"How the fuck did he do that?"
"He beat her with a baseball bat."
"I suppose everyone'll be going home if the appeal fails," said Maureen.
"Don't even say it," muttered Leslie, and handed Maureen a crash helmet.
Chapter 21
Next morning Maureen adopted an English accent and phoned the Northern from Leslie's house. She asked reception to put her through to Frank in the office.
As soon as he lifted the receiver she realized that she should have thought it through beforehand. She didn't know who she was going to pretend to be, she didn't even know what story she was going to tell. She asked him whether he had seen the article about the superannuation mix-up, it was in the newsletter, he had probably read it. Well, Frank said, he remembered something about that, yes. Stunned that the story was hanging together, she staggered on: obviously it wasn't her fault, she had been called in to sort out her predecessor's mistakes, wasn't that always the way? Frank agreed vehemently. Maureen couldn't imagine Frank being called in to sort piss from shit but she didn't say so.
He agreed to get her a printout of the names and national insurance numbers of the full-time medical staff spanning ten years, from 1985 to 1995, excluding agency, and Maureen would send a courier to pick it up at two that day.
She looked at the phone before she put it down. Martin was right: Frank was really stupid.
Frank finished his sticky blueberry muffin and played another three games of Tetris. This was a bit lucky. If he did them this favor they might remember if he applied for a job at the regional office. A job in a real office. An office where you wouldn't be surrounded by bloody loonies.
At ten past two she walked into the office wearing a crash helmet and Leslie's leathers. Frank handed her a brown envelope. Curious as to how far she could push it, she made him sign a receipt for a novel she had bought a couple of weeks before. She walked down the back stairs and out of the hospital with her visor down, feeling untouchable, like a movie hero. Leslie had kept the engine running and the stand up on the bike. Maureen swung her leg over the seat and Leslie turned, spraying gray gravel. The lights farther down the road changed, causing a break in the traffic, and they pulled out into the road.
Back in the Drum they broke open a quarter bottle of whisky, took a slug each and opened the envelope. Frank had printed out a single sheet from his files, all medical personnel employed at the Northern covering the years 1985 to 1995, excluding agency. It was a list of national insurance numbers. No names. Frank really was a stupid bastard.
As they finished the whisky Leslie showed her how to sharpen the end of the stabbing comb into a point. She drew the long handle of the comb across a black wedge of silicon carbide, backward and forward, turning it over at the end to sharpen both sides, dragging it on the diagonal to give it an edge. She wrapped a J-cloth over the teeth and gave it to Maureen to have a go. She scratched the handle over the block, turning it over and drawing it through. She kept going until she brought it to a neat point with an inch-long sharpened ledge on either side of the tip. Leslie rubbed margarine into it to disguise the scratches.
Maureen thought about the stabbing comb as Leslie drove her back to Maryhill and Benny's house, she thought about it and it warmed her, as the remembrance of a great love would.
Leslie dropped her at the bollards in the Maryhill Road.
Benny was in the hall, on his way out to the library. "Maureen, where were you yesterday?" he said, and hugged her. "How're ye keeping?"
She stood stiff in his arms, trying to remember how she used to react to him when he touched her. She pressed herself into his chest and guessed. "I'm fine, Benny," she said, drawing back and looking him straight in the eye, holding his cheek with the flat of her hand. She looked at him, willing her suspicions about him away, but they refused to subside.
He squeezed her shoulders. "Good, wee hen." He grinned. "That's good. You've changed your hair. It's really nice."
"Yeah, I got it cut."
"God, is that whisky on your breath?"
"Urn, yeah."
"Maureen, watch yourself, it's only three in the afternoon."
"I'm watching myself," she said resentfully, and pulled away from him. "I'm just… I just wanted some today, that's all."
"Naw" – he pulled her back by the arm – "don't be like that." He hugged her again and she found herself more uncomfortable than the first time.
"Just see ye don't end up like me, that's all I mean," he said, and let her go. "Spending your days and nights in smoky rooms with a bunch of old alkies."
The police had phoned for her and she was to phone the Stewart Street station. He said he'd made dinner for her and left it in the oven. She shouted a cheerful cheerio after him as he shut the front door behind himself.
She slipped on the oven gloves and took out the casserole dish, feeling the warmth seeping through the cheap gloves. She lifted the lid. It was a mouthwatering cheesy pasta thing. A large portion had been sliced out of it: the fresh cliff of cheese and pasta was collapsing slowly, sliding down and filling the base of the dish. She cut herself a portion and dirtied a plate and some cutlery with it before dropping it into a plastic bag ready for the bin. She arranged the plate and fork on the draining board to look like the disregarded crockery of a happy eater. She ducked into the bedroom and checked the bottom drawer. The CD was still there, unmoved since she put it back.
Her T-shirt was covered in itchy shards of hair from the night before. She went into Benny's cupboard and found the mustard crew-neck jumper she had brought from the house. She took the jaggy T-shirt off and pulled the jumper over her head, opened her leather rucksack and lifted most of her clothes from the shelf, shoving them into the bag. Her hand hovered over the Anti Dynamos T-shirt. She took it for spite and left a pair of knickers and a T-shirt on the shelf in case Benny noticed everything was gone and got suspicious.
Joe McEwan couldn't come to the phone but the officer knew who she was and told her they wanted to see her at the station as soon as possible. He offered to send a car for her but she said it was okay, she'd make her own way down. He didn't object and she took it as a good sign. She collected the bag of food from the kitchen sink and dumped it in a street bin.
She was halfway down the road to the police station when she remembered Jim Maliano's Celtic shirt and jogging trousers sitting on the floor of the cupboard among the dirty socks. She would have to go back to Benny's at some point.
HUGH MCASKILL CAME TO collect her from the reception desk with Inness at his back. Inness had shaved off his gay-biker mustache. It may have been because she was used to seeing him with it or because the freshly shaved skin was a lighter color than the rest of his face but his top lip seemed odd and prominent. Her eyes kept straying to it of their own accord. Inness saw her looking at it and turned his head away to shake off her gaze.
They took her to an interview room on the ground floor. McAskill seemed to be in charge. He gave her a cheeky encouraging look, took a big chocolate bar out of his pocket, ripped the packaging down the middle with his thumbnail and broke the chocolate into squares. He put it down in the middle of the table, setting it on top of the wrapper like a serving suggestion. "Wire in," he said, sucking on a square.
Inness took two and Maureen took one. "Thanks," she said, and wondered why he was always so nice to her.
Inness turned on the tape recorder, told it who was present and what the time was.
"Now, Miss O'Donnell," said McAskill, swallowing his chocolate and addressing her in a formal telephone voice, "the first thing I need to ask you is whether or not you've ever seen this before."