McAskill followed her as she felt her way over to the little hill of bin bags at the back. McEwan was standing uncertainly in the doorway, watching them.
"Come on," she called back to him. "Come on, it's quite safe. There's a wee door here."
McAskill waved him over and they followed her around the bags, their eyes adjusting slowly to the damp dark. She tried to push the den door open but it wouldn't give.
"It wasn't locked before," she said.
McAskill pushed the door hard with the flat of his palm. The top of it opened four inches, springing back as soon as he let go, but the bottom didn't give at all. It seemed to be bolted from the inside. He shoved with both hands and felt it give. "Something's stuck behind it," he said, and kicked the bottom. He pushed hard but the door jammed half-open. Maureen stood at ninety degrees to the door and slid her arm along the wall; it felt warm and powdery, like talcum-covered skin. She found the light switch and flicked it on.
Martin was lying on the floor. His feet had been barring the door and McAskill's shoving had pushed them to the side, making his legs lie at a crazy, broken angle. She thought he was facedown, that she was looking at the back of his head, until she saw his copper bangle. His left hand was resting on his stomach, the fingers rolled back into a fist except for the casually extended index finger. His face and upper chest were unrecognizable, a mess of rips of skin and dark red contusions. Martin's face had been ripped apart. The concrete floor was black and silver, awash with syrupy blood.
Maureen's eyes went into spasm, opening wide, making her stare at the worst of it. She rasped, struggling to breathe until McAskill grabbed her roughly by the back of her neck and pressed her face into his chest.
She couldn't stop crying. Someone had given her some pills but they just paralyzed her face and made her mouth hang open. Tears spilled from her eyes like fruit from a cornucopia. They weren't going to let her go until she spoke again. She sat behind the desk in the miserable ground-floor office at the Stewart Street station, with the wall plans and gray filing cabinets, and stared at the door. Hot air was being pumped noisily through a vent by her chair, warming her calves, she could hear it hissing into the room. The skin on her legs began to get angry. She waited until it stung before moving out of the path of the heat.
She didn't know how long she had been there but gradually the tears slowed down and she thought she could talk. She stood up, shaking slightly, and walked across the room, opening the door and looking outside. A uniformed policeman was sitting in a chair just outside the door.
"McEwan?"
McEwan came in, ashen and angry. "Come," he said, and gestured for her to follow him out of the office. He walked in front of her, leading her up the stairs and through the fire doors to the disorienting corridor with the hideous linoleum. The uniformed officer followed at her back. McEwan opened the door to an interview room and stepped back. "In," he said, and Maureen went into the room.
Something McMummb was sitting next to the tape recorder. McEwan nodded at him and he started the tape rolling. "Where were you on Saturday after two p.m.?" asked McEwan.
It took a tremendous effort for her to speak. The words swirled endlessly around in her head before she could summon the energy to move her mouth and say them. "With a friend," she said finally.
"Who was it and where are they?"
"Siobhain McCloud. At the Dennistoun day center. I'll need to speak to her first, I asked her not to talk to the police."
"Oh," said McEwan, "she'll talk to us."
"She won't."
"I think she will," said McEwan, and Maureen started to cry again.
Inness came into the gray office. He wouldn't look at her. "You'll have to come and tell her to talk."
He took her up to the narrow corridor again and into an interview room she hadn't been in before. It was identical to the others but the window was bigger. Siobhain was sitting on the far side of the table. She looked enormous out of the day center: she was wearing the red nylon slacks that cut into her waist and a Mr. Happy "Glasgow's miles better" T-shirt. Her eyes were open wide and she was grinning. She seemed strangely present: Maureen had only ever addressed the back of her head or the side of her face. It was the first time they'd met without being chaperoned by a noisy television.
"Hello to you," said Siobhain.
Maureen sat sideways in the empty chair, pressing her knees into Siobhain's fleshy thigh. Siobhain reached slowly into her pocket and pulled out a packet of Handy Andys. She folded one around her finger and dabbed the tears from Maureen's face, barely touching her skin with the tissue. Maureen shut her burning eyes and felt Siobhain's milky breath on her lids.
"There," said Siobhain. "Now I can do you a good turn." She lifted her hands slowly to either side of Maureen's head and took hold of her ears, shaking her head softly from side to side, and grinned at her again.
Maureen smiled despite herself, but her eyes began crying again. "Tell them where I was on Saturday afternoon." She sniffed.
Siobhain turned to McEwan. "She was visiting me."
"What time did she arrive?" asked McEwan.
"She came to see me while Columbo was on the television, just after the Hollywood star had ruined the party. She stayed until Howards' Way was over."
McEwan sent Inness to check it out. Maureen noticed that he hadn't turned off the recorder.
"This is the most interesting thing that has happened to me in many years," said Siobhain to a thoroughly uninterested McEwan.
Inness reappeared and McEwan ordered Maureen back downstairs to the grim office.
She had been there for what felt like an hour when McEwan came in for some papers. He still wouldn't look at her. "Could you eat something?" he said.
"No."
"We'll need to talk about protecting you, Maureen. There's every chance that you'll be targeted now. I'd like to offer you a panic button. You can-"
"Why am I still here?" she said.
"We want to talk to you after we've questioned Miss McCloud."
"Why are you still questioning her?"
"She was a patient in the George I ward at the Northern Hospital."
"You can't ask her about that, Joe."
"Why?"
"You just can't. She won't talk to you, will she? She can't talk about it. It'll make her sick."
"Well, she seems to be talking. I'm not questioning her, Sergeant Harris is. Harris is a woman."
"You don't understand. It doesn't matter that it's a woman."
McEwan was impassive. "Why don't you just leave it to us. Are you hungry?"
"No, I'm not fucking hungry."
Chapter 26
The station noises died down and the office became still. The hissing stopped and the heating was turned off. As the oppressive heat of the afternoon seeped away the wooden desk and chair contracted, creaking low groans and snapping loudly. It was growing dark outside the window.
The door opened suddenly and McEwan came in. He stood at the edge of the desk playing with part of a broken pencil, picking at the frayed end. "You can go now," he said, his voice low and slow. "I want you to cooperate with us. We need to provide some protection for you. This is a panic button." He put a small gray box the size of a cigarette packet on the table. "It operates like a beeper. If you press this button it alerts us and we can have a patrol car there in a few minutes. Take it." He pushed it across the table toward her.
"What did Siobhain say?" asked Maureen.
"And I want you back here first thing tomorrow morning."
"Where is she?"
McEwan worked a strip off the pencil with his fingernail. He looked upset. "She's in the foyer." He said it as if it were a question.