The Long Midnight Of Barney Thomson (20 page)

He stepped out of the bedroom, turned to the door next to it. Probably a cupboard which was going to be bigger than his house, he thought, as he put his fingers on the handle.

Inside Barney was tensed, waiting for the moment. Felt as much as heard the hand touching the door above, prepared to dash out. Guessed that if he hit the man in the face with the bag, just as he opened the door, he might be able to get past him and out of the front door before he could do anything about it. Had no idea what he would do when he got downstairs, because he couldn't afford to let them see him driving off in his car. He could worry about that when he got down there, however.

The door started to swing open. He tensed his legs, holding the bag up, ready to pounce. Cold palms, head thumping, nerves raw and bloodied. Last second decision; don't wait for the door to be fully opened – crash out, hitting the guy with it. Started his leap…

'Sir!' MacPherson called from the kitchen, 'I think you should take a look at this.'

Holdall held the door half open; Barney managed to stop himself hitting off it by less than a centimetre. Rested back on his haunches, chest heaving. The door was closed over in front of him. Not closed shut, however. It was left marginally ajar, so that he could hear the conversation that went on the short way down the hall.

Holdall trudged resignedly to the kitchen. He really didn't want to see it, because he presumed it was going to be one of those huge white kitchens that people have in adverts for floor cleaner, but that no one has in real life.

He was pleasantly surprised. It was tiny. Smaller than his kitchen by a long way. Small enough, indeed, to win small kitchen competitions. The thought would have struck him that a single bloke would probably be more interested in pulling women than in having a huge kitchen – if it wasn't for something else which grabbed his attention.

MacPherson was standing in the middle of the room holding up someone's left hand with an exceptionally large pair of tweezers.

20

The Pregnant Escape

Barney held his breath. They were not supposed to have found anything this quickly, whoever they were. His mind and body were disintegrating into a tangled mass of frayed nerves and gelatinous visceral substructure. This was awful; bloody awful. Wished he had turned himself in right at the beginning, as he listened to the voices from without.

'Well, bugger me with a pitchfork. And I thought they'd banned beef on the bone. Who d'you think that belongs to, Sergeant?'

'No idea, Sir. It's male, certainly, but further than that I'd only be guessing.'

'Anything else in that pot?'

'Meat of some kind, sir. Who knows? Half cooked, too, but I wouldn't like to guess which part of the body it might be. Could be a bit of beef for all we know. I'm no pathologist.'

'Me neither. Looks like we've got a few phone calls to make.'

The voices continued, Barney stopped listening. He had recognised them; the same two policemen who'd been in the shop two days earlier. And they had found the hand a hell of a lot quicker than he had wanted them to. The place would be crawling with police within minutes, turning it upside down. He had to get out.

He slowly pushed the door further out, so that he could glance down the hall. The voices were clearer, but he was obscured from view of the action by a corner wall in the hall, between the kitchen and the front door.

He was just going to have to make a dash for it and hope for the best. He tentatively put his foot out of the door, and then, crouching, the rest of his body. Clammy hands, trembling with fear. If he was to escape it would have to be in the next few seconds or not at all.

He was into the hall and moving noiselessly and quickly to the door. He was at his most vulnerable, caught between hiding place and exit, should one of the police walk back out into the hall. And as he put his hand on the door handle and began its silent downward sweep, the conversation in the kitchen stopped. He heard footsteps coming towards him.

He froze. Still like ice. At least, you know, ice that's not thawing or anything. A voice screamed at him to run, but he knew it was too late. They would see the door closing as they came into the hall, there would be a brief chase and then he would be caught. That was all there was going to be.

And so, silently, finally, the flight and fear died within him and he stood waiting upon his fate; waiting upon his executioner.

The legs and then body of Holdall appeared at the corner, Barney released his breath, letting all hope fall from him. And then, as Holdall turned the corner and stood not three yards away from him, MacPherson called out again, having discovered the freezer, and Holdall turned his head away from the hall and Barney, before he had set eyes upon him.

So bereft of hope had he been, that Barney did not immediately dive out of the door. He remained frozen, before finally the impulse to move came to him, and slowly he opened the door, stepped out and closed it quietly behind him. His body disintegrated even further with relief. Stayed calm, because he was shattered of all emotion and anxiety.

He did not rush thereafter. The police were unlikely to turn up in droves in the next half minute and he didn't think he'd be followed down the stairs. So, with strange conviction, he walked quietly down the stairs, bag in hand, and out onto the street to his car.

As he started the engine he thought perhaps someone looked out of a window at him, but he didn't look back. Never look back. That was the way he would live his life from now on. And so he drove off down the road and disappeared into the gloom and dark of late afternoon.

*

The drive home was short and it wasn't until he was about to park his car that he thought to turn on the radio for the football results. He was going to have to tell anyone who asked that he'd been at a game, and it would be a good idea to know the score.

He had to listen for ten minutes before finally they gave a score from a match which he recognised as being in Glasgow. Partick Thistle versus Aberdeen. He wasn't sure exactly where Partick Thistle's ground was, but it seemed a fair bet that it'd be in Partick somewhere. Lived in Partick all his life, had never seen it; how small could a football ground be?

There was parking attached to the flats in which he lived, but he had a lock-up for the car about two minute's walk away. Was glad of it now, as he could get the heaps of plastic bags out of sight. A short walk back to the flat, was reminded that he needed to change his underwear. Too exhausted and relieved to be embarrassed.

He headed straight for the bedroom. It was hardly likely that Agnes would be interested in his arrival anyway. A quick wash and a clean pair of trousers later, he walked into the sitting room. Found her watching the television; the table set, awaiting dinner.

'It's in the oven,' she said to him, not bothering with an
hello
, or to look over her shoulder. Flange and Fleurelise were trying to fit Gossamer's body into the back of a Mini, after he'd been stabbed by Luge for having an affair with Peppermint. Barney grunted, realising with some surprise, as he went into the kitchen, that he was very hungry. All that handling chopped meat, he reflected.

The usual unappetising fare greeted him, but twenty-five years of it had quite lain waste to his taste buds. He was happy to eat anything. As always, he forgot to put on oven gloves and burned his fingers on the plate. Eventually he proved equal to the challenge and retrieved his dinner.

He lost himself in thought, as he plunged into his meal. What was he going to do with the eight hundred pounds or so of dead meat? Maybe he should just have left it in his mother's freezer, and then brought it home bit by bit for Agnes to cook. By the time she'd finished with it, it would have been quite unrecognisable. Still, don't be daft, Barney. You were never able to stomach Wullie alive, he thought, and he smiled grimly. And it didn't strike him how easily the grotesque had become acceptable.

Then, somewhere between a chip and a mouthful of savoury pancake, he realised that while he had to take care of what he did with Chris's body, he could dispose of the others as he pleased. Jings, I should have thought of that earlier, he thought, stabbing another chip with a little more venom. So what if they found the other bodies? It made no difference. It was only Chris's body which would have to remain concealed for all time.

Agnes's sweet voice dragged him from his deliberations.

'Here you! I had the polis looking for you this afternoon.'

Bloody hell.

'The polis?'

'Aye, the polis. They said that Chris was missing. Did you know that?'

He stared at her, wondering if the visit had been merely routine.

'What did they say? What did they want with me?'

'Well, I don't know, do I? They probably just want to ask you the same kind of thing they asked you the other day. Right strange though, isn't it, Wullie disappearing and now Chris? You don't think something's going to happen to you, do you?'

He slowly shook his head, stared into space. So, the police had already been round, even before they'd visited Chris's flat. Thought he better remember that football score. Two-one to Aberdeen. Don't forget it.

'They left a number they said you had to call when you got in. I left it by the ph…Here, what's going on?'

She turned back to the television. Dexter had just stabbed Deuteronomy because it appeared that it was Pleasure who'd drowned Patience and not Leviticus as everyone had thought.

Barney looked at the phone with dread, but something lightened his heart. It was unlikely that those two would come flying round to him, having just found what they'd found. There would be no immediate reason to suspect him, after discovering the cooking pot in Chris's kitchen, and they might leave him alone for a while. They'd be back, but he had probably given himself some breathing space.

Whatever else he did though, he would have to report in or else arouse suspicion. He happily speared three chips and popped them into his mouth. He wasn't home and dry yet, but things could definitely be worse. Much worse.

21

Waste Disposal

The sweat poured down Barney's face, mixing with the light drizzle. His clothes and his skin were soaking.
Barber Drowns In Own Body Fluids
. He hadn't had this much physical exercise since he was twelve, and his body wasn't coping well. He was having to stop every half minute or so and it was taking him a long time to get where he wanted to go. Wasn't that just the mirror of life? He took another look at his watch – already nearly four o'clock. He had to get a move on.

He straightened his back once again and put his shoulders into the task, sinking the oars deep into the water and dragging the boat forward as fast as he could. The weight at the back of the small rowing boat, however, was dragging it down, and it would have taken a much fitter man than Barney to manoeuvre it with any speed out into the centre of the loch. He cursed himself for not bringing gloves, as his hands were numb with cold and he began to feel the first tingle of pain, heralding the arrival of blisters on his fingers.
Helter Skelter
.

Once again he had to stop after no more than a few strokes. He looked over his shoulder and was surprised to see that he was nearer to the opposite shore than he'd thought. He was as close to the middle of the loch as he was able to get. Almost immediately the pain in his hands and shoulders eased and he drew the oars into the boat.

There was another impending awkward moment and not the first of the night. He had to tip the bundle at the back of the boat into the water, without capsizing or without taking himself over the edge with it.

He paused to get his strength back, looking around him. The hills were etched black against the night, the shores of the loch were visible, dim and dark through the drizzle. He could remember when his father used to bring him here for picnics when he was very young. Loch Lubnaig, a mile or two past Callander. Distant memories. Hot summers, smiling father. It wasn't as remote as he would have liked, but he hadn't had the time to go driving away up into the Highlands.

He'd waited late into the evening to see if the police would turn up at his house, and when by midnight they hadn't, he'd decided to make his move. With the final soap of the day finished, and Smoke and Dandelion safely locked up for the murder of Blanchette, a story in which even Barney had found himself interested, Agnes had trundled off to bed and Barney knew that within minutes she would be blissfully snoring and unaware of his movements.

He had headed off on the Stirling road, not entirely sure where he was going. On a whim, however, he drove through Glasgow rather than straight onto the motorway, and just before he came to Glasgow Zoo – which had given him an idea or two – he came across what he had been looking for. A dump. A bloody huge dump. And there he had deposited Wullie's body, and all the others. They would be discovered at some point, but that wasn't really important. It was the body of Chris Porter which needed to remain concealed for a long time.

And now he sat in the middle of the loch, about to dump it over the side. He had pulled off the road beside the loch, into what he'd hoped would be an area of solitude, and got to work with heavy stones and rope and enough plastic bags to wrap up a very large horse. He hadn't been sure if it would all be sufficient to keep the corpse at the bottom of the loch, but it was all that he could think of at the time. It seemed the only thing he had left to chance was in finding a rowing boat lying conveniently at the side of the water, waiting for him; and there it was, almost as if he'd had an accomplice. Divine assistance. A bona fide miracle. God was on his side. Or just maybe it was the Other Guy.

As the day had worn on, the horror of manhandling corpses had slowly faded, and by now he was almost treating them like any other pile of garbage. That initial fear that any second a finger was going to move, or Chris's entire body would suddenly sit up, had passed, and now he could just as well be about to throw away a consignment of rotting chicken.