Set in Darkness

  ‘I must remember to bring my lighter. Two o’clock in Mather’s?’

  ‘There’ll be a beer waiting for you.’

  ‘Siobhan, whatever it was you were up to tonight . . . ?’

  ‘Yes?’

  ‘Did you get a result?’

  ‘No,’ she said, sounding suddenly tired. ‘Not even a goalless draw.’

  He put the phone down, refilled his whisky glass. ‘Refined tonight, John,’ he told himself. Oftentimes nowadays he just swigged from the bottle. The weekend stretched ahead of him, one football game the extent of his plans. His living room was wreathed in shadows and cigarette smoke. He kept thinking of selling the flat, finding somewhere with fewer ghosts. Then again, they were the only company he had: dead colleagues, victims, expired relationships. He reached again for the bottle, but it was empty. Stood up and watched the floor sway beneath him. He thought he had a fresh bottle in the carrier bag beneath the window, but the bag was empty and crumpled. He looked out of his window, catching his reflection and its puzzled frown. Had he left a bottle in the car? Had he brought home two bottles or just the one? He thought of a dozen places where he could get a drink, even at two in the morning. The city – his city – was out there waiting for him, waiting to show its dark, shrivelled heart.

  ‘I don’t need you,’ he said, resting the palms of his hands on the window, as if willing the glass to shatter and take him tumbling with it. A two-storey descent to the street below.

  ‘I don’t need you,’ he repeated. Then he pushed off from the glass, went to find his coat.

  3

  Saturday, the clan had lunch at the Witchery.

  It was a good restaurant, sited at the top of the Royal Mile. The Castle was a near neighbour. Lots of natural light: it was almost like eating in a conservatory. Roddy had organised it for their mother’s 75th. She was a painter, and he reckoned she’d like all the light that poured into the restaurant. But the day was overcast. Squalls of rain drilled at the windows. Low cloud base: standing at the Castle’s highest point, you felt you could have touched heaven.

  They’d started with a quick walk around the battlements, Mother looking unimpressed. But then she’d first visited the place some seventy years before, had probably been there a hundred times since. And lunch hadn’t improved her spirits, though Roddy praised each course, each mouthful of wine.

  ‘You always overdo things!’ his mother snapped at him.

  To which he said nothing, just stared into his pudding bowl, glancing up eventually to wink at Lorna. When he did so, she was reminded of her brother as a kid, always with that shy, endearing quality – something he mostly reserved for voters and TV interviewers these days.

  You always overdo things! Those words hung in the air for a time, as though others at the table wanted to relish them. But then Roddy’s wife Seona spoke up.

  ‘I wonder who he gets that from.’

  ‘What did she say? What did she say?’

  And of course it was Cammo who brokered the peace: ‘Now, now, Mother, just because it’s your birthday . . .’

  ‘Finish the bloody sentence!’

  Cammo sighed, took one of his deep breaths. ‘Just because it’s your birthday, let’s take a walk down towards Holyrood.’

  His mother glared at him. She had eyes like a frigate’s hull. But then her face cracked into a smile. The others resented Cammo for his ability to bring about this transformation. At that moment, he possessed the powers of a magus.

  Six of them at the table. Cammo, the elder son, hair swept back from his forehead, sporting his father’s gold cuff links – the one thing the old man had left him in the will. They’d never agreed on politics, Cammo’s father a Liberal of the old school. Cammo had joined the Conservative Party while still an undergraduate at St Andrews. Now he had a safe seat in the Home Counties, representing a mainly rural area between Swindon and High Wycombe. He lived in London, loved the nightlife and the sense of being at the core of something. Married, his wife a drunk and serial shopper. They were seldom seen together. He was photographed at balls and parties, always with some new woman on his arm.

  That was Cammo.

  He’d come north overnight on the sleeper; had complained that the club car hadn’t been open – staff shortages.

  ‘Bloody disgrace. You privatise the railways and still can’t get a decent whisky and soda.’

  ‘Christ, does anybody still drink soda?’

  This was Lorna, back at the house as they prepared to go out to lunch. Lorna had always had the handling of her brother. She was all of eleven months younger than him, had somehow found time in her schedule for this reunion. Lorna was a fashion model – a story she was sticking to despite encroaching age and a shortage of bookings. In her late forties now, she’d been at her earning height in the 1970s. She still got work, cited Lauren Hutton as an influence. She’d dated MPs in her time, just as Cammo had seen fit to ‘walk out’ with the occasional model. She’d heard stories about him, and was sure he’d heard stories about her. On the rare occasions when they met, they circled one another like bare-knuckle fighters.

  Cammo had made a point of choosing whisky and soda as his aperitif.

  Then there was baby Roddy, just touching forty. Always the rebel at heart, but somehow lacking the curriculum vitae. Roddy the one-time Scottish office boffin, now an investment analyst. He was New Labour. Didn’t really possess the ammunition when his big brother came in with all ideological guns blazing. But Roddy sat there with quiet, immutable authority, the shells failing to scratch him. One political commentator had called him Scottish Labour’s Mr Fixit, because of his ability to brush away the sand from around the party’s many landmines and set about defusing them. Others called him Mr Suck-Up, a lazy explanation of his emergence as a prospective MSP. In fact, Roddy had planned today’s lunch as a double celebration, since he’d had official notice just that morning that he would be running in Edinburgh West End as Labour’s candidate for the Scottish Parliament.

  ‘Bloody hell,’ had been Cammo’s rolling-eyed reaction as the champagne was being poured.

  Roddy had allowed himself a quiet smile, tucking a stray lock of thick black hair back behind his ear. His wife Seona had squeezed his arm in support. Seona was more than the loyal wife; if anything, she was the more politically active of the two, and history teacher at a city comprehensive.

  Billary, Cammo often called them, a reference to Bill and Hillary Clinton. He thought most teachers were a short hop from subversives, which hadn’t stopped him flirting with Seona on half a dozen separate, usually drunken occasions. When challenged by Lorna, his defence was always the same: ‘Indoctrination by seduction. Bloody cults get away with it, why shouldn’t the Tory Party?’

  Lorna’s husband was there, too, though he’d spent half the meal over by the doorway, head tucked in towards a mobile phone. From the back he looked faintly ridiculous: too paunchy for the cream linen suit, the pointy-toed black shoes. And the greying ponytail – Cammo had laughed out loud when introduced to it.

  ‘Gone New Age on us, Hugh? Or is professional wrestling your new forte?’

  ‘Sod off, Cammo.’

  Hugh Cordover had been a rock star of sorts back in the 1970s and ’80s. These days he was a record producer and band manager, and got less media attention than his brother Richard, an Edinburgh lawyer. He’d met Lorna at the tail-end of her career, when some adviser had assured her she could sing. She’d turned up late and drunk at Hugh’s studio. He’d opened the door to her, thrown a glass of water into her face, and ordered her to come back sober. It had taken her the best part of a fortnight. They’d gone to dinner that night, worked in the studio till dawn.

  People still recognised Hugh on the street, but they weren’t the people worth knowing. These days, Hugh Cordover lived by his holy book, this being a bulging, black leather personal organiser. He had it open in his hand as he paced the restaurant, phone tucked between shoulder and cheek. He was fixing meetings, always meetings.
Lorna watched him over the rim of her glass, while her mother demanded that the lights be turned on.

  ‘So damned awful dark in here. Am I supposed to be reminded of the graveyard?’

  ‘Yes, Roddy,’ Cammo drawled, ‘do something about it, will you? This was your idea after all.’ Looking around the premises with all the disdain he could muster. But then the photographers had arrived – one organised by Roddy, one from a glossy magazine – which brought Cordover back to the table, and fixed authentic-seeming smiles to all the members of the Grieve clan.

  Roddy Grieve hadn’t meant for them to walk the whole length of the Royal Mile. He’d gone so far as to organise a couple of taxis which were waiting for them outside the Holiday Inn. But his mother wouldn’t have it.

  ‘If we’re going to walk, then for Christ’s sake let’s walk!’ And off she set, her walking stick seven parts affectation to three parts painful necessity, leaving Roddy to pay off the drivers. Cammo leaned towards him.

  ‘You always overdo things.’ A pretty good imitation of their mother.

  ‘Bugger off, Cammo.’

  ‘I wish I could, dear brother. But the next train to civilisation’s not for some time yet.’ Making show of studying his watch. ‘Besides, it’s Mother’s birthday: she’d be devastated if I suddenly departed.’

  Which, Roddy couldn’t help feeling, was probably true.

  ‘She’ll go over on that ankle,’ Seona said, watching her mother-in-law moving downhill with that peculiar shuffling gait which attracted all manner of attention. Sometimes, Seona felt that it was affectation, too. Alicia had always had ways and means of drawing the looks of those around her, and of including her offspring in the spectacle. It hadn’t been so bad when Allan Grieve had been alive – he’d kept his wife’s eccentricities in check. But now that Roddy’s father was dead, Alicia had started compensating for years of enforced normality.

  Not that the Grieves were a normal family: Roddy had warned Seona about them the first time they’d gone out together. She’d already known, of course – everyone in Scotland knew at least something about the Grieves – but had elected to keep her counsel. Roddy wasn’t like them, she’d told herself back then. She still said it to herself sometimes, but without the old conviction.

  ‘We could go look at the parliament site,’ she suggested as they reached the St Mary’s Street junction.

  ‘Good God, whatever for?’ Cammo droned predictably.

  Alicia pursed her lips, then, saying nothing, turned towards Holyrood Road. Seona tried not to smile: it had been a small but palpable victory. But then who was she fighting?

  Cammo held back. The three women were matching each other for pace. Hugh had stopped by a shop window to take yet another call. Cammo fell into step beside Roddy, pleased to note that he was still immeasurably better groomed and dressed than his younger brother.

  ‘I’ve had another of those notes,’ he said, keeping the tone conversational.

  ‘What notes?’

  ‘Christ, didn’t I tell you? They come to my parliamentary office. My secretary opens them, poor girl.’

  ‘Hate mail?’

  ‘How many MPs do you know who get fan letters?’ Cammo tapped Roddy’s shoulder. ‘Something you’re going to have to live with if you get elected.’

  ‘If,’ Roddy repeated with a smile.

  ‘Look, do you want to hear about these bloody death threats or not?’

  Roddy stopped in his tracks, but Cammo kept walking. It took Roddy a moment to catch up.

  ‘Death threats?’

  Cammo shrugged. ‘Not unknown in our line of work.’

  ‘What do they say?’

  ‘Nothing much. Just that I’m “in for it”. One of them had a couple of razor blades inside.’

  ‘What do the police say?’

  Cammo looked at him. ‘So middle-aged, and yet so naïve. The forces of law and order, Roddy – I offer this lesson gratis and for nothing – are like a leaky sieve, especially when there’s a drink in it for them and one or more MPs is involved.’

  ‘They’d talk to the media?’

  ‘Bingo.’

  ‘I still don’t see . . .’

  ‘The papers would be all over it, and all over me.’ Cammo waited for his words to sink in. ‘Wouldn’t have a life to call my own.’

  ‘But death threats . . .’

  ‘A crank.’ Cammo sniffed. ‘Not worth mentioning really, except as a warning. My fate could be yours some day, baby bro.’

  ‘If I get elected.’ That shy smile again, the shyness masking a real appetite for the fight.

  ‘If ne’er won fair maiden,’ Cammo said. Then he shrugged. ‘Something like that anyway.’ He looked ahead. ‘Mother’s fairly shifting, isn’t she?’

  Alicia Grieve had been born Alicia Rankeillor, and it was under this name that she’d found fame – and a certain fortune – as a painter. The particular nature of Edinburgh light had been her subject. Her best-known painting – duplicated on greetings cards, prints and jigsaws – showed a series of jagged beams breaking through a carapace of cloud to pick out the Castle and the Lawnmarket beyond. Allan Grieve, though only a few years her elder, had been her tutor at the School of Art. They’d married young, but hadn’t become parents until their careers were well established. Alicia had the sneaking feeling that Allan had always resented her success. He was a great teacher, but lacked the spark of genius as an artist himself. She’d once told him that his paintings were too accurate, that art needed a measure of artifice. He’d squeezed her hand but said nothing until just before his death, when he’d thrown her words back at her.

  ‘You killed me that day, snuffed out any hope I might have still had.’ She’d started to protest but he’d hushed her. ‘You did me a good turn, you were right. I lacked the vision.’

  Sometimes Alicia wished that she’d lacked the vision, too. Not that it would have made her a better, more loving mother. But it might have made her a more generous wife, a more pleasing lover.

  Now she lived alone in the huge house in Ravelston, surrounded by the paintings of others – including a dozen of Allan’s, smartly framed – and a short walk from the Gallery of Modern Art, where they’d recently held a retrospective of her work. She had contrived an illness to excuse her from attending, then had gone in secret one day, only minutes past opening time when the place was dead, and had been shocked to find that thematic order had been placed on her work, an order she didn’t recognise.

  ‘They found a body, you know,’ Hugh Cordover was saying.

  ‘Hugh!’ Cammo piped up with mock cordiality. ‘You’re back with us!’

  ‘A body?’ Lorna asked.

  ‘It was on the news.’

  ‘I heard it was a skeleton actually,’ Seona said.

  ‘Found where?’ Alicia asked, pausing to take in the skyline of Salisbury Crags.

  ‘Hidden in a wall in Queensberry House.’ Seona pointed to the location. They were standing in front of its gates. They all stared at the building. ‘It used to be a hospital.’

  ‘Probably some poor old sod from the waiting list,’ Hugh Cordover said, but no one was listening.

  4

  ‘Who do you think you are?’

  ‘What?’

  ‘You heard me.’ Jayne Lister threw a cushion at her husband’s head. ‘Those dishes have been sitting since last night.’ Her head motioned towards the kitchen. ‘You said you were going to do them.’

  ‘I am going to do them!’

  ‘When?’

  ‘It’s Sunday, day of rest.’ He was trying to make a joke of it; didn’t want his whole day ruined.

  ‘The whole week’s a day of rest as far as you’re concerned. What time did you get in last night?’

  He tried to see past her to where the TV was playing: some kids’ morning show; presenter was a bit of all right. He’d told Nic about her. She was there right now, talking on the telephone, waving a card. Imagine waking up of a morning and finding that beside you in the scrat
cher.

  ‘Move your arse,’ he told his wife.

  ‘You’ve taken the words out of my mouth.’ She turned and pushed the off button. Jerry was off the sofa with a speed which surprised her. He liked the look on her face: startled, and with a little bit of fear mixed in. He pushed her aside, reached for the button, but her hands were in his hair, yanking him back.

  ‘Out with that Nic Hughes till all hours,’ she was yelling. ‘Think you can come and go as you please, fucking pig!’

  He grabbed one of her wrists, squeezed. ‘Let go!’

  ‘Think I’m going to put up with it?’ She seemed oblivious to the pain. He squeezed harder, wrenching the wrist round. Her grip on his hair tightened. His scalp felt like it was on fire. Threw his head back and caught her just above the nose. That did it. She shrieked and let go, and he half-turned, pushing her hard on to the sofa. Her foot sent the coffee table flying: ashtray, empty cans, Saturday’s paper. Whole lot hit the deck. A thumping noise on the ceiling – upstairs neighbours complaining again. Her forehead was reddening where he’d connected. Christ, she’d given him a headache, too: as if the hangover wasn’t enough to be going on with.

  He’d done his arithmetic this morning: eight pints and two nips. That tallied with the small change in his pockets. Taxi had cost six quid. Nic had paid for the curry: lamb rogan josh, lovely. Nic had wanted to hit the clubs, but Jerry had said he wasn’t in the mood.

  ‘What if I’m in the mood, though?’ Nic had said. But after the curry he hadn’t seemed so keen. Two or three pubs . . . then a taxi for Jerry. Nic had said he’d walk. That was the clever thing about living in the middle of town: no need to worry over transport. Out here in the sticks, transport was always a problem. The buses weren’t to be relied on, and he could never remember when they stopped running anyway. Even taxi drivers, you had to lie to them, tell them you were bound for Gatehill. When you reached Gatehill, you could either get out and walk across the playing fields, or you could persuade the driver to take you the final half-mile into the Garibaldi Estate. One time, Jerry had been jumped while crossing the football pitch: four or five of them, and him too drunk to do anything but capitulate. Ever since, he would argue to be taken the distance.