Long Time Dead (Gus Dury 4) (22 page)

I felt my head spinning. I touched my eye – there was no blood but I could sense a shiner forming. ‘You think I’d be that fucking daft?’

Shaky looked to Gemmill, frowned. ‘You saying this is news tae you?’

Mac cut in: ‘Of course it was news tae us … why else would we be sniffing around Gemmill’s drinking buddies trying to find him?’

The pug made a move for Mac, thought better of it for a moment and the pair of them stood eyeballing each other as Amy jumped in: ‘Nobody told me to go chasing after him … I did it myself!’

‘Shut it, Amy!’ I said.

She flagged me down, went over to Shaky. ‘You know he’s been up to all kinds of shit …’ She pointed at Gemmill. He looked ready to bolt. ‘He was supplying Ben Laird with drugs behind your back!’

Shaky started to laugh. ‘Nobody does fuck all in this toon behind my back, darlin’.’ He stood up, walked over to Gemmill, said, ‘Danny here’s on my payroll and he knows a good thing when he sees it … unlike some.’ He turned back to Amy. ‘You’re a braw-looking lassie, hen. Ever think ay coming to work for the likes ay me? … Set you up in one ay my saunas no trouble.’

Amy spat at the ground. Shaky laughed. Danny followed suit.

‘Okay … okay … I’ll take that as a no.’

Amy started to speak again: ‘That’s not all—’ but I grabbed her arm, pulled her to me and clamped a hand over her mouth.

‘Wise move,’ said Shaky, ‘that lassie’s gonna get you lot into trouble … more trouble, that is.’ He looked at Hod. ‘Where’s my money, y’cunt?’

Hod stepped forward, went into his pocket and withdrew a manila envelope stuffed with notes – I knew at once it was the money we’d taken from Gillian Laird, to find her son’s killer. Shaky grabbed the cash. ‘What’s this, best part ay a grand? … That’s no’ gonna buy you much time.’

‘You’ll get the rest,’ Hod told him.

I could sense the wheels turning in Shaky’s head. He looked at Gemmill and then he looked back to us. ‘I want the rest ay this, mind …’

‘You’ll get it,’ said Hod.

Shaky pocketed the cash, started to button up his overcoat. ‘Oh, I know I will …’ he walked over to Amy, eyed her up and down, ‘one way or another.’

My fists clenched. I was ready to lay into him, but the part of the brain that deals with self-preservation was holding me in check. The pug pushed us aside as Shaky headed for the door.

‘One last thing,’ he said, ‘this Laird laddie … I don’t want to hear you’ve been poking about in his death again, got me?’

I looked at Gemmill; he was staring at his shoes.

‘Why, what’s it got to do with you?’ I asked.

Gemmill suddenly came to life for the first time: ‘You’ll just do what yer fucking told, Dury!’

Shaky laughed, ‘Don’t mind him. He means well, just a wee bit sparky. He’s right about one thing, though: I hear you’ve been poking about in the Laird boy’s death again, Dury, and your girl-friend’ll be walking Leith Links … in black.’

A LIFT BACK TO THE city was way too much to expect. Shaky and his crew bailed on us without so much as a backwards glance. We all watched as the Bedford pumped blue-grey smoke into the countryside and rattled up the dirt track.

‘Where the fuck are we?’ said Mac.

He was looking at Hod, but didn’t get an answer. I tried friendly, verging on optimistic: ‘Well, we’ve got a nice day for a walk.’

Amy looked pensive. She scratched her elbow as she began to speak, ‘There’s something you should know …’

Now she had our attention.

‘Go on.’

‘When I was talking to Danny … before the date, he told me that Ben Laird owed him money.’

‘He what?’

She dropped her arms to her side, ‘I know he’s shitting it that the police will find out.’

I cut in, ‘He’s no danger there. Plod is officially sweeping this one under the carpet.’

Hod spoke, ‘Aye, but Shaky doesn’t know that.’

It was the first bit of room we’d had to manoeuvre. There was no getting around Shaky’s threat to stay away from the case, but
now we knew what was behind his threat, we could act on it. ‘He’s running scared, then …’

‘Do you think Gemmill’s had something to do with the murder?’ said Mac.

I didn’t know the answer to that, there were far too many variables floating about, but I knew one thing. ‘He looked scared enough to have.’

‘Aye, but you’d be looking scared too if you had just pissed off Shaky in that fashion,’ said Hod.

He had a point.

‘Maybe we should start taking a closer look at Danny Gemmill,’ said Mac.

‘Well, somebody should …’

‘What do you mean by that?’

I walked to the edge of the building, took out my mobi, dialled.

Ringing.

An answer: ‘Fitzsimmons.’

‘Are you glad to hear from me?’

‘Jaysus, Dury …’ He lowered his voice. ‘What have I told you about ringin’ me on the landline?’

‘Never mind that. I need to meet you.’

‘Out of the question. I’m up to me eyes in it here.’

‘I have some very interesting information about that case … one your nephew is involved in.’

A gap on the line.

Long exhalation of breath.

Sighs. ‘Okay, give me a place.’

‘How about the Regent … top of Abbeymount.’

‘Christ Almighty, that’s a feckin’ fruity bar!’

‘Yeah, I know … Don’t go changing. I thought it would be the last place we’d be expected. Say about eight tonight?’

Fitz agreed, hung up.

I motioned the others back to the dirt road, said, ‘Get those thumbs out – gonna need them.’

* * *

I traipsed down the Mile, past a shower of crusty, dreadlocked fire-eaters and a unicyclist in a jester’s hat. Never ceases to amaze me the characters this Festival attracts – every one a total bell-end. I turned eyes to the sky, longing for the day this annual nonsense would all be over.

There was a jakey with a paper cup full of coins sitting outside the
Hootsman
building. He smiled a toothless grin at me; I matched him with my own, dropped in a few pence.

‘Thank you, sir … have a nice day now.’

Fuck me, it had come to something when even the beggars in this city had completed customer appreciation courses. I marched through the front door, rocked up to the wall panel that had replaced the receptionists, and buzzed for Rasher.

In the elevator I removed the can of Guinness I was carrying in my jacket pocket, took a reassuring belt on it. The smooth liquid soothed me as it went down, but I knew there was a deeper craving calling out to be settled. I couldn’t give in to it, though; if I did, it might just be my last.

Sky News played in the newsroom – some twenty-one-year-old was reading the day’s headlines in a cocktail dress and push-up bra. I shook my head. There was a big picture of Rupert Murdoch on one of the monitors as I passed. The place was abuzz with the announcement that he was going to start charging for web content on his newspapers’ sites. ‘Quality journalism doesn’t come cheap …’ was his explanation. I had to laugh: he owned the
Sun
. And he’d aged so much he now looked like Yoda’s sack.

Rasher greeted me in the middle of the floor. ‘Gus lad … good to see you.’ It was all a bit forced, but welcome none the less … I needed all the help I could get.

I returned the bonhomie with some good Scots derision: ‘What you after?’

‘Nothing … nothing.’

He’d be telling me he was just being friendly next. Never trust a friendly hack – rule one in the manual.

We strolled through to his office. The newsroom had been
decimated. Even thinner than the last time I’d been around, said, ‘Where the fuck is everyone?’

‘Ah, we bumped the sub-editors.’

‘You what? How do you put out a paper without subs?’

I could tell he was still trying to figure that one out. ‘The reporters write into boxes … read over each other’s copy.’

I almost laughed. The idea of a reporter writing a paragraph that didn’t need rewriting was a stretch. ‘And what happens when the first big court action comes in because your eighteen-year-old hack missed the legal?’

Rasher frowned, looked skywards. ‘Upstairs have budgeted for that.’

I immediately got it: was cheaper to fight a court action every other month than maintain the wages bill for the sub-editors. This corporate world we live in made me want to chuck. The lunatics had truly taken over the asylum.

We went into Rasher’s office, sat. He produced a bottle of Johnnie Walker. It had been well hit: hardly two fingers sitting in the bottom of it. I felt like necking the lot, but waved aside the offer; he filled his coffee cup.

‘So … you took yer time getting here,’ he said.

Did I explain the hospital visit, the Amy farrago, the trip to the countryside with Boaby Stevens’s crew? Uh-uh. I glossed: ‘Yeah well, busy man …’

‘You still working the same story?’ He leaned over, looked more interested than I’d seen him in a long time. He had his sleeves rolled up and it added to the air of ‘let’s get to business’ that he carried.

‘Oh, aye …’ Recycled a line: ‘Quality journalism doesn’t come cheap.’

He laughed. ‘Very good … very good.’

My left hand started to tremble slightly. I knew it as a sign that the other would be following suit soon if I didn’t take a drink. I removed the Guinness can once more, took a belt on it. Rasher’s eyes widened, he put on a ‘Christ, that’s a jakey look, Gus’ expression. Like I gave a fuck at this stage.

‘So, you got something for me?’

Rasher dug in his drawer, removed a pale blue folder, he opened it up. Inside were a lot of photocopied cuttings. He put a finger on the top one. ‘This is the Laird laddie’s court coverage. All in here: bit of Bob Hope possession, some dealing, argy-bargy with a polisman … few others. Like I say, a charmer, real charmer he was.’ I watched Rasher delve further into the files. He spoke again: ‘I have to say, the lassie did a grand job going through the library … better than I expected.’

‘Oh, yeah? … What did she turn up?’

A grin – wide one, kind he reserved for special occasions, said, ‘Wouldn’t you like to know?’ He slammed the folder closed.

This was a turn in events, Rasher playing cat and mouse with me. ‘What’s this?’

He stood up, drained his cup, said, ‘You really don’t know, do you? You really have no idea?’

I watched him closely. There was a full-on smile playing on his face now. That was rare enough, but this was a smile unlike any other I’d seen on him. He seemed genuinely delighted with himself.

Said, ‘Right, spill the beans, eh, Rasher.’

He went back to his desk, picked up the folder and started waving it in the air. ‘I wonder how much this is worth to you.’

If he thought there was a chance of money exchanging hands, he was deluded. ‘I have about five sovs in my pocket … bit change, and that’s me.’

He laughed that up. ‘I don’t mean money.’

‘Well, what do you mean?’

He sat down quickly, opened the folder and leafed through to the bottom of the pile. He produced a photocopy that, going by the fonts, was about twenty or thirty years old. ‘See this? … This is big time!’

He handed over the cutting, watched me read.

The story was dated 1979 and had the eye-catching header: CITY SHOCKED BY UNIVERSITY HANGING.

I read on.

Genuinely intrigued.

The story told of a boy about the same age as Ben Laird being hanged, in an almost identical manner, some thirty years previously.

‘Well, well, well …’ I said.

‘Indeed.’

‘This puts quite a different complexion on things.’

‘Doesn’t it just … What a fucking story!’

I’d been a hack too long to be shocked by the crassness of Rasher’s statement. ‘If there’s a link, you mean.’

‘Oh, aye … of course. But if there’s a link, you’ll find it, eh?’ What he was saying was,
Go find the link so I can put it in the paper.

‘Why aren’t you working it?’

‘Ha!’ Rasher leaned back in his seat, looked out to the newsroom. ‘That lot out there are struggling enough with rewriting fucking press releases. There’s not one of them capable of chasing this, Dury!’ He snapped forward in his chair, put serious eyes on me. ‘But you go digging, and bring back that story … it’s a page-one exclusive!’

I stood up, leaned over the file, said, ‘Can I take this?’

Hands went up. ‘Be my guest.’

ELVIS COSTELLO WAS ON THE radio, ‘Accidents Will Happen’. Didn’t seem like an appropriate track. Not in the slightest. I walked into the doocot and took off my jacket, hung it on the back of the door. The dustcoat was flung over the chair, inky stains on the sleeves and around the pockets adding a hint of authenticity. Stevo and I hadn’t spoken since the bust-up. Well, if you could call it that; I’d be going with outburst. On his behalf.