The Barbershop Seven: A Barney Thomson omnibus

by Douglas Lindsay

  Barney shook his head. Groaned inside. 'Eh, no, no, it's fine, I'm all right, thanks.'

  He bent to lift the sack, making sure to grab hold of the body again, while Charlie watched. There was little concealing the act now, so he decided to get on with it and hope that an arm, or some other appendage, did not spring free. As he did so, he began to think of another eventuality. What to do with Charlie if he realised what was going on. There were still plenty of pairs of scissors in the shop.

  He pulled the sack to the edge of the pavement, laid it behind the car. Stared at it, wondering if he was going to be able to lift it up over the high edge of the boot. Charlie bustled over.

  'Here, let me help you with that. Looks bloody heavy, whatever it is.'

  Barney shrugged, felt the tightness in his chest. He had to accept the offer, began to make mental preparations for taking care of Charlie, should the need arise. For how could he fail to realise what it was that he was lifting into the boot? Maybe he should just go back into the shop and return with a pair of scissors, embed them in some suitable part of Charlie's body and then bundle his corpse into the boot as well.

  Closed his eyes, breathed deeply. Felt the tremble all over his body. Hands shook.

  He looked into the boot. Never. There was never enough room to put two bodies in there. The back seat then. He cast an eye over his shoulder to see if there was anyone abroad who might see what was going on.

  Charlie studied the black bags, gently kicked them. Used to play wing-half for Queen's Park. Long time ago. God, thought Barney, surely he must realise that this is Wullie, or a body of some description. He must.

  'Look, just a minute Charlie,' said Barney, taking another look up the road, 'I've got to get something from the shop. I'll just be a second.'

  He walked quickly back through the door, lifted the first pair of scissors which came to hand at his own workplace, then returned to the street. Half expected to find Charlie kneeling beside the bags, tearing them apart to reveal Wullie's dead face, contorted in perpetual wonder. Barney prepared to wield the scissors.

  However, Charlie stood alone, staring up the street, idly whistling some aimless tune. Might have been Verdi, might have been Manic Street Preachers, might have been Bob Dylan. Barney slipped the scissors into his pocket. There was no need to do anything stupid yet.

  Charlie turned to him and smiled. 'Wullie's not in the shop is he, letting us two do all the work?'

  Barney swallowed, tried to smile, didn't answer.

  'Right then, you ready Charlie?'

  'Aye, aye.'

  The two men grabbed the ends of the bags and, with some effort, managed to lift them up, shovelling them over the edge of the car and into the boot. The bags at Charlie's end started to tear but the body slumped down into the boot before anything was revealed. It came to rest with the feet at Barney's side still protruding over the edge, and he had to bend the legs to fit the whole thing in – the body already less pliable than he thought it would be.

  They were both breathing hard as Barney quickly closed the boot to prevent Charlie looking at the bags any further.

  'Bloody hell, Barn, what was that thing? Jings, it felt like a body or something.'

  Barney coughed loudly, attempting to cover up the involuntary splutter. Automatically his hand drifted into his pocket, his fingers fell on the cold steel of the scissors. Cold, cold steel.

  'Oh, it's eh, it's just some rubbish, you know, that we've collected, and I'm taking it to the dump.'

  Charlie smiled and nodded. Simple Charlie. Used to play wing-half for Queen's Park.

  'Rubbish? Bloody heavy rubbish, Barney. I don't know what kind of rubbish you collect in that shop.' Gave Barney a wink and a nudge. 'Sure you haven't been having arguments with Wullie or Chris, eh?'

  Barney tightened his grip on the scissors. 'Don't be daft,' he said, attempting a smile. 'It's just, well you know, stuff.'

  Charlie winked extravagantly again. 'Aye, right. Stuff. Your secret's safe with me, son.'

  Barney nodded, grimaced slightly. Thought: God Barney, the guy's joking, he doesn't realise anything. But the hand in his pocket was ready to strike. He looked up the road, the coast was clear. The opportunity was there. Wait. Just wait to see of he said anything else.

  'Thanks for your help, Charlie. I've really got to be going now.'

  Charlie had the collar of his jacket pulled high up over his neck, so that was one point of entry removed. The eye socket, that would be a sure-fire place to do it.

  'Aye, aye, all right. I'll be seeing you, Barney,' and with a wave he walked off towards the main street. Barney watched him go, his whole body aching with relief.

  'Here, Barney,' said Charlie from the end of the street, 'Wullie's not in the shop, is he, I was needing to speak to him?'

  Barney didn't answer. He couldn't. He stood and stared, feeling the rain on his face. Charlie waited a second for the reply, and when he didn't get it, he waved and disappeared around the corner.

  Barney groaned, but there was nothing he could do about it now. Charlie hadn't realised anything. There had been no hint of suspicion about him. Nothing.

  As he walked back into the shop to return the scissors, the phone started ringing again. He gave a little jump. Whoever it was, he was in no mood to talk. He quickly left the shop and locked the door behind him. There was a lot of thinking to be done.

  ***

  He drove home as calmly as he could. He was not relaxed, however; his steering was wayward, his gear changes were edgy, and his avoidance of old people crossing the road, at best, uncertain. His thoughts were consumed with what he was going to do with the body. And as he drove the short distance home, he resolved to tell Agnes. He would have to. He needed someone to talk to, and if he could trust anyone, surely it was her. And perhaps she might even have body disposal experience that he was unaware of, he reasoned to himself.

  He arrived home, parked the car outside, left the bloody booty of his misfortune congealing in the back and tramped upstairs. When he walked into the sitting room, his dinner was waiting patiently and cold on the table, while Agnes watched television.

  He removed his jacket and stood in the centre of the room, his clothes soiled with blood, a look of grim desperation on his face. A chainsaw would not have looked out of place in his hands.

  'There you are. Where've you been? Your dinner's been ready for ages,' said Agnes, without looking round. Blane and Liberty were getting married and everyone was waiting for Sobriety to object.

  He stood for a second before answering, waiting to see if she would turn to look at him, something which under normal circumstances he would've known she would never do.

  It rose within him, a pressure cooker waiting to explode, until he could keep it in no longer. 'I've killed Wullie,' he blurted out.

  Agnes gasped. It wasn't Sobriety who'd objected. It was Bleach.

  'Yes, dear,' she said finally, after coming to terms with the fact that Bleach was pregnant by Blane, when everyone had believed that she'd been artificially inseminated with Rock's semen.

  'Are you not listening to me? I've killed Wullie!' His voice had become a desperate plea for help.

  'Oh, aye, dear? What did you do that for?'

  He took a step nearer to her. She wasn't looking at him, but maybe she was listening at last. 'I didn't mean to. It was an accident. I swear to God, I didn't mean to.'

  Agnes briefly turned and looked at him. 'Don't worry, dear, I'm sure he'll have forgotten all about it in the morning.'

  Barney dropped to his knees, put his hands to his face. Finally, the magnitude of what had happened was coming to him, the idiocy of what he'd done. He had killed a man. Maybe not intentionally, but he had killed him, and now he was plotting to dispose of the body. Whatever trouble he'd been in when he'd started had now increased a hundred fold.

  Why had he not just phoned the police and explained what had happened? Nobody would have suspected him of murder, why should they have? He was known as a reas
onable man. Just because he'd been about to lose his job was no reason for him to kill anyone.

  He started sobbing, loud retches coming from deep within, his chest heaving and the tears tumbling down his face. He bent over, putting his forehead to the floor, started banging his hands on the carpet. With no force, however, just a quiet, pathetic gesture of desperation. The first time he had cried since the death of his father.

  'Shh!' Agnes waved a desultory hand, as she turned the volume of the television up with the other. Lance and Billy Bob were arguing over which one of them had first refusal on Flame.

  Barney quietened down, but remained on the floor, sobbing softly, his head in his hands. Then slowly, a small voice began to come to him, a small instinctive voice nudging at his subconscious. The small voice which everyone hears whenever there is a problem which they cannot resolve. 'Go to your mum,' it was saying. 'Go to your mum.'

  Maybe that was right, maybe that was the thing to do. She'd been almost gung-ho about killing the two of them, perhaps she would know what to do now. It seemed ridiculous, but he needed help, advice at the very least, and it wasn't as if he had too many options. He would go to see his mother.

  He struggled to his feet, looking sadly at the back of Agnes's head, then trudged into the bedroom. He changed his clothes and put the blood stained ones into a plastic bag, which he secreted at the bottom of the wardrobe. He walked back into the sitting room, a sense of purpose having crept unawares back into his stride.

  'I'm going to my mother's.'

  'Yes, dear.'

  And as Barney walked from the house, Charity and Monogamy were trying to pick a dress for Cerease to wear to the christening of Cream and Hamper's daughter, Tupperware.

  Forgive Me, Mother, For I Have Sinned

  There is a time of definition in the life of every man when the pieces fall together or events take place to shape the future. It might happen suddenly or it might be a gradual process, a build up of things over weeks or months. Sometimes when it occurs he will be unaware that it is doing so, until one day he looks back and realises that his life has altered completely, for better or worse. It could be that he has fallen in love. It could be that some outside event changes his whole attitude to life, so that he views everything from a different perspective, and then indeed is life new. It could be that someone dies, creating a hole in his life that cannot be filled. It could be a new job, or a new car, or a new interest of any kind. Or it could be that he accidentally stabs his boss to death with a pair of scissors.

  Barney's life was changing, he knew it was happening, and there was nothing he could do about it. He tried telling himself that this was what he'd wanted, that he had planned to kill Wullie anyway, but deep down he knew there was no way that he'd have been able to do it, had not fate forced his hand. And now he prepared to turn to his mother. Forty-six years old and still the same solution to his problems as he had had forty-four years previously when he'd broken a toy or spilled tomato ketchup on his bib.

  He was still contemplating the fickle hand he'd been dealt when he walked into his mother's house. He called out to announce his arrival, a shout which was, as usual, greeted by silence. He could hear the television playing in the sitting room and imagined she would be engrossed in some dreadful quiz show.

  He opened the door, immediately started coughing as the great wall of cigarette smoke swept into his lungs. It was always the same on days when she'd been sitting watching television all day and it was only very rarely that she ever opened a window; in itself something that was only ever likely to happen between the end of June and the beginning of September.

  He walked into the room, extravagantly waving his arms in front of him, still coughing loudly.

  'For God's sake, I wish you'd open a blooming window in this place if you're going to smoke so much, Mother,' and he walked between her and the television to pull back the curtains and let in some fresh air. Cemolina scowled at him but she was more concerned with the television and Give Us Your Body Fluids.

  He stood by the window breathing deeply, as much for show as clean air, before moving back into the room when he realised that she was paying him no attention. He slumped down into a seat, leant forward, rested his forearms on his knees, looked keenly at his mother. He stared at her for a while, hoping she would notice him. However, her attention was undivided. This show was her favourite. Finally, he felt bound to speak.

  'Mum, I've got to talk to you. I'm in trouble.'

  She didn't answer for a while, then eventually lifted a dismissive hand, waving it in his direction.

  'Shh! Not when they're trying to guess whose fluids these are. Who d'you think? This bloke says Alfred Hitchcock, but I thought they looked more like Robert Altman's. What about you?' She turned, gave him a brief look.

  Barney faced the realisation that all the women in his life were more interested in television than they were in him.

  'Mum, I need to talk. I'm in trouble. Real trouble.' He hesitated, but he had her attention at last. 'I've killed Wullie.'

  Her eyes widened, her jaw dropped. The expression held on her face for a few seconds and he definitely knew he had her complete attention when she lowered the volume of the television. If he wasn't mistaken, there was a glint in her eye, a smile forming upon her lips.

  'Wullie! You've killed Wullie did you say?'

  'Aye, aye I did. Christ, mum, I'm in real trouble. Real trouble,' and he ran his hands through his hair and looked at her with desperation. Comfort me, his face said, I need it.

  'Jings! Well done, I didn't think you had it in you.'

  'What?' he said. Despite the night before, it wasn't the reaction he'd been expecting.

  'Well, you wanted to, didn't you? You said you wanted to kill him. I'm proud of you.' She paused, reflected. 'Although, d'you not think it would have been better if you'd taken care of the papist first? Can't stand they bastards, so I can't. Bastards the lot of them.'

  He looked upon her with wonder. How could she take it so lightly?

  'Well, then, how did you do it? What was the instrument of his destruction? And don't tell me it was poison or I'll be right upset, so I will.'

  When the scales fell from his eyes, they did so quickly and dramatically, cascading and tumbling away in a frantic rush. He looked upon his mother in a new light. She was mad. Of course she was. Completely mad. Perhaps it was senility but if he thought about it, he was sure he could think of examples of her madness throughout the years. She'd always been insane but since it'd been with him all this time he'd come to take much of her behaviour as normal. But this wasn't normal.

  All the plans and schemes and silly ideas she'd had. He had liked to think of her as vaguely eccentric, perhaps even extravagantly eccentric, but it was more than that. Worse than that. And now, what about this reaction? How could she possibly be enthusiastic about him killing Wullie? Killing anybody? What mother could be so welcoming about her son committing such an act?

  What was he doing here and what advice could he possibly get from her that would be of any use? Christ, he'd been a fool. He'd been a fool to tell her what he'd been thinking in the first place, and he was a fool to come here tonight with a bloody corpse in the boot of his car.

  'Accidentally. With a pair of scissors,' he mumbled, wondering why he was bothering to tell her.

  She tutted loudly, displeased at the lack of drama in the description.

  'Was there a lot of blood?'

  'Aye,' he mumbled. 'A lot of blood.'

  He stared at the floor. He had no business here. There were no great answers to his problems to be found in the home of his insane mother. He was going to have to solve them himself.

  'What have you done with the corpse?' she asked, the glint returning to the eye. He didn't notice, so much attention was he giving to the carpet. His heart had sunk. He was scared.

  'It's downstairs, in the boot of the car. Wrapped in several large plastic bin liners.'

  'Crike! Bring it up then. I'll make soup!' />
  Barney looked up, aghast. 'Mother!'

  She smiled, had the decency to look slightly embarrassed, but he knew it was feigned. They cast a quick glance at the television as the presenter produced a bag of thick, lumpy green liquid, but Cemolina was too intrigued with Barney's predicament to raise the sound. Barney turned away from the TV with a look of disgust. Cemolina came with him, her finger momentarily twitching over the volume button.

  'Well, what are you going to do with it then?'

  He let his head hang low, enveloped, as he was, with dejection. 'I don't know, Mum, I really don't know.'

  She stared at him; he stared at the ground, there being very little else for him to say. He had to leave and get on with things, but when he got outside there was a body which he was going to have to dispose of and he had no idea how he was going to do it.

  Slowly he dragged himself out of his seat and stood up.

  'Look, Mum, I really ought to be going. I shouldn't have come here and brought you into this. It's my problem to solve...'

  'Now, none of your nonsense,' she chided, 'you sit right back down and we'll talk this through, all right? I'm your mother and I'm here to help.'

  He paused at her words, grudgingly lowered himself back into his seat, his reluctance to get help from his mother fighting his desperate need for help from anywhere.

  'Now, tell me everything that happened and we'll see what we can do.'

  Barney stared at her. What options did he have? He hardly had any friends with whom he could share the story. Wondered if he could go to the Samaritans; didn't think they had a murder line. So maybe it would do him some good to tell his mother, even if there was nothing she could do to help him. And all the while, something at the back of his mind was hoping that she would advise him to go to the police and get it over with. It wasn't a decision he could possibly make for himself, but he knew it'd be the right thing to do.

  He laid the story out for her, trying not to miss anything out. For almost all of it she sat quietly taking it in, except for pitching in to suggest that he really ought to have killed Charlie Johnstone when he'd had the chance. When he was finished he was distraught and rested his head back against the seat, trying to stop the tears spilling over onto his face. His hands were shaking and now that he had related it all and confronted the full awfulness of his situation, he was close to panic.