by Louise Welsh
Murray had never considered it before, but he could see how the tactic might work.
‘I guess it lets you get up close and personal.’
‘Exactly. I was a bit pissed off on Archie’s behalf, but it was still none of my beeswax and, anyway, something told me Robb was doing it to get Archie’s attention, so I let them get on with it.’
‘Did Archie join in?’
‘Oh, aye, before long he was right in the middle of the hocus-pocus. That made it worse. He was meant to be my mate and here he was giving me a showing-up in front of these serious socialists. Then I heard what Bobby Robb was saying and lost my rag.’
Meikle paused and his face grew tight, as if remembering brought back his anger. Somewhere a car radio cried advance warning of the lunchtime news bulletin and Murray remembered time was against them.
‘What was he talking about?’
‘Reincarnation.’
‘Surely that kind of thing was big back then?’
‘Oh, aye, it was. Hinduism and all that. Not my bag, but I didn’t have a problem with it. No, Bobby Robb was waxing on about how you could gain access to other worlds, other minds, through rituals. According to him, if you hit on the right spell, you’d be able to outlive death. Maybe it was the drugs, or maybe it was the drink, who knows? He’d had a fair few pints by this time, we all had. But according to Robb, the most valuable ingredient was the blood of an innocent, a virgin. You wouldn’t necessarily have to kill the girl to get it, Robb said, just cut her. He asked Christie if she’d oblige, and when she told him she didn’t qualify, started quizzing her on whether she had any friends who did. I waited for Archie to shut him up and when he didn’t, I told Robb he was talking a load of pish. The next thing I know, we’re scrapping outside on the pavement.’
‘You and Bobby?’
‘No.’ Meikle gave a bitter laugh. ‘Bobby wasn’t the kind to fight his own battles. Me and Archie.’ They had reached the library doorway now. Somewhere a clock struck one, but the bookfinder made no move to return to his post. ‘I went round to his flat the next day, but Archie was either out, or not answering. I reckoned if he wanted to see me, he knew where to look. A month later his book came out. No doubt he launched it on a wave of drink. Eventually I heard Archie and Christie had gone off to one of the islands. Robb was with them.’ The bookfinder’s voice took on a definite tone, making it clear he was drawing a line under the subject. ‘Now you know as much as I do.’
‘Except why you blame Bobby Robb for Archie’s death.’
‘It’s just my opinion.’
‘But you’ve got a reason. I’d like to hear it, if you’re willing to share it with me.’
The older man stood silently, looking down the street in the direction of the crossroads.
‘Fuck it.’ He took his mobile from his pocket and dialled. ‘Fiona? Aye, I’m fine, hen, but I’m going to be a wee bit late back.’ He paused while the person on the other end of the line said something, and then answered, ‘No, no problem. Just something I’ve got to deal with. Aye, I remember, I’ll be back in time. Thanks, Fiona, I’ll do the same for you sometime. Cheers.’
He hung up and Murray said, ‘Do you want to go somewhere?’
‘No, I can’t. I’ve got a meeting in a few minutes. Let’s step away from the door, though. I don’t want to chance my luck.’ They walked down the bridge a little way and stood looking down onto old Edinburgh. Meikle nodded at the darkened street below. ‘From up here, it could be a hundred years ago.’ He sighed. ‘You’re right. Archie was a stupid bastard at times, and I’ve no evidence Bobby had anything to do with his death. But there were rumours.’
‘What kind of rumours?’
‘Nothing substantial, only that things got out of hand once they got to the island. Something happened to make Archie do what he did, and Bobby Robb wasn’t an innocent party.’ He looked Murray square in the face. ‘He came back to Edinburgh afterwards, but someone gave him a doing and he moved on.’
‘You?’
‘What does it matter? It was a long time ago.’ In the street below, two old men with open cans of lager in their hands made unsteady progress, arm in arm. ‘Classic Edinburgh: up here it’s hustle and bustle, down there it’s drink and decay. Like lifting a stone.’ Down below, the old men lowered themselves onto the kerbside. One of them gestured expansively, elaborating on some point while his companion tipped his beer can to his mouth. Transport them to a gastro-pub and they might be two professors of English literature debating the finer points of theory.
Murray said, ‘I still don’t see why you blame Bobby rather than Christie.’
Meikle gave Murray a defiant stare.
‘Bobby Robb was a walking pharmacy. Archie had no self-control. Put him on an island with someone like that and what happened was almost inevitable.’
‘There’s more to it than that, isn’t there?’
‘No.’ The bookfinder looked away. ‘Except …’ His phone rang and he took it from his pocket. ‘I’m on my way.’ He stowed the mobile and turned his attention back to Murray. ‘Bobby Robb was a drug-addled opportunist, but even I could see he had some kind of magnetism. And Lunan was looking for a guru. Maybe that was why he palled up with me in the first place. Problem was, I had enough trouble keeping myself straight.’
He turned to walk away.
‘George.’ Murray put a hand on the other man’s arm.
‘You’ve been frank with me. I appreciate it.’
The bookfinder’s gruffness had returned. He hesitated an uncomfortable beat, then took Murray’s proffered hand and shook it.
‘I’ve thought about it nigh-on thirty years, and I believe whatever happened up on Lismore, Bobby Robb was at the bottom of it.’
Murray asked, ‘Did you ever see Christie again?’
‘Once, I saw her in the street not long after Archie’s death.’ Meikle shook his head. ‘That night in the pub, I remember thinking how beautiful Christie was. She was glowing and her hair … well, it was always lovely, but it seemed thicker, shinier.’ He paused as if deciding whether to go on, then continued, ‘The last time I saw her, it was as if she’d aged. She’d lost weight. It made her features look sharper, witchy. Suddenly I felt that I would have as soon talked to the Devil. I crossed the road to avoid her.’
They started to walk together, back in the direction of the library. George Meilke asked, ‘So what next?’
‘It’s all baby steps at the moment. I’m planning on heading to Lismore, see if I can get Christie to give me her account. And I guess I’ll have to try and track down Bobby Robb.’ He gave Meikle an apologetic glance. ‘Even if he turns out to still be as bad as he was when you met him, I need to hear his account.’
Meikle nodded. They walked on in silence for a while. The lunchtime rush was over, but these days the city was never quiet and there was still a slow crawl of cars edging along George IV Bridge towards the lights.
Meikle gave a tired grin. ‘I know where he drinks.’
Murray looked at the older man, wondering if he had intended to keep this last piece of information to himself.
The bookfinder misinterpreted his expression.
‘Don’t worry. I’ve not fallen off the wagon. I saw him in the High Street a couple of years back.’
‘And recognised him? After all that time?’
‘You never forget an ugly mug like that. I’d thought about Bobby Robb from time to time, always regretting I didn’t somehow call his bluff that night. But when I saw him again …’ the older man shook his head. ‘It was like I was glad to see him, even though I can honestly say I hate Robb for what he did to Archie. It was around about Christmas time. I remember that because I was going to look in some of those fancy shops they have up there for a nice scarf or something for the wife. But when I caught sight of Bobby I didn’t hesitate, just reeled round and followed him, like he was the bloody Pied Piper of Hamelin. I had a hard time keeping up. He’s probably got a good ten years on me, but he’s f
ast on his pins, I’ll give him that. He went down Cockburn Street and into Geordie’s. Do you know it?’
‘I’ve had a drink there.’
‘In that case you’ve maybe even seen him and not kent it.’
‘So what did you do?’
‘Nothing. Ordered myself a Coke and stood drinking it at the bar, watching Bobby in the mirror. It was him, right enough. I’ve dropped by a couple of times since, to check he’s still around. He always is. Sat in the same seat, no newspaper, no book, no company, just a pint stuck in front of him ’
Something in the older man’s voice made Murray ask, ‘George, you’re not planning on doing anything, trying to get revenge for Archie?’
Meikle gave a bitter laugh.
‘No, son, I’ve got a lot going for me these days: a nice wife, a family that’s doing well. I just like to see him occasionally, sitting there all alone over his pint, like he does night after night, that creepy scar of his grinning away on one side, while his mouth droops on the other. That’s the best revenge I can think of.’
Chapter Fourteen
A MAN COWLED in a brown blanket sat at the top of the stairway, holding a Starbucks cup in his outstretched hand. Murray dropped some loose change in it, and then loped down into the darkness. Fleshmarket Close was caught between the tourist throng of the Old Town and the Tannoy announcements of Waverley Station, but down here in the piss-fragrant gloom it was as if all that commotion belonged to another city. The bar was set into the basement wall of the high tenements that shadowed the dark wynd. He stepped through its door and back forty years.
Maybe the tartan carpet and framed portraits of clan chiefs had been intended to attract the tourists. But it seemed the Americans and Scandinavians who busied the rest of the city preferred brighter watering holes because the grim faces in the pictures girned down on empty tables.
Murray stationed himself at the small bar. Up in the far corner a mute television played out highlights from the racing at Goodwood. He watched the horses thundering silently towards the finishing line in races already lost and won.
After a while a barmaid appeared from the backroom with a paperback in her hand. Murray ordered a pint of lager. The girl set her book on the counter, took a glass from beneath the bar and went wordlessly to the pumps.
A barefoot man was caught on the paperback’s cover, frozen in the act of climbing a steep street with a box on his back. His expression was resigned, as if he knew this was all life held for him and was reconciled to the endless trek. Large block letters, heavy as stone, declared The Myth of Sisyphus.
‘Great book. Enjoying it?’
The girl placed his pint in front of him.
‘I’m not sure what the point is.’
‘No, I know what you mean.’
Murray told her to take one for herself, like detectives did in the movies when they were trawling for information.
‘Thanks, I’ll have a half of lager when I knock off.’
She put a pound in the tips jar, took her book and disappeared again. It wasn’t how things were meant to go.
Somebody had left the previous day’s Evening News behind. Murray spread it across the counter and took a sip of his drink.
A man had pleaded guilty to stabbing his wife of thirty-five years, though all he could remember was his seventh pint. A teenager had hung himself in his bedroom after a flurry of threatening texts from classmates. A ten-year-old cancer sufferer, who the newspaper had been collecting money for, had died before she could go on her dream trip to Disneyland Paris. Murray looked at the photograph of a little girl in a floral baseball cap, her face split in a broad grin, and wondered why life was so shit.
He was almost halfway down his glass when an old man came in, leaning heavily on a walking stick.
‘Afternoon.’ He took his bunnet off, gave it a shake and bent it into the pocket of his overcoat. ‘She in the back?’
Murray folded the newspaper away.
‘Aye, I think I scared her off.’
‘Always got her nose in a book.’ The old man rapped on the counter with his stick. ‘I keep telling her this is a pub, not Boots Lending Library, but she doesn’t listen.’
The barmaid reappeared and he ordered a half and half. Murray wondered about offering to pay, but hesitated, worried the pensioner would be offended, and the moment passed. He needn’t have bothered. He hadn’t finished describing Bobby Robb’s scar before the old man interrupted him.
‘So that was his name, eh? Bobby Robb. We called him Crippen.’ He put a hand over his mouth. ‘You’re not a relative, are you, son?’
Murray hesitated.
‘His nephew.’
The pensioner held out his hand.
‘In that case I’m sorry for your loss. I’m Wee Johnny.’ They shook and the old one gave a smile that showed the full length of his dentures. ‘I hope you didn’t take offence at what I said there. We like a wee laugh and a joke in here. Don’t we, Lauren?’
The barmaid nodded. ‘Aye, Johnny, laugh a minute in here.’
She slipped back to her sanctuary, leaving them alone in the empty bar.
Murray knew the answer, but he asked, ‘Are you saying Bobby Robb’s dead?’
‘Christ, I’m no the one to break it to you, son, am I?’
The dentures disappeared behind a frown.
‘Don’t worry. We weren’t close.’
He felt bereaved. Another chance of reaching out to Archie gone.
‘That’s something, anyway.’ Johnny stared at him. ‘Aye, now that I get a better look, I can see the resemblance. You’ve not got the scar, but you’re like him round the eyes.’
‘People always say that.’
Murray took an inch off his pint. There was no longer any point in hanging around.
‘Three days earlier and you would have caught him.’
Wee Johnny nodded towards a corner table. ‘Could have sat there all night, except Lauren noticed he was still on his first pint when he should have been on his third and went to check on him. She’s a good lassie at heart. Some reader, though.’ He shouted through to the back room, ‘I bet you’d have liked to get your hands on some of Crippen’s books, eh, Lauren?’ No reply came, and it seemed the old man didn’t expect any because he continued, ‘He had a whale of stuff, your uncle. A whale of stuff – the books – gee whiz.’
He shook his head in wonder at the size of Bobby Robb’s library and sank the dregs of his half pint.
Murray put a hand in his pocket.
‘Could you manage another?’
‘That’s good of you. I’ll take a pint.’ Johnny knocked back his whisky. ‘And a wee malt of the month to chase it down, if it’s no trouble.’
He rapped the counter with his stick and Lauren emerged wearily into the bar. Murray gave their order then asked Johnny, ‘So how do you know about his book collection?’
It was Lauren who answered.
‘Mr Robb rented a flat from my Uncle Arthur that manages this place. He told us about it.’ She poured two pints of lager. ‘I’m sorry for your loss.’
‘Thanks.’ Murray took his beer from her. ‘So have you any idea what happened to his books?’
Lauren avoided his eyes.
‘Uncle Arthur burned them. It took him all afternoon.’
‘Aye, well, he agrees with me.’ Wee Johnny beamed, enjoying the conversation. ‘There’s a time and a place for books.’
‘He’s a Nazi. One minute he’s saying I can go through them and have my pick, the next he’s splashing petrol all over the place. The neighbours weren’t too happy when they saw the state he’d made of the drying green.’ She reached up to the gantry and poured a measure of malt into a glass. ‘He got a red face when Mr Robb’s ex-wife turned up looking to collect his effects, though. I guess that’d be your aunty.’
‘Ex-aunty.’ Johnny took his nip from Lauren. ‘He didn’t even know the old boy was dead.’
Lauren’s eyes widened.
‘You do kn
ow your uncle’s funeral’s this afternoon?’
She turned to Wee Johnny. ‘You did tell him?’
The old man put a hand protectively around his drinks, as if afraid they might be confiscated.
‘I never thought.’
Lauren glanced at the five-minutes-fast clock above the bar.
‘Seafield Crematorium. If you get a cab, you might just make it.’
Murray shoved some money on the bar and headed for the door. Behind him Wee Johnny said, ‘Haud on while I finish these, son, and I’ll hitch a ride with you.’
But Murray let the door swing shut. He headed back out into the murk of the alley, then down towards the station taxi rank, hoping to be in time to see Bobby Robb make the big fire.
Chapter Fifteen
MURRAY FELT THE taxi driver taking in his scuffed trainers and worn jeans and attempted a joke. ‘My mother always said I’d be late for my own funeral.’ He handed over a tenner. ‘Keep the change.’
The driver rattled some coins onto the little tray set in the grille dividing them.
‘There are times when it doesn’t hurt to show some respect.’
He waited until Murray shut the door, then spun the cab round and away, a look of disgust pasted to his face. Murray pocketed his change. As insults went, ‘keep your money’ was a good one. But it lacked sting when the sum involved was fifty pence.
The crematorium looked like a solid place to transform flesh into dust. It had been built sometime in the 1930s, when white facades and art deco symmetry were in vogue. Five frosted glass windows flanked a door wide enough for a coffin and pall-bearers; a giant mouth bounded by milky eyes. There was something grimly cinematic about the whole arrangement; a sombre invitation to a show you might not want to see. Virginia creeper covered the building’s front, a shaggy hairdo at odds with otherwise dignified features.
