Thursday Legends

by Quintin Jardine

  a tip from one, who can remain nameless. He told me that he believed

  that Jason Fargo was only able to operate for as long as he did because

  he was paying backhanders to Agnes Maley."

  "Mmm." Plenderleith murmured, almost impatiently. "So?"

  "So, Jason Fargo's in this very nick, Lenny; I would like to know from

  him if that is true. If it is, I'll need it in writing, signed.

  There'll be no comeback on him, I promise. I'll feed the information,

  personally, to contacts I have within the Labour Party. It'll be

  enough to put a stop to Maley's political career."

  A rumbling sound seemed to emanate from deep in the man's great chest.

  "Ahh, Fate can be a bugger, eh. I'd have done that for Bob. Jason

  would not have refused me; I may be a smart sociopath with his future

  mapped out, but as far as the boys in here are concerned, I am still

  the man to whom you like to say "yes". But sadly, you're about a month

  too late." He sighed.

  "Mr. Fargo is indeed in Shorts nick; the news is not generally known

  at this moment, in case some of the younger inmates get alarmed, but

  he's in the hospital wing, in isolation. The man has full-blown AIDS,

  inspector, and it has attacked him here." He tapped the side of his

  head. "He's fucking brain dead, Neil. The most I'd get out of him

  would be a drool."

  "Shit!" Mcllhenney hissed; then he saw that Lenny was looking at him,

  in a strangely direct way. There was more to come.

  "Going back to the criminal mind ... a real criminal mind, I mean, not

  Mr. Fargo's which was never up to much in the first place, even before

  it went into melt-down ... the worst thing you guys can ever do is to

  underrate it. What I am going to tell you now will be of absolutely no

  use to you, or Bob, because I learned it at the time from Tony Manson,

  who's even deader than Fargo. So it's hearsay. Sure, I could write it

  down for you, but it could never be proved. If you tried to feed it to

  your sources, first they wouldn't believe it, and second they'd look at

  the signature: Lenny Plenderleith, mass murderer, casual observer of

  the Edinburgh scene at the time, and unlikely friend of Agnes Maley's

  enemy, DCC Bob Skinner. We'd all probably wind up in the civil courts,

  or worse."

  Mcllhenney sighed. "You're right, of course. So what is it that we

  can't use?"

  "Just this; and remember that it came from Tony Manson, who knew

  everything and everyone on the criminal scene in Edinburgh. As the

  tabloids had to say, he was the Godfather of his time. The fact is

  that Jason Fargo did not pay, as you put it, backhanders, to Maley. He

  ran the place, paid the kids their pittance, took his own wages, and

  gave her what was left. Black Agnes was the boss, Neil. The set-up

  was his idea,

  and the flat was in Fargo's name, but it was bought with cash which she

  supplied."

  "Why didn't he shop her then?"

  "Work it out; man. He knew he wouldn't have lived to stand trial.

  Think back to those days, and to the way it was in Edinburgh. There

  were three teams; there was ours, there was Jackie Charles and his lot,

  and there was a third one, not as big as us, but a grouping

  nonetheless. You knew about Jackie and us, but you could never get a

  handle on that third one. You were never even sure if it was

  organised, or whether it was just a load of villains picking the scraps

  off our table. Well it was, and Black Agnes was at its heart. Her

  boys did the stuff we wouldn't; protection, the wee boy business,

  smuggling cigarettes and all that.

  "After Fargo got done, she realised that she was pushing her luck, so

  she packed everything up and concentrated on being a councillor. But

  when she was in business, nobody, not you, not even Bob Skinner

  himself, ever had a sniff of her, because her tracks were covered too

  well, and because all you could see was what a fucking pain she was as

  a councillor. But she was much more than that, Neil.

  "Jason Fargo didn't kill those boys off his own bat, man. He did it on

  Agnes's orders."

  Forty-Three.

  "You're quite sure I'm not going to hear from him?" Andrea asked. They

  had found a corner table in the bustling Brown's, only a few yards

  along from 121 George Street, and were waiting for the lunch they had

  ordered to be brought to them.

  "As sure as I can be," Stevie answered. "Maggie .. . Superintendent

  Rose, spoke to him and his solicitor and advised him that the

  investigation's still open, that you're a witness and that he's still a

  suspect. He'd be spectacularly stupid to come anywhere near you after

  having his card marked as clearly as that, and I don't think he is."

  "Do you still think it was him who phoned me?"

  "To be honest, Andrea, I'm not sure any more; his story now is that

  someone else must have used his phone to make that call."

  She frowned for a second. "But if it wasn't him, that means .. ."

  He nodded. "I know what it means, but I really don't think you need to

  worry. It's our thinking that you were lured along to that exhibition

  as a fall.. ." he paused, and smiled '.. . girl. That hasn't

  worked. Fine. So what possible reason could the man have to try it on

  again?"

  She looked at the table as she pondered what he had said. "Yes. I see

  the logic in that. So you're telling me to forget it altogether, keep

  taking the tablets and get on with my life?"

  "Exactly. As a bit of added security, I'll give you my phone numbers.

  If we're wrong and it does happen again, you should call me right

  away."

  "Okay' She looked at him, coyly. "Does that mean that there'll be no

  more surprise invitations to lunch?"

  He grinned back at her. "Not necessarily. I have got a life outside

  CID, you know. I'd like to be your friend, Andrea, instead of your

  investigating officer. I'd like to get to know you, in an ordinary

  situation."

  Her blue eyes flashed at him. "What, both of me, you mean?"

  "I prefer this model, but I'm game for anything."

  "I'll bet you are. You might find getting to know me a frustrating

  experience. I'm not really one of your modern girls. I'm a virgin,

  you know." She frowned, severely.

  "What?" he shot back. "Both of you?"

  A short, snorting laugh exploded from her. "I may have two

  personalities, but that's as far as it goes. Sorry to sound so

  priggish; what I meant was that I've never had a proper relationship

  with a man before."

  "You mean an improper one?"

  "God, I can't say a thing to you." She put her hand to her mouth and

  gasped. "Did you hear that? I just took His name in vain. Steven,

  you're having a bad influence on me already."

  "Sounds promising."

  "I'm promising nothing."

  "And I'm not asking for anything, other than to be your friend."

  "Okay, take me to the cinema, then."

  "What do you want to see?"

  "Lord of the Rings:

  "Deal. When?"

  "Tomorrow. Two dates in one day might be rushing things a bit."

  "I'll pick you up at seven." He took a
card from his pocket and handed

  it to her. "There; Stevie Steele in your hands. That's every phone

  number I've got, office and private. The home ones are ex-directory,

  so don't leave it lying about."

  "I'll keep it in my Bible," she said, casually, 'just to be safe." He

  had to look closely at her, to be sure she was joking.

  A sound at their side caught his attention; a waiter stood ready, with

  their lunch.

  "Steven," Andrea began as he picked up his cutlery. "About the fire.

  Since it wasn't a convenient crazy like me, and since you're

  discounting the man who phoned the newspapers, have you any idea who

  burned the silly picture?"

  "Not a clue."

  "So what will you do next?"

  "We'll probably look at all the people who could have taken the lad's

  mobile and used it to make the call to you."

  "How many?"

  "To be exact, one hundred and forty-two. A hundred and nineteen if we

  leave the partners out of it."

  "How long will that take?"

  "That depends on a few things; on how many of them gave us statements

  on Saturday, on how many we have to re-interview, on how many officers

  we use to do it."

  "So I might be stood up tomorrow night?"

  "Not a chance. Even detective inspectors get time off. Besides,

  there's another factor I didn't mention; that's how lucky we get. You

  never know, the first person we interview might confess."

  "Did you think you were lucky when you saw me on those tapes? That is,

  not me, her. Oh, you know what I mean."

  "I know, and did we ever think we'd got lucky! Especially when we

  found out who she was and what she'd done."

  "Are you sorry you weren't?"

  He laid down his fork, reached across and took her hand. "Who says I

  wasn't?"

  A blush came to her cheeks. "I know I was," she whispered. "The

  others would just have locked me up, wouldn't they? It was you who

  stood up for me, wasn't it?"

  "Not alone. Maggie did too."

  "Then thank her for me."

  She started to explore her lentil salad, and Steele turned his

  attention to his tagliatelle de la casa. "Can I ask you something

  else?" she exclaimed, when she was near the end.

  "Could I stop you?" he countered.

  "Why are you sure that burning the picture was a religious protest?"

  "It's the only possible motive, Andrea. Can you suggest another?"

  "No, I can't, but.. ." She paused, as if she had thought better of

  whatever it was she had been about to say.

  "But what? Go on."

  "Och, it just seems to me that it was awful well planned, that's all.

  Someone who does something like that is a fanatic, right?"

  "Right."

  "Do fanatics plan things that well? When I, she, no, I, did what I

  did,

  there was no planning involved at all. I made the device then wandered

  like a sore thumb into their service, and tried to plant it in what was

  supposed to be an unobtrusive manner. It was a nonsense from the

  start. I was simply driven by my voice telling me to do it. What

  happened in the Academy, on the other hand, was planned like clockwork

  and executed perfectly. If the person who did it is a schizophrenic

  like me, it would have been a shambles. You ask Adam Broadley if you

  don't believe me." "I might, but not because I don't believe you. Go

  on." "This was done by a clear-thinking methodical person with

  technical knowledge. That doesn't fit the fanatic theory, as I

  understand it. Fanatics are the sort of people who walk into places

  and blow themselves up. This person planted the device in secret,

  triggered it and got away scot free. Not only that, he set me up as,

  as you put it, a fall girl.

  "So while you're interviewing all these people, why don't you ask

  yourselves at the same time, why else this might have been done?"

  Forty-Four.

  "Stop here," Bob Skinner told the taxi-driver as he approached the

  drive that led up to the Grace mansion. He paid him in crisp new US

  currency, fresh from an ATM in John F Kennedy Airport, and stepped out

  into the street. It was still short of nine a.m." but the morning was

  hot nonetheless. His Scottish summer clothes felt suddenly very heavy.

  He stood at the foot of the path, out of sight of the house, and took a

  deep breath.

  He had called his daughter from London, and had found her as shocked

  and disbelieving as he had known she would be. He had promised to keep

  her in touch with developments, and then he had tried his level best to

  block the nightmare from his mind.

  All the way across the Atlantic he had fought against the urge to think

  of this moment, to anticipate it, to plan for it. He had played CDs on

  his Walkman all through the flight, and on the shuttle to Buffalo;

  Clapton and King, a Stones compilation, Counting Crows, a live Van

  Morrison double set, all bought at Heathrow and chosen because it was

  heavy stuff that would force him to listen. He had watched television

  all the way through a short, sleepless night in his hotel room, finding

  a channel that seemed to be devoted entirely to showing repeats of The

  Sopranos, wondering to himself how long the fictional Big Tony would

  have lasted in Edinburgh, as opposed to Lenny Plenderleith's late

  boss.

  The moment had come, though; he braced himself and thought positively,

  of Mark, Jazz and Seonaid, and how pleased he would be to see them. He

  picked up his bag from the sidewalk, turned the corner and walked up

  the path. He thought the door might open as he approached the house,

  but no one could have been looking out. The garage door was open; only

  the Jaguar lay inside. He stepped up to the entrance and rang the

  bell.

  He had assumed that it would be Trish who would answer. When the heavy

  door opened and he saw Sarah standing there, he was struck dumb ... as

  was she. They stood staring at each other, neither moving, neither

  seeming to know what to say.

  And then from the hall, there came a yell of "Dad!" and James Andrew

  charged out past his mother, throwing himself up to be caught and

  hugged to his father's chest. Bob felt a sharp sensation as the child

  bumped his pacemaker, but he ignored it in the sheer relief of seeing

  him again.

  Leaving his flight bag abandoned on the step, he carried him into the

  house. "Hello, kid," he whispered into his ear. "How much mayhem have

  you been causing while I've been away then?"

  Eventually he set his son back on his feet. "Go and play," he told

  him. "I'll see you in a minute. I need to talk to your mum."

  Jazz ran off, towards the kitchen and, he guessed, to the yard. He

  turned back to face Sarah. She had recovered her composure; he fought

  for his. "What are you doing here?" she asked, in a quiet,

  matter-of-fact voice.

  "What the hell do you think I'm doing, honey?"

  "So Clyde called you; I told him not to, yet he did."

  "Too bloody right he did," Bob exclaimed, his voice starting to rise,

  before he calmed it. "There are three kids here, and their mother was

 
; in jail. How could you expect him not to?" He walked into the

  kitchen. The trip was catching up with him fast; he needed coffee,

  badly, but fortunately there was a jug on the filter. He poured

  himself a mug, went to the fridge and added barely enough milk to turn