Gillian Galbraith - No Sorrow To Die

At the till he stood, legs crossed and arms folded, watching as the women packed the carrier bags, Frankie talking to the check-out girl as if they were old friends and surreptitiously adding some last-minute purchases, a couple of packets of chewing gum for each of them. Juicy Fruit for him and Wrigley’s Spearmint for her. Only at the kiosk did he lose his temper, after waiting for seven other people to be served before them and then being told that they had no Lambert and Butler left.

Back in the car, the three measures of whisky that he had downed in O’Riordan’s Bar earlier that day warmed him still, making him feel good-humoured once more, content with the world and all its works. As they approached the traffic lights on Gorgie Road, he had a sudden idea, a truly inspired one. He had bought loads of stuff for Frankie and the wee man, so now it was his turn!

‘Stop the car a minute, hen,’ he commanded, and obediently she flicked on the indicator and drew slowly to the pavement, coming to a halt on the double yellow lines opposite the pet shop.

‘Dinnae go an’ get another o’ them fish now, Ally,’ she said wearily, looking over at the pet store as he let himself out of the Nissan. She added, ‘The pump’s no’ workin’, an’ all they cherry barbs ’n’ tiger barbs are deid, mind.’

‘Aha,’ he said, slamming the car door and lumbering eagerly along the pavement, heading straight for ‘Furry Friends’, his mouth curving into a wide smile in his glee. In his absence his wife watched the endless stream of pedestrians dawdling along, heads sunk into their shoulders and their carrier bags half-empty, wondering why only old people were out and about at this time of day. The Credit Crunch maybe?

When she inadvertently caught the eye of a prowling traffic warden, she smiled meekly at him, dropping her eyes to her distended belly, drawing his attention to it by way of excuse for parking illegally. Frowning, he nodded back at her, ostentatiously returning his notebook into his unbuttoned front pocket. Thanks, ye wee Hitler, she mouthed, eyelashes fluttering at him.

After ten minutes she began to feel restive, her swollen belly slightly compressed by the steering wheel and her back beginning to ache. She shifted her position, forcing herself to sit up straight, leaving a few inches between her tummy and the wheel. She was, she decided, looking down at the disappearing curve, nothing more than a monstrous bag of flesh, some kind of childbearing pod. Even her fingers had become fat, so thick that she could feel her pulse throbbing in the one encircled by her new engagement ring. An antique, no less, Ally had boasted that morning as he had wrestled to push it over her knuckle, after first fastening the matching chain of pearls around her neck. Old-fashioned crap, she had thought to herself. A band of white gold with a single diamond had been what she had expected, what she wanted.

The loud noise made by her husband as he clambered into the back seat, shuffling the bulging Mothercare bags along it with his hip, ended her musing. Glancing in the rear-view mirror she saw on his lap a cardboard box. It had tipped on its side, and his head and shoulders seemed to be disappearing inside it.

‘C’mon, back here, ye wee sod…’ he muttered, grasping at air, and then, pushing the box to one side, he bent over to look under the passenger seat, laughing uproariously to himself as he did so.

‘What you get?’ she asked idly, heading off into the traffic again and concentrating on her driving. He did not answer her, so she tried again ‘What d’you get? No’ another of they tortoise things?’

‘Naw,’ he replied. ‘Em, just a wee…’ he hesitated, breathless from being bent double, ‘em… just a wee… eh, snake.’

‘A snake! A snake! Fer fuck’s sake, Ally, tell me there’s no’ a snake loose in ma car?’

‘Naw,’ replied Ally. ‘Naw, hen – no’ loose, really. It’s gone an’ trapped itsel’ under the mat.’

‘Is it poisonous? A poisonous wan? ’Cause if it is, ah’m oot o’ here.’

When they got home, she pulled the handbrake on sharply and made to leave the car, but as she was doing so he shouted at her, his hands scrabbling wildly under the passenger’s seat. ‘Keep your bloody door shut, mind, or it’ll be oot an’ a’!’

‘Ally,’ she said, close to tears, ‘I’m no’ staying here, getting a snake’s fangs in ma ankle, just because you…’

‘Frankie, Frankie, it’s OK, Frankie. Honest, it’s OK,’ he interrupted her. ‘He’ll no’ bite ye, I promise. Armageddon’s a python – squeezes his prey tae death, and he cannae squeeze you tae death yet darlin’. He’s too sma’, he’s less than two foot long. We’ve tae feed him once we get home, then he’ll no’ be looking for prey anyway. He’s tae get his dinner on Mondays.’

‘But whit aboot the baby, Ally?’ she demanded, dully.

‘Whit aboot him?’ he answered, now fumbling under the driver’s seat.

‘Well, she’ll just be wee. Will Armadillo no’ be able to squeeze the life oot o’ her?’

‘Em…’ her husband said, playing for time. ‘Em… him, pet, the life oot o’ him. The bairn’s a him. But Armageddon’ll not…’

Their conversation ended abruptly with a loud knock on the driver’s steamed-up window. Frankie rolled it down slowly, to see herself beckoned out of the car by a couple of uniformed policemen. Standing by them was a young woman, and beside her was a middle-aged man in a beige raincoat, shouting loudly, ordering the constables around.

Sitting alone at the table in the interview room Ally Livingstone stroked his jaw up and down, up and down, feeling the springy stubble beneath his fingertips and listening to the rasping noise made by his fingers. Seeing a chewed biro at his left hand he picked it up, and absentmindedly put it into his mouth. He sucked on it, thinking things over as he did so. He reckoned he knew why they wanted to speak to him and he told himself he must try to concentrate, prepare himself to answer their questions.

The money that they had found on him, and any recently spent, could be explained away easily enough by a win on the horses. Frankie had fallen for that one after all, no bother. All he needed to do was multiply his actual stake twenty-fold, and that would account for his record winnings. ‘Whispering Wind’ had, genuinely, won the 2.30 at Doncaster. And if they could be fobbed off with that, then maybe he would be able to use the card again, please God, because the Parks Department paid only peanuts.

If they were after the card itself then he had an explanation for that, too, although they might not believe him. If he could just get another two hundred pounds or three hundred maybe, then they could buy the cot or the buggy and a couple of corn-snakes, or better yet, a baby African Grey parrot. He could teach it to speak along with the little one, when he arrived. They’d both learn to say, ‘Fuck off ye wee twat’ in unison.

Now deep in thought, he closed his jaws on the biro, accidentally biting into it and splitting its plastic casing into smithereens in his mouth. He tried to spit the tiny fragments out, but a few obstinate ones stuck to his tongue. As he attempted to remove them with his fingers, the young policewoman entered the room and sat down opposite him, catching him in the act. A couple of seconds later, the middle-aged man joined them, muttering gruffly as he sat down, ‘On you go, Alice, love…’

‘Can you tell me where you were from about six o’clock onwards last Saturday, the day before yesterday, Mr Livingstone?’ the woman asked, watching him as he wiped his sticky fingers on the shoulders of his leather jacket.