by Denise Mina
Maureen paused with her hand on the latch, took a deep breath and opened the door.
‘Hugh.’
McAskill nodded sadly. ‘Can we come in for a minute, Maureen?’
She opened the door and the policemen brushed their feet on the mat before stepping into the hall. She had left the heating on overnight, hoping to evaporate some of Douglas’s money, and it was warm in the flat. They took off their scarves and gloves. ‘Why has he sent ye this time?’ she said.
Hugh raised his eyebrows and pressed his lips together. Chief Inspector Joe McEwan was determined to get her for the assault on Angus in Millport. He had no evidence, he couldn’t place her or Leslie on the Isle of Cumbrae at the time, and Angus himself was acting mental and wouldn’t tell them anything. But Joe had made it a special point of principle to question her about any detail that came up, just to remind her that he was still in the game.
‘’Nother line of questioning’s come up,’ said Hugh, ‘so here we are.’
‘How are you today, Miss O’Donnell?’ said Inness unpleasantly. He was an officious prick with a Freddie Mercury moustache and the social skills of a horny lap-dog.
‘Look,’ said Maureen, praying she wouldn’t cry and watching her feet as she did up the buttons on her overcoat, ‘just tell me why you’re here. I’ll get scared and then ye can leave.’
‘We have been given information,’ began Inness, warming to his petty office, slapping his gloves through his palm like a TV Nazi, ‘that you have been receiving letters from a certain hospital patient. We’ve come to pick them up.’
Maureen folded her arms. She could give him the letters, just hand them over and let them deal with it, but the letters hinted at Millport. ‘Tell Joe that I know I don’t have to answer anything,’ she said.
‘Well, why on earth would you refuse to answer us?’ said Inness, feigning cheap surprise. ‘Could it be that you have something to hide?’
McAskill blushed and looked at his shoes.
‘I’d think you’d want to help us,’ said Inness, ploughing on with an already failed ploy.
Maureen caught Hugh’s eye. ‘Isn’t his patter woeful?’ she said, in a vain attempt to cheer herself up.
Hugh raised his eyebrows again. He was always more or less silent during these visits. They had been friendly to each other during the investigation into Douglas’s death. She knew he was sharper than Inness and that Joe trusted him more, but every time they came up Hugh stood by and let Inness do the talking.
‘Angus Farrell has convinced the doctors that he’s mental,’ said Inness, glaring into the living room. He saw discarded newspapers, full ashtrays and the low sun seeping through the sheen of white dirt on the windows. He looked at Maureen, tousle-haired and half naked under her overcoat. She felt the implicit criticism of everything his eye fell on and knew he’d report every detail to Joe McEwan. ‘Maybe he is mental,’ said Maureen.
‘Yeah,’ said Inness. ‘My boss thinks Farrell knows what it means if he’s mental. He knows he’ll get a short sentence in minimum security. Maybe he’ll make a miraculous recovery in two years’ time and get out. Do you think a psychologist would know that?’
Maureen shrugged. ‘I don’t know him that well,’ she said.
‘But he was your therapist.’
‘Briefly,’ she said. ‘Only briefly.’
‘The hospital told us he’s writing to you. Is he?’
‘No,’ she said, conscious of the letter below the telephone table.
‘The nurses,’ said Inness forcefully, ‘post the letters to you, so you can stop lying. I’ll ask again. Is he writing to you?’
‘Maybe he’s got the wrong address. Did ye think of that?’
‘Is he threatening you?’
‘I don’t know what you’re talking about.’ Inness ground his teeth. ‘If Farrell gets a sentence in low security who do you think he’d be most anxious to see?’
Maureen began to sweat and felt an anxious prickle on her neck. She looked to Hugh for support, but he slid his eyes away from her and left her alone. Whatever she said or did was going straight back to McEwan. She took a deep breath. ‘Look, Inness,’ she said, ‘I know Joe sends you down to do the talking because he hasn’t got anything on me. He sends you because you’re an idiot and you’re aggravating.’ She could see Inness getting annoyed. She could see him thinking through the order to come down here, thinking through the politics at the office, wondering if she was right. Hugh bit his bottom lip and stared at the ceiling. ‘So just tell him from me, you’re not as much of an aggravation as he thinks you are and I’m not going to confess to an offence I didn’t commit to get out of your company. Will ye tell him that for me?’
Flustered, Inness raised his hand to his face, flattening his moustache. ‘This place is filthy,’ he said bitterly. ‘Is that a feminist thing? Not cleaning up after yourself?’
Maureen mustered her threadbare dignity. ‘Are you taunting me in an official capacity now?’ she said, feeling the rising panic at the back of her throat, hearing Michael scratching through the glass. ‘Tell Joe that this isn’t Chile. He can’t just send you up here whenever he feels like it.
These fishing trips are illegal.’
‘Who told you that?’
‘My brother.’
Inness gave himself a couple of seconds to think up a witty retort. ‘How is your brother? Still selling drugs to schoolkids?’ Evidently a couple of seconds wasn’t long enough.
‘Liam’s retired,’ she said. ‘You know he’s retired.’
‘Aye, he’s a student now. Selling drugs to other students, is he?’
She felt hot and furious, felt the heat of the blue envelope at her heels, felt Leslie’s saliva on her eye, and knew that she might start bubbling at any moment. She couldn’t cry in front of Inness, he’d love it, he’d tell Joe McEwan, she couldn’t. She pushed past him and threw open the front door. Startled, Inness dredged through his mind for something to hit her with. ‘How’s your friend?’ he said. ‘The girl on the motorbike? Maybe she’d like to talk to us?’
‘Inness,’ she slapped his arm, keeping her head down to hide her tears, ‘you’re pathetic. You’re fucking pathetic.’ She was shoving him into the close and shouting at him, ‘Get out.’
Inness was shocked. O’Donnell had never shown emotion before but she was crying, slapping him, pushing and shouting at him. She was genuinely upset. ‘What are ye doing?’ said Inness, giggling nervously, trying to wrestle her flailing hands down.
Maureen didn’t know what to say so she told the truth. ‘You’re frightening me,’ she shouted.
Inness stopped still. ‘I didn’t mean to,’ he said stupidly. In a TV movie they would have hugged each other, he’d have come back in and they’d have had an honest discussion about their feelings, a sun-dappled moment of tenderness with a stranger, and they’d leave, elevated and touched at their common humanity. But this was Glasgow. ‘Fuck you,’ shouted Maureen, and slammed the door in his face.
She turned round and found McAskill standing by the living-room doorway like a spare arse. ‘Hugh,’ she said, struggling for breath, ‘how can you stand by?’
‘Maureen—’
She threw open the door again and McAskill brushed past her, turning and muttering to her, ‘It’s my job.’
She slammed the door the moment he was through and stared at it, crying and listening as the two men murmured to each other and walked away down the stairs, their footsteps receding to a gentle clip-clop as they reached the ground floor and opened the door to the street. She skipped into the living room, flattened herself against the wall and looked out. They were climbing into a car. She watched as Inness wound down the window and lit a cigarette, blowing the smoke out into the street. They pulled out and drove away.
Maureen lit a cigarette. Back in the hall she leaned under the telephone table and
pulled out the blue envelope. She ripped it open. Angus was writing to say he hoped the bleeding had stopped and he would like to cut her himself. The answerphone was blinking.
‘I know you’re there,’ slurred Winnie. ‘Pickup, you little shit.’
‘Yeah, I’m a shit,’ she murmured, taking a deep draw on her cigarette, savouring the knowledge of an early death. ‘I’m a shit. I’m a shit.’
It was nine forty-five in the morning and she wanted to get drunk and stay drunk.
11
Short Drop
Maureen tramped down the rain washed hill. Cars sped happily through deep puddles, sloshing the pavement and splashing pedestrians. She should give Angus’s letters to the police, he was threatening her after all, but if she was ever done for assaulting him the letters would be evidence against her. She knew he wasn’t mental but she couldn’t count on Joe’s continuing scepticism if he saw the letters. She’d have to explain the meanings and symbols, and that would mean admitting to Millport and telling about Michael. She imagined policemen photocopying the letters, shaking their heads at the nonsensical symbols, handing Angus a bus pass and a coat and letting him go free at weekends.
She threw her fag into the gutter and opened the thick glass door. The stairs were black with dirt and rain. She could almost smell the ruined women, Katia’s smugness and Jan’s dull stories. She didn’t want to be here or meet Leslie but there was nowhere else for her to hide. She could sit in the house and worry about the letters, listening to Winnie on the answerphone. She could go to the shops and see Michael’s face everywhere and feel guilty for buying things she didn’t need. She took the stairs slowly, trying to prolong the journey.
The job-shares were handing over to each other and the office was bustling. Three downcast women waited on the hard chairs by Maureen’s desk. She managed to hang up her coat before Jan spotted her.
‘Hi,’ said Jan, going to the trouble of getting up and coming over to her, ‘how are you?’
‘Oh,’ said Maureen, trying to smile, ‘lots of work to do.’ She sat down at her desk and took a random file out of the drawer, pretending to pore over it, trying to shake Jan off. Jan picked up her mug. ‘Maureen, you look even paler today,’ she said. ‘Coffee?’
‘That would be lovely, thanks, Jan.’
Jan offered the waiting women a cup but they refused. She went off to the coffee room. Maureen took out her fag packet and handed it to the first woman in the line, motioning to her to pass it along, and went back to pretending to read the file. She didn’t watch them, she didn’t want them to feel self-conscious if they were short and needed to take one. When her packet came back to her it was six fags short. She looked at the trio of women. They were smoking hard and staring at the floor.
She took a different file out of the drawer and tried to lose herself in the wording of a statutory clause. All she had to do was get through today and avoid speaking to anyone. She stared at the same sentence for fifteen minutes, thinking vaguely about all the minor disputes all over the world, and all the idiots who fell out with their friends and thought it mattered when nothing meant anything anyway. Jan came round the desk and handed her the cup of coffee before opening her fag packet and passing it to the first of the waiting women. ‘The police phoned here,’ she said, ‘looking for your pal Leslie.’
‘Who?’
‘The police. They asked to talk to her.’
‘But why would they phone her here? She doesn’t even work here.’
‘Dunno,’ said Jan.
‘Did they leave a name?’
Jan shrugged. ‘Just said the police.’
‘Did they ask for Leslie by name?’
‘Dunno,’ said Jan, reaching over and taking her fag packet back from the last woman. ‘Who did they speak to?’
‘Katia.’
‘Cheers, Jan,’ said Maureen, but Jan wasn’t listening to her. She was staring at the two lonely fags left rattling about in her packet.
Katia wasn’t at her desk. She was in the stationery cupboard, chatting to Alice, the funding co-ordinator. They were making arrangements to go to a nightclub at the weekend. Katia had been there loads of times and knew the doorman. She said she could get Alice and her boyfriend in for free. Alice saw Maureen standing by the door and stepped aside to include her in the conversation, but Maureen held back until they had finished talking and caught Katia on her way out. ‘Can I have a word?’
‘Sure,’ said Katia. ‘Come on over to my desk.’ Katia had done well with her space. A partition wall closed off her corner desk from the rest of the ugly room. Her filing cabinet was decorated with photos of herself looking just lovely, standing with attractive pals in a kaleidoscope of thumping venues. ‘What can I do for you?’ she said, settling into her chair, her suede mini-skirt riding up her perfectly geometric thighs.
‘Well,’ said Maureen, trying to sound casual, ‘I heard the police phoned today and you spoke to them.’
‘Yes,’ said Katia.
‘I heard they asked for Leslie.’
‘Did you?’
‘The thing is I’ve been . . .’ she didn’t know how to word it without sounding like trouble‘ ...I’ve been getting visits from a policeman.’
Katia sat forward and looked at her. Maureen spotted a spark of self-interest in her eyes, instantly smothered with treacly concern. ‘Are you going out with the policeman?’
Maureen was getting annoyed now. ‘No, Katia, he’s been harassing me.’
‘Oh,’ she said. ‘Have you reported him?’
‘I don’t want to report him. I just want to know if it was the same policeman who phoned for Leslie. Did he give a name?’
‘Well, it was a woman who phoned, actually. How is he harassing you?’
‘It just– it doesn’t really matter.’
‘No, please.’ Katia reached out to take her hand and Maureen almost felt the saccharine sear. ‘Would you like to talk about it? It must be very upsetting for you.’
Suddenly Maureen began to cry big belting sobs and Katia fell to pieces, standing up and knocking her seat over, banging the filing cabinet and sending a shower of flattering photos to the floor. ‘Listen,’ she said, scrabbling about the floor, picking up the pictures, ‘shall I . . . will I go and get someone? Here are some tissues.’ She handed Maureen a box of pretty Hello Kitty tissues, making her cry harder. ‘Would you like a cup of tea? Shall I phone Vikram?’
‘God, no!’ said Maureen, with such force that a bubble of snot appeared at her nostril. She wanted Katia to go away, just go away, until she got herself together. ‘Just tea, hot tea.’
Katia scuttled away, leaving Maureen alone behind the partition. She managed to slow the crying and dried her eyes. Whatever she had been crying about didn’t seem half as bad when Katia wasn’t there. A final lovely photo of Katia left its Blu-tack moorings and fell from the filing cabinet to the floor. The filing cabinet held the CCB photos. Maureen stood up and opened a drawer quietly.
Ann’s surname was Harris and she found the file in the top drawer. It was a brown envelope, stiff with photos. She shoved it up her jumper, turning it sideways, tucking it into the waistband of her jeans, and sat down again, startled by what she had done. She didn’t know if she’d done it to spite Katia or for Leslie or to fuck up her job even more so she could leave.
By the time Katia came back with a mug of milky tea Maureen had stopped crying and, as well as taking the photographs, she had stolen most of the Hello Kitty tissues too.
‘Better?’ asked Katia.
‘I’m sorry,’ said Maureen, dabbing her nose with the second-to-last tissue, ‘I just, I got upset.’
‘Who’s the policeman who’s harassing you?’
‘It’s a guy. I met him a few months ago . . .’
‘He’s from Glasgow?’
‘Yeah.’
‘Well, it w
as nothing to do with him, then. This phone call was from the Met in London.’
Maureen stood up. ‘Right. Good,’ she said, crossing her arms in front of her to cover her tummy. ‘Thanks’
‘That’s all right. Please think about reporting him, will you?’
‘Yeah. I will.’
‘How’s Vik?’
Maureen moved over to the edge of the partition, wanting to get away before Katia realized that she had a strange package up her jumper. ‘Fine,’ she said. ‘He’s fine.’
Katia stepped in front of her. ‘Maureen, do you resent me?’
Maureen was a little surprised. ‘Do I what?’
‘Do you resent me because of Vik?’ Maureen looked at her blankly. ‘Why would I?’
‘Well,’ Katia rolled her head at the floor, ‘you know we went out?’
‘Yeah, I knew that.’ Maureen felt a pang of jealousy coming from nowhere.
‘About a month ago.’ Katia looked at her knowingly. Maureen had been seeing him for a month, just over a month, and Katia knew that. Maureen wanted to say that she didn’t give a shit, that she wasn’t even fucking sure she was going to live through the afternoon. ‘I need to go now,’ she said.
Katia held the cup towards her as a peace-offering. ‘Won’t you drink your tea?’
‘I don’t take milk,’ said Maureen, and walked straight out of the office, picking up her coat and fags on the way out, leaving her files scattered on the desk. She was never going back there.
The rain was coming down sideways, cascading down the sandstone buildings, running in small ardent rivers in the road and pooling around the drains. Pedestrians pulled their hoods up and ran to get out of the weather, clustering together for shelter in the doorways, watching out of shop windows, waiting for the storm to pass. Maureen felt an unaccustomed creamy calm. She had the whisky and she had decided. She was never going back to the Place of Safety.