Eye for an Eye

by a high-pitched giggle.
    Gilchrist sipped his beer, while Fast Eddy wrapped up the order with some more banter.
    ‘Maggie’s supposed to be coming in tonight, Andy, but I’m not holding my breath. Donno what the world’s coming to. Nobody gives a toss any more.’
    ‘She have a new job?’
    ‘Don’t think so. Said she was moving off south.’
    ‘Come into some money?’
    ‘Couldn’t say, mate.’
    ‘Know where she lives?’
    ‘Sure.’
    Gilchrist made a mental note of Maggie’s address and left his pint unfinished. ‘Catch you later, Eddy.’
    ‘Gotcha.’
     
    The door paint was dull as rust and flaked around the trim. Gilchrist pressed the bell. Sing-along chimes rose and fell like a musical echo, then died.
    He tried again.
    A crack from an upstairs sash window startled him. The window slid up, then Maggie’s head squeezed through the gap.
    ‘I’m in the shower,’ she said. Then her face deadpanned. ‘Oh, it’s you.’
    ‘I’d like to talk to you.’
    ‘I don’t think that’s a good idea.’
    ‘You work in Lafferty’s. We could talk there.’
    ‘I’ve left.’
    ‘I heard you had two more nights.’
    ‘What d’you want?’
    ‘A word.’
    ‘Not interested.’
    ‘We can talk from here, if you like.’
    ‘You heard.’
    Gilchrist watched her head withdraw back into the room. ‘I know you lied,’ he shouted up to her. ‘What I don’t know is why.’
    The window slammed shut.
    Gilchrist knew then that Maggie had no intention of returning to Lafferty’s. And being suspended, he could not force her to talk to him. He strode onto Market Street and ran through his mind the little he knew of her. She seemed nice enough. Attractive, too, if on the heavy side. One of those women who had a problem keeping her weight down. Seldom smiled, as if she had trouble finding pleasure in life. A friend of Sa’s. Although Sa offered nothing of her private side. And that was about it.
    Ten minutes later, he turned into Alfred Place, stopped at the fourth door, and tried the handle. Locked. He rang the doorbell twice without any response, then took out his mobile and phoned Old Willie’s number.
    Again, no answer.
    He crossed the road for a better angle.
    The second-floor curtains were open. On the window ledge sat Tyke, looking down at him, unperturbed. Without wasting any more time, Gilchrist rang the emergency services.
    Then waited.
     
    Beth opened the front door to her flat, flapped her umbrella and poked it into the old wooden rack in the vestibule. Then she opened the inner door.
    Her olfactory sense took in the subtle changes to the smell of her home. Something chemical tainted the air, a faint antiseptic aroma. And the stale smell of sweat. She shivered at the thought of the sanctity of her home being violated and wondered if she would ever again feel safe and comfortable here.
    The gold-framed wall mirror, the one she had inherited from her mother and had reframed, hung at an angle, the glass shattered. She looked at the carpet, but someone had cleaned up the mess. She righted the mirror and noticed a tear on the wallpaper where the corner of the frame had caught it. The hall would need to be stripped and the wallpaper replaced.
    Ornaments on the shelf above the radiator had been moved. She tried to return them to their original positions, but the head of her Lladro clown figurine toppled to the carpet. She kneeled, noticed blood smears on the pile, a missed shard of glass, biscuit crumbs. She stood and placed the figurine’s head on the shelf.
    Outside the spare bedroom, she felt loathing shudder through her. She would have to replace the sheets, the pillows, the quilt, maybe even the bed itself, the curtains, the wallpaper, too. But even that might not be enough.
    Her mind flashed up an image of dark eyes looking at her from between her parted thighs and she strode to the kitchen and over to the sink, where she filled the kettle. Although she had eaten little that day, she did not feel hungry. After her examination by Mary Girvan, she had been offered biscuits and tea, but the police niceties had done nothing to diminish the feeling of personal violation that clung to her. Under the even-toned spell of Girvan’s voice, she had been asked to strip, her pubic hair combed and samples clipped off. Her vagina had been swabbed, as had her mouth, which was when she had broken down.
    She tried to force the memory from her mind and put a slice of wholemeal bread into the toaster, removed a