The First Novels: Pay Off, the Fireman by Stephen Leather Read Free Book Online

pulled into the gravelled drive which curved in front of the grey stone building that was Shankland Hall only two hours after I’d landed at Edinburgh. Originally built as the private residence of a wealthy tobacco baron who decided to devote his retirement to the pursuit of country pastimes, it had been sold to pay off death duties just after the Second World War and was now one of the best, and most expensive, private nursing homes north of the border. Tucked away in a sheltered valley to the east of Pitlochry it’s a case of out of sight, out of mind for many of the residents, dumped there by uncaring relatives with money to spare. In David’s case, though, it was a temporary home, he wouldn’t be there long. I hoped.
            He was waiting at the top of the stone steps leading to the large oak double doors, holding the arm of a nurse in a dazzlingly white starched uniform. He was jumping up and down with excitement and waving with his free hand. My daft brother.
            As I got out of the car he left the nurse and ran down the steps to grab me around the neck, and he squeezed me so tight that I couldn’t breathe. ‘Missed you, missed you, missed you, missed you,’ he whispered into my ear. ‘Don’t go, don’t go, don’t go.’
            ‘It’s all right,’ I gasped, and reached behind my neck to unclasp his hands. I held them in front of me and looked into his brown eyes which were starting to fill with tears. ‘It’s all right, I’m here.’
            A tear rolled down his plump cheek, dripped off his round chin and onto his blue linen trousers. David’s my younger brother, my only brother, and he’s nineteen years old. The only difference between David and you, me and the Duke of Edinburgh is that David was born with one extra chromosome in each of his cells, a tiny amount of genetic material that’s enough to throw his whole body out of kilter and produce a baby that will never, ever, grow up to be ‘normal’.
            It happens in something like one out of every 660 births and they used to call them Mongols and now they call it Down’s Syndrome but David is David and that’s all there is to it. The doctors keep measuring his IQ and coming up with numbers between sixty and seventy which is bright for a Down’s Syndrome adult but so low as to deny him a life on his own, not that he’d want one.
            He is happy, most of the time, and fun and affectionate and occasionally flashes of intuition would come shining through like a lighthouse beam slicing through fog.
            Then he’d spoil it by trying to eat his soup with a fork and laugh because he knew full well what he was doing – teasing me. He’d hug me and ask me to promise never to leave him and I’d say I wouldn’t ever leave him for good and that he was safe with me. My daft brother.
            ‘Go and say hello to Shona,’ I said and pushed him away.
            He rushed over to Shona and grabbed her from behind as she locked up the Rover, picked her off the ground and gave her a bear hug that made her gasp.
            ‘Put me down, David,’ she laughed. ‘You’re hurting.’ But he wasn’t, he knew his own strength and he knew by the way Shona was laughing that she was enjoying it. He giggled and put her down, seized her hand and then pulled her over to me and caught mine, linking the three of us together.
            ‘All for one,’ he shouted.
            ‘And one for all,’ we chorused. It was his favourite joke, but it was more than that, it bound us together and he knew that he could depend on us both.
            Now he was laughing and giggling and squeezing my hand tight, swinging it back and forth. He’d been at Shankland Hall for about three months now, since the day after the funeral, and it wasn’t doing him any good, I could see that.
            His eyes flicked nervously from face to face, eager to please and anxious not to offend. Even Shona’s visits