The back up man, p.18
The Back Up Man, page 18
‘I can turn the radio on if you’d like,’ Jamie said.
She had a vision of the two of them listening to Heart’s loopy love songs in silence, staring at the road ahead, or worse, tuning into an overwrought radio play – about silenced nuns, or a little old lady grieving by the seaside – and felt slightly self-conscious.
‘It’s up to you. You’re the driver.’
‘Sorry. I feel a strange responsibility not to bore my passenger when I’m driving. Speaking of which, there are Twixes in the glove compartment.’
‘Nutritious.’ But she smiled.
‘My car, my snacks. And we should only have’ – he glanced at the dashboard – ‘about an hour and a half to go?’
‘I’m enjoying the view.’
‘The motorway is lovely at this time of year.’
He had a slightly lop-sided grin, and she decided she liked it.
By the time they approached the outskirts of Aberdeen, they had left the thick rainclouds somewhere around Stonehaven, and Anya saw a flash of blue behind the granite steeples: the sea. She shuffled a little in her seat so that she could get a better view.
‘I’ve always thought it would be nice to live in a city on the sea,’ Jamie said.
‘It beats the River Clyde, doesn’t it.’
The traffic had thickened as they prepared to pull off the junction that led them into the city centre, and they had slowed a little. Jamie rolled his shirtsleeves up a little higher and turned to Anya.
‘Could you pass me a Twix?’
She smiled and obliged. He opened the wrapper neatly and bit into two of the fingers in one mouthful.
‘That is a strange way to eat a Twix.’
He chewed and swallowed his mouthful, before he replied.
‘I didn’t know there was a right way to eat them.’
‘One finger at a time. Obviously.’
The pace was picking up again and he rested the chocolate bar in the cup holder and gave the road his full concentration once more. The Google Maps woman announced in her sing-song voice: ‘Continue on for two miles, towards Rosemount.’
‘I’ve never been to Aberdeen,’ Anya announced.
‘I’ve actually been a few times. I visited Euan once or twice – I slept on his floor in halls in his first year. And my sister was at university here.’
‘Did she cross over with Euan?’
‘Yes.’ He was concentrating on the sat nav, jabbing at the phone in the holder.
‘Was she at Kelvinbridge?’
‘She was. Aha!’ He straightened up again. ‘OK, thirteen minutes it says.’ The scenery was more residential now. Anya could no longer see the sea, but she could see plenty of grey stone, Victorian terraces bedecked with bright window boxes, and small independent shops (butchers, fishmongers, a vegan café). This was, clearly, Aberdeen’s version of the West End.
‘The light’s different here,’ she said. ‘Brighter and purer.’
But he didn’t respond and she felt shy, so stayed quiet as they carried on up the straight streets, until finally the Google Maps lady trilled, ‘you have arrived at your destination’. Jamie did a few circuits of the block before he spotted a parking space next to a small dry cleaners and manoeuvred them into it.
She watched him close his eyes and massage his eyelids with his fingers, before opening them and blinking a few times.
‘Sorry. Driving’s tiring.’
‘I wouldn’t know.’ She added: ‘Thanks for doing it.’
‘Pleasure.’ He blinked a few times.
‘So.’ She scanned the street outside, as though Euan might be standing on the corner. She realized her heart was lightly racing. ‘What’s the plan?’
‘We’ll just knock on the door, see where we get to.’ He made this sound easy, so she tried to sound game.
‘And who’s good cop, who’s bad cop?’
He smiled.
‘I’ve always seen myself as more of a bad cop.’
‘I’m happy with that.’
15
Number 17 Belgrave Terrace was a tall, single-fronted Victorian house with a smart blue door with buzzers for four flats, labelled A, B, 3 and C. The garden path was crazy-paved with thick stone slabs, and there was a small, well-tended rose bush out front. The curtains of the ground floor room were drawn, and Anya resisted the urge to press her nose against the window. Jamie had stopped just shy of the stone doorstep.
‘Nice building.’ She stepped back again slightly to get a better look at the house. In the second-floor window there was a yellow poster urging the neighbourhood to vote for the SNP candidate for Aberdeen South. ‘Which flat was Euan’s?’
‘He lived in Flat B.’ Jamie had also stepped back slightly to squint at the building with interest.
‘Well, Detective Kildare.’ She gestured towards the buzzer. ‘What are you waiting for?’
With a nod, Jamie stepped forward and pressed down on the ‘B’ buzzer, which raised a blaring, angry note. Anya held her breath, waiting for the scratch of the intercom, nerves prickling.
Nothing happened; Jamie pressed down on the buzzer again, which blared another angry note. Still, no voice called out from the speaker, though they both stared hopefully at it for a few moments.
‘Well, that was an anticlimax,’ Jamie said eventually. He continued to examine the buzzers, as though a ‘Euan’ one might appear.
‘Which one do you fancy now?’
‘Let’s go A.’
‘Good choice.’
He pressed down on buzzer A, for the ground-floor flat. The bell was closer to them, and Anya heard it chime from inside the flat, listening keenly for the telltale sound of footsteps pacing through the building to answer the call, but none came.
‘Third time lucky.’ Anya pressed the buzzer marked ‘C’.
When there was no answer there either, she pressed ‘3’ without looking at him. To her surprise, a voice sounded.
‘Yes?’
The voice sounded tinny and unfriendly, and possibly elderly and male, although she couldn’t be certain.
‘Hi,’ Anya started, ‘I wonder if you can help me—’
‘I don’t want to buy anything.’
‘No, I’m not selling anything—’
‘Goodbye.’
She shrugged and looked at Jamie. He stepped forward and pressed down on the ‘3’ buzzer again.
The voice was angrier this time, and louder. It was definitely elderly and male.
‘I said I didn’t want anything—’
‘No, we’re looking for someone who used to live here—’ Jamie started.
‘Get off my property or I’m calling the police now.’ Jamie opened his mouth, but Anya placed her arm on his and he closed it again. ‘You hear me?’
‘Sorry.’
The intercom powered off and they both stood very still.
‘Well.’ Jamie raised an eyebrow. ‘The locals are certainly friendly.’
She shrugged, anxious the man upstairs might be listening.
‘Come on.’ He nodded to the street. ‘Let’s get out of here in case the old bastard is still watching. We can try the other buzzers again in an hour or so.’
They walked to the end of the path. On the row of houses opposite, she spotted what looked like a bijou café at the end of the block. Outside was a cluster of women in black leggings, goose-down gilets and high-tops, most of them at the helm of large buggies, looking like they were about to depart en masse. She turned to take in the house once more – and could have sworn she saw a curtain twitch in the flat that was once Euan’s.
‘I swear I saw something!’ He gave her a sceptical look, but she pointed. ‘In that window. The curtain twitched.’
‘It was probably just that cranky old bastard.’
‘Maybe.’ In her excitement, she had slightly forgotten that Euan himself wouldn’t actually be in the flat. She nodded in the direction of the lithe leggings’ posse. ‘We could go get some lunch at that café while we wait and then try the other doors again?’ An idea. ‘It’s basically a stake-out.’
This earned a grin.
‘Good plan.’
‘Phew.’ She glanced up and down the street. ‘I’m starving.’
They crossed the quiet road and homed in on the small café. There were three tables outside, but the mid-October chill threatened to settle in Anya’s bones, so she continued inside to a table next to the window, which gave them a clear view of number 17, with Jamie in a slightly wobbly chair to her right.
Inside, the café was sleek, chic and modern, with sparse wooden tables, white walls bearing framed, abstract artworks by local artists, and a shiny chrome coffee machine, manned by a red-faced, wild-haired barista whose hands were whizzing from milk steamer to coffee grinder and back again, according to some internal order. The eclectic menu was scrawled in chalk on a slate board on the wall: standard posh caff fare – paninis, salads, open sandwiches – plus several Mexican dishes. Anya contemplated the merits of a tuna melt over a burrito.
‘What are you getting?’ Jamie craned over his shoulder to examine the wall.
‘I’m not sure.’
Jamie turned to face Anya just as a plump waiter in his fifties appeared at the table. He wore tartan trousers, a bright red jumper and a name tag that informed them his name was Roger.
‘Hello!’ he said in a sing-song east coast accent. ‘And what can I get for you today?’
Jamie smiled at the man.
‘Tuna melt, please.’
The man’s eyes lit up.
‘Now, you’re not from Aberdeen, are you?’
He leaned in as if to get a closer look. Jamie shook his head.
‘Glasgow. Sorry.’
‘Well, we can’t be having Weegies in here. There’ll be complaints.’ His eyes twinkled. He nodded at Anya. ‘You as well, I take it?’
‘Afraid so.’ Anya smiled. ‘My dad’s from round here though. Originally.’
The man grinned back.
‘We’ll let you off then. What can I get you?’
‘Same please. And a Coke. Not Diet.’
‘Good woman. Any drinks for you, sir?’
‘Orange juice. Please.’
‘Aye, all right then. It’ll be ten minutes or so. We’re a bit backed up wi’ orders and the ladies out here have just put in for fifteen or so coffees to go.’ He gave them another twinkling grin and was backing off when Anya yelped, ‘Wait!’ He turned, a little startled.
‘Sorry, I was just wondering. You didn’t by any chance know someone called Euan Carrick? He lived in that house over there’ – she pointed at number 17 – ‘the second-floor flat. He’s a friend of ours who fell off the radar and we’re trying to … track him down.’
The man mimed a thinking face.
‘I don’t think so. Not by name anyway. What’s he look like?’
‘Erm … tallish, light hair. Good looking.’
The man shook his head in apology. ‘Sorry.’
‘No worries.’ Anya felt a little embarrassed, worried she’d ruined their automatic rapport. ‘Thanks.’
With a nod, the man trotted off behind the counter.
‘Good looking, eh?’
She blushed deeply and opened her mouth stupidly, like a goldfish.
He grinned back. ‘That was a good idea.’
‘Thanks.’
‘We’ll go back over in an hour or so. I’m sure one of the other neighbours will be more cooperative.’
Anya nodded, hoping her flush had settled.
‘So, how did you know about this place?’ She tried to imagine Euan on this street, in one of those flats, walking past this coffee shop.
‘What, the flat? A friend had been here for a party.’
‘But this friend has no idea where he is now?’
‘Nope.’
‘So, Euan must have stayed in Aberdeen after university.’
‘Oh, yes. He did.’
‘What did he do? I can’t really imagine Euan with a job.’
‘Well, at university, he worked in this sandwich shop near their campus. Once, when I stayed with him, he came home from his shift with all this coronation chicken that was about to expire.’
‘Sounds disgusting.’ She made a face. ‘Do you think anyone there would know where he’d got to?’
Jamie considered this.
‘Well, it would have been quite a long time ago that he worked there.’ He stopped while a different waiter – a spotty, callow redhead who nonetheless looked like the spitting image of Roger – silently placed their drinks on the table. He continued: ‘And I’m not sure what it was called.’
Anya pulled her phone from her pocket.
‘Well, we can find the campus and then we could google sandwich shops. There can’t be that many.’
‘Good point.’ She tapped ‘sandwich shop aberdeen uni’, while he continued. ‘More recently, I know he worked in a theatre company up here for a bit. Doing lighting and sets and things.’
‘Really?’
She weighed this detail, hungry for more. She couldn’t remember Euan liking theatre, particularly, although she did remember he’d been quite good at art. Occasionally, on a Friday night, when the light was OK, he’d submit to drawing quick portraits of his friends in the pencil he’d stuck self-consciously behind one ear. He drew her once, on the back of her English jotter; she hadn’t thought about that sketch in years.
‘So, he lived in this flat’ – she gestured at the house with her fork – ‘when he was working for this theatre company?’
‘Yeah.’
‘Do you know what they were called?’
‘No idea. And it wasn’t like he was an actor.’
‘Maybe he’s still moonlighting at the sandwich shop and is right now doing the lunchtime shift?’
‘And he’ll give us a free coronation chicken baguette when we turn up.’
She made a face.
‘I’ll pass.’
They ate swiftly when the food arrived, occasionally pausing to pull strings of molten cheese from their mouths. On one such occasion, they locked eyes and grinned at one another. She finished hers first and took a satisfied slurp of Coke.
‘OK’ – Anya scrubbed her chin with a napkin – ‘so we’ll go back to the house, try those other two doorbells, and then what. Do we try the sandwich shops?’
Jamie considered this.
‘Could do,’ he said evenly. ‘But I don’t think he’s worked there for years. Might be a bit of a long shot.’
‘Unlike the rest of this trip?’ But she smiled. ‘OK, let’s leave the sandwich shop. We don’t have any leads on the theatre company?’
‘I think there was a production of The Lion, the Witch and the Wardrobe, but I don’t think that’s much to go on.’
Google didn’t think so either, although there were three pubs called The Red Lion in the city.
‘I’m just going to nip to the loo.’ Anya stood up and pushed her chair away. ‘Want anything else?’
‘All good.’ He had taken up her role of watching the house now. ‘Thanks.’
The very small toilet was the opposite of the ordered chic of the café floor. It was decorated top-to-toe with Highland cows: on the wallpaper, in framed pictures on the wall, and even one in a tam o’shanter, perched on the top of the cistern. Anya considered giving it a pat for good luck, then remembered where it might have been.
When she reappeared, their table had been cleared and Jamie was standing up and putting his wallet in his back pocket.
‘I’ve sorted the bill.’
‘You got the last one!’
‘You can buy me a Twix.’
Back on the doorstep for round two, Anya felt emboldened by the sugary Coke. When there was still no answer from Flat B, she stepped forward.
‘My turn.’ She pressed the buzzer for Flat A.
They heard it chime again, but this time, they heard another sound: footsteps. Anya did a sharp intake of breath in spite of herself; Jamie leaned forward, towards the intercom, which sounded again.
‘Hello?’
‘Hi, I’m sorry to bother you. I’m looking for someone.’ Jamie spoke loudly and distinctly, like a pensioner yelling into a webcam and Anya bit her lip, trying not to giggle. ‘Someone who used to live in this building? Euan Carrick?’
‘Euan?’ crunched the voice from the speaker, after a moment. ‘Aye, I knew him.’
Anya’s heart leapt and she elbowed Jamie.
‘Hang on,’ the voice on the intercom said, ‘I’ll just come tae the window.’
There was a horrible, metallic rustling sound as they signed off, like someone scraping a set of keys across gravel, and then, a few moments later, the curtains parted, and a woman appeared. She tugged at the window frame until it was halfway open and then kneeled down in order to rest her arms on the sill.
‘Hi.’ Anya stepped forward and tried to look as friendly as possible.
The woman was probably in her early forties and was dressed in overalls, covered in smears of paint. Her hair was thick and greying and tied on top of her head with a strip of fabric, and she had gold hoops all up both ears, and one coming out of her nose.
‘Excuse my appearance,’ she said, brightly. ‘Been working in the shed out in the garden.’ They both blinked. ‘I’m a potter.’ Anya opened her mouth, and then thought better of it. ‘Paint portraits too, sometimes. Can’t beat the light out back in the evenings.’ She clapped her hands. ‘Anyway, you’re looking for Euan, are you?’
‘Yes, we’re friends of his,’ Jamie said. ‘Old friends. We know he’s moved and we’re trying to track him down. You don’t know where he went, do you?’
The woman appraised him calmly.
‘I don’t.’ She was playing with one of the hoops in her ear, spinning it and spinning it. ‘He left in a bit of a hurry, I remember, because the guy who owns the place – Ally – was annoyed about him breaking his contract. I think there was a bit of a tussle over the security deposit, or something. I don’t remember all the details.’
‘And when exactly was that?’ Jamie asked. ‘That he moved on. How long ago?’
‘Must have been a year ago? Maybe a bit more.’
