by Stuart David
So I sat there letting the thoughts about business premises and pink bridesmaids’ dresses and beer and inflatable life jackets and fried eggs on pizzas and eastern mystics up mountains float in and out of my mind, waiting for some of the calm pond stuff, and some inspiration about who would be a good candidate to divert McFadgen next.
It was fucking hellish.
The worst of it was, once all the surface bollocks started to fade away, I kept getting plagued with thoughts about Wilma Caldwell, and how my scheme would lead to her marrying a murderer. I didn’t seem able to get off that, and I wondered what the boy up the mountain would have recommended under the circumstances. And then I pictured him advising me to shelve the fingerprint idea until I could find a less morally grey way to fund it.
You see what I mean?
Murder polis.
So when there was a knock at the door, loud enough to send a tsunami crashing through the gentle lily pond of my mind, I can’t exactly say I was sorry. It even occurred to me that whoever was at the door might be able to banish my thoughts of Wilma Caldwell for a while, and then I’d come back to the notebook with an idea fully formed and ready to go, cooked up by the back bit of the brain while I’d been otherwise distracted.
That was the hopeful state I found myself in as I pushed down on the door handle and twisted the Yale. But, unfortunately, the optimism was short-lived – cause when I opened the door I could tell this particular visitor was unlikely to help clear all thoughts of Wilma Caldwell from my bonce. Owing very much to the fact that it was Wilma Caldwell herself, live and in person, who had decided at this particular moment in time to pay me a visit.
Initially, I was convinced that Wilma had somehow got wind that I was plotting against her future happiness, and she’d come round to have it out with me. No doubt the mountain mystics suffer similar paranoid delusions when they’ve been abusing their brains the way I’d been abusing mine.
As it turned out, though, she’d only come round to see the wife.
‘Is she in?’ she asked me as I stood there speechless, probably looking half demented in my confusion.
‘Eh . . .’ I said, then I got a grip of myself. ‘Oh. No. It’s usually about six by the time she gets back, Wilma. She’ll still be working at the minute.’
‘Och,’ she said, and she looked at her watch. ‘I wanted to thank her for setting me straight the other night. I’ve brought her these flowers.’
Weirdly, I’d failed to notice she was holding a massive bunch of flowers up until that point. Christ knows how – it was a beast of a thing. It looked like half a bush, with a couple of cabbages stuck in there for good measure. She checked the watch again.
‘I’ll just come in and wait for her,’ she said. ‘I might as well. I’ve got another hour before I have to be at my class.’
And she pushed past me, bold as brass, and stoated off through the hall towards the kitchen. Before I’d even got the door shut she’d started clattering about in there.
‘Where do you keep your vases?’ she shouted. ‘I’ll just get these into some water. I don’t want them wilting.’
By the time I’d reached the kitchen myself, there were cupboard doors open and dishes strewn about the work surfaces, and she was down on her knees with the head stuck in a cabinet.
‘Are you wanting a cup of tea?’ I asked her, and she slowly re-emerged, clutching a vase I’d never seen before, stood up, and reassembled herself.
‘That’d be nice,’ she said. ‘I’ll wait for Bev in the living room. Don’t let me interrupt whatever you were up to. I’ll sit and watch the telly or something.’
She elbowed me out the way of the sink – where I’d been trying to fill the kettle – in order to do her business with the vase, then she took it across to the table and started tearing the wrapping paper off her bizarre floral arrangement.
‘What’s this you’ve been working on anyway?’ she said, eyeballing my notebook over her shoulder as she did battle with the cellophane. I quickly abandoned the kettle mid-task and hared it across the room to close the book quick smart.
‘Just another day at the office,’ I told her. ‘Pie-in-the-sky stuff. Just a bit of brainstorming.’
‘Always in at something, eh, Peacock?’ she said as I dumped the book in a drawer. ‘Just you get that tea on the go, and then I’ll be out your hair. Let you get back to changing the world.’
But as I set up the cups and fished out some teabags, I realised that plan wasn’t really going to work. It had been hard enough to get her out of my mind when I’d thought she was on the other side of the city. I was hardly going to be able to plan her downfall while she was sitting on the other side of the wall, watching Come Dine with Me in the living room.
‘These are looking lovely,’ she said. ‘What do you think? Do you think Bev’ll like them?’
I’d a hard job believing anybody would like them. I couldn’t even believe she liked them herself. Maybe Bev was right, and she just went about the place trying to inflict visual misery on the populace. It seemed plausible.
‘Aye,’ I said. ‘They look magic. They’ll fair add a bit of life to the room.’
And then it occurred to me that if I had a talk with her about the upcoming wedding, she might say something that would put my mind at rest about her marrying the Vince chap. Maybe she’d say that nothing could ever diminish her love for the guy. Or maybe it would even turn out that she found prison marriages romantic. You never know. Folk you’ve known for years can have the strangest views they’ve never dared to air in public. It’s a hell of a place, the planet Earth.
‘Come and we’ll see if we can find a good spot for these flowers in the living room,’ I said, when I’d brought the teas to completion. ‘I’ve got as far as I’ll get with the brainstorming for one day. Let’s go and see how they look through there.’
Wilma Caldwell is a toaty wee thing. When she was married to Brian Caldwell, way back when, they made a striking couple, physically. Brian must be six five, give or take, and his obesity long ago crossed the dividing line between clinical and morbid, in absolutely the wrong direction. Folk often feared he might just sit down on her one night, without noticing she’d nabbed his favourite spot on the couch. There’s a good chance that the grounds for divorce Wilma presented in court were simply ‘personal safety’, or ‘to avoid a fatal crushing’.
‘Have you seen Beverley in her bridesmaid’s dress yet?’ she asked me as she positioned the vase on the windowsill, and I told her I had.
‘What did you think?’ she said. ‘She looks amazing in it, doesn’t she? Like a film star on the red carpet. Those colours really suit her. And the fit’s just perfect. What do you think of it?’
‘All of that,’ I said. ‘Aye. It’s a dress and a half, Wilma.’
‘If Bev’s happy, I’m happy,’ she said. ‘That’s all that really matters. And she told me when she came round the other night that you love the dress as well. Not that I put too much store in your taste in clothes, obviously. But it’s a weight off my mind to know that Bev’s content.’
‘What’s up with my taste in clothes?’ I asked her. ‘Are you having me on? What’s that crack about?’
But I don’t think she even heard me. She appeared to be off in a world of her own, frowning at some memory or other she was reliving.
‘I have to be honest,’ she said, ‘I was in a right state the other night, Peacock. I really was. I’m a bit embarrassed about it now, but you know how these things can start playing on your mind if you give them half a chance. I’d got myself thoroughly worked up. But Bev was brilliant so she was.’
The dig about my taste in clothes was still rankling me, but I decided to let it go. ‘Keep the heid, Peacock,’ I told myself, ‘You’re on a mission here, son. Just let it go, like the boy on the mountain top – in one ear and out the other.’
I knew getting some reassurance she’d be fine shackled to the Vince fellow would be of more benefit to me than defending my reputation as
Glasgow’s best-dressed ideas man, so I made an effort to screw the nut.
‘Were you having some doubts about Vince or something?’ I asked her. ‘Bev was saying something about that.’
‘Och,’ she said, ‘I got myself into a right old mess so I did. I hardly knew if I was coming or going. I always thought I’d be married to Brian forever. And I got to thinking that if that had gone wrong, what was to stop this going wrong. Then I started thinking that maybe me getting married again was hurting Brian more than he was letting on, him still being on his own and that.’
‘Did you ask him?’
‘I did. He said if I had any doubts at all I should take my time. Which only got me into a bigger muddle. “There’s no rush, Wilma,” he told me. “If Vince is the right guy, he’ll wait for you. He’ll wait a year. He’ll wait a decade. Don’t hurry into anything.” So I didn’t know what to think.’
I have to admit, the idea of Brian telling her to wait a decade if that’s what it took pulled me up a bit short. What a fucking numptie. We’d a business to be cracking on with, and here’s him totally easy-oasy about it. ‘Get it done and dusted, Wilma. Quick as you like.’ That’s what I’d have been telling her. It fair shook my faith in the guy’s commitment to the project, I don’t mind telling you that right here and now.
‘But everything’s all square?’ I asked her, in something of a panic. I think my voice was probably about half an octave higher than its usual register. None too steady either, if I’m being honest. ‘What was the problem with Vince anyway?’
‘Oh, it was nothing,’ she said. ‘He’d been acting distant recently. A bit snappy. I got to thinking that maybe I didn’t know him quite as well as I’d thought I did. I mean, it’s not as if we’ve known each other that long, relatively speaking. And he’d had a period where he was getting secretive about what he’d been up to, about his comings and goings. No doubt cause I’d got into a routine of badgering him all the time. I probably started acting a bit suspicious of him or something. Bev pointed out he was probably just going through a period of the jitters about the wedding, same as me. She’s always that clever, Bev, eh? She’s got an answer for everything.’
‘Aye, she’s very rarely lost for words,’ I said.
Wilma nodded slowly and had a go at her tea, while I gave some thought to the Vince chap having become secretive about his activities recently. I’ll fucking bet he had. None of this was helping me to feel any more reassured about my current course of action.
‘But everything’s back to normal now?’ I said cheerily. ‘All previous misunderstandings have been swept aside, and it’s full steam ahead for the big day?’
‘All sorted,’ she said. ‘I confronted him with Bev’s idea, that he’d been having second thoughts and getting nervous, and he said that was it in a nutshell. I confessed I’d been going through the same thing, and apologised for being so suspicious. Now we’re closer than ever.’
‘Brilliant,’ I said. ‘I’ll bet even if the guy ended up in jail now you’d stick by him, eh? It seems like that kind of love story, Wilma. The real thing.’
She frowned and thought about it. I held my breath, waiting for the reassurance that would set me on a clear path to my goals. Just a simple nod would be enough to unhook the back bit of my brain from its concerns with morality, and leave it free to work on a longer-term plan to flummox McFadgen.
I watched and waited for a sign – anything – but unfortunately it never came. At that precise minute Wilma’s attention was distracted by the sound of Bev’s key skiting about in the Yale lock, and then by the chaos of Bev clattering full-steam into the hallway – and the moment was lost.
A good twenty minutes of hard work right down the tubes.
‘Get the kettle on, Peacock,’ Bev shouted, dropping her bags on the hall floor and throwing her shoes into the bedroom. ‘You wouldn’t believe the nightmare I’ve had trying to get home. Unbelievable. In fact, forget the kettle. Get me a gin and tonic, and put a lemon in it. I’ve just about had it up to here.’
I got to my feet. I had the feeling she was about to start blowing off steam, and you can never tell where she’ll start when she’s working her way towards the source of her frustrations. It seemed entirely possible she’d start mouthing off about the bridesmaid’s dress, or maybe even Wilma herself, if it took her fancy, so I grabbed the opportunity to nip the situation in the bud.
‘You’ve got a visitor, Bev,’ I shouted back. ‘Somebody’s brought you a wee present. Dive in here for a look while I assemble your gin.’
That did the trick. She was suddenly on her best behaviour and I gave her a quick lift of the eyebrows as I passed her on the way to the kitchen, and watched her tiptoeing her way towards the living-room door.
There was plenty of screaming and shouting while I threw her drink together. Plenty of ‘Oh my God’-ing over the flowers, coupled with a healthy helping of ‘You shouldn’t have’, and thankfully by the time I got back in there and handed her her glass she was flopped down on the couch beside Wilma – totally exhausted.
‘You look like you’ve had a day and a half,’ Wilma said, and Bev groaned.
‘Tell me about it,’ she said. ‘I’m not just tired, Wilma – I’m sha-terd. Bring me that footstool, Peacock.’
I’d half an idea I could still get an answer to my question out of Wilma if I got her back on track quickly enough, so I took my chances while the going looked good.
‘I was just saying to Wilma before you came in . . .’ I said, but that was as far as I got. As soon as I’d dragged the stool underneath the wife’s feet she was off, trampling my good work into oblivion.
‘Aren’t those flowers just beautiful, Peacock?’ she said. ‘Have you ever seen anything like them? And all set up in the vase for me coming in. You really didn’t need to do that, Wilma.’
‘They’re just a wee minding after you helping me out the other night,’ Wilma said. ‘I was telling Peacock how much it meant to me before you came in. I’ve probably been here for ages. I forgot what time you usually get home so I did, but I decided just to wait. Peacock and me have just been nattering away so we have.’
‘Aye,’ I said. ‘I was just asking Wilma if . . .’
‘The trains are to blame,’ Bev said. ‘I’m usually in a bit earlier, amn’t I, Peacock? It’s usually plain sailing. I get the train about half five from Central, and I’m usually walking over the bridge about ten minutes later. It’s dead handy. Then, tonight, they’ve put a replacement bus service on. I couldn’t believe it. We had to walk all the way down to Jamaica Street to get the bus in the first place, and then it’s just chock-a-block all the way down Pollokshaws Road. We hardly moved for about fifteen minutes. Is there football on, Peacock? There must be football on. Or maybe it’s something at the Hydro. Bloody awful anyway. And that on top of the afternoon I’d already had. It was non-stop. That job’ll be the death of me one of these days, it really will. And that Pat MacKenzie . . . Don’t even get me started. Oof!’
She paused for a swipe at the gin and tonic, and Wilma moved closer to her and brushed some of the hair off her brow.
‘This is you to blame so it is,’ Wilma said, staring at me all of a sudden. ‘If she wasn’t having to support the two of you, she’d have more time for herself.’
‘Eh?’
‘You heard me, Peacock Johnson. Don’t act it. Look at me when I was married to Brian. It was far from ideal, but he never worked me into the ground the way you’re doing to Bev. Brian always paid his own way. And the rest.’
‘Ach,’ Bev said, ‘it’s not all him to blame, Wilma. Peacock’s working on his ideas – something’ll come good sooner or later.’
‘Will it, though?’ Wilma said. ‘Will it? I don’t think I’d be marrying Vincent if all he had going for him were a few ideas. I know I’ve had my misgivings over the past few days, but at least I know Vincent’ll be able to pay his own way. You’d better be careful you don’t end up an old woman before your time, Beverley – w
orking your fingers to the bone while that one’s sitting here at the kitchen table scribbling away in his notebook. He even admitted to me himself that what he was working on was pie in the sky. It’s time you manned up, Peacock. Look at the state of Bev here. I’m shocked to see her looking like this.’
I was a bit taken aback by this sudden outburst, I have to admit. But I was fucked if I was about to let it go – not a chance. I was suddenly all fired up, and I got myself stuck right in there.
‘You don’t have a clue what I’m working on,’ I said. ‘Scribbling in the notebook’s one thing, but I’m already in the process of setting up a new business. This time next year the wife’ll be taking early retirement. Can you see yourself being able to say that with the Vince chap at the helm? Not a chance, Wilma.’
‘I can see myself a damn sight more secure than Bev’ll be in a year’s time, I’ll tell you that for nothing so I will. Whatever it is you’re working on’ll go belly up within a fortnight, like every other daft scheme you’ve tried to get off the ground. Your ideas are hopeless, Peacock. Every last one of them. And I’m sick of sitting by and seeing Beverley ending up in a state like this. Her mother’s right. She’s been saying the same thing as me for years. It’s time to wake up, Peacock. Smell the coffee.’
Smell the coffee? Jesus Christ. I took a few deep breaths and calmed myself down a touch, just in case I launched into saying something I regretted, regarding the fingerprint start-up, or even regarding her husband-to-be.
‘Listen, Wilma,’ I said, ‘I admit I’ve had a run of bad luck in the past with a few of my ventures – that’s a given – but I’m on to something this time. You don’t need to worry about Bev. Seriously. It’s under control. We’ll be laughing about this in six months time, toasting my success. Wait and see.’