Denise Mina - Exile

"I'll take them."

"Mum, come and sit down and tell Maureen the story. She's good at this, she'll try and sort it out."

"Isa," called Maureen, from the table, "come over. I don't think it was Jimmy either."

Isa blew her nose on a cotton hankie from her sleeve. "Why don't you think he did it?"

"He's so mild. He makes you look like Ian Paisley."

They were smoking Leslie's cigarettes and sitting around the table, intimate and close, and Isa was telling them about Jimmy's dad and all the wrong he did. She balked sometimes, straining to overcome a lifelong habit of secrecy, mentioning herself occasionally, minimizing her kindness.

Jimmy's father, Billy, was Isa's cousin and a gangster of the old school. It was in the fifties and Billy Harris didn't bother organizing himself to rob banks or anything, he just bullied the other men and had street fights, getting a reputation as a hard man in the Carlton, the roughest part of a wild city. He was friends with all the gangsters at that time and she reeled off a string of threatening names, hollow echoes of the past. Billy was terribly handsome. He would have had his pick of the girls if he hadn't been such a fighter. He had a lot of scars by the time he was seventeen and the nice girls were afraid of him. They'd give him one dance and leave the hall if he asked again. Isa's brothers and sisters avoided him at the dancing, ashamed that he belonged to them. He married Monica Beatty when she was expecting, which was a shame in those days, not like now, and Monica looked like a movie star. She had platinum hair, red lips. Billy first beat her on their wedding night; he put the head on her for smiling at the photographer. There were no shelters in those days. Pregnant Monica had to leave the house when Billy came home drunk. She'd waddle around the dark Bridgeton streets waiting until he was asleep before creeping back into the house. No one questioned it. You married a man and if he beat ye that was just your luck. Isa said that in those days there was a time of night, about an hour after closing time, when the only people in the streets of Glasgow were women and children.

The moment Jimmy was born it was clear that he wasn't Billy's. He took after him in nothing, neither in looks nor temperament. Jimmy was always gentle, always fearful, there was never a drop of Billy in him.

Billy worked the boats. The last time he came home on leave he brought wee Jimmy over to Isa's to stay for a couple of days. Isa took the child – she had no idea, she honestly had no idea. Jimmy had stayed before, when Monica brought him. He'd stayed for days sometimes, but Isa was glad of his company. He was a nice wee thing, always laughing, and Isa's brothers and sister were out at work all day and the dancing at night, so having the bairn was like being a real mother. Billy left the child and went looking for his wife. He had heard about Monica. She'd been running with a crowd from the Gorbals, leaving the child alone and going with other men. He found her in a rough pub by the docks and took her outside. He broke her arms and – Isa paused and stared at the table – he took one of her eyes out. The men in the pub heard the screaming. When they found what he'd done they beat him. He hanged himself in the cells at the Marine. Monica died a few months later, got an infection. Isa pointed to her eye and winced. She thought something bad must have happened to him on the boats, and it must have been something terrible to make him so vicious.

"Maybe he was just like that?" suggested Leslie.

" He took her eye ," said Isa.

"Mum, I hear about things like that all the time and there aren't any boats for the bastards to go on anymore. They're just like that."

"Oof." Isa turned away as if she'd been slapped. She smiled hopelessly at Maureen. "I hope she doesn't use language like that all the time."

Maureen patted her hand. "What happened to wee Jimmy, Isa?"

"Monica's sister came"-she hung her head-"and took him away. She thought I knew what he was going to do but I didn't. I wouldn't think of such a thing, I was just a girl myself. But he was my cousin and he was dead and I got the blame. She wasn't very nice to me."

"And did ye see wee Jimmy after that?" asked Maureen.

"Not for a long time. Then about ten years ago I bumped into him at the Barras." She flushed. "He was all grown-up and he knew me, came running over and kissed me in the street, in front of everyone. I was that pleased. I thought his auntie would've turned him against me but, to her credit, she hadn't. She died before he married. We kept in touch. He came to our Maisie's wedding"-she nodded at Leslie-"and he brought his new wife, Ann. It was nice, us all being together, but then he just drifted away. He wouldn't hit his wife…"

Isa trailed off and Leslie sat forward. "I think he did it," she said certainly.

"Rubbish," said Isa flatly, and Leslie opened her mouth to start a fight.

"I don't think he'd hit anyone," interrupted Maureen, "not coming from a background like that."

"He's more likely to hit someone coming from that," insisted Leslie.

"No, he isn't," said Isa.

"No," said Maureen. "If ye come from that ye can't lie and pretend it doesn't matter. If ye come from that ye'd be acutely aware of what it meant and what it could lead to."

"I still think he did," said Leslie stubbornly.

Isa poured more tea for Maureen. She tried to make her take a gammon roll or at least a biscuit, have a wee biscuit. Maureen took a tea cake just to be nice.

"What d'yees think'll happen to him?" whispered Isa.

Leslie looked at Maureen but Maureen's mouth was full. "The police'll do him for murder when they see the shelter photos," said Leslie.

"What if they don't see the photos?" said Maureen, struggling to speak through a mouthful of mallow and cooking chocolate.

"But they're going to see the photos," said Leslie firmly.

"Could you hide the photos?" whispered Isa.

"Mother," said Leslie, "what are you suggesting?"

Isa quietly rearranged the plate of biscuits. "Ye might misplace them," she said quietly.

"Mum, for God's sake-"

"I've stolen them," said Maureen to Isa. "They're in my bag."

"Oh," beamed Isa, "that's wrong."

"I'm a bad lot," said Maureen. Isa made her take another biscuit. "I think Ann had a boyfriend," said Maureen, basking in Isa's approval. "He could have beat her, she could have followed him to London and he might have killed her there. We should look for a boyfriend."

"Yes," said Leslie, nodding at Maureen as if she were prompting her a line. "But we need to wait and see what the police make of it."

Isa sighed heavily. "I'll go and see Jimmy and get to know the children," she said. "Every time something terrible happens to that family I turn up like Typhoid Mary."

"Mum, if it wasn't for you Billy might have killed the wean as well."

The doorbell rang three times in rapid succession. Isa sighed and stood up, straightening her pinny and narrowing her lips. "I bet that's that bloody Sheila McGregor," she said.

"Oof," said Maureen to Leslie. "I hope she doesn't use language like that all the time."

Isa tee-heed and disappeared into the hall. They heard two oscillating lady voices greeting each other with offers of tea and cake.

"You were brilliant," said Leslie. "She'd have been gutted if I'd told her."

"No bother." Maureen gestured out to the hall. "Who's this?"

"Hungry neighbor. Catches the smell when the lid comes off the biscuits."

Mrs. McGregor's shopping bags filled the doorway. She humphed them onto the kitchen floor and stood up, blinded by the condensation on her glasses. She was dressed in a thick green tweed coat and stood less than five foot tall on bandy cowboy legs. Isa came back into the kitchen and put the kettle on again.