The Raeburn Day Centre was housed in a converted church on the main thoroughfare through Stockbridge, an unending stream of traffic passing close to its doors, deepening the black of its soot-stained masonry and making the very walls vibrate.
Inside, one of the swing-doors leading into the main hall was jammed open with a bucket. Alice peered self-consciously into the hall, her eyes eventually homing in on the only male in a wheelchair in the room. People sat in little groups about the place, some asleep, some knitting, a few talking in low voices to themselves or others.
Occupying the middle of the floor was a ring of office chairs, each with a bored old lady sitting in it. In the centre of the circle, like the bulls-eye, was a gargantuan man, his flesh seeping over the sides of his wheelchair. His partially-shaved head lolled to one side, but when prompted by a member of staff, he threw a tennis ball in the approximate direction of one of the circle, laughing loudly as it missed its target and bounced off the back of someone’s chair.
A female cleaner, clad in a denim jacket and jeans and carrying a mop, attempted delicately to squeeze past Alice, stepping over the bucket into the hall. Moving out of the way, the Sergeant apologised and then asked, ‘Is the man in the middle Robert Clerk?’
‘Aye – he’s like a big bairn,’ the woman replied, rinsing her mop in the bucket and beginning to swab the lino closest to the door, adding as an afterthought, ‘he’s wan o’ ma favourites.’
‘Does he speak at all? Can he speak any more?’
‘A wee bit, but I dinnae think he understan’s a word said tae him. But he’s aye in guid spirits, laughin’, the life an’ soul o’ the party, like…’
Once the game was finished, a helper wheeled the man to the side of the hall, where he sat, smiling to himself, looking round at the others brightly and flexing one bandaged hand in and out to some internal rhythm.
When Alice approached him, bending down beside his wheelchair, he appeared not to notice her until she said, ‘Excuse me, but are you Robert Clerk?’
Still looking straight ahead, he nodded his head up and down vigorously. A woman with childish features and the distinctive eye-folds of Down’s syndrome ambled over and put her arm around the man’s broad shoulders, tickling the back of his neck affectionately with her fingers. Her head was level with his, and when their eyes met the man chuckled delightedly.
‘You want a biscuit, Bob?’ she asked him. Once more he nodded, and when she asked whether he wanted a digestive or a bourbon or a piece of shortbread he assented to each suggestion in the same way.
‘He likes them all? Every type?’ Alice said conversationally to the small figure.
‘No,’ she said, looking fondly at him, ‘he doesn’t, but it’s good manners, eh? To ask him. He only likes jammy dodgers really, don’t you, Bob?’
And in response to the further question he nodded excitedly, his eyes never leaving his friend’s figure as she set off for the tea-trolley on his behalf.
On impulse, Alice asked the man, ‘Are you… Gordon Brown?’ and as before, the man’s head bobbed up and down, communicating that he was, indeed, the Prime Minister.
Alice’s phone went, and she took it from her pocket.
‘Alice, where are you?’ It was DCI Bell, and she sounded rattled.
‘I’m at the Day Centre on Raeburn Place, checking up on Clerk’s alibi for the Saturday night. Tom’s on his way back to the station.’
‘And?’
‘And… it’s not up to much. He says he was with his brother, but the brother’s had a stro…’ Her voice became inaudible as loud cha-cha music started up, a few elderly people taking to the floor. She moved towards the entrance.
‘Jammy Dodger?’ the little Down’s syndrome woman asked, offering her one from a plateful.
She shook her head, speaking into the phone again. ‘The man’s had a stroke, so he can’t tell us whether his brother was with him on the Saturday night or not. There’s a mother, I was going to go and…’
‘Never mind that now. Clerk’s a long shot. I need you to meet Eric at the bank by Saughtonhall Drive. The Fraud Squad’s just tipped us the wink that someone’s used Brodie’s card at an ATM machine on the Corstorphine Road. The CCTV footage reveals that it’s Ally Livingstone.’
‘I thought he was still inside.’
‘Well, he isn’t. So speak to the manager, then go pick him up and bring him straight here.’
Usually, having his wife’s fingertips resting on the handle of the supermarket trolley, restraining it, blatantly attempting to control it, maddened him. But this morning Ally Livingstone did not mind, he even allowed himself to be cajoled into traipsing up and down all the aisles, including the pet food one, although they owned neither dog nor cat. Seeing his heavily pregnant wife helping herself from the shelves, unconcerned about the cost and indulging in needless extravagances, pleased him, and on the only occasion on which she hesitated, he nodded at her indulgently, signalling for her to add the item to their load, just as a rich man would.
At the till he stood, legs crossed and arms folded, watching as the women packed the carrier bags, Frankie talking to the check-out girl as if they were old friends and surreptitiously adding some last-minute purchases, a couple of packets of chewing gum for each of them. Juicy Fruit for him and Wrigley’s Spearmint for her. Only at the kiosk did he lose his temper, after waiting for seven other people to be served before them and then being told that they had no Lambert and Butler left.
Back in the car, the three measures of whisky that he had downed in O’Riordan’s Bar earlier that day warmed him still, making him feel good-humoured once more, content with the world and all its works. As they approached the traffic lights on Gorgie Road, he had a sudden idea, a truly inspired one. He had bought loads of stuff for Frankie and the wee man, so now it was his turn!
‘Stop the car a minute, hen,’ he commanded, and obediently she flicked on the indicator and drew slowly to the pavement, coming to a halt on the double yellow lines opposite the pet shop.
‘Dinnae go an’ get another o’ them fish now, Ally,’ she said wearily, looking over at the pet store as he let himself out of the Nissan. She added, ‘The pump’s no’ workin’, an’ all they cherry barbs ’n’ tiger barbs are deid, mind.’
‘Aha,’ he said, slamming the car door and lumbering eagerly along the pavement, heading straight for ‘Furry Friends’, his mouth curving into a wide smile in his glee. In his absence his wife watched the endless stream of pedestrians dawdling along, heads sunk into their shoulders and their carrier bags half-empty, wondering why only old people were out and about at this time of day. The Credit Crunch maybe?
When she inadvertently caught the eye of a prowling traffic warden, she smiled meekly at him, dropping her eyes to her distended belly, drawing his attention to it by way of excuse for parking illegally. Frowning, he nodded back at her, ostentatiously returning his notebook into his unbuttoned front pocket. Thanks, ye wee Hitler, she mouthed, eyelashes fluttering at him.
After ten minutes she began to feel restive, her swollen belly slightly compressed by the steering wheel and her back beginning to ache. She shifted her position, forcing herself to sit up straight, leaving a few inches between her tummy and the wheel. She was, she decided, looking down at the disappearing curve, nothing more than a monstrous bag of flesh, some kind of childbearing pod. Even her fingers had become fat, so thick that she could feel her pulse throbbing in the one encircled by her new engagement ring. An antique, no less, Ally had boasted that morning as he had wrestled to push it over her knuckle, after first fastening the matching chain of pearls around her neck. Old-fashioned crap, she had thought to herself. A band of white gold with a single diamond had been what she had expected, what she wanted.