“I’m happy to discuss my thoughts, my brother, and to hear yours. But why don’t we do it at my room? I have some warm food there. You are most welcome to share.”
Stewart hesitated. He was pretty knackered, and his brain was already looking forward to going home and collapsing on the sofa. On the other hand, free food was not to be scoffed at. The current state of his supplies was pitiful, consisting of cornflakes, milk teetering on the edge of the use-by date, bread that had fallen off that edge some time ago, ham, butter and, of course, the ubiquitous tomato sauce.
Beth came to his mind as she so often did, without warning. He knew how she’d react once he told her he’d had dinner with Dakar, in Dakar’s place. The gig tomorrow night was looking better and better.
“Eh, aye, sounds good. Sorry, I mean yes. Yes, let’s do that.”
Dakar nodded, and the two got into the car. It pulled smoothly away, silently, from the kerb, heading back for central Edinburgh. They cut back along the bypass before heading up towards Morningside, the other side of Oxgangs this time, and past the Edinburgh Royal. Dakar pulled up outside the building where he gave his classes.
He plugged the car into one of the electric charging posts before turning and walking up the stairs. Stewart followed him up, the wind whipping around him. It was really getting up now, carrying with it a penetrating cold. An old key opened the old, heavy door, and they went inside. The lights in the reception came on as they went in.
Stewart had forgotten, of course, that Dakar lived in the same place where he gave his classes. He’d been here once before, when he had first met Dakar before they’d gone down to Hanover House. He’d been pretty shocked to have seen a small room at the back which seemed to be not only Dakar’s office but also his bedroom.
Stewart looked around the reception. Some places looked really different at night, when they were empty. His old law school, for example. A big old place, built of pale red sandstone blocks, the interior dotted with statues and painting. Grand during the day, when there were people around. But Stewart had been studying in the library late once, on his own, and on his way out his brain had suddenly decided it was just like one of those old mansions that zombie movies were set in. By the time he finished the two-minute walk out the place, he hadn’t met another soul and was convinced zombie dogs were hammering through the halls to eat him.
But Dakar’s place wasn’t like that. The reception was the same, simple place it had been in the daylight. The walls remained blue fading into green and back again, soothing in their minimalism. A polished wooden floor had oriental-style rugs at regular intervals, muted lighting along the floor.
Stewart saw the various types of seats strewn around the reception area he remembered, ranging from a bean bag to an austere, hard-backed chair, looking like a disapproving grandfather among grandchildren. The wee fat golden Buddha guy was also still there, in his alcove, having a great old time just being alive.
Dakar led the way back to his room. They walked across the wooden floor where the yoga classes were held, Dakar’s loafers making little noise while Stewart’s shoes click-bloody-clacked all the way. No lights came on this time, but emergency lights allowed them to see their way. They were more eerie though, throwing a green pallor around the place. The skylight was pure black, the angry clouds directly overhead and blocking out any moon or starlight.
Stewart shook his head. There was nothing to worry about here, inside Dakar’s own fortress. He got his notes out from the bag instead and began thinking about what to include in the report. He’d had to filter stuff out, of course, but he was pretty sure he’d got everything important. He began looking at what to remove. The anarchist tattoo. That could probably go. Although Craig being inclined towards violence might be important.
Dakar opened the door, one hand turning on the lights, before he froze. Stewart, immediately behind him but with his head down looking at his notes, bumped straight into Dakar’s back, like some crap imitation of the Marx brothers.
Stewart looked up, frowning, but his face cleared as he looked at Dakar. He was staring across the room, an unprecedented expression of disbelief on his face. Stewart followed his gaze, and saw another man sitting on one of the chairs in the room.
The sitting man was tapping out a beat on one palm with a pencil he held with the fingers of his other hand. He looked up slowly, smiling like he’d been expecting them. His face was triumphant as he slowly rose to his feet.
“Well now, Sebbie, my old mate. How are you going?”
Chapter 24
Dakar was like a statue, eyes wide, nostrils flared. Even his hand, used to flick on the light switch, remained outstretched, as if he’d forgotten about it.
The man waiting for them, thumped the pencil a few more times into his other hand. “Ba-da-boom.” He smiled broadly. “Guns ‘n’ Roses. Can’t beat the classics, can you?”
He took a step towards them, and threw his arms open.
“C’mon, Seb. Aren’t you pleased to see me again? Been a long time, eh?” One of his arms came forward as he held out a hand. Dakar, his expression like he was witnessing the impossible taking place, reached out his own hand slowly. He shook the man’s hand as if it was some kind of alien object.
“And won’t you introduce me to your friend here?” The man looked at Stewart now, and as their eyes met, Stewart felt the hair on his neck creep up as tens of thousands of years of genetic instinct came into play.
“This is my friend, Stewart Scott.” Dakar spoke slowly, still examining the other guy, as if he might disappear any moment. “My brother.”
The man went to say something, but stopped at Dakar’s last words. “Ah, c’mon now, Seb. Don’t peddle this ‘brother’ crap with me. I know you, remember.”
There was a pause, but not like the normal Dakar pauses. Dakar spoke as if he were saying a chant. “You are my brother.”
The guy laughed a laugh devoid of any humour. “Aye, right, Seb. You might fool the young boys like him …” the man nodded at Stewart, “… but I know you too well.”
The man turned to Stewart. “Frank McPherson.” He held out his hand. Stewart’s eyes darted to Dakar for a second, but the guy looked lost. Stewart slowly reached out and took Frank’s hand. The man shook it roughly.
“Why are you here, Frank?” Dakar asked him, still curious, still disbelieving, looking like he wanted to pinch himself to make sure he was awake.
“Sebbie, Sebbie! Where are your manners? No ‘how are you?’ No ‘where have you been for the last ten years?’ Aren’t you happy to see me again?” The tone was light-hearted and yet wrong in some way, some off-note in it that Stewart couldn’t quite identify.
Then the familiarity of the expression hit him. The man had the look of the Glasgow psycho, the guy who would be laughing with someone, for all the world their biggest pal, then glassing them a second later for some imaginary slight no-one else knew about.
Dakar opened his mouth, but it was like he was having difficulty with his words. “How are you, my brother?” The words stuttered out, as if it was Dakar’s first time speaking.
“That’s better! But shouldn’t we sit down first, Seb? I mean, that’s only polite, isn’t it?” The man went and sat back down where he was, and turned to look at them. There was a flicker, just a flicker, of anger in his eyes when he saw they were both still standing, but it was gone in an instant. “Come, come, join me! No need to stand on ceremony.”
Dakar walked slowly over, sitting down on the only other seat. He was blinking rapidly, like he was catching up to reality. Frank looked at Stewart. “Ah, I didn’t expect Sebbie here to have company. You’ll just have to stand, friend.”
Frank smiled at Dakar. “That’s better, much better. We’re all old friends now.”
Stewart looked at him, the man himself now, rather than just his eyes. He had been quite a thin guy once, but he now had a big gut from drinking too many beers, giving him the same shape as a thin, pregnant woman. He was quite short too
, almost in spite of his big manner. A sallow face testified to an unhealthiness. His hands twitched irregularly, fingers pulsing unevenly.
He was wearing an old, pretty beat-up suit and shirt, no tie, and had a hat on with what looked like a small notepad tucked into a dark brown band that went around it. As Stewart looked at it, the man reached up a hand and touched it, with the same kind of religiosity that people used when crossing themselves.
“I keep it to remind me. We all have to use computers and all that crap these days, but real reporters know that to get the truth, you have to get out there, pound the streets, speak to people, get it from the horse’s mouth. That’s the only way you can tell who’s lying and who isn’t. Just like police work, eh, Sebbie? That’s what you used to tell me.”
The man turned back to Dakar, but the only noise was Dakar’s breathing, coming in shallow waves.
“You asked me how I was, didn’t you, Sebbie? Wasn’t that your question?”
Dakar sat silently, but eventually nodded once. His expression was still that of a man trying to catch up with current events. The man smirked at him, and gave a little laugh. Then he leaned suddenly towards Dakar, the smirk dropping, and Stewart saw the psycho appear in his eyes. “How do you think I am, Sebbie, after you left me to hang?”
There was silence in the room after the man spoke, his hard, urgent tone slowly fading. Dakar leaned away from the guy’s intensity.
“My brother, I know …”
“You don’t!” The man screamed it. “You don’t know! And I’m not your brother!” He lifted one hand and prodded Dakar’s chest across the desk. “You don’t know.” He wiped away the flecks of spittle that had appeared at the side of his mouth.
Dakar put up his hands placatingly, but the other man took no notice. Instead Frank leaned back and took a deep breath, his glare fixed on Dakar.
“Let me tell you. Let me, tell you.” He put an emphasis on the word ‘me’, his finger indicating first himself, and then Dakar. “After you left, after I got hung out to bloody well dry, I got fired. Straight off. Professional misconduct, Dakar, professional bloody misconduct. My editor said without a word from you, he’d no choice. I couldn’t get a job for love nor money, Dakar. Even the goddam Raker wouldn’t take me on. The bloody Raker, for Christ’s sake!”
Frank paused, his wild breathing the only sound. His eyes were fixed on Dakar with an intensity that was painful.
“And I tried. Oh yes. Hit all the local pubs, so I did. Got a couple of good stories, proper stories, as well. And not a soul would take them. Papers wouldn’t touch them if my name was on the by-line. No chance. And then Gemma, she told me she’d had enough. Spending too much on drinking, not bringing in any money. Apparently I wasn’t the man she’d married anymore.”
The man stopped again, his breath intake insufficient to keep up with the sheer strength of his words. Stewart leaned away. He could practically feel Frank’s anger, radiating out like waves.
“I am full of sorrow for you, my brother.” But Dakar’s tone sounded careful rather than kind.
“Aw, cheers buddy. Cheers old pal. Well, I’ll be on my way then, shall I?” Frank’s eyes flashed with fire and brimstone. “No, Sebbie. See, I’m back now. Been in rehab, all that crap. Back on the streets. No more boozing. No more ‘one for the road’.”
“I am happy to hear that, my brother.” Dakar interrupted, but his tone was awkward, like an actor trying to perform a role beyond his skill.
“Stop with your bloody chat! Just stop it!” The man screamed the words at Dakar. He wiped away some more flecks, settling himself down again with a deep breath. “But I’m happy you’re happy, Sebbie. I am. Really. That’s great. See, you’re going to help me. You’re going to help me get back to where I was.”
Dakar opened his mouth to say something, but then closed it again.
The man turned abruptly to Stewart in the silence. “He ever talk about me?”
Stewart cautiously shook his head.
Frank snorted. “Should have known. I used to be the eyes and ears of this town, lad. I knew everyone who was worth knowing, could find out whatever, and everyone, every man and his dog, owed me favours. But that’s all gone now. Thanks to him.” He thumbed towards Dakar, before he turned to him. “But you’re going to help get me back to that place, my old pal.”
Dakar hesitated. “If it is money you want, I can—”
“I don’t want your charity.” The psycho came into full view for a second, in the man’s tone, in his eyes, in everything. He bared his teeth, before the lips rolled back down. “No. See, I want stories. Crime stories. And you’re going to give them to me. Just like old times.” The man flicked his eyes over to Stewart again. “He never told you about how we used to work together either?”
Stewart, his eyes following from one man to the other, shook his head mutely.
“Thick as thieves, we were, down the pub. Sebbie would feed me little bits of info about his cases, juicy stories, and I’d write them up. And I helped him a few times, finding stuff out. Once or twice I even ran a false story for him, to try and flush out a real scumbag.”
Stewart looked over at Dakar. His eyes were fixed on Frank, and Stewart could see the wildness behind them, the peace disturbed.
“I am no longer in the police.” Dakar’s breathing had grown shallower still.
“Oh I know, Sebbie.” The man reached over and patted one of Dakar’s hands. Dakar flinched at the touch. “I know. I’ve read your books, you see. I know all about you and Grace, her affair, falling apart, the working with monks. I know. I saw you never mentioned your own sleeping around in there, Dakar. I guess there probably wasn’t space?”
Dakar bowed his head in the face of Frank’s triumphant smile.
“But, see, I have a few friends left in the industry, people that didn’t duck and run for cover when it all went to shite. And one of them told me about a suicide that turned out to be a murder that he wrote up for a local rag. Down in the borders. And do you know what he found when he talked to some of the people involved?”
Dakar looked back up, his breathing becoming deeper.
“They all told him about someone called Sebastian Dakar, some Zen guy, who solved the whole thing. Some of them were very nice about you, actually. And I thought, oh-ho. O-bloody-ho. Very interesting.” The man rolled out his ‘r’ for longer than normal, drawing the last word out.
The man smiled with glee as Dakar nodded once.
“See, you’re not the only detective! So yeah, you’re not in the police anymore, Sebbie, that’s true. But you’re still out there mixing it up with the bad boys. Even if you are some sort of PI, or something. Meaning, you can still help me out with stories.”
Stewart looked at Dakar. He opened his mouth, but Frank held up a hand.
“And it seems to me, Sebbie, seems to me, that maybe you’ve got something new already, eh? Otherwise, why is this one here, all dressed up in a fancy suit, with some kind of report?” The man scratched his nose casually as he spoke, but his eyes flickered between Dakar and Stewart quickly.
Stewart looked down at his notes, held uselessly in one hand, then over at Dakar. But Dakar was still looking at Frank. Stewart could feel his cheeks heating up. He looked back over at Frank, whose eyes had lit up. He tapped his nose once, and winked at Stewart.
“Knew it. I can smell these things, my boy. You’re going to tell me how it was done, once you work it out, Sebbie. All the details.”
Dakar took a deep breath. “And if I don’t?” His tone was heavy, under tight control.
The man’s face turned angry, the psychotic gleam rekindling behind his eyes. “You owe me, Sebbie. You bloody well owe me. Never gave your name up to the public, did I? Never fingered you as my source, eh? I kept my mouth shut for you. You owe me. You absolute bastard.” The man’s voice was trembling now, and his entire face seemed to be shivering. His fingers twitched violently.
“I know.” Dakar’s tone was curt, the acknowledgment
of an ugly fact. “But it can’t go back to the way it used to be. I tried before, Frank. I tried to make it better. But you wouldn’t let me.”
Frank practically snarled over at him. “Oh yes, I remember. Seb and his bloody wonderful teachings. Two months after I’d lost Gemma, you stupid bastard. Two months after I’d lost her. And you turned up, you and your bloody wisdom. ‘Don’t worry’, ‘be happy’, ‘make your suffering useful’ … It was a bunch of crap back then, Seb, just like it is now. I don’t care how many books you’ve sold.”
Dakar nodded once. “It was the wrong time then, Frank, I know that now, but it cannot be—”
But Frank interrupted him, with a low, vicious voice. “I know things about you, Sebbie. Things you’ve done. Bad things. Things that’ll take this new life of yours away. Forever.”
Dakar looked up now, and he was tense, tense in a new way. Tense, like an animal.
The man’s voice became a whisper. “You remember, don’t you? Billy Crudup? Oh yes, you remember. The coppers were naughty boys that day, Sebbie. Very naughty boys. If all that were to come out, well. There would be a wee spot of bother, wouldn’t there?”
The man trailed off. Dakar’s eyes were narrowing again, as Frank looked murderously at him.
“And that’s all quite beside the fact there’d be a pissed-off murderer on the street looking for some revenge. Remember, Sebbie, Crudup didn’t target the man himself. And Jamie and Sam? They would make some good revenge now, wouldn’t they?”
Stewart looked at Dakar. He’d never seen his eyes like this before. His face, normally so open and peaceful, was contorting, shadows appearing as lines spread out across his face. Stewart caught a movement, and looked down in amazement to see Dakar’s hands forming into fists.
“We’ve all got to atone for our sins, Sebbie. The Good Lord tells us so. And if you don’t want to pay the price, maybe Jamie and Sam’ll pay it for you?”
Dakar remained silent, but Stewart could see his jaw lock in place, the muscles clamping down so hard that hollows appeared in the cheeks of his thin face.
The Price to Pay Page 13
