I got his breezy agreement that we had a big story. Almost as big as the one he himself claimed to be unravelling about the savage death of Alec Morton. Not that he was ready to share the details yet . . . Come closing time, Wullie and I fell out of Ross’s, did the usual hand-clasping brothers-in-ink vows, and stumbled on our separate ways. Creature of habit that I am, the siren smell of battered cod, deep fried in beef dripping, dragged me into the nearby Tallies. I asked for double salt and vinegar and shied off into the night clutching my hot poke, burning my fingers with every chip and sucking them for relief and for savour. With an imp in charge of my brain I found myself steering a path directly away from my tenement flat in Dennistoun. Like a faulty homing pigeon I ploughed my way along Sauchiehall Street, on up the hill to the rarefied heights of the terraces of Kelvingrove Park. I took a final flight of stone stairs up on to a sweep of grand grey sandstone townhouses. I started counting them off until I was outside my target.
