Boswell's Bus Pass Part 5

As good as his word he confided that this was in fact the fifth bus he had driven so far it was only 9.30 in the morning, all of the others had developed mechanical defects of some sort. When pressed he listed their various faults including one errant bus on which the doors refused to open. This explained the ashen demeanour of the surviving pa.s.sengers. At some point in the early morning they would have pressed their sad clown faces and hands against the windows desperate to escape as the bus careered away from their homes, friends and family into an uncertain future in an alien land.

Questions had to be asked of the driver. Was he suffering from some bus-related Munchhausen syndrome by proxy that led to him secretly disabling the very vehicles on which his livelihood depended?

Keeping an eye on him throughout the trip we could only glance towards the domain of Lord Findlater between the road and the coast. Johnson had also declined the opportunity to survey the lavishly landscaped gardens declaring that 'he was not come to Scotland to see fine places, of which there were enough in England, but wild objects mountains, waterfalls, peculiar manners: in short, things which he had not seen before'.

John, a comfortingly large travelling companion, has always revelled in showing off his local knowledge. What he doesn't know he makes up. On the Cullen road we pa.s.sed the outbuildings of the Ladybridge Hospital, formally the Banff Lunatic Asylum. John pointed out the former site of the railway station whose sole function had been to transport inmates.

A subsequent internet search confirmed he was right, and led to images of the inst.i.tution compiled by Decayed Scotland. Adherents of this dubious organisation specialise in entering abandoned buildings and photographing, in this instance, a solitary wheelchair and a strange, haunting statue of four children apparently staring into a Reich-inspired future. Integration into the community would not have been the preferred option for the mentally unwell whose numbers would have included not only those designated idiots, morons, imbeciles and cretins but also women suffering from PMT, young unmarried mothers, inarticulate persistent poachers, unwanted relatives and annoying eccentrics.

All his days Samuel Johnson feared he might go mad. Boswell claimed that his mentor 'Felt himself overwhelmed with a horrible melancholia, with perpetual irritation, fretfulness, and impatience; and with a dejection, gloom, and despair, which made existence misery'.

Adam Smith described how Johnson would 'bolt up in the midst of a mixed company; and, without any previous notice, fall upon his knees behind a chair, repeat the Lord's Prayer and then resume his seat at table. He has played this freak over and over, perhaps five or six times in the course of an evening. It is not hypocrisy but madness.'

Hester Thrale described Johnson as 'her friend who feared an apple should intoxicate him'.

I also feared for my sanity on observing in a field on the outskirts of Cullen a full-sized Flowerpot Man from my childhood. Was it Bill or ...?

Boswell too had profound bouts of depression or hypochondria from which he sought relief not only in travel but also promiscuity, drink, visiting the sites of executions and military fantasies. His Highland jaunt provided ample opportunity for all of these remedies.

While in Cullen Boswell took the opportunity to introduce Johnson to William Robertson who had recently travelled to France to meet Memmie le Blanc, the central figure in his translation An Account of a Savage Girl caught Wild in the Woods of Champagne.

Chambers Edinburgh Journal also ran with the story.

'One evening the people of the village of Songi were alarmed by the entrance into the street of a girl, seemingly nine or ten years old, covered with rags and skins, and having a face and hands as black as those of a negro. She also had a gourd leaf on her head, and was armed with a short baton. So strange was her aspect, that those who observed her took to their heels, ran in-doors, exclaiming, "The Devil! The Devil!'' Bolts were drawn in on all quarters, and one man thought to ensure safety by letting loose a large bull-dog. The little savage flinched not as the animal advanced in a fury, grasping her club with both hands, she discharged a blow at the head of the dog with such force and celerity as to kill it on the spot. Elated with her victory, she jumped several times on the carca.s.s; after which she tried in vain to enter a house, and then ran back to the wood where she mounted a tree and fell asleep.'

The article becomes increasingly hysterical describing how she could fly from tree to tree, swim like a duck, eat raw frogs, not to mention the rumour that on one notable occasion she killed and ate her sister.

I asked John if he had encountered any wild girls during his long career in teaching. In his head he wearily surveyed a line of errant adolescents stretching across several decades and into infinity. Surly, pouting, eyes raised heavenwards, petulant, bored, chewing, disrespectful, downright rude, permanently angry, dismissive, yawning, yearning, defiant, condescending, loud, sulky, rebellious, unruly, disengaged, disinterested. Yes, all of the above but he had not yet encountered any dog killers or caught anyone eschewing school meals in favour of cannibalism. But he did have several months to go before retirement.

And then we caught sight of the Cullen Wild Girl; she was an old girl admittedly but undeniably wild. She was careering down the High Street in a fabulously unstable invalid car, a supercharged capsule, a blue motorised scarab hurtling under the viaduct that held back the sea. Soon, after a slow-motion arc she would land on water, capsize and float serenely towards Norway.

Several of the aforementioned adolescents were on the bus to Elgin and none too pleased to see their rector. One lad visibly sunk into the back seat, his baseball cap pulled down to his chin. Parents too were represented and chose to treat John with total deference despite their surprise on seeing a pillar of their community dressed like a midden.

The bus driver on the route through Morays.h.i.+re's fis.h.i.+ng villages was a frustrated aircraft mechanic from RAF Lossiemouth. Only by moonlighting could he practice the skills that will one day enable him to claim his rightful place both in the sunset and in the c.o.c.kpit of a Red Arrow. While whistling The Dam Busters theme tune through the bus intercom he thrust his vehicle up roller-coaster braes, guided it into rapid descents and as a memorable climax to the display negotiated at speed a full hair-pin bend. As his pa.s.sengers buried their faces in the brown paper bags, thoughtfully positioned, he eased back on the throttle to glide through Portknockie, Findochty, Portessie and Buckpool.

The official sign welcoming visitors into the proud conurb of Portknockie declared with a hint of triumphalism and parochial pride KNOCKERS AYE AFLOAT. The image conjured distant memories of childhood swimming lessons at the local pool.

As we pa.s.sed through Buckpool John pointed out the beach which was the centre of claim and counterclaim in The Northern Scot. A gypsy traveller had allegedly relieved himself in full public view thereby scandalising most of the inhabitants who enjoyed having their prejudices confirmed.

The destination board on the bus should have read THE FIFTIES. The only goods for sale in the shops were innocence and nostalgia.

John reminded me that in the 1770s there would have been nothing but cl.u.s.ters of dreich hovels above the s.h.i.+ngle up which the boats were dragged. Abject poverty and brutal short lives were the order of Johnson's day. He brought to mind John Bellany's stark paintings of fishermen who stare dislocated and consumed with dread at an unseen horizon.

As we crawled through Buckie a sullen youth pushed an empty shopping trolley down the street. In a burst of drunken benevolence he had presumably offered his mate not only accommodation for the night but also a lift home. His mother had been less than pleased to find her new lodger snoring in a trolley parked in the hallway.

His mates were sitting in a perfect line in the window of a cafe leering and making faces at every pa.s.sing woman under the age of fifty. Two very young girls pus.h.i.+ng prams crossed the road to avoid the sneering gauntlet.

The bus accelerated through the sound barrier on the approach to Fochabers. I a.s.sumed initially that the woman was merely rubbing her eyes, I then realised she had already surrendered one eyeball to the g-force and was keen to preserve its neighbour.

Boswell noted, 'Fochabers is a poorlike village, many of the houses ruinous. But it is remarkable they have in general orchards well stored with apple-trees.' Dr Johnson for his part made no mention of the orchards; he just shuddered lest some wizened person rushed out and offered him a poisoned fruit.

The fifty yards or so separating the Gordon Estate from the High Street was fenced off on account of the construction of the mighty Fochabers bypa.s.s. There were no eco-warriors in evidence, no neo-Swampies living in ditches. I did though listen to a woman at the bus stop who was clearly distressed that the construction work and the subsequent new road meant that she could no longer easily visit the lake where her grandparent's ashes were scattered. To her the gulf was insurmountable; it was as if her acceptance of their death had been delayed so long as she could walk round the lake and talk to them. The by-pa.s.s had finally severed her thin link with her past.

More mundanely, the Folk Museum was closed for at least an eternity while the library proudly announced that free dog bags could in fact be uplifted from every library in the county. Forget pus.h.i.+ng back the knowledge frontiers with banks of computer terminals; this was the sort of innovative diversification guaranteed to ensure the survival of the library as an inst.i.tution well into the twenty second century. The helpful picture of a dog on the leaflet failed to make clear if they were dispensing body bags for dead dogs or receptacles for the droppings of those still living.

The Elgin bus was full and we were told to step off the running board. I glanced at the roof to see if there were any emaciated local people each with a precious goat squashed against the hand rails in a pastiche tribute to the Indian sub-continent but no. There was though the strong likelihood that the driver recognised John as the teacher from his past who had made his life a total misery by suggesting that extortion, bullying, and arson were sadly not on the new Curriculum for Excellence.

By the time the next bus arrived the grieving grand-daughter had erected her own small cairn of f.a.g ends.

Johnson would have been incredulous had he seen the extent of Forestry Commission activity. Clumps of mechanically wrenched roots and the mangled limbs of the fallen followed the road. The sense of devastation was magnified by the unexplained presence of single trees that had survived the cull. Paul Nash the war artist had set up his easel in a clearing and could be heard muttering 'Wait until the Ministry sees this.' In the forests that were still waiting to be cut down to size the bellicose theme found its reprise in the white samurai headbands tied round the waists of selected trees for an unfathomable reason.

ELGIN TWINNED WITH ... I missed the list of fortunate but obscure European towns. Hades? Berchtesgaden?

'About noon (we) came to Elgin, where in the inn, that we supposed the best, a dinner was set before us, which we could not eat. This was the first time, and except one, the last, that I found any reason to complain of a Scottish table; and such disappointments, I suppose, must be expected in every country, where there is no great frequency of travellers.'

Johnson was unimpressed with The Red Lion at 44 High Street. Unsurprisingly the premises are now residential. How could any self respecting inn keeper survive the vicious scrutiny of the fat restaurant critic from The Rambler?

Birkbeck Hill claimed to have solved the mystery of the foul meal served to the travellers. The landlord, Bailie Leslie, mistook Johnson for another large pompous guest, Thomas Paufer, a commercial traveller, who had taken to abusing the 'Buy a meal and drink all you can' offer and would only order the tiniest snack that would enable him to become paralytic. Forewarned, the inn staff conspired to serve Johnson with the most revolting meal they could conjure by way of deterrent. Like disgruntled bar staff down the ages they probably spat, or worse, in his beef collops and mutton chops.

The licensed premises nearest to 44 High Street was the ubiquitous Wetherspoons where I left John in charge of a pint while watching Hearts v Hibs on Sky.

Johnson and Boswell spent most of their time in Elgin inspecting the ruins of the cathedral in the rain. Presumably they didn't have to wait until the custodian returned from lunch. As Boswell seemed delighted to have discovered the monument to a nun I asked if it could still be seen. Blank incomprehension is the most positive interpretation I can put on the reaction. A subsequent question about references to the visit in any of the guide books elicited the comment that tourists only wanted to look at pictures. I tried hard to convince myself that this reaction was evidence of the unrelenting anti-Johnson feeling provoked by the publication of his Journey in 1775.

One of the reasons why the nun's stone was no longer there was attributable to the enlightened church authorities who in 1825 indulged a local labourer who made it his life's work to clean up the cathedral and cart away all ancient pieces of masonry. John Shanks emptied 2866 barrow loads of rubbish into the Order Pot, an offshoot of the River Lossie, once considered bottomless and hence the ideal place in which to dunk the local witches.

Despite the scale of the destruction Johnson was less moved than he had been by the ruins at St. Andrews for the simple reason that, on this occasion, John Knox was not to blame. The culprit was a simple Highland hooligan and serial pillager, the Wolf of Badenoch who fell out with the local bishop in the 1380s for taking sides with his estranged wife. It is not too difficult to see why the church failed to support the son of King Robert II whose main recreational activity was siring upwards of forty illegitimate children. The Wolf threw his toys out of one of his many prams and went on an arson, rapine and plundering spree that made the raid on Dresden seem like a mild rebuke. In the best Catholic tradition the threat of excommunication was sufficient to induce a sincere contrition and serene repentance in the Wolf who was finally honoured by burial in Dunkeld Cathedral.

Determined to demonstrate that every cloud has a lead lining the local authorities then proceeded to strip the roof and s.h.i.+p the cladding to Holland. Johnson noted gleefully that the boats with their leaden cargo both floundered in the North Sea and all hands were lost.

A sign next to the cathedral announced the proximity of the Biblical Garden. Ever eager to shake the tree of knowledge and sample the odd forbidden fruit I was disappointed to discover that I would have to wait until at least the discovery of the Ark or the second coming, depending on which happened first, before the gardens opened for the season. I did though climb the wall hoping to catch a glimpse of the Gethsemane theme ride under its tarpaulins.

Johnson considered Elgin 'A place of little trade and thinly inhabited.' The writer of the First Statistical Account of Scotland noted the same trend some twenty years later and attributed the cause to the locals choosing to marry 'when they are advanced in years, and then a puny helpless race of children is produced. Hence, how many men of every description remain single, and how many women of every rank are never married, who in the beginning of this century, and even so late as 1745, would have been the parents of a numerous and healthy progeny?'

A further cause was to be found in the fact 'that everything cold is in disuse. Clothing is warmer. Warm liquors, as punch, tea, etc are the fas.h.i.+on, even among the lower cla.s.ses. On the whole we have come more effeminate ... The women lead sedentary lives in spinning, from which arise obstructions etc that often terminate fatally.'

A glance at the punters in Wetherspoons did suggest that even now few were burdened with the responsibilities of either child rearing or spouse pleasing. Having said that, there was not much of the effeminate about the exiled Hearts supporters applauding their victory; punch was not on sale and few of the women were spinning.

That evening at his steading John and I spoke long into the night about families, work, retirement, the past, dead friends, football, and whisky. This last topic a.s.sumed a less than theoretical aspect as John had ama.s.sed an astonis.h.i.+ng collection of malts from long defunct distilleries. I thanked him for his drink, his company and general nonsense only regretting that he was unable to accompany me on my next leg.

Nairn Forres Cawdor Fort George Inverness

With time to spare at the bus station I wandered into the a.s.sociated shopping complex. The store called Whispers paraded lines of huge lurid fantasy bras and florid plastic suitcases emblazoned with Just married, and by implication subtle promises of perfect s.e.x, 2.4 children, a mortgage and happiness without end. The years flew past in the twinkling of an eye. Next door was Shopmobility, its wheelchairs lined up for a Brands Hatch start, mobility scooters straining at the leash, paraplegic ramps ramping and a s.e.xy line in Cla.s.sic Canes. With your arthritic wrist clamped over the carved skull of a small bird or an ivory fleur-de-lys you can stride off into your personal sunset with great confidence and a song in your heart.

Outside the shops the Press and Journal advertising board told an expectant world that Moray Council move on Travellers. Was the queue in which I stood about to be machine-gunned into compliance by some jobsworth in a high-visibility jacket?

We boarded the 305 Bluebird bus to Nairn without incident. The twelve year old driver was hiding his age behind dark gla.s.ses which made it easier for him to turn a blind eye to the woman peering out from behind a large bush which she manoeuvred into the seat next to her. Birnam Wood must be close. At this point in their journey Johnson had also started to make numerous references to Macbeth.

Hedge woman was followed by a man holding a single golf club. Presumably if he suspected the presence of a sniper behind the foliage across the aisle he would lay into her with his number 4 iron. Behind golf man came a youth hiding a ma.s.sively elongated head in a smurf hat and wearing headphones as big as family-sized pizzas.

As we pa.s.sed through Forres I caught sight of a plaster gnome on a swing in a front room window. Why had it been promoted from the garden? What small act of heroism had warranted this elevation? Was there a waiting list determined by seniority? Was it a punishment? 'I'll teach you to moon at the neighbours, you little b.a.s.t.a.r.d. You can just hang there for a few days.'

I misread a shop sign a.s.suming it promised Trophy Witches and not trophies and watches. On balance I preferred the thought of handsome warlocks flaunting black-toothed Victoria Beckham doppelgangers on their arms. A witch hunt was under way.

A banner in a field urged me to Put British Pork on my Fork. There was something inexplicably gross about the image although I couldn't explain why. For some reason I saw Blacks.h.i.+rts parading through Bethnal Green.

A roadside sign pointed to Activities. These activities must have been undefined for good cause. Presumably they were of an unsavoury nature.

Boswell also engaged in an unsavoury activity at this point in the journey. He stopped the chaise and in ghoulish tourist mode stood beneath the gibbet from which hung the semi-decomposed body of Kenneth Leal who must have regretted robbing the Elgin mail.

We pa.s.sed a bus shelter designed as an alpine shrine.

One of the pa.s.sengers again bore an uncanny resemblance to my mother. Why was she following me? It was definitely her sitting there, disapproving as she fiddled with her brown gloves and wearing her distinctive beige coat.

All of the pa.s.sengers on the bus were travelling alone and were all huddled against the windows. There were no couples. This was strange. I had stumbled on a guarded local secret this was the dating bus. They were in fact communicating in a variety of subliminal ways, putting out subtle signs of availability and preference. The hands crossed in the lap, left over right meant something. The scarf casually brus.h.i.+ng both lapels was obviously a great come-on to the initiated. Not to mention the tapping foot. Before the bus arrived in Inverness phone numbers would have been swapped, pension books compared and long years of celibate widowhood were about to end in the nearest Premier Travel Inn to the A 96. At least I hoped so.

Boswell said of Nairn 'It is a very poor place to be a county town and royal burgh.'The commentator in the First Statistical Account subsequently made the somewhat strange observation that the 'natives were of average height.' What had he expected, tribes of Oompa Loompas cavorting in the ditches, pygmies living in bins? A cursory glance down at the denizens of the High Street suggested they were still of average height. There could of course be giants in the adjacent schemes who spent their days leaning languidly on telegraph wires between games of basketball played with the inflated bladders of small people. I would be watchful.

Johnson declared 'At Nairn we may fix the verge of the Highlands; for here I first saw peat fires, and first heard the Erse language.' Written Erse was apparent in the sign above the local library LEABHARLANN INBHIR NARANN. But not a word of Erse could be detected floating on the linguistic breeze. Just a loud Yorks.h.i.+re voice and a woman whose RP vowels were so garrotted that they tumbled like dead things into her green wellies.

At Nairn Johnson and Boswell received an invitation to visit Kenneth Macaulay, the author of a History of St. Kilda at his manse in Cawdor. They had a quick word with the long suffering driver of the post chaise and journeyed along the banks of the River Nairn. We know nothing about this loyal soul who conveyed his odd pa.s.sengers from Newcastle to Inverness. Had he been able to write he could have made a small fortune with his Confessions of a Cabbie. t.i.t bits from the Mouths of the Great Overheard on a Journey. With Pretentious Speculations and Idle Erudition from Dictionary Johnson and his small friend. Did Boswell slip him the occasional sovereign to secure the l.u.s.tful services of the barefooted tavern maids? Did either of them ever speak to their anonymous driver?

At least they had a driver and a means of conveyance. Realising that there was no bus service from Nairn to Cawdor I hired a bike. I was warned against following the river path for the whole journey as it disappears after two miles into jungle so dense that the previous week three j.a.panese soldiers had emerged blinking into the daylight. They aggressively enquired if the war was over and steadfastly refused to surrender their weapons to the Highland Council peace and reconciliation team.

Not having cycled for years any initial exhilaration was soon replaced by disbelief at the sheer effort involved. I heard myself muttering 'p.i.s.s off!' at the numerous exhortations to slow down, drive carefully and beware of rumble strips. I couldn't even spot any interesting road kill to distract me from the ordeal of turning ancient legs, only an ominous harvest of wing mirrors, a small price paid by boy racers for the joy of smacking cyclists into ditches and over hedges.

I tried to concentrate on the tableaux of feudal gentility that unfolded very, very slowly; large country seats set back from the road and tended by serfs, their forelocks worn away by endless tugging as the 4x4s swept up the drive. I slowly pa.s.sed a field of startled, haughty llamas as incongruous as chickens on the moon.

My legs told me that I was cycling in slow motion through a cloying mix of tar and treacle. I looked up at a sky totally devoid of vapour trails as all flights had been cancelled on account of the eruption of ash into the skies from an Icelandic volcano. In a self pitying cameo I saw an archaeologist from a future time carefully chipping away at my petrified body foetalled round what was thought to be a twenty first century mountain bike.

I was startled out of my reverie by the vacuum thump of a bus pa.s.sing at speed. Where did that come from? There are no buses on this route. The super-charged post chaise was allegedly the 1A, a fantasy bus whose existence is a secret closely guarded by a few local masons and obviously en route to Brigadoon.

A vandalised road sign announced the apparent proximity to a C*UNT** FAYRE. Who drives out to the middle of nowhere, their glove compartment stuffed with an a.s.sortment of black permanent markers to indulge an adolescent and deeply unfunny sense of humour? Get a life. The sign did though provoke a moment of totally inappropriate speculation for an elderly person suffering from acute saddle-ache. How would the wares be displayed?

Distraction came in the form of another sign, this one untampered with and erected by the Scottish Tourist Board, Cawdor Tavern. Sweating like several pigs Lance Armstrong rested his bike against the stone wall, played idly with his maillot jaune and wondered where the rest of the race had got to.

At Cawdor Johnson and Boswell met a Mr Grant, minister at Daviot and Dunlichity, and Valentine White, a factor on the estate, both of whom are buried in the churchyard. The original manse has long gone but the graveyard is still there.

The cliched dappled serenity of country churchyards masks the impact of individual deaths. The green idyll is a fraud. Despite the pa.s.sage of time each crumbling stone with its unique indecipherable patina of letters and dates testifies to grief without expression, disbelief, abject despair and G.o.d d.a.m.ning. The dead included the weaver's daughter who died young, extinguished; the young man who died of his wounds in France in 1917; the airman who failed to return in 1943. Nothing changes. The letter held at arm's length. Better not to open it; thrust it into the burning grate. Although antic.i.p.ated in nightmares this is not happening to us. This is not me screaming in denial; that is not my husband holding me in a pieta of silent supportive agony.

Predictably there was no sign of either Grant or the delightfully christened Valentine. Surely John Shanks had not wheeled his barrow this far. As I pa.s.sed among the stones old bodies leaned upwards towards my footsteps in case they were being looked for, before sinking back in small flurries of dust and exhalations of relief.

It was Grant who subsequently told the unlikely tale of Johnson impersonating a kangaroo. 'Johnson was in high spirits. In the course of conversation he mentioned that Mr Banks (afterwards Sir Joseph) had, in his travels to New South Wales, discovered an extraordinary animal called the kangaroo. The appearance, conformation, and habits of this quadruped were of the most singular kind; and in order to render his description more vivid and graphic, Johnson rose from his chair and volunteered an imitation of the animal. The company stared; and Mr Grant said nothing could be more ludicrous than the appearance of a tall, heavy, grave-looking man, like Dr Johnson, standing up to mimic the shape and motions of a kangaroo. He stood erect, put out his hands like feelers, and gathering up the tales of his huge brown coat so as to resemble the pouch of the animal, made two or three vigorous bound across the room!'

Johnson was not in kangaroo-impersonating mood when he visited Cawdor Castle. He seemed underwhelmed judging by his less than insightful description, 'the drawbridge is still to be seen, but the moat is now dry. The tower is very ancient.'

It was of course closed like every other interesting place in Scotland. I had phoned in advance hoping to play the eccentric traveller card to secure a private tour. Fat chance. Although it was probably the biggest key hole I had ever put my eye to, it was still a keyhole with decidedly restricted view. It is though a long time since I had savoured the pleasure of trespa.s.s. By following the river, skirting round a salmon leap and climbing a wall I could at least wander round the grounds. At any moment I expected that policeman from the early sixties to turn up on his large black bicycle, take all our names and tell us never again to play football in what he claimed was a private field. Even then I knew he was lying; it was never a private field.

I noticed few additional highlights on the ride back apart from a gross overblown footballer's mansion guarded by giant stone mastiffs, unusual heraldic beasts and a meadow full of witches. I heard them before I saw them. Hundreds of crones were practising synchronised mooning in a low lying meadow, cackling in low harmonies like Russian Orthodox priests.

The descent into Nairn was enlivened by a momentary loss of control when cycling downhill through a park and frightening a large youth by clipping his sh.e.l.l-suit at speed. Speechless, he could only finger his abuse at my disappearing figure.

The nearest I came to a real witch was a little old woman with very long white hair tottering down the High Street leaning on a sawn-off broomstick. No spells left. All incantations defunct but still clutching a message bag containing desiccated toads and a jar of newt eyes. Just in case.

From Nairn Johnson and Boswell travelled along the coast to Fort George one of several ma.s.sive garrisons built to intimidate anyone still harbouring Jacobite sympathies.

The Nairn bus station, neither quite a parking lot nor designated waste land, faces a thirties Regal picture house that has morphed into a Somerfield. The same usherettes, now grown very old, parade different aisles. At the back by the dishwas.h.i.+ng powders the same young lads in long shorts and large boots still pick inexpertly at bra straps and are slapped for their pains.

In the s.p.a.ce adjacent to the one bus shelter seven council workers in high visibility vests discussed how best to open the boot of a car. There were so many of them they could have easily lifted it bodily and run with it to the nearest garage.

At least the watching was easy. The sun was s.h.i.+ning, G.o.d may or may not have been in his heaven but his surrogates were there. The gulls occupied the heights while the song birds provided the descant.

The late middle aged driver shook as he dispensed tickets. His hands could barely operate the machine. He kept glancing nervously back into the body of the bus. Sweating. He was fleeing the scene of a dreadful accident; he was being pursued by Gaelic gangsters who had left a bleeding sheep's head in his bed as a final warning. His life was under threat from money lenders, usurers, unscrupulous landlords owed rent. The explanation was more prosaic but equally disabling; he was in the grip of an anxiety attack, possibly without cause and with no end in sight.

Worry was his constant attention-seeking companion. He drove too fast as if trying to shake off the demons clinging by their fingertips to the outside of his vehicle and on one occasion called back a pa.s.senger whose ticket he had previously inspected for no apparent reason apart from the false belief that he needed to check it one more time if he was to stave off some terrible consequence for himself and his family. His sighs were audible the length of the bus which he just controlled despite his tentative Parkinson's grip on the wheel.

Had I not been worried about the man's health this would have been the best short journey so far with views of the Moray Firth and the snow blotched mountains beyond. The foreground though was dominated by a pig farm that ran the length of the route, a Soweto for pigs. There were hundreds of identical small corrugated shelters each with its own patch of land, was.h.i.+ng lines and vegetable patch. Several pigs were chewing the fat with their neighbour over the fence, sharing tips on composting. Having led a sheltered life I had never appreciated just how pink newly washed pigs were. In the sun they seemed a fluorescent plastic, the colour of a Disney poster.

The driver's anxiety was not selfishly focused on the wellbeing of his family alone but on all of mankind and more specifically on the comfort and whim of each individual pa.s.senger. When he learned that I had never been to Fort George before he took a small but significant detour that left me with a reduced walk to the garrison. He seemed so desperate to please he would surely have whipped me up a breakfast omelette on a hastily a.s.sembled roadside primus had I but asked. I hope his day improved.

Unlike Johnson and Boswell I was unprepared for the size and scale of Fort George with its symmetrical complex of streets and squares. The authorities must have been petrified that the rag-taggle Jacobites would rise again and eat any babies left unguarded. Johnson at his dismissive worst commented 'Of Fort George I shall not attempt to give any account. I cannot delineate it scientifically, and a loose and popular description is of use only when the imagination is to be amused.' Boswell was equally sneering, and subsequently made a snide comment about their host's library which was a 'tolerable collection of books.' Nevertheless they accepted the hospitality on offer and devoured yet another trough of mutton.

Boswell always had a penchant for dressing up. When not hankering for the austere robes of the priesthood he l.u.s.ted after the uniform of a soldier. 'At three the drum beat for dinner. I could for a little fancy myself a military man, and it pleased me.' Although there were several military men in desert camouflage wandering through the fort I had no wish to swap with them. How many friends and colleagues had they already lost? The screensaver on my nephew's lap top shows a huge semi circle of men with a draped coffin in the centre. Meanwhile Boswell played the toy soldier in his head, strutting, preening and barking orders.

He had by now been absent from the foolishly loyal Margaret for almost two weeks. His loins stirred when introduced to the Governor's wife who was '... though not a beauty, one of the most agreeable women I ever saw, with an uncommonly mild and sweet tone in conversation. She had a young lady, a companion with her.'

Temporary celibacy must have been a challenging option for Boswell who had always boasted of his s.e.xual appet.i.tes, prowess and indeed size. His pathological fear of masturbation must have been counterproductive. According to McEnroe and Simon he had been mightily influenced by the pamphlet, Onania; or, the Henious Sin of Self-Pollution, and all its Frightful consequences in both s.e.xes, considered which had run into twenty editions by the end of 1759. The fatal practice filled him with guilt. After a night of 'low lasciviousness', he once swore an oath on a drawn sword, 'never pleasure but with a woman's aid.'

The small talk over the evening meal at the governor's residence ranged from Garrick's acting prowess to the fact that 'the Arabs could live five days without victuals, and subsist for three weeks with nothing else but the blood of their camels, who could lose so much of it as would suffice for that time, without being exhausted.'

Boswell, increasingly obsessed with his fear that something terrible had happened to his daughter steered the conversation round to the second sight. He said that his intention was to ensure that if the worst had happened he would at least get credit for having had the gift of prophetic insight. Basically he was savouring the possibility of enjoying an enhanced reputation were he to learn subsequently that his daughter had died.

Neither Boswell or Johnson mentioned the sad knot of whisky-breathed women who habitually a.s.sembled at the gates of the fort to sell their weak bodies and strong drink to the soldiers to whom a posting to the northern garrison must have felt like a one way ticket to Guantanamo Bay without the sun. A contemporary notice admonishes the infantry; No man to make Water but in Place for that Purpose No dirt or filth to be put under the Bedsteads No water, Dirt or Filth to be thrown opposite the Barrack Rooms, in the Pa.s.sages, on the Stairs or out of the windows.

No Woman is to be permitted to walk in any Part of the Barrack Rooms.

The whisky women had dispersed by the time I left the fort which is some ways was a pity. In any case they would not have been allowed on board the salubrious, completely empty double-decker bus that arrived to take me to Inverness. Spanking new and bouncing it veered out of habit into the airport where all planes were grounded on account of the ash with blankets draped over their engines as if they all had bad colds.

This must be the only bus in Britain which enables pa.s.sengers to sit back and indulge in a spot of dolphin spotting. This is surely a missed advertising opportunity.

A blue Scottish Heritage sign indicated that the Culloden Battle Field was two and a half miles away. There is a mystery here. Why didn't Johnson and Boswell make this tiny detour to visit the site of such a significant battle? Johnson was not without Jacobite sympathies. On this occasion he seems lost for words, something of a first. Was he embarra.s.sed? Was he scared? Did he glance with apprehension at the roadside beggars fearful lest they rose up and hurled their crutches at the fat Englishman and his pal lording it over them in a posh post-chaise?