"We’re dead."
Disconsolate, Mark straggled along the street. The Sunday morning debris lay smashed and splashed where it had been thrown. Only Fort William could produce quite such a dreary scene. Two days ago, the conditions had been superb and we had been in Cambridge. Now it was warm and windy. After the elation of leaving for ice and the beauty of an evening visit to Bowden Doors which even shut Scarrett up, the club manic depressives were due for a downer and this was as good as any.
"I think this is a Kafka novel."
"Yes, the bread is a symbol of all our hopes, to be sought amid the wreck and sewage of our attempted pleasures."
"Pretentious prat."
"OK, who mentioned Kafka then?"
"I’m sure the bread’s up hers somewhere."
"Bollocks. We can always scrounge some. It’s starting to piss down."
"’Scuse, Jimmy, wheer’s yon breadshoppy?" Mark asks a passing local. Up there. Further from the nice warm car. My inner boots are leaking, but at least Mark hasn’t got a cag.
We reach it, a nice un-touristy panstore. Some extra chocolate is bought for the hill, and some Irn Bru for now. As we leave, Mark turns to me.
"You’re horrible, Hopkins. It’s bad enough invading them without being rude to them." I’m surprised. Apparently I belched in the nice old shopkeeper’s face. I apologise to Mark, as a representative semi-Scot, and we eat the extra chocolate.
In the centre of town, everyone else has disappeared. We wander around, looking into seedy hostile pubs. We are both soaked, before even setting off. I have an urge to hit things, it’s now two years since I managed to do an ice-climb. Mark is also foaming. We evolve on the idea of this as Hell, and wonder who we will meet to make it worse. It’s hard to see how it could be. We look into the posh hotel by closed Nevisports and there they all are, even Andre and Nigel, who had hitched. The satisfaction of seeing them arrive at midnight, gone. Still, perhaps Andy Baxter will be late. We have a drink and I roll beermats up and Scarrett cracks obscene jokes about a busload of pensioners, with Allister’s encouragement. We all laugh. Then we climb back into the car and drive around looking for Allister’s thermos. As we leave the seventh pit, our gloom lifts and I buy a bouncy ball on a piece of elastic. Perhaps it’ll make the fester pass more quickly...