'Dubh Ardrain,' he said, pointing between the village of Crianfada and the town of Cromlarig. A yellow T' icon (tourist attraction) sat next to the snaking blue of Loch Fada along the stretch where the bridge had collapsed.

'What's that?'

394.

'One of the biggest power stations in the country.'

'But not nuclear?'

'No. Hydro-electric.'

'Why would he be interested in that?'

'Today, I don't know, but he always was.'

'Was?'

'Since we went there as students, on a Geography field trip.'

'I thought you did English.'

'I did Geography too, just in first year. That's where I met Simon. He was very taken with Dubh Ardrain, and believe me, it wasnae often Simon was impressed by anythin' that didnae have an indie label or a bra around it. I remember him sayin' he'd love to shoot a video there one day, inside the hollow mountain.'

'But what could he do there now? Even if he blew the place up, the only people he'd kill would be the staff, and he prefers a bigger bodycount for his efforts. Shit, hang on - it's a tourist attraction though, isn't it?'

'Not today. The road's closed, remember? Tourists cannae get there, and neither can anybody else: such as the polis or any other emergency services, apart from those based in Cromlarig or further north in Strathairlie.'

'Which probably amount to Hamish Macbeth, a district nurse and a bucket of water for the fire service. Better check it out.'

'We better had.'

'What's with we? You've got a wife and baby to get back to, remember?'

'Aye, and I've got a better chance of protectin' them both if it's me who's comin' after him.'

'He's had his fun with you, Ray. He's got bigger fish to fry now.'

395.

'Has he? I can identify four of his men - that part they know for definite. Me escapin' was part of the script, so are you tellin' me they're not plannin' to tie up their loose ends later? As for Simon havin' his fun, that's not over either. He's still got a score to settle.'

'I thought he was the one who fucked you over.'

'He did, but...' Ray sighed. 'Simon had -has-a rather Simoncentric view of the world, so he never saw it that way. Plus there's . . . ach, it's a long story.'

'And we've got a long drive. Including that three-hour detour.'

'There's a watersports centre at Crianfada. We could make the last leg by boat instead.'

'Good thinking. That's three hours less, but it still can't be that long a story. 'Fess up.'Ray didn't tell her everything, obviously. Just the more salient parts, many of which she already knew from the file and her conversation with the polisman who'd lifted them. It had been second term, final year, without doubt the most purgatorial in anyone's university career: the finals are close enough for you to be constantly worried about them, but still too far off when you're impatient for it all to be over. Second term is also post-Christmas, making it the most miserable, cold and dreich in any year, let alone your fourth. Consequently, there was even more recourse to the QM bar and the Grosvenor Cafe, and a greater likelihood of crossing paths with the Dark Man again.

In fact, this was fairly inevitable, given that they still shared quite a few friends. On top of that, Ray remained uncomfortable about the way things had ended, and felt there was something mutually cowardly about avoiding each other rather than sitting down to clear the air over a 396.

beer or at least a coffee. He didn't actively seek Simon out, but did stop doing a one-eighty if he walked into the bar and saw him already seated.

What made this a little easier was that Ray was receiving corroborative reports from mutual friends that Simon had 'calmed down a lot', and that this dampening of his volatility was largely down to his current girlfriend. It was also, some surmised, possibly a consequence of having a relationship with a female that lasted beyond the following weekend and the next chance to pull someone new.

The inexorable reunion happened one Tuesday night in the QM bar, when Ray was already shoehorned in at the back against the windows overlooking the disco, and therefore had no means of escape when Simon and his remarkedly pacifying companion walked up to join their table. Cutting off even the rubber-ear or cursory nod options was the fact that the two girls sitting to Ray's left were just heading off to catch a film at The Salon, so got up and offered their seats to the new arrivals.

With the benefit of hindsight, and particularly given his current informed perspective, Ray could feel justified in saying that Simon was one of the few people on the planet capable of making magnanimity seem ostentatious. Everyone at that low and rickety table knew what had gone down between them, doubtless the new girlfriend included, so instead of a tentative hello, Simon leaned over and offered a warm handshake, before introducing him to 'Felicia' as though he was a brother. Simon even did him the courtesy of calling him Ray and not Larry. In retrospect Ray could see him as Ralph Fiennes in Bchindler's List, staring at himself in the mirror and trying on 'I forgive you' for size. At the time, though, the effect was just another instance of Simon's charms working their magic. Ray felt 397.

forgiven, though it didn't occur to him to evaluate who, if anyone, had actually sinned. And yet again, he felt ten feet tall to be back in Simon's court.

The king's new consort sat between them, and it was easy to see why she hadn't been dispatched as swiftly as her many predecessors. For one thing, she had a smile on her face and she wasn't dressed for a funeral, unlike the succession of self-loathing gnarly Gothettes that had dallied briefly on Simon's arm. Her personality was different too, in as much as she had one. Ray, still in chronic virginal frustration, had oftened wondered of Simon's previous conquests whether their abject dullness made them easier to bed; it certainly made them easier to dump. Rina, as everyone else called her (Felicia being her given Simon name, which she was naive enough to interpret as innocent affection) sparkled with conversation, humour and energy, and was refreshingly non-deferential towards her esteemed host. Ray had been used to Simon's always being the last word on most matters, especially music, but Rina could be wittily withering not only of his opinions, but of the subject's dubious importance in the first place. That was why he couldn't help but smile in recognition when Angelique took the same derisory line.

Looking at the two of them that night, Ray concluded that the comparative longevity of their relationship (six weeks and counting) was due to Simon having finally met his match and liked it. However, within weeks, arguably days, Ray would learn that he was wrong on both counts. She was more than a match, and Simon didn't fucking like it.

Simon and Ray's relationship, on the other hand, was perhaps the best it had ever been. There was a great feeling of maturity about being able to put their differences, grudges and, let's be honest, embarrassments behind them; 398.

together with a sense that they would be better friends for all of it. They blethered endlessly, the way they used to, making each other laugh, exchanging thoughts and ideas. The only jarring note was that the subjects of The Bacchae and The Arguments were conspicuously diverted around like road accidents. Ray was the only one who skirted close to the issue, but the signs he got in return let him know that Simon wasn't ready to laugh about it yet.

Ray got to know Rina very well too, at first through sharing Simon's company, but increasingly through sharing Simon's absence. He might have 'calmed down a lot', but he hadn't changed: Simon was consistently late for meeting both of them, except for when he never turned up at all. It was a downside of Simon's otherwise charming capacity to find certain people (temporarily) fascinating that he was very easily diverted, and it wasn't unusual to coincidentally run into him hours later in the company of a different crowd. If you asked why he didn't show up to meet you, he would tell you it was because he had met them instead, an answer which he expected the listener to find as satisfying as it was logical.

Even when he did show up, he would often spend the first drink with Rina and then gravitate off to a conversation in a different part of the room,'bar,'party, leaving her in the company of his unappointed deputy. This wasn't something Ray was inclined to complain about, because he couldn't imagine any other circumstances under which he and Rina would be spending much time together, and his only concern was that she was unlikely to see it as a fair exchange. If Ray had found it exciting but occasionally vertiginous to be in Simon's exalted company, then being around Rina felt like swinging on a chairaplane round the top of the CN Tower.

399.

She was a year younger than him, but she was the type of girl who made Ray feel as though he was a teenager in the company of a sophisticated adult. Admittedly, most people could make Ray feel that way, probably as a result of his birthday falling in February and him consequently being the youngest kid in the class from Primary school upwards. However, Rina never gave the reciprocal impression that she was thinking of taking him to McDonald's later if he was a good boy. They got very pally, particularly as Ray became more comfortable being her friend and less inclined merely to play the humble fool for her amusement.

But while she and Ray were getting along like best buddies, her patience with Simon was fast wearing thin. Ray recognised the symptoms because he'd been there too. The disaffection happened by degrees, and in Rina's case the process seemed to be happening at an accelerated pace. First came fascination, which Simon underwent frequently and promiscuously among those who took his interest. Next came the charm, as he made you realise that his interest in you was more enduring than in the others, because you were something more than them: a counterpart who gave as good as you got; who had as much to say (and as much wit to say it) as he did. The problems arrived at the third stage, when Simon started to feel threatened. He wanted you to go on being that interesting and witty person, but on his terms, an adjunct, not an equal. That was when he gave you a name, to tell you 'this is who you are'.

Rina had been less bothered by the naming than Ray, but no less resistant of Simon's attempts to contain her. That was why he kept buggering off to talk to other people. He wanted the best of both worlds: Rina on his arm (and 400.

in his bed), without her stealing the limelight, without her diverting attention from him.

'I think part of him wants back to the daft lassies who'll just worship him, but another part of him knows I'm worth more than them, and doesn't want to give me up,' was how she put it.

Despite their growing friendship, Ray would have to own up to a certain culpability in diverting Simon's attention from Rina, now that he'd had his 'interesting person' status renewed, and this was massively exacerbated when they came up with a new shared project. Ray would later put the museum thing down to a certain nihilism instilled by all that final-year, second-term psychosis, but in truth it was merely another instance of late-night drinking spawning an idea so intoxicating that the next morning failed to sober them of it.

Simon, being dedicatedly apolitical, was the last person to be motivated in his deeds by the desire to make a 'statement', and regarded what they were planning as a kind of situationist artwork. Ray did have a degree of genuine anger over the university's decision to splash out thousands on a new security system for a museum that nobody had ever tried breaking into anyway, but was mainly driven, after the idea had become planted in his head, by the because it's there' factor. To that he might add the 'why does a dog lick his balls' factor: once he realised he could do it, there seemed little reason not to. Consequences didn't enter into it. For one thing, ending up in jail would save him from sitting his finals, but even that was barely worth a thought. Consequences only happened to those who got caught, and he, like every other crook in history, wasn't planning to be.

They told no-one, well aware that a juicy titbit mouthed 401.

at Kelvingrove Underground station could make it to the other side of the Hillhead campus before you did. The plan, indeed the whole notion, spawned from a chance remark Ray made to Simon as they discussed the university's latest profligacy. The previous term had witnessed the announcement of a six-figure outlay to have the main building and its landmark steeple (The Tower of Guilt, as it was known among students, particularly those with essays due) sandblasted back to its original white. This was an extravagance compounded by it being the architect's original intention that the stone should gather soot and render his creation black. Now, despite bare shelves in parts of the library, they wanted to shell out on a computerised security system which, as Ray fatefully put it, 'I could disable with a Commodore Amiga and a nine-hundred baud modem'.

Contrary to popular misunderstanding, much computer hacking does not require technical expertise or a facility with arcane pieces of machine code (though both of these do help), but is based around the simple device of sussing other people's passwords and then negotiating the system from there. Mothers' maiden names, dates of birth, children's birthdays . . . People are either too lazy to think of something securely esoteric or too scared that they'll forget what it was; and that's now, when the world revolves around PCs. In Glasgow back in the late Eighties, it was shooting fish in a barrel.

'It's just a question of finding the point of least resistance,' Ray explained to Simon.

The point of least resistance, in this case, was called Wullie Ferguson, the university museum's thick and bad- tempered nightwatchman, because any security system - computerised or not - was only as effective as the stupidest person who had to operate it. Auld Wullie was known to 402.

every student who'd ever raised his or her voice after midnight within a half-mile radius of the museum, barrelling from his office like a ruddy-faced cannonball at the slightest provocation and threatening expulsion as a ready sanction, like he was one step down from the university chancellor. The only time he was known to have a smile on his face was after Rangers victories, and it needed no solicitation for him to inform you that he was an Ibrox season-ticket holder. Using the aforementioned Amiga and primitive modem - one you still had to clamp the telephone receiver to - Ray successfully gained full access privileges on his first test run, the remote computer rejecting 'Rangers', 'Loyal' and '1690' before opening its doors to 'Souness'.

Gaining physical entry to the premises was achieved using the less technological method of starting a fire in a nearby skip and waiting for Auld Wullie to go into Red Adair mode, at which point Ray and Simon snuck into the building via his office.

It was plausibly rumoured that Wullie spent much of the night asleep once the unions were closed and there were no drunk undergraduates to shout at, knowing from decades of experience that this was an adequate level of vigilance in a place nobody had ever attempted to steal from. Ray and Simon therefore waited close to his door until they heard snoring, then set about their fun. In a measured, poignant and well-thought-out demonstration to highlight the university's inappropriate financial priorities, they rearranged all of the stuffed animals so that they looked like they were shagging each other, then carefully removed several paintings from the walls and replaced them with photocopies of that poster showing the tennis player scratching her arse.

403.

Danger: criminal masterminds at work.

Exaggeration built the legend. By the end of the week, it was the Egyptian mummies that were shagging each other and the burglars had rearranged the whale bones into a cage, inside which they had imprisoned a bound and blindfolded Wullie Ferguson.

The adrenaline rush of carrying it out was, Ray had to admit, even greater than that of being onstage with The Arguments, but the aftermath was far less pleasurable. After a gig, he could feel the excitement for days, and enjoyed reconstructing moments in his head, wishing he could remember every second. After the museum, it was dread that lasted for days, and as he reconstructed his deeds, he was wishing he could remember more clearly where they might have left clues.

They hadn't, though. Not ones that the university or the local polis could read anyway. Dire pronouncements of punishment were made, like that was going to make them want to own up, but the more the uni authorities stamped their feet, the more stupid they looked and the more clever the burglars. Eventually they learned to quit digging, realising that the best thing to do was ignore it, write it off - students will be students - and let interest fade. As a result, the story had all but died down when the polis suddenly showed up at Ray's flat to huckle him; by which time he was so used to the idea of having got away with it that when they asked for him by name, he thought something awful must have happened to his parents.

The polis, to their credit, were a lot more down-to-earth about it than the uni, as represented by the vice chancellor, who was practically chewing the reception desk at Partick cop shop. They saw it for what it was: a student prank. No thefts, no breakages, no vandalism, and the only harm 404.

was to a few egos. This was, of course, after they had scared the shit out of the pair of them by giving them third-degree interviews, an overnight stay in the cells and generally treating them like they were a menace to society.

The president of the Student Rep Council - fortuitously a fan of The Arguments - intervened to stay the university's hand, threatening demonstrations if it carried out its stated desire to expel the pair of them. The vice chancellor was made to see sense over how he'd be digging himself back into his previous hole if he martyred the culprits so close to their finals, but he still insisted charges be brought, so Ray and Simon got their day in court, their stern admonishment and their names in the files.

They had to appear together in the dock, which was the last time they ever spoke. The case didn't come up until during the Easter holidays, and by that time their relationship was irredeemably poisoned by words and events that could not be unsaid or undone.

The police had no evidence other than their easily elicited confessions, so the only way they could have found out was if someone had grassed. Ray reckoned that if Simon had told anybody, it would have been Rina, but she swore the first she knew about it was when the arrests were made. This left only one possible culprit, who was as shamelessly prepared to spill his guts to Ray as he had been to the cops.

'Come on, they were gaunny find out anyway.'

'No, they quite obviously weren't.'

'The suspense was killin' you, Larry. Admit it. I did us both a favour, got it over with. We've got exams to worry about, without that hangin' over us.'

'Aye, now I just have to worry about goin' into the job market with a criminal record on my CV.'

405.

'Don't be daft. It was just a bit of fun. They're hardly gaunny throw the book at us.'

'They werenae gaunny throw anythin' at us when they didnae fuckin' know we did it.'

'Fuck's sake, man, chill out. This way we all get a laugh about it. We can tell folk the whole story at last.'

'That's why you grassed us up? So you could act the big man?

'Come on, it must have been killin' you as well.'

'Away an' lie in your pish.'

'Ach, Larry, don't be such a big wean.'

'Aye, sure, cheers for the advice, Simon. An' here's some for you. If you ever plan on a life o' crime, learn to fuckin' button it, eh?'Ray needed a shoulder to cry - or at least whine - on, so was as pleased as he was surprised when Rina phoned that night and asked him to meet for a drink. It wasn't just a friendly show of solidarity, more an expressed need for mutual support. She and Simon had had a huge argument too: the subject had been the same, prompted by her multilevel disapproval of what he had done, but this was really just a route into a whole mass of other angers that had been building up.

They met in a pub close to her flat, a spit-and-sawdust joint where they could be sure Simon would never enter because it was unlikely to contain anyone worth impressing. The conversation began about him, naturally, but by the end of the first pint had moved on to them talking about themselves and then about each other. It was good, really good, the kind of intimacy that makes you feel you're building the foundations of a truly special friendship. Ray was sure it was going to be one of those nights 406.

that went on until chucking-out time, so was a little deflated when, after a second drink, Rina suddenly reached for her bag - and it wasn't her shout.

'I've got a nice bottle of wine back at the flat. Do you want to head round there instead?'

'Yeah, sure,' he said, equally relieved and delighted that the evening wasn't coming to an end. And at that point he was still daft enough to think wine was all they were going back for.

Ray had reached the stage where he had started to regard his stubbornly enduring virginity as a kind of Mephistophelean trade-off. If he had been told on that dreich first Monday he turned up to matriculate that by the middle of fourth year he'd still not have had sex but would have had an indie-chart hit single, he'd probably have taken the deal. Sooner or later, everybody (just about) got to have sex, even people like Norman Tebbit. That was why man invented alcohol. But not everybody got to be in an indie rock band, even if only for a few months. Problem was, those months were now over, and during them he had been extremely disappointed to find that one side of the deal didn't have an unavoidable effect on the other. He was in a rock band, for fuck's sake. People in rock bands had sex. People in rock bands couldn't help having sex. All the girls in their immediate orbit should have instantly turned into adult sophisticates with hang-up-free carnal appetites.

Maybe some of them already were, but if so they never got off with Ray. He had always managed to locate and home in on the ones who shared his own immature self- image, meaning they were cringingly uncomfortable with their developing sexuality, while Ray was hardly the confident and experienced type who could put them at ease and 407.

lay them down by the fireside, baby. It wasn't just the physical side of his relationships that had consequently proven unsatisfactory. He had, in effect, paired up with a series of girlfriends who were too much like himself, and between them they had multiplied their common problems and insecurities rather than helped each other cancel them out. It therefore didn't take long for them to recognise in each other the things they liked least about themselves, and that would be all she wrote.

Always being the runt of the litter at school, Ray had never been in with the in-crowd, and while he was independent enough not to be like those who compromised themselves in often demeaning ways to gain entry, he still carried a few scars to his self-esteem. That was perhaps one of the reasons he was so tolerant of Simon. No crowd was as 'in' as his, and Ray had found himself an integral part of it. With Rina, though, he had at last begun to see how he looked through someone else's eyes, and not found himself staring at a wide-eyed, over-eager, twenty-one- year-old teenager, but someone she wanted to talk to. Someone she wanted to spend time with.

Someone she wanted to spend the night with. Ray had heard any number of stupid expressions in his life, but ahead of even 'compassionate conservatism', 'better than sex' reigned supreme as the all-time champion. Anyone who said something was better than sex couldn't be doing it right. Nothing, he decided that night, was better than sex, and he had subsequently failed to encounter anything that dissuaded him.

As Rina took his hand and led him to her bedroom, even before they had done anything, it felt more exciting than playing onstage, more thrilling than breaking into the museum. And the sense of anticipation was so intense 408.

because he knew they were going to do something. He was playing with one of the big girls today, and he was a big boy now. Or at least would be, very soon.

Ray didn't consider there to be anything remotely sexy or even charming about his virginity, which was why he had no intention of sharing the significance of its passing with the woman who was doing him the unparalleled honour of taking it. Nor did he want his overall inexperience to be conspicuous, as there was definitely nothing sexy or charming about a technically incompetent lover, whatever crap the problem pages spouted regarding enthusiasm being the most important thing. Ray had no shortage of that, as well as years of imaginings to prepare him, but a more valuable source of guidance had been the corner- shop back in Ayrshire, where throughout the early Eighties, requesting 'something from under the counter' got you sorted out with some highly educational Scandinavian materials, even in Betamax.

It was, without question, the greatest experience of his life to that date. Every kiss, every touch, every caress, every sensation surpassed even his most fevered early-teen imaginings, and the best part was that Rina seemed to be enjoying it more than a little too. By some miracle, he didn't come immediately upon seeing her naked body, or at any of the other absurdly over-stimulating junctures along the way; though the time-honoured male mental-distraction technique did come to his rescue during Rina's more vocal moments. For a lot of guys, this involved tasks such as listing album tracks in the correct order or alphabetising the names of football teams; Ray was probably the first to enhance his sexual longevity by trying to remember, in order, the names of all twenty levels of Manic Miner.

He knew it had served its purpose when Rina, apparently 409.

post-orgasm, pulled his head down closer to hers and whispered in his ear: 'Let yourself go. I want to feel you come.'

Were ever any words sweeter?

Ray might have fumbled, bluffed and improvised his way through the rest, but for this part he knew exactly what to do, again thanks to those illicit and much maligned porno vids. As he felt the deliciously unavoidable moment rapidly approach, he quickly withdrew, whipped off the condom (untimely ripped from its long-term rest home,'grave in his wallet), then straddled Rina's chest and ejaculated on to her face.Even before the first warm jet was airborne, he already knew he was in the throes of disaster. There had been a look of confusion in her eyes as he pulled out and removed the johnny-bag, but it all happened too fast to abort takeoff.

'What the hell are you doing?'

Ray felt the greatest moment of his life turn instantly into the worst, suddenly recognising this video-induced delusion as a flimsy edifice he really ought to have seen through. He remembered Dennis Potter's anecdote about a Hollywood producer saying: 'You know when you're just about to come in a girl's face, and the phone rings?' and belatedly appreciated that Potter found the whole thing grotesque, not merely the fact that the Hollywood shark would answer the phone.Time froze, which was just as well, as Ray's heart had stopped beating.Then Rina burst into laughter: helpless, convulsive laughter that shook the bed.

She reached for a hanky from a box near the headboard. Ray didn't feel relief yet. He knew that sexual discretion was not always highly prized among students, particularly 410.

disappointed females, and envisaged the whole campus knowing the story by the end of the week.

'I'm really sorry, I. . .'

'Have you been with a lot of girls who are into that?'