Where the Dead Men Go (9 page)

‘A relative?’ I said. ‘Someone died and left it in their will?’

She shook her head.

‘Uh-uh. I checked with his parents. Nothing like that.’

I looked again at the statement.

‘Horses?’

‘Sorry?’

‘Did he gamble?’

She gave a short laugh. ‘What you asking me for? I’m just the wife. You know more than I do. Did he gamble?’

‘Come on, Clare.’

‘You asked the question. What do you think?’

‘I’ve barely seen him since I came back. He was never in the building. He worked his own stories, half the time he didn’t even come in to write them up. He stopped coming to conference. I’ve barely seen him, these last six months.’

I could see what was coming next, see it in her eyes as clear as if she’d spoken. I slapped the statement with the back of my hand.

‘Well, look, it’s not that much, is it?’ I waved the piece of paper at her. ‘It’s not like we’re dealing with a lottery win here. It’ll be something obvious.’ I sighed, held the paper by a corner. ‘Look. This doesn’t mean he didn’t kill himself, Clare.’

She was shaking her head, her eyebrows arching.

‘The week before his daughter’s birthday?’

‘Look, I don’t think—his priorities aren’t—’

‘We were going to Gleneagles for Hogmanay. Three nights.’

‘Oh, Clare.’

‘No.’ She backed away, her hands up to ward off my scepticism. ‘No. I don’t just mean a holiday. It was our anniversary. He was taking me to Gleneagles for our anniversary.’ They’d been married on the weekend between Christmas and New Year. Eight years ago, or maybe nine. Rod was still a toddler, skidding around the dance floor in his waistcoat and trousers. We stayed the night. Bathrobes. Dark wood. Tartan bedspread. Jamie was conceived around then, or soon after.

I stepped towards her. This time I did reach out, I gripped her by the shoulders and held her at arm’s length but the words I needed wouldn’t come. Give it up, Clare, I wanted to tell her; people don’t clear their diary once they decide to kill themselves. They don’t need to. Driving into a flooded quarry with your wrists lashed to the wheel tends to do the job for you.

But I didn’t. I released my pointless grip on her shoulders. I stood there for a minute and then dropped back onto the sofa and let the radiator slowly singe my shoulder.

‘He’d booked it all up. He only told me about it the week before he died. Why would he do that, Gerry? Why would he tell me if he knew he was going to kill himself?’

‘Clare, he wrote a note.’

‘Right.’ She laughed. ‘They showed me that. Let’s see your phone, Gerry.’ She had her palm out, four fingers flexing back and forth. ‘Give us it.’

‘The police took it. It’s still with the police.’

‘When you get it back, then. Check your old messages. Gerry, he spelled everything out. In full. All the time. He had a thing about it. He was a bloody
bore
about it. He thought text language was the end of civilisation, the first step to Armageddon. Thin end of the wedge.’

Was this true? Did I remember this? I tried to think back, picture one of Moir’s texts on the Nokia screen but nothing came.

‘Do you not remember, Gerry?’

‘Yeah. I don’t know. He usually phoned me, Clare. I don’t know what his texts were like.’

‘Well look then.’ She strode over to the mantelpiece, snatched up her mobile, marched back, thumbs working. ‘Here!’ She held it under my nose. ‘Take it!’

The screen showed a zigzag of speech bubbles, hers in green, Moir’s in grey. I scrolled up, read one of the greys:
Another late one, Clarabelle. Sorry, babe. Will try to make in before twelve. xx

‘Okay?’ Her voice was fierce now, eyes flashing.

‘Aye. I suppose.’ I handed back the phone.

It occurred to me that a man’s hang-ups about text abbreviations were liable to seem less pressing under certain conditions. Like when you’re lashing your wrists to a steering wheel and about to drive to your death. Or maybe she was right and Moir never wrote the text. Or maybe he wrote it with a gun to his head or a blade at his throat, and this was his way of conveying the message, telling us he didn’t kill himself.

I remembered Hamish Neil in the Goldberry car park.
Take him off the streets while the tally’s at two.
Did he mean that the two deaths were murders? Walsh had killed Swan: he hit Billy Swan to get at Neil; that was clear. But did Walsh kill Moir, too? Was that what Neil meant?

‘But the cops, Clare. The post-mortem.’

‘It’s on its way. I’ve asked for a copy, we’ll see what it says. And the police thought it was murder, too – remember that, Gerry. That was their first response. It was just your text message changed their mind.’

A shadow fell on the window, a dog-walker, pausing for the dog to sniff, do its business. The last rays of sun showed up the smears on the glass, dozens of hand-prints, kiddie-sized hands.

‘Have you spoken to the cops, have you told them?’

‘They’re not interested. I spoke to the woman, Gunn, her mind’s made up. They won’t even see me now, the proper police. They send round a “liaison officer”. I have to make her tea and biscuits while she tells me how she’s here for me.’

I reached for my cup, three-quarters full, took a big burny gulp. I needed to get out before she asked me.

‘I’m not asking much, Gerry.’ She was sitting back down now and she leaned across to grip my wrist. ‘I don’t expect miracles. Just look into it. Dig around. Do what you’re good at.’

I smiled, despite myself, at her naivety, the gauche stab at flattery.

‘Topping and tailing press releases, Clare. That’s what I’m good at. Transcribing interviews with bored front-benchers. I’m not a proper reporter any more. If I ever was. It’s why we had Martin.’

She watched me over her cup, said nothing. Behind her in the window the light was dwindling, grey clouds massing on a luminous white horizon. Across the street the seedlings in their tubes of mesh were lashing in the wind.

‘Look, even if I could, Clare, I’m up to my neck. This referendum stuff, Martin’s crime beat. I’m doing two jobs as it is.’

Silence. The red eyes over the mug’s chipped rim, the tousled hair, the sad, uncared-for room. I couldn’t hold out. I shook my head, took another pull on the fortified coffee.

‘No promises,’ I told her. ‘I’ll do what I can.’

I drove back to the city, windows down, cold air stinging my cheeks, the sense of regret filling the car. I wasn’t even sure what I’d offered to do. Look into Martin’s death. Do what I can. What did that mean? Where would I start? Away from the feverish heat of Clare’s living room, the evidence looked thin. A text message? Two dozen characters on a screen? And the money? Twenty-six grand, not the stuff of heists and coke deals. I passed the Covenanters’ Memorial, a Celtic cross in a patch of purple moorland, the long grass switching in the wind. Let it lie, I thought; don’t dig it all up again, but then Clare’s words came back to me, the words she’d spoken as I stood on the threshold.

‘I want to know that the man I wake up crying about is the man I shared a bed with for nine years. I want to know that the man I loved was the man I loved.’

I crested the rise at Priesthill and the lights of the city rose out of the dark. Somewhere in that vast illumination was the truth about Martin Moir’s death, if the truth hadn’t already been established by DS Gunn, chapter-and-versed in the PM report. Was there another story here, a different version of events? And if there was, how did I aim to find it? I had a building-society statement in my pocket. That this slip of paper might refute the approved conclusions of Strathclyde Police, the Procurator Fiscal and the state pathologist seemed a lot to ask. It was a fool’s errand and I was already looking for a way to shelve it. Anyway, I’d told Clare I would need to square it with Maguire. That was my out. Maguire would stamp on it. I flicked the indicator, pulled out to overtake.  

It was after four when I left Clare’s. The city-bound traffic was light, all the headlights streaming south to the coast, the dormitory towns of Ayrshire. I stopped at Shawlands and ate dumpling soup in a Taiwanese restaurant and then drove on up to the Quay. Maguire was in her office but I couldn’t face her just then. Tomorrow would do. I worked hard on Sunday’s piece and it was half past ten when I raised my head, just the night ed and a smattering of diehards at their desks.

I was checking my Twitter feed when a shadow fell on the screen.

‘Hard at it, as ever. Is there no stopping this man?’

It was Neve McDonald, coat buttoned up, bag on her shoulder.

‘Matter of fact, no, there isn’t.’ I swivelled round to face her. ‘Just filed Sunday’s copy.’

‘Woo! Put out the bunting. I’m heading over the road for a swift one. Fancy it?’

‘This is a drink we’re talking about, right?’

She hitched her shoulder-bag, raised her plucked brows in mock outrage.

‘They’ve got laws against that sort of thing now. Did nobody tell you?’

‘Laws against propositioning newspapermen? I’m glad to hear it. I won’t press charges if you buy me a drink.’

The Cope was empty. Couple of subs at the bar. Joe had switched off the gantry lights and seemed less than thrilled to see us.

‘My shout, then.’ Neve was reaching into her bag. ‘You find a seat.’

‘I’ll see what I can do.’

Every seat in the place was free. I walked along the line of booths, slid without thinking into ‘our’ one, second from the end. We’d spent a few drunken evenings parked on this red leatherette. This booth was also – I belatedly remembered – where I’d finished things with Neve, though she’d taken the news disturbingly well. I was wondering whether to move somewhere else when Neve came up with a drink in each hand. She set them down on the table, a White Russian, a Lagavulin, went back to fetch the little water jug. When she slid in across from me she raised her drink in a silent toast, took a greedy gulp.

‘Better?’

She smacked her lips, breathed a long slow sigh through a bright red ‘O’. ‘Getting there.’

She unlooped her scarf and shrugged out of her jacket and I did my best not to notice her breasts in the mint-green sweater.

We sat there sipping our drinks, like we did this all the time, like this was just a normal week-night in the Cope. In fact, I hadn’t talked properly to Neve for three or four years. It was only now, half-listening to Sky News, Joe stacking glasses, that I started to wonder what this was about. I looked around the pub. One of the subs was zipping his jacket, patting his pockets. Cammy Bell, the other sub, was emerging from the gents. He winked and gave me the thumbs-up as he passed. Was that what this looked like? Were we two colleagues enjoying a drink after work, or did it look like something else?

I shifted in my seat. ‘How’s . . . Ronnie? Arnie? Shit, I can’t even remember his name.’

‘Ruaridh!’ Neve laughed. ‘Oh, Ruaridh’s finished. He was more of a friend, anyway. Don’t worry, Gerry. I’m not going to jump you! Not tonight, anyway.’

I sipped my whisky. ‘You never know your luck.’

‘No, but there
was
someone.’ The grin was gone now. She tilted her head, looked up through the shadow of her fringe. ‘For the past year or so.’

I felt the atmosphere shift, a tightening of the air pressure. I gripped my glass.

‘So what happened?’

‘You know what happened.’ She held my gaze. The answer was there in her eyes but I couldn’t read it. Then her eyes filled up and she was rooting in her bag for her paper tissues. I should have reached across and gripped her hand but her words had spooked me and I froze. She looked so unlike herself. The Neve McDonald I knew didn’t cry. The hardest of tickets, the patented nippy sweetie. I had never seen her cry, none of us had, except – I now remembered, watching her press a tissue to her upper lip – at the funeral.

‘
Moir
? It was Martin Moir?’

‘I miss him, Gerry. I miss him so much.’

Jesus. I caught Joe’s eye and waggled my finger: two more.

‘Did people know?’

She shook her head. ‘My pals, some of them. But no one at the paper.’

‘Clare?’

‘Jesus! No.’

I went to the bar to pay for the drinks. ‘That’s your lot,’ Joe told me. ‘Bar’s closed.
I wish I was, ho-omeward bound
,’ he crooned softly. I nodded. Was this another motive, another reason why Moir might have killed himself? His marriage was failing, he’d let them down, Clare, the girls?

I carried the drinks to our table, slid into the booth.

Neve was putting her compact away, snapping her bag. ‘Are you shocked, Gerry? Have I scandalised you?’

‘Ach I’m sorry, Neve. I’m sorry for your loss. It’s a hellish situation.’

‘Yeah.’ She gave a clenched little smile. ‘The other woman. The home-breaker. That fucking funeral. Jesus, you ever felt invisible?’

Joe was putting the chairs up on tables, making plenty of noise.

‘So why are you telling me now?’

She started on her second drink. ‘Can I ask you something, Gerry? You think he did it?’

Christ. Not her too. I glanced at the bar where Joe was bringing the shutters down. I put a hand on top of hers. ‘Neve, people do things.’ Mari’s line came back to me. ‘It’s not a reflection on you.’

She took her hand away. ‘See, I just don’t buy it. I know, I know. Times like this, people believe what they want to believe. That’s not me, Gerry. I was under no illusions. I knew he was never going to leave Clare, the kids. I accepted that. I’m not sure we even loved each other, if you come right down to it. But I liked him. And Jesus I miss him. And when I saw him on the Friday night, the night before it happened – I can’t explain it‚ Gerry. It’s just something you know. He wasn’t getting ready to kill himself.’

‘Okay. Say you’re right. Why are you telling me?’

She finished her drink, shook the ice against her teeth, let the last milky drops slide through.

‘I’ve got his laptop.’

‘The police have got his laptop, Neve. They came into the office and took it.’

 ‘I mean it’s my laptop. An old one. Martin used it when he came round. He’d upload stuff from a memory stick. I think there might be something on it.’

‘You haven’t looked?’

‘What can I do? I interview soap actors, Gerry. TV comedians. Dickheads. You’re the reporter. You have a look.’

The fresh-foul smell of the Clyde gusted up as we crossed the road to the
Tribune
car park. I followed Neve’s Mazda across the river, along the Clyde Expressway. She lived in Yoker – it was on my way home, or near enough. A new-build brick tenement with smart steel balconies, little tables with folded parasols. If an earthquake should ever pitch Glasgow up in the South of France she’d be sorted. I parked behind her MX-5, hung back when she opened the communal door.

‘Oh for Christ’s sake come up, Gerry. Nothing’s going to happen.’

Inside the flat she tossed her keys in a dish by the door.

‘Through here.’

The flat was spare and tasteful. Bare floors. Original art. A little workstation was set up in a corner of the living room, a lacquered black computer table and a three-shelf bookcase. A dartboard was mounted to the wall above the computer; she was using it as a corkboard. Photos and leaflets were pinned to the felt.

She unplugged the laptop. It was a fat old Toshiba, with keys like Scrabble letters. It weighed about as much as her MX-5 probably did.

‘These are his, too.’ There were six or seven Post-its round the dartboard’s edge. She plucked them off, passed them to me in a pastel-coloured wodge. ‘Might mean nothing, I don’t know.’

I nodded. I made no promises. I stuck the Post-its in my hip pocket, wedged the Toshiba under my arm, set off down the stairs.