Carlyle had called Allie after her copy had dropped. ‘Not a bad job,’ he said. In the reluctant lexicon of Scottish praise, that amounted to laurels. ‘I’ve trimmed and tweaked it a wee bit, but you’ll get the splash again. This is becoming a habit.’
‘I could do without this one.’
‘We all could. Listen, I’m taking you off the rota again but we’re having a meeting in the morning at eleven to talk about where we go with the story next. I want you there.’
‘Sure. Has anybody spoken to the family?’
‘Maureen Jarvie from the Edinburgh office went round.’ He let out a sigh. ‘Rather her than me. A death knock’s hard enough at the best of times, but when you’re dealing with somebody you know … I gather it was pretty grim. But she’s got some good quotes for a sidebar to your piece.’
Allie could only imagine the grief drowning the Sullivans. The one thing worse than losing a beloved son must be to know that things were wrong between you at the end. And Joseph, the man responsible for the rift? It would be so much worse for him, knowing how that wedge had been driven between Danny and his parents. ‘And they can’t even plan the funeral till the police release the body,’ she said.
‘They’ll have a wake, at least. As will we, Burns. As will we.’
She’d barely put the phone down when it rang again. This time, it was her mother. ‘Alison, we were just watching the news, and we saw about a journalist getting murdered in Glasgow. Your dad says it was that Danny laddie that you’ve been working with, but that can’t be right?’
‘It was Danny, Mum.’ She didn’t want to admit to finding him; she knew where that would lead. But it would be in the paper in the morning and that would be worse. So she gave in and put up with an inquisition into every detail of the day. God, but she was weary of reliving the worst day of her life.
‘Was it one of those terrorists you were writing about?’ her mother demanded.
‘I don’t think so. They have very particular ways of punishing people and this doesn’t fit.’ Allie forced herself to sound casual in a bid to allay her mother’s anxieties. She had no idea whether the IRA had taken Danny’s life. It was true that the method of murder wasn’t their typical approach but with their Active Service Unit in the cells, who knew what options had been open to them?
The attempt hadn’t succeeded. ‘I’m worried for you, Alison. You did the same stories as him, what if they come after you next?’
‘Mum, it might not be anything to do with his work. Nobody has any idea why it happened.’
‘It said the police are following leads.’
Allie scoffed. ‘Trust me, Mum, the police haven’t got the first idea what’s behind this. But honestly, there’s no reason to think I’m at risk. Now, I’m away now to get my tea—’
‘You’ve not had your tea yet? It’s nearly half past eight. You need to be looking after yourself, Alison.’
Allie closed her eyes and tried to keep her sigh inaudible. ‘I’ll give you a ring later in the week, Mum. But don’t worry about me. I’m not in any danger. I’m just very sad, that’s all.’ As she put the phone down, Allie realised that was nothing less than the truth. Sadness wasn’t something she felt often but tonight, it was almost overwhelming.
She was halfway to the kitchen when the doorbell rang. A flash of panic pierced her momentarily. She was expecting no one. Was that what had happened to Danny? A ring on the bell, a familiar face, an open welcome, an invitation to murder? Allie tiptoed across the hall and opened the inside door with infinite care. She had a chain for the big outside double door and now she slid it into place with all the care of a safecracker turning the tumblers. Only then did she crack open the lock and peer into the narrow gap.
Allie gasped with the laughter of nervous release. ‘Jeez, Rona, you nearly gave me a heart attack.’
Rona Dunsyre shrugged. ‘That’s no way to greet your pals.’
Allie fussed with the chain and let Rona in. ‘What are you doing here? I wasn’t expecting you. How do you know where I live?’ All in a flash flood.
Rona followed her inside and gave the hallway a critical appraisal. ‘Still a work in progress, then?’
‘It’s rented. I’m not wasting money on it. But I don’t understand why you’re here.’
‘Danny. I thought you could maybe do with company. A shoulder to cry on. Or maybe just a wee voddy for the body?’ Rona raised the carrier bag that she’d been clutching. It clinked with promise.
‘All of the above,’ Allie sighed. ‘Come through.’
She led the way into the living room. Rona shrugged out of her voluminous olive-green coat and let it slump to the floor beside the chair that had last been occupied by Danny. Her outfit was more subdued than Allie had grown accustomed to – jeans tucked into knee-length boots with a slouch in the leather, a loose grey mohair sweater with a flattering cowl neck, her only jewellery a pair of earrings shaped into gold ingots. The trademark splash of colour came from a multicoloured tie-dye scarf knotted round her shoulders. She considered the chair, then said. ‘If you need a hug, I suppose it makes more sense for us to coorie down on the couch.’ She eyed the tubular chrome construction. ‘Not that it’s exactly designed for snuggling.’
Allie felt her sadness shift a little. There was something about Rona that always made her smile. ‘I’ll get glasses.’
By the time she returned, Rona had pulled the coffee table closer and emptied her carrier bag. A bottle of Smirnoff Blue Label. Half a dozen cans of Coke. A large bag of dry-roasted peanuts, tipped into a clean ashtray. ‘I’m just making myself at home,’ Rona said, cracking the seal on the vodka bottle cap.
‘I’m glad you’re here.’ Allie sat down beside her and proffered two highball glasses with a single lump of ice in each. Rona poured generous measures and added enough Coke to produce the colour of weak tea.
They chinked glasses, and Rona said, ‘Here’s to Danny.’
‘To Danny. I loved working with him.’
‘What was it about him that made it special?’ She rolled her eyes. ‘God, listen to me. Ever the bloody feature writer.’
Allie took a swig of her drink. ‘He didn’t patronise me or treat me like a secretary. He always listened to what I had to say, and he didn’t mind admitting when I had a better suggestion than him. And he didn’t try to pretend it had been his idea.’ She reached for her cigarettes and lit up. ‘But I let him down, Rona. I so let him down.’
‘What do you mean?’
‘He trusted me with his biggest secret. And I blurted it out to the polis.’ A sigh of smoke. ‘I told them he was gay.’
Rona put her arm round Allie’s shoulders and squeezed gently. ‘You can’t hurt him now, doll.’
‘I can hurt the other people in his life. And I can hurt his reputation.’ She squeezed her eyes shut. ‘I couldn’t help it. They just kept on and on at me with their vile, stupid insinuations.’
‘Tell me about it.’
So Allie did. In more detail than she’d explained to Carlyle. With her boss, to have said too much about her emotional response would have felt like giving him a hostage to fortune. With Rona, she had the freedom to explain how frightened and angry and out of control she’d felt. With her, Allie could be honest about what felt like a disastrous failing without the fear of being judged.
‘You had to tell them,’ Rona said. ‘Otherwise you’d probably still be there. It sounds like they’ve got nobody else to browbeat. It’s not a betrayal, Allie. Wherever Danny is, he’s beyond any hurt you could deliver. And anybody that thinks less of Danny because he was gay …’ She shook her head, contempt on her face. ‘They’re not worth bothering about.’ She half-turned and gave Allie a measured look. ‘Let it go. Stop beating yourself up. If you don’t let it go, it’ll turn into self-pity and that’s just ugly. Plus it’s no help to you or to Danny. You hear me?’
Rona’s brisk good sense gave Allie a brief shock before she recognised its validity. She leaned into her friend. ‘You’re right. What matters now is finding out what happened. What I keep coming back to, Rona: who could have done this? Why would anybody kill Danny?’
‘I’m no detective, but I’ve read enough crime novels to know the motive’s either personal or professional. Plus, Strathclyde Police are nothing like Wexford or Morse or Dalgliesh. Mostly, they couldn’t detect their way out of a paper bag with a map and a torch. We need the likes of Miss Marple or Philip Marlowe here.’
Allie gave an incredulous laugh. ‘What? I need to take up knitting?’
‘No, you need to use your little grey cells, you daftie. You know Danny better than anybody in that office. He trusted you with who he really was. And you know the story behind the stories you’ve been working on these last few weeks. There must be a whole bunch of people the pair of you have pissed off royally.’
Allie felt a shudder in her chest. ‘If our stories pissed anybody off enough to kill Danny, then maybe I’m next.’
Rona’s hand flew to her mouth. ‘Oh, fuck. Allie, me and my big mouth. I didn’t mean to freak you out.’
‘It’s not like I hadn’t thought of it myself. I’ve been trying to put it out of my mind. After all, Danny was the lead name on the Paragon story, and he had the starring role in the Tartan Terrorists one. He did the undercover, so as far as the IRA were concerned, he was the face of our investigation.’
‘Exactly.’ Rona patted her knee. ‘But you don’t kill a journalist after the fact, do you? You kill them to shut them up.’ She paused. ‘The IRA do like a punishment beating, though. A warning to anybody else that’s thinking about betraying them.’
‘They have trademarks, though. That’s how people know it’s a warning. They kneecap people or execute them. This isn’t their style. Even if they were reacting on the spur of the moment, they’d want to leave people in no doubt, wouldn’t they? Pour encourager les autres.’
Even Rona had no answer to that. The two women sat in glum silence for long enough to finish their drinks and pour fresh ones, just as strong as the first.
‘Do you know much about Danny’s personal life?’ Rona asked, grabbing a handful of peanuts.
‘Next to nothing, I know he went to bars and clubs, but he said he was careful about who he connected with. When I asked him whether he had anybody he could talk to, he said he had an “arrangement”. I don’t know what that means?’
Rona shrugged. ‘I don’t know either. Honestly, I think gay men are from a different planet to lesbians. That whole picking up strangers in bars, and worse? I just don’t get it. I don’t have arrangements, I have relationships. And I’m guessing Danny didn’t have one of those?’
‘Not that he admitted to me. But there was something.’ Allie gave Rona a sideways look. ‘Between the two of us, right?’
Rona hugged her again. ‘Just the two of us, doll.’
‘You know Gordon Beattie, the crime corr?’
‘Wee Gordon? Wee in stature and wee in talent. Don’t tell me he’s secretly Gay Gordon?’ Rona guffawed.
‘No. God, no. But he’s got a Special Branch contact, Thomas Torrance. And he brought him into the office to consult on the Tartan Terrorists story. Danny just about had a heart attack when he saw Torrance. He turned the colour of putty. When I asked him about it, it turned out he recognised Torrance from one of the clubs in town.’
‘That’s interesting, but surely not any kind of threat? Face it, doll, if Danny pointed the finger at Torrance, he was exposing himself at the same time.’
‘I know, but get this. The guy Torrance was with – and I mean with, as in he was snogging him – it turns out this guy was Roddy Farquhar, one of the Tartan Terror crew. When we discussed it, Danny reckoned it was just casual between them. But it’s a helluva coincidence that Farquhar did a runner just before the paper hit the streets.’
‘So, what? You think they were an item? And Farquhar told Torrance what his pals were up to?’
‘It makes sense, doesn’t it? And rather than arrest them before things got out of hand, Torrance let them run to see where they were going. Then when Wee Gordon Beattie brought him into the tent he learned what Danny and I had found out. Torrance must have warned Farquhar to get out before the police came for him.’
‘Oh my God,’ Rona breathed. ‘So Torrance had a very good reason for shutting Danny up. He could still have totally fucked him up.’
All at once, the unshed tears that Allie had managed to hold at bay burst through her defences. In a matter of moments, she was shaking and sobbing, gulping for air and howling like a child. Rona wrapped her arms around her and held her tight. Allie clung to her, clutching handfuls of her sweater, letting her grief flood through her. Danny was dead, and there was no solace.