Dead Catch

by T F Muir

  ‘I would imagine a lot.’

  ‘And how many man-hours do you want to waste chasing this hare-brained idea of yours? Because that’s what it is, Andy. It’s hare-brained. You’ve got about as much chance of finding money-laundering accounts and linking them to Maxwell as I have of flying to the moon.’

  ‘Any other suggestions?’

  The line fell silent for several seconds before she came back with, ‘OK. The FIU should be the ones to initiate an investigation with the Bank of Scotland. I can’t see millions being laundered through any single account, so I’m thinking they should probably start with accounts that are shifting hundreds of thousands. Or maybe tens of thousands, but through a lot of transactions.’

  Although Jessie had come round to his way of thinking, Gilchrist realised that trying to convince the Financial Investigation Unit to look into the possibility of drug money being laundered through bank accounts they had yet to identify was not a big ask, it was a massive ask. He wasn’t sure he could pull it off, but if he could get the FIU onside, it would be a huge bonus.

  The FIU had the power to obtain legal orders through the courts, which was critical in stripping assets from organised criminals. The Proceeds of Crime Act 2002 allowed them to seize cash and assets of anyone suspected of having profited from their crimes. The problem Gilchrist had with all this, of course, was trying to prove that crimes had been committed in the first place, by backing into money-laundering accounts he had yet to find.

  Christ, talk about arse over tits in the extreme.

  ‘OK,’ he said. ‘Get hold of Harvey Kenn. He’s the best financial investigator in Scotland. And he’s worked with us before. If anyone can do it, he’s it.’

  ‘Jeez, Andy. I thought I’d been pulled off the case.’

  ‘You have. Officially you’re off the books.’

  ‘Which means …?’

  ‘Which means I’m trying to keep costs down.’

  ‘Does Smiler know?’

  ‘Of course not.’

  ‘That’s brilliant, that is. Are you trying to get me suspended?’

  ‘Just get on with it, Jessie, and get back to me as soon as.’

  He killed the call, and pulled out from behind a couple of slow-moving vehicles. Then he floored the pedal, and tried to settle down for the drive to Dundee.

  CHAPTER 36

  Despite it being Sunday, rather than drift around the streets of Dundee in search of a parking space at a free meter, Gilchrist drove into the Gellatly Street car park. The King’s Arms was no more than a ten-minute walk from there. Even so, he arrived at the bar just after 10 a.m. to find it closed.

  He tried the door handle – locked – then backed a couple of steps into the pedestrian precinct. He thought back to yesterday’s call and wondered if the meeting with Shepherd had been intended for ten in the evening, not the morning. But lights at the windows told him someone was inside, so he tried the door again, thumped it hard with the heel of his hand.

  A few seconds later, the sound of locks clicking was followed by the door creaking open and the appearance of a small man in a black suit and waistcoat – no taller than five-six – with a scarred face that proved he’d been on the wrong side of a broken bottle, and eyes mean enough to warn all-comers that he was ready for another shot at it.

  Without a word, he stepped aside.

  Gilchrist brushed past him into an empty bar redolent of paint and varnish. Protective sheets of hessian backed with plastic covered the wooden floors, and folded over and around the central bar area as if someone had tried to put the place to bed. The only exposed areas were the walls and ceiling on which an attempt was being made to repair damaged cornicing. He felt his heart stutter at the sound of the door slamming shut, and the metallic clatter of locks being engaged. If they threw away the key, he might never get out.

  But it was the hessian that worried him.

  A good material in which to roll up a body for disposal later.

  ‘This way,’ the man grunted.

  If they were going to do something to him, Gilchrist reasoned they would have done it by now. So he followed the man, heart stuck in his throat, along a short hall that led to the toilets. At an unmarked door, the man stopped and gestured for Gilchrist to enter.

  ‘After you,’ Gilchrist said.

  Silent, the man stood back.

  Well, he was here now, he thought, so he opened the door and entered an office of sorts. His heart jumped as the door thudded behind him.

  If he hadn’t been expecting to meet Jock Shepherd, Gilchrist would have been hard-pressed to recognise him. Where he had once been upright and broad-shouldered with a hefty bulk that easily filled out his six-foot-six frame, Shepherd now stooped bony-limbed and as gaunt-faced as a famine survivor. A couple of days’ growth bearded jaundiced skin that hung from his neck in a loose fold as wrinkled as chicken wattle.

  A skeletal hand waved at him. ‘Have a seat, son.’

  Gilchrist puzzled at the weak Glasgow rasp, nothing like the voice he’d heard on the phone. Only then did he notice a square table in the corner of the L-shaped room, beside which stood a younger, healthier version of Shepherd – his son from the looks of him – who pulled out a chair, an invitation for Gilchrist to sit.

  But he didn’t like the idea of being seated at a table for two with a third person behind him. He’d seen too many movies involving cheese wire. ‘I’ll stand,’ he said.

  Shepherd shrugged. ‘Suit yourself.’ Then he shuffled on unsteady legs towards the table. ‘Fucking buggered, son … You don’t mind if I sit, do you?’

  Despite the question, Shepherd was not asking permission, and Gilchrist stood silent while the old man – once Glasgow’s invincible crime patriarch – was helped into the chair by the younger man who then stood behind him like a palace bodyguard.

  Once seated, Shepherd held out his hand for Gilchrist to sit opposite. ‘I’m no gonnie bite, son.’ His voice had no strength, as if the words were being spoken from the roof of his mouth, his lungs not strong enough to string more than a few words together. He paused to take a breath. ‘Take a fucking seat … so’s I can talk to you … without having to strain … my fucking neck.’

  Gilchrist thought it surreal that he was standing in an office in a pub in Dundee, about to talk to a man who had once been widely acknowledged as the Godfather of Glasgow. Just the three of them – whoever the third man was.

  As if sensing Gilchrist’s unasked question, Shepherd said, ‘Johnny … say hello to Mr Gilchrist.’

  The young man stared at Gilchrist, and said, ‘Hello, Mr Gilchrist.’

  Gilchrist recognised the voice on the phone. Well, in for a penny, as they say, so he pulled out the seat opposite and sat down.

  Shepherd rubbed spittle from his lips, and said, ‘I didnae want to drag you … all the way down to Glasgow … Besides … the city’s fucked now.’

  ‘In what way?’

  ‘It’s no how it used to be … Cannae go for a shite … without some fucking high-flying cunt … asking questions … There’s nae fucking respect any more … Isn’t that right, Johnny?’

  ‘That’s right, Mr Shepherd.’

  Gilchrist felt his eyebrows rise at the young man’s deference. Maybe he wasn’t Jock’s son after all. He locked his eyes on Shepherd’s, and said, ‘I’d heard you’d been pulled in for questioning.’

  Shepherd waved a hand in the air as if it was nothing. ‘I’m dying, son … A man as smart as you … would’ve taken half a second … to work that out.’

  Gilchrist thought silence his best option.

  ‘We’ve all got to die … There’s nae getting away from it … I’ve come to terms with my end … Now it’s no longer a matter of when … but a matter of pride …’ His eyes flared, and for just that moment Gilchrist saw into Shepherd’s black soul, felt his once incontestable raw power. ‘And dignity.’

  Gilchrist thought it best just to nod in agreement.

  ‘I’m a proud man, son … so I
’m no gonnie give up my right … to die with fucking dignity.’

  Gilchrist swallowed the lump in his throat, cast a glance Johnny’s way. But Johnny just gave him a dead-eyed stare. In the hall outside, footsteps approached, then stopped at the door. He half-expected it to be kicked open and one of Shepherd’s up-and-coming killers to burst in and machine-gun the room. Sweat trickled down his back, and he prayed that the tremor that gripped his legs would not shift to his hands. He clasped them together, just in case, then placed them under his chin, as if giving grave thought to Shepherd’s words.

  ‘But your lot … are no for showing any respect … to a dying man.’

  The effort to speak seemed to be draining Shepherd. Gilchrist looked at Johnny, and said, ‘I think he could use a glass of water.’

  Shepherd flapped a hand with impatience, as if appalled by the idea. Then a silver hip flask appeared as if from nowhere, which he unscrewed with expert skill and pressed to his lips. He took a small mouthful, then another, then held the flask out to Gilchrist. ‘Fuck knows where I’d be without the nectar of the gods.’

  ‘No thanks,’ Gilchrist said.

  Shepherd screwed the top back on. ‘You never were the whisky type, were you?’

  ‘I have the occasional glass,’ he agreed. ‘But not during the day.’

  ‘You don’t know what you’re missing, son.’

  The sips of whisky seemed to have worked wonders for the big man, for his speech picked up, his eyes sparkled, and his mouth broke into a perfect smile that must have set him back thirty thousand, maybe more. Well, if you had the money to burn, Gilchrist supposed, setting out to be the gangster with the best teeth seemed as good a goal as any.

  ‘I like you, son,’ Shepherd said, the strength in his voice back, as if by magic. ‘You listening to this, Johnny?’

  ‘I’m listening, Mr Shepherd.’

  ‘This man here done me a good turn a while back. Took care of some fucking wee nuisance for me. Banged the cunt up for the rest of his natural, so he did.’ Shepherd leaned forward. ‘D’you remember that, son?’

  ‘How could I forget?’ Gilchrist said, and meant it. The wee nuisance Shepherd was referring to had come within a hair’s breadth – literally – of taking Gilchrist’s life. Evidence given to him by Shepherd helped the Procurator Fiscal successfully argue a sentence for life without parole.

  ‘Well, son, I’ve got another one for you.’

  At some unspoken command, Johnny walked from his spot behind Shepherd over to the door. He gave one hard knock. The door opened, and he took hold of a folder. Without a word he walked back as the door closed behind him, then laid the folder on the table in front of Shepherd.

  Shepherd stared at it for several long seconds before opening the cover and sliding out a colour photograph on glossy ten-by-eight paper, which he turned face-up to Gilchrist. ‘You recognise him, son?’

  Gilchrist almost caught his breath.

  The image was a headshot – if it could be called that – of a dead man. Even without the open wound that showed the subcutaneous layer of fat and gristle, the oesophagus and airways of the throat, he could tell from the glazed look behind half-shut eyes that the man was never going to waken up.

  He shook his head. ‘Don’t know him.’

  ‘Cutter Boyd,’ Shepherd said, and slid out the next image. ‘How about this one?’

  Despite the tingle of excitement that fired through Gilchrist at hearing Boyd’s name – one of the six – he grimaced at the face before him, which looked as if it had been hammered from behind and turned inside out. No one, not even the man’s mother, could have identified him – or her.

  Again, he shook his head. ‘No.’

  ‘Bruiser Mann.’ Shepherd slid another photo forward. ‘Him?’

  Gilchrist felt his stomach spasm, but managed to keep down an acidic lump of bile at the back of his throat. How anyone could inflict such brutality on another human being was beyond imagination. ‘No.’

  ‘Hatchet McBirn.’ Then another one. ‘How about him?’ Shepherd said, then sat back as if to better study Gilchrist’s reaction.

  This one Gilchrist did recognise. Stooky Dee peered at him through swollen eyes. A metal wire cut deep into his throat. His split lips were partially open to reveal teeth cracked and broken from being hit with a hammer, or maybe from being pulled with a pair of pliers – same difference. But the significance of this image did not slip past him.

  He lifted his eyes and glared at Shepherd. ‘This was taken from police files.’

  ‘I told you he was smart, Johnny.’

  ‘You did, Mr Shepherd, yes.’

  Gilchrist said, ‘How did you get it?’

  ‘You shouldnae be asking how I got it, son, but why I got it.’

  After five seconds of silence, Gilchrist realised that Shepherd was waiting for him to ask the question. ‘All right,’ he said. ‘Why have you got it?’

  Shepherd narrowed his eyes and smiled. If Gilchrist had any doubts that the big man had lost any of his power, they were quashed right there and then. Shepherd leaned forward, his stare as sharp and piercing as a whetted blade of tempered steel. ‘I got it for revenge,’ he said. ‘I got all of them for revenge.’ He slapped spittle from the corners of his mouth.

  Gilchrist returned Shepherd’s hard look with one of his own, and came to understand that even though Shepherd might be dying, the man had lost not one iota of his psychopathic tendencies. He might be stark raving mad, for all anyone knew. Shepherd’s vitriol might not be aimed his way, but Gilchrist knew he still needed to tread with care. ‘If you know who’s behind these killings,’ he said, ‘you should let the police take care of it.’

  Shepherd’s lips tightened, his eyes bulged, and for one frightening moment Gilchrist feared the man was going to launch himself at him, or instruct poker-faced Johnny behind him to do so.

  ‘Do I look fucking stupit?’ Shepherd spat.

  Gilchrist tried to lower the heat. ‘You look angry,’ he suggested.

  ‘Of course I’m fucking angry.’ From the tremors in his jowls, the man looked beyond anger, as if he was having a stroke. ‘Does the cunt that done this to my men …’ He thudded two fingers against his chest so hard he should have broken his ribcage. ‘My men,’ he roared. ‘Mine … think he’s gonnie get away with it … by folding fivers … and stuffing them down their fucking throats?’

  His anger seemed to have drained him. He sat back, retrieved his hip flask and, with shaky hands, managed to unscrew the top and press it hard to his lips.

  Gilchrist tried to settle his thumping heart. He was still no clearer as to the purpose of this meeting, other than to witness the frightening force of Shepherd’s rage. Another glance at Johnny left him none the wiser. He turned his attention back to Shepherd, and said, ‘Cunt.’

  Shepherd scowled at him. ‘What the fuck did you say?’

  ‘Cunt,’ Gilchrist repeated, even though he hated the sound of that word and the way its consonants clipped the air. ‘Single. Not plural. Not a group. Not a gang. But one man.’

  Shepherd’s anger vanished with a smile. He cast his gaze upwards. ‘What did I tell you, Johnny? The man’s smart.’

  ‘You did tell me that, Mr Shepherd, yes.’

  ‘And you know who this … this …’ Gilchrist didn’t want to use that word again, ‘this one man is,’ he said. Not a question, but a fact.

  ‘Of course I fucking do.’

  Gilchrist raised his eyebrows, a silent appeal to be given a name.

  But Shepherd didn’t tell him. Instead he pulled all four photographs together and cupped them like a hand of cards. ‘And when I take that cunt out, by Christ he’s gonnie suffer like this.’ He slid Stooky Dee’s image to Gilchrist. Then Hatchet McBirn’s. ‘And this.’ Next, Bruiser Mann’s. ‘And this.’ And finally, Cutter Boyd’s. ‘And this.’

  Gilchrist picked the photographs up, one at a time. He had no doubts that whichever poor soul Shepherd was referring to was going to be torture
d beyond recognition. But he was still no closer to why Shepherd wanted to meet. He rested his hands on the table, and leaned forward. ‘And when you’re happily taking your revenge by hammering some punter’s head to a pulp, what am I expected to do?’

  Shepherd held out his hands, palms up, one sane man beseeching another. ‘I’ll give you the name of the man who killed Tommy.’

  Gilchrist almost jolted. ‘Tommy Janes?’

  ‘How many Tommys do you know?’

  He let several seconds pass as he tried to work out if he was being toyed with or not. But Shepherd had come through for him once before. ‘I’ll need more than a name,’ he said. ‘I’ll need proof.’

  ‘Oh I’ll give you proof, son. Don’t you worry about that.’

  Something in the way the words were spoken made Gilchrist say, ‘But …?’

  ‘But you’re gonnie have to give me something in return.’

  Gilchrist waited six beats before saying, ‘Such as?’

  But when the answer came, he could not have been more surprised.

  Shepherd gave a victory smile, and said, ‘Joe Christie’s logbook.’

  CHAPTER 37

  Back in his car and out of the car park, Gilchrist forced himself to work through the convoluted rationale behind the meeting he’d just had. According to Shepherd, Joe Christie’s logbook contained information that Shepherd needed to keep secret. What that information was, Shepherd had refused to say, and Gilchrist had wracked his brain trying to figure it out. From memory, the only thing of any worth had been the business card with Maxwell’s name printed on the back. All the other entries had been notes about weather and bearings, which had to be completely worthless to a man like Shepherd, surely.

  And how had he known that Gilchrist had the logbook in the first place? From Mrs Christie came the likely answer. Which in itself opened up a whole bucket of maggots. And Stooky Dee’s photograph from police files? How the hell had Shepherd acquired that? Christ, the man seemed to have a reach that dipped deep into the pockets of the law and beyond. His head was reeling as he forced his thoughts back to the contents of the logbook.