The Stone Gallows (32 page)

He said nothing. He didn't need to.

‘Jason, you're a scumbag. I hate to be so plain, but there you go.

When I spoke to you yesterday afternoon, I was just passing on what everybody thinks of you. There was no need for you to do what you did.'

‘What I did. . . I didn't do anything.'

‘Yes, you did,' I said patiently. ‘You followed me home and burned down my flat. Last night.' I patted him affectionately on the cheek. ‘I don't mind – it was a shithole, really – but I was in it at the time. As was a close friend of mine. Now I can understand why you might hold a grudge, but seriously, all you did was demonstrate the sort of stupidity and ineptitude that got you locked up in the first place, and by putting my friend's life in danger you made yourself much more important to me than you originally were.'

‘I swear, I don't know what you're talking about.'

‘Jason, I saw you.'

‘You didn't. I was at home last night. I had no where else to be.'

‘Bullshit. I suppose it was just a co-incidence that your car was parked down the street when my flat went up in flames.'

He tried to shake his head, but I held him down. ‘I don't know. I didn't burn your flat down. I swear it. I can't be the only person in Glasgow who drives a Mercedes.'

‘You're the only one who's threatened to kill me in the past forty-eight hours. And that's quite a coinkydink, isn't it?'

We carried on like this for another five minutes or so. He kept denying it, and I kept pressing him. Eventually I dropped the matter, deciding that I had made my point. I found his mobile phone in his inside pocket and checked the display. Three bars; good reception. He wouldn't have any difficulty phoning for an ambulance.

I told him that I was going to let him go – on two conditions. He nodded. Anything.

‘One. Move the fuck out of Glasgow. You've got money, so it won't be a problem. If I don't see your house in the property pages by this time next week I'm going to find you and break your other arm.

Alright?'

Alright.

‘Two. You might be entertaining some silly ideas about revenge. It's alright to think these things, but to act on them would be very, very silly. There are so many things I could do to you. I have so many friends that can act on my behalf. I have friends in the police department, I have friends on the street. You got off easy tonight. Your arm will heal. I could have happily taken a hammer to your joints, but I like to think of myself as a kind person. Fuck with me again, I'll do something you won't walk away from. Understand?'

He understood. I tossed his mobile phone onto the ground next to him. ‘Phone an ambulance. Tell them that you tripped and fell. They won't believe you, but that's their problem and not yours. You mention my name, I'll kill you. Do you think I'm kidding?'

He didn't.

11.1

I woke up the next morning a changed man. My lungs, which had spent the last twenty-four hours feeling like a deployed airbag, felt clean and refreshed. The air seemed to shimmer with the promise the new day had to offer. It was time to move on from all the shit that had been holding me back. Instead of thinking of the loss of my flat as a tragedy, I would see it as an excuse to move on. I would find somewhere better. Nicer. Christ knew, it wouldn't be hard. I was a lucky man. I had a great job with a good boss. A nice girlfriend. A beautiful son. It was time to stop wallowing in self-pity and start getting on with my life.

I hummed as I shaved

After the excitement of the past couple of days, it was good to get back to what passed for normal in my life. Joe and I spent the morning in the office, going through the nuts-and-bolts work that comprised maybe seventy percent of his business. Sophie Sloan wasn't the only active case we were investigating. We had several other clients, all of whom believed they were more important than anybody else. I spent most of my time on the telephone, chasing down avenues as they wound their way into various blind alleys and dead ends.

I wanted to show Joe how much I appreciated the bed and the loan, so I took him out to lunch. We ended up spending the afternoon in the pub, playing pool and talking bullshit, the line between employer and employee becoming ever more blurred as the drinks flowed. After his third drink, Joe mentioned something that caught my attention.

‘You ever think about the future, Cameron?'

I lined up a stripe, aiming for the corner pocket. ‘Not really. I find that it happens soon enough.'

‘I think about it a lot. I'm going to be a granddad soon. You find yourself wanting to leave something behind. Not just money, but more. A. . . a
legacy
, if you will. An empire.'

‘An
empire
?' I straightened, clapping my hand to my cheek and pretending to be concerned. ‘Joe. . . are you dying?'

‘Fuck off.'

‘It's just that you sounded very serious for a second. I thought you were going to tell me that you had a terminal disease.' I eyed the glass in his hand. ‘Like liver failure.'

‘I
am
serious. I've been thinking about expanding the business to include a diligence department.'

Even though I wasn't really concentrating on the game, I bent to the shot again. ‘What, like Sheriff Officers?'

‘And Messengers at Arms. I've got the contacts; I think it would be a good little moneyspinner.'

Sheriff Officers and Messengers were the Scottish version of Baillifs, only with significantly more legal power. It wasn't a popular job, but neither was it a bad one. I shot. Missed. The cue-ball bounced awkwardly and hid against the top cushion.

Joe sighed and shook his head. ‘You're shite at this.'

‘Yeah, well, I never claimed to be Steve bloody Davies, did I?'

Joe leaned down and cued up, aiming for an almost-impossible yellow at the opposite end of the table. ‘I'd need to have somebody to run the department.'

It wasn't often I didn't know what to say. ‘. . . Are you serious?'

He looked up at me. ‘You'd have to do the exams. Once you passed them, I'd form a separate company. We'd be partners. Not
equal 
partners, 'cos I'd be the money, and would take a bigger chunk of the profits, but there would be enough to go around. We recruit people as we need them, and you can run it.'

‘Christ, Joe. . . that's a hell of an offer.' I was so moved, I had to look away for a second. ‘Why would you offer something like that to a guy like me?'

He shrugged. ‘I like you. I liked your dad.'

I took a few minutes. I'd always known that Joe and my dad had been pals, but he'd never really talked about it. I wondered if Joe had made the offer out of some misplaced sense of obligation, and said so.

‘Bullshit.'

‘So why me, then?'

‘Like I said, I like you. More importantly, I trust you. Never do business with somebody you don't trust.'

‘How do you know you can trust me?'

Joe looked me straight in the eye and made his shot without taking his gaze from mine. ‘Because I only ever pick winners.'

I knew the effect he was going for, of course; even men over the age of fifty occasionally aspire for a moment of Scorsese-inspired cool.

Unfortunately, it didn't work out the way he planned it. The cue ball trickled slowly down the table and rolled sedately past its target. Joe looked stricken.

I couldn't help but laugh. ‘I hope you're better at business than you are at pool.'

11.2.

The boy walked quickly, his rucksack over one shoulder, the knees of
his trousers stained dark with lunchtime playground mud. His lower lip
was set in a pout he had inherited from his mother. He was angry. It was
mummy's fault he was walking. She'd been late four times that week,
rolling up at the school gates after all the other mummies had been and
gone. It wasn't fair; the other children had started calling him the boy 
that nobody wanted. Just yesterday, his favourite teacher, Miss Kenwood,
had offered him a lift and he'd had to say no because he knew that if he
just waited just a little while longer, his mother would arrive. And he was
right: ten minutes later she showed up in a bad mood and yelled at him
for not fastening his seatbelt quickly enough.

He hated her. She wasn't like the other mothers, who smiled and
laughed and wore pretty dresses and smelled of flowers. Instead, she
smelled of cigarettes and mobile phones and she never stopped telling
him that she gave up her career so that she could look after him.

This afternoon, when she'd been late again, he'd started walking. He
knew that it was naughty – he'd been told he must wait – and decided
that he didn't care. Just for once, she could be the one who waited outside
the school gates in the rain. He was a big boy and could find his own way
home, and if she got a fright then maybe she would show up at the same
time as all the other mothers. Maybe he should stay out all night, and
when he finally came home she would give him a big cuddle and tell him
that she was sorry that she was late and sorry for making him stand in
the rain all by himself and then all the other kids would stop laughing at
him.

Behind him, a car beeped its horn. He turned and looked over his
shoulder, watching as it pulled level with him, the window sliding down.

‘Mark! Hello.'

Mark stopped and said nothing. They'd talked about Stranger Danger
at school.

‘I was just driving past and I saw you there. Your mummy asked me
to give you a lift because she's late.'

‘She's always late.'

‘I know. She's very sorry. She asked me to buy you a Big Mac to show
you just how sorry she is.'

‘I don't know you.'

‘I'm a friend of your mummy's.'

‘I've never seen you before.'

‘I know. But I know your mummy, and your daddy. I'm friends with
them both.'

‘Where's my dad? Where's Auntie Lynne?'

‘Your dad's at work. I don't know where Auntie Lynne is.'

Mark shook his head and looked round. ‘I don't know you. They said
that if I didn't know who it was then I wasn't to get into the car.'

‘I know. And you're very clever and a very good boy. But your
mummy can't come and collect you today. She told me to show you this.'

There was something in the driver's hand: a picture. Mark recognised
it at once; him, mummy and daddy. They'd gone to the zoo that day and
watched the penguin parade. It was the last day that the three of them
had done anything together. Then daddy had his accident and everything had changed.

He stepped forward and took the picture. ‘Are you a friend of
mummy's?'

‘I'm a friend of both your mummy and your daddy.'

‘Why isn't daddy here?'

‘He's working.'

‘That's a nice car.'

‘Thank you.'

‘My daddy has a Golf. Mummy has a Land Rover.'

‘I know. I've seen them. They're not as nice as mine, are they?'

‘How fast can it go?'

‘A thousand miles an hour.'

‘Really?'

‘Really.'

Mark didn't know what to do. He didn't know this person, but they
claimed to know him, and they had a photograph. Strangers were bad.

They wanted to do bad things to him. He didn't know the exact nature
of the bad things, but his friend Josh had told him that some people had
a beast living inside of them that made them do nasty stuff to kids. They
would bite him and watch him bleed and then throw him off a bridge
with his head bashed in and his pockets full of stones. The police might
catch them, but it didn't really matter, because they just told the judge
about the beast inside that controlled them and made them do things
that they didn't really want to and instead of going to prison for ever and 
ever, they were sent to a special hospital where they got electric shocks
that were supposed to cure them but didn't and then they had their
names put on a list and then they were allowed to go home and kill
again.

He looked carefully at the person behind the wheel. ‘Are you on the File?'

‘The what?'

‘It's a list of bad people.'

‘No, I'm not.'

‘I shouldn't get in a car with a stranger.'

‘Of course you shouldn't. But I'm not a stranger. I'm a friend of your
mum and dad's. Just the other day your dad was telling me that he'd like
me to meet you.'

‘Are you his new friend? The one that was coming to play Laser Quest
with us?'

‘Why, yes. Yes, I am.'

Mark shrugged his shoulders and got into the car.

11.3

We drifted back to the office at about quarter to five, making our way through the streets of Glasgow, checking out the girls and laughing at the students. The weekend was approaching fast and I'd already made plans. I had phoned Audrey just to let her know I was still alive and intended seeing Mark as the two of us had previously agreed. She'd sounded disappointed but I felt it was unlikely she would mess me around the way she had last weekend. Her attitude might have been different if the media had known the truth about the fire, but for once I seemed to have caught a break so far, all the reports made the incident sound like nothing more than an accident. My plan was to take Mark to the hospital to meet Liz, and then on to Laser Quest as promised. I even managed to get Audrey to agree to let me take him out for a proper meal – ‘As long as you go to a place where there's menus and cutlery and salad.'