She turned and smiled at him. “Forget it. I’m just glad you’re back. I should never have doubted you in the first place.”
“I was a bit … well, I did lie. Thanks for tipping me off, anyway. At least I had a chance.”
The kettle started boiling, and Seth hurried back in to make tea. Mara put the tray of scones in the oven and washed her hands.
“Right,” she said, drying them on her apron. “I’m ready.”
They sat down in the living-room and Seth poured tea.
“Come on, then,” he urged Paul.
“Come on, what?”
“Tell us what happened.”
“Where do you want me to start?”
“Where did you go?”
Paul lit a Players and spat a strand of loose tobacco from his upper lip.
“Edinburgh,” he said. “Went to see an old mate, didn’t I?”
“Did he help you?” Mara asked.
230
Paul snorted. “Did he fuck. Bastard’s changed a lot. I found the building easy enough. It used to be one of those grotty old tenements, but it’s all been tarted up now. Potted plants in the stairwell and all that. Anyway, Ray answers the door, and he doesn’t recognize me at first-at least he pretends he doesn’t.
I hardly knew him, either. Wearing a bloody suit, he was. We say hello and then this bird comes out-hair piled up on top of her head and a black dress slit right down the front to her belly button. She’s carrying one of those long-stemmed wineglasses full of white wine, just for the effect. ‘Who’s this, Raymond?’ she says, right lahdedah, like, and I head for the stairs.”
“You didn’t stay?” Mara said.
“Are you joking?”
“Do you mean your old friend wouldn’t let you in?”
“Gone up in the world has old Raymond. Seems he was entertaining the boss and the wife-he’s in computers- and he didn’t want any reminders of his past. Used to be a real wild boy, but… Anyway, I left. Oh, I reckon he might have let me in if I’d pushed hard enough, stuck me in the cupboard or somewhere out of the way.
But I wasn’t having any.”
“So where did you go?” Seth asked.
“Just walked around for a while till I found a pub.”
“You didn’t walk the streets all night, did you?” Mara asked.
“Like hell. It was colder than a witch’s tit up there. This is bloody Scotland we’re talking about. First thing the next morning I bought myself a duffle coat just to keep from freezing to death.”
“What did you do then, after you left the pub?”
“I met this bloke there,” Paul said, reddening. “He said I could go back to his place with him. Look, I know what you’re thinking. I’m not a fucking queer. But when you’re on the streets, just trying to survive, you do what you have to, right? He was a nice enough bloke, anyway, and he didn’t ask no awkward questions. Careful, he was, too, if you know what I mean.
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“Next day I was going to head for Glasgow and look up another old mate, but I thought fuck that for a lark, best thing to do is get straight to Ireland. I’ve got mates there, and I don’t think they’ve changed. If I’d got to Belfast, nobody would have found me.”
“So what went wrong?” Seth asked.
Paul laughed harshly. “Bloody ferry dock. I goes up to this shop-bloke to buy some fags and when I walk away he shouts after me. I can’t understand a bleeding word he’s saying on account of the Jock accent, like, but this copper sees us and gives me the look. I get nervous and take off and the bastards catch me.”
“Did the shopkeeper recognize you?” Mara asked. “Your picture was in the papers, you know.”
“Nan. I’d just given him too much bloody money, that’s all. He was shouting he wanted to give me my fucking change.” Paul laughed and the others laughed with him. “It wasn’t so funny at the time,” he added.
“What did the police do?” asked Rick.
“They’ve charged me with being an accessory. I’ll have to go to court.”
“Then what?” Mara asked.
Paul shrugged. “With my record I’ll probably end up doing porridge again. That copper with the scar seems to think I might get off if they get a sympathetic jury. I mean, sometimes you respect people for standing by their mates, right?
He says he might be able to get the charge reduced to giving false information and wasting police time. I’d only get six months max, then. But the other bloke tells me I’m looking at ten years. Who do you believe?”
“If you’re lucky,” Mara said, “Burgess might be gone by then and Banks’ll take it easy on you.”
