‘Morning,’ I mumbled.
‘Sorry, Oz,’ she said, with the bright morning voice of the professional nurse, ‘I was trying not to wake you. This isn’t part of the service either,’ she added, almost as an afterthought, ‘but Susie’s feeding baby Janet and she asked me if I would bring your tea in.’
I mumbled again as she left, then checked the bedside clock. It told me in big red liquid crystal numbers that I’d slept for almost ten hours. I pulled myself up in bed and used a remote to switch on the television in the corner, but all I could find was cartoons, kids making a noise, and that blonde girl with the tattoo on her bum who does the Saturday morning football programme.
I gave them all up and settled for Radio Clyde One, just as Susie came into the bedroom with wee Jan still attached. Maybe it was all the stuff that had been happening over the last few days, but my heart and my eyes just seemed to fill up at the same time.
‘Come here,’ I said, barely able to see them. ‘Come into bed and let’s be a family.’
We did that, we just lay there, did Susie and I, for about half an hour, with our child between us, talking mostly nonsense. I told her about Ewan and Alison having done their deal, I told her about the rehearsal and the scene set visit to Advocates’ Close, and I told her about meeting Don Kennedy, the famous golfer, and his gloomy prognosis for my slice. But I did not tell her about Anna Chin; that sort of stuff has no business invading a moment like that.
Eventually we got up, and each of us, while the other showered, took turns at playing with the smiling Janet. Some people say it’s only wind at that age, not a real smile, but that is sheer nonsense. . I have two nephews and a daughter; I know these things.
It was Ethel’s hard-earned weekend off; she muttered something about going to see her sister in Roseneath and headed off in her all-silver Ford Ka. ‘Right,’ Susie declared. ‘Janet’s fed, now what about us?’
‘Saturday morning,’ I replied. ‘Glasgow. I’ll go for the rolls and the papers, like any other bloke. You start the fry-up, and get the tea on, like any other woman.’
‘Bloody chauvinist! But I don’t fancy going out looking like an unmade bed. .’ See? Stereotypical behaviour; with her red hair tousled, and her freckled face fresh from the shower, she looked absolutely stunning. ‘. . So we’ll do it your way.’ She took the door keys from the kitchen table and tossed them to me.
The flat is in a building near the top of Woodside Terrace, so I cut along to Lynedoch Street, and down to Woodlands Road, where I could take my pick of grocer newsagents, each one just like my friend Ali’s place. I went into the nearest, bought four morning rolls, baked that day, the Daily Record and the Scotsman. The woman behind the counter gave me a knowing look, probably marking me as an out-of-towner, because I hadn’t taken the Herald. I had a reason for picking the Edinburgh daily, though.
I sprinted across the street, and stopped on the other side, turning to glare over my shoulder at a taxi-driver who had blown his horn at me. As I did so, I caught a figure at the edge of my vision, turning away from me. Of itself, there was nothing unusual in it, but something clicked in my head, all the same.
I looked after the bloke, but he was heading briskly off towards Charing Cross. . yes, Glasgow has one of them too. Paranoia, Blackstone; not everyone is out to get you. I forgot about it and opened my Scotsman. The death was worth a paragraph on page one, and a longer story on page three. That told me that the police had launched a full-scale murder investigation after the body of a twenty-five-year-old woman had been found in the new headquarters building of the Torrent group. The victim, Anna Chin, a doctor’s daughter from Barnton. . If she had been a waiter’s daughter from Leith, would they have mentioned that? I wondered. . was in the habit of working late on Fridays to take weekend returns from the field sales team. Detectives were working on the theory that she had disturbed an intruder.
Fine, I thought. Ricky’s put them off the trail, for now at least. I knew that it was a matter of time before they tumbled to the David Capperauld connection, but hopefully by that time there would be nothing that would tie Alison to the scene.
I took out my mobile and called Ricky on his, ship to ship, as a pal of mine used to say. ‘How is she?’ I asked him.
‘Okay,’ he replied, in a quiet voice. There was a pause: I guessed he was still with Alison and that he might be going somewhere she couldn’t hear him. Knowing her better by now than I ever had before, I guessed that he was probably getting out of bed.
I heard the sound of a closing door; Ricky was probably in the toilet. ‘She’s calm now,’ he said, more clearly.
‘Did she tell you anything else?’
‘Only what we guessed; someone called her and told her that Torrent wanted to see her at the office.’
‘Who?’
‘She doesn’t have a clue. She said that the voice wasn’t clear; the caller said he was passing on a message from Natalie Morgan, that Torrent wanted a quick meeting that evening.’
‘What about Torrent? Do we know where he was?’
‘The records in his office showed that he signed out at three, with Natalie. The police tried to get hold of him last night; eventually they found them both at a dinner at Gleneagles Hotel. I called someone I know there afterwards. They checked in at four-fifteen.’
‘Separate suites?’
‘Of course, she’s his niece.’
I couldn’t help laughing; there are some things that coppers can’t contemplate. ‘Cynical bastard, Blackstone,’ he muttered. ‘Even if they were, they still wouldn’t just take one suite.’
He had a point; I wasn’t as smart as I thought. No need to let him know that, though. ‘It could still have been Natalie who made the call,’ I pointed out.
‘Sure. I’m betting it was.’
‘She couldn’t have killed Anna, though,’ I said. ‘She must have been alive when the last person signed out.’
‘She could. She could have checked in, driven back, done the girl and been up there again for dinner.’
‘And why would she want to do that?’
‘That’s a question I’d love to ask her, but I can’t risk it.’
‘Then get one of your tame policemen to ask.’
‘I can’t do that either; they’re off chasing intruders, remember.’
Yes, I remembered. We were boxed in, good and proper. Or at least, Ricky was; I had to remind myself that this investigation had nothing to do with me.
I had almost put it out of my mind by the time I got back home to the family. I had got the best of the deal all round; Susie’s a much better breakfast cook than me, and she always uses olive oil when she’s frying. I’ll use anything.
We stuffed the four rolls with fillet steak and egg. . decadent, eh. . and ate them in front of the telly. The tasty bird with the tattoo on her bum had finished, and we were into previews from around the grounds.
‘That’s enough of that,’ said Susie, once we were finished. She grabbed the remote and switched off. ‘We are taking our daughter out for an airing.’
‘Where?’
‘I thought that Kelvingrove would be nice. We could walk there.’
That sounded good to me. ‘Okay,’ I agreed, ‘if I can do the Transport Museum as well.’
Susie got the baby dressed for the outdoors, we did the same, and we headed out into the bright autumn day. We walked Janet, in her pram. . a sort of multi-purpose vehicle for kids. . down Elderslie Street, and turned into Sauchiehall Street, the most famous thoroughfare in Glasgow, if not the nicest. We strolled along at no great pace, but it didn’t take us long to come to the old Kelvin Hall, which houses the city’s museum of transport. When I had lived in Glasgow, before, and Jonny and Colin, my nephews, came to visit, they always made me take them there. I took no persuading; I love those old Glasgow trams and I’d love to have ridden on one for real. My Dad did, on a visit to Glasgow as a child, and he still talks about it. The city was all the poorer when they were replaced by giant electric trolleybuses; Whispering Death, they became known as, as they came rolling silently up behind a number of unwary Glaswegian drunks who had chosen exactly the wrong moment to step off the pavement.