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winced as he put weight on his bad leg, said, ‘Go please, you have no right to come into my room.’
    ‘Oh, no . . .’
    His eyes blinked a spasm. ‘I can expect some privacy.’ He limped away from me, went to smooth over the duvet on the bed. He tugged out the edges, stood up and put his hands on his hips. Sweat glistened on his upper lip.
    Jayne called again, ‘Gus?’
    The lodger lifted a hand from his hip, indicated the door with his palm. I put one foot in front of the other, but kept a bead on him as I went. For a second I wondered if I had him all wrong, but I still had my suspicions. At the door I turned, said, ‘Pray I don’t take an interest in you.’
    Jayne had climbed the stair, was waiting for me in the hall.
    ‘She’s quietened down.’
    ‘That’s good. Look, I know this must be a shock and you must have questions and . . .’
    She looked back at the door I’d just walked through. ‘Were you talking to Vilem?’
    I tried the name on. ‘ Vilem  . . .’ I looked back to the room – the door was closed now, ‘Yeah . . . Where was he last night?’
    Jayne tugged nervously at her earlobe, playing with the little gold hoop in there. ‘He was here with us . . . He watched a movie downstairs with Alice.’
    ‘He was here all night?’
    ‘Yes, all night . . . Well, he was here when I was. I went out to my book group.’ Her eyes misted over as she remembered. She turned away from me and sucked in her lower lip. I could tell that she was replaying the last time she saw Michael.
    ‘I’m sorry . . . I don’t mean to . . .’
    Jayne snapped, ‘Are you checking our alibis or something, Gus?’
    ‘I’m just . . . checking.’
    I watched her closely for a change of tone, a tell; nothing came. ‘Vilem is a nice boy, he’s one of Michael’s new workers. He’s just here till he finds a flat. Michael was helping him out.’
    I took her back a few steps. ‘New workers?’
    ‘After the lay-offs . . . Michael was . . .’ Her face drained of blood; she flattened her hair back with her hand. I watched her eyes follow the ghost of another memory.
    I hadn’t heard about any lay-offs at my brother’s firm. He always prided himself on looking after folk, last of the great cradle-to-grave employers. I wanted to know more but couldn’t face the tears; knew this was the wrong time to press her. I said, ‘I’ll let you be, Jayne.’
    She jerked back to me, rubbed at the outside of my arm, then hugged me. ‘Thanks for everything . . . I know you mean well. For Alice and me.’
    I didn’t want to hear the words, they put ice in my belly – the thought of them on their own, without my brother, wounded me. I stood silently – nothing seemed the right thing to say, then some stored response began to play: ‘Jayne, if there’s anything you both need, or I can do . . .’
    I didn’t have the words to make her feel any better. I was stood in my brother’s home, talking to his wife about his death when he had been with us less than twenty-four hours ago. It seemed like I’d started to inhabit someone else’s life.
    ‘Thank you,’ Jayne said. She looked wrecked, black circles forming beneath her eyes. ‘Oh God . . . Davie.’
    Michael’s business partner Davie Prentice was a golf-club bore, what we refer to in Edinburgh as a cheese merchant. ‘I’ll go and see him: you need to know the lay of the land with the business.’
    I walked to the stairs. I’d reached the bottom step before Jayne hollered to me, ‘Gus, please don’t give Davie a hard time.’
    Her words sliced me like a rotor blade; was I carrying that much threat? I lied: ‘I’ll be on my best behaviour.’

Chapter 4
    I FELT PUNCHY. NUMB. I palmed off the job of telling Mam about Michael to my sister. Catherine would handle the task better, but it stung. I consoled myself that I wasn’t up to the job – it would have ended me and I needed to keep it together. Was struggling though, even