What You Pay For

by Claire Askew

  It wasn’t until I saw Toad in action that I realised how smart he could be.

  Anyway, he brought me a pint and I sat there and sipped it while he and Tsezar chucked their double vodkas back. I really wasn’t the brightest kid. I had no idea the shit that was about to go down.

  Rab had steered her back out through the bullpen, one hand hovering behind her shoulder, not quite touching, but somehow propelling her forward nevertheless.

  ‘You just go and clean yersel’ up, hen,’ he’d said, his voice softer now. ‘Take your time, I’ll be here.’

  Birch had stood for a while, looking at her own face in the mirror. She couldn’t quite believe how bad she looked: her eyes sunken by lack of sleep, her skin pink and blotchy. The mascara she’d ham-fisted on that morning was now redistributed in streaks across her face. She’d wadded up a paper towel and soaked it, then done her best to erase the evidence of her own emotional detonation.

  It wasn’t the first time she’d had messages ‘from Charlie’. In the wake of the disappearance, when Grant Lockley had made it his personal mission to fill the papers with the murkiest speculations he could find, it had happened a fair bit. Well-meaning bystanders with impossible so-called sightings: Charlie getting on a city bus at the same time every morning, as if to commute. Charlie drinking in the Gunner in Muirhouse. Charlie on a beach in Spain, even. Cranks writing intricate letters insisting they knew the truth. The odd cruel arsehole who’d claimed to be Charlie: usually abroad and in need of money in vast sums. Chancers. Fantasists. But none for many a year now . . . and never anything like this.

  It was hard to run away from what this might be, now: it most likely wasn’t someone she’d booked once having a laugh at her expense, and it definitely wasn’t some lonely random-dial weirdo. This person was invested: those flowers weren’t a cheap Interflora job. The phone stranger, the skull-masked man, his friends in the dark grey Mercedes: were they connected? And if they were, what did they want? For the life of her, she had no idea.

  Now, she sat opposite Rab in one of the canteen’s bucket-like plastic chairs, a cup of milky tea on the table between them. Rab was watching her drink it: he’d loaded it with sugar the way her granny used to whenever anyone took a fainting fit. He’d helped himself to a sad-looking Danish pastry with implausible yellow custard at the centre of its swirl. His hands shook, just slightly, and Birch wondered if this was a permanent affliction, or if it was just a while since Rab’s last smoke.

  ‘With all due respect,’ she said, after they’d sat quietly for a while, ‘shouldn’t you be somewhere right now?’

  Rab grinned. ‘Probably,’ he said. ‘But I like tae prioritise.’

  Birch sipped her saccharine tea.

  ‘So,’ Rab said, lifting the entire Danish between his thumb and two indelicate fingertips, ‘now you’re going to tell me what’s been going on, darlin’.’

  She took a deep breath and, stalling for time, blew the non-existent steam off the surface of her tea.

  ‘Okay,’ she said at last. ‘I have a little brother. Or I did have.’

  Rab nodded. ‘Charlie Birch,’ he said.

  Birch found herself smiling, the way she sometimes did when someone recognised her brother’s name. It was funny, him being a little bit famous – except it wasn’t at all, because he was also probably dead.

  ‘You know,’ she said.

  ‘Aye. You think I came up the Clyde on a banana boat, hen?’ Rab laughed. ‘Excuse me, another o’ my granny’s. It wis a big case for a while there. I mind yer man Lockley writing up a storm in the papers.’

  Birch rolled her eyes. ‘You and everyone else,’ she said. ‘But you know my feelings about that.’

  Rab waited, so she went on.

  ‘Okay, so . . . if yesterday I seemed a little, I don’t know – off, that’s because it was Charlie’s anniversary. The anniversary of his disappearance, I mean. Fourteen years.’

  Rab waggled his eyebrows at her. ‘That long?’ he said. ‘Holy Mary Mother of God, does the time no’ fly, hen? But anyway . . . go on.’ He opened his mouth and bit off about one-third of the Danish: a sign that he didn’t plan to speak again for a while.

  ‘It’s hard every year,’ she said. ‘But this year it felt worse, with Operation Citrine and everything, you know? And maybe something about just having got back out there, after the disciplinary. For a while I couldn’t keep busy . . . I had too much time to think about him.’

  Rab was chewing, and nodding.

  ‘But also,’ Birch went on, ‘something happened yesterday. Well, a few things happened actually. And I don’t know what the hell’s going on, but I don’t think it was an accident that it all kicked off on the anniversary. Someone knows about Charlie.’

  Rab swallowed. ‘Someone?’

  Birch closed her eyes. ‘Sorry,’ she said. ‘These . . . I’m getting funny phone calls. Like . . . silence on the line. Someone listening to me. A man. The first one, yesterday, there was breathing – but not like a heavy-breather sort of call, more like laughing. Like a creepy, husky laugh. Then the rest, just silent. Or they have been. Until today.’

  Rab took another giant mouthful.

  ‘Yeah,’ she said, feeling her face begin to prickle. ‘Today I kind of lost it, and . . . I spoke. I said some stuff to them. Or him. Whatever. I showed he was getting to me.’

  Rab chewed, watching her.

  ‘Maybe I brought it on myself,’ she said, ‘not taking him seriously, ignoring the calls. Now he’s upped his game.’

  She tossed the florist’s card across the tabletop to Rab. She watched him enact a calmer version of her own reaction: he read the message, frowned, then flipped the card to look at the back. No further clues.

  ‘You think they’re one and the same?’

  Birch nodded. ‘He was on the phone,’ she said, ‘as you walked in. He mentioned the flowers. Or seemed to, anyway. But there’s something else, too.’

  ‘Aye, go on.’

  She closed her eyes, trying to see again what she’d seen the previous night, trying to conjure it.

  ‘There was a man,’ she said. ‘In my back garden – or I think he was. When I got home last night, he climbed out over the wall and walked up to my car. It was right after I’d parked, like he’d been waiting for me.’

  Opening her eyes again, she saw a switch flip somewhere in Rab, and he went into interview mode.

  ‘Description?’ he said.

  ‘Medium height,’ she replied, ‘maybe five ten, five eleven. Lean guy – he had no trouble scaling an eight-foot wall. Dressed in black jeans with a belt, a big belt buckle, and a plain hoodie. Very short dark hair, like a buzz cut. Caucasian, I think, but it was dark, and he was wearing this skull mask.’ She corrected herself. ‘Well . . . a bandanna with a skull face on it.’

  She could see Rab taking mental notes.

  ‘And he approached the car?’

  She nodded. ‘Came right up to the passenger window and just stood there,’ she said. ‘Hands folded in front of him. And then . . . Rab, it was so weird. This car pulled up on my driver’s side, cheek-by-jowl, close enough to touch, nearly. In fact, it drove past me, but then stopped and reversed back. And this guy walked around the back of my Mondeo and got in the other car – the back seat, driver’s side. A dark-coloured Merc, before you ask. Black, or maybe dark grey.’

  ‘You didnae get the reg?’

  Birch flushed. ‘SK65,’ she said, ‘but that’s all – and I’m not positive.’

  Rab posted the last chunk of Danish into his mouth, looked down into Birch’s half-empty tea cup, and chewed.

  ‘That,’ he said, after a long time, ‘is an uncanny thing, agreed.’

  ‘I’m sorry,’ Birch found herself saying. ‘I’m kicking myself for not getting the number plate. My phone was ringing too, this same withheld number guy, and . . . it all happened fast. I was . . .’

  ‘You were terrified, lassie, and no shame in being so,’ Rab said. ‘Dinnae go fretting. The only w
ay ye went wrong was not phoning up here and making a report on the spot. And ye ken that fine well.’

  Birch sighed. ‘I know. I just . . . when I got in, the house was still all locked up. Nothing gone from the garden.’ She remembered the call with Anjan. ‘I was tired and . . . got distracted. But nothing else happened all night. I mean, was there even a crime?’

  Rab rolled his eyes, a thing she wouldn’t expect a man of his age and bearing to do. She almost laughed.

  ‘Was the garden secure?’ he asked. ‘Locked?’

  ‘Yes.’

  ‘Grounds for trespassing, then. Threatening behaviour too, for sure – come oan. Ye’d take it seriously if some elderly wifey phoned that in.’

  Birch grimaced.

  ‘Aye.’ Rab put his forearms onto the table, and leaned towards her. ‘So what’s good enough for a wifey is good enough for you, all right? Enough secrets. Promise me.’

  Birch nodded, though she felt queasy. I don’t want secrets, as such, she thought. But I do want privacy . . .

  Rab was patting at his various pockets. At length, he produced a biro, and a scuffed-looking business card: yellow and black, not his own card, but one for a Glasgow-based taxi firm. He turned it over, and wrote a mobile phone number on the card’s plain back, BIG RAB in all caps next to it.

  ‘That’s me,’ he said, ‘out of hours. Anything else happens, I want you to call me.’ He held the card out to Birch.

  She looked at it.

  ‘Come oan, lassie,’ he said, flapping the card at her. ‘It’s no’ like calling the cavalry. It’s just if something else happens that you cannae put yer finger on, and ye want a chat about it. All right?’ He flapped the card again. ‘Take it, there’s a good girl.’

  Birch sighed, but there was a smile under her exasperation. She dropped the card into the breast pocket of her blouse.

  ‘Now,’ Rab said. ‘The big stuff. If ye had tae make a guess, who is it that’s phoning ye?’

  Birch frowned.

  ‘Wild guess,’ he said.

  She looked down into the beige tea, half gone now, its surface turning oily. ‘I’m sorry,’ she said. ‘I’ve been racking my brains trying to think: who have I wronged, who have I nicked in the past who might be recently out and wanting to wind me up? I mean, there are probably some old perps out there who’d like to have a go, but how many of them have my work number? Or are this persistent? Who’d link it to Charlie? I can’t get it straight in my head. I can’t make it add up.’

  ‘Lockley?’

  Birch paused, then shook her head. ‘I don’t think so,’ she said. ‘I’ve wondered about that, but it’s not his style, to be anonymous. There’s nothing he’s more fond of than saying his own name. No way he’d send those flowers and not sign the card. And he wouldn’t be making the calls – he’s on remand for hacking phones and the Police National Computer. If he had to explain how he got my number it wouldn’t bode well for his case.’

  Rab was nodding again, wearing a look that Birch couldn’t read, but didn’t like.

  ‘Someone close to Lockley?’ He didn’t seem to want to let the Lockley idea go – as if he didn’t believe it but wanted it to be true.

  ‘I can’t think who. Or why, really. His fans are a whole lot less rabid now he’s up on criminal charges.’ Birch snorted. ‘Funny that.’ She turned her eyes downward again, but in the margin of her vision saw Big Rab pass a hand over his eyes.

  ‘Well, lassie,’ he said. ‘I’m no’ a fan o’ this theory, but it looks pretty likely from where I’m sitting that aw this is linked tae the Solomon case. Operation Citrine, day one: these phone calls start. And intimidating the polis is a Solomon speciality.’

  Birch glanced back up at Rab. He looked tired. The shaking in his hands had increased.

  ‘I guess,’ she said. ‘But I’m not a big fish in this operation. Surely it’s Crosbie they want. Or DCI McLeod, or you.’

  Rab shrugged. ‘Aye, but . . . without sounding auld-fashioned, we’re men. It’s no’ Solomon himself, thanks to the bars he’s behind – it’d be his boys. If they’d been told tae intimidate wan of us, they might well start wi’ a woman, it’s their speciality. An’ they’re no’ the brightest sparks. Blunt instruments, shall we say. Although – the flowers. That isnae just some thug that’s done that.’

  Birch put her elbows on the table, and made a bowl for her head with her laced hands. Her neck ached. She was feeling every second of her sleepless night, all at once.

  ‘You see?’ She could tell her own voice was muffled behind her hands and arms and hair. ‘It’s maddening.’

  Birch held her head that way for a long time. She knew she was in danger of dropping off to sleep, in spite of the buzzy overhead lights, the hard plastic table under her elbows and Rab right across from her, waiting for her to speak. She shifted slightly, pressing the heels of her hands into her eye sockets and watching the neon-green fractals her retinas made. She did this for so long that she half expected Rab would have stood and left by the time she sat up again. But no, there he was: leaning back in his chair, his arms folded, his loose gaze fixed on nothing in particular.

  ‘Of course,’ he said, when he saw she’d recovered. ‘I have tae ask . . .’

  Birch blinked. The fractals still swam in her vision. ‘Ask what?’

  Rab’s expression sharpened, and he eyeballed her. ‘Charlie,’ he said. ‘Is there any chance that Charlie really does send his love?’

  Birch flinched hard, like she’d been slapped. ‘I don’t know what you mean,’ she said, though she did.

  ‘Where is Charlie?’ Rab kept his arms folded, but pitched forward to rest them on the table. Birch blinked. ‘Do you know?’

  She felt oddly stung by the question, wondered why he was asking it. Her head fizzed. ‘No,’ she said. ‘There hasn’t been a proper lead in fourteen years. A couple of blind alleys, but – no.’

  Rab held his hands up, as if she were pointing a gun at him. ‘Now, I’m talking just tae talk for a second,’ he said. ‘But if there’s been no evidence . . .’

  Birch scraped her chair back, hard, shocking him into silence. She stood. ‘No, Rab. Please don’t. Please don’t speculate like that.’

  He looked up at her. His mouth was open, but he didn’t look stung. Not exactly.

  ‘It’s been fourteen years,’ she said. ‘If you think I haven’t heard every conspiracy theory going, then you’re dead wrong. If you think every time I get a cryptic spam email or a missent letter I don’t immediately think, It’s Charlie, then you’re not as smart as I think you are. It’s never Charlie. It never has been Charlie. And it’s not Charlie now. I’m certain. And the reason I’m certain, is Charlie is dead. He has to be dead. There’s just no way he could still be alive and me not know about it. It’s not him, I’m sure. I’m totally, totally sure.’

  She wanted to say more but she didn’t really know what. She found her breathing was a little hard.

  Rab gave her a look. ‘Ye ken, darlin’,’ he said, ‘I find, wi’ the benefit of my advancing years, that actually ye cannae be totally sure about much.’

  Birch closed her eyes. In her head, she was counting. Eight. Nine. Ten. ‘I know you mean well,’ she said. ‘But that isn’t really very comforting.’

  His look turned a little frosty then, but his tone stayed warm. ‘It wasn’t necessarily meant tae be,’ he said. He pushed his own chair back a little, but didn’t drop his gaze. ‘I’m just tryin’ tae get a handle on what’s been happening.’

  Birch said nothing, though her mind was running: Surely not, she thought. Surely my missing brother wouldn’t make himself known by sending me fourteen white lilies? No, she decided. It had been a long time, but she knew Charlie. It just wasn’t a Charlie thing to do.

  ‘I’ll log this,’ Rab was saying. ‘It’ll go in the Operation Citrine file. I’m sorry tae say it, but there’s reason tae think it’s maybe connected with Solomon. Senior officer from the raid team starts getting funny phone calls later th
at same day? An’ then a dodgy visit after dark? Sounds like intimidation tactics tae me, hen.’

  Birch looked hard at Rab. ‘You know way more about Solomon than I do,’ she said. ‘You’ve seen how he operates. If this is Solomon, or Solomon’s boys, how worried should I be?’

  Rab gave a shrug, as though he were shouldering on an invisible coat. ‘I’ll ask around,’ he said, ‘see if anyone else oan the team’s had calls, or anything else they cannae explain. It might no’ just be you. But darlin’, I’ll be honest wi’ ye. Solomon’s one radge bastard, a violent, woman-hating bastard, too. I hope for everyone’s sake that is aw a coincidence an’ nothing tae dae wi’ him.’

  Birch shivered.

  ‘We’ll get ye set up wi’ a panic button,’ Rab said. ‘An’ that number I’ve given ye, my number? That’s twenty-four-seven, okay? If ye think the panic button’s overkill, I’m there, whatever time. I’m back-up, right?’

  She felt sick. She needed to eat something, and to sleep, and to find the elusive missing piece of this weird why me? jigsaw she suddenly seemed to be living in. Rab was looking at his watch, preparing to stand. He’d said his piece.

  ‘But if I’m right,’ he added, ‘ye’re due to start interviewing shortly. So you get back up in that office now. I’ve had they lilies put in the prayer room for ye. DS Scott took the liberty of taking a few photos first, for evidence.’

  In spite of herself, Birch managed a smile. ‘Thanks, Rab.’

  He shrugged, and began to pat himself down for the packet of cigarettes she knew he must have been thinking about all this time, the same way she’d been thinking about checking her phone.

  ‘Nae worries,’ he said. ‘And ken the phone calls?’

  She nodded, slightly rattled by his apparent mind-reading.