The Long Glasgow Kiss (31 page)

‘That you’re Small Change MacFarlane’s son? I’m sorry, but it’s not the big secret you think it is. Half of Glasgow knows.’

‘I see. What can I do for you, Mr Lennox?’ Still relaxed. Collins was either extremely cool or he had been expecting my visit.

‘I’ve been looking into a few things concerning Bobby Kirkcaldy. I thought you might be able to cast some light on them.’

‘Really? Why me?’

‘You know something, Jack … Do you mind if I call you Jack? You know something, Jack, I’m quite a philosophical cove. I reflect on the nature of things. One of the things I’ve been reflecting on is the nature of coincidences.’

‘Oh?’ He put on an unimpressed act. Or maybe it wasn’t an act.

‘Yeah … Just like nature abhors a vacuum, I abhor a coincidence,’ I said.

‘What kind of coincidence do you have in mind?’

‘Well, for a start, you are the semi-secret and completely illegitimate son of Small Change MacFarlane. The population of this city is over two million, yet your father’s murderer just happens to train in the gym downstairs. In fact, his defence is based on the claim that he got an anonymous telephone call to the only place with a ’phone where he could be reached. In the gym downstairs. And then there’s Bobby Kirkcaldy, who’s famous for his rigorous training regimen. And where does he train? In the gym downstairs. Then, of course, there’s the fact that every bookie in town is smarting because Bobby Kirkcaldy folded in the middle of a fight that he was expected to win easily. Every bookie, that is, except you.’

‘I’m not a bookmaker.’

‘Not officially, but you and Small Change had a real MacFarlane and Son thing going. I’m guessing that you’ve taken over his book. That’s why there was no paperwork worth a damn for the police to find. My God, you must have moved quickly. And I have to say your grief over your father didn’t impede your business acumen, did it?’

‘You’re becoming very offensive, Mr Lennox. And what makes you think that I didn’t lose out? Everybody expected Bobby Kirkcaldy to walk that fight.’

‘A friend of mine seemed to think that there was someone in the know. Someone who didn’t so much hedge his bets as get Capability Brown to landscape them.’

‘You shouldn’t believe everything Tony the Pole tells you,’ said Collins with a sneer. He was a bright boy, right enough.

‘I don’t
understand
everything that Tony the Pole tells me. And before you go pointing fingers, I did a lot of asking about and everyone says it was you who scooped on the fight. There are a lot of fingers pointing at you.’

‘What is it you want from me, Lennox?’ He leaned back in the chair, elbows resting on the arms, slender fingers interlocked beneath his chin. A pose of contrived concentration.

‘What I want is to know what exactly you, Small Change and Bobby Kirkcaldy have gotten yourselves involved in. I was hired by Willie Sneddon to find out who was trying to intimidate Kirkcaldy and to look after his investment. Now, after that sham last night, it looks to me like whoever it was succeeded and Sneddon’s investment has gone down the pan. Either that, or a deal of some kind has been done to get you all off the hook. What I want to know is with whom.’

Collins watched me as I talked, still cool and unflustered. I had to resist the temptation to walk around the desk and kick the chair from under him.

‘If what you’re saying is true, what’s it to you? Why should you care? You’ve run your errand for Sneddon. Fight’s over, the outcome is what it is, whether Sneddon likes it or not.’

‘Well, first of all, I have a funny feeling that it wasn’t some disenchanted gypsy brawler who killed Small Change. Secondly, even though you seem to be taking it remarkably well, the bottom has fallen out of Lorna’s world and I feel I owe her something. And thirdly …’ I stood up and leaned knuckles on his desk, pushing my face towards him. ‘And this is the thing that really riles me … There’s a kid lying in the Southern General taking his lunches through a straw, all because there was a chance he saw you arrive to talk with Bobby Kirkcaldy. And that’s where it gets puzzling. It was no secret that Kirkcaldy and Small Change did business. And you were Small Change’s partner in at least one enterprise. So what I’m wondering is who was in the car with you and why he didn’t want to be seen arriving that night.’

‘Listen, Lennox … if you’re really interested in clearing up Jimmy’s death, like you say you are, then I’m grateful for it … though it looks pretty much to me like the police have got their man. But putting that aside, do you think I would really have anything to do with killing Jimmy? Like you said, he was my father, whether it was public knowledge or not, and he looked after me. There were lots of things we were going to do together. He had big plans for me. Why would I have anything to do with his death?’

‘I don’t think you did. I don’t think you were responsible for his death and I don’t think you wanted his death. But I
do
think you’re scared. And I
know
Small Change was scared witless before he died. Whoever had him scared has got you toeing the line, for fear of getting the same treatment.’

‘This is shite, Lennox. God knows where you’re getting this stuff. I wasn’t anywhere near Kirkcaldy’s house that day or any other.’

‘What day? I didn’t say when it was. And I didn’t say whether it was day or night.’

Collins gave a small laugh. ‘Look, you’re not tricking me into saying anything because there’s nothing for me to say. You’re barking up the wrong tree.’

‘Really? I think different. But, like you say, I’ve got nothing to back it up. Yet. When I do, it will be interesting to see who your biggest problem is: the police or Willie Sneddon. But, in the meantime, you think things over. If you decide you need my help to get yourself out of whatever it is you’ve gotten into, give me a call.’ I pointedly tossed my card onto his desk. He pointedly didn’t pick it up.

C
HAPTER
S
EVENTEEN

Bantaskin Street, Maryhill, was hardly Sunset Strip, Hollywood, and observing a building from a car is less than inconspicuous when yours is one of only three cars in the street. It meant I had to park around the corner, some distance from the gym, leave the Atlantic, and carry out my surveillance from a tenement corner.

I hadn’t really expected to get anything worthwhile out of Collins. The whole exchange with him hadn’t been to find out what he knew, rather to hint at what I knew. Which was less than met the eye. If my hunch was right, it would take Collins only the time it takes to make a ’phone call and arrange a meet before he’d come hustling out of the side door of the gym. I’d guessed ten, but in fact it was nearer twenty minutes before he emerged and crossed the street to where he had parked his Lanchester–Daimler. I sprinted back to the Atlantic and came around the corner just in time to see the tail of his car as it took the junction into Cowan Street.

I had hoped for a car to intervene between me and Collins’s Lanchester, but Maryhill Road was pretty much empty of anything but trams and buses. I had to hold back. Collins would have checked the street before he got into his car, satisfying himself that I had gone. But that didn’t mean he wouldn’t be checking his rear-view mirror a little more frequently than usual. Thankfully, his burgundy Lanchester was the kind of colour you couldn’t miss, and I reckoned I could keep tabs on it from a distance.

Collins led me up Maryhill Road and through Milngavie. I smiled smugly, for no one’s benefit but my own: we were heading for Bobby Kirkcaldy’s place in Blanefield. But we didn’t. Instead we passed through Strathblane and Blanefield and headed further north and into Stirlingshire. I couldn’t complain about my work not being varied. Over the last two weeks I had seen more Scottish countryside than a Bluebell Tours bus driver.

We were the only cars on the road now and I held right back, allowing myself to be guided by the blood fleck on the horizon that was Collins’s Lanchester as it breached a hill or took a corner. There was nowhere for him to go, which made me feel relaxed about following him but perplexed about where he might lead me.

We were now out into that part of Scotland that was gently scenic rather than dramatic, but the mountains ahead reminded me that we were becoming ever more remote. When I turned the next corner I found that I had lost sight of Collins completely, so I gunned the Atlantic a little until I reached the next bend. Still nothing. I stopped reflecting on the view, dropped a crunching gear and floored the accelerator. I took the next bend a little too fast and the rear tyres protested. Still no Collins. I took the next stretch as fast as the last, braking hard at the corner. This time there was a long, open expanse ahead of me where the road dipped between trees and rose gradually again, stretching out towards the mountains. I slowed down. No Collins, and there was no way he could have cleared that stretch before I made the corner.

It took me a while to find a place where I could get turned around. The Atlantic objected a little as I floored the accelerator again, heading back up the hill and around the bend. Slowing up on the straight, I checked every farm gate and track, peering through the dense clumps of trees. I passed what looked like the entrance to a house, but couldn’t see the building itself because of the trees and bushes that lined the road, just a sweep of dirt and gravel driveway. I drove on for another five hundred or so yards, checking for signs where Collins could have turned off. Nothing. It had to be the entry into the house. I found a lay-by of sorts and parked so I could steal up the driveway on foot and have a nosey-around. This was becoming a bit of a habit and I was becoming more gumboot than gumshoe. As I headed along the road to the entrance to the driveway, I wondered if I should trade in the Atlantic for a tractor.

It was a long driveway. Tree-lined and curving, so you couldn’t get a glimpse of the house till you were nearly on it. It turned out to be a big Georgian type. Bigger and classier even than Sneddon’s newly acquired country retreat and fight venue. But when I drew closer I could see that most of the windows were shuttered and a door to the side was boarded up. Another empty house. But not another derelict. This had all the look of a home boarded up while the owners were away, or one that was between owners. The driveway opened out into a huge semi-circle in front of the house. No blood-red Lanchester. In fact, no cars at all. I could have saved myself some time and driven up to check it out. There was clearly no one here, least of all Collins. I’d lost him. But it still made sense for me to check the house out. And it still made sense for me to be cautious as I did so.

I decided to get off the drive: the gravel was crunching under every footfall and everything else around here seemed to have taken a Trappist vow. I walked across a broad triangle of lawn that was yearning for a long-lost mower and around the side of the house. The first couple of windows I found – the usual tall, elegant Georgian jobs – had the internal shutters closed over. But when I got around to the back, I found an unshuttered window, its glass as black as obsidian. I peered in through it, pressing my face to the glass and shielding my eyes with my hands, but it was no good: the interior was so dark I could see nothing.

I straightened up. There, reflected in the dark glass, was a face next to mine, standing behind me. A battered, indeterminately old face that looked like it had been used as a punch bag for decades. The name ‘Uncle Bert’ formed itself in my head and I started to turn, but something that felt like steel slammed into my back, right above the pelvis. The pain exploded through my gut and I felt as if my kidney had exploded. The punch had caught me exactly where I was still tender from my encounter with Costello’s goons outside the Carvery.

I spun around and swung wildly at the old man. He blocked my punch with his forearm, and his fist, still feeling like steel instead of muscle and bone, rammed into my solar plexus. Every bit of air pulsed out of my lungs. I stopped defending myself. I stopped thinking. Once more, all of my being was concentrated on the simple effort of breathing. He pushed me back and to the side so I collided with the wall.

Uncle Bert took his time, holding me in place with one hand and pulling his other fist back to deliver a right that we both knew would send me sleepy-bye-byes. He had braced his legs to deliver the maximum power and I swung my foot up as hard and as swiftly as I could manage. My foot went through between his legs but my shin slammed into his groin. He doubled over and I grabbed his ears, hoisted him up and smashed my forehead into his face. The good old Glasgow Kiss.

I pushed him away from me. Blood was pouring from his nose and I fully expected him to crumble; but Uncle Bert was an old pro and came straight back at me. I scrabbled in my pocket for my sap and swung it at him, catching him on the temple. It sent him sideways but again, amazingly, his feet remained planted and he didn’t go down. I backhanded him with the sap. He went down on one knee and I kicked him in the face. He fell backwards onto his back. I staggered forward, pulling air into my empty lungs and bent from the pain in my kidney. All the hate and the rage was back: I stood to one side of him and raised my foot, aiming to smash my heel into his ugly, old battered face.

There was a shot. I staggered back.

C
HAPTER
E
IGHTEEN

I looked down at my body, then down at Bert Soutar sprawled on the ground at my feet. Neither of us was hit. When I looked up I saw Bobby Kirkcaldy, his face carrying the evidence of his defeat the night before, standing with a Browning in his hand. He’d obviously fired a shot into the air, but I now found myself looking at the business end of the automatic.

‘Against the wall, Lennox,’ he said, his voice still disconcertingly calm. Gentle. ‘Uncle Bert, you okay?’

Soutar got to his feet slowly, eyeing me with malice. I knew what was coming and so, clearly, did Kirkcaldy.

‘Leave it, Bert,’ he said. ‘We’ll do this in the garage, like we said.’

Soutar grabbed me by the collar of my suit jacket and pulled me from the wall. He took up position behind me and guided me with vicious shoves around to the back of the house. The drive arced round the far side of the house to a whitewashed outbuilding. It looked like it had, at one time, been a stables, but had since been converted into a garage. There was a dormer window above it suggesting that the attic had been the chauffeur’s accommodation. There were two huge double doors, and I reckoned you could easily have parked four cars inside it. I studied the structure carefully, for two reasons: the curiosity of the condemned man about his place of execution; and because I wanted to work out any possible escape routes well in advance.

Soutar kept the shoves going and I considered dancing with him again. He was a tough old bird, all right, but I’d do my best to snap his neck before his nephew got one off. I could always hope that Kirkcaldy was a worse shot than he was a boxer.

‘All of this because you fixed a fight?’ I called over my shoulder. ‘I’ve got to give it to you, Kirkcaldy, you take your petty larceny very seriously.’

‘Shut up and walk …’ Uncle Bert gave me another shove. It was beginning to become rude.

‘We’ve got a friend waiting for you,’ said Kirkcaldy, and laughed in a dark, vicious way. He went ahead of us and opened one of the doors into the garage.

Just as I had expected, there were two cars in the garage: the sleek, carmine droplet of Collins’s Lanchester and Bobby Kirkcaldy’s open-top Sunbeam-Talbot Sports. What a chump, I thought bitterly to myself. There I was thinking I was all smart and devious, stirring up Collins so he would lead me to Mr Big. Yep, I had had it all down pat, except that the delay in Collins leaving his office had been to give Kirkcaldy time to make the fifteen-minute drive from Strathblane to this place, and get himself settled in. All Collins had had to do after that was lead me by the nose. It served me right; I was beginning to believe my own advertising.

The garage was even bigger inside than I had guessed. The two cars took up less than half of the space. Jack Collins stood in the middle of the free area of floor.

‘I told you he’d follow me,’ he said with a contempt I could have found hurtful.

‘Okay, so you’re pissed off that I’m doing my job. But like I said outside, this doesn’t smell right to me. You’re going to too much trouble just to cover up a fixed fight. Why the artillery?’ I asked, nodding to the Browning in Kirkcaldy’s hand.

‘Maybe you’re right, Lennox,’ Kirkcaldy said. ‘Maybe there’s more going on than you can understand.’

‘Try me,’ I said. ‘I’m an understanding type. But first of all, indulge my curiosity as a fan … why throw the fight last night?’

‘What makes you think I threw it?’

‘Oh, come on. I was there. And I’ve seen you fight several times before. If you could flatten McQuillan the way you did, then Jan Schmidtke should have been a walkover. You threw the fight all right. Is your heart really as bad as that?’

‘As a matter of fact it is,’ said Kirkcaldy, in a matter-of-fact way. ‘Congenital defect. I’ve had it since birth but didn’t know about it. It’s only over the last six months that I’ve had problems with it. The quack says I’ve to take it easy, take the stress out of my life. Maybe I should start with you, huh, Lennox?’

‘So I’m guessing you made a killing on the fight?’ I asked.

‘Jack here arranged it all for us. It actually started off as Small Change’s idea. No really big bets. Nothing that would get noticed too much, but lots of them, spread out across all the bookies. And each bet placed by a third party who couldn’t be connected to Collins, far less me.’

‘Very sweet,’ I said. ‘But you weren’t the only ones in the know. Two young Flash Harrys tried to broker a big bet against you winning through Tony the Pole.’

‘That’s something I don’t know about,’ said Kirkcaldy as casually as he could manage. If he had been as poor at throwing a feint in the ring, then his prematurely terminated career would have terminated even more prematurely.

‘Who were they?’ I pushed my luck. Seeing as I was at gunpoint in an outbuilding in the middle of nowhere, where a shot would go unheard far less unnoticed, I felt I was just as well pushing it.

‘I told you, I don’t know anything about them or anybody else laying bets.’

I decided to move on before Kirkcaldy’s pants caught fire. ‘I’m sure your little scheme will have raked in a lot of cash. But not that much. Not enough for this kind of grief. And it doesn’t add up to something worth killing Small Change for.’

‘Small Change’s death has got nothing to do with us. Nothing at all. And it’s got nothing to do with the fight scam either.’

‘No … I believe you didn’t kill Small Change, but the fight scam
does
have something to do with his death. Maybe Small Change came up with the idea of you throwing the fight to start with, but when he did it was simply to get you out of the fight game with a little pension. You must have told him about your heart condition. But the real reason you needed to pull it off was because you needed to pay someone off quick. Someone who was going to give you the same treatment that Small Change got.’

Kirkcaldy didn’t say anything, but exchanged a look with Uncle Bert.

‘You see, Bobby, I’m a studious sort. I spend a lot of time up at the Mitchell Library expanding my mind. One direction I’ve expanded in is the traditions and customs of our travelling cousins. Take the ones up at Vinegarhill. Now, to start with, I thought they were just Irish travellers, but it turns out they’re
Minceir
, proper Romanies from Ireland … the real Gypsy McCoy, you could say.’

Kirkcaldy said nothing.

‘They’ve had a long and difficult history, gypsies,’ I continued. ‘They’ve been in Britain for centuries, you know. Did you know that we actually sold them to Louisiana to work as slaves for freed blacks who had their own small plantations? Or that we used to hang them just for being gypsies? It’s made them an unforgiving bunch. They’re big on vengeance and blood feud.’

‘What’s that got to do with anything?’ Kirkcaldy said, but again I could see behind the expression.

‘I don’t know what you did. That’s the one piece that’s missing for me. You see, like I said, I’ve been reading up on gypsy customs. And I met Sean Furie, whose son is up for Small Change’s murder. Now, to start with, I thought Furie was more Blackrock than Bulgaria, but it would seem he’s the real thing. He and his mob follow gypsy customs and law. Furie himself is a
Baro
– that’s a kind of clan chieftain. The kingpin gypsy. And as a
Baro
, Furie will also sit as a judge on the
kris
, the half-arsed court arrangement they have going. One of the things the
kris
does is sit in judgement on fellow gypsies or even on
gaje
as they call non-gypsies.’

‘Very fucking interesting,’ said Bert Soutar. ‘Consider my horizons expanded. Now get over against the wall.’

I decided to stay where I was for the moment. ‘It
is
interesting. You see, one of the things the
kris
sits in judgement on is if one of their own is killed by someone else. Murder, say … or a careless accident. Then they can issue a sentence on the accused and the only way he can get out of it is to pay a
glaba
. Blood money.’ I paused for a moment. Less for dramatic effect and more to check my surroundings again. There were a couple of small, grimy windows over by the rear wall. A clutch of old and rusting garden tools, including a small hand scythe mottled with reddish-brown flecks. A shadow fell across the grime-dimmed window and passed on. There was someone else here. Outside.

‘Anyway,’ I continued, ‘here’s the way I see it: you, good old Uncle Bert, and young Collins here, are all under sentence of death. And death, though it’s bad enough, isn’t as scary as the kind of death you’ll have at the hands of the gypsies. Now I don’t know if Furie’s son carried out sentence on Small Change or not, but you fellas have a pretty good idea what’s ahead of you … unless, of course, you hand over a large
glaba
ransom.’

‘So what are we supposed to have done?’ asked Kirkcaldy.

‘Well, it’s pretty obvious at first sight. Uncle Bert here supplied that young pikey fighter for the bare-knuckle fight. Then he dies. So Soutar, Small Change and Collins are held responsible. Small Change meets a sticky end by having his skull pulped with a statue of his favourite greyhound, and you start getting traditional gypsy symbols of death dropped on your doorstep. I was supposed to work it all out. Well I have. But what I don’t get is why … the gypsy boy went into the fight of his own free will, knowing the risks, and took his chances. So why does his clan hold you responsible?’

‘You’re not as smart as you think you are, Lennox,’ sneered Jack Collins. His face was white and drawn. The coolness had gone. He was afraid. It was either what I had been saying, or he knew he was about to witness something unpleasant. I did my best to believe it was the power of my oratory.

‘Shut up, Collins,’ said Kirkcaldy. ‘Against the wall, Lennox. And keep your hands where I can see them.’

‘So this is it?’ I asked. I noticed I wasn’t breathing hard and I didn’t feel my heart pounding. That was what happened, I guessed, when you’d thought you were going to die so many times before. When you’d seen so many others go before you. ‘So you’re going to kill me over a gypsy curse and an amateurishly fixed fight? No … this doesn’t make sense. I’m missing something here. Who was it in Collins’s car outside your house? And why are the gyppos really after you?’

My back was to the wall now, but, as I’d backed up, I’d angled my steps so I ended up next to the scythe. A rusty garden implement against a gun and two experienced fist fighters. They don’t stand a chance, I thought to myself.

‘Show him …’ Kirkcaldy barked the order at Collins and indicated his car with a jerk of his head. Collins went over to the car and opened the trunk, lifting out something wrapped in a blanket. He carried it in his arms like it was a baby. He laid it on the floor and unwrapped it for me to see. It was the
Ky-Lan
demon statuette. It had been broken into two pieces. The fake jade was less than an inch thick. The contents spilled from the broken sculpture: tightly wrapped waxed paper bricks.

I sighed as something tied itself into a knot in my gut. I knew what Kirkcaldy having it meant. ‘Sammy Pollock?’

Kirkcaldy smiled, and it reminded me of the way Sneddon smiled. ‘Just like everything else in Glasgow, Lennox, the Clyde is unpredictable. You dump two bodies at the same time in the same place and one washes up and the other sinks without trace.’

‘He didn’t deserve that, Kirkcaldy. He was just a kid.’ I thought about how Sheila Gainsborough would take the news. I hadn’t earned my fee on that one, that was for sure. But, there again, it wouldn’t be me who’d be breaking the news to her. I gave a bitter laugh.

‘What’s so fucking funny?’ asked Kirkcaldy.

‘Just that I was working two cases that I never connected. I’m not as smart as I thought I was.’

‘You’re smart, Lennox. Too smart. But you should know by now that nothing happens in this city without it being tied into everything else. And before you get all huffy about Pollock, remember that he brought it on himself. He wanted to play with the big boys. He ended up way out of his depth.’

‘I don’t think you’re far behind him. You having that stuff means you don’t just have a bunch of irate gypsies after you. Have you heard of John Largo?’

‘I’ve heard. And I know this is his stuff. But he’s still looking for Pollock and Costello. We happened on this by chance. We’re in the clear.’

‘Not that in the clear. I found you.’

‘No you didn’t. All that you said to Collins here was smoke and mirrors. You were grouse-beating. Except now it’s the grouse with the gun on you. Anyway, you’re not going to be telling anyone anything.’

That’s that then, I thought. If there was one thing you couldn’t accuse Kirkcaldy of, it was ambiguity.

‘How did Costello and Pollock get their hands on the jade demon? There was no way they could have known what was in it.’

‘That’s where you’re wrong. Young master Pollock was a young man of cosmopolitan tastes. Bohemian, you might say. He was a bit of a hashish smoker and had experimented with opium. No other bastard in this city would have realized the value of refined heroin, but Pollock knew all right. But that was as smart as he got. He was no master criminal and he thought he was dealing with Al Capone when he got in tow with Paul Costello. But Costello was a wanker and as much out of his depth as Pollock was.’

‘So how did they get their hands on this?’ I asked. The three of them – Soutar, Collins and Kirkcaldy – were all facing me now, with their backs to the doors. Kirkcaldy had left the door open a few inches and I could have sworn that I had seen it move. My shadow at the window was maybe not another accomplice after all. I pinned my hopes on a guardian angel.

‘Paul Costello was always looking for a score,’ Kirkcaldy continued and I made a gargantuan effort not to cast a glance at the garage doors behind him. ‘I think he was trying to prove he could be a real player, like his Da. Fuck all chance of that. He didn’t have the brains to blow his hat off. Sammy Pollock was supposed to be the thinker. Talk about the blind leading the blind. Anyway, they did a couple of night-time jobs. They got two other guys in with them. Their first score was a warehouse with cigarettes. French shit. They didn’t have a clue how to move the stuff on, other than going round the clubs and pubs themselves. Complete amateurs. You don’t pull a job unless you’ve done a deal in advance with a fence who’ll move the stuff on. Not only did these wankers have no deal, they didn’t even know a fence.’