“Let me tell ya, Jimmie,” McTavish said as he pushed his pint pot toward the barkeep. “I was stopped out on the moors, me car flat out of petrol on this dark and moonless night with nae so much as a torch to light me way.”

I nodded to the barman to supply him with another stout and put it on my tab, then I said, “Well, go on, Mr. McTavish. Your car had stopped on the moors. . .”

He took a long draught from his now replenished pint pot and said, “It was as pitch black dark as the devil’s own bowels, but that dinna stop me from stepping out onto the road and kicking that no good stinking Opel squarely in its miserable door.”

We laughed. We’d all seen McTavish kick his car.

“It was then,” said McTavish, “that I turned around and there before me stood the devil hisself, horns and tail and says he, ‘Jimmie, I’ll start yer car if ye give up drinking’.”

“I looked him square in them red eyes, I did, then turned around and walked straight here wi’out another word said.

Like magic, his pint pot refilled again.