published by PointBlank Press, on sale June 2004
11th JANUARY, 2001
10:23 am
Four months and twenty-two days after he stopped taking his medication, Robin Greaves dragged the chair out from under the desk and sat down opposite the private investigator.
After all this time, everything still seemed normal.
As the PI shuffled through a stack of papers he’d scooped out of a plastic tray, Robin glanced round the office. It didn’t take long. A desk, the chairs they were sitting on, a filing cabinet, a plain grey carpet with a rectangular indentation to the left of the doorway (a heavy piece of furniture had once stood there, he guessed) – that was it. Behind the PI, a framed certificate hung at an angle on the wall and, above his head, a bare bulb dangled from the ceiling. The only natural light came from a single tiny window on the right.
Well, Robin thought, here he was. About to find out, at last. That’s what he wanted, wasn’t it?
Hands hidden beneath the desk, he started to tap out Bach’s Italian Concerto on his thighs, fingers making little slapping sounds against his trousers. The PI glared at him for a second or two, then returned to the serious business of scrutinising his papers.
Robin winced as a twinge in his wrist momentarily paralysed his fingers. When the stabbing pain passed, he locked his hands together and squeezed them between his knees. He took a deep breath. As much as he wanted to know the truth, part of him would have preferred to remain ignorant.
The PI coughed. After a while he coughed again and began placing each sheet of paper, individually, back in the tray from which, only moments before, he’d removed it. When he’d finished, he stood slowly, as if his knees needed oiling, and approached the grey, three-drawer filing cabinet crammed in the corner of the room. He tugged at the middle drawer. It didn’t budge. He opened the top drawer, fiddled with a catch on the side, shut it and tried the middle drawer again. This time it slid open.
He started flicking through dozens of green suspension files, tongue darting in and out of his puckered mouth as he sought the information Robin had requested.
Robin stood. "Mind if I smoke?"
"Yes."
Robin shrugged and walked towards the window. A fire escape fragmented his view of a pebble-dashed brick wall four feet away. Hardly the finest vista in Edinburgh. He tapped his fingers against the windowpane, listening to the deep drumming sound, wondering why it was so unlike the tinkle glass makes when it breaks. "You going to be long?" he said.
"Be with you in just a second."
Robin wedged his hands in his trouser pockets and bent his knees. With his head craned back just far enough to be uncomfortable, he could see a sliver of grey sky. He ambled back to his chair, took his hands out of his pockets and rubbed his left eye with the back of his wrist. For a while he sat motionless, observing the PI. Then a muffled cry came from outside, where a crow was perched on the far railing of the fire escape. It shuffled to the left, stopped. Another two steps, stopped again. It looked straight at Robin, opened its beak and squawked.
If it was trying to tell him something, it was wasting its time.
The PI slammed the drawer shut and turned, gripping a white envelope between his finger and thumb as if it was a soiled tissue. He lobbed the envelope onto the desk.
Robin trapped it beneath his palm and let his hand rest there as he gazed out the window, watching the crow fly away.
"Go ahead," the PI said. "Open it."
The envelope was unsealed. Robin reached inside and removed a handful of photographs.
"You wanted proof." The PI sat down.
Robin said nothing. Did he really want proof? Did he really want to know? The skin over his cheekbones prickled as if he’d been out in the sun too long.
Proof. Photographs. He couldn’t look. Didn’t want to see them.
Don’t look. Don’t do it. Don’t. Oh, shit, you’ve done it now.
The first photo. A couple getting into a taxi. By itself, proof of nothing. He let out a long breath. They could be going out for a friendly drink. The fact that his hand was on her elbow was, well…you could easily read too much into something perfectly innocent.
This was Robin’s first visit to Eye Witness Investigations. He didn’t know the private detective’s name and he’d never asked. He didn’t care. His solitary prior contact with the PI had been over the phone.
Robin had said, "I need you to watch someone."
The PI replied, "May I ask why?"
"I want to find out if she’s…seeing anybody." Robin hesitated. "Can you do that?"
"I can do that."
"How much?"
"Three hundred a day."
"Give me proof within seventy-two hours and you get fifteen hundred. You need a deposit?"
The PI said, "That won’t be necessary. Just give me your name and a contact number."
"The name’s Robin Greaves. I’d rather you didn’t phone me, though. I’ll get in touch with you."
"Let me write this down." The PI broke off for a second, then said, "What’s her name?"
The sound of gunfire blasted through the paper-thin walls of Robin’s sitting room. He would have jumped if it weren't for the fact that by now he was used to his elderly neighbour watching westerns on his TV with the volume cranked up. God, this was hard. Finally, he spoke. "Carol," he said. "My wife." He gave the PI their address.
Within seventy-two hours, he’d said. He couldn’t complain. He was getting the service he’d asked for.
He slapped the picture face down on the desk. His palms were sweaty. In the next picture the photographer had snapped them from behind, catching them holding hands.
"I’m sorry," the PI said.
Who did he think he was? Why was he fucking sorry? When Robin looked at the third photo he noticed his hand was shaking. The picture showed the couple entering a nightclub. The next shot, in which they were laughing, had been taken as they left. In the fifth, Eddie had his arm around her. In the sixth, Carol had her fingers tucked in his back pocket. There were ten photographs in all. The remaining four showed the same scene: his wife and her good friend Eddie in the doorway to his flat, joined at the neck, the chest, hips, his arms twisted around her, her eyes closed.
He tucked the photos back in the envelope.
"Happy?" The PI coughed again. "Or maybe that’s not the right word. Satisfied?"
Happy? Satisfied? Who was this joker? Patches of black spotted the edges of Robin’s vision.
The PI stared at him, grinning.
Robin imagined leaping across the desk, ramming the heel of his hand into the bastard’s nose, then standing back and watching the blood stream out of it. He imagined the injured man staggering to his feet, groaning behind the hand cupped over his very probably broken nose, shirt collar a red band around his throat. Robin took out his wallet and counted fifteen hundred pounds in fifties, the last of his money, withdrawn from the bank less than an hour ago. He bent forward.
The PI leaped backwards with a yell. His hand fell from his face, tracing a dark red curve on the pale wallpaper behind him. He leaned against the wall, snorted, spat into his hand. His mouth sprang open and his stained teeth chattered. He blinked several times, then said, in a thin, sticky voice, "What was that for?"
Robin took shallow breaths. He dropped the money into the plastic tray on the desk. His lungs were full of pebbles. He ferreted in his jacket pocket and found his cigarettes and disposable lighter. He stuck a cigarette to his bottom lip. Had he hit the poor man? Surely not. But there was no one else in the room and the PI hadn’t assaulted himself, had he? Robin lit the cigarette. "I’m sorry," he told the cowering figure, stuffing his cigarettes and lighter back in his pocket and picking up the envelope. "I don’t know what – "
He had to leave right this minute. Who knew what would happen if he stayed?
10:25 am
Winter in Scotland was far too cold to walk around bare-chested. That’s why Pearce wore a t-shirt. His fists clenched, relaxed and clenched again. His forearm muscles writhed under his goose-pimpled skin. He smacked his hands together.
Last time he ventured into this area was over ten years ago. A couple of dozen dilapidated tower blocks roughly six miles west of the city, Wester Hailes was the dumping ground for single mothers, the elderly, the unemployed, winos, whores, students, crazies, ex-cons, junkies, and dyke social workers. The properties were damp, the heating didn’t work, there were problems with the plumbing and the lifts kept breaking down.
Ten years ago Wester Hailes was Edinburgh’s drug centre. Junkies congregated from all over the city to share needles in the dozens of abandoned flats.
As Pearce’s sister had said, "The views from the top are pretty cool. Get high to get high, you know. You got the Pentlands to the south. You ever seen snow-capped mountains through a heroin haze? And on the other side, sometimes I see the struts of the Railway Bridge wriggle just like my veins after I’ve jacked up."
Last time he was here he arrived too late. Dislodged from his sister’s arm, a syringe nestled against the skirting board. She lay on her back, naked, her only view a web of cracks in the ceiling. She’d been dead for two days.
Maybe things had changed, like they said, although it needed more than a bit of colourful re-cladding to convince him. At street level the yellow and green tower blocks shortened the horizon. He felt hemmed in, imprisoned. He rubbed his palms on his jeans.
An upturned shopping trolley propped open the door of the building he was looking for.
"Hey!"
He craned his neck. On the top floor a teenage boy in a grey hooded top was leaning over the balcony, waving. He held something in his hand. Without warning, he let go. Pearce stepped to the side. The object struck the ground a couple of feet from where he’d been standing, bounced once and rolled to a stop. A syringe. Clear plastic split down the centre, plunger depressed, needle snapped off in the fall. He tossed the trolley out of the way and ducked through the doorway. So much for change.
Staircase to the left. Sprinting up the stairs. Out of breath. "Muriel!" Lift straight ahead, door yawning at him. Chest tight, lungs burning, he stepped inside the lift and its scarred, steel-grey mouth swallowed him. The door shut with a clang that made sweat break out on his forehead. Stale air filled his nostrils. His hand shook as he pressed the button for the eighth floor.
He had arrived too late. Stop it. He had failed to protect her. Forget it. She’s dead. I wasn’t looking out for her. Stop it. Think about something else. Concentrate on the job. Do what you’re here to do. Concentrate on the old man.
The old man was called Willie Cant and his mother had gone to school with him. They’d even kissed once, she told Pearce. She asked him not to be too hard on the old guy. Pearce looked down at the steel toecaps of his light-brown boots. They could cause a bit of damage. He wouldn’t use his feet, then. The lift grumbled to a halt and the door struggled open.
Two teenage boys blocked Pearce’s path. Fifteen, sixteen years old. The one wearing the grey hooded top pointed a knife at him.
Pearce felt nothing at all. He said, "Move."
The teenager’s hand was unsteady. He glanced at his pal, and grinned. His teeth were yellow.
Pearce took a step to the side and the youth mirrored his movement. "Out of my way," Pearce said.
"Where’s the party? Are we invited?"
Pearce’s eyes probed the boy’s. Dull brown. No sparkle. Lots of movement. The silence lengthened. In a little while, the one without the knife spoke and the voice startled Pearce. It belonged to a girl.
"Let’s piss off, Ross," she said. "This guy’s weird."
Pearce’s eyes darted over the contours of her light brown jumper, then back to Ross. "Listen to your girlfriend," he said.
She had started to move. She was tugging Ross’s sleeve. Her hair was as short as Pearce’s.
Ross licked his bottom lip slowly, carefully, as if his tongue was an expensive lipstick. Somewhere below, a dog started to bark. Ross lowered his hand and his tongue shot back into his mouth. "Next time," he said, faking confidence, and wheeled around.
Pearce watched them disappear up the stone staircase. The girl shouted something he didn’t quite catch and forced laughter ricocheted off the walls. Cant’s handwritten name was taped on top of the garish pink paintwork of his front door. The letter a had been scored out and replaced with a u. Pearce felt the corners of his mouth twitch. He slipped a fingernail under a burst paint blister, which peeled off like boiled skin.
He slammed on the door with the heel of his hand. "Open up." He waited a minute, watching the second hand of his watch complete a full circle, before hammering on the door again. Then he waited another minute, precisely. "Last chance, Cant."
From the other side of the door a quiet voice said, "What do you want?"
Okay, let’s see. I want to pay off the grand I owe Cooper. And I want Mum to get another job. It’s not safe working there these days. To Cant he said, "I think you know."
The old man whined, "I don’t."
"Open up."
After a moment, Cant whispered, "I don’t want to hurt you."
"That’s very kind of you," Pearce said. "Now open the door."
Silence.
"Open it."
The old man’s voice rang out: "Bugger off."
Following Joe Hope’s advice, Pearce tried a different approach. "My mum remembers you," he said, pressing his ear to the door. "Hilda Pearce. When she knew you she was Hilda Larbert. You were at school together. Ring any bells?"
A slight pause. Then, "What are you going to do?"
"Open the door. We’ll talk."
"Tell me what you’re going to do."
"You’re making me angry. Open the door, Mr Cant." He waited. "You can do it."
"Tell him he can have his money tomorrow."
"I won’t discuss business through a closed door."
"Tomorrow. I promise."
Pearce took a deep breath. Fuck Joe Hope’s advice. What did he know? He was nothing more than one of Cooper’s hired thugs. Pearce flicked a switch in his head and instantly words rattled out of his mouth like bullets out of a machine-gun. "If you don’t open the fucking door right fucking now you piece of shit there’s no way I’m going to be accountable for what happens to you, you with me on this, you understand or do I have to explain it all again?" He waited a moment, took a step back, aimed to the right of the handle and kicked the door with his heel. His boot went straight through the wood and stuck there. He hopped a couple of times until he regained his balance. Splinters scuffed his boot as he dragged his foot back out.
He dug his hand in his pocket and pulled out a pair of surgical gloves. They fitted like an extra layer of skin. He wriggled his gloved hand through the hole and fumbled for the key. His fingers caressed the empty keyhole, slid up the door and turned the knob on the Yale. Locked. He flicked the snib downwards and tried again. The door opened, but only as far as the length of chain allowed. He leaned against the door, tearing the chain out of the wall.
Cant’s flat smelled of dried vomit. A puff of dust rose from the carpeted hallway as Pearce stepped into the old man’s home. Coffee-brown stains flecked the left hand wall. The right was shelved. Two shelves. A dead plant on each.
The old man had fled.
But he had to be here somewhere. Pearce walked to the end of the hallway. The door facing him was shut. There was another door to his left, open a crack. He kicked it.
A single bed was jammed against the wall. He lifted the quilt and glanced underneath. Dozens of identical socks – grey with parallel strips of red diamonds – littered the floor. He lowered the quilt and reached the wardrobe in two small steps. Brass handles. Dark wood scarred in a dozen places. He opened both doors. Empty, except for a solitary coat hanger and more socks. The right hand door squeaked when he closed it.
His eyes swept the room one last time. Turning, he stepped into the hallway and grabbed the handle of the other door. It clicked and swung open with a groan.
Cant was pressed into the far corner of his living room, upper body gently rocking. He didn’t look up. Pearce traced the grain of an unvarnished floorboard with a critical eye. Living room segued into kitchen with only a tattered patch of linoleum indicating the change. He shook his head. Grime coated the kitchen surfaces. A tower of dirty dishes sat next to the sink and more dishes swam in a basin of filthy water. The open drawer by the sink was where, presumably, the old man had found the bread knife he was cradling against his chest.
Pearce could never live like this. He’d die first. He found himself wondering what his mum had seen in Cant. Well, who could tell with kids? Would she still have kissed him at school had she known he would end up in this pitiful state? Probably. Mum was all heart. Always had been. She understood why he’d had to kill Priestley.
"Fifty quid." He fixed his eyes on the old man.
Cant’s lips were moving. He was mumbling. Praying, maybe. For all the good it would do.
"Due yesterday," Pearce continued.
Cant stilled for a moment, then started rocking and mumbling again.
Pearce moved towards him.
"No closer," Cant cried out. His bony fingers squeezed the handle of the knife, his knuckles pale, the skin stretched across the back of his hand. His shoulders heaved as he gulped air in desperate mouthfuls. "No closer, you bastard." He wiped his nose with the back of his hand. His eyes met Pearce’s briefly, then lowered to gaze at the floor.
"The way I look at it," Pearce said, "I’m doing you a favour. You’ll be looked after in hospital. Free meals. No bills. And by the time you get out you’ll have saved enough to pay back Mr Cooper."
"Oh, no," the old man said, and started moaning. He fell to his knees. "Go away." He dropped the knife. "Please." Eyes shut, he rolled over onto his side and drew his knees to his chest.
Pearce picked up the knife. He carried it into the kitchen, returned it to the open drawer and slammed the drawer shut. He yawned and said, "Excuse me," into his cupped hand as he ambled back over to Cant. He prodded Cant’s scrawny arm with his toe.
The old man’s eyes snapped open. His arm recoiled and he tucked it between his legs. His dark eyelashes fluttered. A thick thread of drool joined the side of his mouth to the floor.
"I’ll give you another twenty-four hours," Pearce said. "But fifty pounds won’t be enough." He rubbed a thick finger across his chin, enjoying the rasping sound it made. "You’ve defaulted on a payment. That’s a ten pound fixed penalty. My time’s another ten. Interest, that’s another ten. And another twenty, say, for not breaking anything. What’s that? A hundred?"
Cant looked up. He sniffed, propped himself on an elbow. "You’re a nice guy," he said.
Pearce nodded, eying Cant’s socks. Grey, with red diamonds.
10:44 am
"Pish." Kennedy was holding a cup of coffee in each hand and his phone was ringing. Directly ahead of him, residue of Edinburgh’s volcanic past, Salisbury Crags formed a jagged wall high enough to obscure the massive mound of Arthur’s Seat. Just looking at it made him dizzy. He tried to find somewhere to deposit the paper cups. "Pish," he said again. If only the drinks dispenser hadn’t been repossessed. He bent down and set the cups on the ground.
Expecting the caller to hang up just as he answered, he dug his mobile out of his pocket. "Kennedy," he said.
He was wrong. The caller said, "Where are you?"
The voice sounded familiar, even if it was strangely nasal. He asked, "That you, boss?"
"Course it’s me. Where are you?"
"Across from the office."
"He should be leaving the building now."
"Who should? You developed a heavy cold since I went to get the coffee? Either that or you’re wearing a nose-plug. Oh, God. You haven’t taken up synchronised swimming, have you?"
"Shut up and listen."
"Since you asked so politely."
"About five ten, five eleven. Short dark-brown hair. Padded black jacket. See him?"
The grocers beneath the office had spawned a canopy when it changed owners a couple of months ago. Two wall-mounted heaters kept the crates of vegetables that littered the pavement from freezing. Today’s special deal was on cabbages: two for the price of one. Kennedy couldn’t manage to eat a single cabbage before it went off, let alone two. He had the same problem with bread. Even small sliced loaves were too big. In fact, half the food he bought went stale or rotted and ended up in the bin. If only you could buy individual bread slices. Or pairs, in case you wanted a sandwich. Maybe it was time he bought a freezer.
He’d have to get paid first, though. Or get a new job. He’d just about had enough of this one. God, he was bored.
His boss’s voice again: "Do you see him?"
To the left of the grocers, six narrow steps led to a salmon pink door. It was shut. "No." As he spoke, the door opened. "Wait. Got him, I think. Dark green trousers?"
"Yeah. Don’t hang up. Get in the car and follow him."
"What about your coffee?"
"Fuck the coffee."
"I would, but I don’t fancy the blisters."
"Not funny. Now fucking move."
Kennedy left the coffee on the pavement and crossed the road. "He’s getting in his car. Want the registration?"
"Read it out."
He read it out. "Who is he?"
"Robin Greaves."
"Isn’t he a client?"
"He was."
Robin Greaves’s metallic green Renault Clio squealed away from the kerb.
"He’s off. Speak to you in a minute." Kennedy dropped the phone onto the passenger seat. He let a couple of cars pass, then tucked in behind a silver Nissan Micra. Driving one-handed, he picked up the phone again and said, "Wasn’t Greaves’s wife involved in a bit of extra-marital?"
"Yeah." His boss sniffed. "I showed him the pictures."
"How did he take it?"
"He broke my fucking nose."
"Fucking hell!" Kennedy bit his lip and rocked with silent laughter. After a while he cleared his throat and said, "Broke it, eh? No shit?"
"No shit." After a pause, his boss said, "And your sympathy is duly noted."
He wanted sympathy? Kennedy said, "I’m very fucking bloody sorry. Sir."
"Don't be an arsehole, Kennedy."
Neither man spoke for a while.
Kennedy’s boss finally broke the silence. "When he gets where he’s going, phone me."
"Shouldn’t you go to the hospital and get your nose fixed?"
"I’m staying right here. And, Kennedy? I don’t need your bloody advice."
The line went dead.
Robin Greaves led Kennedy through light traffic towards town, then headed east down Leith Street. Construction work was underway at Greenside. The shell was now in place and already it was brown with rust. In yesterday’s paper some journalist had suggested that the sixty screens offered by Edinburgh’s eight existing cinemas ought to be enough for a city with a population of less than half-a-million. Building a new multiplex at Greenside, so claimed the writer, was a scandalous waste of money. Kennedy wouldn’t have worded it quite as strongly, but he agreed that it did seem excessive. Bizarrely, though, the dickhead had gone on to complain about Edinburgh having twice as many bookshops as Glasgow. Which gave a new slant to the whole article. Kennedy chucked the paper in the bin, since the journalist was obviously from the west coast and therefore everything he said was unadulterated pish.
Greaves turned off Leith Walk, Kennedy following two cars behind. Greaves parked in Iona Street, got out of his car and entered a block of flats in a tenement where scaffolding had spread in rectangles like ivy with an instinct for geometry. Kennedy was impressed. The scaffolders had done a hell of a job. Kennedy had no head for heights. When he painted his ceiling last month, he’d almost fallen off the stepladder.
He found a place to park and called his boss. "How’s the nose?"
"Where is he?"
Kennedy peered through the scaffolding and read the number off the door.
"Ah, he’s returned to the nest," his boss said.
"Probably could have worked that out for myself. The set of keys gave it away." There was no reply. "What do you want me to do?"
His boss said, "I’m thinking."
With the phone still held to his ear Kennedy got out of the car and crossed to the doorway where Greaves had disappeared. "You still there?" he said into the phone.
"Yeah."
On the left of the doorway a row of buzzers ran down the wall, and opposite each buzzer, protected by a clear plastic cover, was a name. Sixth from the top, beneath Hewitt and above Law, was Greaves. Kennedy said, "Looks like our man lives on the second floor. Want me to pop up and say hello?"
"Keep out of sight for the moment. And keep an eye on him until I tell you otherwise."
"If he leaves his flat?"
"Follow him."
10:57 am
Pearce had been living in his mum’s spare room for the last two months. It didn’t amount to much, but it was home, and it was a big improvement on what he’d been used to for the last ten years.
One night, relaxing with a can of Tennants, listening to his mum’s Burt Bacharach CD, he'd told her about Julie. It took a lot of nerve.
She said, "How can you have been so stupid?"
"Stop it, Mum." He looked at her and his shoulders slumped and he said no more.
She released a big fat sigh. She said, "Come here, you great pillock. It’s so good to have you back."
He had known Julie for two weeks. Retrospectively, it might have been too soon to get engaged and, certainly, his mum thought so. But, at the time, it seemed like a good idea. How gullible could you get? He had never had any luck with women. You want to get engaged, Pearce? Nothing better to do on a Saturday morning. Yeah, Julie, but what’s the catch? Julie wanted a diamond ring and she’d seen one she liked in Jenners. If he could put up the money she’d pay him back when the banks opened on Monday.
"I won’t let you pay for your own ring," he said.
"I want to. In fact, I insist. Besides, you can’t afford it."
He thought about it for no time at all. "You’re right," he said. "I don’t have that kind of money."
"What about your friend, Cooper?"
"Cooper isn’t a friend. I don’t want any favours from him."
"You scared of him?" She touched his bare arm.
Pearce went to see Cooper, borrowed a grand and bought Julie’s ring. They parted after lunch, at one thirteen, and that was the last time he saw her. They’d arranged to meet later that evening but she didn’t show up. When he dialled her mobile it was switched off. He left a message. Soon afterwards, he visited the address she’d given him, a semi-detached in Gilmerton. When he got there the owner claimed he’d never heard of her. Pearce described her: tiny, slim, fragile, dark-haired, pale. The owner shook his head. Pearce checked he had the correct address and the owner said yes and closed the door. Pearce tried her mobile again and left another message.
On Sunday he went back. This time the owner wasn’t so helpful. He refused Pearce’s request to have a look around, so Pearce shoved him out of the way and started hunting for Julie. The television blared in the sitting room. Otherwise it was empty. In the kitchen, a pot of soup simmered on the cooker. Upstairs, he glanced inside both bedrooms. No Julie. He already felt foolish enough, otherwise he’d have checked under the beds. One last place to look. He knocked on the bathroom door and, when no one answered, he walked in. He pulled back the shower curtain, just in case she was hiding in the bath. She wasn’t.
He apologised to the owner for his intrusion and promised he wouldn’t be back again.
He postponed seeing Cooper for a week. By that time any last hopes of his fiancé’s miraculous reappearance had vanished as surely as the thousand pound engagement ring. If he waited any longer he knew Cooper would send someone to look for him, so he went to Cooper’s house and told him what had happened.
"Stitched up," Cooper said. "By a wee girl, eh?" He shook his head. "Lost it, did you, Pearce? Inside?" He pursed his lips. "What did you have in mind?"
"I thought, maybe, I could work off the debt."
"Let me think about it." Cooper showed him the door.
Two days later Pearce got a call. Cooper said, "Here’s the deal. Your debt currently stands at two grand."
"Twelve hundred’s what we agreed."
"We’re discussing a compromise here. You want to argue with me or do you want to hear how you might be able to keep your legs?"
Pearce said, "Go on."
"You’ve already missed your deadline and you’re telling me the girl, your security, has done a bunk with the ring, which was your sole asset. Therefore, your financial situation has changed. Accordingly I have reviewed our initial arrangement, the consequence of which is that you now owe me two grand. However, I’m prepared to let you work it off. Isn’t that good of me?"
"How much are you going to pay?"
"What?"
"I want to know how long it’s going to take me to pay it all back."
"That’s up to you. This isn’t Burger King. You don’t get paid an hourly rate, same as I don’t pay your fucking national insurance and neither of us pay any tax."
"So how do I pay you back?"
"Commission. You earn twenty percent of what you recover. I’ll deduct that amount from your debt. So the more you get out of my clients the happier, and richer, we’ll both be."
"None of these people, your clients, have any money, Mr Cooper."
"It’s surprising how often they can find money."
"Shit."
"You think so? We must use different dictionaries. Tommy Gregg, now he was a shit."
Everyone knew about Tommy. He’d mouthed off about how he wasn’t scared of Cooper. One night, Cooper and one of his thugs visited Tommy’s flat armed with a coffee grinder. These days, Tommy walked with a limp.
"This is the only offer you’re going to get," Cooper said. "It’s generous and it’s non-negotiable. Difficult to believe, but Tommy used to fancy himself as a hardman." He laughed. "See him now, Pearce. If I told him to suck my dick, the dirty toeless cripple would be down on his knees with his tongue hanging out like a hundred quid an hour whore before I got my fucking zip down. You wouldn’t want to end up like that, would you?" He paused for a moment. "So what’s your answer?"
Pearce said, "Okay," and Cooper said he’d see him tomorrow. One of his lads would show him the ropes.
When Pearce told his mum she said, "Don’t do it. I’ll lend you the money."
"And where are you going to find two grand?" he asked her.
"I suppose I could borrow it from Cooper."
"Right, Mum."
Pearce dug in his pocket and pulled out the list Cooper had given him. Four names, four addresses, four debts. The first on the list wasn’t at home. Cant had been second. The woman, Ailsa Lillie, was number three. She owed Cooper three hundred quid. Pearce wondered how much she’d borrowed. Hating this job already, he checked the street number, folded the paper and put it back in his pocket.
Cars slalomed down Easter Road, weaving between lay-bys and traffic islands. Buses stuttered along, threading through gaps in the oncoming traffic towards the next stop or pedestrian crossing. He squeezed through a gap in the queue at a cash machine, nearly treading on the tail of a dog tied up outside the neighbouring newsagents as he did so. At the first break in traffic, he crossed the road.
Ailsa Lillie’s building was next to a bookies. The exterior wall was black with soot and traffic grime. The outside door was open, but he pressed the buzzer and waited. No harm in being polite.
10:58 am
There they go again. Bang. Bang. Fucking bang.
Robin couldn’t sit in his flat doing nothing, not with that racket driving him mad. For at least a week now his almost totally deaf neighbour had been watching back-to-back John Wayne movies with the volume turned all the way up. Robin usually retaliated with a CD of a late Beethoven string quartet, or something with a prominent brass section – Janacek was good – or a Baroque opera played so loud the windows rattled. Often he’d sing along at the top of his voice. But not today. Today was different.
Two hours to go. He was tense. Couldn’t stay cooped up. Had to get out.
As if being a tenant again wasn’t depressing enough, their flat wasn’t as nice as the old one. They no longer had a separate kitchen, for instance, and on the rare occasions either he or Carol cooked, the smell permeated the furniture in the sitting room. The couch would stink of fish or steak or bacon or whatever for days. A granny carpet – flowers, in pinks and purples – covered the floor. The piano had been moved once too often and badly needed tuning. Didn’t matter, though, since he hardly ever played it. Five minutes now and then, maybe once a week, if the pain wasn’t too severe. Once his Robinson upright might have been a musical instrument, but these days, it functioned primarily as a piece of furniture.
If he was going out, he’d better fetch the bag.
Maddening striped wallpaper covered three of the bedroom walls. Despite the illusion of depth created by the mirrored wardrobes running along the remaining wall, the room looked crammed. On the dresser squeezed in the space between bed and door, stood twelve framed photos of Carol. Watching himself in the mirror, he knocked them onto the floor with a sweep of his arm.
How could she do this to him? He couldn’t believe she’d let Eddie touch her.
Observing his movements in the mirror as he shuffled forwards, he moved his right hand slowly, as if waving underwater. Conducting, of course. Who was asking? Yeah, he’d carry on as normal. An orchestra. What else? Pretend he didn’t know. Raising himself on his toes for an imagined upbeat, he adopted a faster tempo. His hand sliced through the air. After a few bars, he stabbed the circled finger and thumb of his left hand at the brass section. His hands dropped to his side and he shook his head. "Late again," he said. "Just not good enough."
Otherwise he risked jeopardising everything. And this was personal. Nothing to do with business. Tomorrow was soon enough to decide what to do. He would deal with Carol first and then he would deal with Eddie.
The bag lay under a pile of dirty clothes. He dug it out and slung the strap over his shoulder. If Eddie knew what he was about to do now, he’d have a heart attack. Robin chuckled at the thought.
Outside, the temperature was only a notch above freezing. But it was dry and he didn’t have far to walk. Just as well, since he couldn’t risk taking the car. He stepped under the canopy of poles and planks erected after the accident about a month ago when a window lintel had fallen from the third floor and struck a pedestrian on the neck. Workmen had arrived days later and covered half the block in scaffolding. They hadn’t been back since.
He passed Mrs Henderson, an old lady who lived in one of the ground floor flats in his building. She was wheeling a tartan shopping trolley behind her. He said, "Good morning," as he overtook her. She peered at him through her thick-lensed glasses, and nodded her tangle of white hair at him.
He turned the corner and crossed the road, the heel of his hand tingling. He wondered how the PI’s nose felt.
Hogging the centre of the congested post office, two freestanding display racks forced the queue along the side of the walls. More racks, stuffed full of leaflets, spanned the length of the near wall. Opposite, protected by a clear anti-bandit screen (that’s what they’re called, so Eddie said), two cashiers served with an unremitting lack of urgency. Robin observed the fat one, who looked about sixty. As she chatted to her colleague the flab under her chin wobbled.
When he reached the front of the queue he said, "A first class stamp, please." Her hairspray caught in his throat and he coughed before he had time to cover his mouth.
She said, "And then, well, I shouldn’t say," and tore a single stamp out of a book. He pushed a fifty pence piece through the gap at the bottom of the grill. "But there could be some trouble," she carried on, counting his change from neat piles stacked in a velvet-lined box. Her podgy white fingers pushed the money towards him.
"I’ll see you later," he said. Only then did he get her full attention.
"What did you say?"
He smiled at her and scooped up his change.
"Do I know you?"
He said, "Not yet," and left. She’d know him soon enough, though.
10:59 am
Ailsa Lillie buzzed Pearce into the building without a word. When he knocked on her door it opened a crack. She kept the chain on.
"Who is it?" Her voice was deep and came from the back of her throat. She wasn’t from Edinburgh. Her accent carried a north-east lilt.
"Can I come in?" He smiled at the slice of face that had appeared between door and doorframe. It looked as if someone had dunked her head in a sack of flour. Her hair was grey, her face pale except for the purple bruise over her eye.
"Why?" Her head shook. She looked about forty.
He lowered his voice. "You owe a friend of mine some money."
"Who?"
"You know who, Ailsa. Let me in."
"You seem nice," she said. "But I’m a poor judge of character. You could be a serial killer for all I know."
"You owe Mr Cooper three hundred quid. You think a serial killer would know that?" He hesitated, then continued, "All I want is for us to agree on some kind of mutually acceptable repayment terms."
Her eyes dropped. Without looking up she said, "Mutually acceptable?"
He nodded slowly. The door clicked shut. Seconds later it opened fully and she stood in front of him.
"Close the door behind you." She turned away from him, feet silent on the carpeted floor. "The bedroom’s this way."
"Wait." He stepped into the hallway and eased the door shut. She ignored him. He watched her disappear into the bedroom. She moved like somebody much younger. He slipped the chain back on. "Ailsa," he said. "Ms Lillie," he said. After a moment he followed her.
She was lying on her stomach on the unmade bed, her right leg dangling over the side. Repetitively, she dragged her toes over the surface of a faded red rug that was threadbare along the edge.
"Ailsa."
"You keep saying my name."
"I’m trying to tell you – "
"What’s yours?"
"My name’s not important."
"I’d like to know." She swivelled her hips and faced him, arms stretched over her head. "Oh please, at least grant me that. After all…"
"Pearce," he said.
"You are nice." Her green eyes shone. "Sit down next to me, Pearce"
He strolled towards the bed and sat down.
"How do you want to do it?" she said.
"What happened to you?" He reached towards her. When his fingertips were an inch from her face she turned her head away.
She laughed, but there was no humour in the sound that rasped from her throat.
"What happened your face?"
She mumbled into the pillow.
"I didn’t hear you." He leaned closer.
"What do you care?" Suddenly she sat up, pointing a pistol at him, holding it as if it was scalding her palm. She was shaking violently.
"If you shoot me Cooper will just send someone else." He held out his hand. "Someone who might not be as nice as me."
"Are you a bit thick, Pearce?" She clamped her other hand around the one that was clutching the gun and tried to steady her aim. "If I shoot you," she explained, "I’ll go to prison. Cooper will be the least of my worries. I’ll be safe."
"I might not be as thick as you think. Why don’t you tell me about it?" he said. "You borrowed the money from Cooper to buy that gun, didn’t you?" Her gaze flickered and he continued, "I would guess that the weapon was purchased with a certain person in mind. Am I right? Maybe that special person is the same one that knocks you about. How am I doing so far?"
Her lips twitched. "Not bad," she said.
"And might that be him?" He pointed to the framed photograph on the wall above her head. She didn’t look, but she nodded. "Husband?" he asked her, then noticed that the fingers gripping her gun were free of jewellery. They had stopped shaking, but her knuckles were white as young bone. "Just a boyfriend?" he said. "Why don’t you leave him?"
When she laughed again it was as if someone had wrapped her larynx in sandpaper. She said, "I tried that."
He lifted his eyebrows. "And you came back?"
"He didn’t like it."
"Who cares what he likes or doesn’t like?"
"If only it were that easy, Pearce." She gulped and lowered her hands. "As long as it involved me alone. As long as he didn’t touch anyone else, I was prepared to take his best shot."
Gently, Pearce prised one of her fingers off the gun.
"This is nothing." Her hands fell apart and the gun slid onto the bed. She touched her bruised eye. "Compared to what he did to Becky."
"Your sister?" He picked up the gun. It was heavier than he’d anticipated.
Ailsa Lillie shook her head. Her eyes blazed. "Rebecca’s my daughter."
He examined the weapon. Nickel, he guessed. CCCP engraved on the butt. "How old?"
"Eighteen." She paused, then added, "Old enough."
"For what?"
"A fractured cheekbone and a broken jaw."
"She doesn’t live here?"
"You kidding? Becky left home when she was sixteen." She smiled and said, "She’s a hairdresser."
"She his daughter?"
"No, thank God."
"This isn’t loaded." He showed her the empty magazine.
"Christ, don’t I know it."
He shoved the clip back in.
"After I’d paid for the gun," she said, "I didn’t have enough money left to buy bullets. I didn’t realise a box of ammo cost half as much as the gun."
"That’s a hell of a mark-up." He looked at her and started laughing. She joined him and sounded as if she meant it. He said, "What’s your boyfriend’s name?"
"Why do you want to know?"
"You’re in a mess, Ailsa. If you want out of it, here’s what you do. Tell me his name and where I can find him."
She told him. "He’s dangerous," she added.
"I’ll be very careful." He handed her the gun. "Take that to whoever you bought it from and demand your money back. You won’t get it all, so hold out for half. That’s reasonable. Enough to be useful to you, but not too much for him to lose face. He’ll see the sense in it if you point out that he can sell the gun again. Will you do that?"
She nodded.
He stood. "I’ll be round tomorrow to pick up the money."
She grabbed his hand. "What are you going to do?"
He shrugged. "Have a word with your boyfriend. Tell him it’s over. That you don’t want to see him again." He slipped his fingers out of hers and rubbed his chin.
"He’ll kill her." She clutched his hand again. "He’ll kill Becky."
"She has nothing to worry about."
She didn’t believe him. Creases lined her forehead and wrinkles erupted at both sides of her mouth.
"I promise you," he said, "neither you nor Becky will ever see him again."
Her forehead smoothed out once again and she looked almost pretty. "I owe your boss money. Why are you doing this? Why are you helping me? You some kind of vigilante or something?"
"Remember what I said?" He gazed down at her. "That I wanted to negotiate mutually acceptable repayment terms? Well, that’s what we’ve been doing. I never meant to imply that I wanted to…" He made a circular motion with his hand. "All that, anyway. It’s just business, Ailsa. You’re an investment and I’m protecting you like I would any other investment."
She levelled the gun at him, closed her puffy eye and said, "I should shoot you for being such a crap liar."
He turned his back on her. "I’ll see myself out."
"Hey," she said. "There’s a big guy who works with Pete. His name’s Tony. He’s nice too. Like you. Say hi to him for me."