The Courier & Advertiser (Angus and Dundee)
Maggie sat up straight. “I don’t see it like that. It’s a disaster whichever way you look at it
Aberdeen Police tonight issued the following statement: A 19-year-old man has been charged… “Did you hear that?” Maggie caught the end of the newsflash as she came through Wilma’s back door. “Aye.” Wilma killed the TV. “Watched it earlier.” “That it sorted, then?”
“Seems like it. Come in about.” Wilma led the way through to the conservatory. “You look shattered, woman.” Maggie sank gratefully into one of the big chairs. “I am.”
“Kids OK?”
“Yup. I put Kirsty on the Dundee Express this afternoon. Colin’s got a sleepover after rugby training so I’m off the hook. How about you?”
“Ian’s working overtime. Said he’d be late.” Wilma hesitated, “But haven’t we got billing to do?” Maggie grinned. “Nope. All up to date.” “Aren’t you the kiddie?”
“Not me, Wilma. Us.”
“Us, then,” Wilma beamed. “So how’s about I crack open a bottle?”
Sensation
Languidly, Maggie stretched. “Why not?” “What a week it’s been.” Wilma set a couple of glasses down on the coffee table and poured a generous helping of red wine into them. “Week? Month, more like.”
“And the rest. Anyhow, here’s to you, Maggie.” She raised her glass, took a slurp.
“And you, Wilma.” Maggie swilled a mouthful around her tongue, savouring the sensation of it before she swallowed.
“We’ve covered a fair bit of ground this last while, don’t you think, pal?” Wilma took another slurp.
“Haven’t we just? Mugging up on the legals. Building our client base.”
“Then you nailing Craigmyle and Brannigan.” “Hang on,” Maggie interrupted, “it was you delivered Brannigan.”
Wilma beamed. “What a team! But the Seaton drugs investigation was down to you, Maggie. And that poor student’s death. Those wee lads on the fringe of it.”
Maggie grimaced. “Poor soul. But what about all the other stuff?” She took another glug of wine. “Remember that surveillance job I did? Sat outside half the night and it was the wrong house?”
“And the time I served papers on that fella in the altogether?” “And the guy that set the Alsatians on me?” “And that pair up Nigg Point. The car was rockin’ that hard I thought it was going to lift off.” Wilma topped their glasses up. “In broad daylight, too. Ah wis fair knocked oot o’ ma stotter, ah’ll tell you that for nothin’.”
“You’d have lifted off if that fella had caught up with you,” Maggie teased. “You have to admit, Wilma, you can be a bit of a loose cannon at times.”
“You’ve got a nerve, Maggie Laird, the way you go head-on at things. What about your run-in with that Fatboy, not to mention the time you went off in high dudgeon to beard James Gilruth?”
“Don’t remind me. It was a daft thing to do, going to see him like that. I can only conclude I was still in shock, what with the trial and its aftermath and George dying like that. Seeing conspiracies at every turn,” Maggie’s lips formed a bitter smile.
“I was in such a dark place, Wilma, clutching at anything at all that would help make sense of it. Still,” she sighed, “I guess it was a good exercise, if nothing else. Helped me cut my teeth as a PI.”
“Still, the fella’s fair got his comeuppance.” “How so?”
Wilma grinned. “You mebbe haven’t squared things with the father yet, but you’ve fingered the son.”
Disaster
Maggie sat up straight. “I don’t see it like that. It’s a disaster whichever way you look at it: for that boy, Christopher. For the parents, for Kym, for wee Kyle. It hasn’t all been a disaster, though, the business – has it, Wilma?”
“No, of course not. Look at the number of corporate clients we’ve got signed up now.” She took another gulp of wine. “And the corporate accounts are where the big money is, don’t you think? All thon insurance frauds. And they’re on the up and up. You only have to look at the billing.”
Maggie took another sip of her wine. “I suppose.” “And if this new contract comes up trumps, we’ll really be sorted.”
“I know. Who’d have predicted that I’d be able to get justice for George and build something useful out of the ashes of his career? And it’s kept me close to him, in a way.” She looked wistful, all of a sudden. “We can’t be so bad at it, either, can we? A woman’s touch. Isn’t that what they said?”
“Aye. And they’re no’ daft. Folk feel less threatened by a woman, Maggie, so you can get more out o’ them. Plus PIS can go places police can’t.”
“You’re right. Fingers crossed, then.” Wilma twined her fingers. “Fingers crossed.” “We might as well finish it.” She upended the bottle into Maggie’s glass.
“Dear Lord, have we drunk all that?”
“Not a problem.” Wilma struggled to her feet. “Plenty more where that came from.”
Maggie closed her eyes. She couldn’t believe how far they’d come in the space of a few months. When she thought back to…
“Here we go,” Wilma emerged from the kitchen brandishing another bottle.
“You’re a bad influence on me, Wilma Harcus. I’m fairly getting a taste for this stuff. I never used to drink till I teamed up with you.”
“I remember,” Wilma grinned. “One wee spritzer and you were out of it. Changed days, huh?”
Decisive
Maggie couldn’t believe how much she’d changed since Wilma Harcus first stood on her doorstep. She might look the same.
Well… she raised a hand to her head. Maybe not the hair. But she wasn’t the same.
She was tougher. More decisive. More accepting of people as she found them. And more aware, of herself and others. Maggie felt the colour rise in her face as she recalled her reaction to Allan Chisolm. “Here you go, pal,” Wilma proffered the bottle. “I can’t. Really.”
“Course you can. No billing to do. No kids to get up for in the morning.”
“All the same…”
“Lighten up,” Wilma joshed. “That’s your problem, Maggie Laird, you never let up.”
Maggie stiffened. “I can’t help it.” She thought back to Methlick, to the farm. Her parents had led a hard-working, pretty cheerless existence. And she’d been the product of that: innocent, old-fashioned, her values from another generation. What was it Wilma called her once – a country mouse?
“Well, if I’d let up, as you call it, we wouldn’t have got the results we have.”
“True.” Wilma refilled their glasses. “So why don’t we drink to that?”
“Ah wis thinkin’…” Wilma’s accent always got broader once she’d had a couple of drinks. “We’re needin tae think aboot oor USP.”
“I suppose that’s another one you got off The Apprentice?”
Wilma drew herself up. “As a matter of fact…” “Oh, don’t be like that.”
More tomorrow.