centre. Who wouldn’t be charmed by a big, bonny lad like Lorimer, she thought dreamily, thinking of the missed chances she had had in her own love life. Ach, it’s all this stuff you’ve been reading, woman! Helen told herself, flinging down her magazine with its pages devoted to romance. Fair addled your brain! Time you were back at work, your mind on real life not stories. She flicked the ‘on’ button for the television and surfed between the channels. The velvet tones of the actor, John Cairney, made her pause and listen as he recited one of the more amorous poems of Robert Burns. Smiling despite herself, Helen James settled down to enjoy the programme. It was Burns day after all, she told herself, then wondered idly what sort of reception the bard would have got from the girls who frequented the drop-in centre.
‘Bet you never paid for it in your life, Rabbie,’ she said aloud, then stopped. Was that behind all of those brutal killings? Had some man refused to pay a woman’s price? Out of … what? Some warped sense of pride? Or some notion that he was above that sordid sort of transaction? Helen blinked, trying to imagine such a scenario, the words of poetry lost to her now as she gazed past the television screen. She rose, pressed the mute button to banish the actor’s lovely voice and lifted the telephone once more. Sooner Lorimer got over there and did some digging the better.
‘Mattie? It’s me, Helen James. Yes, okay DCI James. Listen, I wonder if you could do me a favour?’
The warden in the Robertson Street drop-in centre looked at the tall policeman from narrowed eyes. They were sitting in a back room that served as an office away from the main area frequented by the street women.
‘You don’t like me being here, do you?’ Lorimer asked candidly, his smile crinkling the corners of his piercing blue eyes.
‘The girls are happier with women around,’ Mattie Watson retorted.
‘Less of a threat to them?’ he suggested.
‘Something like that,’ she replied grudgingly. ‘You know many of them prefer to live with women, don’t you?’
Lorimer nodded. It was hardly surprising, given the way that so many of Glasgow’s prostitutes had been treated, that they had become lesbians. One familiar pattern was of early abuse at the hands of a father or father figure, then a decision to go on the game and earn money for the sexual favours that had already been stolen from them for nothing.
‘Men, for some of them, are merely the means to an end,’ Mattie said, breaking into his thoughts.
‘A punter for a hit,’ he mused.
‘Exactly. So, given that we can’t do as much as we want about getting them clean and off the game, we have to have a place where they can at least get some practical help.’
Lorimer nodded. Beside Mattie Watson’s desk were stacked boxes of leaflets that he knew would contain information about sexual health and advice on housing; probably the same as the posters fixed on the walls in this very office.
‘Do you encourage them to go on the Big Blue Bus?’ he asked. ‘They hand out stuff like that, don’t they?’ He pointed to the flyers displayed on the walls behind the warden.
‘Oh we are all in it together,’ she agreed, ‘even those do-gooder types,’ she added, though there was something in her voice that sounded a tad cynical, Lorimer thought.
‘Yes?’ Lorimer raised his eyebrows encouragingly.
‘Och, you get a few religious nuts who only want to save their souls. But there are other ones who know the score. Like that minister, Mr Allan, he goes around helping the girls, you know,’ she added.
‘Did you ever meet with Edward Pattison?’
For the first time since his arrival at the drop-in centre Mattie Watson gave a smile. ‘Such a lovely man,’ she said, dropping her gaze for a moment.
‘He came here?’
‘Oh, no,’ Mattie replied in shocked tones. ‘We met at a reception given by the SNP. That was before he made his visit to the Big Blue Bus,’ she added.
‘Nice man, then?’ Lorimer asked casually. ‘Never met him myself.’
‘Oh, yes. Such perfect manners. He listened to everything I told him about the centre. Promised he’d bring up the subject of funding at government level, you know.’
Lorimer raised his eyebrows, questioningly.
‘Well, didn’t get the chance to, did he, poor man,’ she said brusquely. ‘That awful serial killer … ’ She broke off then glared at Lorimer. ‘Shouldn’t you be out there finding