‘But my guys aren’t signed up with anybody.’

‘No, I know.’

‘So we create a company to represent ’em, and get cracking.’

Dan sighed. Katelin was right about Duncan looking up to him and, certainly, it was like talking to a kid sometimes; he should never have encouraged him in the first place. Well, he wasn’t sure he had encouraged him, it was rather that he hadn’t discouraged him, which amounted to the same thing with Duncan.

‘I’m just not able to commit to this right now,’ Dan said. ‘It’d need a hundred per cent effort.’

‘What you so flat out with?’

‘Usual stuff, plus a potential book contract – I’m seeing a publisher next week – and I said yes to this offer from Six Music, the new music panel – I told you about it? Jesus, Duncan. Don’t make me account for myself.’

‘Look,’ Duncan said. ‘Let’s just give it a year, see how we go? Those wee lassies, they’re awesome.’

Dan nodded. ‘They are, they really are. They need some representation, for sure.’

‘So?’

Dan shook his head. ‘You do it,’ he said. ‘I’ll watch.’

‘You might end up famous for being the man who said no to Jeanie and the Kat.’

‘A risk I’m going to have to take,’ Dan said. He knew what Duncan would be thinking though: that if he, Dan, didn’t want in, it probably wasn’t as good an idea as he’d thought. Duncan believed Dan knew what he was doing, never put a foot wrong, made only good decisions that didn’t land him in the soup.

He really should tell him all about Ali Connor, Dan thought. He almost did, drew in his breath ready to speak, got right to the very edge of it. But then he didn’t.

Back at home McCulloch staggered at him with demented happiness, as if he’d believed he was to be forever alone. He whined and threaded himself in a frantic figure of eight, in and out of Dan’s feet, and Dan stooped to briefly scratch the little dog’s ears, then he stood up again and said, ‘That’s your lot,’ and McCulloch, who fully understood the rules, immediately composed himself and settled for simply shadowing Dan’s every move.