Bitter Water (14 page)

I had no idea where Sam Campbell and I were going on a personal basis – nowhere probably. Maybe I had to accept that I just wasn’t her type? – but I felt happy at the prospect of being around her. Our exchanges were a bit too sharp for comfort at times, but that’s what you get when you befriend an educated woman of independent mind and means. I had no sense from her that this arrangement was anything other than sharing a bottle, some painful memories and a big empty house. There was certainly no prospect – she’d made it plain – of sharing her bed. Which kept bringing me back to Morag Duffy. She was in so many ways the opposite of Sam: light, frothy, fun and street-smart, as opposed to serious, challenging and intellectual-smart. If I boiled it down to basic chemistry and the even more basic chances of uninhibited sex, the choice was easy. But what would we talk about afterwards?

Leaving aside all thoughts carnal, there was the not inconsiderable bonus of swapping a dive for the run of an elegant house where my bedroom would be bigger than the entire single-end I was leaving. There was also the sheer hedonistic prospect of a toilet and bath to myself instead of sharing the stairheid lavvy and – in the days before joining the Western – paying for a slipper bath once a week at the municipal pool. These pluses more than compensated for anything as transitory as unrequited lust. I supposed.

It might also keep me out of the pub a bit. If I could afford my share of the whisky bill. Wullie would be disappointed.

I took the cross-city trams and deposited myself like a war evacuee at her door. All I lacked was a label round my neck.
Needs regular feeding and occasional Scotch. Ignore bouts of maudlin sentimentality
.

Sam opened the door and cocked her head to one side. She crossed her arms. ‘I must be daft.’ Only a slight lift of the corners of her eyes gave her away.

‘Changed your mind?’

‘Several times, Brodie. Several times. Come in. You know where your room is.’

It felt like coming home. High ceilings. Tasteful striped wallpaper and stucco coving. Big window looking out on the tiny back garden and the cobbled street that ran behind all the big townhouses in the terrace to provide access for tradesmen. Despite herself, Sam had even put a wee bunch of cheery marigolds in a vase on the sideboard. I put my case down on the carpet, feeling an untoward and no doubt unwarranted sense of peace.

I found Sam downstairs in the kitchen. Two cups of tea were laid out. Best china. She poured, and pushed across a set of keys. She smiled.

‘I was ungracious at the door, Brodie. You know what I’m like. Welcome back.’

I smiled back. ‘As you noticed, I didn’t need much persuasion.’ I dug in my jacket pocket and placed my ration card on the table together with two one-pound notes. ‘Are you sure this is enough?’

‘Booze separate. And another thing: I have certain standards in this house.’

I wondered what was coming and whether I’d switched one dragon landlady for another.

‘That’s your only suit, I suppose? Shirts? Collars?’

I flushed. ‘I’m saving for a trip to the Co-op.’

‘Good. But before you do, I want you to take a look in my dad’s wardrobe. I’m finally having a clearout. Before anything goes to the church jumble sale, rummage through it. The suits are a bit on the old-fashioned side, but good cloth. And I had them all cleaned before I put them away. Don’t know why I kept them really . . .’

I’d borrowed a good tweed suit of her father’s before, having carelessly discarded my own in the Firth of Clyde. It was either maintain sartorial standards or drown. But I’d given it back when I bought the second-hand outfit I was wearing. I was touched and mildly embarrassed. I found myself jabbering.

‘Sam, you’re too kind. That’s amazingly good of you. I can’t thank you enough.’

‘Wheesht. You’ll be doing me a favour. The waists were a bit loose, I recall? Can you get them taken in? What are you smiling about?’

‘I know just the man.’

‘Oh, and for future reference the guns are locked away again. Not that you’ll ever need to know that, will you? Your pen now being mightier than any sword?’

It was a pity. The other thing worth lusting after in this house was the matched pair of Dickson shotguns left by her dad. Scots-made killing machines of rare and exquisite beauty and balance. Their trademark round action gave a silk-smooth opening. And efficient; spent cartridges automatically eject when the gun is broken, saving crucial time on reloading.

‘That’s right. I’m an office boy now, Sam. Determined to lead a quiet and saintly life from here on. But remind me to have a look at your dad’s ammunition. I had no problems with it – as you know. But we should check for moisture and rust. Maybe we can bag a few grouse sometime?’

I said it facetiously but she looked at me queerly and then finally said, ‘Maybe we could at that, Brodie. I have a standing invitation to shoot at the estate of an old friend of my dad’s. Up by Aberfoyle.’

Of course she did. We left it at that. I wasn’t sure if that had constituted a date or just a pleasantry, but I fancied the idea of me in my tweeds stalking across the heather with Sam beside me carrying a silver whisky flask and spare shells. Such a dreamer. But it would be nice to overlay the last memory I had of crawling through gorse with a gun. My old outfit, the Seaforths, trained at Spean Bridge after we reformed the regiment from the remnants of the British Expeditionary Force. We were wet for a fortnight, living in dripping tents, wearing sodden clothes, squelching through peat bogs. At first we had to stick heather fronds in our helmets and uniform as camouflage. But by the time we were dragged from the swamp our own personal moorland had taken root on us. We were at one with nature. It would have been perfect training for invading Holland, say. So our first posting was North Africa.

The second shift of track occurred later that afternoon. I’d agreed to meet Wullie at the Highland Light Infantry memorial in Kelvingrove Park. Though it was a fine day for strolling in the fresh air, I hadn’t ever imagined doing so with Wullie McAllister. His invite to meet at the weekend so far from his saloon-bar haunts had been mysterious and out of character. Admittedly the pubs were closed in the afternoon but he’d have been able to raid an off licence to bridge the gap. I hadn’t seen him for a few days and the invite had come by phone to the newsroom.

‘Brodie? It’s Wullie. I could do with a wee chat. What are you doing Saturday afternoon?’

‘I’m flitting in the morning but free later. What’s up?’

‘I cannae just say. I’ll explain the morn.’ He told me where and when and hung up before I could ask anything else.

SEVENTEEN

I
got to the HLI memorial and studied the soldier in his pith helmet and puttees. He sat awkwardly but realistically on a high rock, scouting for Boers. Given the choice of wars, I’d take his over mine. North Africa had been desert hot, and, later, it always seemed to be raining in France, except when it snowed in the Ardennes. There was no sign of Wullie. I walked a little past the memorial and saw him slouched over the parapet of the Prince of Wales Bridge.

He saw me coming, pushed himself up and with a nod of his head invited me to walk with him. Apart from the habitual fag dangling from his lip he looked different. Smarter, almost dashing. It wasn’t just that he was in pale slacks and short sleeves. He seemed looser limbed, younger, as though he was wearing weekend skin. We started heading towards the Stewart Fountain.

‘Fine day,’ I said.

‘It is that. Sorry for a’ the mystery, Brodie.’

‘Am I in bother, Wullie? Are you trying to break it to me gently that I’m getting my books?’

‘Nut at a’. You’re doing fine, so you are. Big Eddie’s in awe of a’ that education of yours. Not to mention the war-hero bit while he was sat on his fat arse. And Sandy says you have a nice style on the page. He says he hardly has to change a word.’

‘I’d hate to see his blue pencil in full flow.’

‘Trust me, Brodie, when you take over my desk, he’ll hardly notice I’ve gone.’

‘Don’t be daft, Wullie . . .’

‘Wheesht. Look, I wanted to meet you away from the office and away from the pub because wa’s still have ears.’

I looked at him, wondering if he’d sneaked in a couple of wee goldies at lunchtime.

‘Sounds big. What are you up to?’

‘A breakthrough on the Morton murder. Beginning to hit the high notes in my swan song. Let’s sit here.’ He chose an isolated bench off the main path under the shade of a thick chestnut. He quickly and effortlessly rolled his own and lit up. I tugged on a Senior Service and waited.

‘I’m no’ going to tell you everything just yet. Partly because I still don’t have all the facts.’ He took a meaningful drag on his cigarette. ‘Partly because it’s
need to know
.’

‘Christ, Wullie, have you been conscripted into the SOE? I thought they’d been disbanded.’

‘That’s the other thing. I didnae think you’d believe me.’

‘I’m unshockable. Fire away.’

‘You’ll recall Sheridan mentioning the Bruce report?’

‘The plan to knock down Glasgow and rebuild it out in the Campsies? A new Jerusalem? Where Rangers and Celtic fans will lie down together in brotherly love amidst green pastures . . .’

‘Aye, aye, the very man. A heidcase. But the worst kind. A heidcase with a vision. The fact is, something’s got to be done. The city’s bursting. Have you smelt the Saltmarket in this heat? Even if Bruce’s plans don’t get totally accepted there’s going to be upheaval. Hale streets torn down. Thoosands of new houses built. And where there’s big change there’s big money . . .’

He took a deep pull on his fag and spun it into the undergrowth. Then, there, in the sunny park, surrounded by folk going about their Saturday business, laughing and joking, or just lying soaking up the sunshine, Wullie told me a tale of thieves and robber barons . . .

Glasgow corporation, like every big city after the war, had decided to renew itself. Whether like Coventry they were starting with a clean sheet thanks to Goering’s Baedeker raids, or like Glasgow where decades of overcrowding had led to the worst slums in Europe, the city fathers were dreaming grandiose dreams. They’d heard the French had style and wanted to pay homage to Le Corbusier here in the North. They’d create an urban paradise where carefree citizens could promenade down leafy boulevards, where rickets and TB were banished. Where the gangs would lay down their razors and take up harp lessons. And where all would be happy, healthy and wise. All thanks to town planning. Tom Johnston, Secretary of State for Scotland – Churchill’s ‘King of Scotland’ – had commissioned the Clyde Valley Regional Plan, a visionary masterpiece and, like enough, a recipe for chaos and profligacy.

The trouble is that in many a Glaswegian’s veins runs the blood of an entrepreneur. Stand in a pub for longer than five minutes and strangers will sidle up with offers to sell you anything from dirty postcards to the bloody head of a freshly rustled sheep. At the other end of the scale the city has more than its fair share of dynasties built on the shipyards and the railways. Men who’d made fortunes in the colonies buying and selling tobacco, spices and slaves. These were gentlemen of acumen, risk-taking and guile. Or, as we ordinary mortals knew it, men on the make. The Depression and the two World Wars had put a lid on opportunities for advancing their fortunes unless they’d been able to turn over their steelworks to ammunition factories. And the luckier ones who had now needed to turn their shell-case production lines into prefab or tramcar manufacturing.

So the prospect of being in on the ground floor of the rebuilding of an entire city centre was a mouth-watering opportunity. A bonanza for anyone in the building and finance businesses. If you could round up an army of Irish labourers, they’d be kept busy for a decade. If you owned a concrete factory, you should be cornering the market in sand and gravel. A lorry contractor? You had a one-way bet on ordering as many new trucks as could fit on an assembly line. Roll up, roll up for a once-in-a-century chance to triple your money.

There would be contracts going out to tender and the winners’ rewards would make Croesus look like a bum. And who would be dispensing such largesse? A bunch of low-grade, low-paid politicians on Glasgow City Council.

It was almost taken for granted that City Hall was infected by corruption. That even the most pious and high-minded servant of the public just needed a few sniffs of the tainted air in the grand corridors to be smitten by a severe bout of avarice, the only known palliative being the discreetly palmed brown envelope.

It also seemed to be a fact of human nature that the louder a man flaunted his working-class credentials and the more strident his opposition to the dark forces of capitalism, the more suspect he was. His interpretation of the socialist ideal of wealth redistribution was filling his own pockets first. It was a perfect alliance of interests: politicians with power and industrialists with spare capacity, all in support of worthy objectives sanctioned by the new Labour Government. Everyone a winner.

‘You think Morton was on the make? Or getting in the road of someone who was?’

‘One of the two, that’s for sure.’

‘If I could be devil’s advocate, does it really matter who fills their pockets? I mean, if the job has to be done, does it matter who does it?’