The Day She Died

by Catriona McPherson

  “You make it sound as if you’ve only just met him,” he said. “I thought you were friends.”

  The shop door dinged before I could answer and I turned, gratefully, away. I didn’t recognise the man who stood there. Definitely not a client. He was in his fifties, dressed in jeans and Timberland boots, with a Gore-Tex fleece on top and a Gore-Tex shoulder harness on top of that with a phone velcroed on. He smiled at me.

  “Miss Constable,” he said. “I’m here about the clothes.”

  I blinked. Then I got it. This was the volunteer care worker, and I hadn’t started searching for what we might have in a twenty-eight. I smiled back. A few years ago I’d have said he didn’t look like a typical volunteer, back when they were all church ladies. But it was getting hard to tell now. Folk were getting nervous about their jobs and rounding out their CVs. And some of the big companies in town had cottoned on to giving time instead of money too, all those middle managers taking an afternoon to streamline some charity into efficiency and sending the little old church ladies packing with the new rules and the computing system.

  Father Tommy was sick of the lot of them. “Say it with cash” was one of his slogans. He’d tried to tell that to the Peter Pan steering group. But he’d said a lot of other stuff too. “Hierarchy, a line of command, central control of resources. It’s not a quilting bee.” And someone at the meeting had piped up—I knew because Dot had told me—“Would His Holiness be interested, Father?” and there’d been a lot of tittering and a few jokes about Bishoprics and Presbyteries, which didn’t sound all that funny and Father Tommy resigned from the committee saying that it would all end in tears.

  And hadn’t it just! Poor old house was lying there with the roof off and the blue polythene sheet flapping and a bulldozer sitting chained up in the garden, because the plant hire company wouldn’t let the volunteer building crew use it and wouldn’t send a driver (or even come and pick it up) until they got paid. A fiasco, just like Father Tommy had said, and who could blame him for sounding a bit chuffed about it.

  I was on my way to the outsize section when I turned.

  “Women’s clothes?” I asked. How could a male volunteer help a woman try clothes on?

  “Men’s clothes, Miss Constable,” he said. And that was another thing. Volunteers were Miz users all the way. Only the little old church ladies ever Miss’ed me.

  “Size twenty-eight is a woman’s size, though,” I said.

  He stared at me. I stared back. Steve cleared his throat and disappeared through the back. When he had gone, the man moved forward, pretty fast, between the rails and tables.

  “I hear you didn’t want to say where you’d seen them,” he said. He spoke without moving his bottom lip, as if his teeth were clenched. Made him look like a ventriloquist’s dummy.

  “I have no idea what you’re talking about.”

  “Bit late for that,” he said. “You did better than that yesterday. ‘If only he hadn’t been wearing a donkey jacket, he might not have drowned.’ ” He said in a high, mincing voice, mocking me.

  “Those clothes!” I blurted. I started back, but he grabbed my arm.

  “Hey!” I said. “Steve?” I heard the toilet flushing and shouted louder. “Steve!”

  “Where is he?” he said. “What do you know?”

  He was gripping my arm really hard just below the elbow and he started turning it back, like you do when you’re taking a drumstick off a roasted chicken, until it snaps. But I’d been well trained in getting out of someone’s grip who was bigger and stronger and thought they could bully you. I looked quickly to check my aim and then stamped down on his boot. My foot bounced back, aching. Steel-toe caps? But I’d distracted him long enough to let me knee him hard in the groin. Then I felt his grip slacken, and I twisted my arm away. I got myself behind the counter and yelled again.

  “Steve!”

  He was limping badly, but he made his way to the door.

  “Hey, pal,” I said. He looked up, just for an instant, and I had him. Click! We always keep a camera behind the desk in case there’s trouble.

  “I haven’t finished with you,” he said, pointing at me, jabbing the air with his finger. His other hand was cupped over his crotch.

  “Oh, you’re a big scary man that’s holding his willie,” I said. If someone really goes for me, I always turn lippy. And it worked on this guy. He left without another word.

  “Were you shouting?” said Steve. “I was in the loo.”

  “Yeah, sorry,” I said. “Listen, Steve, what exactly did Dot tell you happened yesterday?” Because someone had told that guy everything, down to the very words. So either Dot or Steve, whether deliberately or accidentally, had said far too much to someone.

  “What I said,” said Steve. “Why?”

  “Trust me,” I told him.

  “Dot said the police thought you recognised the coat.”

  “Did Dot say whether she thought I did too?”

  “No,” said Steve.

  “Did you tell anyone?”

  “Tell them what? What’s going on, Jessie?”

  “I’m not sure,” I said. “I need to think. So if you didn’t mind looking out some twenty-eights, I’m going to slip away.”

  There was an idea growing inside me, like some kind of toxic toadstool, but I couldn’t root it out. Dot had said something to me and when I called her on it, she’d toughed it out, counting on me not asking her to follow through. She’d slipped and she knew it. Then I shook myself. Dot? Dittery Dot? Dot lived in a bungalow in Thornhill with a Corgi. But still.

  I took the camera with me. Round to Catherine Street, into the library. I didn’t have time to check for myself, so I went to the reference desk and asked the librarian there.

  “Hi,” I said. “Listen, am I right in thinking that you keep press clippings?” He nodded. “So does that mean you go through the papers every day?” Another nod. “So if something had been in the news about Dumfries, you’d know, right?”

  “If it was memorable enough,” he said. “I’m not the oracle.”

  “Oh, you’d remember this,” I assured him. “Are there gangsters in town? Known gangsters?”

  He laughed. He must have wondered why I couldn’t join him. “No, not that I can recall,” he said, clearing his throat.

  “So there’s not been anything in the paper about real proper master gangsters?”

  “Not in the Standard,” he told me. “Maybe the Marvel.” And he laughed again, at his own joke this time.

  I thanked him and left, my head fizzing. However Dot knew about gangsters in town, it wasn’t from the paper like she’d said. She was in this. She had to be.

  I hurried across the road to my flat. I’d told Kazek I’d be back in the evening, so I hoped I wouldn’t surprise him in the shower. But it was better to do it now. If the Timberland boot man was going to have me followed, he’d do it at four when the Project closed. This might be my last chance to drop in on Kazek safely, for a while anyway. Thinking that, I changed direction, went to the corner shop, and stocked up on milk, rolls, chocolate bars, big bags of crisps, some bacon and eggs. The girl behind the counter stared at me and couldn’t help her lip curling. I know, I know, I wanted to say. Only stoners buy bags and bags of junk food in corner shops in the middle of the day. But where would your business be without them?

  Kazek was in the shower, but fully dressed, with the shower head in pieces on the floor of the bath. “Jessie-Pleasie?” he called.

  “It’s me!” I called back.

  “Broke. Fix,” said Kazek. “Come in.”

  And then he explained very fast, with lots of pointing at the shower head, what I already knew: that the water only came out of one side and the hot and cold didn’t mix together properly. “Fix,” he said. He had my pathetic little collection of tools laid out on the slip mat. An adjustable spanner, a
set of screwdrivers from out of a Christmas cracker, and a hammer and measuring tape in matching purple flowers that I’d got at work in the Secret Santa.

  “Thank you,” I said. I held up the carrier bags and then went to the kitchen to put them away. He’d been busy in there too. The cheap cabinet doors that had slipped down on their hinges until they were all hanging crooked were all hanging straight again. And—was this even possible?—the wrinkles were gone from the vinyl flooring. I bent down and squinted along the length of it. There should have been ripples like in the mouth of a whale, but there was nothing.

  “Fix,” he said, coming up behind me.

  “How?” I asked him. He reached into the swing bin and pulled out a rolled-up strip of vinyl, then he showed me the line of tacks along the far end holding it down, screwing his face up in apology for the shoddy workmanship.

  “I’ll let you off,” I said. “You lifted and relaid my lino?” I turned round and checked out the living room. “Haven’t hemmed the curtains yet, I see. Free-loader.” He caught my tone and smiled.

  “Okayyyyyyy,” I said.

  “Okayyyyyyy,” said Kazek.

  I pulled the camera out of my bag, found the picture of the Timberland boot guy, and handed it over. I should have seen it coming. Kazek dropped it. Good hands though; he caught it before it hit the floor.

  “Bad man,” he said. “Jamboree.”

  “Let’s phone Ros’s sister.” I had to mime before he got me, but he got me in the end. I handed him the phone and watched while he punched in the number.

  “Hello?” she said, when he passed the phone to me.

  “Eva?” I said. “Hello. My name is Jessie Constable and I’m a friend of Kazek’s.”

  “He told me,” she said. “He gave me a different number for you but no one answered, and then he called me yesterday. Thank you so much for taking care of him.”

  “How do you know Kazek?” I asked, but she had her own priorities.

  “Do you know where my sister is?”

  “I don’t. I hoped you could tell me something that might help me find her. She left the place she was staying on Saturday.”

  “She would never leave Kazek and Wojtek. Or worry me this way. Why has she not phoned me?”

  “I don’t know,” I told her. “I really can’t say. But here’s a good thing. She took her stuff with her. Some of it anyway. She left deliberately. Packed and made plans.”

  “She would not leave Kazek,” Eva repeated. “Why would she do that, eh?”

  Now this was a problem. I didn’t know what her sister knew about Ros’s life, the possible Becky connection, the money, the kind of

  people Ros hung around with if Timberland Guy was one of them.

  “Listen,” I said. “I showed Kazek a photo of someone,” I said. “I’m going to pass you over and I want you to ask the name. Okay? Ask who it is.” It only took a moment until I had her back again.

  “Gary,” she said “Gang man. Does he know where Ros is?” Here she broke down into dry heaving sobs. I put my hand over the phone.

  “Gary?” I said to Kazek, pointing at the camera. He nodded and crossed himself. “But who is he?” I said into the phone. Gary the Gangster? Didn’t seem likely. Thomas the Tank Engine. Larry the Lamb. And if Ros’s sister knew there was a gang mixed up in this, did she know about the money too?

  “How does Ros know him?” I asked.

  “She doesn’t,” the sister said. “Why would she know such a person?”

  “Look,” I said, “I don’t want to worry you, but Wojtek is dead.” Her gasp made the line crackle. “And Kazek is terrified for his life. It’s true, even if he hasn’t told you. I can’t actually believe this is happening—and if you knew Dot, you’d know I’m not kidding—but Ros is involved somehow. A young woman killed herself. Not Ros, for God’s sake! Her friend Becky. So I really need to find Ros, because she’s the one who’s skipped and left all this behind her. She must know something.”

  “You are looking for my sister to answer questions?” said Eva. “Not to make sure she is safe and okay?”

  “Where did Kazek get the money?” I asked her.

  “What money?” she said.

  “Ask him.” I passed the phone over and listened to them. I was beginning to think I could understand Polish by now. I could get the gist of the intonation anyway, and I couldn’t believe what I was hearing. I grabbed the phone back.

  “Well?” I said.

  “He doesn’t know what money you mean,” Eva said.

  “He bloody does,” I said. “God, if we had Skype, I could show you.” Except of course I didn’t know where he’d stashed it this time. “Okay, listen. Can you think of anyone Ros would go to? Any town she’s got friends in, any particular reason she’d have to go somewhere instead of somewhere else?”

  “I think I don’t trust you,” she said. “I don’t know how you know all these dead people. Or why you are looking for Ros. What is the real true reason you want to find her, eh?”

  “Oh, great,” I said.

  “I think I will call the police,” she said.

  “Yes, good! I agree,” I told her.

  “Let me speak to Kazek,” she demanded.

  “To tell him not to trust me? Why should I?” But I handed the phone over anyway, because she could just as easy call back after I’d gone. I gave him the hard stare with my arms folded all the time he was talking. Policja was the only thing I understood out of the whole endless stream of it. He talked her round too. “Nie dzwon po policja. No police. Okay,” was the last thing he said before Czesc and hanging up. He raised his hands, surrendering. Hung his head too.

  “Sorry, Jessie-Pleasie,” he said.

  “Okay,” I said. “I will find something, either in the cottage or at Gizzy’s, in Ros’s old gaff or in the office or something somehow, or something she said to Gizzy or Gus or Ruby or something for God’s sake that’ll help us work out where she’s gone—and then we can find her.”

  He nodded. He walked over to the kettle and held it up, questioning, for all the world like we were just two pals hanging out in my flat, like you do.

  “Only what’s that going to change?” I said, sort of to him but more to myself, really. “She might be able to tell me why Becky killed herself, but how can she get Gary the Gangster off your back?”

  “Jaroslawa jest prawnikiem,” said Kazek. “Prawnikiem, Jessie-

  Pleasie.”

  “Write it down,” I said. I gave him a scrap of paper from beside my phone and once he had scribbled on it, I put it in my pocket and sat back. I was exhausted. Then I hauled myself to my feet, opened the fridge, and showed him the shopping.

  “Stay here,” I told him. “Don’t answer the door.”

  Nineteen

  I stayed exhausted too. Four o’clock came crawling round, and I had to drive back to the cottage with the car windows open to keep myself awake. One good thing about living down a farm track and through a caravan site, though—especially when you had to take it at five miles an hour behind the bin lorry—was I could be sure Gary or one of his minions wasn’t following me. I stepped out onto the turf and let the sea breeze blow my hair back. Minions! Could someone be a friend of Dot and have minions? Henchmen, heavies, muscle. A week ago I thought I knew what my worries were, and they were bad enough. I turned and looked towards the cottage. Then, in the time-honoured way, it all went tits up because I met a guy.

  I could see him through the living room window. He was sitting at the table, bent over something. Reading, maybe, or writing. And I could hear the sound of the kids, squealing and thrashing about with something. Would I go back? Undo it if I could? I pushed my sleeve up and looked at the red mark where Gary had grabbed me. Thought about Kazek in my flat and Ros’s sister. Gus lifted his head and waved. I waved back and trotted up the path.

  “Hiya!” I s
houted.

  “Jessieeeeee!” squealed Ruby.

  “Mummmeeeeee,” said Dillon coming along at her heels. He put his head against my legs and hugged me.

  “He doesn’t mean it,” Ruby told me. “He calls everybody that babysits Mummy.”

  “I know,” I said, playing it cool, but my heart had filled my chest until I thought my coat would pop open. “So what are you doing?”

  “Playing at funerals,” said Ruby. “Come on, Dill. You be the dead body and I’ll be the angel.”

  I took off my coat and scarf and fluffed my hair in the mirror, stopped just short of biting my lips and pinching my cheeks. Got close though.

  “Did you hear that?” I asked Gus. He was writing—a proper letter on a pad of writing paper with a lined sheet underneath to keep it straight.

  “Yeah,” he said, laughing. “Wee toe rags. I told them about Becky’s funeral, and Ruby took to it. Hey, guess what?”

  “Who’re you writing to? Relations?” I said. “What?”

  “What relations?” he said. “I thought I’d told you. I’m writing to that hill walker. See if he wants to come to the funeral maybe.” I couldn’t keep the frown off my face. He raised his eyebrows, silently asking.

  “Ohhhh, I don’t know,” I said. “Just. Okay, that’s a nice idea. He might. Best to give him the choice. But what about your mum and your dad? And why not try to reach your brother? And surely Becky must have some family. Why not let them all know on the off-chance some of them might want to come too? That’s all. I’ll butt out. That’s all I’m going to say.”

  “Guess who phoned today,” he answered. I think it was an answer anyway.

  “Your brother,” I tried. “Becky’s mum? Who?”

  “Try again, Jess,” he said. “Who have we been waiting to hear from?”

  “Who?” I said. “Oh! Ros’s sister?” Shit! Did she phone here after we spoke to her at the flat? Had she dropped me in it? Can’t have, the way he was smiling at me.