A Good Hanging - Rankin: Short 01

by Ian Rankin

  He returned that evening to his own tenement and his roaring gas fire. But there was a surprise awaiting him on the doorhandle of his flat. A reminder from Mrs Cochrane downstairs. A reminder that it was his week for washing the stairs and that he hadn’t done it yet and it was nearly the end of the week and when was he going to do it? Rebus sent a roar into the stairwell before slamming shut the door behind him. It was only a moment before other doors started to open, faces peering out, and another Edinburgh tenement conversation began, multi-storeyed, undertone and echoing.

  Not Provan

  How badly did Detective Inspector John Rebus want to nail Willie Provan? Oh, badly, very badly indeed. Rebus visualised it as a full-scale crucifixion, each nail going in slowly, the way Willie liked to put the boot and the fist slowly, methodically, into the victims of his violence.

  Rebus had first encountered Willie Provan five years before, as a schoolkid spiralling out of control. Both parents dead, Willie had been left in the charge of a dotty and near-deaf aunt. He had taken charge of her house, had held wild parties there, parties to which the police were eventually, habitually called by neighbours at the end of their tether.

  Entering the house had been like stepping into an amateur production of Caligula: naked, under-aged couples so drunk or drugged they could not complete the act which so interested them; emptied tins of solvent, polythene bags encrusted with the dregs of the stuff. A whiff of something animal, something less-than-human in the air. And, in a small back room upstairs, the aunt, locked in and sitting up in her bed, a cold cup of tea and a half-eaten sandwich on the table beside her.

  By the time he left school, Willie was already a legend. Four years on the dole had benefited him little. But he had learned cunning, and so far the police had been unable to put him away. He remained a thorn in Rebus’s side. Today, Rebus felt someone might just come along and pluck that thorn out.

  He sat in the public gallery and watched the court proceedings. Near him were a few of Willie Provan’s friends, members of his gang. They called themselves the Tiny Alice, or T-Alice. No one knew why. Rebus glanced over towards them. Sleeves rolled up, sporting tattoos and unshaven grins. They were the city’s sons, the product of an Edinburgh upbringing, but they seemed to belong to another culture, another civilisation entirely, reared on Schwarzenegger videos and bummed cigarettes. Rebus shivered, feeling he understood them better than he liked to admit.

  The case against Provan was solid and satisfying. On a cup-tie evening several months ago, a football fan had been heading towards the Heart of Midlothian ground. He was late, his train from Fife having been behind time. He was an away supporter and he was on his own in Gorgie.

  An arm snaked around his neck, yanked him into a tenement stairwell, and there Willie Provan had kicked and punched him into hospitalisation. For what reason? Rebus could guess. It had nothing to do with football, nothing with football hooliganism. Provan pretended a love of Hearts, but had never, to Rebus’s knowledge, attended a game. Nor could he name more than two or three players in the current team’s line-up.

  Nevertheless, Gorgie was his patch, his territory. He had spotted an invader and had summarily executed him, in his own terms. But his luck had run out. A woman had heard some sounds from the stairwell and had opened her door to investigate. Provan saw her and ran off. But she had given the police a good description and had later identified Provan as the attacker. Moreover, a little while after the attack, a constable, off duty and happening to pass Tynecastle Park, had spotted a young man, apparently disorientated. He had approached the man and asked him if he was all right, but at that point some members of T-Alice had appeared from their local pub, directly opposite the Hearts ground and had taken the man inside.

  The constable thought little of it, until he heard about the assault and was given a description of the attacker. The description matched that of the disorientated man, and that man turned out to be Willie Provan. With Provan’s previous record, this time he would go down, Rebus was sure of that. So he sat and he watched and he listened.

  He watched the jurors, too. They winced, perceptibly as they were told of the injuries to the victim, injuries which still, several months on, kept him in hospital, unable to walk and with respiratory difficulties to boot. To boot. Ha! Rebus let a short-lived smile wrinkle his face. Yes, the jury would convict. But Rebus was most interested in one juror in particular, an intense young man who was taking copious notes, sending intelligent written questions to the judge, studying photographs and diagrams with enthusiasm. The model juror, ready to see that justice was done and all was fair and proper. At one point, the young man looked up and caught Rebus watching him. After that, he gave Rebus some of his attention, but still scribbled his notes and checked and rechecked what he had written.

  The other jurors were solemn, looked bored even. Passive spectators at a one-horse race. Guilty. Probably by the end of the day. Rebus would sit it out. The prosecution had finished its case, and the defence case had already begun. The usual stuff when an obviously guilty party pleaded not guilty: trying to catch out prosecution witnesses, instilling mistrust, trying to persuade the jury that things were not as cut and dried as they seemed, that there was probable cause for doubt. Rebus sat back and let it wash over him. Provan would go down.

  Then came the iceberg, ripping open the bow of Rebus’s confidence.

  The defence counsel had called the off-duty constable, the one who had spotted Provan outside the Hearts ground. The constable was young, with a bad case of post-juvenile acne. He tried to stand to attention as the questions were put to him, but when flustered would raise a hand towards his scarred cheeks. Rebus remembered his own first time on the witness stand. A Glasgow music-hall stage could not have been more terrifying.

  ‘And what time do you say it was when you first saw the accused?’ The defence counsel had a slight Irish brogue, and his eyes were dark from want of sleep. His cheap ballpoint pen had burst, leaving black stains across his hands. Rebus felt a little sorry for him.

  ‘I’m not sure, sir.’

  ‘You’re not sure?’ The words came slowly. The inference was: this copper is a bit thick, isn’t he? How can you the jury trust him? For the counsel was staring at the jury as he spoke and this seemed to unnerve the constable further. A hand rubbed against a cheek.

  ‘Roughly then,’ continued the defence counsel. ‘Roughly what time was it?’

  ‘Sometime between seven-thirty and eight, sir.’

  The counsel nodded, flipping through a sheaf of notes. ‘And what did you say to the accused?’ As the constable was about to reply, the counsel interrupted, still with his face towards the jury. ‘I say “the accused” because there’s no disagreement that the person the constable saw outside the football ground was my client.’ He paused. ‘So constable, what did you say?’

  ‘“Are you all right?” Something like that.’

  Rebus glanced towards where Provan sat in the dock. Provan was looking terribly confident. His clear blue eyes were sparkling and he sat forwards in his chair, keen to catch the dialogue going on before him. For the first time, Rebus felt an uneasy stab: the thorn again, niggling him. What was going on?

  ‘You asked him if he was all right.’ It was a statement. The counsel paused again. Now the prosecution counsel was frowning: he too was puzzled by this line of questioning. Rebus felt his hands forming into fists.

  ‘You asked him if he was all right, and he replied? What exactly did he reply?’

  ‘I couldn’t really make it out, sir.’

  ‘Why was that? Were his words slurred perhaps?’

  The constable shrugged. ‘A little, maybe.’

  ‘A little? Mmm.’ The counsel looked at his notes again. ‘What about the noise from the stadium?’

  ‘Sir?’

  ‘You were directly outside the ground. There was a cup-tie being played in front of thousands of spectators. It was noisy, wasn’t it?’

  ‘Yes, sir,’ agreed the constabl
e.

  ‘In fact, it was very noisy, wasn’t it, Constable Davidson? It was extraordinarily noisy. That was why you couldn’t hear my client’s reply. Isn’t that the case?’

  The constable shrugged again, not sure where any of this was leading, happy enough to agree with the defence. ‘Yes, sir,’ he said.

  ‘In fact, as you approached my client, you may remember that there was a sudden upsurge in the noise from the ground.’

  The constable nodded, seeming to remember. ‘That’s right, yes. I think a goal had just been scored.’

  ‘Indeed, a goal had been scored. Just after you had first spotted my client, as you were walking towards him. A goal was scored, the noise was terrific. You shouted your question to my client, and he replied, but his words were drowned out by the noise from the ground. His friends saw him from the Goatfell public house and came to his aid, leading him inside. The noise was still very great, even then. They were shouting to you to let you know they would take care of him. Isn’t that right?’

  Now, the counsel turned to the constable, fixing him with his dark eyes.

  ‘Yes, sir.’

  The counsel nodded, seeming satisfied. Willie Provan, too, looked satisfied. Rebus’s nerves were jangling. He was reminded of a song lyric: there’s something happening here, but you don’t know what it is. Something was most definitely happening here, and Rebus didn’t like it. The defence counsel spoke again.

  ‘Do you know what the score was that night?’

  ‘No, sir.’

  ‘It was one-nil. The home team won by a single goal, the single goal you heard from outside the ground. A single goal scored -’ picking up the notes for effect, turning again to face the jury, ‘in the fifteenth minute of the game, a game that kicked off ... when? Do you happen to recall?’

  The constable knew now, knew where this was leading. His voice when he spoke had lost a little of its life. ‘It was a seven-thirty kick-off.’

  ‘That’s right, it was. So you see, Police Constable Davidson, it was seven forty-five when you saw my client outside the ground. I don’t think you would contest that now, would you? And yet we heard Mrs McClintock say that it was twenty to eight when she heard a noise on her stairwell and went to her door. She was quite specific because she looked at her clock before she went to the door. Her call to the police was timed at seven forty-two, just two minutes later.’

  Rebus didn’t need to hear any more, tried to shut his ears to it. The tenement where the assault had taken place was over a mile from Tynecastle Park and the Goatfell pub. To have been where he was when the constable had approached him, Provan would have had to run, in effect, a four-minute mile. Rebus doubted he was capable of it, doubted everything now. But looking at Provan he could see the little prick was guilty. He was as guilty as hell and he was about to get away scot bloody free. Rebus’s knuckles were white, his teeth were gritted. Provan looked up at him and smiled. The thorn was in Rebus’s side again, working away relentlessly, bleeding the policeman to death.

  It couldn’t be true. It just couldn’t. The trial wasn’t over yet. Things had been strung out over the afternoon, the prosecution clearly flustered and playing for time, wondering what tactic to try next, what question to ask. He had lasted the afternoon and court had been adjourned after the summings up. It was all to do with time, as the defence counsel contended. The prosecution tried to negate the time factor and rely instead on the one and only witness. He asked: can we be certain a goal had been scored at that precise moment when PC Davidson approached the accused? Is it not better to trust the identification of the witness, Mrs McClintock, who had actually disturbed the attacker in the course of the assault? And so on. But Rebus knew the case was doomed. There was too much doubt now, way too much. Not guilty, or maybe that Scots get-out clause of ‘not proven’, whatever. If only the victim had caught a glimpse of Provan, if only. If, if, if. The jury would assemble again tomorrow at ten-thirty, retire to their room and emerge before lunch with a decision which would make Provan a free man. Rebus shook his head.

  He was sitting in his car, not up to driving. Just sitting there, the key in the ignition, trying to think things through. But going around in circles, no clear direction, his mind filled with Provan’s smile, a smile he would happily tear from that face. Illegal thoughts coursed through his head, ways of fixing Provan, ways of putting him inside. But no: it had to be clean, it had to be right. Justification was only part of the process; justice demanded more.

  At last, he gave an audible growl, the sound of a caged animal, and turned the ignition, starting the car, heading nowhere in particular. At home he would only brood. A pub might be an idea. There were a few pubs, their clientele almost silent, where a man might drink in solitude and quiet. A kind of a wake for The Law. Damn it, no, he knew where he was headed. Tried not to know, but knew all the same. He was driving towards Gorgie, driving deep into Willie Provan’s territory, into the gangland ruled by Tiny Alice. He was heading into the Wild West End of Edinburgh.

  The streets were narrow, tenements rising on either side. A cold October wind was blowing, forcing people to angle their walk into the wind, giving them the jack-knife look of a Lowry painting. They were all coming home from work. It was dark, the headlamps of cars and buses like torches in a cave. Gorgie always seemed dark. Even on a summer’s day it seemed dark. It had something to do with the narrowness of the streets and the height of the tenements; they seemed like trees in the Amazon, blocking out the light to the pallid vegetation beneath.

  Rebus found Cooper Road and parked on the opposite side of the street from number 42. He switched off his engine and wondered what to do now. He was treading dangerously: not the physical danger of the T-Alice, but the more enveloping danger of involvement in a case. If he spoke with Mrs McClintock and the defence counsel were to learn of it, Rebus might be in serious trouble. He wasn’t even sure he should be in the vicinity of the crime. Should he turn back? No. Provan was going to get off anyway, whether because of an unconvinced jury or a procedural technicality. Besides, Rebus wasn’t getting involved. He was just in the area, that was all.

  He was about to get out of the car when he saw a man dressed in duffel coat and jeans shuffle towards the door of number 42 and stop there, studying it. The man pushed at the door and it opened. He looked around before entering the stairwell, and Rebus recognised with a start the intent face of the keen juror from Provan’s trial.

  Now this might be trouble. This might be very bad indeed. What the hell was the juror doing here anyway? The answer seemed simple enough: he was becoming involved, the same as Rebus. Because he, too, could not believe Provan’s luck. But what was he doing at number 42? Was he going to talk to Mrs McClintock? If so, he faced certain disqualification from the jury. Indeed, it was Rebus’s duty as a police officer, having seen the juror enter that stairwell, to report this fact to the court officials.

  Rebus gnawed at his bottom lip. He could go in and warn the juror, of course, but then he, a policeman, would be guilty of approaching a juror on the very evening prior to a judgment. That could mean more than a slapped wrist and a few choice words from the Chief Super. That could mean the end of his career.

  Suddenly, Rebus’s mind was made up for him. The door of the tenement was heaved open and out ran the juror, an eye on his watch as he turned left and sprinted towards Gorgie Road. Rebus smiled with relief and shook his head.

  ‘You little bugger,’ he murmured in appreciation. The juror was timing the whole thing. It was all a matter of time, so the defence had said, and the juror wanted to time things for himself. Rebus started the car and drove off, following behind the juror until the young man discovered a short cut and headed off down an alleyway. Unable to follow, Rebus fed into the traffic on the main road and found himself in the rush hour jams, heading west out of town. It didn’t matter: he knew the juror’s destination.

  Turning down a sidestreet, Rebus rounded a bend and came immediately upon Tynecastle Park. The Goatfell was ahea
d of him on the other side of the street. Rebus stopped the car on some double yellow lines by the stadium side of the road. Opposite the Goatfell, the juror was doubled over on the pavement, hands pressing into his sides, exhausted after the run and trying to regain his breath. Rebus examined his watch. Eight minutes since the juror had started off from the tenement. The only witness placed the attack at seven-forty, absolutely certain in her mind that this had been the time. The goal had been scored at seven forty-five. Perhaps Mrs McClintock’s clock had been wrong? It could be that simple, couldn’t it? But they’d have a hell of a job proving it in court, and no jury would convict on the possibility of a dodgy clock.

  Besides, her call to the police had been logged, hadn’t it? There was no room for manoeuvre on the time, unless ... Rebus tapped his fingers against the steering wheel. The juror had recovered some of his equilibrium, and was now staring at the Goatfell. Don’t do it, son, Rebus intoned mentally. Don’t.

  The juror looked both ways as he crossed the road and, once across, he looked both ways again before pushing open the door of the Goatfell and letting it rattle shut behind him. Rebus groaned and screwed shut his eyes.

  ‘Stupid little ...’ He pulled the keys from the ignition, and leaned across the passenger seat to lock the passenger side door. You couldn’t be too careful around these parts. He stared at his radio. He could call for back-up, should call for back-up, but that would involve explanations. No, he was in this one alone.

  He opened his own door and swivelled out of his seat, closing the door after him. Pausing to lock the door, he hesitated. After all, you never knew when a quick getaway might be needed. He left the door unlocked. Then, having taken three steps in the direction of the Goatfell, he stopped again and returned to the car, this time unlocking the passenger-side door, too.