Authors: William Meikle
"You can leave me here," he said as we pulled into the car park. "I'll go up myself."
But I was too old to fall for that one...I'd been too old for that one when I was twelve.
"No, your mammy owes me for all those fags you're been smoking."
The flats were protected by an entry phone, which to my surprise still functioned. I heard old lady Malcolm tell us to 'Come away up', and we walked into a surprisingly well- maintained hall. I'd been in many blocks of flats in Glasgow, most of which smelled of stale piss, and none of which, until now, contained vases of freshly cut flowers. The lift worked, there were bulbs shining in all the lights, and there was no graffiti. It looked like I'd have to reappraise my rating system...this place was like the Hilton compared to anywhere on the North Side.
"Shoes," Mason said, as we approached a door to a flat. At first I thought he was going mad, then I saw him bend to slip off his trainers.
"She's obsessive about the carpets," he said.
I had bent to undo my laces when the flat door opened and Old Lady Malcolm peeked out at us. She looked Mason up and down and pursed her lips.
"Oh. It's you," she said. She didn't look particularly pleased to see us.
"If you're here, I suppose you'd better come in," she said. Mason went past me into the flat. I would have followed, but the old woman stopped me before I got my shoes off.
"Not you, son. Family only tonight. But thanks anyway. Wait here."
I stood in the doorway, wondering whether to go into the hall beyond or not. Inside the flat a soap opera character was moaning...they do that a lot. He bemoaned the fact that another man, his worst enemy, had fathered his child. I tried to ignore it...I knew from experience how seductive the soaps could be...I'd got hooked on one for two years, and it took large doses of beer to keep me away from it.
"You can have your old room," I heard the old lady say, and it was a voice that would brook no argument.
"Mother," John Mason said, and there was a hitch in his voice.
"Not in front of strangers," she said sharply, and the door opened again in front of me. She handed me a check and, before I had time to reply, she'd shut the door in my face.
At least she hadn't tried to bum any more cigarettes.
* * *
There was a group of kids trying to get into the Land Rover when I got back to the car park, but they weren't trying too hard, and they weren't the vicious kind...they ran away instead of trying to cave my head in with a brick. And there was another plus point...they didn't try to bum any cigarettes either. I had a check for a thousand pounds in my pocket, a couple of packs of cigarettes, the night was young, and I didn't have to think about Norse Gods, seal women and disemboweled dogs. I didn't
have
to think about them.
All the way back to the office I thought of little else.
It was just after eight o'clock when I parked the car. Old Joe was shutting up shop.
"Early night?" I asked. He didn't usually shut till ten.
"Aye," he said. "Although I wish it wasn't. I've got the mother-in-law coming round. Can I put it off for a bit and get you some fags?"
"Naw...I picked some up earlier."
He looked shocked. "Going elsewhere? Traitor."
He knew and I knew it was a ploy to start a conversation...I was too tired, and I wasn't biting.
"Away you go home to your lovely mother-in-law. What age is she now?"
"Ninety-fucking-four," he said. "I wish she'd hurry up and die so I can retire in peace."
"Retire? Aye, that'll be the day."
He smiled. He was about to reply, but I realized he'd suckered me in...the conversation had already started. I turned away from him quickly and waved.
"I'll see you in the morning," I shouted over my shoulder. He stood at the shop door, waiting to see if another customer would come and give him an excuse to get back into the shop...but the street was quiet for once. As Joe walked away along the road he suddenly looked his age.
I felt my own age as I slowly climbed the stairs. The main light was still on, but when I tried the door it was locked. I rattled the doorknob, and there was a small squeal from inside. Something was knocked over, and Doug swore loudly.
"Go away. I've called the police!" he shouted.
"It's me. Let me in, you idiot."
He at least had the sense to look sheepish as he opened the door. With one glance I took in the half-empty coffee cups, the take-away cartons and the sleeping bag rolled up in the corner.
I laid the Old Lady Malcolm's check beside its near twin still lying on my desk.
"Please tell me you're been outside this office in the last thirty-six hours."
He stared at the floor and shuffled his feet. He'd been doing that since he was a boy...and he'd never succeeded in looking anything less than guilty.
"I was waiting for you to call and..."
"Oh no you don't," I said. "You can't blame me for this one. Get your coat...we're going out. We've got some celebrating to do."
"You got him?"
"Got him and took him back to his mammy. And we got paid."
"And there was no 'out there' stuff?"
"No," I said, and I managed to lie with a straight face. I've been doing that since
I
was a boy.
"So come on. Give me a chance of a shower then I'll buy you a beer and something to eat. And I'll tell you all about your 'Auld Kelpie'."
* * *
I spent a long time letting the shower play over me, clearing my head, washing the case away with the grime it had left on my body. By the time I'd changed into clean clothes I felt refreshed and ready for a beer.
Doug had his coat on already, and was waiting by his desk.
"Oh," he said. "Jim Morton has been calling for you all day. The air has been getting steadily bluer."
"I can imagine. That's part of the story I'll got to tell you...once we get a beer inside us."
Doug got the edited version of the story in the Aragon over a few pints of strong, hand-pumped ale.
"I don't understand," he said once I finished. "Why did the old lady think he wasn't her son?"
"How should I know?" I lied. "Stress at the death of her man? Dementia? Too much whisky? I don't know and I don't care. We got paid, and you're now an employee in a successful Detective Agency. Life is good. Let's get pissed."
We had a few more beers and reminisced about how the Aragon hadn't really changed since we'd first visited it as students. At that time the pub had a reputation as a place to pick up loose women...nurses in particular. Not that Doug and I had ever had any luck...we always got too drunk. Much like now, in fact.
When the reminiscing got too maudlin, we moved on to the Ashoka for a curry.
And that's where Jim Morton finally caught up with me. I heard him before I saw him.
"Where is the bastard? I know he's in here. Get out of my fucking way."
There was a clatter, and I turned to see him step round a pile of plates. He saw me at the same moment.
"Adams, you wanker. Where is he? Where's my story?"
"Hi, Jim," I said. "How are the nuts?"
"I'll be singing fucking soprano for a month," he said. "And I won't ask you again. Where is he?"
Three waiters converged on Jim, but he held them at bay with a stare so ferocious that they backed off.
"Sit down before they throw you out, Jim," I said. "I left him wi' his mammy. He's not going anywhere."
He stared at me suspiciously, then sat down and started eating his way through our meal.
"So fucking tell me already. You owe me."
"I owe you nothing, Jim. It was you that couldn't talk a barmaid into giving you a lift, not me. And I didnae know where they would take me."
He was slowly calming down. Maybe it had something to do with the amount of our meal he was wolfing down.
"You could have phoned me," he said as he pushed half a Nan bread into his mouth...his table manners were nearly as bad as his language.
"Nope," I said. "I didn't have the mobile with me. Doug will tell you."
Doug had a mouthful of pakora, so he could only nod.
"Okay. I'll believe you," the reporter said, helping himself to my lager. "But I still need to talk to him. I'm going to go over there now. Are you coming?"
"No. I've already been paid. But good luck. You'll have a job getting past his mother."
Then I remembered my promise to John Mason.
"Could you not leave it alone, Jim...for tonight at least?" I asked him. "The boy is burying his father in the morning. Give him a few hours peace 'till then."
"Buy me a beer and I'll think about it," he said.
The night went downhill fast from there.
About midnight the three of us rolled out of our fifth pub and Jim Morton caught a cab. Then I started the process of getting Doug to go home.
I was thinking that maybe I'd made a mistake by giving him a job... and he was becoming increasingly out of touch with reality. Now he was trying to persuade me to let him sleep on the floor of the office.
"I won't be any trouble," he said. "I did it last night, and it was fine. All I needed was the cushions from the sofa and..."
"I said no...and I mean it. I'm not running a doss house for retired archaeologists."
My attempt at humor fell flat.
He suddenly looked like a lost and bewildered boy. Tears hung at the corners of his eyes.
"You don't know what its like," he said. "I hear it, in the dark, the crazy flute player...and I feel them, the rough tentacles, crawling all over me."
In truth I knew part of it...we shared similar nightmares.
"Please, Derek?" he said. "I can't be alone. I'm not ready. Not yet..."
And I gave in, as he knew I would.
I do believe he actually would have slept on the floor for a second night, but I had a cot bed in my room that had been bought in case of sudden visitors. The fact that it was still in its original wrapping plastic reminded me, more than I cared to admit, that I didn't have enough friends to merit sudden stopovers. But Doug looked suspiciously happy as he helped me carry it out into the office.
"This is great," he said. "And it'll only be for a couple of nights...a week at most and..."
"A week? I don't think so. Let's just get tonight out of the way," I said. "It's been a long day and sleep is calling."
"Okay," he said. "I've got my e-mail to check, then I'll be off myself."
I could see the flickering light of his monitor under the door when I put out the light, and it was still on as my brain shut down and I fell gratefully into sleep.
* * *
I dreamed. I was in bed, in the flat, having been woken by some never repeated noise. The room was lit from outside by an orange sheet light that cast red shadows across the carpet. I was in that state between awake and asleep that causes the imagination to run riot and the heart to lurch at the slightest unexplained noise.
Something climbed the stairs outside. Well, not climbed as much as slumped, the noise like a wet fish being slapped on a fishmonger's slab. The shocks caused by its movements jolted the room, the red shadows quivering in the mirror, making the reflected room shake. The air in the room was damp and then damper, and I had the impression of water glistening on the carpet, droplets covering the ceiling and running in small rivulets down the walls.
Whatever the thing was, it had climbed the stairs and was dragging itself across the landing towards my bedroom door.
I wasn't worried, I knew that it was a dream, vivid, maybe, but still a dream, and that I would wake up before it got too frightening...after all, it wasn't as if it was T
he Amulet
dream.
The radio alarm switched itself on.
"Kashmir" by Zeppelin echoed its bass line around and around. The door, behind my back and out of sight, opened slowly, and it came into the room, bringing with it the tang of sea and rotting weed. I felt something take hold of the duvet and pull it away from me. I resisted as hard as I could, pulling back and holding tightly, but the pull was too much, dragging my body sideways across the bed and onto the floor that squelched wetly as my shoulder hit it and forcing my head round to face my attacker.
The Creature from the Black Lagoon stared back at me-at least that's what it looked like, a large, blue-green scaled body topped by a big maned head, green, saucer-like eyes unblinkingly scrutinizing me.
The creature reached down, grabbing my shoulders, sinking small claws into the flesh beneath my shoulder blades, lifting me up to face the twin rows of teeth and breathing one word that woke me up. I stifled a scream.
* * *
I sat up straight in bed, sweat pouring off me. The red digits of the alarm told me it was three-thirty in the morning, but that didn't help me. I sat there, breathing heavily, until some control returned to my breathing, then I lay back down. But it was a long time before sleep caught me again. When I got up in the morning Doug was either still at the desk or back at the desk...I didn't have the energy to ask which.
"Did you sleep OK?" he asked.
I see-sawed my hand back and forth as I slumped in my chair.
"There's coffee in the pot, and the paper and cigarettes are on your desk," he said.
I reached for a cigarette.
"Fetch me a coffee then, wench," I said.
He smiled, but brought me a piping hot, thick, black mug full.
"I put the cot away against the wall," he said. "And I've been to the bank and deposited the checks."
"Thanks...but you forgot to polish my shoes."
He looked grief-stricken, until he realized I was pulling his leg.
"I just wanted to say thanks...for letting me stay," he said.
"Just don't expect it to be a regular occurrence. You caught me at a weak moment."
Once more he looked crestfallen, and I suspected the tears might be back, but I hid behind the newspaper until I heard him tapping at the keyboard.
The day passed slowly. Nobody came up the stairs, and old Joe down in the newsagents only sang "Just One Cornetto" twice. I read the paper and smoked ten cigarettes over four cups of coffee.
I got days like this sometimes, when the clock crawls and I have too much time on my hands...time which weighs heavy on me. Normally I'd be down in the pub by mid-afternoon, having the first of too many beers. But I had an employee now, and I didn't want to set a bad example...not in his first week on the job, anyway.
I moped, I flicked rubber bands, and I stood at the window for a long time, staring out at the busy street, trying to will someone to walk up to the office.
In the late afternoon the first visitors of the day climbed the stairs. Unfortunately, it wasn't a client...it wasn't anybody I wanted to see...it was the police.
There were two of them, neither of whom I'd seen before. The first through the door was almost as wide as the doorway itself. He was at least six-foot-two, and looked like he ate Rottweilers for breakfast. His face was beet root red, and he was breathing heavily, like a bull before a charge. His suit, shiny at knees and elbows, was a full-size too small for him, and he looked like he'd burst it if he kept breathing too energetically. The floor of the office shook and I could feel myself inwardly cringe away from him as he approached my desk. If he said "Fee-fi-fo-fum" I wouldn't have been surprised.
I had to make the effort to smile.
"Good afternoon, officer," I managed to say.
"How did you know I was the Police?" he said in a voice that sounded like he gargled with sandpaper.
"Don't be stupid," a voice said from behind him. "How could somebody that looks like you be anything else?"
The man-mountain moved aside, and the other half of the partnership came into view. I say half, but she was more like a quarter...she was small and thin, and dressed in the female coppers street uniform that they pinched from TV shows...black slacks, white shirt and black leather jacket. If she said
"There's been a murder,"
I was going to have a giggling fit.
"Mr. Derek Adams?" the mountain said, and I nodded.
"Are you the owner of a Land Rover, registration DA70 5RS?"
I nodded again. Somehow, I felt talking would be too dangerous.
"We've had a complaint," the female officer said. Her voice was high-pitched, shrill, almost a shout. "Someone using that vehicle committed a felony assault on a reporter from the Star."
"Felony assault...what is this...
NYPD
-fucking-
Blue
or something?" the big man said. He turned to me.
"Jim Morton says that some bird was driving your car and gave him a kicking for no apparent reason. Me, I want to meet her and shake her hand, but the wee dirt peddler has only gone and raised a complaint against the woman. My boss wants her 'brought in to hear her side of the story'."
"And?" I said. That was my mistake. A hand the size of a shovel had me round the throat before I could breathe in.
"And just tell me who she is and we'll be away and leave you in peace," he said. "Or do I have to ask you again?"
Black spots floated in front of my eyes, and he had to release his grip slightly before I could talk.
"Irene...I don't know her surname," I croaked. "...Irene from the Portree Hotel. I was on holiday there and she delivered the car from Portree for Mallaig for me so that I could take a fishing trip. I..."
His hand left my throat.
"See. That was easy," he said, interrupting me.
He turned on his heel and left without another word. The female cop scurried along behind, giving me a look that seemed to say "Sorry, but I'm not with him" before she shut the door quietly behind her.
The encounter had lasted maybe ten seconds. Doug had sat, mouth open through the whole thing.
"You gave her up..." he finally whispered.
"Not quite," I replied. "And if I know her, she can handle herself well enough. It looks like Jim is out for revenge, and I know better than to go up against both the papers and Police at the same time. Have you seen the big fellow before?"
Doug shook his head. He still couldn't believe I'd given the police Irene's name.
I rubbed at my throat.
"I need some air. I'll go and ask Old Joe. He knows everything," I said. "Hold the fort...and don't lock the door behind me...if the big fella comes back he won't bother to knock."
* * *