‘That’s all very instructive, Mr Garland,’ I told him. ‘But it’s not the main reason why I’m here. We’ve got a particular interest in any payments that might have been made to a Mr John Varley at any time.’
‘Who’s he?’
‘You don’t need to know that.’
‘Is he a supplier? I’ve supervised the audit for a few years now, so I’m familiar with most of them. That name doesn’t ring any bells. Give me a clue. Come on, I’m being frank with you.’
‘No,’ I said, ‘I can’t do that, not at this stage.’
He leaned back in his leather swivel chair, the kind that I’d love but can’t afford. ‘Have it your way, then,’ he drawled. ‘I might have been able to make it easier for you. As it is, you’re going to have to go through the purchase ledgers and thirteen years of receipts. You can take it that my staff will have cross-checked one against the other, so that will save you a bit of time, but you won’t be able to finish them before we close, so I suggest you come back on Monday and do it then.’
I pushed the court order that I’d shown him earlier back across the desk, or rather, halfway across, because that was as far as I could reach. ‘Read that,’ I told him, ‘and you’ll see I’m authorised to remove all the records I need. I can do that, or you can leave someone here with me to lock up after I’m done. Your choice.’
‘Oh really!’ he moaned. ‘I can’t ask any of my people to do that.’
‘Okay, I’ll take them with me.’
‘No, no.’ He held up a hand, palm out, as if to resist. ‘No,’ he sighed, ‘I’ll wait with you. Not that it’s going to do you any good,’ he added. ‘You won’t find any payments to anyone called Varley in there.’
He was right, God damn him. I didn’t.
Bob Skinner
I was checking my watch, and wondering where young Haddock was, when Gerry stuck his head round the door to tell me that front desk security had called to warn him that a young guy had walked straight past them and was headed for my floor. He had barely finished before Sauce came into view behind him.
‘You have to wait to be escorted up here,’ I said, as he joined me.
‘I’m sorry, sir,’ he stammered. ‘But it sounded urgent, so. .’
‘That’s okay,’ I laughed. ‘I’m only repeating what my wife was told when she came here earlier on this week.’
‘I did show him my warrant card,’ the lad volunteered. ‘Twice.’
‘Once more than should have been necessary. I must do something about that outfit,’ I muttered. ‘Between you and me, lad, I don’t like paramilitaries, and too many of these private security firms behave as if they are. Do you want a coffee?’
‘Yes please, sir,’ he replied.
I noticed that he was carrying a brown paper bag. ‘What’s in there?’ I asked.
‘Kosher cookies, sir. They’re called rugelach. Solly pressed them on me; I couldn’t refuse. Would you like some?’
‘What’s this? An apple for the teacher?’ I handed him a mug. ‘Aye, why not? Let’s have a taste.’
They weren’t half bad; a lot of cream cheese about them, but okay. I let Sauce ingest some of the coffee. It had been on the warming stand for a while, so it must have been well stewed, but the boy took it without flinching.
‘What was that you said when you were driving?’ I asked him. ‘What you got from your interview? It sounded like “wrestler” to me. What was it really?’
‘That’s what I did say, sir. Solly, that’s Mr Solomon, the restaurateur that I went to see, confirmed that Mortonhall Man did eat there, very shortly before he died, with two other guys. Solly said that one of them looked like a smaller version of Brock Lesnar. He’s a. .’
‘I know who he is,’ I said. ‘My younger son is into that sort of stuff.’ I wonder how many dads there are like me, people who would never dream of admitting that they watch TV wrestling themselves, and blame their knowledge on their kids. ‘I doubt if we could circulate his picture, though.’
‘No, sir,’ he conceded, ‘but there’s a good chance I’ve got a set of the third man’s prints.’ He slipped an evidence bag from his jacket pocket and held it up. It contained two large banknotes. ‘He paid with these.’
‘Good work, Sauce,’ I told him. ‘Banknotes though,’ I wondered, ‘how many prints will they have on them?’
‘Hopefully, not too many, sir. These are brand new. Solly’s agreed to give us his fingerprints, for elimination; I’ll have to arrange that. I thought that if we circulated all that are left. .’
I nodded. ‘Yes, you’re right, son. You will never know, unless you ask the question. Feed them all into NCIS and see what pops out. If your friend Solly doesn’t have a record you can circulate his too, and no harm done, so forget about printing him.’
I could see something else in his eyes, the hesitancy of a young man who doesn’t want to seem to be too pushy. ‘Go on,’ I said to him.
‘Jack isn’t here to take the piss. What else have you got?’
‘Maybe nothing, sir, but if Solly’s right we might need to go beyond the NCIS if we want to trace these men. He doesn’t think they were British. He told me that they were speaking a foreign language among themselves, one he didn’t recognise.’
‘Could they have been Israelis?’
‘No, sir, he said he’d have known their language and also the other two guys didn’t have a clue about Jewish food.’
That did set my antennae twitching. But I wasn’t about to tell young Haddock as much. One thing at a time with him, and that wasn’t why I’d asked him to come to see me.
‘Let’s not fly too high,’ I told him. ‘You get those banknotes processed straight away up at the lab, priority job on my orders, and run what you get through NCIS. You should send me copies of all the prints through the force intranet, but on the quiet, to keep me in the loop without Becky thinking I’m looking over her shoulder. Meantime,’ I added, ‘I’ve got some real undercover work for you.’
I thought I detected a tremor of excitement run through him, but maybe it was just the coffee. ‘The tip that you brought me,’ I continued, and knew right then that his reaction had nothing to do with caffeine, ‘the one about Kenny Bass and his import venture, the one that opened this whole pit of mischief that Jock Varley’s fallen into. You told me that your source insisted that you brought it to me and me alone, and that there wasn’t to be a hint to anyone else in the force of where it had come from.’
I stared at him until he nodded.
‘If that had been anyone but you, Sauce,’ I murmured, ‘I’d have melted you into fucking ingots. But I didn’t; I went along with the whole presumptuous thing. As a result, only you and I know about this, as requested; nobody else, not the deputy chief, not the head of CID, just the two of us. I agreed because we both know who your source is, although you never named him: it’s your girlfriend’s grandfather.’
He opened his mouth, but I closed it for him. ‘Shut up,’ I said.
‘You don’t have to break any promises. I don’t need you to say his name. I’m fine with the way it is. I bought into it because I reckoned that it was Grandpa McCullough’s way of sending me a signal that he wasn’t thinking at all of using your relationship with Cheeky to suborn you. But when one of the top figures in organised crime that this country has seen since Perry Holmes died co-operates with the police in any way, at any level, I have to treat it very warily.’
I took another kosher cookie from the bag and made him wait while I munched my way through it. When I was good and ready, I went on. ‘I’m sure that when Grandpa told me, through you, that he’d heard on the grapevine that a wee crook from my patch called Kenny Bass was trying to make himself a big crook in the illegal tobacco business, he reckoned that I’d take it as some sort of peace offering. But with the intervention of Freddy Welsh it’s become more than that. Welsh is a completely unknown quantity, a surprise player. Whatever his role is, he’s caused chaos within this force. Therefore, I ne
ed to know. . and that means that we,’ I said, heavily, ‘need to know, Sauce. . whether Grandpa’s playing some game or other. You’re the conduit, or part of it, and so, even though it’s way above your pay grade, it’s down to you to find out. This is what I want you to do.’
Lisa McDermid
It was well past eight by the time I got back to my flat in Haddington, and my evening was well and truly busted. I’d had a supper and possible shag date with a guy I’d been seeing for a couple of months, and I certainly wasn’t up for the second without the first, so I’d called him earlier to cancel. I would have been happier if he’d sounded more disappointed.
I’d picked up a takeaway tandoori on the way home, and chose a nice Semillon blanc from the fridge to go with it, but when I looked at it on the plate I decided that I didn’t really fancy it at all, so I binned it and settled for the wine and a bag of crisps.
Then I thought about George. He’d told me to check in with him in the morning, but I was restless, so I picked up the phone and dialled his number. The dead voice answered. I’ve never met Jen, but I’ve spoken to her a few times. She’s always polite, and never asks me why I’m calling, but her tone still gets to me. That’s because there isn’t one, no intonation at all; she sounds as if she’s medicated, but apparently that’s not the case. I can’t imagine what their home life must be like but I hope to God nothing like that ever happens to me. I have quite a few childbearing years ahead of me, and I can appreciate the horror of having one then losing it.
He took the call on an extension; I knew this because there was television noise in the background when he picked up. ‘Hi, Lise,’ he murmured. ‘You done?’
‘Yes,’ I told him. ‘I got as far as I can go; the well’s dry, trail’s cold, whatever.’ I looked at my glass; it was still half full, so I was nowhere near the limit. ‘Fancy a drink?’ I asked, taking myself completely by surprise. ‘Business meeting,’ I added.
‘Nice idea,’ he replied, ‘but I’ve had a couple already, and I don’t think you and me should meet in the Longniddry Inn. People who know me might wonder. So maybe we’d better not. Another time, yes?’
‘Sure,’ I said, wondering how likely that was.
‘No links to Varley in Welsh’s records then?’ His voice changed, became more businesslike; I wondered if Jen had come into the room.
‘Not a light. The auditor said the accounts were meticulous and he wasn’t kidding.’
‘Nothing at all out of the ordinary?’
‘Nothing that I could see; trust me, boss, I spent long enough looking. The bookkeeping’s flawless and every tax return is accepted. There are even a couple of over-payments, where the taxman’s issued refunds without even being asked.’
‘God, the man’s a philanthropist,’ he chuckled. ‘Over-paying tax indeed.’
‘What about Alice?’ I asked him, changing the subject. ‘Has she been interviewed?’
‘Absolutely. High level too; by Mario McGuire and Andy Martin. The chief’s accepted her resignation, by the way.’
‘Ah, that’s a bugger,’ I sighed, but in truth it wasn’t a huge surprise to me. I’d sensed things were heading that way. ‘What about Griff Montell? He’ll be okay, I suppose.’ Don’t let anyone tell you the police force isn’t still male dominated.
I heard another soft laugh at the other end of the line. ‘There’ll be a note on his record, and he’ll be taken out of the limelight for a while.’
‘What the hell does that mean?’
‘You’re going to love this,’ George chuckled. ‘He’s replacing Tarvil. The chief told me, just as I was leaving tonight.’
‘Jesus.’ I’d never worked with the guy, but I’d met him, through Alice. I wasn’t sure about him; he struck me as another testosterone-fuelled type, like Skinner, maybe even higher octane, being twenty years younger and a bloody Springbok into the bargain. ‘When does he start?’
‘As soon as he can be replaced in Leith; might even be Monday.’
‘Mmm,’ I muttered, not trying to hide my cynicism, letting him make what he would of that. ‘Listen,’ I went on, ‘the bigwigs’ interview with Alice: what did it cover?’
‘Not much; she gave them a written statement along with her resignation. Why?’
‘I’m wondering if I should talk to her, that’s all, about Varley and Welsh.’
‘On or off the record?’
It was my turn to laugh. ‘I thought everything we did was off the record, boss.’
‘True,’ he conceded. ‘Okay, do it, but there’s one thing you might not know. There’s history between Alice and Freddy Welsh.’
‘As in sexual history?’ I asked
‘Just so. She owned up to it at interview. Years ago and a one-off, she says, but it’s best if you’re aware of it when you speak to her. Have a good evening.’
‘Thanks, you too.’ As if, poor sod; his good evening would only involve another couple of drinks. ‘I’ll let you know how I get on.’
I finished mine, refilled my glass and dialled Alice’s mobile number. ‘Yes?’ she answered on the third ring, cautiously.
‘It’s me,’ I said, ‘Lisa. Didn’t your phone tell you?’
‘No, it came up as “Private number” that’s all.’
‘I see. Maybe something to do with my new job,’ I surmised.
‘Your. .’ She stopped. Having worked there herself, she knew the form. ‘Probably, if I read you right. When did that happen?’
‘This has been my first day in the office.’
‘Lucky you. No more of those for me. You’ll have heard, I take it.’
‘Only just. I’m sorry, Alice.’
‘Me too,’ she sighed, ‘but I fucked up big time, so I’m blaming nobody.’
‘Not even the Springbok?’
She hesitated. ‘No,’ she murmured, eventually, then added, ‘It would be nice if the sod would stop blanking me, though.’
‘If he does that, he’s not worth the grief. He’s come through it all right. Same old story,’ I snapped, ‘the boys always stick together.’
‘Hey, you’d be best to keep your feminist tendencies under wraps where you are now,’ she warned. ‘Shannon’s one of the boys herself; God knows, she’s test-driven enough of them in her time. Including your ex-gaffer, from what I hear.’
‘George?’ I exclaimed. ‘You’re kidding.’
‘Nope. It wasn’t recent, though, long before. .’
‘Well, there’s a surprise. And here’s one for you; he’s still my gaffer. I’ve just finished speaking to him, in fact. I asked his permission to call you.’
‘All change, eh,’ she chuckled softly. ‘But you don’t need his okay, surely. Am I really as non grata as that?’
‘Not at all,’ I told her. ‘It’s what I want to ask you that I thought I should clear. I’m looking into possible historic links between your uncle and the guy he called in the pub the other night.’
‘A call,’ Alice boomed, angrily, ‘that the son-of-a-bitch tried to claim I made, incidentally.’
‘Don’t worry,’ I assured her, ‘nobody’s buying that.’
‘I should think not.’ She paused. ‘Lisa, I suppose you know about the other guy and me.’
‘I’ve been told,’ I admitted.
‘And were you told what my shit of an uncle said when he was interviewed? That he’d spied on us when it happened.’
‘No, that’s news to me.’
‘That’s what he said, apparently; in fairly graphic terms too. Mr Martin called me to warn me that he’d been bailed. He said I’m to report any approach he makes to me, and he also filled me in on what he’d claimed, about me making the call, and why. Hell, Lisa, my dear uncle will be bloody lucky if I don’t approach him, armed to the teeth!’
‘Alice,’ I said, ‘I have to ask you this. You’re clear that there’s been nothing between you and this man since?’
‘Absolutely. I was drunk, he could barely get it up, plus he had BO, so it was an experience
I regretted as soon as I’d sobered up. You know the kind, I’m sure.’
I could have lied and told her that I didn’t; instead, I let it pass. ‘Is there anything you can tell me about his relationship with your uncle, anything I don’t know?’
‘Other than just family?’
‘Yes.’
‘I wish I could. I wish I could give you a nice big juicy secret that would lead to the sods being banged up for five years, but there isn’t. There is no relationship between the two of them that I know of, other than him being my aunt’s cousin. Nothing professional, apart from the conservatory of course, and that was Jock and Aunt Ella giving him business.’
‘Say that again,’ I asked. ‘What conservatory?’
‘The one they had built on their house in Livingston. It’s a full-scale extension really, but that’s what Aunt Ella calls it. Bloody huge thing it is, not your bog standard double-glazing job. His company built it for them.’
‘It did? When?’
‘Can’t say for sure; five, six, seven years ago.’
‘Alice,’ I said, ‘I’ve just been all over the records of Anglesey Construction, from its very beginning. There’s no mention of any job with your uncle’s name on it. I will double-check with his auditor, but I’m bloody sure of it.’
Bob Skinner
I wasn’t planning on rushing back to Gullane that night, for reasons that were both personal and domestic. I knew the kids would be back home, so I called them and had a chat with each of them. They’d had a good week with their mother, and didn’t sound as if they were missing America one bit, although Mark took me by surprise by asking if he could have a mobile phone. He’s a responsible kid and he’s never given me a moment’s trouble since he came into our family, so I said that he could, subject to Sarah’s agreement, yet when I hung up the phone I was left with an inexplicable notion that, somehow, I’d been stitched up.
I was pondering this when my personal mobile sounded: as you’d expect, I have two, police and private. I checked the screen and saw that it was Aileen calling. I thought about letting it go to voicemail, but I couldn’t let myself be that petty, so I picked up.
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