30

On Sunday I woke to the smell of coffee and bacon. The other side of my bed was now empty. Relieved any awkwardness had been avoided, I pulled on a pair of shorts and a T-shirt and pressed two fingers hard at my forehead in the hope that it would alleviate my headache.

In the kitchen Chris was at the table, an iPad and a pot of coffee in front of him.

‘Anybody I know?’ he asked.

‘Eh?’

‘The woman who let me in as she was leaving…’

After Chris dropped me home the previous evening I went for a drink in town. Got talking to a woman. One thing led to another.

I poured myself a coffee, swallowed a mouthful and sighed with pleasure, signalling that was the only answer he was going to get.

‘By the way, we have a couple of viewers for Mum’s house.’

‘We do?’

‘They’re coming next week.’

When was I going to have the time to see to this while I was at work?

‘Don’t worry,’ he added when he saw my reaction. ‘I’ll take care of everything. I’ll do the grand tour with them all.’

‘Okay,’ I said, pleased. ‘Thanks.’

‘And…’ He leaned heavily on the syllable. ‘I posted that photo of you and Thomas on my Facebook page,’ Chris said.

‘You did? Why?’

‘Got to cover all the angles, right? I know we’re doing the private dick thing, but lots of stuff happens online these days. Who knows what will come of it?’

‘Probably attract a lot of weirdos.’

‘Yeah, totally, but nowadays social media is like that old saw: if no one is there to see the tree fall in the forest, did it really fall?’

‘You’re saying if it doesn’t appear on social media…’

‘…it didn’t really happen.’

‘Jesus, the world is fucked.’ I scratched at my forehead.

‘Every silver lining has a cloud.’

‘I can only take so many messy aphorisms this morning. Anything turned up?’ I drank some more coffee.

He reached for his iPad and opened it up at his Facebook entry. I peered over at it and read a few comments.

—Cute kids.

—Sorry for your loss.

—Wish you well in finding him.

—Man, your parents were careless.

‘Arsehole,’ said Chris. ‘There’s always one.’

‘Ach, well, worth a try.’

‘It’s been shared about a dozen times, so who knows what will come from that.’

‘Okay,’ I said trying to inject some enthusiasm into my voice. I used the Internet, of course I did, but I saw how much damage social media did every day to my kids so I was pretty sceptical about its use in our situation.

Chris looked at me as if he was about to say something, then changed his mind.

‘Remember D.I. from school?’

‘D.I.?’

‘Sandy Taggart? He was in my year. Good footballer.’

A tall, skinny lad hove into my mind’s eye. He had the misfortune of sharing a surname with the most famous TV detective of the time and consequently copped a silly nickname.

‘Oh aye. What about him?’

‘He saw the post and got in touch. So, I’m meeting up for a few beers with him and a couple of the lads. School reunion.’ He looked pleased with himself. ‘See. Social media ain’t such a shitshow after all.’

I waited for him to add that I was welcome to come along, but he got to his feet, rubbing his hands. ‘I have another couple of avenues I’m looking into.’

‘Yeah?’ I sensed a note of excitement.

‘I’m thinking there’s another visit you and I could make,’ he said.

‘Just bloody tell me.’ My head was too sore for his games.

‘The Lochwinnoch kid that went missing – Robert Green; he was the only one who was with someone at the time. The other two were on their own.’

‘That’s right,’ I tried to recall what I’d read on the microfilm. ‘He was with a girlfriend, wasn’t he?’

‘That’s significant on its own,’ he said. ‘If Elsa is right and kids were being picked up and moved on, the fact the kidnappers changed their methods and went for someone who was in company could be worth investigating.’ He paused. ‘And while you were getting up to whatever’ – he waved his hands in the direction of my bedroom – ‘I tracked her down.’ He looked so pleased with himself I almost wanted to slap it out of him.

‘Just tell me already.’

He turned the iPad round so I could see the screen. What appeared there was the face of a woman I’d been speaking to a few weeks earlier.

‘Is that…?’ I looked over at Chris, my mouth hinged open in surprise.

‘Yup,’ he replied. ‘Benny Marinello’s granddaughter, Gina.’