work and he'd let himself in. He'd be there, waiting for me, dinner made, wine on the table. Jesus…'
The words Jesus made dinner for you? are on his lips, but the time for sarcasm is past. However slowly, she is finally getting to the point.
'We had a big fight one day, another one, another one… I said everything I was thinking. Everything. I said insults that I hadn't even been thinking. The size of his cock, his breath, his… fuck, everything. Sense of humour… like he fucking had one.'
Her words are coming more quickly, the feelings are being dredged up as before. Anger and fear, loathing, desperation.
'Fuck…' she mutters down the phone.
'What happened?'
'There were just a couple of days of it,' she says quickly. 'I changed the locks, then I saw him standing outside my house. Watching. Fuck, I got up in the middle of the night and he was still there. He turned up at my work. Fucking bastard. Really. He just creeped me out. Then he swiftly got to the death threats. Fucking freak.'
'Did you call the police?'
She snorts down the phone.
'Oh yes. Like you lot gave a fuck.'
'Well why the fuck are you calling the police now?' says Herrod, his disdain bursting to the surface.
'Because I thought you needed help,' she snaps.
Herrod scowls at the phone. Briefly it's a toss up on who will hang up on the other.
'What did you do?' says Herrod.
'I just left. Just as well that I was in a position to. Was renting my flat, job was shit. I went to live in Dundee, stayed with a pal for a while. Got my own place now. Put a lot of shite on Facebook, made him think I was somewhere else. I heard he kept looking for me.'
'It's a tragic story,' says Herrod. The tone of his voice is awful. Horrible cynicism, deserving that she hangs up.
'Well it is now,' she says sharply.
'What d'you mean?'
'The guy was a fucking freak,' she says. 'I mean, fuck… I don't know why he was obsessed with me. Really. Who knows why any of that shit ever matters, why anyone falls for anyone else…'
'Cut out the… fuck, I don't know, the fucking philosophical mumbo jumbo and just tell me why in the name of fuck you're calling. From a fucking call box.'
Another pause. She wants to hang up, but she needs the call. She's thinking about it too much, thinking about him too much. She needs to transfer those thoughts, get them off her chest, out of her conscience.
'I looked at his Facebook account a while back, which really fucked me up on the trying not to think about him front. He was friends with all these women… they looked like me, same hair colour, same sort of age. It was just creepy. He was writing the weirdest fucking shit. I looked again last night because I'd started thinking about it again. That shit just got weirder and scarier, until a couple of weeks ago and then it stopped.'
'And?'
'And… I was wondering if that weird shit had begun to manifest itself in different ways. More dangerous ways…'
'And?'
Herrod wonders if his life will end sitting here, talking to this woman on this phone.
'Those two women who were murdered in Glasgow. They look like me… I look like them,' she adds helpfully.
Herrod shakes his head. Fuck. Hitler, My Part In His Downfall. She was probably recording the fucking conversation and it would be on YouTube in a few minutes. Jesus.
'You think these murders are happening because of you?' he says.
'Yes,' she replies quickly.
'Well, OK, fuck…' he says. It was possible. After all, her description of the ex-boyfriend being a scary, murderous freak, pretty much tied in with their total knowledge of the killer. 'Go on. Do you have a name for me?'
It would be cool, he suddenly thinks, if this was the breakthrough, no matter how shit it sounds. Every case has one. And he's the one on the phone — Bloonsbury is asleep, Hutton's out somewhere doing God knows what, Taylor is staring at the ceiling.
'I don't want him to find out I phoned. You have to promise.'
He nods down the phone. 'Your secret, such as it is, is safe with me.'
Another long hesitation. He hears her swallow, imagines her chewing her lower lip.
'Healy,' she says, the word rushed. 'His name was Ian Healy. He was a lawyer in Tollcross, somewhere around there.'
Herrod closes his eyes. Oh my God! Out of the blue. She has got to be kidding? This can't be for real. His fists clench. He looks around the office — it's busy with people going about their business. No one knows what he knows.
'Ian Healy?' he says, voice lower. 'You're sure about that?'
'Yes.'
Herrod could kiss her. The lawyer Hutton had brought in, and whom he and Taylor and Bloonsbury had all been happy to dismiss. Bloonsbury had even spoken to the guy for about an hour, and come up with nothing. The man had to be permanently pickled. Ian Healy. He would go round and get him now. No reason for the guy to be suspicious, and it will be him that has the collar.
Life is sweet. Out of nowhere, life is sweet.
'Now, we can bring this man in, but you have to give me your name and a telephone number where I can reach you,' he says. He keeps his voice low, tries to sound reassuring, tries not to betray his excitement.
'Can I not call you back?' she says, and Herrod shakes his head. But it doesn't matter.
'It'd be better if you gave me the number,' he says.
'I'm sorry,' she says, 'I'm frightened. I'll call you tomorrow,' and the phone clicks off.
'Stupid arse,' says Herrod, but there is a smile on his face, and he taps his hands happily on the desk. Absurd, totally absurd, but sometimes these things are.
Taylor appears from his office and looks at him.
'Just found out someone else you don't like is dead?' he says.
Herrod shakes his head, and mumbles. Taylor can take a fuck to himself, he thinks.
'Where's Jonah?' asks Taylor
'No idea,' says Herrod, lying. I'm not telling you he's home in bed, still drunk out of his face from last night.
Taylor mumbles something himself, and walks back into his office. Herrod smiles. He hadn't got her details, but she'd call again. He had the feeling. Now, however, there were more important things to do. He would go and seek an interview with Ian Healy, then bring the guy in.
He knows he should not go alone, but that's the way he prefers to work. Particularly on something as big as this, where all the credit would be his. Sees his name in lights.
As he lifts his jacket, an earlier thought — how did the woman know to ask for him? — slips his mind.
'Got a few calls to make,' he shouts through the open office door at Taylor, who mutters, 'You don't have to tell me what you're doing,' in reply. Then Herrod is gone.
28
Christ. Woke up at almost twelve o'clock. Not hungover for once, which left me disorientated for a start, compounded by being in someone else's bed. The curtains were open, the grey light of another dull day filled the room. Got up and stumbled around — wasn't until I looked out the window at the leaden Firth of Clyde that I
