The True Story of Spit MacPhee by James Aldridge Page A

to think about it for a moment. Apart from an occasional strap at school he had never been beaten or slapped by an adult. His grandfather had never touched him because that was not the way they had lived. Though they had always shouted at each other, there had never been any question of obedience or disobedience needing punishment, so there was something here that Spit didn’t like and didn’t want and resented. On the other hand he was very hungry and he said, ‘If he wants to give me a hiding, he can do it any time he likes.’ He looked across at Ben, hoping for some support.
    Ben had been so rarely disobedient that this was a new experience for him too. He had lived his life unable and unwanting to escape obedience, or the moral guidance of his forceful mother. Moreover he was afraid of all violence, so that in character he should have missed his meal rather than taken a hiding. But Spit’s offhand acceptance of a hiding, together with a new hope in a friendship restored, gave Ben enough courage to say, ‘I’d sooner the hiding than miss my lunch.’
    Betty Arbuckle, in her Australian way, was not without a sense of humour, and she also knew her son. ‘Are you sure you want to be brave?’ she said to him.
    Ben kept his eyes down, knowing that if he looked up at his mother he would collapse.
    ‘You’re a very bad influence, Spit,’ Betty said calmly, ‘and you won’t like it,’ she said to her son. She called Frank and told him to get the strap.
    ‘I thought they were going to do without their dinner,’ Frank said to her.
    ‘They decided to take a hiding, so we’ll have to make it clear to Ben that he must not be led astray. And we have to show Spit that he can’t lead others into temptation. You’ve got to learn not to be wicked,’ she said to Spit.
    ‘What’s wicked about it?’ Spit protested. ‘I was just …’
    ‘Please don’t answer back,’ Betty Arbuckle told him in her troubled voice. ‘And don’t shout at me like a navvy. You’ll have to change your awful ways, Spit, and I’m only thankful that Joannie’s not here to see what you’ve done to Ben.’
    Frank Arbuckle had his razor strop in hand, a long double layer of leather with a metal hook at one end and a thickened handle of leather at the other. It was gashed with the cuts of a mishandled razor, and oily with lubricants like old Fyfe’s own strop. Spit looked at it, judged its effectiveness, looked closely too at Frank Arbuckle who seemed unhappy and nervous, and decided that it was bolder to bend over willingly and submit rather than struggle and make it difficult.
    ‘Bend over the chair, Spit,’ Frank said.
    Spit did so without hesitation, but Frank’s first blow surprised him with the force because he had forgotten that Frank Arbuckle had a lot to remember him by. Spit had made too much trouble for him with the water mains to be easily forgiven, and Frank was not going to let this opportunity pass. In Frank Arbuckle’s delayed punishment Spit felt the strop scour his flesh:
one, two, three, four …
    ‘How many, Bet?’ Frank Arbuckle said. ‘Is that enough?’
    ‘I don’t know, Frank. Give him at least half a dozen, so that he learns his lesson.’ Betty was firm, but she wouldn’t watch.
    Spit flinched each time but he bore the half dozen successfully, though he knew that one or two more could have wrecked his determination not to cry out. As he straightened up he caught sight of Ben’s face, and though he said loudly, ‘You didn’t hurt me,’ Ben was unconvinced, and after two blows from his father he was in tears.
    ‘I told you, Ben,’ Betty Arbuckle said, almost in tears herself. ‘I
told
you. And it’s for your own good because you must not be tempted.’
    Spit watched the blows, and though they were serious enough they were not as forceful as the ones he had taken on his own backside. But since it was simply a matter of an eye for an eye now, Spit didn’t mind Ben’s milder punishment because he