The Amateurs (21 page)

‘A
ND HOW MANY NIGHTS WILL YOU BE STAYING FOR
?’

‘Ah, er, jist the wan, hen.’

The receptionist did her thing with the computer and Lee shuffled about uncomfortably. He wasn’t used to places like this. The Glasgow Radisson was a big modern hotel with a facade of distressed copper, airy open public spaces, neat, minimalist bedrooms and views over the River Clyde. None of these, however, were factors in Lee’s choosing the place. It had simply been the first hotel he’d come upon when he stumbled out of Central Station.

It had been an uncomfortable night for the elder Irvine brother. He’d scrambled his way down through the woods in the dark, tripping and falling and cutting himself many times. He’d got back to his car to find that during one of these falls he’d lost his car keys. Cursing and swearing, his eyes still raw from the crying fit, he’d walked alongside the dual carriageway in the dark–jumping back into the ditch when the odd set of white lights came roaring
by in the night–until he got to the big roundabout.

‘Newspaper in the morning?’ the receptionist was asking.

‘Er, naw, hen.’

He’d followed the main road down into town. Avoiding the mall and the town centre, he’d cut along the riverbank and over the old iron bridge, finally arriving at Ardgirvan train station just before dawn. Then a shivering hour in the icy waiting room before the first train to Glasgow pulled in at 5.30 a.m.

‘If I could just take an imprint of a credit card?’

‘Naw, ah don’t…ah’ll pay cash, hen.’ Lee flattened the notes on the counter with filthy, scratched hands.

‘You’re in 501 on the fifth floor. Just turn left when you come out of the lift. Oh, do you have any bags?’

‘Er, naw. Travelling light. Thanks, doll.’

Under the stinging, reviving needles of the shower Lee began to think.

He really was in deep shit now.

Out of the shower, wet, a towel wrapped around him as he smoked a cigarette, he sat down on the edge of the bed, picked up the phone and dialled Lisa’s mobile. She answered on the second ring.

‘It’s me, hen.’

He let her shout and scream and swear for a few seconds. When she paused for breath he said, ‘Listen tae me, listen,’ but she was off again.

‘Ya fucking bastard, where the fuck were ye last night, eh? Ah’m hame maself wi three weans while you’re oot doing fuck knows whit and no even a phone call tae l—’

‘LISA! FUCKING SHUT IT AND LISTEN TAE ME!’ The line went quiet. ‘Listen,’ Lee continued, ‘ah’m in trouble, right? Ah cannae explain now. Naw, just listen. Upstairs, in
ma sock drawer, away in the back left-hand corner, there’s aboot a grand in there. Take the money and get the weans and go and stay wi your cousin May doon in Galashiels, a’right?’

‘
Whit?
Why? Where are ye? Whit’s going on?’

‘Lisa, please, hen, ye have to do whit ah’m telling ye.’

‘Aw God, aw my God, Lee,’ she was crying now, ‘whit have ye done? Whit have ye done now?’

‘Shhh, hen. It’s OK. It’ll be awright. Ah love ye, doll, so ah dae. And it’s no something I’ve done. It’s something I haven’t done.’

And, as he said those words, for the first time since he ran from the Mastersons’ house into the woods in the early hours of that morning, Lee felt something other than shame, failure and fear. He felt relief. Almost pride.

She’d been looking at him, her eyeballs bulging like mad, struggling against the duct tape, trying to speak. He’d said, ‘I’m sorry,’ and then, just as his finger tensed on the trigger, an image and a short string of words came to him very clearly. He’d burst into tears, slumped down against the wall and cried for a long time, cried like he hadn’t done since he was a wee boy, big convulsing, racking sobs. Crying because of what he had come to, what he’d been about to do, yes, but also crying because he knew now he could never do it. And he’d be in big trouble. And they could have really used the money.

With a trembling hand Lee had reached up and peeled the silver tape gently off her mouth. For some reason, something in her eyes, he knew she wasn’t going to scream now. Clearly, very calmly, she said, ‘It’s my husband, isn’t it?’

They had talked for a while, the two of them, Lee sitting on the kitchen floor, Leanne still taped to the chair.

‘Shhh, hen, shhh,’ Lee said as Lisa sobbed steadily on the other end of the line. ‘It’ll be OK. Just get the weans ready and go. Ah’ll sort everything out and ah’ll come and get yese.’

‘Aw, Lee,’ Lisa sobbed, getting her breathing under control, ‘where are ye?’

‘Ah’m OK. Ah’m in Glasgow. At a hotel. Get going, hen. Ah’ll phone ye at May’s, right?’

Lee hung up, feeling better, and lit another cigarette. He walked over to the window and pulled back the net curtain. Just visible over the slate rooftops was the River Clyde and the railway bridge that led into Glasgow from the south, from Ardgirvan.

Lee remembered the family trip to Glasgow on the train, years ago when he and Gary were just wee boys. They’d walked all over the city that day, covering the great length of Sauchiehall Street, into the leafy streets that ran along the River Kelvin, taking turns riding up on their dad’s shoulders, squealing with delight as he unexpectedly jumped and jiggled them, or squeezed his strong thumbs into their fleshy calves. They’d gone to a fair in the Kelvin Hall and then ate the picnic they’d brought with them in the park, warm Vimto and the bread of the sandwiches wet from the tomatoes, the crusts dark and bitter. (
‘Curls yer hair
,’ their dad told them as he ate theirs.) Him and Gary play-fighting with their dad on the grass, climbing over him like he was a mountain. His parents kissing. Walking back to the station in the warm dusk they’d seen a beggar slouched over a grating outside some shops. He was filthy; a long straggly beard, his skin yellow with dirt under several layers of tattered clothing. He had a little tin next to him and a sign that said ‘Please Help Me’. It was the first time Lee and Gary had ever seen a beggar. You didn’t get them in Ardgirvan. (There was Benny, the town
drunk, who famously shat his pants in Shorts the baker’s once, but that was different.) Their dad bent down and dropped the change from his pocket into the man’s tin. ‘Why did you give the man money, Daddy?’ Lee had asked him. His father took his hand and squeezed it and said, ‘There but for the grace of God go I, son.’

It was those words and that image of his father that had come unbidden into Lee’s head as he stood over the Masterson woman in the kitchen of her big house last night. Those words and that image that had stopped him from doing what he’d been going to do.

Lee tossed his cigarette end out the window and watched the glowing tip spiral five floors to the street below. He lay down on the bed, his head swimming.

Just a wee nap.

Alec Campbell, as angry as he’d ever been, drove fast and hard through the winding streets of his housing scheme, calling up the Beast’s number on his mobile as he went.

‘Frank? It’s Alec. Meet me at 15 Burns Crescent in ten minutes.’ Alec listened for a moment. ‘Good. And Frank? Bring yer kit.’

B
Y
C
HRIST, THE BOY
WAS
PLAYING WELL
, R
ANTA
thought. Gary had been at the eleventh when Ranta arrived, the fearsome par five known as ‘Railway’, on account of the train tracks that ran parallel to the hole. He’d made par there and all the way through to the sixteenth, which he birdied to go to eight under for the round–currently looking like the best round of the day–and level par for the tournament: safely within the projected cutline of one over par. (Gary’s playing partners had been less fortunate: a string of bogeys had taken Coffey to six over par and out of the tournament. Crawford Koon’s drive at the eleventh had been pushed too far right, clattering onto the train tracks. Koon triple-bogeyed the hole to go to four over and Goodnight Vienna.)

When Gary’s putt dropped for birdie on the sixteenth Ranta was thinking hard, feeling that tingle between the shoulder blades. If he waited until he made the cut Ranta’s odds would be drastically reduced. However, if he made the bet now and
Gary didn’t make the cut then he’d be out an awful lot of money in the time it took to play two holes of golf.

Ranta called his bookie–Big Malky. He spelled Gary’s name out. ‘A hundred and eighty to one,’ Malky told him. Ranta thought about Masterson’s envelope still sitting in his desk drawer. Fuck it–it was found money anyway. There was a long, long pause after Ranta told Malky how much he wanted to bet. Even Malky, long used to Ranta’s extreme-danger betting was stunned. ‘Jesus fuck,’ Malky said. ‘Are you sure about this, Ranta?’ Ranta was sure. He hung up.

‘Just get it on the green somewhere,’ Stevie said, handing Gary the five-iron as they walked onto the seventeenth tee: a tough par three, 220-odd yards, wind freshening and coming off the right now. ‘Nothing fancy. Two pars and we’re done and dusted.’

‘Nae bother,’ Gary said, feeling as relaxed and confident as he’d ever felt.

A few seconds later he was saying ‘Fuck’ and feeling his stomach collapsing as he watched his ball sailing horribly offline.

Ranta fought his way back to the front of the ropes, tucking his mobile into his pocket as the crowd began to groan. ‘Whit happened?’ Ranta whispered to the girl next to him as he strained to catch sight of the ball.

‘He’s pulled it,’ April said.

Ranta felt faint.

Lisa packed quickly. The boys were out, playing at the skate park round the corner with their pals. Wee Amazon was out the back in her sandpit.
Phone a taxi, finish packing and pick the boys up on the way to the station.
She hurried across the bedroom, pulled open a drawer and started throwing under
wear into her holdall. The thick roll of fifty-pound notes in the front pocket of her jeans felt hot.

The slam of a car door made her look up and out of the bedroom window: a black jeep in front of the house and two men walking up the garden path.

Alec Campbell.

Jesus Christ, Alec Campbell at their front door. Behind him was a huge man with a deep scar running from one temple to his chin. Lisa swallowed and took a couple of deep breaths before she came running down the stairs as the doorbell started ringing.

‘Haud oan!’ Lisa said, trying to sound pissed off as she tugged the door open.

‘Aye?’ she said aggressively.

‘Lisa?’ Alec said, smiling.

‘Alec?’ Lisa said, squinting, pretending not to recognise him at first.

‘It’s been a few years, eh?’

‘Aye.’

‘We’re looking for Lee.’

‘You and me both.’

Alec looked past her, into the hallway where the bag she’d packed for the kids lay. ‘Off somewhere?’ he asked. The other guy was just staring at her.

‘Och, ah wis just taking the weans oot for the day.’

Alec smiled. ‘Is that right?’ he said.

He pushed past her into the house, the Beast following.

‘Hey, whit dae ye think yer–’ Lisa began, following them into the kitchen, where Alec took a seat at the little breakfast nook. The Beast stood at the back door, looking out into the garden, where Amazon was playing in her little sandpit.

‘Lisa hen,’ Alec said, ‘don’t be a fucking erse. Listen tae me now. Lee’s been a daft boy. He took a wee job on for me and
my dad.’ Ranta. The mention of him was enough to make Lisa unsure of her legs. ‘And, well, let’s just say he’s let us down.’

‘Alec, ah swear, ah don’t know where he is. He didnae come home last night. Ah’ve been sick worrying about him. Ah–’ Alec held up a hand to silence her.

‘He went out last night then?’

‘Aye. About the back o’ nine. Said he’d be home aboot midnight.’

‘He hasn’t phoned?’

‘Naw, Alec, ah swear tae ye. Ah swear oan ma weans’ life.’

‘Sure and that’s the second time we’ve heard that, eh, Frank?’ The Beast opened the kitchen door and walked out into the concrete backyard. ‘Christ, when was it I last saw you, Lisa?’ Alec went on pleasantly. ‘Doon the Metro or somewhere back in the day? Right wee raver back then, weren’t you? Loved yer pills.’ Lisa didn’t answer, she was looking at the Beast, standing over the sandpit talking to Amazon. ‘Big Suzie Donald and Karen Henderson you were pals wi, weren’t ye?’

Lisa reached into her pocket and took the money out. She held it towards Alec. ‘Here, there’s nearly a thousand pound there, Alec. Ah don’t know how much ye gave him but we’ll pay it aw back.’

Alec laughed as he took the money from her. ‘Oh aye, raid wan o’ yer Swiss bank accounts, will ye?’ he said, looking around the tiny, squalid kitchen. ‘Anyway, Lisa, it’s no even aboot the money any more. It’s a question o’ professional ethics. Ma family’s standing in the community and aw’ that.’

The Beast came back in, carrying Amazon. He sat down opposite Alec with the child in his lap. ‘Yer wee lassie was showing me her sandcastles, weren’t ye, hen?’ he said.

Amazon nodded proudly. ‘We’re going away on holiday!’ she said. ‘You can’t come!’ she added, pointing to Alec.

‘I’d love to sit here and chat about the old days, Lisa, ah really would.’ Alec, getting up now and coming over towards her, putting his hands on her shoulders. ‘But ah’ve got to sort this out. So, why don’t ye just tell us where he is, eh? And then we can all get on with our day and Frank here’ll no have to carve a pair o’ smiley faces into your wee lassie’s fucking cheeks.’

Lisa started to cry, her head bowed down, hair covering her face. Over her shoulder Alec saw her mobile phone sitting on the counter next to the sink. He reached out and picked it up. Into ‘Received calls’ and there was a Glasgow number. Alec had dialled it before Lisa realised what he was doing. She made a grab for the phone, but Alec clamped her wrist with his free hand and easily held her away.

‘Mummy!’ Amazon said.

‘It’s OK, doll,’ the Beast said, restraining the child. ‘They’re just playing.’

‘Naw,’ Lisa sobbed.

‘Glasgow Radisson Hotel, Deborah sp—’ the girl said before Alec hung up.

‘Please, Alec,’ Lisa said through tears, ‘d-don’t hurt him.’

‘Cheer up, hen,’ Alec said, reaching out and cupping her face, ‘you’re still a good-looking lassie. Ye can do better than Lee Irvine. Now, ye don’t mind if ah leave Frank here for a wee while, do ye? Prevent ye from making any rash phone calls or anything like that.’

The front door slammed behind Alec and Amazon ran over and wrapped her arms around Lisa’s leg while the Beast slipped his jacket off and hung it over the back of his chair. ‘Be a doll and stick the kettle oan,’ he said to Lisa, ‘ah’m gasping fur a cuppa tea so ah um.’