Where the Dead Men Go Read Online Free Page B

breast had touched it.
    ‘So I hear. You tweet it yet?’
    ‘What?’
    ‘The story. Gallacher’s trending already. He’s got pics from the locus. Quotes. Do one now you’ll get some of his traffic.’
    ‘Traffic?’ I shook my head. ‘Jesus Christ, Neve, a man’s dead. Dead, okay? I boiled it down to six hundred words. You want me to tell it in 140 characters? To do what – steal “traffic” from that prick at the News of the World ?’
    ‘Fine.’ Neve’s hand was up, shutting me off. ‘Do I give a fuck if you tweet it or not? Tell Driscoll. Tell Maguire. Jesus, sorry I spoke.’
    ‘Okay, Neve. Look, let’s – I’m sorry, alright? It’s rubbish, anyway – paper of record splashing on a city killing, local neds. It’s freesheet stuff. Never have happened under Rix.’
    She breathed out slowly through her nose, took a swig of her drink, licked her milky moustache. ‘No one ever tell you you’re hard work, Gerry?’
    I sipped my whisky. ‘Someone might’ve. Few years back. But I knew she was joking. The way she said it, I could tell she didn’t mean it.’
    She paid for the drinks, slotted her change into the big charity whisky bottle on the bar. ‘Mari okay? The wee fella?’
    ‘Angus,’ I told her. ‘Brand new, thanks.’
    ‘Good.’ She collected her drinks in a little diamond formed by her fingers and thumbs. ‘We’re in the back booth.’ She jerked her head across the pub. I could see Maguire talking to Davidson, Driscoll lifting a pint to his lips.
    ‘I’ve got to get back.’
    ‘Aye. No doubt.’ She squeezed back into the crush, her drinks held high, hips swivelling.
    I lifted the paper from the bar-top, tucked it under my arm. The night was cold and clear, the clouds gone, the pavements icy. I crossed the bridge, stars ablaze in the glossy Clyde. I looked up to see if the scattered pricks of light would resolve themselves into a constellation – a bear or a plough or one of the others – but they held their random stations. My heels rang on the walkway of the bridge as I crossed the river and set off into town.
    In some ways the gloom was cheerful, the gloom that enveloped the trade, that pervaded our weeks from conference on Tuesday morning to the Cope on Saturday night. At least we had the benefit of foresight. We knew that our business was on its way out. We were the scattered remnants, the last of the clan. Okay, let’s go out with style, make the last days count. The past few weeks as I rode the subway to Ibrox I’d been happy, I relished my job more than ever. I was like a man recovering from a life-threatening illness; every day was a bonus.
    The weather helped. I always think of winter as a hopeful time, a season of quiet graft and preparation, of groundwork and hidden diligence. Summer makes me nervous, fretful, I feel life passing me by. The sunny days are like an accusation. When the shortest day has passed I feel bereft, wrong-footed, like I’ve missed the boat again. But with the winter coming on, with November around the corner, with a hard blue sky in the mornings and a silver glint on the pavements and the cold air punching your lungs everything seems ahead of you. The future seems assured, even when it’s not.
    I was glad I’d come back from PR. PR is where you go to die, or where you go when your paper does. I stuck it for three years before I staggered back like Lazarus, back to my old desk, my old beat, my old contacts and adversaries. Only everything was new. The title on my business cards – Scottish Political Editor, Tribune on Sunday – was the same, but now I was writing for the daily as well as the Sunday, writing for the website as well as the paper, writing news as well as Politics. And Politics wasn’t Politics any more.
    I’d come back in time to cover the last election and I was still recovering. The losing party can go off and lick its wounds, regroup, elect a new leader. But the hacks who get it wrong? We have to sit down and write next