The Lost Sister

He doesn't waste a moment. Lets go of the axe, brings both hands round on either side of my head and slams them together. Catches me underneath both ears. The impact makes me nauseous, causes the world to go black for just a moment.

But I'm alright.

Because I don't feel anything.

And then I realise I'm on my back and suddenly it's like there are flames inside my skull.

I try to sit up. Can't do it.

Bastard's put me down for the count.

He's big. Doesn't need technique so much as momentum. He's a brawler. The kind of bastard you could see in another life slinging arseholes from pubs.

Aye, looking for zero tolerance? This is who you'd call.

I'm too stunned to even be angry.

Didn't he say it himself?

We're the same, McNee.

Meaning on the inside. Like we were kindred spirits. Some bollocks like that.

Aye, right.

But I should have seen this coming sooner. Should have known it would happen.

Of course, I've got a death wish, haven't I?

Seeking out danger. Any excuse to put myself in the path of pain.

And the way he's builtâ¦

The very embodiment.

He gives me a moment, lets me try and stand. Then kicks out with those bastard boots, knocks me back on my arse. Am I hallucinating, or do I hear a rib crack?

I'm past feeling anything. Aware of the pain, but it's like something inside me's broken and all the signals are coming in over long distance.

Do I cry out? I don't know. I could have made sound, or maybe I'm too far gone.

Jesus Christ, I don't know.

I blink, try to bring the world back in focus.

Look up at the big man.

But he's gone fuzzy. Like he's fading out of the world.

Mary Furst Missing
24 Hours
Chapter 1

I'd done work for Cameron Connolly before, a few covert surveillances. Some â and he's the one who made the joke â “leg” work.

He paid well, asked that I keep our dealings discreet. It was a casual arrangement. His bosses would throw a fit if he asked them to retain an investigator on the payroll.

I could have told him, “discreet” was my middle name. But we didn't play those games. He didn't want the gloss, the image, the ideals he'd grown up watching on the TV. He wanted the work.

I always delivered on that.

First time he called, he said, “I like the card.”

“Aye?”

“Does the job, right? Who wants flash from a PI? Like that tosser Magnum, the one with the moustache?”

I finished it for him: “Aye, and the bright red Ferrari.”

“Talk about subtle.”

Connolly was on the ball. Had the gig down cold. There's simpatico between the life of a reporter and that of an investigator. We are not the focus. When we become more important than the work â when the reporter becomes the story, or the PI becomes part of his own investigations â that's when we wind up fucking the work.

No, Thomas Magnum would never have made it in the real world.

Connolly and I had worked well together on some small cases. He was something of an arsehole, but a good reporter. Carved out his career in Edinburgh, but something happened and he took the quiet â well, quieter â life working for the
Dundee Herald.
Only got in over his head once, but once was enough. It landed him in a wheelchair.

Working an expose on Dundee's drug trade, he'd broken that cardinal rule and become part of his own story. Beaten by irate hard bastards. His spine snapped, legs left useless.

Get his wee joke now?

This happened years before I met him, of course.

He'd told me how his brother-in-law had been an investigator, too. I recognised the name, thought I'd heard something about how he'd left the business. Personal problems.

The business could eat your life.

Best if you didn't have one to start with.

It was a Thursday when Connolly called to ask for my help. He had a story waiting to break. “And break big,” he said.

Foresight? Reporter's instinct?

Either way, he didn't know the half of it.

It was early afternoon, the sun was high, shining across the top of the Overgate Shopping Centre, down North Lindsay Street and streaming into the third floor window of my offices. I was drinking coffee, catching up on correspondence.

Watch the films and you might believe most PIs are walking dark alleys, snapping secret shots of illicit lovers, getting a kicking from punks and tossing off quips every time someone pulls a gun on them.

The truth?

We spend most of our days at computer screens. Farm out the specialised work to specialised individuals. When we can afford to.

And we write reports. Spend half our life trying to remember the rules of grammar we'd ignored all through school.

I'd never taken an official test, but after a few years in the business, I had a feeling my WPM could beat that of most secretarial staff.

Thing was, I wasn't typing up too many reports when Connolly called.

On the news, they talked about The Credit Crunch. Capitalise it, it's that important. Like the world was going straight to hell. Maybe so. I couldn't comment on that. But I could say that it had turned my usual pool of clients into a bunch of stingy bastards.

Guess in an economic downturn, priorities change.

So I welcomed the interruption. The chance to talk to someone else on the other end of the line. Even a hermit needs to talk every once in a while.

“It's all hush-hush,” Connolly said.

I couldn't help myself. “On the QT?”

“Confidential.” Connolly hesitated. I heard a door open and close somewhere nearby. He wasn't kidding about confidential if he was waiting for someone to leave. “I'm serious, pal. The coppers don't want this one getting out. Not before they say so.”

“Hang on.” I looked around for a pen. Found one fast, then realised I didn't have any paper. Started hunting through drawers, all the while trying my best to take in what Connolly had to say.

He said, “I should tell you up front, this isn't the usual arrangement.”

“Oh?”

“The high heedjuns, they aren't exactly looking to splash the cash.”

“Meaning?”

“Every penny has to be accounted for.”

My services weren't on the books. Probably filed under misc, some shite like that. I'd never cared to ask. It had never mattered before.

“I don't do favours.”

“You'll be compensated.”

“From your pocket?”

“Ever heard of mate's rates?” He didn't sound hopeful.

I found the pen, looked at the correspondence on my email. Thought about the hours stretching ahead waiting for the next case to just fall in my lap.

Fuck it. Like I had anything better to do?

“Go ahead,” I said. “I'll hear you out at least.”

He dived on, like he'd never expected me to say any different. “Lead on this one's DCI Bright.”

“Ernie?”

“You know him?”

“Trained under him when I went for the CID gig.”

A gig I never completed. Couple months, waiting for the probationary period to end. After the car crash that killed Elaine, my career took what's best described as a downward spiral. Wound up with me breaking a superior officer's nose. Hardly dignified, but then life seldom is.

Things could have been worse, I suppose.

There was a notepad at the back of the bottom drawer in my desk. Couple of old numbers scribbled on the first page. I scored through them, tried to remember if they were important.

Elaine used to laugh at how disorganised I was. Couldn't figure how I got anything done.

My excuse was, I had a system, she just didn't understand it.

Her response: “Neither do you.”

Aye, she'd had a point. Always did.

Connolly said, about DCI Bright, “That's it? There's something more between you and Bright. Don't kid a kidder, McNee.”

Guys like Connolly could hear those things you didn't say.

“It's not important.”

He let it drop. We had a surface relationship, but he understood me enough to know when I didn't want to talk about something.

“Bright's in charge, then,” I said.

“Yep. Missing girl. Fourteen years old. Name's Mary Furst. Been missing since yesterday afternoon.” He told me the story. Gave me the facts.

I scribbled furiously.

Reflected later.

Mary Furst was in her third year of high school. First year of Standard Grades.

A bright student. The kind of girl who breaks hearts, but never with malice. The kind of girl everyone likes. The kind of girl who'll never want for anything. Not an enemy in the world.

No wonder Connolly was on the case. This was the sort of story, you could tug people's heartstrings. The right details, every reader would be smudging the type with their tears.

Tragedy equals circulation.

In fairness to Connolly, he didn't seek it out, but he had this instinct. Knew when tragedy was close at hand.

This was one in the making.

Mary Furst left school at the usual time, according to the police reports. The family â just Mary and her mother these days â lived within walking distance of the Bellview Academy campus. She'd generally sling back across neighbours' gardens. That kind of neighbourhood. Most of the residents knew each other, didn't mind their kids taking shortcuts through their property as long as they behaved themselves.

Over the phone, Connolly said what I was thinking: “Thought that kind of world disappeared around 1966.”

So Mary makes it home, passes Mum in the kitchen, says she's heading upstairs to get changed. Mum reminds her: homework.

So far, so domestic.

Mum pops out for milk. The shop's across the street.

Her daughter is fourteen.

Bright. Intelligent. Trustworthy. More than most kids, if what Mum says is to believed.

But when Mum comes back with the milkâ¦

â¦Mary's gone.