Cross Purpose: Episode 29

It’s all been too…” Maggie struggled for the word. Settled for one of Kirsty’s. “Random up till now”

Wilma opened the door. “Maggie?” she said. “You’re a surprise. I thought you were in town today.”

“I was,” came the reply, “but the meeting was off.”

“How come?” Maggie hung her head. “Got the wrong day.” “Maggie Laird,” Wilma wagged a stubby finger. She held up her hands in surrender. “Don’t know how I managed it.

“But I’ve been spread that thin lately, trying to beef up the business, keeping a weather eye on Colin. And now I’m back at work…”

“They weren’t leaning on you, were they?”

“No, but it’s early days yet. I need a fallback position. Especially after…”

“Your wee outing to Rubislaw Den.” Wilma looked at her sternly. “You should have told me, Maggie. That was a daft thing to do.”

“Don’t I know it. And it’s not as if I wasn’t warned. It’s just… I had it all worked out in my head, Wilma, and once I make my mind up to something…”.

It was her biggest failing, Maggie knew – the way she ran at things head-on.

And hadn’t that been responsible for the morass she found herself in now?

“At least your appointment wasn’t yesterday.” Maggie made a face. “No. But I felt such a fool.” “Never mind. In you come. I’ll brew you a pot of tea.”

Judgmental

“Thanks.” She followed her friend through to the conservatory at the house and flopped into a capacious rattan chair.

Wilma puttered through to the kitchen. Maggie could hear the tap running, the clatter of crockery. She let her eyes droop shut.

She could remember quite clearly the very first time she’d been invited round to her neighbour’s house. Wilma had shown her into the sitting room.

The space should have been the mirror of Maggie’s own room.

Would have been, were it not for the heavily patterned silver wallpaper, the over-sized leather sofas, the glitzy black glass chandelier. And the smell!

Scented candles on every surface. Way over the top for a bungalow in Mannofield, she’d thought at the time. Maggie could hardly believe now how judgmental she’d been.

With a clatter, Wilma set down a tray on the coffee table. Maggie’s eyes shot open. “Tell you what, though…”

“Oh, what’s that?”

“Since we’ve been working together, one thing’s become abundantly clear.

Maggie was fully alert now. “If we’re going to make this thing work – build up the agency and still hold our jobs down – we’ll have to put it on a proper footing.”

Wilma poured tea into two mugs. “What do you mean?”

“It’s all been too…” Maggie struggled for the word. Settled for one of Kirsty’s.

“Random up till now: the way we’ve been setting about George’s caseload, jumping at every prospective new client.

“Now that business is beginning to pick up, we really should adopt a more systematic approach.” “I’m not sure where you’re going with this, pal.” “Well, it seems to me that a lot of the work that’s coming in is routine: credit checks, traces, that sort of thing. Demands application, more than anything.

“Some of it, on the other hand, needs legal knowhow, or computer savvy, or interpersonal skills.

“Instead of sitting down together like we’ve been doing, wouldn’t it be more productive if we divided our workload, each worked on what we were best at?”

“How will we do that?”

Jargon

“Make a list of our strengths and weaknesses: like me being careful – nit-picking, as you keep telling me.

“Having familiarity with legal jargon. Being able to frame a business letter, write a report, that sort of thing.”

“Oh,” a wave of recognition washed over Wilma, “you mean a skill set?”

“Wil-ma!” Maggie burst out laughing. “Where did you get that? Not from your pub in Torry.”

“I got it off The Apprentice, if you must know.” “Oh, Wilma,” Maggie’s voice was contrite, “I’m not making fun of you.”

“Yes, you are. You and your legal knowledge, your command of English…” Wilma bit her bottom lip. “Where does that leave me?”

“Well, there’s your computer skills, for a start. I’d never have been able to run all that background stuff without you. Then there’s your inside knowledge.

“The information you’ve been able to bring to the table about tenancy problems, the benefits system, fraud, petty crime – stuff you pick up in the pub, even. I wouldn’t have known about any of that.

“And then divorce procedures, they’ve all changed since I worked in a lawyer’s office.”

“So? You can get that off the internet.” “Accepted. But there’s the knowhow you bring from working at the hospital: the folk who come through Accident and Emergency, the battered wives, the kids with suspect injuries, the druggies that have been duffed up. The drugs themselves.”

Maggie paused. “I don’t know the first thing about anything like that – recreational drugs, Methadone programmes, even the number of folk that are addicted to prescription medicine.”

“Doesn’t happen in Methlick,” Wilma teased. “I know,” Maggie came back at her. “I can’t help it if I’m slow when it comes to these kind of things, but it just goes to show how savvy you are.

“Plus, on top of your practical knowhow, you’ve got such a wide circle of contacts.

“Since we got up and running, you’ve been great at worming information out of folk.”

Grimaced

“Too much information, sometimes. I see what you’re getting at, though. I suppose I do know a thing or two about life on the pointed end.

“When I was a kid, hardly a day went past there wasn’t a squad car down our street.” Maggie’s eyes widened. “Really?”

“You don’t know you’re born, Maggie Laird, sittin’ in that tidy wee bungalow of yours next door. “Oh,” Wilma grimaced, “I’m sorry. I didn’t mean…” “That’s alright.”

“It’s just, till I moved in with Ian, I’d never had a home, not a real home.

“Lived in nothing but rented stuff – cast-off furniture, outside toilets, electric meters that were forever running out.

“I was aye hungry, Maggie, when I was a kid, even with free school dinners.

“Had to leave school the minute I turned 16, go out to work at the fish processing.

“And once that Darren Fowlie got me in the family way…”

“Darren was your first husband?”

“Aye. He was that lay around the house all day. Out half the night.

“Plus I’d get the back of his hand if I so much as looked at him sideways.”

More on Monday.