“Everything’s fine,” she said again. Her arms were flung wide like she was going to hug them, then show them the door and marshal them off her dirt island.
“Aye? Glad to hear it, Mrs Hamilton.”
“It’s Buchanan,” she said. “Ah never marriet their father, ah never got the chance. So it’s Ms. Ms Buchanan, thank-ye-very-much.” Mo-Maw usually went by the name Hamilton, it took less explaining, and it gave everyone a sense of belonging. The only time Mungo heard his mother issue this correction was when she was talking to men.
The officers were unsmiling. They looked down on this small woman and would not be corralled. The stockiest of the two had a ratty mullet, better suited to a radio disc jockey.
The polis were scowling at the three young Hamiltons, a pack of strays who were now spread far across the waste ground. They discounted Jodie almost immediately and focused instead on Hamish and Mungo. They had a stony-faced way of staring, but Mungo knew they were observing him closely and cataloguing every little detail. He could feel their eyes travel across his scuffed knees and up across his sore face. He worried that they could see all the things he didn’t want them to.
The polis had a deliberate way of holding their silence for too long, well past the point of it becoming uncomfortable. It made Mungo want to rush in and fill the void. Hamish had taught him how to wait it out; how to start at the letter A and list all the animals he knew in his head, and when he was done with animals, to begin again and this time list all the fruit. Hamish said that to think of vegetables and dogs’ names and countries was the best way to keep your expression inscrutable.
Mungo was thinking of koala bears when one of the polis finally spoke. The mulleted officer shook his head grimly. “There’s been some bother, see. The body of a man was found today in a loch. Somebody had stabbed him and then tried to sink him. Based on what you telt us, Mrs Hamil –， sorry, Ms Buchanan, we wanted to see what …” The polis looked at his pad. “Mun-go?” He shook his head in pity at a name destined to get belted in any playground. “… what young Mungo might know about it?”
“Bodies don’t sink, not for long,” said the other policeman. He was losing his hair, but he had been brave and cropped it close. He was gruffer than the first.
“Decomposition,” said Jodie dryly. “Rotting fat turns to gas. Everybody knows that.” Mungo didn’t. He was irritated by the fact that even in this moment, Jodie couldn’t help but show off.
The detective nodded in admiration. He pouted in open surprise that Mo-Maw could have a child this bright. “Aye, right enough. Smart wee lassie ye’ve got there, Ms Buchanan.”
“Aye. She’s a real pleasure. A talking bicyclopedia. Do ye want to borrow her?”
The gruff man frowned. “Ye keep givin’ yer weans away. Are ye planning on opening a lending library?”
Jodie shifted in embarrassment. The sarcasm of it was lost on Mo-Maw.
The detective explained how Strathclyde Police had phoned Balmaha, Balquhidder, Loch Lomond, and Inveraray to ask if there were any sightings of Mo-Maw’s missing boy. The Inveraray police had said no, however, they had just found a drowned body which was not suspicious in itself, but the body had been stabbed and was wearing a designer outfit of Italian denim, which was very unusual. The fishing warden had been patrolling for licence violations and had found the body partially submerged, its pockets filled with dozens of small stones. The body should not have risen so quickly; Gallowgate was not a fat man and the water was cold. He would have stayed submerged for weeks if he had been weighted properly.
When the police had hauled the body to the small village and called the mortician to come collect it, it had caused the stir of the century. The postmistress had instantly recognized Gallowgate and said he had a quiet boy with him. She said they both had thick, uncultured Glaswegian accents, that the boy was surrounded by a sadness, and that they had stolen chocolate bars and owed her a pound fifty.
“Ah’m glad Mungo came home. Yer lucky that everything worked out. But we do need to talk to the boy.” The mulleted detective turned his head from one brother to the other. “So, which one of youse is the bold Mungo Hamilton?”
Jodie and Mo-Maw did something strange then. They turned not to Mungo but to Hamish. In pure instinct, they looked to Hamish because he would know what to do. He was the man of the house. Their eyes seemed to implore, Handle it, Hamish.
The first detective kicked the ground like he had lost a bet. It was not the brother he had thought it would be. Hamish was certainly the shorter of the two, but this boy was slightly too old to fit the description. But the mouth of the balding detective pulled tight in a knowing grimace. As soon as he had clocked Hamish, he had thought him capable of violence.
Hamish stepped forward almost immediately. He didn’t blink, he barely nodded. “I am. I am Mungo.”
Gallus eejit. The officers would not play daft for long.
It could be the last time he ever saw James. Mungo knew it now. He turned because he wanted to look on him for as long as he possibly could, to remember the smile that made everything better, the mouth full of happy gappy teeth. He wanted to see if his cheeks had turned their usual bluish-pinkish tartan in fresh air.
James’s broken hand was raised in a frozen greeting. In his many coats he again resembled the statue of St Mungo at Kelvingrove, reaching out, welcoming followers.
James was biting his split lip. The rushing traffic blew his tawny hair over his eyes, the wheat and the barley, the sticky pulled sugar of it caught and ate the last of the sinking sun.
The broken hand swivelled then. He turned his bandaged knuckles towards Mungo and the splinted fingers that had caressed the soft down at the bottom of his spine twitched faintly, discreetly. The swaddling made the gesture crude, inarticulate, but Mungo understood.
He beckoned him only once. Once was enough.
Come, it said. Come away.
ACKNOWLEDGEMENTS
I am so grateful to my family, the gallus Glaswegians that I was blessed with, and the wonderful friends that are lumped with me. I wouldn’t be here without you.
I am indebted to my editor, Peter Blackstock, and to the Grove Atlantic team: Morgan Entrekin, Judy Hottensen, Deb Seager, John Mark Boling, and Emily Burns. Thank you to my fellow ugly duckling （his words） Ravi Mirchandani, and to Camilla Elworthy, Jeremy Trevathan, Stu Wilson, Gillian McKay, and the talented folk at Picador. Love and thanks to Anna Stein, Claire Nozieres, and Lucy Luck for taking such good care of Mungo, and to Grace Robinson, Julie Flanagan, and Will Watkins for all their support. Thank you to Mungo’s friends from o’er yonder, Cathrine Bakke Bolin, Daniel Sandstr?m, Susanne Van Leeuwen, Lina Muzur, and Valentine Gay.
I survive on the encouragement of my early readers, so many beers are owed to Patricia McNulty, Clive Smith, Valentina Castellani, Margaret Ann MacLeod, Tanya Carey, and Tina Pohlman for the loan of their hearts and minds.
Thank you, above all, to Michael Cary, who has always believed.