Final extract from No Shadow In The City

Jakey, MP

She went straight to the point, while seeming never to go anywhere near it. Only a very clever lawyer can do that, or a very clever woman. Bernie, of course, was both.

“Welcome back to the farm, Stevie.  I’m quite surprised you developed that much passion, that quick, for poor wee Murray Gilchrist.”

“There’s no answer to that one, counsellor. Although you forgot to add the number 24 to your client’s name.”

“I know, and anyway, it wasn’t even a question. And maybe I lied, maybe I’m not surprised.”

“So tell me why I should be excited about your KKK boy. Assuming there is a reason.”

“I told you on the phone, there’s no way he did what he’s in the Bar-L for. We’re getting an independent forensic report on the second firebomb cuz we wouldn’t necessarily trust the police version and we’re comparing it to the official report on the first one – they wouldn’t’ve obscured anything there. If it’s exactly the same MO…”

“Then mibbe Gilchrist and one of his buddies just have very similar habits, they learned their trade off the same how-to website. Bombers-R-Us. Or Gilchrist left some old stock and his mates got a buzz on one night and thought, fuck it, ‘mon we’ll lob a sparkler up in there? We’ll use one’a Gilly’s specials, might even give him a hand up wi’ his appeal, nice win double.”

“If you’d seen any of Murray’s mates, you’d know how very unlikely that kinda thinking is. Opening a tin of beans would be an evolutionary leap. Or if you’d seen Gilly – which you need to. You know where to find him, right? And it’s not Gilly, it’s Muz or EmGee.”

“Okay – so I brace him in the jail, he denies it, says naw, I dunno if any of my mates coulda done this…Okay, if you never dropped the first bomb, who did? Cuz that’ll be the same guy, right? That’s yer ticket out, Muz, so who was it, if not you?...Uh, dunno, I really fuckin don’t, man. Wisny me done it, gen up, but I don’t fuckin know who did, that’s the pure heavy truth, man...Give us some hope, EmGee, drop a name or two on me….uh, Weezy, Scud, Herman the German, Big Cheesy, Haunless, Gammy, yon Geraldine wi’ the teeth, Kyle – no’ Irish Kyle, the other wan – Leishy, Jagga, big Linda ‘n’ mibbe Moorsy. And by then, EmGee’s given me the name of every imbecile in his street. Pointless. So, even if this bomb is identical to your boy’s, so what? Guilty! Next?”

“Do your best, Stevie. And you’ll likely not spend long at the Bar-L. I think you just previewed the whole conversation, right there.”

“One thing botherin’ me…”

“What is it, Lieutenant Columbo?”

“Dornoch Textiles. You get firebombed, you get more threats after that, you’re an obvious target to these kinna guys…why no CCTV outside the factory? It’s basic, so why not?”

“You won’t believe why…they had CCTV, but the unions complained it was surveillance against their members, so they took it down again. They regret it now, as it happens. Not just cuz of this other firebomb, but now there’s a picket line outside the factory – dispute about Dornoch using non-union labour, saying that includes illegals, but nobody’s proved that. So, they might as well have carried on surveilling their members, or whatever they were doing. Or just having a security camera, could be.”

“If they’re havin’ a square go with the union, why the hell did they bother to pally up to them about the cameras?”

“Allan Dornoch, as in ’Dornoch Textiles’? Remember the name? Friend of the unions cuz…”

“…aw, Dornoch? He used to be a Labour MP. Not another one...”

“That’s it, till he got his arse toed in favour of Vijay Chavan, so he’s now just an ex-MP, but still a good union man. Didn’t help Dornoch’s public image that he spends his days suckin’ on a Chivas Regal bottle – always did – and he had himself a reputation for letting his hands wander when he got a drink in him.  Nothing ever official, but shit sticks.”

“Right...same question in reverse, then. If they’re buddied up, how come there’s a picket line outside?”

“Cuz Allan Dornoch is just a name, he doesn’t actually run the company. Ayleen does, his wife, and she’s not sentimental about traditional skills and craftsmen’s guilds.”

“Christ. You couldny make a worse job of it, all snakes and no ladders.”

“But Dornoch Textiles aren’t my problem, unless you tell me different, Stevie. Murray Gilchrist is the client.”

“And who’s paying for all this, to keep a junior Nazi out of jail?”

“You pay taxes? Well then, you are. Them’s the rules, we all get to play.”

*** *** ***

Even with all the windows of the bus open, my shirt was stuck to my back by the time I climbed out of the humid metal box into the harsh shimmer of the street. Air-conditioned public service vehicles in Glasgow? What use would they be? Dornoch Textiles stood one half a block off Eglinton Toll, a Victorian-school-turned-enterprise-centre separating it from the main road. The fire-blackened section I recognised from before was still there, but now it was balanced by a second, different area of scorched brick, as if a pyromancer obsessed with symmetry had corrected some offensive artistic imbalance. Still visible beneath the newer fire-damage was a two-foot high slogan, crudely sketched in block letters: WHITE PRIDE, WHITE JOBS. Across the narrow street, in the full blaze of sun, stood a desultory picket line, six or seven Asian women and one white man in a suit. They were presumably keeping some court-ordered distance that also ensured they could find no shelter from the heat. Even allowing for the wilt-factor of the sun, they looked a worn-down, demoralised crew. Two of the women were wearing black armbands. The factory entrance, by comparison, stood in cool shadow.

I waved to everyone and no-one on the picket line. “’mornin’. Hot day to be standin’ here – you must really mean it.”

It was the white-man-in-suit who answered. “I don’t recognise you, my friend, but I’m Danny Galloway, United Union of Garment Manufacturers and Allied Trades. UUGMAT, to people with short attention spans.”

“Stephen McCabe, jist an innocent bystander as far as all this goes. I’m actually here to talk to the Dornochs and I saw your picket here…obviously. Thought I’d have a word, see what the problem is.”

“You workin’ for Dornoch Textiles then?”

“Christ, no, never met them. Somethin’ totally different, no unions harmed in the makin’ of this picture, old news in fact. Now…these ladies would be your members?”

“Aye, but if you want to ask anythin’, I speak for them.”

“Really? Disny seem the most equal opps arrangement I’ve ever heard but I’ll have a shy anyway – speak for them about why they’ve got black armbands on.”

“If ye don’t know already, ye don’t need to. And I don’t care about how anythin’ seems to you…I do speak for them, aye.”

“What if I want to comment on the weather? Or compliment their choice of dress? You’d still speak for them? Does UUGMAT really offer that kinna representation? Some service. Except the only thing I actually want to ask, somehow ye don’t speak for them on that? I’d want my dues back, I was them.”

“Chuck bein’ a wide-o and do one, Mister McCabe. This is serious union business here and you’re jist in the way.”

“Well, Mister Galloway, this is a free country and I reckon if I wanted to have a wee chat with your members, then I would, don’t you? As it happens, this is none of my business, far as I know, so I won’t bother. But a wee bit advice? Doesny look good, big ginger white man frontin’ up this kinna deal, looking like you actually ‘represent’ nobody. Bad PR, is the best ‘hing you could call it….but good luck in your dispute anyway, assuming righteousness is on your side…Ladies…sorry I couldny speak to you there, Mr Galloway has an opinion about that. I don’t share it, but I have to go inside now…mibbe we can chat some other time? Have a good one.”

*** *** ***

Both the Dornochs were waiting for me, each keen to give me pieces of their respective minds. Me, I didn’t necessarily think I wanted to be given either of them.

And Mister Dornoch was already well refreshed, flush-faced and beady. Mrs Dornoch, however, looked almost chilly, despite a turtleneck sweater that fought against common sense in the heat.

“Mister McCabe, your phone call said you were ‘investigating’ this latest attack on our business, but Calder Street police station says they’ve never heard of you – care to put us in the picture?”

“Well, Mrs Dornoch, it probably isny true that they’ve never heard of me there, not literally, unless you spoke to somebody particularly dense, cuz they have; I’m practically related to some of them. But no, I don’t work for the police, never claimed to you I did. And I am investigating the incident, on behalf of Murray Gilchrist.”

“Good God – that soap-dodger has a private eye? Strange days. And why would we want to waste any of our busy day on behalf of the reptile who tried to burn us down? And I’m sure you know the reasons why he did it – because we employ people whose skin he doesn’t like and we have connections to the Labour movement. My husband used to -”

“- he probably knows what I used to be, Ayleen. Cuz I know who Mister McCabe is. This McCabe put a friend of mine in jail.”

“Did I? That could be quite a few different people…aw, hold up – Billy Hutton? You would’ve been an MP same time as him, sure. That never occurred to me, but now you mention it…you must’ve been. You and him buddies then?”

“Well, I had to step down one term before he did. I had my own local difficulties to sort out, but Billy was elected again. A very hard-working MP, a good man. Until the likes of you torpedoed him.”

“Your man Hutton needed no help, but if he did there would’ve been a queue. He was a crooked bastard, bent to the bone. He couldny tell up from down, but I don’t know if he was ever a jakey as well. You any idea?”

“Fuck off out of our premises, you slimy prick!”

“Well, if you put it like that…”

“Mister McCabe, Allan…please! I don’t think anybody needs the conversation to go this way…Allan, could you go and see whether Parveen has finished the new online pricing pages?”

“What? I’m not fuckin -”

“Allan? Please. We need that to be finalised before the relaunch. Now.”

Dornoch (Mister) turned and…no…no…I can’t resist the word…he flounced from the room. Dornoch (Mrs) looked at me like a Great White Shark who had just shooed away an eel from her prey.

“I won’t apologise for that. My husband can be a prick but I have to say diplomacy lost nothing when you never turned up for the exam.”

“No, but that’s not what my card says anyway, so nobody should be disappointed. And Billy Hutton…sorry Billy Hutton MP…was so crooked he wouldny fall straight. Whether he was your husband’s mucker or not.”

“I met him, and you’re right. Problem is, what I said was true – this company has always had good relations with the unions and the Labour Party. My husband’s grandfather founded the company and he was Lord Provost of Glasgow. He fought for the right of Indian and Pakistani workers to bring their families here. We’re a community company and we’ve got a lot of connections, so when one of those connections goes up in flames – I mean Billy Hutton now – then we’re suspicious of anybody who had a hand in that. We question their motives, especially when they claim to be police when they’re not.”

“First up, we covered that point – if you chew up what I say and put it in the wrong dress, not my problem. I am investigating this, and that’s all I said. And second…are you really suggestin’ that this is political? That Barclay Hutchison Skivington – or me, personally – has some kinna hard-on for…for what? You? Your company? Or your…all due respect, now…your has-been, disgraced jakey husband? Is that your theory? Nobody gives a shit.”

“I should tell you to fuck off.”

“That’d be two of you in the last five minutes. Your call.”

Sighs, low whistles. The Great White was sagging and seeming weary, never much-sought-after in a shark.

“Mister McCabe…Stevie, isn’t it? - why do you think I agreed to see you today, at short notice? And it’s true, I did call Calder Street station, but whatever they said – or didn’t say – you can take it I know perfectly well who you are. So, why?”

“Off the cuff…you’re not convinced that Murray Gilchrist bombed you the first time. I don’t know why you think that, but this second firebomb made you think it double, so if somebody like me bowls up – and yes, you just said you know who I am – you think to yourself, okay, let’s see what he dredges up. Cuz you know as well as me that the polis have got no reason to pick Gilchrist out of the fire and this’ll be the only way any stones get turned over. And I do it for free – far as you’re concerned.”

“Half right.”

“Okay…you make this big song-and-dance about your company being founded by Lenin himself, and how you’re all one big happy family with all the nations of the earth...and yet, when I walk down this street, the first thing I see is an official union picket line, and Asian women on it, foreby the snider that’s got the suit. Somethin’ is very wrong with this picture. And…Ayleen, yes? – I think you’re not really sure how the hell this all happened. You’re a determined woman, running this company – even though it’s not your own family name on the wall – and you’re just fuckin mystified how it all came to this. Is that the second half of your why?”

“It is. I can’t see how we got to this stage. My husband’s the MP…ex-MP…so he sometimes doesn’t see the need to run the business in a business-like way; I do. If that means different working methods, then it does. We still have a recognised union, we still pay industry rates, we still check everybody is entitled to work here, we pay taxes, and the union takes a dump on us because we don’t employ as many people as we used to. Allan’s kinda caught in the middle, he actually convinced me to take down the security cameras after the union complained. Bastards are picketing us and we do that! It’s a bit pathetic, the way he wants to be the workers’ friend -”

“That was in the mix for his wee local difficulty as well, it seems. Too friendly.”

“I’d leave that, Stevie. You said it once, no need to go again. You think I want to sit in my office and listen to a stranger snigger at my husband? And – not that you give a fuck – nobody got hurt apart from him. Allan paid for that in politics, and you can take it to the bank that’s he still paying for it within these walls. But, like you said, it’s his family name on the wall, not mine, so we do what we have to. All right?”

“Understood. Very clearly. On-topic…my question about your problem is that, if Dornoch Textiles is totally kosher, what does the UUGMAT guy say is the reason for the picket line?”

“He’s got his facts wrong. He says we use illegal immigrants, non-union labour – and if some of our workers don’t join, that’s up to them, doesn’t mean we stop them doing it – don’t pay PAYE, insurance, etc. If he was right, he’d be right, but he’s not.”

“So, you don’t know a thing about who firebombed your factory the first or the second time?”

“No clue. But I know when that slogan – white pride, white jobs? – went up on the wall. The night after the cameras came down. We wiped it off and it went back up again, so…you tell me. And we had stickers on the front door – Scotland: White Pride, with a nice local address for their office, just down the road, where all the fun and games has been kicking off these last few nights. How’d’ you like that?”

“I needed to be heading down that way sometime soon, I reckoned. You’ve jist confirmed that. Nice day for a walk, after all… Listen, ‘fore I go, some of the women in the picket line are wearin’ black armbands – do you know if that’s for some real reason, or is it some symbolic ‘death of workers’ rights’ thing?”

“Oh, Christ, no, that’s real. It’ll be for Rani, Rani Jadeja. She used to work here, she’d know a lot of the women. Maybe all of them, cuz she works for the union now. Worked.”

“That’s not the woman got attacked with the acid? Her name was Uzma...”

“No, worse…Rani…Rani’s dead. She was killed a few days ago, that case…her husband killed her and her kids. In was in all the papers, TV. Awful…awful.”

“Over in Govan, in Elder Park? Ah, stupid question, ‘course she’s the same one…did you know her well?”

“Used to, when we weren’t fighting the union. Went to her place, once, over by Albert Drive? She stayed there when she split up with her husband, kept the kids. She was killed there, I think, although some of the papers said it was at his house. He moved away…well, like you said, Govan. Where he….”

“Aye. Listen…I’ll let you know what I find out. If there’s somethin’ wrong here, it’s not just Gilchrist’s lawyers need to know. And sorry if, y’know, I started somethin’ there, between you and your husband.”

“I wouldn’t lose sleep over it, but you could use better manners.”

“Sometimes, mibbe. Other times, I really, really need the manners I’ve got.”

Back outside, I crossed to the picket line and ignored Galloway, addressing the women directly. “I’ve learned more from Ayleen Dornoch about what’s happenin’ here and I heard the awful news about Rani. I’m very sorry to hear that and please accept my sympathies for your friend. She must have been quite a lady. Please take my card, anybody who wants it, my number’s on there if you want to talk. I hope this all works out the way you want it to.”

Each of the women took a card; Danny Galloway glared at me. 

No Shadow In The City Part 4 (note -some chapters omitted for spoilers)

The Boys…Boy… Are Is Back In Town

Glasgow Central station, Victorian glass roof and vaulting arches, had gathered the heat as it seeped from the streets, night falling breathless and sticky. No current stirred in the dead air as I stepped from the train, footsteps clattering with others’ like an inept round of applause rattling along the platform. I felt the keys in my hand, their dull jangle of metal and plastic sounding a flat tinkle of welcome. You’re home, Stevie.

A slender scatter of commuters scanned destination boards, waiting for their trains to the southern suburbs; fewer long-distance travellers on this midweek night sat with heavy baggage, slumped in the heat, destined for Manchester, Birmingham… some for London. Why they drooped out here in the accumulated warmth of the day, instead of on the air-conditioned carriages…? Maybe they were just too wabbit not to, or maybe they knew something I didn’t.

The Bat-signal had blazed in the sky for me, but here, nobody had noticed.

“Haw, mate? Bung us a pound bit for my fare? Coupla quid’d be good, ye got it.”

My new ‘mate” had eyes like hunted animals – not, you understand, eyes like those of hunted animals, but eyes which in themselves were like animals. It made quite the impact.

“Where is it you’re goin’…mate?”

“Uh…hame, know? Uh…” – eyes darting to the destination boards – “over by Whifflet.”

“Christ, bud – you ever been near Whifflet? Can ye spell Whifflet? Listen, what’s a pint cost over in the Toby Jug?”

“Eh…three-forty. How?”

“Right, show us yer kitty...c’mon, what’re ye up to so far? Right…all of it…okay…let’s see…one, one-fifty, sixty, eighty…Christ, eighty-two…ninety-two…two pound two, two pound seven. Right, here’s a quid. Away and tap somebody else for 33p, my pleasure, you’re welcome.”

My time at St Mungo’s hostel hadn’t been in vain. I’d just used the ‘skills’ I learned there to befriend somebody, venture into some basic economics and encourage some personal enterprise, all for the cost of a pound, albeit it would end in drink. Glasgow was already the richer for my five minutes in town, even if I was marginally poorer.

*** ***

My key turned in the lock, and the build-up of solar gain that had pumped into the apartment through my undrawn curtains rushed out to meet me. I took a moment to let some of the wave of heat dissipate and stepped inside. Everything was the same, of course, because I hadn’t been that long away and there was nobody else to change anything. No mail piled behind the door, which meant my re-direction had been successful…which also meant that I’d have to especially pleasant to Joanna at Centrus, where my “business” was nowadays located. It was strictly an anonymous cubicle-and-mailbox accommodation address and they won’t have been too impressed to see all of McCabe’s mail suddenly clog up my doocot. My buddy Joanna on the front desk probably wouldn’t mind, I told myself. She was sharp and sassy, she’d be happy to be bending the rules. Maybe…

I slid up all the sash windows to let some of the heat escape and there was a pressure-change as the night air – cooling now that darkness had fallen – seeped in and sent the trapped Fahrenheit thermalling up and away.

I left the flat to cool for a moment and went downstairs and into the street, then back up the exterior stoop to the separate tiny property that had once been my office, two rooms – well, one of those was really a small lobby. I’d given it up when Mrs Mac robbed me, legally and illegally, and I found myself in a new/old world of hand-to-mouth, both glad that my Bernie was a lawyer and depressed that I needed her income, however indirectly. The office still stood empty, the way I’d left it. A strange, awkward space, it was eagerly available for lease. And it would be cheap.

I went back upstairs, the flat now exhaling, and looked out at my part of what I called home.

It wasn’t London and I didn’t have much of a view from the flat. Audio, I had...the buzz of Byres Road and further distant streets drifting across rooftops to me in an indecipherable pattern, the scat singing of the city. But visuals, no. Just an occluded half-vista of gables and roofs, windows and back-courts. No dizzying heights, only an array of flickering lights in the dark, and definitely no romantic river far below.

No river to ponder, just reflections on the overlapping sheets of glass in my raised window, the twin images not quite aligning, overlaid and distorting, reflecting versions of me and the future. We both looked okay.

There would be something out there tomorrow and I would be ready for it.

But who am I to judge?

(I Don’t Want To Go To) Chelsea

The National Gallery sits on the edge on Trafalgar Square, right where every tourist thinks everything in London is located, including the Tower of London, Big Ben, BuckingHAM Palace and Madame Tussaud’s. And Shakespeare’s house, Windsor Castle and Oxford University.

I was transfixed by Jan Van Eyck’s masterpiece, the Arnolfini Portrait, all darting light and reflection, humour and narrative, texture and shadow, painted in 1434…1434, Christ, hundreds of years ahead of its time and yes, we all got the memo that the scene it portrays isn’t actually a wedding – well, duh, that’s what all the old guys thought, we know better now…

…when my phone vibrated, ringtone switched off but still active. I spoke quietly into it, giving my name, still staring at the happy Arnolfinis...

“Hello, mister McCabe, I used to call you Stevie, is that okay still? This is Della Maguire, did ye get my message?”

“I did, Della…you’ll have to forgive me, has it been a while? I don’t remember your name, sorry.”

“Ah, right, no problem. I used to stay up the next close to you in McCulloch Street, mind? I used to work in the wee dairy at the foot of the close, know?”

“Oh, Jesus, Della? Della! Christ, that was a lifetime ago. Sure, I remember you, you were always in there in the mornings when I got my rolls…I used to be in there most days, s’pose.”

“Aye, we used to get in that Guardian for you. ‘Course, that was afore the Pakis bought it off Mister Fulton.”

Giovanni Arnolfini, hand half raised as if in welcome, looks towards two figures reflected in the mirror behind him on the back wall, one of them – surely – the artist, the other a mystery. His wife, Giovanna Cenami, lays her hand on a swelling belly but, no, they tell us she isn’t pregnant, merely posing fashionably…well, those might have been their names, and that might have been what they were doing, but we don’t really know. The picture retains its tease, its suggestion.

“See, it’s my daughter, Mel? You mind her? She would be only wee when you lived by Cully, wee blonde one? I had the three daughters, and wee Brandon. Dana’s married onto one of those…ach, would you listen to me now? I’m talkin’ shite. It’s no’ aboot Dana, it’s aboot Mel. She…”

“Aye, you said in the message. I’m awful sorry to hear that.”

“I warned her, you do, don’t ye? Warned her about who she hung aboot wi’, but ye canny tell them, aw naw, they know best, right? Aye, right. So, she goes out the other night, cuz there’s been trouble round about here, riot this, riot that, she went to see whit’s goin’ on.”

“Hold on a second Della, why are you tellin’ me all this?”

The couple were Italian, but lived in what we now call Belgium, rich merchants garbed in velvet, sable and damask, fabrics in which they traded and made their fortunes. Well, somebody had to pay Van Eyck for his work and the mere bargees of Bruges lacked the coin. And they lacked much 15^th century bling, the type of thing merchants and nobility would drench themselves in.

“Well, I saw your name in the paper, the Daily Banner, right?”

…not again. That rag and its payoff were riding me down.

“So, I thinks to mysel’ at the time, I know him, that’s Stevie used to live over by us, aye says Tam – that’s ma husban’ – so it is. So when, y’know, this ‘hing happened, your name was right there, in my mind. I’m thinkin’…he’s in the papers, Stevie McCabe, top ‘tec they called ye in the Banner. You must be some kinna big shot, jist the man to help us out, so I phones up the paper -”

“-The Banner?”

“Uh-huh, and the guy there gives us this number.”

“Aw, for fuck’s sake. Ogilvie, him?”

The artist’s name was emblazoned right there, like high graffiti, and – right next to the name - that date so long ago, and a flurry of symbolic messages to ponder today. Cherries, signifying love…oranges signifying purity…a wee dog, a bizarre squirt of a canine with a pirate’s facial hair, signifying…that the Arnolfinis owned an ugly wee dog (interpretation my own).

“Thing is, Della, I know you saw me in the papers and everythin’, but I’m jist a one-man band, I don’t…I can’t…investigate things like…I can’t just say I’m gonny take on a rape case. Anyhow, I’m not in Glasgow, I’m in London the now.”

“Ah, it’s like that, is it? The bright lights? Made yer fortune and doon to the smoke?”

“Della, I hardly know ye. I haveny lived in McCulloch Street for, I dunno, a wheen of years. I don’t need you gettin’ on my case. How can you not just get the coppers to do their job?”

“Well, that jist it, they willny. Jist point-blank refused, said…whit did they say?...said it wid be bad for community relations, they said that. Could inflame tensions, that was another one. Cuz of these riots and that. All cuz it was one of they Pakis raped her.”

Oh, no…

Light, all light, true light, daring techniques nobody had dreamt of, searing back off a  chandelier, a mirror, a brass frame, a golden chain, the whole scene reflected perfectly in the image-within-the-image, subtly insinuating from the convex glass of the mirror, a perfect non-Euclidean transposition of the objects…the guide said.

“Della, I really don’t need to be hearin’ this. I’m awful sorry to hear about your daughter, about Mel, and I wish you well, I do, but I’m not your guy. It’s not about bein’ mister-high-and-mighty, it’s just…you don’t ask a fireman to bake you bread, you ask a baker. Jist not my job.”

“Wis it cuz I said ‘Paki’?”

“Naw…it’s…well, that’s not the reason, really not, but tell the truth, I’m not comfortable hearin’ that, no. I know ye’re upset and that….”

“Okay, well, one of they Asians done it, how’d’ye like that? Mel was out on Albert Drive and it was all kickin’ off. She’s doin’ her nosey, mibbe had a wee drink, and this is whit happens? She comes home to me, comes home in some state, says mum, somethin’ terrible’s happened…”

“Listen, Della…if I could do somethin’, I would, but like I say, here’s me in London and that’s no good to you and Mel. You need to get the polis to do their job right. Sorry I canny do anythin’ more, but that’s jist how…”

I was speaking to empty space; Della was gone.

None of the other paintings in the room, mainly facial portraits with a scattering of devotional scenes, interested me at all, but Jan Van Eyck’s creations gazed at me from half a millennium away and spoke of status, hopes, vanity and the transitory nature of it all, the Arnolfinis puckish compatriots to Shelley’s Ozymandias and Fitzgerald’s Gatsby.

Or, at least, that what my exam answer would have said.

I left the gallery educated, provoked, perplexed…disappointed, dismayed and feeling several different brands of shabby. It seemed like some kind of bait had been cast and I was the quarry.

*** *** ***

London Is Burning and I…I Live By The River

“Ronnie, you still got a pair of those binoculars, the big old heavy Zeiss numbers the Met used to give you for surveillance?”

“Eh, most likely, somewhere. Why, you on somethin’ moody? Some tail job, surveillance? No? Don’t tell me you’re going bird-spottin’ or some mad ‘hing?”

“Actually…”

“Whit? You’ve lost it, McCabe. Truly. You’ve turned back into your fifteen-year-old self. Your face’ll be breakin’ out in plooks next.”

Phone ringing, screen saying it was Bernie. Bernie Feeney, my ex, my partner, my former lover, my significant other, my past, my future, my victim.

“Early in the day to hear your voice, Bernie, they tell me the weather up there is-”

“Sorry, Stevie, later, eh? This is business just now. You see the news, from up here I mean?”

“Oh, that guy wiped out his family, happened in Elder Park, some of it anyway. Shockin’ thing, Tommy Mac phoned and I-”

“No, not that, something else - remember the Dornoch Textiles fire?”

“What? Ah…warehouse or a factory or somethin’, out on the Southside, I used to pass it sometimes when I was working on that TV show, you could still see the-”

“Aye, that’s the one. Client of ours got five years for arson, racist attack as well, they said, because the factory employed mostly Asians.”

Ronnie was shouting that he had left the binoculars in the hall as I flipped open the laptop to scrape the rust off my memory of Dornoch Textiles and their convicted firebomber, described as Murray Gilchrist, 24.

“It’s coming back to me now…I’m Googlin’ it, I’m lookin’ at the old news report here…okay, it’s history, I don’t see the joy?”

“Well, we think there’s something to play with. Murray Gilchrist always denied he did the attack – I mean, genuinely denied it. And there’s been a second firebomb attack, same deal, same method, same result, and Gilchrist’s still in jail. We think this goes to his innocence. It was never a strong prosecution in the first place, they painted a load of shit on his back just cuz he was a zoomer in this white power mob, hooked an Asian one time, used all the non-magic words while he was doin’ it…”

“I dunno, that sounds pretty good evidence to me – punch a Punjabi for Scotland, that’s a crime even if he’s wearin’ a tartan tammy when he does it.”

“Well, we’re his lawyers-”

“’course you are. Every wide-o with an agenda knows he’ll get the best defence from his enemies, unless he just wants to make a point and wave his flag. So he picks you, nice liberals. And now you think this second firebomb’s gonny help an appeal, right? When anybody else’ll jist think it’s one of his Nazi buddies. Even if these guys’re not givin’ him some help, they might just do it for the fun – that’d be a good night out for the master race on the Southside.”

“Like I say…we’re his lawyers. It’s our job, and we just get the message – strong message - that the coppers aren’t too keen to find anything that’ll take one out of the win column. We need a second opinion.”

“Bernie, I’m not your guy, I’m in London, for Chrissake, I-”

“Nobody knows better than me that you’re in London, Stevie, nor why. At least, I think I know why, but you weren’t usually the kinda guy to run away from something. Kinda the opposite.”

“Ah, now, suddenly it’s you-and-me talk?”

“Actually, no. That was just me taking a shot – I’m entitled, don’t you think? So, if you plan to get your arse back in Glasgow any time soon, we’d appreciate your help with this wee business. And I’m saying that nice.”

“I’m the only guy you can use? Just call anybody on your books, or do you not trust all the other ex-coppers not to get a wee bit too cheerful gettin’ a gig as cheerleaders for white power? Unless you think there’s somethin’ about me that I’d be your best bet for-” 

“No. I think there’s somethin’ about you that might make you do it for me.”

Call ended, and I knew I’d lost. Fucked if I could tell what it was I’d lost, but it was something, maybe more than just one battle and it hadn’t even been close.

Fuck you, Murray Gilchrist (24). Who were you, creeping into my day unbidden and smearing your shitty hands all over it? Another guy in a black hat, hundreds of miles away, like Pradip Jadeja, letting other people broadcast their versions of his story, another tribal historian telling tales. This one, though…I owed her. Not this way, I didn’t think, but when you’re in debt, you don’t always get to pick and choose how you pay. So, Dornoch Textiles…

Their warehouse/factory was only a few blocks from the location of a TV show I’d worked on, Unmissable You, the cause - one way and another – of all my recent troubles. Unmissable You was the reason I found myself in London, the reason I was separated from Bernie, the reason why I was considering a change of career, and the reason why I had money to spend…hey, sometimes there’s a silver lining. Different effects, different outcomes, different feelings, but all stemming from Britain’s most sensational, most ridiculous, most talked-about (for mostly the wrong reasons) TV show.

Dornoch Textiles was located a little south of the TV studio and occasionally, when I wasn’t using West Street subway station, I’d pass the factory on my way there from where the bus dropped me off. Those would be the times I was arriving from Bernie’s place…better times.

The textile factory occupied an entire block, classic red Victorian brickwork around dirty windows, secured behind I-defy-you security screens, as if the building protected gold, not silks and cottons. And along the longest wall that faced the main road, soot-blackened bricks told one part of Murray Gilchrist’s story…

…sharp frost nipping at his face, he kept close to the wall as he turned the corner. He knew there were no CCTV cameras here, but he didn’t need anybody seeing his face – don’t wear a mask, ya fanny, Magsy said, it’ll jist make you look rank, walkin’ right out there like some kinna criminal. He was outside the place now, where all they Pakis worked. The screens looked impressive over the windows, but they were attached to the wall with crappy brackets that his wee crowbar pinged off like party poppers. He peeled back enough of the screen to take aim at the glass beneath, punching a jagged hole with a half-ender, simultaneously trying to muffle the sound the brick made as it shattered the window. He squirted petrol through the hole, spraying it as far as he could and hurling the incendiary after. Don’t make that fuckin ‘hing blow up in your face, Magsy said, keep the wick ‘hing , the fuse timer ‘hing, whatever it is, away from ye when ye light it, ye get me?  So he did, the deep whoosh of flame startling and exciting. He launched the flaming missile through the hole in the window and watched the dark factory interior jangle to life in the light-and-shadow dance choreographed by the juddering spikes of flame. He wanted to stay and watch it burn, but Magsy said get off yer mark, quick as, the busies’ll be down in a minute and you need to be somewhere else by then.

Was that how it happened? I don’t know, I wasn’t there, I made that up. But, yeah, it made sense and it was the story people believed.  The blaze caused “extensive damage”, whatever that means, despite whatever fire-detection and prevention systems Dornoch Textiles had (or hadn’t) installed.

Later stories told me that Murray Gilchrist was arrested, charged and convicted for the offence, betrayed by his boasting-down-the-boozer and a cache of “incendiary devices” found in his home, in a classic stupid/evil mash-up. He pleaded not guilty to the end, but…oh, here we go, here we are…his membership of Scotland: White Power did him no favours, made the jury believe that he was that wee bit more likely than the next guy to firebomb a factory employing largely Asian workers. Bye, bye, Murray Gilchrist (24), see ye in five.

And now, it seemed like somebody else was intent on pursuing his unholy mission, because Dornoch Textiles had suffered a very similar attack and it wasn’t – for sure - the bold Murray, since he was still in HMP Barlinnie. I guessed all the other members of Scotland: White Power, if any, would be tidying up their cupboards and garages as a matter of some urgency, jettisoning anything that would burn.

Anyhow, so what? Me, I’m in London, what do I care?

Elder Park Is Melting In The Dark

Elder Park is Melting in the Dark

Pradip Jadeja killed his children in Elder Park.

For some fuck-knows-why reason he took them, hand in hand, all the way down to the playground at the Clyde Tunnel end of the park and he killed them there, among the swings.

Not with a gentle pillow, not with the drifting bliss of narcotics, not with a mad twist of his steering wheel into the eternal embrace of a Douglas Fir.

But, instead, with a knife.

Bloody, visceral, and public, he killed them where everybody could see, even although none of them wanted to, men, women and children.

No, Pradip Jadeja killed his children in Elder Park.

Both of them.

And when the police went back to his tenement flat overlooking the park, they found he’d killed his wife, too.

Of course, naturally.

With the same ten-inch blade he used to kill his children. And he didn’t bother to wipe it, witnesses said.

No, he led his two children through Elder Park to the chutes and roundabouts where they died, carrying a huge fucking bloody blade in his hand.

How do I know? How does anybody know? Because the witnesses said so.

The witnesses who watched a man grasping a bloody knife and leading children by the hand.

The witnesses who noticed enough to remark – later - on what they saw, but who never thought to intervene.

Who failed to prevent the murder of two children under the age of seven, butchered beneath a darkening evening sky in Glasgow G51 by their loving father.

But, listen…some of that story isn’t true. How much? Some…plenty…most…I don’t know. I don’t know, because I wasn’t there and because “witnesses” are the worst kind of evidence upon which you could ever choose to base any conclusions. Witnesses lie, they forget, they invent, they rationalise, they concur. They will tell you what they thought they saw, what they wanted to see, and what they think you want them to tell you they saw.

If ever you hear the words “I saw it with my own eyes” tumble from the lips of a member of the general public, assume whatever they are saying is garbage. If you do make that assumption, you’ll be right more than half the time – which immediately makes you more reliable than most “witnesses”.

So, all I know about Pradip Jadeja and the death of his children in Elder Park, I read in the papers or I heard at the other end of a phone. And then again, it was because of the phone calls that I read the papers. The papers...they take what witnesses say and add their own gloss, their own slant, their own...lies.

And it didn’t - couldn’t – concern me anyway, because I was four hundred miles away. I wasn’t in Glasgow at all. Instead, I was ambling across Blackfriars Bridge, trying to figure out how that new station worked, the one that was on both sides of the Thames, when Tommy Mac called.

“’How ye doin’, Stevie?”

“I’m good, jist admiring some architecture here…well, actually, it’s a train station on a bridge across the river, so mibbe it’s more a question of engineering than architecture. Anyhow, shouldn’t you be educating Scotland’s future about now?”

“That’s a job for lesser men and women. This time of day, people like me are doing management. Put some quotation marks round that, if you like.”

“Which includes this phone call to me?”

“It seems to. Thought I’d give you a bell and see if you’ve had enough of London yet.”

“Samuel Johnson said…”

“…I know what he said – what does Stevie McCabe say?”

“Well, I’m still here. That’s the non-breakin’ news today. Am I missing much while I’m away?”

“Uh…everybody’s, you know…the same…the weather’s amazin’, though. The weather, you believe it? This heat, never known anything like it. Everybody was like lobsters for a few days, now they’re like walnuts. Canny get a breath, even at night. Hotter than Casablanca, they said on the news…talkin’ about the news, did ye see that thing there, those murders? Terrible thing over your old patch last night. This taxi driver killed his kids, right there in Elder Park. Two or three of ‘em, stabbed them on the swings, a sword or somethin’.”

“Jesus. Bastard. Gettin’ back at his wife for some reason, usually, that type of thing. If I can’t have them, nobody will. They divorced, him and the mother? A certain kinna guy just…”

“Dunno. I jist heard it on the TV, and people are talkin’, y’know? Like you’d expect. How could anybody do that, and so on. Shockin’ thing – is it not on the national news?”

“Might be, haveny seen it...but I must admit, news isn’t the first thing on my mind these days.”

“Whit? Not even the Daily Banner?”

“Ouch, Tommy, that hurt, but I guess I asked for it. Or did I? Anyway, sure, I’m still spending the Daily Banner’s blood money. It keeps me from havin’ to do anything as tedious as actually work. For now, anyway.”

“So… you thinkin’ seriously that you might actually stay in London – you gettin’ on okay with your mate?”

“Ronnie is bein’ very good to me, but I’m cramping his style. It’s fine the now, but…dunno. He could get me a job, probably, if I wanted it, workin’ for the bank he’s at. Dunno if I want that, or not. An actual job...hmm. Depends on a lot of things.”

“Doesn’t everything? You talked to Bernie?”

“Talked? Eh…”

“Simple enough question.”

“You’d think. Yeah, I phoned her, twice, so we talked.”

“How is she? About you, I mean.”

“She’s the way you think Bernie’d be. She’s angry…no, that’s not right…more like she was angry, now she’s disappointed. Like when somebody lets you down, and you knew it was comn’, but it happened anyway. Disappointed like that. But she’s…fair. I think that’s the word. She’s not slow to stick the knife in, you give her the chance, but what can I say? She’s right, that’s fair.”

“And ye’re not down there makin’ matters worse, with that woman from your TV show?”

“Worse? Christ, Tommy, Sarah is just a friend.”

“Whoa there, where did that word come from, ‘friend’? Sounded just wrong in that sentence, Stevie, like you’d said ‘anvil’, or ‘stickleback’. Or worse.”

“Well, Tommy, it’s a weird fuckin’ day in old London town when it’s you givin’ me relationship advice. I think you need to get back to your management, in quotation marks, or telling 5C about covalent pair bonds.”

“Fair enough – just let me know what address to send your wedding invitation to.”

And he was gone before I could ask “what wedding”? I knew anyway, it would be Tommy and Veronica, who else? And I guessed that they would be inviting Bernie as well as me.

Still, he had planted a seed in my mind, so I made my rounds of the news sources of the world wide web and after an hour I was better informed than Tommy about the bloody murders in Elder Park. Elder Park, Govan’s dear green space, every inch of its northern perimeter staring down a huge brick-and-steel industrial mass of what had once been the shipyards that built the world’s fleets but was now…what? I don’t know. Nothing, probably. Reading the words on the screen stirred some memories, prompted some thoughts, provoked some doubts…

And so, Pradip Jadeja and his tragic family crept their way into my life, not as experience, but as drama, a tale told by another, who was himself playing the tribal historian and adding his own layers to the “truth”. Still and all, lies and their bastard offspring are…were…my stock-in-trade

But me, I’m in London. What do I care?