a b.i.t.c.h'. He a.s.sured us that this particular term of abuse was current in the late 18th century and was not a term invented by Hollywood. We agreed that Joseph Ritter would have been ideally placed to comment on this explosive encounter. Johnson and Adam Smith held diametrically opposed views about almost everything. Smith was a confirmed atheist, anti monarchist, neocla.s.sicist and decidedly 'Frenchified'. Nigel Leask explained how Smith was not only the original exponent of English Literature as a legitimate area of academic study, but was arguably the founder of the modern university curriculum. He explained how in many ways Adam Smith is the hidden presence in both accounts of the journey.

He then gently steered the conversation to the fact that Johnson had only consumed one nip of whisky on the entire journey. Not having challenged a Professor of English Literature for a good forty years I decided it was time to try again. While I earnestly suggested that it had perhaps been two drinks Nigel smiled broadly and offered us a Glen Grant from a bottle nestling on a shelf next to Samuel Smiles' Self Help. We accepted with Boswellian alacrity and thanked him for his kindness and insight.

On the 62 bus we were exhorted to Feel the Freedom of a Job if we were Claiming Health Related Benefits, or else we could escape the Glasgow streets altogether by taking the Nightflyer to London. We thought of starting a new life with our possessions in a spotty bag hanging from a pole, a pair of d.i.c.k Whittingtons ignoring all advice to turn again while stepping carefully along pavements paved with Emba.s.sy Gold.

The tenements in St Vincent Street were lit in a random chequer board as residents settled back into their lives, pausing at the windows to stare into the night, wondering what to make for tea, hoping he won't come home drunk again.

From the roof of the bus a line of yellow handcuffs swung into each other in a demonstration of Newton's Cradle.

I accidently caught the stare of a sh.e.l.l-suited girl who glanced up momentarily from her one fingered texting. 'Y is tht mn st'ing @ me rdng my txts? Perhaps I had misjudged her, 'In gp of xistntial angst plse help'.

A slowly revolving disc on the top of a van at the corner of Pitt Street suggested it was transmitting instructions to unseen drones. The third flat on the right does not have a valid TV licence, direct fire to reduce collateral damage. Destroy.

A Mother Teresa lookalike moved to the back of the bus to carry out missionary work with the young who protected themselves by wielding a mobile phone in her direction like a light sabre. It flooded the bus with a burst of white noise, stifling conversation as the bus negotiated the urban rapids.

The driver embraced a risk-taking strategy to offset the tedium of the day and managed his speed to ensure that every traffic light he approached was poised on the infinitesimal cusp between amber and red.

Casino land, Cash Generator, Coral, Ladbrokes, neon-lit invitations to borrow and gamble and spend and spend again; garish money brothels promising intense, transient respite from the attritional grind of being unemployed. n.o.bles Entertainment offers anything but. Punters are even denied the simple pleasure of pulling down on the puggie handles, an action as satisfying as stamping a die or pulling a pint. Just press the b.u.t.ton instead and enjoy disappointment without the foreplay while watching the spinning aces, hearts and diamonds configure themselves into the wrong combination. Next door the Fireworks Factory offered pleasures even more intense and transitory; become a flash in the pan, light up the sky with your inner brightness before extinction.

Caught in traffic the bus paused outside KFC beneath the smiling monster, the nightmare uncle with the over white beard; the sort of man parents warn their children about. Inside every table had a single occupant all facing the same way; at six o'clock all unattached people must face their own lonely Mecca. In the bleak street human heads had been replaced by black umbrellas jostling and nudging angrily. ECO bags were apparently available from Waterstones. They also had supplies of ego bags for pa.s.sersby whose sense of self had been utterly crushed.

A man in white stained overalls paid his fare. He was carrying a large spirit level, the working man's Hippocratic staff. He was for hire, moonlighting of course. If anyone was uncertain if they were on the straight and narrow he could tell them just by squinting expertly as his tame bubble. A brief conversation about some 'lanky b.a.s.t.a.r.d' broke out at the back of the bus. A large Asian woman looked at her reflection in the rain smeared window and adjusted her head scarf to better show off the sequins.

On October 29th the post chaise delivered Boswell and Johnson into the liveried and flunkied care of The Saracen's Head in Glasgow. The inn complex included stabling for one hundred horses, a blacksmiths and an a.s.sembly room. The current pub, the Sarry Heid, is situated directly opposite the original site. A fiercely loyal Celtic pub next to the Barras, it has garnered a certain reputation down the years. My friends in the know urged me to keep my mouth shut lest my Southern vowels precipitated summary execution and David had been firmly instructed to leave his army flak jacket at home.

Reputation is of course an idle imposition oft got without merit and lost without deserving. The barmaid with the manly tattoos could not have been more accommodating as she disappeared behind the bar and proudly reemerged with her sc.r.a.p book of newspaper cuttings referring to the pub. The men pa.s.sing through looked us up and down before acknowledging our presence with 'All right boys', which was not necessarily a question more a discreet warning that we would be tolerated for a while at least. On the gantry a tiny icon of the Virgin Mary nestled against a huge green framed portrait of Jimmy Johnstone.

The most dominant motif though was a caricature of the original Saracen who presumably lost his head in a moment of madness. With bushy beard and mad staring eyes he bore an uncanny resemblance to someone else. Only after the second pint of Guinness (a choice made to deflect suspicion) did things fall into place. It was Osama Bin Laden. Cave searches in the Afghanistan hinterland will never be successful so long as OBL continues to skulk in the vicinity of Parkhead. He had been initially misled by tabloid references to Paradise. There may have been no need after all to embark on a campaign of Jihad, mayhem and general carnage; virgins were obviously plentiful in this green corner of Glasgow. There was then no need for martyrdom. Just buy a season ticket, learn a few sectarian songs and infiltrate the stadium. By the time he realized that his search for virginal solace was in vain he had become fond of the banter, especially when the British Army was its focus, and found a ready outlet for his hatred in Old Firm vitriol. He must tell that smooth-tongued ranter with the claw hand that he could learn a few things by listening to the match day bile hurled from the terraces.

The Guinness seemed to be imparting something more than an inner glow as I felt the sort of a.r.s.e-warming satisfaction only previously experienced after accepting a lift in a state of the art Range Rover with heated seats. The recycled tram benches had been placed on top of the pub boilers. h.e.l.l's fires are never far from Paradise.

A faded cutting from the sc.r.a.pbook gleefully recalled how excavation on the site of the original inn had revealed heap upon heap of human bones including some complete skeletons facing East with humerus neatly folded across thorax. In more recent times ghost hunters had descended into the pub bas.e.m.e.nt and emerged decidedly unwell. Johnson and Boswell would have loved all of this.