The Ned Wood Archive

Kings of Oblivion

Let me tell you a bit about Fi and Cat. The babies of the group. Younger than all of the others. And quiet. Shy. Didn’t talk much. At least not to begin with. In retrospect, that was just them finding their feet. Not surprising really cos Nessie was a bit too loud to begin with. As was Pete. Gav was a bit too quiet to begin with too. So with Pete and Nessie doing all the talking and Gav not doing any talking at all, Fi and Cat sort of got left out. Apparently, I was the only one that said anything to them at first, at least, that’s what they told me, although all I said was just Hi and stuff at first. You know – you just smile as you pass by, just say a word or two, maybe more, and then, one day, you connect, and from then on you’re good mates.

That would have been when the three of us were in the TV room, watching Top of the Pops that one day. They were talking about the Banshees and wondering aloud whether they’d be on the show. That would probably have been when they released Mittageisen/Love in a Void as a single. I didn’t hold out much hope, but you never knew. I didn’t say that, instead I just mentioned that I’d just seen them with the Cure, this was in Birmingham just before term started, and that produced an avalanche of questions. Who was there? What did they play? What did they say? That’s when I realised that they weren’t that quiet and shy. And that was when I also realised that the two of them were sometimes sort of like a double act. Like two people talking with one voice, both asking the same questions and making the same comments. And then quietly whispering quick thoughts to each other like a conspiracy before firing off more comments and questions. Like they were plotting their attack. I couldn’t answer them in enough detail, though. I knew that two of the band had just walked out and that the Scottish dates had been cancelled, but the two of them were ahead of me on all of that. So I failed that test and the Banshee conversation died a bit and we got down to the old old student tradition of criticising Top of the Pops.

We had a laugh at at a band called the Jags. They did that got your number written on the back of my hand song. We all thought they were fake. Pop as in bad, not pop as in good. The guitarist was trying to look punky and failing. The singer was too cute to be punk. We all laughed. Then we compared notes about decent bands likely to be on the show. Like the Undertones. And I mentioned Buzzcocks. And they’d been to the Buzzcocks/Joy Division gig at the Odeon, so we compared notes on that. They weren’t that into Joy Division though. And then Tenpole Tudor was on the show doing Rock Around the Clock. None of us could take that seriously either. But wasn’t that the point?

“Tourists only.” said Cat.

Then Gav joined us. I’m pretty sure this was the same evening. After we’d turned the TV off. He started talking to me about the memorials in the cemetery we’d seen and what he’d been thinking about since. I think he may have wanted to try out his ideas on Fi and Cat; at least give them a chance to overhear what he was saying to me and then hopefully get their agreement.

“Ned, you know what you were saying about not using sandstone for important monuments and stuff and that granite would be much better?”

“Yeah, I think that’s accurate enough. Have you started studying your rocks yet, then?”

“Not yet, no,” he said. “What I’ve been thinking about is the Stone of Scone…”

“Has Pete found it yet?” I asked, interrupting.

“No. Don’t be stupid.” He paused. “I’ve been thinking. If you were going to create a stone that represented everything that was important to you, that was gonna be used down through the ages, wouldn’t you use something tough like granite? What I mean is, wouldn’t they have spent the time to make the Stone of Scone out of granite? I mean, wouldn’t they have used granite for the kings when they were crowned?”

“Invested,” said Fi. “Scottish kings were invested not crowned.”

Gav pauses again. He’s got them listening, but he’s been slightly put off. He wants to impress the girls with his knowledge of Scottish folklore. But he knows there’s a chance they’ll know more about it than he does. I think they did. However, we all want him to continue, Fi and Cat as well as me. I smile at Fi and she gets the message.

“Sorry, Gav. I’m interested. Carry on. I just wanted to make sure that Ned knew that our traditions have more subtlety than we’re oft given credit for.”

“Yeah, exactly,” said Gav, now that it appeared he may have Fi on his side. “So, maybe it’s true what folk say. The English really did get palmed off with a fake stone when they nicked it. Maybe the real one was granite and maybe it really is up here and has been all along.

“Look, they had plenty of time to hide the original and get a plan together because they knew the Sassenachs were coming up to nick the stone. And the English didn’t know what the stone looked like. They didn’t have photos or anything.”

Notice he said Sassenachs. Which means he’s addressing young Fiona and Cat now, not me.

“And the fact that the one down in London is made of sandstone from near Scone doesn’t mean anything. It just means that there was some local sandstone to hand in Perth when the English arrived. That shouldn’t surprise anyone. Perth’s made of sandstone.

“And the fact is everyone says the stone came over from Iona, which means it could come from anywhere. Even Ireland. There’s granite there, isn’t there, Ned?”

Well, I didn’t know about Iona, but the west coast of Scotland is full of granite. And Ireland must have plenty. I mean, Giant’s Causeway is all volcanic. So that’s what I told him.

“Have you seen the Stone?” asks Cat.

“Which one?”

“The proper one. The only one. The one in London. The one the English took,” she says. It’s clear that Cat hasn’t bought Gav’s theory yet.

“No. But I’ve seen pictures.”

“Right. So, it’s got carvings and handles on it. It isn’t just any old stone that was lying by the roadside that they gave to the English. It’d definitely been used. And almost certainly used for the kings at Scone.”

“Not necessarily,” says Gav. “Think about it. It could have been something else. Something fairly important to fool the English. My Dad thinks it was something like the cover for a crypt or a store room under the church.”

So now we all realise that he’s been talking this over with his Dad. He’s taking it seriously. I don’t know the history behind this so I don’t quite understand how important it is. But the girls do. They’ve heard the conspiracy theories before. They’ve been educated to treat the stone and the story of the stone with respect and to laugh at anything that doesn’t follow the accepted history. But they don’t want to deflate Gav so they don’t shoot him down. And so the conversation just peters out.

“Well, we’ll never know,” says Cat. “If the real stone hasn’t turned up yet, it never will.”

“Yeah. Perhaps you’re right,” says Gav. He’s disappointed.

“But, you know what that means, Gav,” I say. “It means that you’ll never be proved wrong.”