Denise Mina - Garnethill

Leslie tried to introduce herself but she couldn't get a response either. Maureen pointed her through to the kitchen. "Why are you here with her?" whispered Leslie urgently. "She should be in hospital."

"No, Leslie, I can't take her to a hospital, that's her worst nightmare."

"Why didn't the police deal with it?"

"If I'd left her in the station they'd have sent her to hospital for sure."

They stood in the kitchen and Maureen explained what had happened.

"Let me call her a doctor," said Leslie. "She might need some medication."

Maureen wasn't sure but Leslie swore on her mother's life that she wouldn't let them take Siobhain to a hospital.

Maureen searched the bathroom and Leslie looked through the drawers in the kitchen but they couldn't find anything with a doctor's name on it.

"Try the bedroom," suggested Leslie.

They opened the door and, past the bed, saw an old-fashioned lady's dressing table with three angled mirrors. In front of them, on the surface where the cosmetics should have been, sat an army of pill jars arranged into squads of five. The three mirrors reflected them, swelling their numbers. The same doctor's name was printed on all of the labels.

Leslie went down to the phone box. She came back up and said that Dr. Pastawali didn't want to come out. He had told her that Siobhain had these turns sometimes and she'd be fine in the morning. Maureen took the number and went down to the phone box herself.

She had been so short with him on the phone that she expected Dr. Pastawali to be annoyed with her but he was sweet and courteous. "Good evening to you, ladies," he said when they opened the door to him. "Where is Miss McCloud, please?"

He was a tall Asian man in his fifties, with dark sad eyes. He crouched down next to the armchair and took Siobhain's pulse and blood pressure. He muttered to Siobhain all the time he did it, explaining what he was doing and why, asking her little questions about her health, moving on to another query when she didn't answer. Eventually, he managed to get her to look at him.

Maureen hung about in the doorway as he got Siobhain to move her hands and wiggle her toes. He held her hand and muttered something unintelligible.

"I'm very tired," murmured Siobhain.

He took Maureen into the kitchen.

"You're not going to send her to hospital, are you?"

"No," said the doctor. "I'm sending her to bed."

Siobhain wouldn't help Maureen undress her. After half an hour of asking and cajoling and finally trying to wrestle her out of her trousers Maureen gave up and put her to bed fully clothed. She turned off the light, shut the door quietly and crept back into the living room.

Leslie had turned on the television to the evening news. Douglas and Elsbeth's wedding photograph flashed onto the screen. The picture had been treated so that the vicar and Elsbeth were in a dark shadow and Douglas's face was highlighted. The supercilious expression on his face made him look smug and unkind. "Bad picture," said Leslie, as Maureen sat down next to her on the settee.

Carol Brady was being interviewed outside the front door of a house. She was chalk white and quivering with fury. She complained about the Strathclyde police force's incompetent handling of the investigation, saying they should concentrate on bringing charges against the person who had killed her son. They knew who had done it and so did she. She read out a prepared speech about the disastrous consequences of Care in the Community and the danger of it, not only to the public but to those people released into the community and unable to cope. Anyone familiar with the case would appreciate the implication that Maureen had done it.

Leslie leaned over and turned it off.

"Nae luck, Mauri," she said.

"Do you mind if we stay here tonight?" asked Maureen. "I just want to be here in the morning in case she's the same."

"No," said Leslie. "I don't mind."

They took the cushions off the settee and armchairs and made beds on the floor. Leslie turned out the light and they settled down to sleep in the drafty living room. Maureen put the police buzzer on the floor next to her, touching it when she lay down to make sure it was within easy reach.

Leslie had her leathers on but Maureen only had her overcoat for cover. She took the place nearest the gas fire and left it on but it just accentuated the damp cold creeping over any part of her body not directly in the path of the heat. A streetlight just outside the drizzle-splattered window suffused the room with a warm orange glow. Maureen lay on her back, watching the light dance on the ceiling as the steady rain fell. "If I hadn't been to see Martin he'd never have been killed and if I hadn't told them about Siobhain they'd never have questioned her. I'm fucking up people's lives."

"Shut up, Mauri," Leslie murmured sleepily. "It's nothing to do with you."

"Yes, it is, it's my fault. I'm playing at this and I don't know what I'm doing. I could be putting you in danger, or Liam, or anyone. Or even Siobhain."

"Maureen, please, shut up and go to sleep."

"I can't, I feel like such an arse. I was there just a couple of hours beforehand. I was the last person to see him alive-"

"You can't have been, Maureen," said Leslie, her voice irritated and loud. "They wouldn't have let you go if you had been."

"D'ye think so? D'ye think someone else saw him after me?"

"Yeah. Why's that important?"

"Dunno. Do you think I've got a good memory?"

"What, for details and stuff?"

"Aye."

"It's fine, Mauri. Can we go to sleep now?"

"I should never have gone to see Martin in the first place, and going back a second time, I don't know what I was thinking about or why I was trying to find the person who did this. There's nothing I can do even if I do find them."

"Why?"

"Well, if it has got anything to do with the Northern the police'll want to talk to Siobhain and all the other women about it, and look at what this afternoon did to her. It could kill her."

Leslie rolled onto her back and stared at the ceiling.

"So you're giving up?"

"Fuck, I'll have to. Everyone at the Northern knew about the list from that Frank guy. I mean, I might have been just as clumsy about other things."

"He isn't coming after the people the police are talking to, is he? He's coming after the people you're talking to. That means you're on the right track."

"But even if I do find out who did it I can't take them to the police. They'll need witnesses and they'll have to question the women. God knows what kind of damage they could do."

Leslie rolled onto her side and looked at her. "You can't just stop." She sounded angry. "It doesn't matter a toss that you can't take him to the police, Maureen, for fucksake. We have to take responsibility about this and do something to stop it."

"But the police-"

"Never mind the fucking police. The point is, you know more about this than anyone else now. We can't just throw our hands up and walk away, for Christ's sake. We have to stop him from hurting other people."

"But I wouldn't know what to do."

"Well," she said sarcastically, "let's mount a poster campaign or something. How about letters to the papers?"

"Auch, Leslie-"

" 'Auch, Leslie' nothing. This is it, Maureen, this is the big crunch. Do you genuinely give a shit or do you just like fighting about politics?"

"No, but-"

"If you do give a shit we have to find this man and put him out of action."

"I'm not killing anyone."

"I'll do it if you don't." Leslie rolled onto her back again, crossing her arms and tucking her hands under her armpits, grunting with annoyance.

"We still don't know it's a man who did it," said Maureen carefully. "We don't know that the rapes at the Northern were done by the person who killed Douglas or Martin. For all we know those murders could have been done by a woman."