"I appreciate that," she said, gracious in victory. "I'll do everything I can to help you but right now I need a break."

He looked at her disbelievingly and motioned for her to follow him as he walked out of the room.

Coming down the stairs to the main entrance she could see Liam sitting on a plastic chair in the lobby. He looked up and grinned when he saw her, wrinkling his nose. She shook her head softly and looked away, warning him not to speak to her. If McEwan saw Liam he'd recognize him as her brother and would insist on interviewing him right away. Maureen would have to wait for him.

"I'll be back by half-one," she said, distracting McEwan's attention. "I promise."

McEwan walked straight past Liam. He paused by the reception desk and patted it with the flat of his hand, telling her firmly that this was where she should report to when she came for their appointment. Maureen gave him an insolent look and left.

McEwan watched her walk through the glass doors and saw a young man with the same build and hair color follow Maureen O'Donnell toward the main road.

Liam caught up with her in the street. "He must be used to dealing with half-wits," he said.

"Naw, I think he was trying to patronize me. He's pissed off because I insisted on leaving for a while."

Liam's Triumph Herald was parked at the far end of the street. Maureen could see the rust patches from two hundred yards away. It was a rotten car, it broke down at least once a month but Liam said it was good for business: the police tended to stop young guys in Mercs, not mugs in shitey motors.

Maureen slipped her arm through his, something she hadn't done in years. "Did Mum tell you about Douglas, then?" she asked.

"Yeah," said Liam, keeping his eyes on the road and squeezing her arm hard.

"How long were you waiting for?" she said.

"Just about three-quarters of an hour. Not long anyway."

"Liam, they're going to have to speak to you. I didn't think and I told them you had a key to the house."

He flinched. "Oh, bollocks."

"I'm sorry," she said. "Would they know about your business?"

"Dunno, maybe," he said. "Auch, actually they probably don't. Where are we going, anyway?"

"Well, I want to ask Benny if I can stay there for a while. I'm not allowed to go home until they've finished looking through everything and I can't stay at yours, obviously. How's Mum?"

Liam looked shifty. "Mm, well, Una's with her."

"You mean she's pissed?"

"Umm, she might be," he said quietly. "She's very upset. Una's comforting her."

"For fucksake, this is going to turn into something that happened to her, isn't it?"

"You know Mum, she could scene-steal from an eclipse." He opened the passenger door for her and saw that she was winding herself up. "Getting pissed off won't make a sod of difference. You should know that by now."

Maureen got into the car. The windows were opaque with cold condensation. Maggie was sitting in the backseat. "Oh, Maggie," said Maureen. "Have you been here all that time?"

Maggie smiled politely and nodded.

"Why didn't you come inside? You must have been freezing."

"I didn't like to," she said vaguely.

Liam revved the engine. "Let's go and see Benito," he said, and pulled out into the Maryhill Road. "Benito Finite"

An unmarked police car followed the Herald at a discreet distance.

Hillhead Comprehensive's catchment area covers a middle-class area and a profoundly deprived one. Benny came from the latter. He had been expelled in third year for setting fire to a toilet but Maureen and Liam stayed in touch with him because he was mental and a good laugh.

Benny drank like his father. Consequently his early life was a series of Dadaesque adventures: he woke up in a meat factory, he got engaged to a woman whose name he couldn't remember, he fell into a quarry on a Saturday night and didn't manage to get out until the men came to work on Monday morning. When he was twenty he said he was sick of getting his face kicked in all the time and started attending Alcoholics Anonymous and got sober. He was homeless at the time and Maureen let him sleep on her bedroom floor at home. He talked about nothing but the joy of AA for two months. Winnie came to hate him.

His alcoholic family disowned him when he moved in with Maureen's family and got sober. He did some exams at college and got into Glasgow University to study law. His family owned him again. He was in senior honors studying corporate law and had a series of traineeship interviews lined up with high-flying companies. His bank manager kept writing to him, asking him to take out more loans.

THEY DREW UP INTO Scaramouch Street. It was short, only four closes long, with bollards blocking off the end from the Maryhill Road. The street used to be a handy cutoff before the lights. When the bollards first went up several drivers, thinking they'd be cute and save a couple of minutes, swerved straight into them and wrote their cars off. They climbed the stairs to the second floor and knocked. Benny opened the door. He wasn't bad-looking: he was dark with long eyelashes and kind gray eyes, six foot something tall, and had a solid muscular frame, but his close association with Liam and the rest of her family made Maureen squeamish about fancying him. He looked Maureen up and down and burst out laughing. "What the fuck are you wearing?" he squealed. "You look like a ned!"

Maureen pushed her way in through the door. "I've had a bit of an eventful day," she said, and went into the kitchen to put the kettle on. Benny was a dirty bastard: the kitchen was filthy. Dishes, bits of food and packaging were sitting on the work tops and table, the sink was full and smelled faintly of mildew.

She could hear them in the hall, Liam mumbling the story in a monotone and Benny whispering exclamations back. Liam called to her that he was going to drop Maggie home and would be back in half an hour.

Benny stayed in the living room for a few minutes before coming into the kitchen. His face was gray. "Jesus, Mauri," he said, "Jesus. I don't know what to say."

Maureen dropped into a chair and covered her face with her hands. She wanted to cry but nothing seemed real. Benny sat next to her, putting his arms around her, holding her close and kissing her hair. He was trembling. "Oh, Mauri," he whispered, "Jesus, Mauri, it's so shockin'." She sat up and asked him for a fag. "Haven't you got any?" She explained what had happened to hers and he insisted that she take his packet.

He gave her a lemonade and an ashtray and sat at the table with her, leaning close and listening intently. She told him about the cagoul and the shoes and the rope. How could they get into the house, she kept saying, how could they get in the front door without making a noise?

"Did Douglas have his own key?" asked Benny.

"Aye."

"And there was no sign of forced entry?"

"Not that I noticed."

"Well, Douglas must have let himself in and, either then or later, let in the person who did it. Unless they picked the lock. What kind of locks have you got?"

Maureen described them.

"They'd have to know what they were doing," he said. "Chances are he let them in so ye can conclude that he knew them."

"Aye." She was impressed by the logic of his deduction. "Aye, that'll be it. You're good at this."

"This is awful. I suppose they think it was one of his clients from the clinic. Or could it be the woman he was living with?"

"Elsbeth?"

"Yeah, Elsbeth. It's kind of poetic, killing your unfaithful man in the other woman's house."

"It didn't look very poetic," said Maureen.

"Oh, fuck, I shouldn't have said that, I'm sorry, it's hard to take in."