Calling Jesus

There was no name on the door, but there were on the others, and none of them was Clancy. I chapped the splintery surface and waited.

No answer. Inside, I could hear the television, canned laughter and whooping. I knocked again, the door juddering under the rap….the TV was still the only sound. I bent down and shouted through the letterbox. “Taxi for Clancy!” Inside, vague bumps and clicks. The door was opened in slow-motion by a woman with no outline, a shape you couldn’t pour custard into. She spoke in the same halting freeze-frame style.

“I never phoned a taxi. Must be a mistake.”

“You answered to Clancy, but.”

“I’m no’ goin’ anywhere.”

“Aye, I know. My name’s Stephen McCabe, by the way. Here’s a letter from a lawyer, says why I’m really here. Can I come in?”

“Eh? I canny…whit is it ye want?”

“Somebody left you money in their will, except the money seems to have taken a walk. I want to talk to you about that.”

“Canny be arsed.”

“Are you listening to me? I said, there could be money in this for you – a lot of money, actually.”

“Whit do I have to do?”

“Let me come in and talk to you – deal?”

Linda Clancy’s living room was definitely well on the upside of average for a single woman presumably living on welfare benefits, absent the junkie hallmarks of no carpet, two weeks’ worth of takeaway containers piled askew, drug paraphernalia, grim odours and unfathomable dirt. It was, in fact, clean, tidy and decorated sometime this century, furnished with Sweden’s finest flatpacks and Scotland’s tartan-est fabrics. The one startling item was a 54-inch Samsung plasma, but that was hardly uncommon and it didn’t constitute evidence that Linda was wallowing in the delights of a Cayman bank account.

Sad to say, she didn’t offer tea, a dismal reflection on her manners, although I would have declined if she had, a dismal reflection on mine.

“I’m readin’ this letter, but you’ll have to tell me whit it means.”

“It says…in a sentence, that Lachlan Doune left you his money. Pretty much all of it.”

“Who’s Lachlan Doune?”

“Lachlan Doune. He…you don’t recognise the name?”

“Who is he? Funny kinna name. Sounds stuck-up. Or some kinna teuchter.”

“Sorry to bring this up…I think. He’s the man that killed your daughter.”

“Whit? My daughter’s fine. She was up here yesterday. She’s up here aw the time. Ye’re talkin’ mince.”

“No, this was years ago – Nicole.”

“Aw…awww. Wee Nicole? Aw, no. Aye, I remember her, I…”

“You remember her? She was six and -”

“- aye, with ye now. Some guy kilt her. Aye, right enough. Awful sad. Sad for me, that is, no’ for him – ach, I suppose it was jist sad all round, eh?”

“Linda, I’m not gettin’ the normal signals from you here. You do remember Nicole?”

“Aye. Was an awful long time ago, but. Cuz, see me? I had this drug problem, awful bad, for a lotta years. A load of stuff is…hazy. I canny remember everythin’. See, even now? I canny remember ‘hings. Names? Your name? Did ye tell me it? I dunno. I couldny tell you your own name. My daughter’s awful good to me, right enough. Leanne, that is, no wee Nicole. She’s…”

“Do you have any other family now? Husband?”

“That’s a laugh. I’m Teflon to men, nothin’ sticks. It’s jist me and Leanne, no’ like she lives here, that’s only me. But she comes by regular.”

“And you’re sure the name Lachlan Doune means nothin’ to you?”

“Well, now you’ve told me, aye. He was the fuckin paedo weirdo that killed my Nicole. Mad bastard, huge but he was only twelve or sum’hin. Aye, now you say his name, I remember him. Hated him. For whit he did, know?”

“You ever meet him?”

“Meet? Naw, don’t ‘hink so. Saw him, s’pose.”

“Twenty years ago? Or since?”

“Dunno, don’t ‘hink I ever met him, like I say. Look, I told you, I didny know what day it wis, back then - it wis aw they drugs. My brain’s fucked. If I ever met that guy, I don’t remember.”

“Never got a letter, phone call from him? Or anybody else, talkin’ about him? Nobody mentioned money?”

“Money? That’s a good yin. ‘hink I’d be sittin’ here if I had money? I canny tell ye any’hin, mister. Well, actually, the one ‘hing I can tell ye is ‘jist say no, kids’, that’s right enough, cuz they drugs are bad news. S’obvious, int’it? Look at me, I’m a zombie…here, whit was that ye said about a will?”

“You were named in Lachlan’s will, but there’s no money anyway.”

“Ha! That’s typical, jist ma luck.”

“Why’d he do that, name you in his will, if he never met you?”

“That’ll be the sixty-four million dollar question, eh? Cept it isny, it’s the no-dollar question, accordin’ to you.”

“Am I wastin’ my time to ask you what you remember about the time Nicole went missing?”

“What d’you ‘hink? Fuck all, is the answer. It was an awful long time ago, and I was -”

“I know. Full of the smack and that. Somebody else told me the same thing.”

“I wisny always like that, sometimes I’ve been okay. Like now? Been clean enough for a good long time. But back then? Naw. And your memory jist gets gubbed after a while. So when do I get the money?”

“The what? The nothing, you mean? Never, seems like. Or, put it another way, you can have it right now, since there’s nothing to give you anyway. Mind you, there’s a lawyer that’s payin’ me to chase after that nothing, jist because it’s the right thing to do. How d’you like that?”

“Well, a mad bastard like that – what’s his name, Lachlan? – wouldny have any money anyway, would he?”

“Turns out he should’ve, cuz he got all the Doune cash. Families are strange, they tell me.”

“Very bastard strange, aye. Still, what’s mine’s mine, right? If that will says I should have the money, then somebody has to give me it. Aye? And if that freak doesny have it, get it off Malcolm or one of them.”

“Malcolm? You don’t remember the name of the guy that killed your six-year-old, but you remember his brother?”

“Is that his name? Good guess. I’m like one of those old guys, them that’s got that dementia? Wee ‘hings from a hunnert years ago? Clear as day. Your own address? Not a clue. Don’t mean that exactly – I know my address, but some a’ they guys don’t. Some ‘hings jist jump out, like ‘Malcolm’. If you’d gone and asked me that name, I’d go ‘whit brother?’, but there ye are, it jumped out…seems sum’hin stuck somewhere. Funny how the mind works.”

“When Nicole went missing, when she was six years old, what were you doin’ then? You have a job?”

“I was…a mother. I’ve never worked, since I had my kids…well, Nicole was the only one, back then. Aw, naw, wait a minute - there was Gemma, too, aye…but Nicole’s da was a bad bastard, in and out the jail, only good ‘hing he ever did was give me the wean. And I had my troubles, like I said, but I was a mother, that was my job.”

“The guy in jail – you marry him? Was he Clancy?”

“Whit ye gettin’ at? Why’s my name matter? Naw, we never got married, Clancy’s my name. I could tell ye his, but it’d take me a minute to mind it - Charlie was his first name, how’s that?”

“Reason I’m askin’…if he was your legal husband, he’d be entitled to some of your inheritance. Not the biggest disaster in the world, half of fuck-all is still nothin’, but if we get a hold of any of the money, well…”

“Would he? Is that true? Well, that’s…doesny matter anyhow, cuz I never got married.”

“No? Well, hardly matters, like you say. Listen, if you think of anything else, call me? Here’s my card.”

“If I ‘hink of anythin’ else, I’ll be callin’ Jesus, cuz it’ll be a miracle.”