Between You and Me | Page 5

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