"Hello, Alan," said Leslie, looking revolted.
"Hello," said Alan, forgetting he was pretending to be sleepy and sitting up straight. "You were here before," he said to Maureen. He had Jimmy's teeth. "Did ye find my mum?"
No one knew what to say to him.
"Not yet, son."
"Will ye?"
"Dunno, pal."
Jimmy patted him on the back. "Come on now, you should be in your bed. Ye can go up yourself."
"I want you to put me to bed," he said, clinging to Jimmy's arm.
"Now, Alan, I'm talking to people-"
"Jimmy," said Maureen, "we'll go."
The boy smiled.
"Naw," said Jimmy. "He's old enough-"
"We'll go," said Maureen. "You take him up." She stood up and Leslie lurched towards the door, desperate to get out. Maureen touched the boy's yellow hair. "Cheerio, Alan, I'll see ye again."
Alan wouldn't look at her. He was holding on to his dad, afraid to let go. He wouldn't even let Jimmy come to the door to see them off.
"See ye later, Jimmy," said Maureen, looking back into the living room, but Jimmy had his hands full trying not to fall over his son.
She shut the door quietly and followed Leslie to the lifts. It was windy on the veranda and televisions blared behind the neighboring doors. The smell of urine had faded in the lift, leaving behind it an acute bitter undertone. AMcC was still sucking cocks but had been joined in the endeavor by Rory T.
"God," Leslie groaned, "my mum'll be feeding them mince intravenously when she sees them. What was all that." 'Don't go down the mine today, Daddy' stuff?"
"There's moneylenders up threatening him every night – the wee boy's frightened for him," said Maureen, trying to think of something positive to say, to stop Jimmy being Mr. Pathetic Universe. "They're a very close family."
"They're a very frightened family," corrected Leslie. "That boy knows what's going to happen to his dad. He knows it better than his dad does."
"Are ye going to take the pictures to the police?"
"I dunno," said Leslie quietly, biting the inside of her bottom lip.
She rubbed her eyes. "But the first sign that he did it and I'll go to Peel Street myself and hand them over."
Maureen grinned at her as the lift doors slid open into the empty foyer. Leslie stomped across to the door and Maureen followed her out into the dark and windy yard. She waited until Leslie had unchained the bike. "Auch," she said stagily, "I've left my lighter up there. I'll just be a minute."
She knocked very quietly so that the boy wouldn't hear her. Jimmy looked pleased when he saw her and even more pleased when he saw she was alone. "What are ye back for?" he asked, opening the door wide.
Maureen looked up the stairs and saw Alan's ruffled hair above the solid banister on the landing. She called to him, "It's just me again."
Alan stood up and looked at her. His eyes were puffy and tired.
"Go back to bed, son," she called softly. "It's all right. I just forgot something."
Jimmy looked up the stairs, apparently surprised that Alan was there. "Away you to bed," he said, raising his hand in a threat. "Go."
Alan got up and bolted back into his room, closing the door overquietly, trying not to wake the other children. Jimmy led her into the living room, shutting the door to the hall so that Alan couldn't hear them. Maureen bent down and picked up Vik's lighter. "Jimmy, why did ye fly to London last week?" Jimmy didn't answer. She pointed to the space by the wall where the bag had been. "I saw your bag with the baggage sticker on it."
Jimmy breathed in unsteadily. "Do the police know?" he whispered.
"I don't know."
Jimmy fell back into his seat, looking guilty and hunted. He smiled nervously up at her. "Thought my luck had changed."
"Why were ye there?"
"Someone put a ticket through the door," he said. "It was late at night. In an envelope. With a letter. It said I had to go to this lawyer's office in Brixton."
"Why did ye go?"
He looked at her, not understanding. "It was a lawyer's letter," he said simply, as if it had the force of a papal edict.
"What was it about?"
"Some money."
"What money?"
"From a will. Someb'dy'd died and left me money. If I didn't go I wouldn't get it."
"Like in the movies?" asked Maureen sadly.
"Aye." He nodded. "Like that."
Maureen got her packet out and dished him a fag, lighting them with Vik's lighter. "What happened when you went to the lawyer's office?" she asked.
Jimmy pulled the saucer out from behind his chair. He exhaled a thin stream of smoke and paused. "I went to the address. It was a lawyer's office but it was a different office, different name. They used to be called that name a while ago but they changed it. They'd not written to me. There wasn't a will. It must have been a joke"-he smiled nervously-"but I thought, Oh, well, at least I got to go on a plane, ye know?"
"Have ye still got the letter?"
"The one from the lawyer?"
"Aye."
"I think so." He rummaged through a pile of bills at the side of the chair. "I've it here somewhere."
He stood up, lifted the chair cushion and found an envelope with a printed address on it and no stamp. The letterhead read "McCallum and Headie," and was printed in a typeface available on the most rudimentary word processors. The text of the letter was in the same font as the heading and the paper was photocopy quality.
They hadn't even spell-checked it: Jimmy was instructed to attend the office at 2 p.m. on the Thursday or he would lose his claim to the inheritance. He replaced the cushion and sat down on his chair.
"Jimmy"-Maureen was appalled by his naivete-"what possessed ye to go?"
"Thought my luck had changed." He jerked his head at the letter. "You'd've known, would ye?" He looked at her. She didn't want to say but Jimmy knew anyway.
"What day were you there?"
"A week ago today."
"Last Thursday?"
"Aye. The polis said she'd been in the river for about a week. That means I was there when it happened, doesn't it?"
"When did ye get the ticket?"
"It came through the door the night before."
Jimmy wasn't fly enough to dodge a glacier. The kids might even be better off in care but Jimmy deserved one break in his entire fucking life. Just one break. She looked at the letter again. Liam had a lawyer. He used to lie about it if it came up in company, pretend he knew nothing about them if the firm was mentioned in the papers. He said you could tell the most intimate details of a person's life from the name of their lawyer, how much they earned, whether they were straight or bent, who they hung about with, what they were into. She jotted down the name and the address on the letter and put the bit of paper in her pocket. "Did anyone see ye in London?" said Maureen. "Would anyone remember you being there?"
"No, I was only there for the day. I couldn't have gone otherwise – the kids, ye know. I felt like a real jet-setter – flying down in the morning, coming back at night. The food was nice too. I saved my pudding for the wee ones."
She thought about the mattress. "Don't you know anyone in London, Jimmy?"
"No. I know Moe, but not well enough to go and see her. Should I just not tell the polis about it?"
"I don't know," said Maureen. "Don't volunteer the information, eh? Wait till they ask ye."