Denise Mina - Garnethill

The Seedy Man finished his recital and Liam shot Maureen an abortive smile. Inness took his arm, leading him away through the double doors on the ground floor. The Seedy Man followed them. Liam didn't look back at her: he walked off with his head bent to his chest like a man about to be taken to a place, there to be hanged by the neck until he was dead.

McEwan watched the door swing after them. "You want to watch the company you keep," he said.

"How do you mean?" she said innocently.

"Your brother and that Benny pal of yours."

"Benny?"

"He's got a record, didn't you know?" He pointed upstairs. "You know the way by now."

They walked up the first flight of stairs. "Naw," she said. "Benny's studying law, he couldn't get into uni if he had a record. You're mixing him up with someone else."

"It was a no pro," said McEwan.

"A what?"

"That means they didn't prosecute."

That made sense of it: he'd have been arrested for pissing up a close or something. "Not worth the hassle?"

"He was diverted."

"I don't know what that means either," she said, tired of his smug jargonizing manner.

"He got a psychiatric referral for alcoholism instead."

"Oh, right, I didn't know about that. We must look like a right bunch of nutters to you."

McEwan smiled enigmatically and opened the door to the interview room. Maureen sat down at the far side of the table and crossed her legs, swinging her foot in manic rhythmic kicks. Something important was about to happen and she couldn't concentrate for thinking about Winnie. They had been in such a hurry to caution both of them.

McAskill slipped into the seat next to the wall and started the tape recorder. McEwan took the outside chair.

"How are you, Maureen?" said McEwan, as if for the benefit of the tape.

"I'm fine, Joe," said Maureen, wishing he'd get to the fucking point. "How are you?" fine.

They paused and looked at each other. Joe McEwan was savoring the moment. Maureen shifted in her chair, sitting sideways and re-crossing her legs. "Are you going to ask me questions or are we going to sit here and look at each other all day?" she said.

"Yes," he said serenely. "I do have some questions to ask you. First, I want you to tell me, in as much detail as you can, what you did from nine in the morning until ten p.m. the day before Mr. Brady was found dead."

She repeated the story, telling him the details about the Pizza Pie Palace and Leslie again, wondering why they were asking about the evening. McEwan asked her if she was sure about a couple of the times she had given them and then sat back confidently, looking her up and down.

"Anything else?" she said rudely.

"Yes," he said. "A number of things. I want to talk to you about your harassment of Mrs. Carol Brady."

"My what?" Her voice was straining high. She made a mental note to calm down.

"Mrs. Brady told me that you'd contacted her and insisted that she meet you. She wouldn't be specific about the nature of the meeting-"

"It was lunch."

"I meant what was said."

"I'll tell you what was said." She sat forward. "Same thing as Elsbeth said-"

"And that's another thing," he interrupted, "stay away from her too."

"Look, they both approached me, I didn't go looking for either of them. You were there when Elsbeth asked me to wait and you gave bloody Carol Brady the address I was staying at."

"I most certainly did not."

"Well, she told me she got it from the police. Her assistant turned up at the door and nearly scared the living shit out of me." She was talking very fast, very angry.

McEwan looked at McAskill. McAskill looked confused and shook his head.

"We'll look into that," said McEwan.

"And you told her that my family were unsavory ." She was glad to be on the offensive, glad she had something to pull him up about. "We're as savory as any other family in this city…" She sounded ridiculous.

"As I said," McEwan reiterated, "we'll look into it. If someone did give her the address it was against my express orders. Anyway, I made it perfectly clear I didn't want you to wait for Elsbeth. Why did you talk to either of them?"

"Look," she said, "I'm a failed Catholic woman, I feel guilty all the time anyway. I was shagging her husband and Carol Brady's son died in my living room. What the fuck am I going to do when they ask me to speak to them? Spit?"

McEwan warmed at the mention of Catholicism. McAskill didn't look up. He might be a Protestant. He might not give a shit. Maureen hoped it was the latter.

"When did Carol Brady approach you?" asked McEwan.

"Urn, Saturday night. She sent her assistant to Benny's to tell me I was having lunch with her the next day. I was freaked enough as it was. Those bloody journalists had been at my work-"

"Did you give them the picture that was in the paper yesterday?"

She moved her chair back and recrossed her legs. "No, my mum did."

"Did you tell her to do it?"

"No," she said, uncrossing them.

"Why did she, then?"

Maureen held up her hands. "The ways of Winnie are many and varied."

McEwan suppressed a derogatory snigger. "I spoke to your mum."

"Oh, yeah?" she said, wanting to slap him for implicatively slagging her mammy. "I heard she was in here. She's a bit of a live wire."

McEwan grinned unkindly. "Yeah," he said. "She is."

" Unsavory, " said Maureen. "Anyway, both Elsbeth and Carol were asking if Douglas gave me money."

"Did he give you money?"

She noticed that the conversation was getting faster and faster and she was wiggling about in her chair. Slow, slow, she told herself, slow. "No," she said, probably too slowly. "No. He tried to pay my mortgage a couple of times but I wouldn't take it."

"He 'tried'?"

"Yeah, but I wouldn't let him."

McEwan was perplexed. "Why?"

"I didn't want to be beholden to him."

He frowned, tried to understand for a millisecond and then gave up. "I thought that was one of the good things about being a woman," he said flirtatiously.

"But nothing's for nothing, is it?" she said, puzzled by his attitude. And it hit her. That was how certain he was: he was talking fast and flirting with her, letting his guard down every which way. He didn't give a shit what she thought anymore. They'd cautioned Liam, too, and McEwan thought he had them.

She faked calm and glanced at the tape recorder. Her eyes fell on McAskill's hands, one on top of the other, resting on the table. He lifted a finger, signaling to her to look up. His face was sad and soft. He blinked his blue eyes slowly and when he opened them again he was looking at the table.

"Are you a feminist?" asked McEwan, acting surprised and dragging her back to the game.

"Yeah," said Maureen, feeling genuinely calm, as if she'd absorbed some of Hugh's tired dignity.

McEwan laughed. "I thought you liked men," he said.

"Yeah, feminists don't like men and Martin Luther King picked on white people. You don't know many feminists, do you, Joe?"

"No," he said, oblivious to her supercilious attitude, "but I know what they look like and they don't look like you." He pointed openly to her large tits and looked away, leaving Maureen – and McAskill – aghast. He knew he'd offended her but he didn't give a shit. "Still, your political beliefs would allow you to accept cash."

"What are you talking about?"

"He gave you cash, though. You were happy enough to accept that from him, weren't you?"

"No. Where did you get that idea from? I didn't take money from him. I didn't want his money. I don't make a lot of money but it's mine and I manage."

McEwan reached into his pocket and pulled out a bank statement. Maureen recognized the red and blue type on the heading. He unfolded it and pushed it across the table to her.