I lay hunched up on the floor until the draught from the stair started to freeze my spine. I knew I had to go on, hauled myself to my feet; but I knew also Debs wouldn’t be coming back. I’d hurt her again, perhaps more than I ever had. Her face had tensed at the thought of my grief and I knew she felt deeply for me, but she couldn’t help me. That was her revelation — Debs had sensed there was nothing she could do for me, because there was nothing I could do for myself. I had brought my demons to the relationship once more, and they had defeated us both.
I took the quarter-bottle of Grouse from my Crombie and walked through to the living room. I sat down and unscrewed the cap, placed the bottle in front of me. I smelled the whisky working its way to my nostrils; the mere scent of it triggered a sensation in my brain. I felt the wonder of it putting my thoughts to sleep already. I smiled, laughed. One sip and I’d have a legion of help to beat back those demons.
‘Dury, you piece of shit…’
After all Debs had done, after all her efforts, here I was.
I picked up the bottle.
My hands trembled as I brought the rim to my lips.
‘You fucking loser,’ I laughed out. The glass edge touched a tooth, I felt the whisky vapour rising into my throat. And I froze. My mind seemed to hurtle down another path.
‘No.’
I put down the bottle, stared at it and screwed the cap back on. I knew that one sip would have thrown me on the flames. One sip would have undone all Debs had put herself through for me. One sip would have let my brother’s killer off.
I straightened myself. Got up and grabbed my mobi from the mantel.
Dialled.
‘Fitz, what the fuck’s happening?’
He latched on to my tone. ‘Calm down, Dury, there’s a limit to what I can do.’
‘Limit… I gave you the gun, what have you done with it?’
He cleared his throat. ‘Would ye feckin’ watch what you’re saying, Dury…’ Fitz dropped to a whisper, ‘The boffins say the shooter’s a match… but.’
I clenched my teeth, felt my pulse racing. ‘But what?… I need a name, Fitz. Just give me a fucking name.’
A pause, his voice rose again: ‘We don’t have the prints tied up yet.’
He was bullshitting me, I smelled it. ‘I want the name, Fitz.’
He locked me down: ‘Dury, I want you to listen to me very carefully. There are things about this case you have no idea of, no idea!’
I went back at him, ‘That’s why I’ve come to you. Don’t brush me off, Fitz.’
He paused again. I heard him shuffle forward in his seat. ‘Look, we’ve busted the house in Leith… We’ve got Radek in the cells. There’s a warrant for murder out on him in the Czech Republic… He won’t be going anywhere.’
If he was telling me this, he knew Radek wasn’t our man as well as I did. Fitz wouldn’t be slow in slapping a murder charge down. ‘What about Davie Prentice?… What about the Undertaker?’
‘Dury, would ye ever feckin’ listen to me?… We are on top of it. Let us do our work.’
‘And let me do mine. I’ll call back soon, I want to know whose dabs are on that Webley, Fitz, and I’m not fucking around.’
I threw my phone at the couch. Cursed Fitz.
He was holding out on me and I knew it. I needed to get moving before he dragged someone in; if he got to them before I did, chances were I’d be watching my brother’s killer grinning at the cameras on the Six O’clock News, after receiving a slap on the wrist. I had proper justice in mind for the fucker.
I paced the flat, sparked up a Marlboro. The place seemed so empty again without Debs. Her words kept singing in my ears. I heard every one of them like they were being replayed to me on a tape recorder. I knew what she meant; I was out of control. Nothing could stop this rig smashing into the wall. I wouldn’t let up until I’d squeezed the life out of Michael’s killer.
I thought of my mother’s struggles to raise Michael, how she had taken the news of his savage beating by my father all those years ago. I thought of Catherine and of Jayne and of Alice. Little Alice, whom Debs and I had held in our arms the night she was born. My niece had been robbed of her father. Michael had tried so hard to be the kind of father we never had, and it had all been for nothing.
I couldn’t focus any more. My thoughts sprang one way then the other. I remembered what Debs had said about minding out for Alice and I booted up the computer. The internet connection was slow, almost dial-up speed; I cursed the service provider and slapped the monitor in frustration.
‘Fucking piece of shit!’
My Yahoo homepage was full of doom-laden news about business collapses, house prices nosediving, car lots full of unsold motors and the Prime Minister, as ever, proclaiming he was doing everything in his power to stabilise the fallout. I wanted to spit, but I clicked away from his smug coupon instead.
I had no idea of the web address so I Googled Alice Dury and Bebo together. The search threw up a page of responses, but Alice’s name and page sat top of the list.
I double-clicked.
The page took a while to load — seemed to be a lot of photographs — but then Alice’s photo appeared, a yellow smiley face and a few lines of biog beside it.
I grinned, said, ‘Hello, Alice… found you.’
The site had a stack of puerile comments from schoolfriends, all accompanied by thumbnail pictures of them taken on mobile phones. To a one they looked half-cut. Teenagers know how to party these days; in my time, I was always the most pished in the room.
I read and scrolled, and then I stopped.
I didn’t expect this.
A photograph of the Czech lodger that my brother had installed in his home had been put up. Vilem was standing in the garden, seemingly unaware his image had been captured. In the comment box beside the photo Alice had keyed: ‘Welcome to my Boy Zone!!.. More to follow!!’
I didn’t know how to interpret this — was it just a teenage girl being a silly wee lassie? She’d posted the picture a week before my brother’s death. A few of Alice’s friends had posted comments in their hybrid language of text-speak and slang, but Alice hadn’t updated the site again. It seemed pointless to leave a message for her there if she wasn’t using it right now.
I logged off the web.
Shut down.
I felt guilty for not giving Alice more attention. I knew she was taking the loss of her father hard. I should have intervened earlier, maybe come down on her harder about the drinking. Decided I would try her mobi again. I had the contacts book open, finger hovering on the call button when I heard a knock at the door.
I jumped up to the spyhole. The back of a head covered it. I opened up, immediately regretted the move.
A shoulder forced the door into my face. I went back, tumbled downwards and felt my palms get scorched on the carpet. Next thing I felt was a backhander knocking me into the wall.
‘All right, Gus boy.’ It was Dartboard; the pug with the parka stood behind him. ‘… You and me are going on a wee visit to a friend of ours.’
He grabbed my hair and hauled me up.
‘Get his coat, Sammy.’