My father brought...

Andrew McCallum

Beside the track by the derelict station, where the railway leaves the cutting and shoots its arrow diagonally across the flat expanse of the Red Moss, the platelayers had built a brick bothy in which to shelter at piece-time. One of those platelayers was my grandfather; and sometimes on his 'spiv-days', when the weather was fair, my father would hoist me onto his shoulders and carry me through Station Wood to have my piece and some craic with the men.

"And whit have ye got in yer piece the day?" the Black Doc would ask, after Id pushed my way through a turnstile of knees and squeezed into a crevice between the men who crammed the plank benches. The only light came from a doorless aperture let into the gable of the bothys lee side, and the men were dark from their labour and the sun. I remember them mainly as redolences of stale sweat, damp clothing and tobacco. ... (continues)