Pig Island

1

Ten empty Newkie Brown bottles hanging on the wall…

There were ten empty Newkie Brown bottles lined up on the bog seat. Ten. I lay in the bath staring blankly at them, trying to work out how long it had taken to drink them. I couldn't talk myself into getting out of the bath and all the way over to the toilet, but I needed a piss — had needed one for the last twenty minutes, so I could have been here for, what? An hour? Two?

It was four months since Lexie died ('Sepsis,' the consultant had said. 'She would have been vulnerable to sepsis from the moment she was admitted and I find it difficult to believe you weren't warned of the possibility') and I suppose it'd be fair to say I'd let myself go. I didn't know if I was more depressed that she was dead than I was depressed Dove had won, after everything. Every time someone found a corpse in Scotland, bones mashed into the side of a rock or something bloated bobbing like a dirty tarpaulin in the sea, they thought it was Dove's body. But it wasn't. I'd thought he was going to be easy to find. So I'd been wrong about that too. Some days I thought I knew the answers, others I knew I didn't.

On the floor my mobile rang. I dropped my hand over the side of the bath and grabbed my jeans, shaking them until the phone fell out of the pocket.

'Are you supposed to use mobiles in the bath?' I asked the phone, staring at it. The display said: Finn. Answer? 'I don't know. I mean, will it kill me if I do?' I opened the phone. 'I'm in the bath,' I said. 'This could kill me.'

'Fucking great,' he said. 'It's two in the afternoon, you're in the bath and I'm sitting staring at an empty in-box. Was expecting fifteen thousand words and a synopsis by nine this a.m. At the latest. Instead I've got six slush-pile manuscripts and a Ghanaian asking me to ship money into his bank account.'

I didn't answer. I'd been dragging my feet, waiting for Dove's body to pop up before I committed to a book deal. But I knew I was losing it: a lot of what had happened out on Cuagach had already been released — the public knew about the pig corpses, the gargoyles, what life in the Psychogenic Healing Ministries was like. Two ex-members had already signed publishing deals for their stories. The story, the whole purpose behind the last six months, was slipping through my fingers.

'He's dead, Oakes. Dead. Can you hear me?'

I lifted my foot out of the water and studied it. It was pink and wrinkled into magnified folds, like the skin on a baby rat. I tried to turn the hot tap on with my toe, but it wouldn't budge.

'Oakes,' Finn snapped. 'Can you hear me?'

I pushed the tap harder. When that didn't work I changed my strategy and stuck my toe up it instead. I looked at it for a moment or two, then laughed. I was thinking about an old film where a plumber comes into the bathroom and finds some blonde or other with her toe stuck in a tap. I laughed again, liking the way my voice echoed off the walls.

'Oakes, you are weirding me out here. You're laughing. Can you hear yourself? Laughing.'

'Yeah,' I said. 'I know. I've got my toe in the tap. It's funny.'

There was a long, cold silence. 'Joe, you can sit there laughing because you've got your toe in the fucking tap, but out here in the real world there are articles every day about what happened on Cuagach — something only this morning about his Mexican wife, Asuncion. She died on the mainland two years ago, did you know that?'

'Yes. I knew.'

There was a moment's silence. I stared at my toe. Even more like a rat now. A rat with its nose up a tap.

'Oakes, you're hurting for money, am I right?'

I pulled my toe out, letting my foot splash into the water. 'Yeah,' I said dully. 'You're right.' I'd gone a long time without a paycheck. My syndication-agency accounts stood at zero. Worse, when I got back to London I'd discovered the hole Lexie had got herself into without telling me. She'd run up an overdraft of over three K on our joint account, paying her therapist seventy quid a pop. There was a P45 in the mail, too, from the clinic. Another part of her life she'd forgotten to mention.

'And then,' said Finn, 'yesterday I hear how some hack from Glasgow is auctioning his story. Reckons he's interviewed some of the major players in the police and the clean-up crew out on the island. Says they let him inside the temporary mortuary and what he's saying is there're photos.'

'I've got pictures from the mortuary,' I said coldly. 'I told you already-'

'I know, but that was more than four months ago.'

'Yes. And in those four months I lost my wife.'

Finn sighed. 'I'm sorry, I really am. But you're acting like you're on some fucking candyfloss cloud floating across the sky. Now, listen. I'm going to tell you what to do.' I could hear him switch off his computer and swivel round in his chair. 'First, get me those words. Don't worry about Dove, just do it. Then I want you to talk to that kid.'

'Kid?'

'The one who pulled the video hoax. The one arsing around with the devil suit. He's important to the story. Did you speak to him yet?'

I hesitated. I looked at the winter sunlight making stars of the condensation on the window. Angeline was out there in the garden. She'd come down to London with me, waiting until they found Malachi's body and the probate began. I knew it was a mistake. I'd given her the front room with the fold-out guest futon, the one printed with the bright orange flowers that Lexie had been nuts about, and she stayed in there day after day, the door closed tight, coming out only to cook or to go into the garden. She spent hours outside, digging and planting vegetables, sometimes even in the dark. But most of all she spent time watching me. She would sit at the kitchen table, her chin in her hands, and stare at me, like she was expecting me to say something. It'd got so I didn't look at her. I knew if I did I'd have to go into a part of my head I didn't want to open.

'Well?' Finn said. 'Have you got an interview with the kid? Without an interview it comes across like you've taken your eye off the ball. It comes across sloppy.'

'Then you know what?'

'What?'

'That's probably because I am sloppy. In fact, you know what? I'm so sloppy that right now I'm pissing in my bath-water. It's gone cold, so I'm pissing in it while I'm talking to you.'

There was a pause. Then he said, 'No, you're not. Don't talk sick.'

'I am.' I closed my eyes, relaxed my muscles and the urine leaked out of me across my thighs. 'Told you.'

'Jesus, Oakes. What's happening to you? What's happening? You've got to pull yourself together…'

I dropped the phone on the floor and lay back in the bath. The condensation hung like teardrops from the ceiling — the whole bathroom was soaked with steam. No wonder it's cold: the bathroom is stealing my heat, I thought, and suddenly I was crying. I was trembling and crying and holding my hands up to my face, shaking my head and crying like a baby. I got up, sobbing angrily. You just pissed yourself, for fuck's sake. Where's this going to end? I unplugged the bath, turned on the shower and stood under it, exhausted, self-pitying sobs jerking out of me while the cold water rained down on me and the pissy water disappeared down the plug-hole between my toes.

2

Me and Lex had lived in that house just off the Harrow Road for almost four years. The Victorian semis round there all had driveways and side entrances and were highly desirable, according to the local estate agents, who kept poking their leaflets through the letterbox. But I knew my house let the neighbourhood down, with its peeling windows and the cellar stuffed full of crap the previous owner had left: paint pots, kitchen tiles, a rusting old fridge-freezer I'd never had the guts to open. When me and Angeline got back from Scotland in December — after four months of the house being locked up — you could smell the cellar coming up through the floorboards. The first thing I did, while she put on the heating and swept dead flies from the windowsills, was go down there and open the door to the garden just to let some air in. That was five weeks ago and I hadn't thought about it again. I'd opened it and never got round to closing it.

It was Tuesday. The day after Finn called. I sat under the diseased old apple tree, hunched against the cold in my thin sweater, and stared at the cellar door, trying to find the energy to get up and do something about it. In the corner of the garden Angeline was forking over the hard clay, her breath hanging in the air. When I came out to the garden to be with her like this we almost never spoke, and in spite of the small sounds of her breathing and the fork clicking against a pebble, a silence had come down over the garden that felt like it belonged to the darkest part of winter. If this had been the weekend the neighbours would be out in the alley that ran along the bottom of the fences, wheel-barrowing bags of mushroom compost and topsoil down to their gardens, but today the neighbourhood was deserted. We were the only people outside and all the windows looking down at us were blank sockets, bare branches reflecting back from the panes.

Angeline worked intently, jamming the fork into the ground, making small grunts, occasionally stooping to pull out a root or a piece of stone and throw it into a pile. She wore a scarf, mud-congealed boots and a thick hemp skirt. Her hair had grown in, very dark and curly. Whenever she bent, the extra limb strained against the fabric of the skirt in shadowy outlines.

'What?' she said, straightening up. The work and the cold had brought the blood to her face and against the stony colours of the garden her skin was vivid. She pushed some stray strands of hair back into the scarf. 'What're you staring at?'

'Nothing,' I said.

'You're staring at me. What's wrong? You know what's under my coat — you saw it — so why are you staring now?'

I let all my breath out at once. My pulse began to move a bit. So today was the day we were going to talk about it.

'Well?'

'Well what?'

'You saw it, but you've never once said what you really think.' She was flushed now. Her knuckles, where she was pressing the fork into the ground, had gone white. 'Joe? What did you think? Of my twin? My twin?'

I stared at her, not blinking. I couldn't answer. Just couldn't get a single word out. I didn't know what I thought. I'd read Lexie's letters. I'd spoken to Guy Picot and somewhere I had a vague idea I'd dealt with it, fitted it somehow into my head. But I was finding good ways of not thinking about it. It was locked away somewhere. Just locked in a place I didn't want to go.

'Well?'

I stood, avoiding her eyes. I crossed the frozen ground to where the wind had opened the gate to the alley just a fraction, so a section of shingled ground was visible through the crack. I waited for a second or two, wondering if I could say anything. Nothing came to me. I pulled the gate closed, kicking a stone against it to jam it there. I looked at the gate, at the stone wedged at the bottom, then turned back to Angeline.

'You know something? You know when I'll feel better?'

'No. When will you feel better?'

'When they've found your dad's body.' I went and closed the cellar door and stood, brushing my hands off, looking up at the featureless blanket of cloud above us. 'But I suppose you know that already.'

In the kitchen I opened a bottle of Newkie Brown and sat at the table. Outside it was getting dark and the clouds had that heavy look, like they might start spitting out hailstones any minute. I sat on the chair, upright, my hands on my knees, my heart thudding. I tried to read the paper. But I couldn't. On the wall the clock was ticking dead loud.

After about ten minutes the door opened. At first I thought it was the wind, but then she came in, bringing rain and dead leaves. She didn't see me sitting there in the dark. She stopped on the mat and stamped the mud off her feet, so hard you'd think she was pissed off with the floor. She levered one boot off with her heel and was about to start on the other when she realized I was there. She froze, one boot on, one off. Her eyes rolled round to me.

'What?' I said, guilty of being in my own kitchen. 'What?'

She shook her head. She began to say something, but instead closed her eyes and suddenly she was breathing very fast and hard, like she was ill. Then all these tears came out of her eyes and dribbled down her face and on to her chin.

'Oh, Christ.' I was on my feet next to her, not knowing what to do. I kind of patted her shoulder cautiously, not leaving my hand there for too long. The way you'd pat an animal you thought might bite. 'Oh, Christ. I'm sorry. I'm sorry. I really am.'

She turned away from me so her face was against the wall, put her hands over her ears and just cried and cried, like she was crying for everything that had ever happened to her. We stood there, me kind of shocked, useless, without the guts to put my arms round her; her with her forehead pressed into the wall, her shoulders jerking up and down.

'When's it going to be over, Joe? When?'

'When's what going to be over?'

'This. This — this…' She could hardly get the words out, she was trembling so much. 'You're paralysed, Joe, just paralysed, and I don't know why. I mean, you read the letter. You know what she did.'

'What who did? Lexie, you mean?'

'Yes, Lexie. You know what she did. Why c-can't you forget her?'

'Why can't I…? No. It's not just her — not just her any more.'

'Then it's my dad. It's about him.'

'Yeah, him,' I said. 'Him too. It's about lots of-'

'And that's just as bad. Can't you see — can't you see? If you let him stop you writing then he's won. He's won again and you're just sitting there and letting the world go past us both.'

'Yes, but — hey, hang on — '

She lurched past me, out of the kitchen, up the stairs and into her room. I stood for a second, listening, not knowing if I was supposed to go after her. I could hear her moving things around, and after a couple of minutes I went into the hallway, following the trail of mud from her single boot up the stairs. On the landing I stopped. The bedroom door was open. She was in there, hobbling around, pulling things off the shelves in big handfuls. I hadn't been in her room for weeks. She'd filled it with library books and notebooks. Sheets of paper printed off the Internet.

'James Poro.' The moment she saw me on the landing she flung a book on the floor. It was open at a black-and-white photo. I didn't have time to register it before another book came down. And another. 'Lazarus-Joannes Baptist Colloredo, Betty Lou Williams…' She turned to the shelves, sorting through the other books, leaving me to blink at the one on the floor. It showed a photo of a traffic-stoppingly pretty girl in a frilled prayer-meeting dress. Arranged in her lap were four small limbs, plump and black against the white dress. If there was a head you couldn't see it: it was buried in the girl's stomach. I went from the limbs to her face and back again.

'Betty Lou.' Angeline limped over to me, holding more books. She squatted down, the books wedged between her knees and her chest, and put her hand on the girl's face. She wasn't crying any more. The tears had dried on her cheeks and there was a fixed look in her eye. 'Betty Lou's twin was epigastrus. Do you know what that means? No. Why would you? It means the twin is attached here. To your chest.' She opened another of the books and slammed it down. 'Most of them are epigastrus, but some are like me. Look at this — Frank Lentini. He was just like me, an extra leg. Look, Joe, look where it's attached.'

I held up a hand, stalling her. I couldn't process it all, this science fiction, this Victorian bestiary she was showing me. 'This isn't real. This isn't real.'

' "The deeper aspect of the parasite is composed of large, cystic and tubular structures."' She picked up a piece of paper and read, her voice fierce: ' "And solid organs resembling liver and-"'

'Angeline-'

'"Resembling liver and spleen. There are rudimentary gastrointestinal structures, some bowel sac, for example, a rudimentary genito-urinary system, severe skeletal anomalies compromising the autosite's vertebrae…"' She held up another book, pushing it in front of my eyes so I had to look. 'It's real, Joe. It's real.'

This book showed a young man with a small pagri on his head. He was smiling graciously into the camera and holding up two tiny limp arms protruding from the front of his embroidered tunic. A matching pair of legs dangled below, reaching just below his belt. '© Barnum and Bailey collection', said the photo tag line. 'Until the era of prenatal scans and microscience, circuses were littered with parasitic twins.'

'That's Laloo. He was famous. Made a fortune. But you know the worst thing for him? For Laloo?'

I pushed the book away. I sat down with my back to the doorpost, my hands on my ankles. I couldn't look any more.

'The worst thing was he couldn't stop his twin urinating.'

'Please-'

'He never knew when it was going to happen. He couldn't stop it happening. And you think I've got problems.'

She stood in the doorway above me, breathing hard, the colour darkening in parts of her face: the tips of her ears, her nose, her mouth. The shadow of a branch outside the window moved back and forward across her face. It struck me that I'd never really studied her face before, never taken it in, never noticed she was pretty. All I'd ever thought about was her body. I dropped my eyes, heart thumping. Couldn't look at her.

'Joe,' she said, in a low voice. 'Joe, you can't let me keep this secret any more. I can't not talk about it. I can't be on my own with it any more.'

I sat there, my face hot and rigid, staring at the fabric of her skirt, fighting the feeling that this moment had been crashing towards me all my life. Face it, old man. Do it. Do or die. I cleared my throat and knelt up, tipping forward so the change in my jacket pockets jangled softly on the floor. I reached across and put my hand under the hem of her skirt. She stiffened, but I didn't take my hand away. I found her small warm calf and circled it with my thumb and forefinger. The cuff of her boot pressed against my wrists. We stayed in that weird position for a long time, not looking at each other, the only noise the wind blowing in the attic over our heads.

'You're not on your own,' I said, after what seemed like for ever. 'Can't you tell?'

3

'Well, isn't this the arsehole of London?' Finn came in, flicking the rain off his coat, like Kilburn rain came out of the sewers instead of the bottled Evian stuff they got in Chiswick. It was Thursday. He'd come over because I'd told him I was ready to talk. 'I'd forgotten how crap it was. I mean, the sheer turdiness of it is awesome.'

He pulled off his coat, dropped it over the chair. He wore a suit, but hints of the subversive Finn lingered — ironic 1970s sideys almost to his jawline, a shiny kipper tie fixed with a Playboy pin. A Zenner symbol stud in his ear and his vague out-of-season suntan. He bent to check his reflection in the hall mirror, swiping at the raindrops scattered in his hair. Then he paused and looked sideways at me.

'You don't look as bad as I expected.' He patted my arm. He wasn't going to say it, but he was worried about me. He's my cousin. Some things don't need to be said. 'I mean, you look crap 'n' all, but not as crap as I expected.'

'You don't have to stay long,' I said, checking my watch with great deliberation. 'I'll kick you out at eleven.'

'Yup.' He held up his hand. 'Good to see you too.'

We went into the living room. Angeline was standing near the kitchen door pulling on her gardening coat and fastening the scarf round her head. When she saw Finn she came forward, smiling, one hand extended in greeting, the other pushing the stray curls off her forehead. She moved smoothly, coming across so regal, so weirdly at ease, her brown eyes focused and serious, that I was a shabby coach tourist next to her, in my fading shirt and chinos.

'Finn, this is Angeline.'

'Angeline. Hey!' Finn said, holding up his hand to salute her. He took her in, her hair, curly and dark, her small nose, kind of moulded-looking, like it was made of china. There was even a bit of lipstick on her mouth. 'How's it going?'

'Fine, thanks.'

Wicked, Angeline,' he said. 'Wicked to meet you.'

'Angeline was just going into the garden,' I said. 'Weren't you?'

She held up her gardening gloves. 'I'm afraid I'm an addict.' She went into the kitchen calmly and out of the back door. When she'd gone, there was a pause. Then he turned and stared at me, a look of amazement on his face.

'What?'

'What?' he mouthed. 'You never said a word about her. She's totally fit.' He went into the kitchen and drew back the curtain. He stood on tiptoe, his nose against the glass so he could see her moving round the garden. 'What's wrong with her? She got a limp or something?' He turned to look at me. 'Is she hurt?'

I stood silently, looking at him without expression.

'What?' he said. 'What you looking at me like that for? The girl's got a limp, I'm asking you about it. Don't get PC on me here.'

'Come upstairs. I've got something to show you.'

'What?' He dropped the curtain and followed me bad-temperedly to the staircase. 'You going to seduce me?'

In the study I switched on the light and fired up the laptop. 'I've got the proposal. A proposal and the first ten chapters.'

'So you've seen the light. You're really ready to go?'

I hesitated. I drummed my fingers on the desk. Didn't meet his eyes.

There was a pause, then Finn seemed to read my mind. He shook his head and sighed. 'Dude, the man is dead. Dead and gone. If he wasn't we'd have heard.'

'Yeah. Yeah, I know.' I paused. I kept trying to imagine Dove's body — somewhere up in the Highlands. 'If we do it, how long've we got before publication?'

'Depends on which house takes it. If they're really pushing… three, four months?'

'Three months?'

He sighed. 'Oakes, pardon my rudeness, but you get me over here because you say you're ready.'

'I am. I am ready. I've thought about it. You're both right. You and-' I nodded towards the window. 'You and Angeline. You're right.'

'She pulling your strings for you? What's she got to do with anything?'

I was silent for a moment, holding his eyes steadily. Then I swivelled the chair round to face the computer, clicked on the media-player icon and found the tourist video. 'Ever seen this? Did I ever show you this?'

'Sure.' He leaned forward and watched Angeline's hazy figure crossing the beach. 'It's weird as all fuck. Knobhead kids. Have you spoken to him yet? Like I said?'

'It's not a kid.'

He turned his eyes to me. 'What?'

'Not a kid.'

'Oakesy,' he said, smiling cautiously, 'you told me it was a kid.'

'I lied.'

'Then who was it?'

I looked back at him, then turned my eyes slowly to the video.

'What?' he said. The video played again, Angeline walked across the beach. The colours from the screen moved over Finn's puzzled face. He frowned, opened his mouth, then closed it. He looked at me and I could see the beginnings of something dawning. Slowly, almost woodenly, he put his hands on the desk and peered closer at the video, watched it for a moment or two, then turned and let his eyes drift out of the window to the garden.

'No,' he whispered. 'No fucking way…' He was suddenly pale under his tan. 'You're kidding me.' Slowly, moving like in a dream, he went to the window and stared into the garden for a long time. Angeline was out there, tapping a plank into place beneath the gate, edging it under the cross-bar to keep the gate firmly closed. Then he turned and looked at the computer screen, licking his lips, a look of half revulsion, half excitement in his eyes. 'What the fuck is it?' There was a line of sweat on his forehead. 'What the fuck has she got down there?'

'A parasitic limb.'

'A paia-what?'

'A limb. Part of a twin that never formed right. You'd call it a Siamese twin. It's not weird, Finn. Whatever your face is saying, it really isn't that unusual.'

'Not unusual?''

'No.' I clicked the video off. 'It's not. There are kids born like this every year.'

His eyes got even wider, filtering all the information. Then the clouds parted for him — and he got it. 'Shit, shit, I mean shit I've just come in!' He sat down abruptly on the sofa, staring at me in awe, his hands on his temples, like he was trying to keep his brains from falling out of his skull. 'Holy fucking Christ. You're clicking her, aren't you? That's what this is. You're dicking her.'

'Yes,' I said quietly. 'Yes, I am.'

4

When he'd gone I went to bed. It was still daylight. I took my clothes off and I lay on my back, watching the grey sky out of the window. After a while Angeline came in from the garden. She'd taken off her coat and scarf and was wearing a belted olive-green cardigan. When she came into the room I rolled on to my side, my head resting on one hand, looking at her.

'Hi.'

'Hi.' She'd come up because she knew I was there. But she was timid. It was new to us, this. It hadn't really sunk in. 'Well,' she said, when I didn't say anything. 'I'll — I'll come to bed.'

She undid her belt and cardigan and dropped them. Underneath she wore a skirt and a thin-strapped vest, showing her narrow shoulders. She took it off, unzipped the skirt and stepped out of it, and then she was naked, wearing only a pair of grey knee-high socks. You could see the long muscles in her legs even though she wasn't moving.

She gave a small laugh. Shy. She stayed for a moment or two, resting her left foot on the right. She knew I was looking at her body. Peeping from behind the calf was the end of the extra limb, tapering unevenly to the battered, deformed foot resting against her ankles. I pictured its roots high up inside the smooth basket of her stomach: a bundle of limb, bone and sinew packed away inside it. Something else living inside her. I looked at her belly, at the little crease above her pubic hair.

'Well?'

'Well what?'

'I've been thinking about it all day.'

'Finn?'

'What did he say?'

'He said.' I scratched my head. Tried not to smile. 'He said he loved it.'

There was a pause. A smile twitched at the corners of her mouth. She got into bed, pulled the cover up and mirrored me, her elbow on the pillow, her head resting on her hand, holding my eyes, fighting to keep a smile off her face. We looked at each other without speaking. In the slanting light from the window I could see microscopic details of her face: fine downy hairs, cushiony diamond creases of the skin. Last night we'd sat here on the bed for two hours. She'd been half turned from me and the limb was lying on the sheet between us. She let me examine it. I'd held in my hand the pea-sized nodules inside the skin where toes were meant to be. I'd moved them around, letting them click and grind against each other. I'd rested my hand over a swollen place half-way up the limb, where the flesh strained against the skin: a weird tension of muscle tethered to bone. A knee.

'And did he think it was weird? Me, I mean. What did he think?'

'He thought you were beautiful.'

'Beautiful?'

'Yes.'

There was a pause while she bit her lip, fighting the smile. 'What? Really? Beautiful?'

'Really.'

'My God,' she said, and now the smile came, breaking out, showing her small teeth. 'I can't believe it.' She shivered, half laughing, lifting her shoulders and squirming in delight under the covers so that her cold knees touched my legs.

'Excited?' I said.

'And scared. Really excited, but really scared too. Both.'

We'd talked about it: about how much she needed people to know all about her. I had to remember she was nineteen years old. Just nineteen. And I was thirty-eight. I'd forgotten what it was like to want normality the way you want a drug. For her being public, very public, was the fastest route to normality she knew. Didn't matter what I thought. In a closed-off section of my calloused old head I sort of knew I had to put my unease to one side. I nodded, tried to smile. Tried for more enthusiasm.

'It's going to be three months,' I said. 'So, not long.'

'Not long?' She grinned and shivered again. 'Three months seems like for ever.' She shuffled towards me, pushing her face close to mine, her swimmy eyes magnified so I could see my own face in them: grey, drawn, not at all certain. 'For ever,' she murmured, tilting her face sideways and putting her mouth over mine, the breath from her nose warm on mine. Her hand came up, fumbling round my neck, pulling me closer.

I closed my eyes and kissed her. I reached under the covers and dragged her body hard towards me, thinking if I pressed her stomach tight enough to mine the anxiety would go away and I'd stop thinking, Three months, three months is nothing. And they still haven't found Malachi…

5

We were in Finn's office when we got the news. That was the irony. We were actually signing the book deal. Angeline was sitting neatly at Finn's desk, wearing a coat I'd never seen before with embroidery on the sleeves and fake fur round the collar, and she was dead excited and flushed. I was next to her, wearing this huge sweater because I was cold all the time, these days, and trying not to think about this sick feeling in my stomach. Finn had been brokering the contract for days, and although it wasn't the total off-the-scale deal he'd hoped for, it wasn't bad. 'Enough to keep you in Newkie Brown for a couple of years.' And I was going to be paid separately for the photos too, so that was a little icing. Still, my guts were in knots over it. Just three months.

'Now,' Finn said, 'initial these pages and sign here — on the last.' He handed Angeline this big show-off fountain-pen. She was going to be joint signatory on a clause that tied her into publicizing the book. 'Because,' said Finn, pushing up his sleeve to bare his suntanned arms and the dingy old Glastonbury braid, 'you are the best-kept secret, Angeline, after where Saddam hid all that uranium — which, as we all know, was up Tony Blair's arse.' He winked at her. 'The press are going to be all over you. We're going to make sure we play it right.'

There were a few moments' silence. The winter sun came through the giant arched window and on to her curly head as she leaned over the contract. No one spoke. The only noise was the scratching of the pen. She lifted her head and handed it to me and, with a moment's hesitation, I pulled the contract over and signed quickly, turning the pages and initialling fast before I changed my mind. There were ten pages and it was the exact moment I lifted the pen off the paper that the mobey rang in my pocket. It was Danso.

'Joe,' he said, 'where are you?'

'London.'

Sitting at the desk opposite, Finn was looking at me, silent.

'Got your car?'

'Yes.'

'OK. Would you do me the honour of getting into that car, and bringing that lass with you?'

A beat of unease went through me. 'Yeah,' I said cautiously. 'Probably could, if you tell me where you are.'

'Dumfries, just over the border.'

'Dumfries? And what's in Dumfries?'

There was a pause. When he spoke his voice was low, excited. 'Joe, we think we've got him. We really do, Joe. We think we've got him.'

Dumfries in southern Scotland is a good hundred miles south of Pig Island. It lies near the English border on the Solway Firth to the west of Lockerbie. They'd picked him up at eleven o'clock the night before in a forest two miles outside the town and now he was lying on a mortuary block in the Dumfries and Galloway Royal Infirmary.

It took me and Angeline five hours to drive there, and it was dark when we arrived, but Danso was waiting for us outside the undertaker's loading bay, looking calm, a little pleased. He came forward to open the car doors. Angeline had been shivering with nerves most of the way but when she got out of the car she managed a small smile.

'Hello there, lassie.' Danso held out his hand to her, slightly surprised to see her so confident. 'You're looking very bonny, I must say. Suits you, does it? London?'

She shook his hand. 'I suppose it must do.'

Struthers came out of the hospital mortuary, pulling on his coat, and when he saw her he paused for a second, a little flush coming to his face. 'Hi,' he said hurriedly, when he realized we were all watching him. He wiped his hand furtively on his trousers and gave it to her to shake, his eyes on her face. 'It's been a long time.'

She had changed. It had happened so gradually I hadn't noticed it. But now, seeing the men following her with their eyes as she made her way to the lighted building, I could tell she was a different woman entirely from the one they'd first met shivering with fear at the Oban station. She'd left the embroidered coat on the back seat and was wearing a tight, ribbed sweater and a greyish skirt. She'd put her hair back in a beaded slide she must've got from Lexie's drawer. She looked like she was going to a dinner party. Struthers kept shooting glances at the skirt out of the corner of his eyes as we went into the building.

Two men waited in a wallpapered side-room: the family liaison officer and the pathologist, dressed in a suit and tie, his reading glasses tucked into the breast pocket. They stood to introduce themselves to Angeline, explaining who they were, why they were there, what was going to happen next. The procurator fiscal has asked me to perform a postmortem….

Danso waited a moment or two, then put a hand on my arm and beckoned me back into the corridor where we couldn't be heard.

'Joe,' he said, closing the door behind us, 'just needed to say something. This character we've got on a slab, he's carrying no ID. The doctor's thinking he won't be getting any prints because of slippage.' We stood against a painted pink panel on the wall, our faces sick-looking in the fluorescent lights. 'Do you know what that is? That's when the skin starts to slide off.'

'Decomposition?'

'Aye. And you can't get a print off it.' He went and peered through the glass panel into the waiting room. Inside, Struthers had brought Angeline a cup of something and was standing facing her, not speaking, just watching her with this arsey smile on his face. 'Discussed it with the chief. We're going to back ourselves up before we go public, get DNA. But that'll take till next Monday and, the idea goes, this is the quickest way for us to get the PM done.' He cleared his throat. 'But, look, when I say there's slippage on his fingers…'

'Yes?'

'There's some on his face too — that's what I'm trying to tell you. I almost called and said, "Forget it, we'll wait for the DNA." Not sure I want her to go through this.'

We both watched Angeline through the glass panel. She was standing in the middle of the room, holding herself straight, listening to what the pathologist was saying. She was holding the drink in both hands. Usually her hands would be hovering self-consciously behind her. The back of the skirt stood out from her small waist like a bustle.

'But you know what?' Danso said, smiling slightly. 'You know what? Not sure now what I was worried about. The way she looks right now she could handle anything.'

The smell in the mortuary was nothing like I expected. It was fresher and sweeter, even tame in its way. Even the viewing room didn't smell of death. It had the whiff of a newly cleaned industrial kitchen, vases of fresh yellow flowers in each corner. Seven or eight seats were arranged round the walls, a Bible and a blue box of paper tissues on each one, and along the far end of the room, side on, a linen-covered shape lay on a trolley. A mortician in a white coat stood next to it, watching as we all filed in. His hand was resting on the white-and-blue-striped towel that covered the corpse's face.

'You're aware of the circumstances of the discovery of this body,' the pathologist said. 'You know there could be some discolouration on his face. If this is your father he might not look exactly the way he did when he was alive.'

'I know.'

He nodded, studying her carefully.

'Well now,' he said. 'You take your time. Look for as long as you want and if you need a break we'll take you out and you can have a breather. Come back inside later. We've got all the time in the world.'

'I'm ready.'

I held my breath, my heart knocking at my ribs. The mortician folded down the towel. Dove lay on his back, just his face showing, the sheet pulled up to conceal the rope he'd hanged himself with. The first thing I thought was, Christ, he's thin. He must've lost about five stone. He looked totally different: his jaw was so far relaxed it melted into his chest, his jowls drooped in folds, touching the sheet. His thick fair hair was reduced to sparse patches on the skull and his skin had lost that burned-looking red colour — even under the skim of makeup the mortician had used you could see it was yellowish-brown, the weight of it pulling at the rest of his face so you could see the sharp bone in his nose. I stared at him, not blinking, listening to my breath going in and out. In my head I'd been here, in this mortuary, a hundred times, looking at his dead body.

'Angeline,' said the pathologist, clearing his throat, 'are these the remains of your father, Malachi Dove?'

She turned to me, her hand over her mouth. I put my arms round her and she buried her face in my chest. 'My God, my God.'

'Angeline?' said Danso gently. 'What's happening with you, pet?'

'Yes,' she muttered, nodding into my sweater. 'Yes. It's him.'

'Are you sure, lass? You sure you don't want another wee keek just to be sure? You can take your time. He's lost some weight — living rough all this time.'

'Doesn't matter,' she whispered. 'Doesn't matter.'

'Doesn't matter?'

'No. It's him. I'd know him anywhere.'

'You all right?' After the viewing Angeline went to get a cup of water with Struthers and I went outside for a ciggy. Danso came to stand with me, his hands in his pockets, looking out at the car park, the ferroconcrete fire escape that led up to the Pathology Unit. 'Don't look happy to me.'

I shook my head. I took a drag on the ciggy and looked up at the stars. It was a clear night, just a few clouds, horror-movie clouds, floating across the sky. 'I've been waiting half my life for this.'

'Aye. I'll bet you have.'

'And you know what's weird?' I turned my eyes sideways to him. 'What's weird is I never pictured it like this. Always thought it'd be different.'

'Different how?'

I gave a short, dry laugh. 'Don't know. S'pose I couldn't ever get rid of what he said: "My death will be memorable." Do you remember? "Memorable."' I turned to look at the mortuary. The windows threw square panes of light on to the gravel. 'Not like this.'

'You mean you thought it'd be staged?'

'Yeah.'

'It was.'

I blew out some smoke. 'It was?'

'Yeah.' He pulled a clear plastic wallet of photos from inside his coat and handed them to me. 'Not supposed to show you these, OK?'

I put the ciggy between my teeth and held up the photos so the light from the lit walkway overhead fell on them. At first I thought I was looking at a bundle of clothes caught in a tree. Or a parachute tangled up. Then I recognized hands, and I could make out the outline of a body among all the material, stiff like a scarecrow, the head flopped down on to the chest.

'Rope round here,' Danso said. 'Round the trunk. Jumped out of the tree, rope broke his neck. The branches caught his arms. This stuff here is some groundsheet he had wrapped round him — been living up there rough for weeks.' He paused. 'Look at him Joe. He looks just like an angel, doesn't he?'

I didn't answer. I was staring at the groundsheet, the way it extended from the outspread arms like wings.

'An angel. That groundsheet was flapping like mad in the wind. Put the creeps up the lads — you could hear him before you saw him. Blak-blak-blak coming out of the trees. And smell him too.' He sniffed the air, like the smell was still in his nostrils. 'And smell him.'

I handed him the photographs, flicked away the ciggy and sat down, back against the big door the undertakers used, elbows on my knees, head down.

'Joe? You OK, son?'

I nodded, but I didn't look up. I was staring at the ground between my feet, pictures going across my head like a train: Finn's ma; me and Lexie; the evil way Dove dissolved out of the trees and lay on top of me. Danso wanted me to jump up and punch the air or something. I knew that was what he wanted — it was what I'd always pictured too — but I couldn't do it. All I felt was this great fucking ocean of tiredness open up inside me, and spread and spread, until I knew I was tireder, much tireder than I'd ever been in my life.

6

In London spring was on its way. There were winds and floods. Half of East Anglia and Gloucestershire was under water and Londoners sat glued to the television, watching cars floating down high streets like driftwood, thanking God they lived in a city civilized enough to have a flood barrier. The back gate had been forced open again. I put it down to the high winds, but the neighbours said it had happened in their gardens too, and probably a tramp was living in the neighbourhood. Nobody had seen him, but they were sure he was there. Everywhere he left trampled lawns, scraps of tissue and Twix wrappers that had to be picked up on gardening forks. He was using the back alley to sneak into gardens at night, trying to find a warm place to sleep. Some of the other gardens had the locks broken off their sheds.

The world didn't seem real to me. With Dove gone, it was like the plug had been pulled on my life. The tiredness thing wouldn't let up. I slept long stretches, nine, ten hours, but I'd wake up tireder than before and end up asleep at my desk, hands flopped on the keyboard, sending long strings of letters on to the screen. It crossed my mind to see a doctor, but I kind of guessed what the answer would be — Have you been under any stress recently, Mr Oakes? And then it would come out — Lexie dead, the way I didn't feel better that it was all over, worry about the book. Before I knew it I'd be in counselling, clutching a Seroxat script. So instead I kept going, pushing forward like I was under water, ignoring this perpetual drag on me.

After ten long days I got the manuscript off to the editor. The publishers' art department had been sending us visuals of the dust-jacket and now they'd arranged a photo session for Angeline in some studio in Brixton. This was something Finn and me and Angeline had spent a long time talking about — how to show her to the world. She wasn't going to let the deformity itself be photographed, so we'd decided on a still from the video, and for a modeller who worked for a medical-supply company to make and photograph a fibreglass cross-section of it. The publishers were going to send her up to Pig Island later in the month to get some shots of her at the chapel, but they wanted some studio portraits too. Just head and shoulders. It happened on the first Monday in March. The beginning of spring and, looking back at it now, it turned out to be the beginning of another kind of change in the air.

'Well?' I said. 'How do you feel?'

We sat in the makeup room looking at each other. She hadn't taken off her outdoor clothes: she still had on her coat and a knitted stripy beanie pulled over her hair. I'd brought the JD with me and now I opened it, poured her some in a plastic cup and handed it to her.

'You going to be OK?'

'I don't know.' She took it and shivered, shooting an anxious look at the door. We'd been let in by the janitor to an empty studio, but now the others were arriving. We could hear voices out there. 'They've seen the video. I wonder what they're going to think. Of me.' Her eyes went across the room at a rack of dresses pushed into the corner. They were covered with Cellophane but you could see the long skirts trailing the floor. She'd been fitted and measured for these, specifically so nothing would show. 'But whatever I wear, it doesn't matter. They'll still know.'

'You can change your mind,' I said. 'I'll have Finn tear up the contract. You only have to say the-'

'No. No, really.' She gave a small, nervous laugh. She pulled off her hat and ran a hand through the short curls, raising her eyes cautiously to the mirror, getting a shy look at her face, bare and colourless. 'I'm going to do it. Of course I am.'

When the makeup girl came in I left them to it and wandered into the studio, thinking about what she'd said: What will they think of me? The studio was in a warehouse with polished concrete floors, ceiling cross-braces painted black, and big, unlit studio lamps standing like sentinels in the dark corners. A roll of white paper hanging from an overhead brace had been pulled down to the floor and a small swivel stool placed in the centre. An assistant wandered around setting up lights, snapping open diffusers, all the time chatting in a low voice to the photographer, who was bent over the top of his camera, peering into the viewfinder. The photographer was in his early twenties and looked like he wrote for an alt music mag like Mojo or NME, with his faded print Bob Marley T-shirt and his jeans hanging round his arse. They didn't see me come in so I got quite close and I'd listened to them for a few minutes before I sussed they were talking about disabled people modelling.

'There's this whole, like, obsession with it at the moment. Marc Quinn and that pregnant bird, Alison Lapper.'

'Yeah, and Aimee Mullins…' said the assistant. 'Both totally cool.'

'And personally, I'm, like, this is 50, you know, so about time too.'

'I know.'

'It's so overdue, it's just not funny. It's time they-' The photographer broke off suddenly and straightened, looking far off into the corner of the studio. Me and the assistant both turned to see what he was looking at. The dressing-room door had opened and Angeline was there, blinking shakily in the studio lights. She was wearing some silver number that had a neckline half-way down her stomach and looked like it cost half my yearly salary, and she was a totally different person: the makeup girl had slicked her short curls back against her head like a black helmet, fixed false eyelashes on her, and outlined her mouth in lipstick like red plastic. Her hands were shaking but her face was as composed as a shop-floor dummy, almost glassy it was so perfect. She swallowed, then began to walk, slowly, sort of tentatively, putting one foot in front of the other, like she thought she might fall. No one breathed while we took her in and the studio went totally silent, just the sound of her heels clicking on the floor echoing round the high roof. She got to the edge of the lights, hesitated, then stepped on to the paper, walked quickly to the stool and sank on to it like it was a life raft.

'Fuck.' The photographer let out an amazed whistle. Just soft, under his breath. 'Fucking hell.' He shook his head, then tugged up his jeans and went to stand on the paper about two foot in front of her, looking at her curiously, like he was asking a question. There was a long pause. Then he goes, all surprised, 'You're beautiful, Angeline. You're totally fucking gorgeous.'

At first she stared at him, like she couldn't work out what he'd said or who he was. Like he might be telling her off, maybe. Then something inside her sort of cracked open and all this colour spilled out under her skin and her cheeks went pink. 'Thank you,' she whispered shyly. 'Thank you.'

He gave a disbelieving laugh, still staring at her. 'You,' he said, 'are totally, totally welcome.'

Not taking his eyes off her, like she might run away if he did, he walked backwards to the camera. He lifted up his hands — the way you'd pacify a skittish animal.

'Don't move,' he said, glancing down at the viewfinder. 'Don't move.' And before she knew what was happening he'd taken a photo. The flash fired and he was winding on the camera.

Angeline blinked at him. 'Did you do it?'

'Yes,' he said, switching the camera to display and squinting at the screen. He looked up at her. 'See how easy it's going to be?'

It was so weird that afternoon to stand there, outside the lights and watch her kind of… I don't know the word, but expand, maybe. Like she was growing under the attention. It was like each time the flash fired the muscles in her face relaxed a bit more until the doll look softened and she looked, even I have to say it, awesome. And no one was treating her weird or patronizing. No one was stupid about the way she had to sit, half tilted over because she was never comfortable on a stool and had to grip the sides of it. Instead they were treating her like she was something cool.

When they'd done about twenty shots they got her changed, put her in a different dress, different hair and stuff. During the day she went through about six different dresses, most of which looked totally fucking ridiculous to me, like some of those makeover boudoir get-ups but must've been some kind of style statements because everyone else seemed to get them. Even Angeline. By three o'clock I had to sit down. I was getting tired. And there was something else. I was starting to get arsed off with the photographer.

At first it was great, seeing how happy he was making her, but now he was getting sort of tiresome. The way he kept up with this beautiful, beautiful shit, it was getting on my tits. I started watching him a bit more closely. I went further into the shadows so they couldn't see me, and stood there, fiddling impatiently with my keys, spinning them on my finger, pulling them on and off the ring, trying to stop myself saying, 'What? Do you fancy her or something? Stop staring at her.' So when, at the end of the day, we were all knackered and I thought, At least it's over, he went up close to her, dropped his face, and said something really quiet, I stopped spinning the keys and went very still, watching them closely. Angeline's smile went. She sat there, her eyes on the floor, and listened to him talk, tucking the hair behind her ear and thinking about what he was saying. He finished and straightened, took a step back. 'Well?'

'Hey,' I said, coming closer to the set so I could feel the lights on my face. 'Angeline?'

But she didn't turn to me. She didn't even seem to hear me. Her eyes were locked on his. There were a couple of beats, then she gave a small nod.

'Hey,' I murmured. 'Angeline?'

No one reacted. The photographer went and unscrewed the camera, took it off the tripod and lay down on his stomach, resting on his elbows with the camera raised to his eyes. He was focusing on her skirt hem and, suddenly, catching us all by surprise, she reached down, grabbed the fabric and lifted it to her knees.

I've got the photo from that moment and I still look at it, even today. Her thin ankles, the little sweaty footprints of her feet on the background paper, but most of all the third, broken and squashed foot, heavier-looking, but you can tell it's made out of the same flesh as the other two, and it's hanging there, with its own shadow. Turns out it's the best shot in the book, the one everyone talks about. But at the time I was ready to kill the photographer.

When they'd finished, when she'd gone to get her makeup off and someone had brought round coffee and a bottle of sparkling rose, I took my glass and made sure I sat near him. Wanted to keep an eye on him. I wasn't having him talking to her on his own again.

He was lounging on a sofa, half on his back, idly running his charity bands up and down his arms. If he knew I had the arse with him he didn't show it. 'So,' he said, all casual, 'what happens when it all comes out?' He paused to drain his glass, and swivelled his eyes to me. 'When I was watching her all I could think was, What if her dad reads the book? What's he going to think? See, if it was me I'd be hiding in a hole.'

I looked at him steadily. 'Malachi Dove is dead. How can he read the book?

'Is he?'

'Don't you read the papers? They've been talking about it all week.'

'Oh, that body. In Dumfries. But they never confirmed it. Never said it was definitely him. Did they?'

'No,' I said, in a slow voice, like he was a child not listening properly. 'They're waiting for DNA before they do. But it was him. He. Is. Dead.'

Angeline came across the floor then, holding an opened can of diet Coke. We both looked up. She was wearing a white dressing-gown and I could see where her makeup had been taken off: a line round her neck. Above it, she was pink and shining, glowing more than she had a right to after five hours under the lights.

'Hey,' said the photographer, getting up and smiling, a really fake smile like he was dazzled by her. 'Have a seat.'

She sat down, tucking her curls into two pins above her ears. 'I'm 5000 tired,' she said, with a smile. She looked at me. 'I'm so tired.'

'You were great,' I said, but I had to force it out.

'Hey, Angeline.' The photographer leaned sideways and shoved a hand into his back pocket. He pulled out a card. Held it out to her between two fingers, so delicate you'd think it was some exotic butterfly, not a bit of cardboard. 'I work with her all the time. Her work is lush — just lush. Edgy. Real. Know what I mean?'

She took the card and looked at it. Her mouth twitched a little.

'What is it?' I said, leaning over. 'Let's see.'

There was a moment's hesitation before she handed me the card. I had to pull it a bit to get it out of her fingers. Just a bit. I flipped it over and stared at it, my face set. The features editor of the Daily Mail. What was going on? I turned to the photographer, moving my head stiffly. 'Well? What's this?'

'She's really wanting to do something on Angeline.'

The fucking features editor of a national newspaper knew about Angeline? How had that happened? I leaned forward and tapped his knee, getting him to look at me, wanting to tell him to sit upright, stop slouching. 'That's OK. That's fine. Except we're negotiating the serial rights on this story and it's not with the Mail.' I paused to make sure he'd heard that. 'OK?'

'Sorry, mate.' He held up the glass to me, like he was toasting our status as a couple. 'Didn't want to interfere. Not my job to make waves.'

I stood up. 'Come on,' I said, holding my hand out to Angeline. 'Let's get you dressed.' But she didn't get up. She sat there, staring at my hand. 'Come on,' I repeated. 'It's time to get dressed and go. Let's give your friend some time to read his contract.'

Angeline sighed and rolled her eyes. 'OK,' she said, in a sarcastic voice. The same voice Sovereign always used with her mother. 'I'm commg.'

She finished the Coke and dropped the can into the bin. She held up her hand, thumb at her ear, pinkie at the corner of her mouth, and smiled at the photographer. 'Call me,' she mouthed, and walked straight past me, sauntering off to the makeup room, her feet in the towelling slippers slapping lazily on the floor, the way I'd seen hookers in Tijuana walk. I stood and watched her and all I could think about was when I was a teenager in Bootle. Back then the local fathers used to line up outside nightclubs waiting for their daughters at kicking-out time. They'd get out of their cars and put their elbows on the roofs. They'd look casual, but you could tell what they were thinking. They were thinking if one of those arseholes in the club had laid even a finger on their little girl he was going to get a hiding he'd never forget.

7

We travelled home in silence, Angeline in the passenger seat chewing gum she'd picked up somewhere. She kept fiddling with the radio, trying to find Choice FM, until I reached over and switched it off. I'd made up my mind we weren't going to speak to the photographer again. I didn't like his interfering and I didn't like the knowing way he talked about Dove. The body in Dumfries was him, no one had said it wasn't. In the morning I'd call Danso — just so I could hear the DNA match from his mouth. Even so, when I got home I went into the back garden and nailed the gate closed. Then I double-checked the cellar door and trundled the lawnmower up against it.

Inside, the phone was ringing. As I came into the kitchen I heard Angeline's hurried footsteps on the stairs, and her breathless 'Yes? Hi?' I came into the hallway and stood there, my coat half off, staring at her. 'Yes,' she was saying into the phone. 'It's me.' A giggle. 'I know — he told me all that.'

She noticed me then in the doorway and turned away to face the wall, twiddling her hair round her fingers, resting one foot on the other and jiggling up and down as she spoke. 'No, that's OK. Honest. I wanted you to call.'

I stood there in silence, toying with the idea of putting my fingers on the phone connectors. Instead I pulled off my coat and went and sat at the kitchen table in the semi-dark, moodily necking a bottle of Newkie Brown. The fathers outside the Crosby nightclub kept coming back to me.

'Joe?' When she finished the call she appeared in the kitchen doorway, eyes bright, chin lowered, a little-girl smile on her face. 'I've been naughty, haven't I?'

'You're going to do it?'

'Friday.'

'Friday? You really think that's safe? Before we know if it was your dad or not?'

'But it was him.'

'He looked so different.'

Her shoulders slumped. 'Not this again.'

I sighed and rubbed my temples wearily. 'I don't know. I really don't know. I don't like it.' I dropped my hands and looked at the window, thinking about the security locks on them. They hadn't been used in years — like we had anything worth robbing — and I couldn't remember the last time I'd seen the key. It was probably in the old coffee jar on the basement shelf. Danso, I told myself again, would've called if there was a problem.

'Joe,' she said, coming and putting her hands on my shoulders. She swung her leg over my legs and sat on my lap facing me, her skirt bunched up between her thighs so her legs were exposed. I could smell the coffee she'd drunk and the cold cream they'd used to take off the makeup. 'Why don't you believe me? It was him.'

'And why can't you wait until we're sure? They'll have the DNA any time now. I'm going to call Danso in the morning.'

'But it was him, Joe. And, anyway, it's not like I'm going to say anything.' She shifted a little, pulling the skirt out of the way so her bare thighs pressed against my jeans. 'I won't say where I live.'

'You're going to have to wait till I've spoken to Finn. You could mess up the contract if you're not careful. He's not going to like it.'

'He is. He'll love it.' She took my hands and eased them up under the skirt, forcing my fingers between her legs. She hadn't got knickers on. She was damp and warm and I could feel the hard pressure of the deformed leg pressing down on my knuckles. 'I promise, I promise,' she whispered, closing her eyes and moving her hips in a circular motion. 'I won't say a word about you.'

8

She wasn't trying to antagonize me. She totally wasn't. I wasn't in her thoughts at all, I knew that. All she was doing was wanting to be heard. She was nineteen, for Christ's sake, and if everything she did when the Mail came to interview her seemed like she was giving me the finger, it was my own fault.

I'd talked to Finn and he didn't love it. Not one bit. He'd gone through the contract with a fine-tooth comb and unless she talked about the massacre itself there wasn't a thing he could do to stop her, but he was furious. I'd called Danso over and over again and I kept getting his answer-service, so I left all these messages telling him to call me if the DNA didn't match. But he didn't get back to me. It was starting to seem like I couldn't stand in front of this landslide and hold it back. All of which made me the bad tempered-arsehole boyfriend during the Mail interview, hovering behind the journalist and signalling to Angeline over her head if I thought she was giving stuff away.

She kept losing her grip — being careless about what she was saying. At one point she said, 'I can't talk about that because Joe and I…'

'Angeline,' I said significantly, 'you're, uh-'

'Oh, yeah,' she said. 'What was I thinking? What I meant to say was…'

I spent the rest of the time staring at her furiously, waiting for the wrong word, the wrong expression. After a while she got fed up with me hovering and took the journalist into the kitchen, where the pair of them sat in a girlie huddle, drinking tea and smoking. I kept making excuses to come in: to boil the kettle, or wander through into the garden. Every time I did it they'd stop giggling and turn to me with sweet, empty smiles, waiting politely for me to go so they could get on with the interview.

I didn't know if she'd stuck to her promise until the article came out three days later. It was a Monday, and although I'd set the alarm for seven, when I woke up the bed was already empty. I knew where she'd gone — down to the newsagent's to get the paper. I was still in bed, rubbing my head and trying to wake up, when the phone rang. It was Danso, his usually austere voice weary and tense.

'Well, you sound crap.'

'I feel it. Been up all night and come straight here to the airport. We're on the Tarmac now.'

'We?'

'Me and Sancho Struthers. My travelling companion.'

'Not off to Miami, then. Or do you take him on your holidays too?'

He didn't laugh. 'Joe,' he said, 'are you going anywhere today?'

'Me? Only the corner shop. I'm staying in. Got a book to write.'

'We're on our way to Heathrow. Be with you in a couple of hours. Need a little consultation if that's OK.'

'A consultation? What's up?'

He hesitated. 'It's a lot to go into on an open line, Joe, if you're with me. Shall we hold it till we're face to face?'

I threw off the covers and swung my feet out of bed. Something in his voice had set a bell ringing in the back of my head. 'It's not him, is it? That sad sack on the slab in Dumfries, that's not Malachi. I've left messages, Peter, about this. Been waiting for you to call.'

There was a silence. Just the sound of static on the line and the steady thrum of a small-engined jet.

'Peter? Can you hear me? I said, it's not him, is it?'

'It's not him,' he said eventually. 'The DNA's wrong.'

'Fucking knew it.' I stood up. 'He found someone who looked like him. The suicide note, everything, he just wanted you off his back for a few weeks.'

'No. We don't think he did this one — think it's coincidence.' He lowered his voice — probably getting the evils from the other passengers. 'The Dumfries guy's an ex-squaddie, not been right since Desert Storm. Threatening suicide for years.'

'Peter,' I said, pacing up and down the room, tapping out the words in the air, 'how long does DNA take?'

'Not long. It's-'

'Exactly. Not long. You said Friday — that's three days ago. You've known three days, and I've left messages asking you to let me know if-'

'Joe, listen-'

'To let me know if there wasn't a match and in the meantime Angeline's gone to the fucking newspapers and given them her story.' I went to the window and flicked open the curtains, expecting to see her coming down the street. 'He'll read it this morning and know where she is and-'

I broke off. Something in the street outside had caught my eye.

'Peter?' My blood had gone a bit slow, a bit cold. 'Peter, you bastard? What's happening? What aren't you telling me?' I opened the window and leaned out, my breath steaming in the air, condensation wetting my naked shoulder. 'There's a fucking squad car in the street outside with his lights on. What the fuck's going on?'

'He's from Salusbury Road. Joe? Joe! Listen. He's just there as a precaution.'

'A precaution? Jesus fucking Christ — you'd better tell me what's going on.'

'Maybe you'll stay in the house today. You've got no reason to go out, eh? Cancel the shopping trip. I'm going to text you the number of the local nick — they know all about the situation.'

'The situation?'

'The plane's taxiing, Joe — I'm getting the evil eye from the stewardess.'

'Listen,' I hissed, 'Angeline's out. What am I going to do about-'

'Just relax. There's nothing to worry about,' he said, and the phone went dead in my hand.

I punched in 1471 then 3 but his answer-service picked up. I hung up and stared at the phone, the blood thumping in my ears. 'You bastards,' I said. 'You knew about this.' I looked out of the window. The streetlights were still on, the orange mixing with the flashing blue light. When I went to the bed and put my hand on the side where Angeline slept it was cold. The newsagent's was only a five-minute walk. Fear came up into my mouth like stomach acid.

I put on jeans and went down the stairs, pulling on a T-shirt. Every step was a bit closer to panic. By the time I got to the hall my teeth were chattering. I ran outside in my bare feet, hesitated, went back and unhooked the keys from above the phone, then slammed the front door tight behind me. In the car opposite the police officer turned his head in my direction as I came down the path. I couldn't see his face — it was behind the sun visor — just his chapped hands resting calmly on the dashboard. I ran into the middle of the road, the cold biting my feet. I turned to check both ways up the street and was about to continue over to him, to hammer on the car window, when I saw her in the distance, coming down the road towards me.

It nearly snapped me in half, the relief. I limped back and leaned on the gate, getting my breath, lifting my head to watch her approach. She was carrying three newspapers and her eyes were bright.

'Joe!' she said, speeding up when she saw me. 'It's in here!' She waved one of the papers at me. 'She said I'm beautiful.'

'Come inside.'

She hesitated, her smile fading, her arm falling slack at her side. 'You haven't got any shoes on.'

'Just get inside.' I took her arm and led her down the path, not speaking. Inside I locked the door and bolted it, put the chain on. She stood in silence as I locked the back door, up-ended the coffee jar on the floor and sorted through the keys until I found the security key. I went round each room locking the windows. I drew all the curtains, then went back to the hallway and took the newspaper from her limp hand.

'Is this it? The article?' I put it on the kitchen table and began to leaf through it. 'Does she say we're living together?'

'No,' she said, unwinding her scarf. Cautious. 'She doesn't mention you at all.'

I found the page and placed my hands flat on it, leaning down to study it. Above me the electric ceiling light moved in a slow circle, its shadow rotating across the newspaper like a divining stone. The article was a two-page feature, a large head-and-shoulders shot of Angeline in the centre, and two insets: one of Dove and one taken offshore at Pig Island, the police tents and boats clustering round the village.

I skimmed the text rapidly. It was standard who-what-why-when journalism: the horror of the massacre, the number killed, Malachi Dove on the run, Lexie's death, all covered in the first paragraph. Then it went on to describe Angeline. There was her favourite line: a beauty, hints of a piercing intelligence. It said she had been disabled from birth and walked with a limp. Nothing more specific than that. Then there was a synopsis of her life on the island, her impression of the murdered cult members, finishing with a reference to the book, due in August. I didn't get a mention.

I bent nearer and examined the photo, looking at the reflection in her eyes, half expecting to see my own face there, standing in the shadows of the studio, anxious and jealous-looking. But there was nothing. Just the photographer's flash.

'Joe. You'd better tell me. What's happening?'

I shook my head and sat down at the table, pressing my fingers into my temples. I needed a painkiller. I pulled the paper towards me and stared at it glumly.

'But, Angeline says, the members of PHM treated her well. "They were all so sweet to me, I think they knew what was happening to me."'

'They were so sweet?' I looked up at her. 'Is that what you said? "I think they knew what was happening to me?" Those are not the words I remember.'

'No.' She coloured. 'I didn't want to…' She rubbed her nose, embarrassed. 'I didn't want to sound bitter.'

'Didn't want to sound bitter?' I sighed. 'Listen, you think you know what you're doing but this is dangerous crap we're dealing with. It wasn't smart talking to them.'

'It's just self-preservation.'

I looked at her stonily, my words coming back at me like an echo. 'You think this is self-preservation?'

'Yes. Yes. I do.'

'You know what it sounds like? You know what it sounds like to me?'

'What?'

'Not only does it sound like you've given a different story from the one I'm giving, which is going to be a bit fucking embarrassing since that part of the book is already with the publishers-'

'Please don't swear.'

'Listen,' I said, holding up my hand. 'Let me finish. Not only does it sound like that, but it also sounds to me like antagonism. It sounds like you're baiting your dad.'

'Baiting him?' She blew a little air out of her nose. 'Well, that's stupid. How could I be baiting him? He's dead.'

I dropped my hand from my head and looked at her seriously. 'Sit down.'

'Why?'

'Just do it.'

'Joe?' she said, sitting at the table opposite me, her face paling a little. 'You're scaring me.'

'They're coming down from Oban to speak to us. Something's happened.'

'All the way from Oban?'

I sighed. 'Angeline, you think you saw your dad in that mortuary but…' I put my hand over hers '… it wasn't him. They ran a DNA match.'

She snatched her hand away from me, all the colour leaving her face. 'What're you talking about?'

'It wasn't him. I know you… I know you wanted it to be him, and I know why — but it wasn't.'

'My God,' she whispered, putting both hands to her face. 'My God, you mean it, don't you? You really mean it. It wasn't him.'

'It's not just your fault — they wanted it to be him as much as you did. But looking at it now, I think you and Danso both, you were clutching at straws.'

She breathed in and out a few times through her nose, moving this information around her head. Then slowly, very slowly, she raised her eyes to the kitchen window, to the curtains drawn tight against the morning. She turned and looked down the corridor to the lock on the door. 'Oh, no,' she whispered. She put a hand to her throat. 'This is a barricade, isn't it?' She looked at me. 'Isn't it? A barricade? They think he's on his way.'

I didn't say anything for a long time. Then I took her hands. 'They'll be here in two hours. There's a police car outside. We're going to be fine.'

9

For the last few days the skies over London had been draped swollen over the rooftops, inert, not breathing. But late that morning, just before lunch, the clouds gave up their stalemate. They dropped a barrage of hailstones on the little terraced houses of north London, which bounced off the roofs like buckshot, danced pogo in the street.

We didn't speak much that morning, but I was sure Angeline and me were both thinking the same thing: that Malachi was clever, that he could slip through air vents and up chimneys and through knotholes in the floorboards. She had turned on all the lights, looked under the beds and checked inside every cupboard. Then she went to sit in the living room and tried to read her newspaper. But she couldn't concentrate. From time to time she'd get up and go to the french windows, flick open the curtain and stare at the rain-drenched garden. 'There's someone in a tree,' she said at midday, putting her nose against the glass. I came to look. It was a police officer, dressed in boots and a blue sweater with epaulettes. When he saw us he waved. We raised our hands in reply. After that Angeline stopped peering out at the garden. She left the curtains closed.

I wasn't content with the locks on the windows: I'd hammered nails into the runners of the sash windows to seal them and closed up the letterbox with packing tape. I took a torch into the attic, ripped my jeans as I crawled around checking all the tiles, every brick, every rafter, every rotting roll of insulation, the hail clattering on the roof inches above my head. It was like hearing hell fall out of the sky.

'The cellar,' I said, when I'd finished. Angeline looked at me from the sofa, where she sat biting her nails and anxiously watching the clock. 'I'm going to check the cellar.'

'Do you have to?' She sprang to her feet and limped after me to the cellar door. 'Can't you stay up here? They'll be here in a minute.'

'I won't be long.'

I went down the rickety steps, fumbling with the torch. Angeline stood at the top of the stairs, watching until I disappeared from view into the gloom. I'd bolted the garden door from the outside and pushed the lawnmower against it, but now I hammered an extra four nails into the wood until I was sure it would never move. When I'd finished I sat down on an old deck-chair and clicked off the torch, letting the darkness come to rest round my head and shoulders. It smelt of moss and petrol in here, and something older, more familiar. Overhead Angeline had left the doorway and was in the kitchen, making the floorboards creak.

I switched on the torch and shone it up into the braces under the kitchen floor, listening to her moving about, watching the little puffs of dust coming out of the ceiling. She'd stiffed me with those comments about the PHM. She couldn't see it, but she'd totally stiffed me. I was going to have to talk Finn into getting that bit of the manuscript retracted. I let the beam travel down the wall into the box-vaulted recesses that stretched out under the front garden. Everything was as I remembered it, all the crap piled up, the fridge-freezer glinting dully at me. Strange how nothing down here had changed when upstairs everything was so different.

The doorbell rang. I went up the steps, clicking off the torch and running the bolt on the cellar door, giving it a kick to wedge it into place. 'They're here.' I went to the front door. I switched on the porch light and pressed my face close to the window. 'Yeah?' I called. 'What d'you want?'

'It's us,' came Struther's dry answer, raised above the clatter of the hail. 'All the way from sunny Oban.'

I pulled off the chains and bolts and opened the door. They stood huddled in the porch, cold and sombre in the overhead light, their shoulders wet with hailstones. In the dark street beyond, another marked police car waited, lights flashing lazily, its driver turned in his seat to watch us, resting his elbow on the steering-wheel.

'Our ride from Heathrow,' Danso said, when he saw me looking. 'I admit I wasn't expecting that kind of co-operation from the Met, the stories you hear.' He leaned back and cast his eyes around the front garden, first over one shoulder, then the other. 'Joe?' he said, peering past me into the warm hallway. 'Hate to bother you, son, but it's cold out here.'

I stepped back to allow them in, placing the torch nose down on the windowsill. 'He's not dead.' They came in and I shot the bolts. I put the chain on and turned to them, my back to the door. 'Is he? Not dead. And you know where he is.'

Struthers nodded. 'We know where he is.'

'Listen,' said Danso. 'Can we-' He looked around the hallway. 'I think we should go and sit down for this.'

I stared at him, suddenly angry. 'He's here, isn't he? In London. And you've known it for days.'

'I think,' Danso said, more slowly and deliberately this time, taking in me and Struthers with his tone, 'we should sit down for this.' He put his hand on the living-room door. 'This way, is it?'

We went into the living room, me angry, Danso weary, his feet dragging. Struthers came behind, ostentatiously checking out the room, lifting the curtain and peering out at the police cars in the road. 'Nice place,' he said, dropping the curtain and looking around at the posters and the drab houseplants. 'But, then, it's a nice job you've got.'

'There you are,' Danso said, raising his hand to Angeline. She'd appeared at the kitchen door, wiping her hands on a tea-towel. 'Hello, wee lassie. Saw you in the paper this morning. You're famous.'

'Hello,' she said, with a weak smile. She looked at Struthers. 'Hello.'

'Hello,' he muttered, standing stock still staring at her, at the low-cut sweater, the glitter of something at her neck, her hair caught up in a slide so little curls just covered her ears. 'How are you?'

'Yes. Yes, I'm-' She swallowed and put the tea-towel on the counter. She limped into the living room and stood in front of Danso. 'It wasn't him, then? That's what Joe said. The man you showed me, it wasn't Dad.'

'We're so sorry, hen.' He gave her a sad smile. 'So sorry you had to go through all that.'

'I'm sorry I made a mistake.'

'No.' He shook his head. 'Don't be.'

We all stood for a moment, looking at each other, embarrassed. 'Well,' she said, with a tired shrug, 'you'd like a drink?' She pointed at my drinks cabinet, at the VSOP Armagnac Finn got me last birthday. 'I've got brandy. Or some gin. There's lime-flavoured tonic water in the fridge. Oakesy only drinks Newcastle Brown Ale and you won't want that.'

'No, thanks, pet, we're on duty.' He indicated the sofa. 'Can we?'

'Sorry,' she said. 'Of course.'

Struthers took off his coat and draped it over the sofa arm. He dropped down, settling himself comfortably with his legs stretched, patting the sofa and nodding approvingly, like he was in a showroom, testing the furniture. 'Joe,' Danso lifted up the tails of his coat and sat down on the sofa, with a soft 'ooof' like any movement pained him, 'we need to ask you a few questions.'

'Ask me some questions? What about I ask you some questions and what about you give me some answers? Is Malachi in London?'

'If I give you my assurance you're safe, would you believe me?'

I hesitated.

'I mean it, you're quite safe. You and Angeline. But we've got to follow up a new line of investigation and that's where you come in. Bear with us, son. It's going to sound like we're going round the houses a bit.'

'But we're not,' Struthers said, still checking out the sofa, bouncing his arse up and down to test the springs. 'We're going somewhere.'

I sat on the other sofa opposite them, moody. There was an empty glass on the table between us — the G and T Angeline had been drinking. 'Well?' I folded my arms, trying to calm down. 'What?'

'Look, I know we've done this to death,' Danso put his elbows on his knees and leaned forward to look at me, 'but, see, it's that car again. I want to go back and think about that car you saw outside the house the day Lexie was attacked.'

'The saloon?'

'Because the surveillance PC's version is different from the version you gave us. The lad's saying you first came to the house from the east. From the road that ran along the bottom of the playing-fields.'

'That's right.'

'Right?'

'Yeah. But I never saw the car parked up. I've thought about it and I'm sure.'

Danso sighed. 'Joe, Joe, why didn't you tell us this earlier? You never said you came from the east.'

'Didn't I?'

'No. You said you'd come along the main road, that you'd parked opposite the police car.'

'Yes, but I…' I closed my mouth. Opened it, and closed it again. 'So? So I forgot. What difference does it make?'

'It means that when you drove up to the main road you'd already been to the house.'

'Yes. I mean, no, not inside the house. No. I'd stopped outside the house. In the car.'

'Joe?' Struthers leaned forward, elbows on knees like Danso. 'Remember when we went out to Cuagach?'

I looked from him to Danso and back again. 'Yeah,' I said cautiously. 'For the forensics. Why?'

'Remember how I asked you if you'd been in the chapel? And you said only for a few minutes to take photos? You can't think back now, I suppose, and recall something else happening in there?'

'Something else?'

'Something that would have left your DNA?'

'No. Fingerprints. I told you, probably just some prints. Can you get DNA from prints now? Maybe you can.'

'I'm thinking about blood. Remember our thirty-first victim? Our hair and skin on the floor? Blood.'

'Blood?' I blinked at him. I wasn't getting it, just wasn't getting it at all. 'No. Not blood.'

'Nothing happened that could have left traces of your blood, hair and skin? A fight, maybe? Because the DNA on that thirty-first victim? Remember him — in the chapel? It turns out to be yours, Joe.'

'What?'

'Your DNA. You're our thirty-first victim. And remember that crack in the cupboard at the rape suite?'

I shook my head, holding up my hands and appealing to Danso: 'Hang on, hang on. Where's this going?'

'Sorry. I don't think you heard me — let's try again. That crack in the cupboard at the rape suite? Do you remember when it got there?'

'I said, where's this going?'

'You told my boss here you cracked the cupboard when you were having a fight with your wife. When was that fight?'

'That's it,' I said, pointing a finger at Struthers, fixing him in the eye. 'I said, where the fuck is this going? My DNA's in the chapel, so fucking what? I got a twatting off Dove and they took me somewhere. I was half-conscious so it could have been the chapel, for all I fucking know, but what has it got to do with a fucking cupboard?'

'Don't point at me. Put your hand down.'

'I said, what has that got to do with a fucking cupboard?'

'That's enough.' Danso cleared his throat and looked up at me with watery eyes. 'I didn't want to do it like this, but please,' he pointed at my finger, 'please drop your hand.'

'What's going on?'

'Your hand, please, Joe.'

I lowered it slowly, narrowing my eyes at him. 'Come on, old man. What's happening here?'

'I'm sorry.' He shuffled inside his jacket and pulled out his warrant card, putting it on the table in front of me. He couldn't meet my eyes. 'You know who I am anyway — but let's make it official. That's me, DCI Danso, and I am cautioning you, Joe Oakes, under section fourteen of the Criminal Procedure of Scotland Act, 1995.'

'Cautioning me?'

'You're going to be questioned about a series of murders in Argyllshire at the end of August and in the first week of September 2005, which we believe you may have been involved in.' He put the card back into his pocket and said, 'You're not bound to answer, but if you do your answers will be noted and may be used in evidence.'

I stared at him, thinking, This is a joke. This is someone's idea of fun… What, Danso old boy, are you wearing suspenders under that suit? Is that the gag? I sat back in the chair, swallowing hard, shaking my head very slowly. 'No,' I muttered, looking from one to the other and back again. 'No. This is a joke.'

'We're doing this under Scottish law, Joe, under our cross-border powers, and that means we're detaining you. If I'm going to be strict about it I'd say I don't even need to give you a solicitor, but I wouldn't do that to you.'

'We could just question you for four hours. Imagine that — you and me on our own for four hours.' Struthers raised his eyebrows. 'I don't know about you but I could look forward to that.'

I gave a weak laugh. 'No fucking way. Stop it now.' I looked from one to the other, still hoping to see the crack of a smile, the wink: Aah — had you going! 'Stop, because you're talking bollocks. It started off funny but now it's just arse. Let's end it here.'

But Danso was watching me seriously, a film clouding his eyes. Struthers was smirking, his arms folded across his chest like he was concealing a weapon. I thought of the blue police lights flashing silently on and off in the street outside, and something dull clenched under my ribs. They'd been here all day. It wasn't to protect us. It was to stop me leaving the house. Angeline lifted my arm and pulled it round her shoulders, burying her face in my chest. I put my hand on her head and pressed it into me, not taking my eyes off Struthers. I hated him at that moment more than I've ever hated anyone. 'Well?' I hissed. 'You'd better start giving me some answers.'

His eyes were cold. 'The only time I've ever seen DNA receptors like you left in the chapel is after a fight.' He took a notebook from his coat pocket and opened it, uncapping a pen. 'You didn't like the PHM much, did you? We spoke to your publishers this morning. They were saying how you-'

'J wasn't even on the fucking island when he killed those people.'

'Aye. That's the problem. Malachi didn't kill "those people".'

'Oh, please, what toss is this now? Of course he did:

Struthers and Danso looked at each other. Danso rearranged his coat, pulling the two sides neatly together and smoothing it down. 'Joe,' he said quietly, 'he couldn't have.'

'Couldn't have?'

'No. He was already dead.'

I stared at him. I knew the blood had left my face.

'That's right. He'd already been dead more than a week.'

'What?' In my arms Angeline raised her head, wiping her eyes. 'What did you say?'

'He was dead when it happened,' said Struthers. 'You'll hear all the science bit in court — got some bearded creep from Edinburgh University lives and breathes insects. Turns out that early winter we got in Argyll was a jackpot for a forensic entomologist.'

'OK,' Danso said warningly. 'Let's not hand him our case on a plate.'

But Struthers was sitting forward, smiling at me like a pitbull on a leash, his eyes watering. 'Aye, turns out there are things that insects just can't do to a body when it gets that cold. See, me, I never knew that. Never knew it, but sounds like some insects just won't lay eggs if the temperature's wrong. See, if he'd gone in the ground after the killings in the chapel he wouldn't have had-'

'OK,' Danso said. 'Let's stop this now.'

'Where was he?' Angeline sat up and stared at Struthers, pushing her hair from her eyes.

'On Cuagach, hen. Near your home. Contractors found him. Cleaning up the chemicals. This time we know it was him. The DNA works. Aye,' he muttered, staring red-faced at me. 'Shoved head first in a mine shaft — and your boyfriend's stamp all over the place. He took photos of the pig too. Something else his publishers told us. Bit of a souvenir collector when it comes to photos.'

'Look,' I said reasonably, 'this doesn't work — he was seen after the massacre. Loch Avich for a start.'

He shook his head. 'The DNA from the bothy didn't match.'

'Didn't match?'

'No. It was just some dosser. Dove was already dead. And now it's all unravelling. What's funny is that all the time we were trailing him round Argyllshire there's nothing to place him on Argyll the whole of September.'

I stared at him. 'Nothing to place him there?'

'It's true.' He shrugged. 'Strange but true. We caught up with the wee sods who had the Vauxhall from Crinian Hotel car park. Glasgow neds, like I always said.'

Angeline made a small sound and tried to stand, pulling herself up slowly and shakily. Her face was drawn and smeared, her head a little wobbly. She put out a hand to steady herself, like she felt faint, and instantly Struthers was on his feet, supporting her under the elbows, lowering her back to the sofa. 'There you go, hen. There ye go.'

She sat for a moment, breathing in and out, her hands pressed to her temples, staring at me like everything was falling into place. 'You didn't like him,' she muttered. 'You never liked him. You didn't like them either. The Garricks — you said you didn't trust them.'

'When did I say that?'

She didn't answer. She turned to Danso pleadingly, tears in her eyes. 'Can I go, please? I can't stay here in this — in this — place with — with him.' She made a low, furious sound in her throat, and raised her foot to kick me viciously in the calf with the tip of her stiletto. 'Why did you do it?'

'Fuck off,' I said, holding my hand out to stop her doing it again. 'Fuck off.'

'Hey! Hey! Come along now…' She tried to kick me again, but Struthers pulled her away, turning her to look at him, holding her face. She was weeping uncontrollably now, wiping her nose and shaking her head. 'Let's not see any more of that, wee lassie. You hear me?'

'I want to go. I want to go. I'm not staying here with him.'

'Callum, for God's sake.' Danso waved his hand at Struthers. 'You're FLO-trained, aren't you? Take her somewhere. Have you got somewhere to go, lovey?'

'No!'

'No one to visit?'

She shook her head again. Then something occurred to her. She wiped her eyes with the palms of her hands, taking breaths to stop her chest heaving. 'Yes. Paul. I can go to him.'

'Paul?' I echoed. 'Who the fuck's Paul?'

She looked at me, full of contempt. 'You didn't even bother to find out his name.'

'That fucking arty photographer? How long have you and him been friends, then?'

'That's enough.' Danso flicked a hand in the direction of the street. 'Get her out of here. Meet me at Salusbury Road.'

As Struthers pulled her to her feet, the warm, creamy expanse of her right breast slid briefly into view from her sweater, then back as she straightened. She shook her hair, tucking a curl behind her ear, taking care not to look at me. I sat totally still, numb, silent. My head was pounding. Mineshaft, I was thinking. Wedged in a minesbaft.

'Was there a carcass on top of him?' I asked Danso distantly, not taking my eyes off Angeline. She was letting herself be led to the door. In the hallway they paused so Struthers could sort through the coats, looking for hers, asking her, did she need a handbag, keys, phone? A wash of unreality came over me. I felt like something old and poisonous had fastened its mouth over mine and was breathing silently and steadily into me. 'An animal? One of the pigs?'

'I suppose if someone wanted to disguise the smell of a corpse it's a good idea…'

'Yeah. A dead pig. It would have disguised the smell. And my fingerprints… they were…' I paused. Struthers was taking Angeline out of the front door and on to the garden path. Now he'd transferred his hand from under her arm to round her shoulders. She was leaning against him, steadying herself against his chest as she limped away to the street. For a moment I was back on Cuagach, a cold wind blowing, her voice, thin and fleeting: 'Stop it watching me…' 'They were on a chemical drum, weren't they? My fingerprints. That's where you found them?'

'I've got a case to build, Joe. You understand that. What we're going to do now is take you down to Salusbury Road and question you.'

'But they were. Weren't they? My prints. On a chemical drum.' I stood, heading in a trance for the front door. 'A drum wedged in front of him.'

'You'll need to stay here, Joe. Until I've got some men in.' When I didn't stop he raised his voice behind me. 'You're detained, Joe. Detained.'

I threw open the door. In the dark street the blue emergency light flashed on and off, shadows racing up the neighbouring houses. The hail had stopped and Struthers stood at the police car, closing the door on Angeline. As I came down the path he went round to the other side and got in. Danso was coming up behind me. I wrenched the garden gate open. 'Hey!' I said, hurling myself at the car, shaking the handle. 'You! Angeline.' I banged a fist on the window. 'Open this. Open the fucking door.'

Out of the corner of my eye I could see uniformed police jumping out of the other cars. I could hear Danso breathing behind me. 'Joe,' he said. 'Come on, son.'

'Open the fucking door,' I bellowed. The driver flashed me a nervous glance, just a small glint of eye under the cap, and put the car into gear, taking off the handbrake. Struthers was leaning forward, urging the driver on. 'No! You fuckers!' I grabbed the door trim, digging my nails in, shouting at Danso who was behind me, hands on my shoulders. 'I put the fucking drum in the shaft for her.' I banged on the window. Blood vessels popped in my temples. 'Angeline. Open this fucking door.' Flecks of spit shot out of my mouth. 'Angeline. You bitch. You BITCH. You evil bitch:

Suddenly, with a whoosh of cool air, the electric window slid smoothly down and Angeline's face appeared close to mine. Everyone on the street became very still. The driver re-engaged the handbrake and Struthers sat back with a jerk. 'What did you say?' She leaned close to me. Her breath was sour, like something was erupting from her. 'Just then, what did you say?'

'I said, you evil fucking bitch:

'Joe.' She reached a hand up to my face. 'Joe. You don't believe in evil. You don't believe in possession and you don't believe in evil. You said it yourself.'

'Shut up!' I bellowed. 'Shut up!' Out of nowhere hard arms wrapped round me, pinning my hands down. Someone was frisking me, searching my pockets. I twisted in their grip, banging my leg on the car and sending someone's cap flying off into the gutter. 'You arseholes.'

'Joe, whatever it is you've done…' More tears came to her eyes. She looked pityingly at my struggles. '… I don't blame you. You must remember that, I don't blame you.'

She sat back in the seat, letting the electric window slide calmly up to close off her face. I stopped struggling and stared at her. She crossed her stockinged legs and next to her Struthers lowered his chin to get a look. There was a bit of a pause, then the driver took off the handbrake again and the car pulled neatly out into the road. For a split second I thought I saw something coiled and dark, like smoke or a spirit, lifting itself out of the car and hovering near the roof, then the driver reached the end of the road, hesitated, put the indicator on, turned and disappeared from sight, leaving me standing in front of my own house, held back by two police officers, nothing better to do than watch the car drive away.