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the dog had a pretty miserable life,' said Jean. 'Alex was always trying to ride him
like a horse.'
I remembered Alex's disdain for cats. He tormented them, not in any cruel way,
but simply by ignoring them, not letting them get what they wanted. When he
came to stay with Rose and I, our cat soon learned there would be no sign of in-
terest or affection and just left Alex alone. It was a tactic he could use as effectively
with people.
Alex's sister Libby was born when he was five. 'He adored his sister, but not her
constant pestering. When she was two and always wanting to play, Alex would take
a book and climb into Libby's cot and sit there reading in the middle where she
couldn't reach him. But as they grew up, Alex became incredibly fond and protect-
ive of his sister.'
Libby was a bright, good-looking teenager during Alex's climbing years. Very few
of Alex's climbing friends were introduced to her. I remember meeting Libby only
once and he tracked our conversation, watching me with knife-like eyes. Neither
Jean nor Alex wanted Libby falling for a climber. They both knew too much about
us. Mostly, Libby was never there when we passed through. She'd be staying with
friends, and that may also have been Jean's doing.
The family used to spend three weeks each summer back in Campbeltown, visit-
ing relatives and taking long walks on the open sandy beaches that extended along
the coast, or up into the wooded hills. One of Jean MacIntyre's mother's brothers
- Uncle Andrew - owned a herring drifter, a single-masted broad-beam fishing
boat.
'Ever after, Alex asked us for a boat, but we never lived near enough to water to
justify the investment. Maybe that was a mistake, perhaps if we had bought him a
boat, he never would have taken up climbing and he'd still be with us.'
When Alex had passed his eleven-plus exams, his parents decided he should at-
tend a good Roman Catholic school. They felt he needed some stability since his
father's work was moving him around a good deal. He was enrolled at the Jesuit
Mount Saint Mary's College on the outskirts of Sheffield as a boarder. (Old boys
are known as 'mountaineers', which is apposite in Alex's case.)
'Being a Catholic, I wanted him to go to a Catholic school, but it was a waste of
money because he never went to church afterwards. Well, only occasionally just to
please his mother. He said to me after he left Saint Mary's: “Prison would be a
doddle compared to that school.”'
Alex's first experience of climbing came after his parents moved to Letchmore
Heath. Hamish had once again changed jobs and it was now a long way for Alex to
go home for weekend visits. He said he wanted to go home to be with them and
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