Long Time Dead (Gus Dury 4) (24 page)

She came through with the pot of coffee, placed it on the tray. I thought about pouring the cups out, but in my current condition, knew I’d spill the lot. I waited until she offered me a cup, my hand remained thankfully steady as I took it.

‘So, you look well,’ I said.

She smiled, knew she wanted to say,
Wish I could say the same about you
, but went with, ‘Well … it’s a quiet enough life.’

I wondered if that was a dig at me being absent for so long. Thought better of it – knew my mam didn’t have it in her for digs. She was as close to the perfect human being as you could get; perhaps that’s why her suffering hurt me so much.

‘Mam, I’ve been thinking a lot …’ I stalled, looked out the window. Could I really do this? My mind wandered off track, a long silence stretched out between us.

‘Yes, son?’

I turned back, refocused. Her face looked open and approachable. ‘Mam, I’ve had some time to think … a lot of time, actually, since the split from Debs.’

Mam sipped her coffee. ‘Is that so wise?’

‘What? I mean, I know … thinking’s never a good idea, is it?’

She seemed to agree but gave nothing away. Did she sense what I was here to ask her? The thought slayed me. I knew my mother had been through enough grief in her life – now she was old, she had earned her peace. Who was I to come here and disrupt that? And for what? To satisfy my ego, to let me sleep better at night? Christ on a bike, if any one of us deserved to sleep soundly it was her. I couldn’t bring up the past in this house again. She deserved better.

She put down her coffee, clasped her fingers together, spoke: ‘These walls have seen a lot over the years, have they not?’ It was as if she knew what I was thinking, what it was I needed to know. ‘At times these walls felt like a prison to me, Angus …’

‘They did?’

‘Oh, I think they felt like that for us all.’

I knew what she meant, but we had never spoken about him like this. It felt strange to be treading towards this territory. ‘Mam, why?’

‘Why what? Why did I stay with him? Why didn’t I take you all away to safety … somewhere else?’

The words faltered on my lips. ‘I-I guess so …’

My mother looked at me, but at the same time seemed to be staring straight through me. ‘Where to, Angus? I had nowhere to go … Back to my family? Oh, I tried. They sent me back to him … It wasn’t the done thing, then. You didn’t leave a marriage, not when you had children. I had no choice.’ Suddenly her eyes flickered. It was as if she sensed I wanted more. ‘Angus … it would have made no difference, he would have found us. He would have found us wherever we went.’

She made him sound like a monster; my own mother conceded that my father’s actions had harmed us all. She knew all we had suffered at his hand, she knew Catherine and I were still damaged and confused children at heart and she knew it was all because of him.

‘Mam, do you remember the night I had to call the ambulance?’ There had been many nights I’d had to call the ambulance, but only one like this. ‘For you.’

Her face changed shape; she seemed to straighten her back. She spoke through pinched lips: ‘I remember it, yes.’ It was hard for her to find any words. I didn’t want to make her speak. I didn’t want to force her to tell me the answer to the question I had carried around with me for decades.

I stood up. ‘I should go, Mam.’

She watched me rise. ‘Your father had something inside him, Angus … a dark place that he couldn’t escape. No matter what good he had in his life, the darkness was always there.’

I knew what she was trying to say.

‘Mam, I have to go … I’m sorry to—’

She placed a hand on my face. It felt soft and cold. ‘I know you have the same dark place inside of you, son … but you have a better heart than him. Please, son … try and listen to that heart of yours, and not the other place.’

I MADE MY WAY TO the Regent, ordered in a pint of Guinness. Got some looks from a fruity boy at the bar in a boy band get-up, all low-cut T-shirt, tight waistcoat and skinny jeans. I gave him a smile, a good wide view of my gaping mouth. He turned tail. Couldn’t say I was taken with the place, but at least it looked like a drinker and not a gay bar. Don’t know what I expected – men with handlebar moustaches dancing to ‘YMCA’ maybe? – but this place seemed down to earth. I made a note to stop flying to all kinds of conclusions about people based on their personal make-up. I knew that now, more than ever, I needed to put the brakes on my assumptions. Ben Laird’s murderer – and likely Calder’s – was still out there. If I was to get to the root of these killings, I’d have to sweep aside every silver-spooned animus I harboured.

Took a seat at the front window and kept an eye out for Fitz. My mind was working overtime; surprisingly, since my visit to my mam, I felt rejuvenated. Was in a ‘glass is half full’ as opposed to ‘half empty’ mood. But I knew it wouldn’t last long. I had stopped worrying about whether the man I called father had actually fathered me; but the realisation that I
was
his son didn’t fill me with joy. Somewhere inside me I guess I had always hoped that I wasn’t his. Even when I knew in my heart that I was.

I knew exactly what my mother had meant about the dark place.
It was the Black Dog. It had leapt from him onto me and I had never been able to shake the bastard. Debs knew it was there, and that’s why she had left. I knew I had no chance of a reconciliation with her, like my mother had hinted at; I knew I didn’t even want that now. More and more my mind was turning to Amy. I had been worried about her at first, but now she was becoming a full-time concern. Hoped I wasn’t substituting her for Debs – that would lead to no good, guaranteed.

I changed tack, kept my mind focused on the job at hand. Tried to weigh up the news Rasher had delivered. A previous killing at the university was something worth covering up for sure, for obvious reasons. The uni was big business these days, and no big business wants to attract bad publicity – presuming the weakened media could deliver some. It was the same situ with Shaky, but on a lower scale. However, as a motive for murder, it didn’t sit well with me.

I knew the Craft were up to their necks in this too, but I got the impression their involvement was more crisis management – covering tracks. The reason for their intervention was still to be confirmed but I had an idea Fitz could check that out. When you weighed it all up, I was still missing the bigger part of the puzzle and I needed to get to it. And soon.

I was on my second pint when the bold Fitzsimmons strode in. His face was flushed red, the collar of his white shirt open at the neck. He ordered himself a whisky at the bar then scanned the room, made for my table. He looked over his shoulder as he walked, his gait unsteady, like he was breaking in new shoes.

‘I don’t like this, Dury … not one feckin’ iota I don’t.’ He seemed edgy.

‘It’s a nasty business all right.’

‘Jaysus, I’m not on about that.’ He pressed his index finger into the table. ‘I mean meeting in here. First crack I hear about taking it up the Gary, I will swing for ye, Dury!’

I let out a laugh. ‘Yeah, well … I need to keep a low profile for now.’

Fitz riled, ‘So what’s feckin’ new?’

I told him about being hoyed up by Shaky, the trip to the country-side, the threats. I stretched out all the juicy bits, made him fully aware of how seriously he should take it. After all, there were implications here that he needed to consider too. Shaky might not be the kind of criminal that he spent his days chasing after any more, but he understood how they operated, knew every one in his manor and liked to think he could keep them under control.

Fitz rubbed his fat cheek as he spoke. ‘I’m not getting this. Why’s Stevens so concerned with the Laird Boy?’

‘Simple. The kid owed his man money. Gemmill has form for GBH and a serious record. If it was to be known that he had been helping the lad set himself up as a dealer it wouldn’t look good for Shaky, would it?’

Fitz sipped his whisky, savoured the taste a little, showed his bottom row of teeth, then spoke: ‘There’s that, I suppose. But then, why doesn’t he just cut Gemmill loose? … Be the answer to all his problems.’

‘Gemmill’s too deep into that organisation. If he went he could sink him, or worse, set up on his own, and nobody wants a bloody drugs war.’

Fitz sighed, waved a hand at me in a ‘slow down’ motion. ‘Okay, okay … whatever his reasons, what we have is Stevens putting the frighteners on you to keep away from the Laird boy’s murder investigation. Let’s stick to those facts for now.’

‘All right … so where does that get us?’ I played wingman to Fitz; sometimes it paid to let him think he was the smartest man in the room.

‘Way I see it, with the Craft involved, and the uni’s boyos … this investigation is as dead in the water as our Laird laddie. At least, they think it is … if Stevens was connected to that mob, he wouldn’t be shitting himself about you poking yer nose in.’

I put the tick in the box, let him see I was paying attention: ‘So he’s running scared without any cause …’

‘Correct! Or should I say … up to a point.’

I saw where he was going with this now. ‘What you mean is,
it doesn’t matter to the Craft who killed Ben Laird; they just want it swept under the carpet. But if it was Gemmill who killed him, and he’s trying to cover his own tracks, in fucking clumsy fashion, then he might just blow this whole thing open.’

Fitz raised his glass, slugged deep. I watched his Adam’s apple move up and down. He licked his lower lip, put down the glass, ‘You leave young Gemmill to me, and fucking Shaky as well … By Christ, I’ll give the fucker a shake, so I will.’

I liked the sound of that. ‘You’ll keep me out of the picture?’

‘Jaysus, of course. I’ll be watching him closely, though. He’ll know he has serious police interest and if he puts a foot wrong he’ll be hauled in … Should free you up a bit to get down to brass tacks.’

There was certainly plenty to be getting on with. ‘Well, there’s some progress.’ I produced the folder from Rasher, opening it at the cutting with the headline about the seventies killing. I pushed it towards Fitz.

‘What’s this?’ His face drooped as he took in the header, and the implications.

‘Read ’em and weep.’

Fitz scratched his head as he scanned the cutting. He was a slow reader. I watched his brow crease up as he digested the piece. Once or twice he looked up from the print, shook his head a bit, then his eyes returned to the cutting. When he was finished he sat back in his chair and pinched the flabby skin under his chin, said, ‘Christ Al-fucking-mighty … they’ve got form for this caper.’

‘Oh, yes.’

He held up the cutting, winced. ‘Where did you get this?’

I finished off my pint, said, ‘The paper … they’re all over it. I have to tell you, they’re looking to go big on this, mate.’ I went back to the file, produced another cutting that I’d found tucked away at the bottom of the pile. ‘This makes especially interesting news. I was looking through the file and I found this.’ I handed over a picture of the class of ‘79 that the paper had reproduced. ‘I don’t think the hacks have cottoned on to this, but that one I’ve circled … recognise him?’

Fitz squinted, ‘No … who is it?’

‘It’s Joe Calder. He was a classmate of the boy that was hanged. This goes way back, Fitz … years back. If this gets blown up, there’s people with lots to hide that’ll be thrown into the spotlight.’

‘Oh, the feckin’ Craft will love this discovery.’ Fitz rubbed his hands together, laughed it up. I saw him register the way this might play out – old scores settled for him; top brass shed from the force. And his nephew in the clear. It was a pretty payday ahead for him … if he worked it right.

I smiled, wiping the froth of Guinness from my mouth. ‘Thought you might say that. You need to check out if any more of those faces are matched to names in the force … and especially the Craft.’

Fitz leaned forward, rested on his elbows. ‘I’m all over it.’

I HADN’T SEEN AMY SINCE her ordeal with Danny Gemmill and Shaky, but she didn’t seem to be too worse for wear. Pacing about the flat in a pair of flared white hipsters and a flowery top that tied around the back. She was blasting Hod as she went.

‘You old fart,’ she yelled, ‘since when were you appointed my father?’ Hod looked wrecked, standing at the end of the sofa with his fist resting on his chin. ‘Gus, thank fuck!’ He reached for his jacket. The chair it lay on nearly went with him. ‘Your turn, mate … you can do some babysitting for her.’

Amy stood in the doorway, one hand on her hip, the other in a single-digit salute directed at Hod.

‘See some folk … no matter what you do for them, it’s never enough,’ said Hod.

‘I told you, I don’t need looking after,’ roared Amy.

I had to laugh.

Hod said, ‘Isn’t that your tune, Dury?’

He had me there. I opened the front door for him, said, ‘Where you off to?’

‘Away … any-fucking-where!’

‘Aye, well, watch out, eh. Remember, Shaky’s still got your number and he wants paying.’

‘Aye, aye, aye.’

As the door closed Amy balled fists, raised them and looked to the ceiling. ‘Oh, thank fucking Christ. He won’t even let me sit in my room on my own in case I shimmy down the drainpipe.’