News travels north, fast along the tram and train lines, hitting the solid cliff of black basalt that is the Campsie Fault and rolling back, reverberating over the city.
One hour before late-edition newspapers are dry from the presses everyone in Glasgow already knows they’ll hang him in a month and they celebrate, because then their troubles will be over.
22
Friday 30 May 1958
THE DAY AFTER HE is found guilty his father and mother are allowed to visit Peter in the deputy governor’s office at Barlinnie.
Brigit Manuel sits rigid. Samuel stands behind her, clutching the back of her chair. A scurry outside the door tells them their condemned son is approaching. The door opens and Peter is brought in by three officers. Both Brigit and Samuel expect him to be angry but he isn’t. Peter is excited. His mood is up. He wants to talk about the trial.
Brigit is pleased initially, feels the relief of her husband at her shoulder. Samuel expected him to be angry as well, she realises now, though he never said so.
Peter sits down in the chair set out for him. He wants to talk about what happened, who said what and how he feels about it. He knows the Empire News has bought his mother’s story for a lot of money. He encouraged his parents to do the deal. He thinks he is talking directly to the press through his parents. He doesn’t know that Brigit has infuriated the Empire News with all of her conditions: she will not talk about the trial or the crimes or speak about any of those poor people. She will not describe the night of the confession or this meeting now. She will talk only about what sort of boy Peter was when he was growing up, how much she loved him and prays for his soul.
But Peter thinks he is holding a vicarious press conference. He grandstands about Lord Cameron’s conduct of the case. Peter wanted to give a speech at the end of the trial, after the verdict. He wanted to address the room, he’d been thinking of things to say, about his treatment in the press and Harald Leslie’s conduct, but Cameron said no.
‘Maybe he thought you’d said enough,’ says Brigit.
Peter nods towards her, not really hearing her but acknowledging that she has spoken. And then he’s off again, rambling about his lawyer and the possibility of his appeal and how the van from the court wasn’t very safe and he should have had a seat belt if they were going to drive at that sort of speed.
As he talks Brigit looks at her son’s hands. They are in front of him, hanging between his knees, palm to palm. He is chopping them for emphasis as he would have in court.
Brigit imagines enfolding her son’s hands with hers, transferring the warmth from her skin to his skin. The hands are not a big man’s hands, not raping or strangling hands, but small chubby boy hands, swallowed by her mother-hands. She imagines wilting over his hands and washing them with her tears, drying them with her hair. She should tell him that she loves him and that God loves him, that Jesus loves him and forgives him, but sitting in the governor’s chair, listening to her raping, murdering son ramble on about the injustices done to him, Brigit is too sad to speak.
Cameron should have let him talk, he says, he had things he wanted to say, to the public, to the journalists. He stops for breath. He looks at his parents, waiting for them to react. Samuel can’t think what to say.
Brigit tries to reimagine cupping his hands again but she remembers him now. She looks at his fine, square face, an echo of his father as a younger man. Peter won’t be home tonight. She asks God to forgive her for feeling so glad.
He talks about his appeal. He is hopeful.
The visit finishes. Brigit touches his sleeve and asks him to speak to Father Smith. Samuel shakes his son’s hand. They take Peter away, back to the cell.
They meet their son three more times before he dies.
The second and third visits are uneventful. Normal prison visits. Brigit saves up news from the family and the papers, impressions from her day so that she will have something to say. She waits for the right moment and asks Peter if he has been to confession? Attended the blessed sacrament? Peter has done neither. It’s a difficult subject for her to bring up but she knows that she’ll regret it for eternity if she doesn’t try. She values her redemption above her comfort.
The last time they meet is different. It becomes violent and Brigit leaves sobbing. She cries all the way home on the bus.
The last visit is two days before the execution date. They wait in the governor’s office and Peter comes shuffling in, dried white saliva crusted at the side of his mouth. Two officers lead him in, one holding each arm. They guide him to his chair. They sit him down.
Peter’s eyes are unfocused. His hands are trembling on his knees. The drool from his mouth begins to foam, small white bubbles gathering at the side of his lips. He is acting.
Brigit is instantly furious with him. She says his name. He doesn’t react. She says it again. Nothing. She reminds him that this may well be the last time they ever see each other in this life.
Peter? Peter? Peter!
Nothing. His hands tremble and he lifts them slightly as if he is showing them to her.
In her head Brigit thinks: I am your mother. I have cried for you since the day and hour of your birth. I have tried to love you. And now I am nothing but an object in your play. I am a tablecloth. I am a cup. My feelings mean nothing to you. You don’t care.
Brigit stands so suddenly that the chair topples behind her and she shouts his name. She shouts that he can’t fool her. She’s here to say goodbye.
Nothing. Not a spark of recognition, but even a madman can hear shouting.
Brigit does what she would never dare to do if they weren’t in a prison. She slaps him. His face falls to the side under her hand. His head comes back to true. Still nothing.
She grabs his hair and tugs it hard. This is something Peter cannot stand because the bald spot on his crown is a weakness to him. Messing his hair, tugging his hair, is the one thing that will always send him into a rage. Nothing. The prison officers are not stepping in either. They want her to hit him.
Peter stares forward but she can see he is angry from the hooding of his eyes.
She sits down and, weeping, speaks to him in a monotone:
‘I have never found it easy to talk to you. My knees are broken with praying for you. I fed and clothed you and you did nothing but hurt me. And still you hurt me. You asked me to choose between my God and my son. I prayed and I wept for you. I chose you. You made me choose and I chose you, always. I kept you in my heart. When I saw you go out of that door I never knew what harm you would do. And still I kept you in my heart and my home. I loved you and you never gave me a spark of love back. You did nothing but shame me and mock me. You have broken my heart you vicious, godless man.’
She waits for him to say something. She waits but he does nothing. She stands up without permission from her husband or the officers or her son. She stands and says, ‘So, goodbye.’
She doesn’t try to touch him any more.