“Dickens?”

 Dickens stopped to stare into the now stationary vehicle, then, realizing who it was, rolled his eyes and carried on. Judith felt sorry for the guy because of the condescending, if not downright nasty manner in which the Oran Mor crew had treated him. He’d obviously taken great offence to their mocking and, she reckoned his rudeness now was due to him associating her with them. So, feeling guilty, she gave it another go and cruised alongside him once more.

 “Dickens, can I give you a lift somewhere?”

 Dickens stopped dead in his tracks, turned, tugged on his roll-up then sighed heavily, filling Judith’s face with Old Holborn tobacco smoke.

 “I’m on my way to Herman’s – to do his garden,” he said glumly, like a sulking schoolboy.

 The mere mention of this name seemed to paralyse Judith with fear.

 “Err…I can err…I can drop you there,” she replied, hesitantly.

 Dickens climbed into the car, which now had a hooting traffic jam behind it. Following his directions, Judith drove across the River Clyde to a leafy part of Pollokshields, where sandstone villas and Baronial mansions stood set back from the road. On learning that Herman had already left for a hospital appointment, she accepted her passenger’s invitation to a cup of tea and followed him into a seven bed-roomed, blonde-stone gothic pile, complete with conical roofed corner turret. While he made drinks in a kitchen the size of most people’s apartments, she perused the sepia photos on the oak panelled hallway walls, where she was a little perturbed to find all twelve were of Bob Fitzgerald singing.

 Dickens led the way out through some French doors to a wrought iron table and chairs on the terrace, carrying bone china crockery on a silver tray. While he poured the tea, Judith wiped the creases from her white cotton summer dress then sat down to admire the olive and emerald green stripes of the long, sweeping lawn.

 “I suppose you want to know how I came to be at the Great Eastern?” Dickens asked, perceptively.

 Judith shrugged her shoulders, embarrassed by his insight.

 It transpired that Dickens had been abandoned as a baby and spent his formative years in care. Since then, if he wasn’t backpacking or sleeping in a tent, he’d resorted to the hostels. He’d spent the previous summer dossing in the Scottish Highlands and, on his way back to England, had wandered into Glasgow and a little bar called The Mitre. The place was packed with arty types from all over Scotland, who met there every six months to discuss their ‘movement’. Dickens had merely been an anonymous onlooker, but people kept enquiring about what he did and where they’d seen him. He’d never been noticed before without deliberately courting attention, so for people as important as writers and painters to see value where he felt there was none, was flattering. It was the night he’d first seen Bob Fitzgerald, stood alone in the corner, perusing his fellow artists with disdain. On spotting Dickens, though, he’d made a beeline for the drifter, who, desperate not to jeopardise this newfound attention, had introduced himself as a writer. Indeed, from that moment on, Dickens had been masquerading as a man of literature, hence the nickname which he only now recognised as Oran Mor sarcasm. Writing, he’d thought, was the easiest way to fit in. Anybody could pick up a pen, whereas painting and music took years to learn and he couldn’t afford the equipment for photography.

 Dickens had deluded himself that these artists could be like the family he’d never known, with Bob as a father figure. But, he told Judith, he should have learned long ago that such things never could be, having made the same mistake time and again throughout his thirty years — working on a fairground, running with football hooligans and even living with new-age travellers.

 Dickens explained how he’d never had time for his carers. He’d constantly run away from homes in search of unconditional love, or at least people to want him for who he was, not simply because he was the vehicle to a pay packet. Paradoxically, though, he was constantly pretending to be somebody he wasn’t in order to attract that love. For example, he reckoned he’d never enjoyed violence, but was always the first one into fights at football matches, often at the expense of a broken nose or rib, in order to impress the older, ‘top boys’. He reminisced about their post combat hugs of approval.

 “And it’s exactly the same now, pretending I’m a writer so they’ll like me.” Dickens pulled the rimless glasses from his big, beaklike nose and skimmed them into a nearby pear tree. “There’s absolutely nothing wrong with my eyesight — I just thought it gave me a bit of a WB Yeats look.”

 Judith was grateful for this light relief, laughing away some of the embarrassment that confidantes often have to endure.

 “As you’ve probably noticed, they’ve all sussed me out,” Dickens continued. “Some bastard must have told them where I live. You should have seen the way they used to treat me when they thought I was the next Alasdair Grey, compared to how they mock me now. I’m a laughing stock.”

 “No!” Judith grabbed Dickens’s hand across the table to reassure him, even though she knew he was right.

 “As soon as possible, I’m leaving Glasgow for good.”

 “But why throw it all away just when their getting to know you for who you really are…the thing you claim to want above all else?”

 “Yes, I want people to like me for who I am, but these people only like you for what you’ve got. No, the more they get to know me the less I’m respected.”

 She couldn’t argue. Their lack of respect for Dickens was written in neon lights for everyone to see.

 “How come you’re doing Herman’s gardening then?” Judith asked, trying to change the subject.

 “So I can raise the funds to get out of here. If I do all the flower borders he’ll give me a hundred quid.”

 She scanned the expansive lawn. It was a big job.

 “Do the two of you talk much?”

 “Talk? Herman?” Dickens pulled a bewildered expression. “Herman talks to nobody.”

 “Not even to Bob?”

 “Not even to him.”

 “Then how come he hangs around with him? I mean, how did they meet?”

 Dickens shrugged his shoulders, “I’m damned if I know. Herman used to turn up very occasionally at Oran Mor to see Bob, who always looked embarrassed by the guy and got him out of there pronto. Ingrid and the other girls were petrified of him, coz he used to just sit in silence, staring at everyone. Then, all of a sudden, he and Bob became inseparable. Wherever Bob goes Herman’s there, even though it pisses the others off…To be honest I think he’s a bit of an imbecile. He’s only got this place coz it was inherited from his parents.”

 Just then, somebody appeared behind Judith. She turned to find the redheaded girl from the party standing on the terrace, looking extremely nervous.

 “Oh…I’m really sorry to disturb you…I’m err, I’m looking for Herman?” She spoke with a trembling, honeyed Surrey accent.

 “He’s not here at the moment,” Judith replied. “Is there anything I can do?” She asked this because the girl looked so perturbed, haunted even. “Would you like some tea?”

 As the girl put the palm of one hand against her stressed brow and shook her head, a tear ran down her left cheek. Judith shot up immediately to put an arm around her slight, quivering frame. As she did so, Dickens gave them some privacy, taking off up the garden on a motorized lawnmower, sucking on another roll up.

 Once Judith had got the young girl sat down at the table and given her a big hug, drying her tears for her with a hanky, she began opening up.

 “At the party I couldn’t quite grasp where I’d seen Herman before. It wasn’t until Sunday afternoon that it suddenly hit me.” The girl stopped talking, seemingly reluctant to carry on.