Stonemouth

‘Aye, but ye didnae talk to us, did ye, Stewie?’ Norrie says. ‘Just cos Grandpa thought the sun shone oot yer arse, doesnae mean we all do.’ He looks over at Murdo. ‘Eh no?’

‘Ssh, Norrie,’ Murdo says. He reaches out one boot, taps me on the head. ‘You can sit up, Stewie. Slide back against that wall there.’ He nods.

I do what he says so I’m sitting with my back to the plywood wall, dusting my hands down — they’re shaking — taking out the earbud that remains lodged in my left ear and putting both into the pocket they took my phone from.

‘Guys, come on,’ I say. ‘There shouldn’t be a problem here. I’m back to pay my respects to Joe, that’s all.’

‘Wait a minute,’ Murdo mutters. ‘This button on the top. Turns them right off.’ He keeps the button down, waits for the slide-to-power-off screen to appear, then powers down the phone. He sticks it in the front pocket of his dungarees. He looks at me.

‘What you saying?’

‘I just want to pay my respects to Joe, that’s all I’m saying. That’s all I’m here to do. I’ll be gone by Tuesday.’ I look round the dim interior of the van. ‘What the fuck’s all this about?’

Oh fuck, what are they going to do to me? Being in the back of a van with these guys, them turning the phone off. This doesn’t look good. But I talked to their dad! He said it was okay for me to be here, just for a few days. Fuck, is there some sort of power struggle going on? Are the brothers starting to get impatient, disobeying orders, making their own decisions? What have I landed myself in? And what fucker has spoken to the Murston boys, dropped me in it? Ezzie, probably, though you never know.

The van’s going faster now; you can hear it in the engine note, in the sound of the tyres on the road and the air slipstreaming round its tall bulk. We slow a little, take a long, constant radius, maybe 270-degree corner.

Murdo looks at me. ‘See tomorrow?’ he says.

‘What?’ I say, voice cracking because my throat’s suddenly dry.

‘At the funeral, at the hotel afterwards?’

‘What, Murdo?’

‘Don’t want you talking to her.’

‘But, Murd,’ Norrie asks, though he’s silenced by a glance from his elder brother.

‘Ssh,’ Murdo says, before looking back at me. ‘Just leave her alone, right? Grandpa said he wanted you at the funeral — fuck knows why, but he said it, so fair enough. You get to go. But you just leave Ellie alone. Otherwise we’re going to be on you, understand, Stewart?’

Well, I’m relieved; sounds like I’m going to live, but on the other hand, is that all? What the fuck’s all this Stasi-style kidnap shit for, then? The fuckers could just have texted me.

‘Jeez, Murdo,’ I say. ‘She’s her own woman; what if she comes up to me?’

‘Then you’d better walk away,’ Murdo says. ‘Cos we’ll be watchin.’

‘Murdo, come on—’

‘You’re on fuckin dangerous ground, Stewie,’ Murdo tells me. He sounds reasonable, almost concerned. He has changed a bit; there’s less outright aggression, more gravitas. It goes to make a more studied kind of threat.

The van has felt like it’s been going up a straight, shallow slope for a while now. I can hear the sounds of other traffic. Then there’s pressure against my back as the van brakes smoothly and we slow to what feels like walking speed. Traffic continues to rip past, very close. We stop, then reverse, the van making a beep-beep-beep sound.

Oh fuck, I think I know where we are. A sudden bang-bang sounds from one of the van’s rear quarters, making me jump. A voice outside shouts, ‘Whoa!’ The traffic outside makes a tearing, ripping noise. Something heavy roars past, making the van shake. Is that a slight up-and-down bouncing motion I can feel?

The bridge. We’re on the fucking road bridge.

‘Dinnae fill yer kecks,’ Murdo tells me with a thin smile. I must look as terrified as I feel. ‘If this was for real it’d be dark and you’d be tied up like a gimp.’

Norrie opens the rear doors and there’s a rush of traffic noise. Outside where the sky ought to be there’s white and red stripes. ‘Come and take a wee look,’ Murdo says, and the three of us get out.

We’re on the road bridge all right, somewhere about the middle of the southbound carriageway. The van has backed up to a sort of tall tent structure erected over the roadway, red and white plastic over a metal frame. Whoever banged the side of the van and shouted at us to stop isn’t here now. Two sides and the roof of the tent are rippling in the breeze; the other side thuds and pulses each time a truck goes past.

A square of the road surface, maybe three-quarters of a metre to a side, has been lifted up and out; it sits, a quarter-metre thick, at an angle beyond the hole, lifting brackets still attached. Murdo takes a handful of my jacket at the shoulder. Norrie’s holding my shoulder and elbow on the other side. They march me to the hole.

Looking down, I can see the criss-crossing members of the girder work under the road surface. Straight down, though, there’s just air and then the grey waves, a fifty-metre fall away.