Criminals

by Margot Livesey

  “Like what?” he asked. He’d cheered up at the mention of clocks and calendars; they had those at home.

  “Well,” she said, “you chose this topic before you came to talk to me, and I made it up before you chose it. Before and after are ways of measuring time. Sometimes things happen at the same time, like you eating your tea in front of the telly.”

  He’d asked why some bits of time whizzed by and others dawdled. “I don’t know,” she’d said. “It always seems back to front. When we enjoy something it’s over too soon, and when we don’t it goes on and on. Maybe in your project you’ll have an insight about that.”

  Her profession of ignorance had made a huge impression on him. He spent the whole weekend pondering this business of time going fast and slow. Lots of things, he realised, were arranged like that—more of what you hated than what you liked—and disguising your feelings made no difference. When he presented his project, he revealed his solution to the discrepancy: out-of-body travel. It was an idea he’d borrowed from his mum, who claimed to do this on difficult occasions, beginning with his own, untoward birth. Some of his classmates giggled, but Miss McBain nodded seriously. “We’ll have to give that a shot,” she said. “Not during school, though, boys and girls. Thank you, Kenneth.”

  He had thought of her then as outside time, and this seemed confirmed by his subsequent, rather infrequent, glimpses of her. Last year he had run into her in Woolie’s. He was about to pocket a fancy Biro when, glancing down, he saw a pair of familiar shoes beside his grotty trainers. There she was buying half a dozen pens, testing each one carefully on the wee pad the shop provided. She looked exactly the same, if anything a little younger. He put the Biro back and moved away as quietly as possible. At the shop door he suddenly noticed they’d installed one of those gizmos that beeped if you carried something through without paying. Good old Miss McBain had saved him from another argy-bargy with a shop manager. How he loathed their white shirts and bow ties.

  Now time raced by like Easy Does It, although he wasn’t precisely enjoying himself. He hadn’t meant to wait so long before his second phone call to the Laffertys. In fact he didn’t realise he had until he went to collect his dole and counted off the days on his fingers. There were reasons for the delay. The pub with the special phone, The Blind Beggar, was a good twenty minutes from Joan’s flat, so he couldn’t pop in on the spur of the moment. And the situation with Joan was tricky. For one thing, she refused to eat, he didn’t know why. Maybe she stuffed herself at the infirmary, but at home he never saw her have more than a cup of tea. “You’d make a good Irish prisoner,” he joked, “already in training for your hunger strikes.” She gave him a stony look and went on spooning baked beans onto his plate. He’d started collecting her from work—a nuisance, but he wanted to be sure she didn’t try to see her mother. Impossible to tell what the old woman thought, a wizened monkey in her sari, chattering in some weird language. She could easily kibosh his plans. Lalit, he thought, you are my main man. He looked fondly and often at the photo on the fridge.

  So when he was standing in line for his dole and saw the date above the counter—Monday 13th April—it came as a shock. Three days since he dumped Grace, two since he phoned. As soon as he got his dole, he walked over to The Blind Beggar and dialled the phone. No answer. He played a game of darts with two blokes who turned out to be brothers. They both worked at the swimming pool—leisure centre it was called nowadays. “You can smell the chlorine on me night and day,” one of them boasted. “It doesn’t matter how much I wash.”

  He held out his arm, and sure enough, Kenneth got a whiff when he sniffed the sleeve of his cardigan. He won the game by seven points and tried the phone again. Still no answer, but he wasn’t fazed. Being out and about himself, seeing a steady stream of people come into the pub for a lunchtime pint and bridie, made it seem natural that the Laffertys were out too. Then he had to go and see his mum. If he didn’t show up on dole day, she might change the locks. As it was, she winkled fifteen quid out of him before she even made him a cup of tea or read his horoscope.

  “Leo,” she read, “a busy week. You have ample opportunity to consolidate your position. Believe in yourself and don’t back down. Beware of vanity, your besetting sin.”

  “Let me see that,” he said, reaching for the magazine. Except for the vanity—and what was besetting anyway?—it sounded so appropriate she must be making it up, but no, there it was, beside the little lion. He’d always been proud of his star sign. The only good thing his mum had ever done for him.

  Finally, on Wednesday, he took Joan with him to The Blind Beggar. As soon as he said they were going out, she leapt up, and he knew she thought they were fetching Grace. She was into her raincoat in a trice. Outside, she streaked along the pavement, tugging him across the streets. At the sight of the pub her face went pinched. The place was much busier than at lunchtime. He stuck her in a corner by the cigarette machine and bought her a lemonade. No point in wasting a shandy on her in this mood. He carried his pint over to the phone. Joan was watching him, like a punter watches a horse, desperate to know his next move.

  At the nearest table three old geezers were playing dominoes. The youngest, a lad of sixty or so, clacked down a tile. Opposite him, a chap with a hearing aid the size of a Walkman laid down a couple. Kenneth lit a fag. The pressure of Joan’s gaze made that first drag particularly sweet. Ah well, time to get on with it. He took out his one-pence coins, okey-dokey, and rooted in his back pocket for the envelope where he kept his bits and pieces. There was the phone number tucked between a five-pound note and a bus ticket.

  As he lifted the phone, he saw Joan lean forward, almost rise out of her seat. It had been drizzling on their walk over, and her skin matched the damp, ashy colour of her raincoat. Kenneth held up his free hand the way policemen do. She sank back, and praise be, someone answered.

  He wasn’t even sure it was the Lafferty woman until the second hello. Then a sponge wiped across his brain. All his ideas, every last one of them, vanished. After the several unanswered calls, he’d got out of the habit of making up speeches. The domino players were arguing, and the geezer with the hearing aid was slowly getting up from the table.

  That was it, Kenneth thought, he should ask for the bloke. He did, and she said he wasn’t there, and he began to lose it.

  “Don’t get high-and-mighty with me, bitch. I know you’ve got—” he shouted. But she had hung up. He squeezed the receiver so hard it made a small cracking sound. When he closed his eyes, the lids boiled red.

  Hold on, Kenneth, he said to himself. No use killing the goose that lays the golden eggs. He put the phone down and found his cigarette where he’d balanced it on the edge of an ashtray, more ash than fag by this time, and took a quick puff. When he looked round again, Joan was standing up. Could she have heard him? He gestured for her to sit down and pointed to the Gents. Inside, there was a bloke ahead, and he had to wait. He leaned his forehead against the wall. It was icily, unpleasantly cold, and he soon straightened up. The white paint was speckled with graffiti. Free Scotland/Fuck Maggie, he read. Bert Swanson eats haggis.

  While peeing, Kenneth had an idea, a small one that nonetheless made him feel better. It was gormless to have the phone number on a wee scrap of paper, especially when he was staying at Joan’s and traipsing around. He’d write it on the wall of the lav: For a good time call … Then the number would be here when he needed it, no bother. And maybe someone else would have a go. That’d be a laugh. He stood on tiptoe and wrote it as high as he could above the basin.

  When he came out he rang back. The line was busy, and he pictured plainly the empty cradle, the receiver dangling. I need to get a grip, he thought. He had the sudden fear he might be overlooking something obvious, like that time in London with Duncan. They had made money by hanging around King’s Cross Station, where the trains to Scotland came and went, with a sign about needing the fare home to Perth. “We should put Inverness on the sign,” Duncan suggested. “More
charisma.”

  “Don’t be daft,” Kenneth said. “Perth’s good enough for me, good enough for anyone.” But one afternoon when Duncan had skived off, he made a new sign, with Inverness, and raised three quid more than usual. So much for Duncan and his bloody charisma.

  The geezer with the hearing aid was back in his seat. Kenneth watched him lay down three tiles. It doesn’t do to be stubborn, he told himself. You have to be flexible, inventive. Look at this business of bringing Joan along, for instance. Bloody stupid. It meant he was thinking of too many things at once. He didn’t have the concentration to deal with the Lafferty bitch. Now at the cigarette machine a bloke was talking to Joan, probably asking for change, but she said nothing. Just hung her head. The bloke stepped away to the bar, and she sat there, head down, everything hidden by that pink headscarf, bad as those hats at the infirmary. What I should have done, Kenneth thought, was lock her in.

  Next morning, as soon as Joan left for work, he made himself a cuppa and sat in the kitchen, laying his plans. You could only do so much on the phone. Tomorrow, Friday, was Joan’s day off. He’d leave her here and go to Mill of Fortune. He wondered if he ought to get a partner, someone to watch his back, like in the pictures. But the only person he trusted was Duncan, and he was away in Glasgow. Besides, he wasn’t dealing with the Kray brothers, just a bunch of toffs. That he knew they had Grace, and had kept her now for close on a week, was the only weapon he needed. If he hadn’t been cut off during his last phone call, he’d have named his ransom price. Four thousand quid. He’d thought the whole thing through. If he asked for too much, they wouldn’t cough up right away. But four grand—not to have your name in the papers as a pervert was dead cheap. They could hand the dough over, no bother. Along with Grace. Then he’d give her back to Joan and get the hell out of here.

  He finished his tea and went to the bus station to check the times. The three o’clock race looked interesting, but he didn’t stop at the betting shop. He felt he had just enough luck for one venture. To enter into others would be to invite disaster. Then he had the bus times and there was nothing else to do. At a loose end, he wandered down the High Street and into Kinnoull Street. As he passed the library, a lad in a natty black outfit swung through the doors. Watching him ponce down the steps, Kenneth reflected on his own wardrobe. What should he wear to Mill of Fortune? Neither his red jacket nor his anorak seemed right. Then he remembered the sports jacket he’d last worn to apply for a job at the infirmary, and made a detour to his mum’s to retrieve it. She was out, thank God. On his way back to Joan’s he stopped at the barber on Barossa Street, an Eyetie who did a nice job for three quid.

  That evening he took Joan to the supermarket. “Got to stock up,” he said. “I’m eating you out of house and home.” He marched her up and down the aisles, putting stuff in the basket: soup, baked beans, sausages, eggs, margarine. In the bread aisle she suddenly froze. He didn’t know what was happening. Then he saw her beady eyes fixed on this woman, dark like her, and a baby, dark like Grace; for a few seconds he even had the wild thought it could be Grace. But as they came closer he saw it was just an ordinary, spotty baby, dressed in blue. Tears were rolling down Joan’s cheeks. He nudged her. “I suppose you want brown bread,” he said.

  No response. He eyed the nice white Mother’s Pride, then put the biggest brown loaf he could find in the basket. “Never say I don’t care about you,” he said.

  • • •

  Friday morning, with the help of Joan’s alarm, he was up at seven. Joan was watching as he got out of bed, but of course she didn’t utter a peep. He went to the kitchen and put on the kettle. As he waited for it to boil, he greeted Lalit, his wavy hair, his bright white shirt. On impulse he made a cup for Joan, too, and carried it into the bedroom. “Here’s some tea,” he said, setting it down on the bedside table.

  She lay on her side, looking at him blankly. Could she be poorly from not eating? “Listen,” he said. “I’m going to get Grace. She’ll be back here tonight.”

  She sprang up as if he had set fire to the bed. “Kenneth,” she cried, flinging her arms around his neck. “You promise? Grace is coming home? You promise? Grace is really coming home?”

  She must’ve asked twenty times. He laughed. “Yes, yes,” he said. “Start warming the nappies.” He pulled himself out of her clutches and went to the bathroom. He shaved for the first time since his last bus journey, borrowed Joan’s deodorant, and combed his hair. The haircut was a good move. Through the closed door he heard Joan, noisier than she’d been in days.

  He was ready to leave. In his mind he’d seen himself pocketing her keys and slipping out of the house while she was still asleep. Now, with all this good humour around, he felt he had to tell her what he was up to. “But why?” she said. “I will stay here. I will do what you tell me, but I do not like to be locked in.”

  He couldn’t quite recall his reasons, and for a moment he was tempted to relent. Then he told himself not to be soft. “Grace,” he said. “It’s safer for Grace. Give me your keys.”

  “All right. When will you be back?”

  “By dark. Maybe sooner. You have to be patient. Watch the telly and tell me what you see, okey-dokey? Good girl.” He kissed her and was out of the door.

  As he stepped into the street he saw the sky, clear blue with not an inkling of rain, and once again felt the spell of his own good luck. He’d given no thought to the possibility of bad weather. He stopped at the corner shop for fags and was at the bus station with ten minutes to spare. He didn’t really need to, but out of nostalgia he used the Gents. There was something different about the place, and looking around, he realised what it was. They’d put up a mirror over the bloody basin. About time, he thought, giving his hair another approving glance. When he came out, the bus was waiting, with the same snooty woman driver as before. That trip already seemed so long ago she ought to be in retirement by now. She didn’t recognise him, which was maybe no bad thing.

  He spent the journey in a hectic trance. He pictured himself talking calmly to the bloke in a suit, the way he would’ve liked to speak to that snotty supervisor at the infirmary. He pictured money, a thousand dole cheques piled up and nobody telling him what to do. He wouldn’t go mad with it either; he’d do what his horoscope said, consolidate his position. And the great thing was that he wasn’t the one with anything to hide—well, from Joan, perhaps—but anyone else would think it was the toff who’d behaved badly, skedaddling with a baby, and he, Kenneth, was the hero, getting her back.

  They reached the town. A couple of people got off at the caravan site on the outskirts. Then they were pulling up beside the Odeon, and he was following a woman in a brightly patterned headscarf down the aisle and out into the square. He walked along the main street, wondering where to ask the way. The chemists was the obvious choice, but he felt wary of a repeat visit, and it was too early for the pub. The butcher’s with the hares hanging up outside caught his eye.

  Inside, everything shone—the counters, the knives, the bald head of the butcher. “Good morning,” he said. “What can I do for you?”

  “I’m looking for Mill of Fortune. Some folk called Lafferty live there. Do you know it, by any chance?”

  The woman in the chemists had said something else, a name he couldn’t recall, but the butcher was already nodding. “Indeed I do. It’s up Glen Teall. You’ll be driving?”

  “Yes.” He would be soon.

  “I’ll draw you a map. I’ve always fancied myself a bit of a cartographer.” He took a white paper bag from the pile beside the cash register, pursed his lips, and began to draw. Kenneth stared at the rows of chops, so neat they must have come from the same cow, and the chickens with their prickly flesh. This was what the country was for, he thought: making dead animals. After a few minutes the butcher summoned him. “We’re here.” He pointed to a square marked “Rae,” then explained the route ending at a larger square, marked “Lafferty.”

  “How far is it?”

 
“Five miles?” His eyebrows rose into the expanse of his forehead. “Maybe a wee bit less.”

  “Thanks. Thanks a ton.” Kenneth folded the bag in two and backed out of the shop, nearly colliding with an old wifie coming in.

  Five miles, he thought, no bother. He stopped to buy a can of Coke and a Mars bar and set out across the bridge. Once he was on the road to Glen Teall, he walked briskly, sticking out his thumb each time he heard a car. A dozen passed him by. “Wankers,” he shouted. Then a grey van stopped: a father and son, delivering potatoes to the local farms. “Where are you headed?” asked the father.

  “Mill of Fortune.”

  “Och aye, the Lafferty place. It’s right along here.”

  Strange, Kenneth mused, as he balanced on a sack of tatties, having a house with a name and everyone knowing about it. This only made the whole business with Grace even more peculiar. The chances of a bloke like that being in a bus station were tiny, but then so were the chances of him being there with Grace. He shifted, carefully keeping his jacket away from the dirt, and felt a sneeze coming on. Luck, he thought, ideas. He reached into his pocket and surprisingly encountered a Kleenex.

  They dropped him off at the bottom of a small road. Fifteen minutes’ walk, they said, keep to the left, an old stone house. He watched the van disappear; a puff of gravel and it was gone. He was alone, utterly alone, surrounded by this weird thing: maybe it was silence. He looked down at his hands and feet to reassure himself that he existed, and he did seem to, there they were, but everyone else, he thought, could be dead. His mum, Joan, Grace, Duncan, even the immortal Miss McBain, they could all be dead and buried in this sinister peaceful valley. A huge loneliness washed over him. He longed to be back in Perth, doing normal, boring things, like sniffing the chlorine on a bloke’s cardigan. He was tempted to turn around right there and start walking back to the town.