Denise Mina - Garnethill

"What time was it last week?"

"It's always the same because I can't remember."

"Yeah, I know, but what was the old time, before the new time?"

"Wednesday at one, Wednesday at one"

"So you didn't get to see him last week, then?"

"Yes. The police said it was because he was dead. I was there for ages because Douglas didn't come."

"That's a shame, Tanya."

"My neighbors banged on the wall all weekend and I needed to tell him that."

"That's a shame. Did you get to tell someone?"

"I told the police. They don't listen. They asked me about Douglas but they don't listen."

"How don't they listen?"

"They just don't. They think I'm daft. He said thank you but I saw him laughing at me. He had a mustache."

"I know that policeman. He was rude to me too."

"Yes. I don't like him… My pal seen him."

"Your pal saw the man with the mustache?"

"No. She seen him. She seen him when he was dead."

"She saw Douglas?"

Tanya nodded frantically.

"When he was dead?"

"Aye," said Tanya. "Then."

"Was he a ghost?"

Tanya looked at her askance. "There's no such thing as ghosts."

"No, sorry, you're right. There's no such thing."

"There's no ghosts. Only on the telly."

"How did she see him when he was dead, then?"

"Eh?"

"Your friend who saw him, how did she see him?"

Tanya looked at her as if she was daft. "With her eyes."

"He was standing in front of her?"

Tanya opened her eyes wide and stuck out her lower jaw at Maureen, angry at being asked so many pointless questions. "He was standing in front of her."

"When he was dead?"

"Aye, when he was dead."

Maureen was still confused. "I'm sorry, Tanya, I don't understand."

"He was dead and she seen him."

"When?"

"When they asked me about-"

"No, when did she see him?"

"When he couldn't see me because he was dead."

"Wednesday at one?"

"Wednesday at one"

"What's the name of your friend, Tanya, the friend who saw Douglas?"

"Siobhain. I meet her at the day center. She's fat now too."

"What's her surname?"

"Why are you asking me that?"

"I thought I knew her."

"Oh."

"Do you know Siobhain's surname?"

"McCloud."

Maureen wrote the name on the back of her bus ticket. "Is that the day center in Dennistoun?"

"Yes."

"Does Siobhain go there a lot?"

Suicide snorted. "She practically lives there!"

On the way into the town Tanya made rash comments about the other passengers at the top of her voice. Not a soul looked back at her. She told Maureen a complicated story about an Alsatian on top of her telly that smashed. Maureen thought she was describing a hallucination until she realized that the Alsatian was a china ornament. When they got off the bus Maureen took her to a fancy-goods shop and bought her a replacement. "That's a better one," bawled Tanya at a frightened man in the shop. "That's got a chain on it."

Tanya wanted to go with Maureen. Maureen had to explain several times that she was going to the university library and she needed to have a ticket to get in.

"I can't get in because I don't have a ticket."

"That's it, Tanya. You need a ticket."

"Buy me one."

"You can't buy them."

"No?"

"No, they have to give them to you."

"Will they give me one?"

"No."

"Why?"

"You're too tall."

Tanya insisted on waiting with Maureen until the bus came. Maureen got on the bus and waved eagerly through the window but Suicide ignored her.

In the library basement she asked an assistant for some help finding the salary scales for clinical psychologists. The assistant gave her a professional publication from behind the desk. He would have been on about forty-five K. She thanked the woman and caught the lift up to the top floor.

She pulled out the past papers and skimmed through them for news of the ecology conference in Brazil. It had been opened officially on Wednesday morning by the president. The story was accompanied by a picture of Carol Brady and some other people in expensive clothes.

Glasgow University library is eight stories high and built at the top of Gilmorehill. The walls are floor-to-ceiling smoke-tinted glass, giving the sprawled city below an unreal quality. She sat down at a table and looked out over the neo-Gothic university building, down to the river, past Govan to the airport, looking for the lightbulb factory far to the west, next to the motorway. It's possibly the most beautiful building in Glasgow. She couldn't see it.

Angus was the only therapist she had ever felt understood her properly, the only one she had ever connected with, and he thought she'd killed Douglas. He wasn't even angry with her. He must think she was very mental. She folded the newspapers carefully and shoved them back in the pile. She left the library and caught the bus back to Benny's house, hungry for the sight of him and his casual kindness.

They had never seen Liam so angry. The police had raided his house. He had been lying in bed with Maggie when they kicked the front door in and four officers stormed upstairs into the bedroom and found them naked, covered with a sheet. They pulled the sheet away, made them get out of bed, watching as they dressed, and took Liam downstairs.

Because of Maureen's timely warning there was nothing incriminating for the police to find, but they had brought tracker dogs with them and found the scent everywhere. They gutted the house, pulling up floorboards and digging up bits of the garden. Liam said the house was un-fucking-inhabitable; it looked like 25 Cromwell Street.

Maggie sobbed hysterically for half an hour and then phoned her mum in Newton Mearns, begging her to come and fetch her. Until this point her mother had believed that Liam was a music-business entrepreneur. Maggie didn't mention the police on the phone, her mum thought they'd had a fight. Good mother that she was, she dropped what she was doing and drove all the way across town to get Maggie. Nearing the house she saw the police cars and, good citizen that she was, pulled over, asking them what it was about and could she help. They told her. She took her daughter home and forbade her to see Liam again.

"They can't trash my fucking house and just leave it like that," said Liam aggressively. He turned on Benny. "Can I sue them for compensation?"

"There must be some way," said Benny, trying to placate him, "given that you didn't commit a crime, but I can't think what it would be."

"Those fuckers can just rip my house apart and walk away? That's fucking outrageous."

"Why don't you write to your MEP?" said Maureen, trying to lighten the prickly atmosphere.

"That's not fucking funny!" shouted Liam.

"Don't shout at me!" shouted Maureen. "It's not my fault."

"Well, if you hadn't-" Liam realized how bad he was being and corrected himself. "I won't be able to work for ages."

"I have to tell you," said Benny authoritatively, "it'd be stupid for you to deal now." He said that because the police had found the scent everywhere, they would be back time and time again until they caught him out. Even if he moved house they'd still be on his back. "I wouldn't even pass a spliff at a party now if I were you."

Liam dropped onto the settee and covered his face with his hands. "Jesus Christ," he said, his voice muffled, "what the fuck am I going to do now?"

Maureen sat down beside him. "Come on, now," she said. "You're a bright guy, you've got loads of capital in the house and you've saved some money, haven't you?"

"A bit."

"It's a big bit, isn't it?"

He shrugged. "S'pose."

"Well, we'll think of something."