“All right. I know. You’re doing what you can.”
And better than you did, Selevan thought. But that was before he’d caught Tammy on her knees. She’d fashioned herself what he called a prayer bench?she’d referred to it as a pree-something but Selevan was not one for fancy terms?in her bitsy sleeping area in the caravan and he’d thought at first she meant to hang her clothing from the back of it, the way gents did with their suits in posh hotels. But not long after breakfast, when he’d gone in search of her in order to drive her in to work, he’d found her kneeling in front of it with a book open on its narrow shelf, and she was reading studiously. This he’d discovered too late?the reading?because the first thing he’d assumed was that the girl was at her God damn beads again, and this despite the fact that he’d already removed two sets of them from her belongings. He’d pounced and hauled her back by her shoulders, saying, “We’ll none of this nonsense,” and then had seen that she was merely reading.
It wasn’t even a Bible. But it also wasn’t much better. She was soaking up some saint’s writing. “St. Teresa of Avila,” she revealed. “Grandie, it’s just philosophy.”
“If it’s some saint’s scribbles, it’s religious muck,” was what he told her as he snatched up the book. “Filling your head with rubbish, you are.”
“That’s not fair,” she said, and her eyes became moist.
They’d driven to Casvelyn in silence, afterwards, with Tammy turned away from him, so all he could see was the curve of her stubborn little jaw and the sheenless fall of her hair. She’d sniffed and he’d understood she was crying and he’d felt…He didn’t know how he felt because?and he cursed her parents soundly for sending her to him?he was trying to help the girl, to bring her to whatever senses she had left, to get her to see she was meant to be living her life and not spending it caught up in reading about the doings of saints and sinners.
He felt irritated with her, then. Defiance he could deal with. He could shout and be rough. But tears…He said, “They’re lezzies, you know, the lot of them, girl. You got that, don’t you?”
She said in a small voice, “Don’t be stupid,” and she cried a little harder.
He was reminded of Nan, his daughter. A ride in the car and Nan in this same position, turned away from him. “It’s just Exeter,” she’d said. “It’s just a club, Dad.” And his reply, “We’ll be having none of that nonsense while you’re under my roof. So dry your eyes or feel my palm, and it won’t be drying them for you.”
Had he really been so hard with the girl when all she’d wanted to do was go clubbing with her mates? But he had, he had. For clubbing with mates was how things started, and where they ended was in disgrace.
All of that seemed so innocent now. What had he been thinking in denying Nan a few hours of pleasure because he’d had none when he was her age?
The day passed slowly, with Selevan’s internal skies quite clouded. He was more than ready for the Salthouse Inn by the time the appointed hour rumbled round for his embrace of the sixteen men of Tain. He was also ready for some conversation, and this would be provided by his regular companion of the spirits, who was waiting for him in the smoky inglenook of the Salthouse Inn’s public bar when he arrived late in the afternoon.