Once again we are beholden to the current executors of the Knolly estate for letting us publish this, the second package of the great man's journals and memoirs.

From our high vantage point we could see in the distance the mass of work that was being undertaken to create the showground, exhibition halls and so forth that were to provide the centrepiece for the international community.

"Glasgow does seem a deuced odd place to play host to the world, don't you think?" Bertie muttered as he scanned the view and the surrounding city.

I smiled as I heard him mumbling something under his breath about Hyde Park or Crystal Palace being superior venues for such an event.

"As I've said before, you can't have everything in London, you know. Now; come along! We need to get to that telegraph office and then on to meet up with Elspeth and company. I'm sure they'll be wondering where we have got to."

"Indeed. Poor Mungo must be worrying himself silly by now...."

I did not feel the need to respond to this remark. Bertie only had to look at my face to know that this part of the conversation had ended.

We made our way in the direction that our host had indicated, over the rooftops of those establishments, a mixture of shops and dwellings, that cosied up to the funeral parlour. There was the odd slipping and sliding moment - most un-serving indeed - that was understandable considering the footwear that both Bertie and I were currently wearing. Luckily no tiles were dislodged and for now, our escape route had not been noticed by those below. But we needed to make haste, for it would not take them long to work out that we had escaped in an up-and-over direction rather than the more usual along-with-twisty-turny motion.

As we progressed, we made a point of trying every available skylight and hatchway that could have led us into an attic space and then onwards to the streets below. Unfortunately the good folk of the city were more security conscious than I would have given them credit for, and it wasn't until the last but one in the row that Bertie and I had some luck. I'm not altogether sure what we would have done had none of the hatches opened up; forcing an entry would have undoubtedly alerted the Widows below, I'm sure.

The obliging skylight that led down to the attic space below was only a cheap wooden affair and it shifted easily, as though it was used regularly by whomsoever lived below, and therefore no bolts had been shot across.

"Right then! Who goes down first?" asked Bertie.

I looked behind him in the direction that we had scrambled. There was fortunately still no sign of pursuers across the rooftops. I started to wonder if perhaps we had got away with it?

"Let's check down in the street first," I said.

Bertie nodded and eased the skylight back into its recess.

"Good plan. Don't want to drop down the hole into the waiting arms of the local constabulary, do we?"

"It's not the boys in blue that I'm worried about ..."

"Oh, right! It's the biddies in black; isn't it? Here... hold my feet and I'll have a look."

I was quite taken aback by this instant act of volunteering, but said nothing. Bertie eased his way towards the edge of the roof, whilst I too lay flat across the tiles with my own foot hooked around the chimney stack. Bertie clasped hold of the lead guttering and cautiously poked his shoulders toward the edge of the roof. I could make out that he turned to the left and then to the right. But he remained strangely silent.

"Well?" I called out, but not too loud.

"What?" hissed Bertie.

"What do you see?"

"Nothing."

"You mean all clear."

"No. I mean I can't see anything. My cloak's flopped over my eyes."

I very briefly considered hoiking him over the edge, but instead suggested (in no uncertain terms) that he get himself sorted out on the double, else something unpleasant happen to the contents of his trouser areas. I am pleased to say that he heeded my advice, and quite soon he shuffled back up the roof akin to some strange crab-like apparition, and he crouched next to me.

"Looks clear," reported. "Our local uniformed chaps are still down the way, taking notes. And there are two Widows across the way from the funeral place. No one below us."

I breathed a sigh of relief.

"Gah!" exclaimed Bertie as he stood up. "Just look at my togs and my cloak ... It's absolutely filthy up here, and you're not much better. Elspeth won't be amused."

I looked down at my own clothing, now heavily stained with soot and city grime and then looked at Bertie's face and my hands. I'm sure there were cleaner sweeps in the city.

Bertie continued. "You know next time we do any of this roof malarkey, we really need to dress appropriately. Or better still …"

I nodded. "I know what you're thinking. And yes, Charlotte would indeed have been an asset up here."

"Really " said Bertie in mock shock. "And there was I thinking more along the likes of lightweight ropes and grapnels."

"Oh, right. Well, that would work too."

"Yes indeed. We would need some sort of belt arrangement to hold them all in too ... perhaps a modified Army pattern webbing, and then a gun to fire the grapnels across any gaps and then a mechanism for winding in the rope and hauling one's self up …."

He had that faraway look in his eye, signalling that he was on the edge of daydreaming ...

"... soaring hither and swooping thither!"

... and there he was, a grown man, cape stretched wide as if he were gliding around ....

" .. an acrobatic denizen of the rootfops!"

It was time to bring him back to the real world.

"Bertie! You are wandering! Save it for later. For now, please concentrate your thoughts on us getting off of this roof, especially as it's starting to rain."

The sky had taken on a shade of gunmetal once again as a set of squally clouds scudded in from the West. The wind caught at Bertie's cloak and it flapped about, threatening to lift him skyward like a poorly constructed kite. As he gave a panicked laugh, he grabbed hold of me and I grabbed hold of a chimney stack.

"Time to go I think?" I said. "I'll go first."

Together we lifted the skylight and then peered in. Below us was a bed, thankfully unoccupied.

"Well! A nice and easy drop down, then?" grinned Bertie.

Easing myself over the lip of the hole, I lowered myself down until my feet were above the bed, and then I dropped.

There was a scream. And it wasn't me.

"Knolly are you all right?" asked Bertie, leaning further though the hole than he ought to have done. This precipitated another scream, only this time, my eyes had accustomed themselves to the gloom and I could see where the noise had come from.

It was a young lady of about eighteen years or so, eyes wide with shock at such an intrusion. And understandably so. She was semi dressed (or semi undressed, depending on your point of view and depending on where you were looking. In one hand, she held an umbrella which she pointed in my direction. Her other hand was desperately trying to hide her décolletage with what appeared to be a local newspaper.

"Pardon me, miss!" I said as I carefully stepped off of the bed towards her. "I trust that that bumbershoot is not loaded?" I added in an attempt to lighten the situation, which was this: a filthy-looking gentlemen falling into the bedroom of a half-dressed young woman.

The young lady was just about to say something, when she was distracted. She was distracted by a second filthy-looking man who had dropped from on high and had collapsed on to the bed behind me. I knew that as soon as he took in his surroundings and the vignette before him, he would be grinning like an old fool behind me. There is something about a scantily dressed woman that just brings out the worst in him, regardless of the number of "Gender Benders" he has taken.

"We mean you no harm, miss," I said. bowing with as much dignity as a soot-encrusted interloper could muster. "In fact, we are just passing through after a ... er ...um, a regular chimney inspection."

I began to pat my pockets. "I have papers here somewhere to explain ...."

The young woman looked on with some bemusement at this act, but kept the umbrella in a classic "en guard" stance.

bounced off the bed and was trying to untangle that wretched cloak once more. The remaining fear in the eye of our host beat a hasty retreat as she began to giggle at the scene before her.

Keeping an eye on the weapon, I made a grab for the door handle.

"Well, our work here appears to be done. We'll be on our way, then. Good day to you miss." I turned to Bertie and said: "More chimneys to inspect. Come along, Mr Barrymore!"

Bertie was looking over his shoulder to see who else had joined us in the room.

I sighed and went into Blinkage: "THATS YOU REMEMBER STOP CARACTACUS BARRYMORE"

A switch seemed to go on and Bertie launched into his Yorkshireman-act.

"At your service ma'am! Mr Caractacus Barrymore." In one movement, he disarmed the girl and kissed her hand, leaving a sooty smudge mark on her fair skin.

"Now Mr B. Time is a wasting and I'm sure this young lady had things to do before she was so rudely interrupted when we ... um ... dropped in."

Bertie was getting into role and was thumping the fireplace and tapping at the chimney breast. I grabbed him rather unceremoniously by the collar of his cloak, hauled him through the bedroom door and shoved him down the stairs. Together, we barrelled down the staircase taking them two at a time until we found ourselves at the front door.

"Well that was different. And a trifle rough, I must say …" Started Bertie,

I held a hand up to "shush" him, gingerly opening the front door and peering out. The local folk of Glasgow seemed to be going about their normal days' work, oblivious to the police presence that was further down the road. "All clear. We should go."

"We're going to stand out a wee bit, looking like this," said Bertie, with great clouds of dust billowing from his flapping cloak.

"Do you think so? I think not, if you consider all the different type of folk we've seen since we got off the platform, Come on! Straight back, no slouching! Let's act as though we own the place."

As soon as we rounded the corner, we breathed a sigh of relief and then tried to get our bearings. Things certainly looked different at street level than they did from above. Fortunately, we were given a clue to our intended destination by the small army of telegram boys on bicycles who streamed from the gates of telegraph office.

The Great Knolly Archive

The Shepherd and
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