The Weight of Angels

by Catriona McPherson

  I hadn’t been in T&C’s builder’s merchants since the early days in our real house when we were still hanging pictures and spreading gravel. It had grown since then. The outside yard had displays of decorative paving, birdbaths and sundials, and inside, as well as the saw blades and nails by the pound, there were alcoves with bathrooms set up and bigger alcoves with kitchens laid out, fruit bowls, wine racks and all. For the first time, it struck me that Marco getting his foot in the door here was more than just a bit of casual money and a way to save his face while he looked for a proper job. This was a proper job.

  ‘Ali?’ I looked at the girl behind the counter and just about recognized her. She’d definitely been at school with me, anyway. ‘You looking for Marco?’

  ‘I was in town and thought I’d stop by,’ I said. ‘See if I could cadge a lift home with him. What time does he finish?’

  She shrugged. ‘He’s the boss. He can finish when he likes. Go through.’ She nodded at a half-glass door to the side of the counter and I opened it after a quick knock to find Marco behind a desk covered with invoices and sample books. He was on the phone and he was smiling round the stick of a lollipop held between his teeth. As he saw me, he sat up and spat the lolly out all in one smooth move. I had time to wonder who he was talking to, with his eyes dancing that way. The same brown eyes as Angel, of course, since that was where Angel had got them, but Marco’s were bigger, big enough to shine tawny in sunlight, not like those two wee roasted hazelnuts that spiked my heart every time I really looked at them.

  ‘I’ll phone you back in a bit,’ Marco said. ‘My wife’s just walked in . . . Eh? . . . Aye . . . Oh, aye, probably.’

  ‘Who was that?’ I said, when the phone was down and Marco had wrapped the lolly in a twist of paper and dropped it in the wastebasket. He stood up and wiped his hands on his trouser-fronts.

  ‘Pete Muirhead,’ he said, just a bit too loud. ‘You know he got divorced, right? Aye, well, he’s been at that online dating. Jesus Christ, don’t ever leave me, Als. It’s a jungle.’ He laughed, and that was loud as well.

  ‘Whose office is this?’ I asked him.

  ‘Shared,’ he said. ‘The two supervisors and the manager all share it, depending on who’s in. But never mind that. Are you okay? What are you doing? Not that— Listen, do you want a cuppa now you’re here? I’m gasping. I’ll shoot over to the Whistlin’ Kettle, eh? Tea? Latte?’

  I had meant to tell him about the photograph of the watch and ask him what he thought. Double-checking, relying as I always had on his rough-and-ready good sense. The same bluff common sense that got me better quick after I was ill and had got him a supervisor’s job ten minutes after he’d started working here.

  But three things got in the way. One, I didn’t believe for a minute that Pete Muirhead had put those lights in Marco’s eyes, and two, that common sense hadn’t stopped him bringing a three-year-old child to a hospital and letting him see his mum pure white and flaked out with compression boots on and needles in the backs of her hands. There was too much else going on for me to think about that right now, but it was in there waiting. And three, it never occurred to me how strange it would strike him, me turning up like this. He should be worried, like maybe I wasn’t okay. He shouldn’t be stuttering and stumbling, trying to say the right thing and not quite making it. Covering up with offers of tea.

  But even while I tried to unpick all that, I saw something that distracted me. On the cabinet behind him there was a colour printer, its red standby light flashing at me. ‘Cup of tea would be great,’ I said. ‘And a coconut cake if they still do them.’

  ‘Oh, aye,’ said Marco, standing up and patting his back pocket to check his wallet. ‘Ice caps melt and empires fall but the Whistlin’ Kettle’s coconut cakes are for ever.’

  He gave me a kiss on the cheek as he passed me and I heard him shout to whatever her name was behind the till did she want a coffee. Hail fellow well met, I thought. And he hadn’t asked about Angelo. I walked round the desk and sat down, hoping the guy who really belonged here didn’t show up suddenly. Marco’s claim that the office was shared hadn’t fooled me for a minute. Then I saw something that puzzled me. There was a silver picture frame on the desk, incongruous there in that scruffy little room with the order books and invoices. It belonged on a bank manager’s polished mahogany or even on the top of a piano in a grand drawing room. But that wasn’t what bothered me. It was the picture. It was a photograph from a year ago, when Angelo had dabbled, so briefly, in after-school rugby. He had hated the dirt and the endless bruises as much as I had and he’d dropped out again. But there, on the manager’s desk at Marco’s new job, was a picture of him, hot and muddy, laughing into the camera with some other boy’s leg behind his head and some third boy’s hand tugging his jersey.

  I didn’t know whether to laugh or cry. Did two supervisors and the manager himself ‘hot-desk’ this grubby little office, even to the length of swapping their family photos shift by shift? And who was Marco trying to impress, picking a photo of Angel from a short-lived and out-of-character sporting career, instead of the honest truth of him scowling out from under his hoodie?

  But I was wasting time. I kissed the photo – he was my boy, after all – then looked for where to stick in the flash drive.

  The picture printed and the envelope sealed with a squirt of hand sanitizer, I pushed it up my sleeve and went back out to the shop floor.

  ‘Melanie!’ I said, happy finally to have remembered.

  ‘What?’ she said, startled.

  ‘Can you tell Marco I’ll be back in a minute?’ I said. ‘And don’t let him eat my cake. I just need to nip out to the post.’

  ‘Away and get,’ Mel said. She nodded to a wire basket on a shelf behind the till. ‘Stick it in there and I’ll bung it in with my post office run at the back of five.’

  ‘Oh, but I haven’t got a stamp on it yet,’ I said. ‘I’m not going to give Marco a bad name, pilfering the petty cash on his first week.’

  Mel frowned at me. ‘Who’s going to know?’ she said.

  ‘The other supervisor?’ I said. ‘The big boss?’ This was why I didn’t lie. I tripped myself up. I could have said anything, but because I had an envelope up my sleeve I had to mention posting something.

  ‘The supervisors don’t care,’ Mel said. ‘And the big boss thinks the sun shines out Marco’s hm-hm. Take a bloody stamp, Ali. This is me you’re talking to.’

  And I knew what she meant. Her and me and Elaine Malcolm had swiped all the cooking chocolate from the home-economics department store cupboard one day when we were going to an athletics tournament and made ourselves as sick as pigs in the back of the bus.

  She dinged open the till and peeled a stamp off a sheet, holding it out stuck to the tip of one finger. I stared at it. If I stuck that stamp on the envelope her print would be on it. If prints can survive the glue. Never mind that she’d wonder why I put gloves on before I shook my letter down from up my sleeve.

  ‘I’ll just nip out to the post if that’s okay,’ I said. ‘Keep things ship-shape.’

  Mel’s face closed, like a flytrap, and she jerked her chin up once before she unpeeled the stamp and stuck it back to the book again. ‘Good to know,’ she said. ‘Spot me this one for old times’ sake, eh? And I’ll watch it from now on. Never had Marco down as a jobsworth.’

  I gave her the best smile I could muster, then headed out, trying to make sense of the drop in temperature. Just because I didn’t want to nick a stamp, why would I go clyping to Marco? And how big a numpty would he have to be to carry tales from his wife to the manager about somebody who’d worked there longer than he had?

  I could just see the back of his head in the queue inside the Kettle so I turned away and nipped up the side-street, headed the long way round to the post office.

  ‘Well, there’s a sight for sore eyes,’ a voice said, as I came out of the next street down. I lifted my head. It was Muriel, one of the hairdressers who’d rented a chair
from me and then gone in as co-owner when I left. ‘How are you? Where have you been? How come you’ve not been in to see us all?’

  ‘Oh, you know,’ I said.

  ‘What? You’re not waiting for an invite, are you?’

  She had never been the sharpest tack on the stair carpet. Maybe she really couldn’t imagine why I didn’t want to come back in and visit the place that used to be mine now it was nothing to do with me. I gave her a smile and hoped my thoughts didn’t show through it, because I was thinking that it was pretty great to work with people who had a clue about how brains work. But as well as that I was thinking I couldn’t go into the post office now because clearly meeting me was a big deal in Muriel’s day and she wouldn’t forget it in a hurry.

  And just like that I came to my senses. I was mad to think I could hand it over on the down low. The cops would check Marco’s work printer as quick as they’d check Angelo’s home one. There was a much better way to do it. As long as my nerve didn’t fail me.

  Five minutes later I marched into the police station, all set to tell them someone had pushed the sealed envelope through our door and I had brought it to them before I even opened it in case it was something to do with the investigation. I sat down under the posters about needle disposal and drink-driving, waiting for the person in front of me to finish up. It was an elderly woman, well dressed and so ashamed of what had brought her there that she was leaning right over the desk, whispering to the secretary. I tried to sink back into myself so’s not to hear whatever it was she was so desperate to keep quiet. Her voice shook with emotion and the low responses she was getting didn’t seem to be soothing her.

  I shifted on the hard bench and moved the envelope to my other hand. The more of my prints on the outside the better, since the inside was clean. I read the poster about home safety again. I could feel sweat trickling down the insides of my arms. I was sitting so rigidly that, when my phone rang, I let go of the envelope, then dropped my phone when I bent down to swipe it up again.

  ‘Mum?’ It was Angel, his voice stretched harsh. ‘Where are you?’

  ‘I’m in the waiting room at the poli—’ I said.

  The secretary stood up and looked round the embarrassed woman at the desk. ‘No mobiles in here, madam,’ she said.

  ‘Mum, you need to get out of there.’

  ‘I’m just leaving,’ I said, standing up. I waved the phone at them. ‘He found it so I don’t need to make the theft report. Typical male!’ The secretary gave the ghost of a smile. I think she believed me. The old woman didn’t even turn round.

  ‘What is it?’ I said to Angel, once I was outside.

  ‘Were you really going to hand over a flash drive to the cops?’ he said.

  ‘I printed it out.’

  ‘They’d still know it came from my phone.’

  ‘How?’ My voice was a whisper as faint as that poor woman inside the station.

  ‘Okay, well, not my phone but one the same as mine. A Nokia. Not an iPhone. They can tell what make and model it was taken on.’

  I swallowed hard. ‘They’d be able to tell that from a printed-out copy? Not just from a file?’ I had the buzzing feeling in my lips that I knew went along with my face draining. I had got so close to doing something so stupid. ‘Why didn’t you tell me?’ I said, turning my fright into temper, unable to help it. ‘Jeez, Angel. Why didn’t you say that right away?’

  ‘I didn’t know! I – I looked it up.’

  But I had heard the break in his voice. ‘Don’t lie to me, Angelo. What did you key in?’

  ‘What?’

  ‘Don’t mess with me. If you looked it up, what did you Google?’

  ‘I can’t remember,’ he said. He was always a terrible liar. Not much better now than when he’d say he didn’t know what had happened to the choc ices when he was standing there with a mask of melted chocolate six inches wide all round his mouth.

  ‘Who did you phone?’ I asked him. ‘The same person you showed the picture to?’

  ‘I didn’t show the picture to anyone,’ he said, full of umbrage, covered by his technicality.

  But what technicality?

  I almost laughed as it hit me. He had practically told me. He’d said they ‘hung out’ a few times before they met up and before their ‘real date’.

  ‘You weren’t alone,’ I said. ‘You didn’t have to show someone the photo because someone was right there with you to see the real thing. And that same someone just told you about identifying the phone from the printed photo.’

  ‘Mum, for God’s sake,’ was his reply. ‘No one was with me when I took the photo!’ There was that same grievance and outrage again.

  ‘Angelo, this isn’t a game and she’s not trustworthy. She’s proved that to you.’

  ‘Never mind that,’ he said. ‘I just want to forget all about it. Listen, I’ve worked out why the specs are posher than the rest of his stuff. At least, I think so.’

  ‘Okay,’ I said. ‘Convince me.’

  ‘The cheap belt and jeans and watch, right?’ he said.

  ‘Yeah.’

  ‘Whoever stashed the body knew they’d be found, right?’

  ‘Yeah.’

  ‘Exactly. Whoever it was took his Gucci belt and Ferragamo suit and Hublot watch off him and disguised him as an ordinary Asda kind of guy. And they took his posh specs off him too. His smashed specs. Only they didn’t know they’d left a bit behind. They had no idea they’d left behind a clue that he was rich.’

  ‘God Almighty, you’re right!’ I said. ‘Yeah, you’re right. Did you think of that all on your own? Do you really know all those designers’ names? Ferra-who?’

  He didn’t answer me. But before I could wonder why, I saw the sergeant coming round the corner with one of his wee WPCs trotting at his side. ‘I need to go, Angel,’ I said, and switched off the phone.

  ‘Mrs McGovern,’ the sergeant said, twinkle-eyed and beaming, standing right in front of me that way that policemen do. He wasn’t tall but he was wide with big shoulders and thick short legs. The overall effect was someone you wouldn’t mess with.

  ‘I was waiting to see you,’ I said, ‘but my phone rang so I had to come out.’

  ‘And what’s brought you all the way in here from the wilds of Dundrennan to ask me?’ he said.

  ‘Tell you actually,’ I corrected, which he didn’t think much of. ‘It’s about the Armani specs and how they don’t go with the—’ my lips had rounded to say ‘watch’ before I managed to stop and change it to ‘—own-make jeans and cheap belt.’

  ‘Oh, uh-huh?’ he said. ‘You think you’ve considered some angle that’s outwitted the plods, do you?’

  ‘I wouldn’t put it that way,’ I said. ‘It’s just it occurred to me, you know, chewing it over, that the cheap stuff was deliberately put on him to make you think you were looking for that kind of guy. An ordinary type. And whoever it was that bashed his head in didn’t notice that a bit of his fancy glasses got left behind when they stripped him. So I reckon you’re looking for a Flash Harry and they didn’t want you to know that. See?’

  The look of scorn didn’t even flicker on his face as he answered me. ‘Very good, Mrs McGovern. Yes, we’ve been working on that basis for eight days now. And I’d be grateful if you’d not gossip about your theory. Okay?’

  But the WPC blew it. Her eyes flashed and a little grin crept onto her lips. She even half turned towards the door of the station as if she was champing to get in and see what they could make of the new information.

  ‘Really?’ I said. ‘I’d have thought you’d want to spread the news. Help with the ID.’

  ‘But you’re not a trained detective,’ the sergeant said. His poker face was a thing of wonder. There wasn’t the slightest sign on it that he was talking shite, but his eyes had lost the twinkle.

  ‘Right, then,’ I said. ‘I better get round to T&C, see if that man of mine’s ready to hit the road.’

  ‘Oh, yes, that’s right,’ the sergeant s
aid. ‘The McGovern family is well in there, all of a sudden.’

  I nodded and left them. I wondered if he had always liked being a know-all and if that’s what made the police service seem like such a tempting idea, or if being the one who got to ask the questions and didn’t have to answer any had turned him into what he was.

  Marco was back in the manager’s office with my lukewarm tea and the coconut cake turning the bag greasy.

  ‘You can use a stamp, Ali,’ he said. When I didn’t answer he went on, ‘I didn’t go bankrupt over stationery.’

  ‘What?’ I said. ‘I never said a word.’

  ‘Yeah, and it nearly deafened me.’

  So I never said a word about the decoy watch, belt and jeans theory and how the specs had scuppered it either. We drove home in silence and he didn’t turn the car round to get the passenger side into the kerb, like he usually did when it was raining. He just pulled in, climbed out and slammed the door, leaving me to scrabble for my own key to dink the car locked, then hurry up the path as the wind threw the cold rods of rain at the side of my head until my hair was dripping.

  Chapter 19

  But I told Lars all about it in the car the next morning, and he told Belle and Hinny in the staff kitchenette, where they were setting themselves up with coffee for the change.

  ‘Lord, you’re right, Ali,’ Belle said, thinking it over and nodding. ‘Did all of that just come to you?’

  ‘To my kid,’ I said, squashing down the memory of Angel saying, Gucci, Ferra-something and Hublot. Unless they made trainers, how could he possibly know?

  ‘Bright spark,’ said Hinny. I flashed on the picture of him that morning, a mound under the duvet, refusing to budge, missing another day of school.

  ‘Wasted effort, though,’ Lars said. ‘He’s been in the ground over a decade. Whoever killed him, and chavved him up away back when, couldn’t have dreamed what was going to happen in between then and now, eh?’