Nor Will He Sleep (26 page)

Robert Roach was not a gambling man, save perhaps an occasional wager on Leith Links as regards his prowess with a mashie-niblick, and so he hesitated.

If wrong, his head might roll.

‘And with a wee bit of luck,’ added the inspector, ‘I’ll cut Carnegie down.’

The Queen looked down upon her three subjects. One of them had to make a move.

Surely?

He lay in the corner, huddled limbs together like a threatened animal.

From the outside he seemed still, inert, but in the depths of his being a change was taking place. The other was sleeping now, the idiot brute, and that was splendid because it gave him time to
plan.

And paint pretty pictures in his mind.

For there was no evil to be found in this, no, what he did was a service – as a good husbandman would clear the stinking growths around a fine tree, so he frees the living creature to
reach up for the sun.

And bless the child.

So.

One more before the awakening.

One more that stood between himself and the moment he had dreamt of for so long.

An ugly image lurched into his mind. The old witch in the tavern, mouth twisted and leering, trying to smile, slobbering tears, hands like talons, crying his name –
HIS NAME!

He had pulled away, but she yowled and clawed at him, then by fortune stumbled to the ground so that he might escape, out of the tavern doors into the fell, dank air of the harbour, with tears
blinding him.

Yet she had revealed his destiny. So for that she must be thanked and for that she must be destroyed.

It was only right. Only justice.

Had he felt joy when he lashed down?

It must be admitted there was some delight, as if he was tasting the sweet, beginning fruits of freedom.

He had wrapped the witch in swaddling blanket and then left her at the glistening door as eliminated memory that could no longer harm the coming splendour.

He screamed with joy as the carriage cut through that dark night like a knife.

Soon he would be free!

And even with the first who had dared to threaten, to reveal the sacred book he kept so close, who was no more than a slug under foot, again he had felt such glory as the cane whipped its
precise music upon her face and body.

Now there was a third.

Come from nowhere.

The last.

A viper, vixen, naked and wanton.

To tempt, seduce, suck out life and blood, her soul squalid as a leech.

The other two were old and ugly but she was exquisite, a doorway to depravity.

How beautiful are thy feet with shoes, O prince’s daughter the joints of thy thighs are like jewels, the work of the hands of a cunning workman.

Thy navel is like a round goblet, which wanteth not liquor: thy belly is like an heap of wheat set about with lilies.

All this he would destroy.

It should not take long.

Silence the whore with a first blow across the fluttering pulse in her throat and then whip out the life.

He heard a sound somewhere, footsteps on stone perhaps, but he did not open his eyes.

While they were closed he was safe.

For the moment he could only plan, but soon he would be released to dance around the writhing harlot.

And strike down.

The blood in her mouth would be as blood upon his own lips, stripes upon her skin the flayed pain he had suffered since the advent of the witch.

Each welt an exact chastisement.

Patience and death.

The plan was made; the moment would arrive.

Only just. Only right. Only proper.

A joyful deliverance.

George Dunwoody smiled a little foolishly as he directed his wayward feet towards his own wee door.

The crack had been no’ half bad at the tavern, men of a decent age all with tales to tell; most stories George had heard before, but having the pelf for a decent dram of whisky brightened
the prospect of an oft repeated anecdote, and he himself had been accorded pride of place, having brought in a healthy round.

Money cements friendship.

Of course, no mention, not a hint of present events; this knowledge George hugged to himself, while regaling the party with the umpteenth retelling of the blessed day he saw his teeth smiling
like a lover’s promise from the market stall.

All the time, though, his ears were cocked for scraps of gossip or a remark made in drink at a nearby table, for his hearing was sharp as a razor shell.

Like a squirrel George stored these careless remarks away, for who knows when they might come in handy?

But not this night.

Now he had money in his poche, and providing he steered clear of such as that big lump of a girl Susan Templeton who had winked her eye when he stumped up coin at the bar, safe in his pocket it
would remain.

Mind you. She was a ripe temptation.

George laughed aloud at that idea, navigated the narrow hallway and turned his key in the lock.

Safe from all carnal incitement, it was the work of a moment to light the candle, banishing the darkness.

This he did, and then he blinked.

Did his eyes deceive, or was a man not sitting in the single three-legged chair?

And another leaning against the damp wall.

Men he knew.

But they did not belong in this neck o’ the woods.

From the chair, one spoke.

‘Aye, George,’ said James McLevy. ‘You seem in fine fettle.’

‘Wrestle a bull to the ground,’ added Mulholland.

‘How did you get in here?’ George asked, grinning in spite of himself.

‘Magic.’

This remark of the inspector’s was not strictly true, since he had utilised a set of lock-picks confiscated from a master craftsman many years ago, and now in McLevy’s hands at the
service of justice.

At least this is what he told Mulholland when the constable suggested, as usual, that his inspector might be sliding towards unlawful entry.

‘Throw me in the jile then,’ was the retort accompanied by a defiant glint in the eye. In truth McLevy relished the thrill of tickling ratchets, the moment of consummation and then
the compliant click as the lock sprang open.

They had searched the place top to bottom without success, uncovering only a small cache of photographs involving a well-upholstered naked female with what seemed a remarkably versatile, large
snake.

Mulholland had identified it as a boa constrictor, male because of its pelvic spurs.

All grist to the mill.

The photos had been replaced in their oilskin wrapping. McLevy continued the exchange.

‘I’ve spent the night calling in favours, Mister Dunwoody. Some folk didnae even wish to make donation, being of a profession that is but one step up from the sewage rat.’

‘Yet once we twisted their tails, they squealed a fine little tune,’ Mulholland added cheerfully.

George said nothing, but carefully lowered himself onto a small stool, as if preparing for the long haul.

‘Should have done this before,’ remarked McLevy genially. ‘But in my defence let it be said I have been somewhat beleaguered.’

‘No-one is perfect, sir, not even yourself.’

The inspector ignored this sage comment from his constable, attention fixed upon the old man, who now sat forward alertly, as if about to receive a commendation of sorts from his betters.

Indeed, there was a curious innocence in his eyes, which McLevy was intent upon demolishing.

‘George Dunwoody. Ye make a wee living, peddling to the papers. A dirty business.’

‘Gossip, hearsay, all kinds of calumny,’ Mulholland threw in.

‘Scandalmonger. Paid informer. Muckraker.’

The old man blinked.

‘These are gey harsh words, inspector.’

‘And I didnae pay a penny for them!’

Indeed, though McLevy had canvassed and coerced the gentlemen of the press, to a certain extent his work had been made easier by the fact that a certain slimy rodent was loathed even amongst his
own feral tribe.

‘And an avid buyer of the scurrilous dross you peddle is none other than Sim Carnegie, I am reliably informed.’

George suddenly stuck his thumb into his mouth, chewed on it for a moment, then pulled it out with a pop
.

‘Now and again,’ he announced.

‘What?’

‘A wee drap tittle tattle. Peyed buttons maistly.’

‘By Carnegie?’

‘Amangst other folk.’

‘You didn’t mention that,’ Mulholland observed.

‘I forgot.’

‘Forgot what?’ growled McLevy.

‘I knew him, like. Carnegie.’

‘That’s quite forgetful.’

Dunwoody made no response to the constable’s words, while McLevy struggled to contain a mounting ire.

Of course they had earlier, after George’s first visit to the station, checked out the old man in the tavern where he drank and with his neighbours in the wynd, but Dunwoody kept a low
profile and other than a fey disposition from time to time, seemed to lead, for Leith, an unassuming and ordinary life. A reliable witness then.

It wasn’t till McLevy started to dig deeper this very night, especially with a possible Carnegie connection in mind, that a certain incriminating sideline had emerged.

But the inspector still blamed himself.

They say never look a gift horse in the mouth, but a good policeman should have been alerted by the teeth alone.

George sat like a jovial elf on the stool, eyes bright and shiny.

‘All right,’ muttered McLevy a trifle heavily, because there was something about eternal cheerfulness that he found very wearing. ‘I’ll lay it out how I think it happened
and at the end all you have to do, George – is nod your head.’

‘That’s all I have tae do?’

‘If you agree, that is,’ Mulholland interjected for the sake of even-handedness.

McLevy shot him a look to indicate that further neutrality would not be welcome, and began his dissertation.

‘Sim Carnegie, it is my conjecture, approached you, George Dunwoody, with a plan for a great wee piece o’ mischief, and there’s naethin’ you love more than mischief on
the burner, eh sir?’

A nod almost came in response, before George remembered he was only supposed to perform that particular action at the end, and only if in concurrence.

‘Mister Carnegie had already met with one of the suspects, as it were, in the tavern, so he was able to furnish you with a detailed description of the young man; the bad leg, the cane, the
time you would have seen him that night.’

Nothing could be gleaned from the old man’s face so far, other than he was enjoying this, as a spectator would a rollicking good play.

‘Carnegie paid you – good money I trust and not buttons, George – to land up at the station and set the cat amongst the pigeons.’

McLevy let out a mirthless guffaw that sounded more like a bull walrus catching sight of a rival, and lest George take alarm, Mulholland sidled in.

‘Great fun to be had watching the police chase their own tails. Great fun!’

‘Only,’ added McLevy with a savage grin, ‘too true. There we were, hammering at this boy, worrying our guts about how Carnegie broke the story, and the answer was simple; he
had started it in the first place.’

Dunwoody stuck his thumb back into his mouth.

‘Whit a caper, eh? And you did a grand job, George – ’

‘First class!’ chimed the constable.

‘You could take pride in mission accomplished – is that not so, my mannie?’

There was a long silence. Both McLevy and Mulholland inclined their heads in enquiring but kindly fashion, as if they in turn were genteel spectators at a clever show.

At last George removed the fleshly digit, though for the moment afterwards was frozen in time and space.

‘A chance tae be the hero, eh? Sim Carnegie – all his plan, his doing. But you were the champion.’

‘The bold boy!’

Mulholland’s Irish blue eyes were filled with admiration; the inspector winked in high regard.

The old man smiled at such approbation and then – nodded. Firmly. A man of mettle. A champion.

Neither by movement nor glance did either policeman indicate the importance of that inclination.

‘Sim Carnegie is a clever chiel,’ said McLevy. ‘But you George, you went intae the lion’s den.’

‘It didnae feel like that,’ replied the old man. ‘It felt . . . righteous.’

Best not to quibble too directly with that; strike a solicitous note.

‘But if you’d stood up in court, George. Sworn on the bible, eh?’

‘Wouldnae have gone that far, inspector.’

Silence. McLevy took a deep breath.

‘Tell me a wee thing more.’

‘If it got anywhere near tae trial, Carnegie tellt me I was tae alter course before. Change of mind. Wisnae sure. Bleary auld eyes, dark night, rain in my face – a clever chiel,
eh?’

The old fellow let out a peal of laughter, more of a dry, cackling sound, teeth up and down like a drawbridge.

Worried McLevy might revert to type, tear the man’s head off and throw it out the nearest window, Mulholland made a more sobering contribution.

‘Do you not think – it might have been – a little on the questionable side?’

‘How so?’

‘False witness.’

‘No’ exactly false. Sim was certain sure the boy had done it!’

‘Was he now?’ muttered McLevy.

‘Certain sure. Whit he told me. Whit he desired wis that once startit, ye would find out the bona fide truth.’

‘That’s why he did it, eh?’

‘Vengeance. His poor mother was dead. Every man loves his mother!’

The inspector could have cited at least ten murder cases contradicting that last assertion, but at least they had got what they wanted.