Weaveworld Read Online Free

d’you make of it?’
    He had come within ten yards of the removal men, and one of them, the idler, was addressing the question to him.
    ‘I don’t know,’ he answered honestly.
    ‘Maybe they’re goin’ to migrate,’ said the younger of the two armchair carriers, letting drop his half of the burden and staring up at the sky.
    ‘Don’t be an idiot, Shane,’ said the other man, a West Indian. His name – Gideon – was emblazoned on the back of his overalls. Why’d they migrate in the middle of the fuckin’ summer?’
    ‘Too hot,’ was the idler’s reply. ‘That’s what it is. Too fuckin’ hot. It’s cookin’ their brains up there.’
    Gideon had now put down his half of the armchair and was leaning against the back yard wall, applying a flame to the half-spent cigarette he’d fished from his top pocket.
    ‘Wouldn’t be bad, would it?’ he mused. ‘Being a bird. Gettin’ yer end away all spring, then fuckin’ off to the South of France as soon as yer get a chill on yer bollocks.’
    ‘They don’t live long,’ said Cal.
    ‘Do they not?’ said Gideon, drawing on his cigarette. He shrugged. ‘Short and sweet,’ he said. ‘That’d suit me.’
    Shane plucked at the half-dozen blond hairs of his would-be moustache. ‘Yer know somethin’ about birds, do yer?’ he said to Cal.
    ‘Only pigeons.’
    ‘Race ‘em, do you?’
    ‘Once in a while –’
    ‘Me brother-in-law keeps whippets,’ said the third man, the idler. He looked at Cal as though this coincidence verged on the miraculous, and would now fuel hours of debate. But all Cal could think of to say was:
    ‘Dogs.’
    That’s right,’ said the other man, delighted that they were of one accord on the issue. ‘He’s got five. Only one died.’
    ‘Pity,’ said Cal.
    ‘Not really. It was fuckin’ blind in one eye and couldn’t see in the other.’
    The man guffawed at this observation, which promptly brought the exchange to a dead halt. Cal turned his attention back to the birds, and he grinned to see – there on the upper window-ledge of the house – his bird.
    ‘I see him,’ he said.
    Gideon followed his gaze. ‘What’s that then?’
    ‘My pigeon. He escaped.’ Cal pointed. ‘There. In the middle of the sill. See him?’
    All three now looked.
    ‘Worth something is he?’ said the idler.
    ‘Trust you, Bazo,’ Shane commented.
    ‘Just asking,’ Bazo replied.
    ‘He’s won prizes,’ said Cal, with some pride. He was keeping his eyes glued to 33, but the pigeon showed no sign of wanting to fly; just preened his wing feathers, and once in a while turned a beady eye up to the sky.
    ‘Stay there …’ Cal told the bird under his breath, ‘… don’t move.’ Then, to Gideon: ‘Is it all right if I go in? Try and catch him?’
    ‘Help yourself. The auld girl who had the house’s been carted off to hospital. We’re taking the furniture to pay her bills.’
    Cal ducked through into the yard, negotiating the bric-a-brac the trio had dumped there, and went into the house.
    It was a shambles inside. If the occupant had ever owned anything of substance it had long since been removed. The few pictures still hanging were worthless; the furniture was old, but not old enough to have come back into fashion; the rugs, cushions and curtains so aged they were fit only for the incinerator. The walls and ceilings were stained by many years’ accrual of smoke, its source the candles that sat on every shelf and sill, stalactites of yellowed wax depending from them.
    He made his way through the warren of pokey, dark rooms, and into the hallway. The scene was just as dispiriting here. The brown linoleum rucked up and torn, and everywhere thepervasive smell of must and dust and creeping rot. She was well out of this squalid place, Cal thought, wherever she was; better off in hospital, where at least the sheets were dry.
    He began to climb the stairs. It was a curious sensation, ascending into the murk of the upper storey, becoming