by Lesley Kelly
Just when I think I understand, it all get’s confusing again. ‘So, why’s Meikle bothering becoming a director? Why isn’t he trying to get control of the shares of the company?’
‘He’s probably doing both – taking control of the company as a director in the short-term, and pursuing the shareholders as a long-term way of staying in control.’ Wheezy gives a bitter laugh. ‘I wouldn’t like to be a shareholder with that bastard after me.’
‘Wheeze.’ I’ve got a sudden bad feeling about all of this. ‘If somebody left you their entire estate would that include any shares they’d inherited?’
‘I suppose so, why do you ask? Oh.’ He leans back in his seat. ‘You mean Lachlan Stoddart.’
‘I really need to get out of town, Wheeze.’ I dig out the remains of Meikle’s money. ‘But I’ve got £3.50 to my name.’
Before Wheezy can respond, my mobile rings.
‘Mr Staines?’ A woman’s voice that I can’t quite place. Then I realise.
‘Miss Spencely.’ I sit down. I’m not in the mood to deal with any lawyer crap, and epecially a lawyer that has a bampot for a boyfriend.
‘I’m at Mavisview, Mr Staines, and…’
I think I can hear her crying at the other end of the phone. I’m tempted to hang up. The last weeping woman I was nice to was Marianne, and I think everyone would agree that virtue in that case really was its own punishment. Still, I’d better know what was going on.
‘Miss Spencely - what’s the matter?’
There’s a loud sniff on the line. ‘Oh, Mr Staines – there’s another body. A young woman.’
Oh God.
‘Mr Staines’ – she’s really bawling now – ‘I think it’s a friend of yours.’
This is surprising. The nearest thing I have to a friend is currently sitting opposite me stuffing his face with Father Paul’s chocolate biscuits. ‘Who?’
‘Marianne Murphy.’
I stand with the phone frozen to my face. My first thought is that she’s making it up, but then I remember her boyfriend thinks I owe him a tallybook that I’ve not delivered on.
‘Mr Staines? Are you still there?’
I try to keep my voice level. ‘Yes.’
‘Can you come over?’
Wheezy looks up. ‘What was all that about?’
Wheezy has to be physically restrained from heading right over to Mavisview.
‘See sense, Wheeze, it could be a trap. Remember who Miss Spencely’s boyfriend is? That Bruce chappie – nasty bastard?’
He pushes me out of his way. ‘I don’t care, Staines, this is my niece we’re talking about.’
I grab a handful of his donkey jacket. ‘At least let me phone her mobile first.’
Liam answers.
‘Is your mother there?’
‘No.’
‘Where is she?’
There’s a long pause.
‘She wasn’t here when I got back from my granny’s.’
‘Where’s she gone?’ I realise I’m shouting which isn’t helping matters. For all we know Liam’s just been semi-orphaned. I try to calm down.
‘It’s important, son. Do you know where she went?’
There’s another pause. ‘She left me a note saying she’d be back in a couple of hours but she hasn’t come back.’
I try to sound reassuring, which is difficult cause I’m starting to panic. ‘Why don’t you phone your granny, son, and get her to come round, and I’ll call you back later?’
I look round for Wheeze but he’s already out the door.
2008
By the end of 2007 my drinking was out of control. I would tell myself that I was just popping out for a couple of pints, but more and more often I didn’t make it back to Lachie’s. Sometimes I went back to Wheezy’s after the pub and fell asleep there. Other times I’d wake and find I was sitting in a doorway or lying on a bench in the Links. Lachie didn’t take it well if I wasn’t in the house when he wakened. He was like a jealous lassie if he thought I was off having fun without him.
One particular morning, having spent the night lying on Wheeze’s floor, I was walking home on tenterhooks wondering what kind of reception I was in for. I’d just turned into the street when I saw two Polismen come out of our stair, with Lachie in between them. I immediately sidetracked into another stair. I didn’t know what Lachie’d been caught for but I could do without getting tangled up in it.
I gave them ten minutes then headed up to the flat to consider my options. If Lachie’s dealings had caught up with him, I didn’t really want to be around when he got back. I wouldn’t put it past Ma Stoddart to set me up to take the blame for whatever it was he’d done. It would kill two birds with one stone from her point of view – her beloved son off the hook and his waster pal out of her hair.
I put the chain on the door then went into Lachie’s room. The room was a disgrace. Your average teenager would be ashamed to live like this: there were clothes all over the place, plates with rotting food on them, and condoms scattered across the floor, which were a mystery to me because I wasn’t aware of him having a girlfriend in all the time that I’d been living there.
I knew what I was looking for, though I didn’t really want to admit it to myself. After half an hour digging around in the stour under Lachie’s bed I found it: a cardboard box off a bottle rocket that he’d had since he was at primary school. I opened it and as I suspected, it was full of notes. There must have been thousands. I could be out of there, and set up in a new life.
I picked up an empty plastic bag that was lying on Lachie’s floor and grabbed a handful of the notes. I was about to drop them into the bag when something stopped me. The picture of the rocket was bringing back memories of us as kids and I didn’t know if it was nostalgia or what, but I felt a bit crap doing a runner when Lachie was in trouble with the Polis.
I heard a key in the door, which caught on the chain.
‘Stainsie you tool! Why’s the chain on?’
I dropped the box and kicked it back under the bed, hoping that I hadn’t disturbed the dust so much that Lachie would notice that I’d been in his room.
‘Staines!’ Lachie was kicking the door in frustration, and nearly took my hand off when I loosened the chain and he threw it open. ‘What are you playing at?’
He marched past me into the kitchen and I didn’t have to answer. He poured himself a large vodka, which was unusual because he wasn’t much of a drinker, least of all in the morning.
‘Are you in trouble with the Polis, Lachie?’
He ignored my question and pushed past me into the living room. He sat down on the sofa and buried his face in his hands. Within seconds his shoulders started heaving up and down.
‘Lachie – are you crying? What’s the matter?’
He didn’t speak for a minute or two, then ran his nose along his sleeve and said, ‘It’s my ma.’
‘What about her?’ I hoped the old bat’d finally been arrested.
He looked up at me with a tear-stained face and said, ‘She’s dead.’
Four hours later I was sitting in the late Mrs Stoddart’s house with a broken-hearted Lachie. He’d downed the rest of the vodka and had started on the whisky, with the occasional snort of cocaine on the side. I was trying to be as comforting as possible, but I was struggling to think what to say, not least because I was glad the old bag had finally got what was coming to her. Lachie was in a mood-and-a-half, which I supposed was fair enough what with his Ma being murdered and all.
‘She was a handsome woman, Staines.’
News to me. ‘Oh aye, Lachie, a handsome woman.’
He poured himself another glass of Johnnie Walker. ‘But people round here didn’t like her.’
I thought that was understating the case a little. ‘Oh, well, I wouldn’t say that.’
He glowered at me. ‘You know the difference between you and me?’
I shrugged and waited for him to start.
‘People like you. But they don’t
like me’
I wasn’t sure if I would annoy him more by agreeing or disagreeing with him, so I shrugged again.
Lachie leant forward with his best approximation of a hard man snarl. ‘But I don’t like you. I’ve never liked you. I didn’t like you in primary school and I don’t like you now.’
Lachie stopped for another line of coke, and rejuvenated, continued with his theme. ‘See you – you’ve drank away every chance you’ve ever had. Your wife left you. Your bairns don’t know you. And I’ve seen you lying face down on the street in your own puke.’
He wasn’t wrong, but it wasn’t nice to have to listen to.
‘You are a first class jakey. But people still like you.’
Lachie stood up, a little shaky on his pins, and disappeared out of the room. Two minutes later he was back with a book. ‘What do you think this is?’ he said, thrusting it at me.
I leafed through it. There was page after page of names and addresses, with amounts of money and ticks and crosses next to them. I took a wild guess. ‘It’s your ma’s tallybook.’
‘It’s a list of suspects!’ He waved his glass at me and a tiny splash of whisky flew over the side. ‘One of they losers murdered my mammy and I want you down that scheme using your charm to find out which one, before she goes into her grave.’ He paused and leant forward. ‘I want a name.’
I kept leafing through the book but I knew it was inevitable. I was going be chasing round the scheme trying to come up with an answer that’d save me from a kicking from Lachie’s lackeys.
‘Lachie?’
‘Aye?’
I pointed to the book. ‘Why is there a dog listed here?’
‘Pissed on my mammy’s shoes after Mass one Sunday. The owner’s paying it off at a pound a week.’
I left Mrs Stoddart’s with my napper spinning from the drugs, drink and unhappy responsibilities that had been thrust on me. Lachie’d given me the book away with me, which I wasn’t happy about at all. The information in that book could get a man (or woman) killed. Under the circumstances I felt the need for a couple of beers so I stopped in at the offy on the way home, only to be accosted by Wheezy.
He threw his arm round my shoulders. ‘Stainsie, Stainsie, Stainsie, my son – where’ve you been? I’m drinking on my tod here!’
I shrugged his arm off. ‘Not tonight, Wheeze – I’m off home for a sleep.’
He grabbed hold of my jacket. ‘C’mon now – a couple of cans with an old pal won’t hurt you.’
I was drowning in the Water of Leith, and every time my head came back above the water, Isa Stoddart was standing there and booted me back under. The dream was so vivid that when I woke up I could still feel the water lapping round my feet. Then I realised that my feet were in fact wet, because I was sitting at the number 16 bus stop on Commercial Street with a pile of empty beer cans at my feet.
The Book. Sweet Mother of God, I prayed. Let the book still be in my bag. But the Blessed Virgin wasn’t looking too kindly on my pleas because there was nothing in my bag except a couple more empty beercans.
It took me two hours to track Wheezy down to a café on Leith Walk.
I slumped into a chair, fighting to get my breath back, while he tucked into his double egg and chips. ‘Wheeze – see last night, whatever I told you…’
He held up a hand to stop me. ‘Not a word my son, your secret’s safe with me. Soul of discretion and all that.’
‘Thanks, pal.’ The waitress came over to take my order but I told her I wasn’t staying. The thought of the kicking I was going to get if that book was lost had robbed me of my appetite. ‘Wheeze, I’m in trouble.’
Wheezy finished off his eggs and started eating his chips using his fingers. ‘If this is about your tallybook, Father Paul has got it.’
I stared at him. ‘Father Paul?’ Relief that the book was safe gave way to confusion, which was booted out of the way by fear. ‘What the fuck does he want with it?’
Wheeze wiped a paper napkin across his face and stood up. ‘Long story. I’ll tell you on the way there.’ He opened the café door and gestured to me to follow him. ‘Are you coming or what?’
The door to the Priest’s House was opened by Wheeze’s niece. She did some cleaning, or housework, or something for Father Paul. Her torn-faced laddie was there as well, playing on one of those hand-held computer games. The noise of electronic gunfire wasn’t helping my nerves any.
‘All right, Marianne – is Father Paul in?’
She nodded. ‘Aye, come through.’
I was still none the wiser about what was going on. Despite his promise to fill me in, Wheeze hadn’t said two words on the way over. Father Paul was sitting at the kitchen table, resting an elbow on the tallybook.
‘You want a coffee, Stainsie?’ Marianne asked.
‘Aye, I wouldn’t say no,’ I said, without taking my eyes from the book. ‘Any chance of having my property back, Father?’
He smiled. ‘Your property, Stainsie? Or do you mean Mrs Stoddart’s property?’
We stared each other out until Marianne handed me my coffee. ‘If you are going to get technical about it,’ I said, ‘it’s Lachie’s property.’
Father Paul pulled the book closer to him and folded his arms on top of it. ‘Oh yes, Lachlan Stoddart. Your best pal. Is he planning to continue the Stoddart debt-collecting business?’
Somehow I couldn’t see Lachie running any kind of business. ‘It’s not really uppermost in his mind. He’s more concerned about finding out who did his mammy in, and he thinks one of those debtors probably did it.’
Marianne’s laddie’s computer game chose this moment to announce ‘Game Over’.
‘Liam – will you get out of here with that.’ He ignored his mother, and turned round in his seat so his back was toward her. She grabbed his arm, pulled him to the door and pushed him through it. There was a shout of protest from the hall as she closed the door behind him.
Father Paul and Wheezy looked at each other, then Father Paul placed a shoe box on the table. ‘We’ve got a proposition for you.’ He slid the box toward me.
I flipped the lid off. The box was filled to the brim with used notes. ‘What’s this?’
‘It’s £1,700. Ten pounds each from every man, woman and dog listed in that book. And it’s yours. All you need to do is take that book, get out of town and never come back.’
I stared at the money. Maybe the Virgin was listening after all because this was the answer to all my prayers, my ticket out of Edinburgh and far, far, away from Lachie Stoddart.
And yet. Lachie Stoddart, fat, useless, Lachlan Stoddart, my oldest friend. My only friend. Who was sitting alone in his late mother’s house, crying into his beer about his poor, dead mammy. Lachie, who had no idea what was about to hit him, when the sharks that circled the Stoddart empire realised that he was in charge. I gave him six weeks before some one put a bullet through his head. So, what was I to do? Stay, and try to keep Lachie out of trouble, or save my own skin?
The three of them were staring at me. I picked up some of the money and looked at it. ‘Why do you care so much about that book?’
Father Paul thumped the book. ‘The Stoddarts have been bleeding my parishioners dry for years. This is a chance to end that.’
I nodded. ‘Aye, well, I can see that but what about you?’ I looked at Wheezy, who I’ve never seen put his neck on the line before. ‘And you, why…’ I looked at Marianne. She was a bloody good-looking woman. I’d always had a wee thing for her; the only thing that had stopped me making a move was that in a certain light there was a strong family resemblance to her uncle.
I couldn’t understand why she’d got herself mixed up in Father Paul’s business and a thought flitted across my mind, wondering what the relationship was between the two of them. Was it one of those things where she was giving him more than housekeeping services?
Then suddenly it hit me. I realised why Wheeze, the tightest man in Scotland was buying me drinks all last night. I u
nderstood why Father Paul was out with the begging bowl round his parishioners.
I got to my feet and pointed to Marianne. ‘It was you. You done Mrs Stoddart in!’
Wheezy punched my shoulder. ‘No, she didn’t. Don’t you go telling lies like that!’
Father Paul said ‘Sit down, Stainsie, there’s no need for that kind of nonsense.’
But Marianne just stared back at me, until tears started running down her cheeks.
‘I never meant it to happen,’ she said very quietly.
‘Marianne!’ Wheezy grabbed her by the arm, but she shook herself free.
‘I owe her a fortune, and I thought I could maybe negotiate with her. I saw her at evening Mass and followed her out the church but… but the things she was saying to me about how I could pay off my debts. I never meant to hurt her but I just snapped and hit her and…’
I can’t bear crying women. ‘Calm down.’
She didn’t. She looked back up at me and said, ‘Stainsie, please…’ but then choked up. I didn’t need her to finish the sentence, I got the message. Her uncle put his arm round her shoulders, and I looked away.
‘So…’ Father Paul put the lid back on the box. ‘What’s it going to be, Staines? Are you going to take our money, or are you going to send Lachlan Stoddart and his thugs straight round to this wee lassie’s flat?’
I thought about Lachie. I thought about Marianne. I thought about the money.
I sighed and reached over for the book, and the box, and shoved them both back into my rucksack. ‘How do you know that I won’t just take your money and give Lachie back his book?’
There was silence, apart from Marianne sniffing. Then Father Paul spoke. ‘We’re trusting you, Staines.’
I nicked back to Lachie’s flat, picked up my things, such as they were, and got myself onto the first train out of Edinburgh. I planned to head to London, but on a whim leapt off at Newcastle. Maybe I didn’t really want to be too far away. In the hotel room, I unpacked the tallybook. I couldn’t believe that Father Paul trusted me with all this information about people. I knew I shouldn’t look at it ’cause there are some things it’s just better not to know. I couldn’t resist, though, and flipped the book open at a random page. I ran my fingers down the page and read the names out loud.
