I was startled by the kind but firm mildness in his tone. A chameleon and a mimic, it seemed. Or had Conall picked up his technique from him? I doubted it, somehow. One by one he extracted three large, familiar photographs and placed them in a line in front of Billy, who paled visibly at the sight of them.
“I believe these men are familiar to you. They are currently being actively hunted and will soon be in police custody. But, until then, we’d rather not risk anything happening to either you or to the McGregor family. Do you understand me, Billy?”
“Yes.” It came out as little more than a choked whisper. We already knew everything then?
“Good.” Mr Keane leaned back, inviting the whole room to relax a little, “I’d usually offer you something to drink around now, but you’ve just landed after a bit of a flight. There’s a bathroom there, if you’d like to use it before we go on. No rush, Billy, you just take your time.”
Billy nodded, rose shakily and disappeared through the indicated door. Mr Keane removed his sunglasses and placed them on the table, before cocking an enquiring eyebrow at Conall. I don’t know quite how he achieved the effect, but he’d somehow schooled his features in a way that added ten years to yesterday’s incarnation.
“Nicely done,” Conall allowed in a low voice, “but I think that was the easy bit. That boy’s been scared out of his wits.”
“That ‘boy’ is only four years younger than you are, Inspector. What had you already survived by his age?”
“A lot less than you, I’d wager. And Billy is an entirely different species, although, in your case, I think we probably all are.”
Mild dislike and professional admiration? That was the distinct vibe I was picking up, anyway. Neither of them seemed to feel the urge to chat after that. The object of their mutual interest emerged again a few minutes later, pausing, startled, as Mr Keane turned his head to look up at him. Yeah, those eyes could do that to you, alright. He managed to sit down again without missing the chair.
“Tea for me, I think, and you, Sergeant?” I nodded. Tea would be very welcome. “How about you, Billy? A coke, perhaps? Yes? And a decent double espresso and some waters, thank you.” Mr Keane smiled amiably and removed his earpiece and clip-on, switching them off and dropping them into his pocket. “Won’t be long.” He sat back a little. “Now, Billy, I think you can tell me who the man in the left-hand photograph is, can’t you?”
A nod and a swallow. “Pete Ferguson.” Slightly above a whisper.
“And the other two?”
Billy extended a finger. “They called that one Mike. I don’t know what the other one’s name is.”
“They let themselves in?”
Another nod. “While I was at work. I’d just got my coat off when the third one got his arm around my neck and showed me the knife.” His hands were twisting in his lap by then. “Ferguson and Mike were waiting in my living room. Ferguson was just sitting there with his feet up, sipping at a big tumbler of whiskey from the bottle I’d got in for Christmas.”
I had to admire the way Shay Keane walked him through it from there, as if he’d been there himself and was just prompting the witness to confirm that their recollection of events matched his own.
Billy, according to Pete Ferguson, had caused three years of nagging worry and endless bother. Sure, that was Archie’s fault really, but Billy was a big boy now, he should have had the sense to reach out long before it came to this entirely avoidable, regretful necessity. Then Ferguson had shown him pictures of his mum and his brother and his sister and told him to take his medicine quietly, like a man, if he didn’t want to earn them a similar visit. The following beating had been methodical, brutal, and scientifically applied. Once that message had been clearly delivered and understood, they’d dropped Billy into an armchair where Pete Ferguson, still quietly sipping his drink, could observe him sadly.
“He told me I really looked like Archie, when he was my age, but he could see I was a good and decent lad, not like him at all. Then he asked me what Archie had said to me, that one time I went to see him.”
“And you told him, of course. He’d threatened your family, and you knew, by then, that he meant it.”
Billy nodded. “I told him that Archie had warned me about him, but not told me anything about where he’d hidden the coins he’d stolen from that poor woman. And that he’d told me to collect an ‘insurance policy’ from his lawyer’s a week later, just in case Ferguson ever came looking for me; but not to open it, not to break the seal.”
“He must have hated it when he thought of arranging that for you,” Mr Keane told him, sharing the narrative. “Archie would have given almost anything to make sure Ferguson never got his hands on those coins. But not his son. He didn’t want you to be made to pay for his sins, did he?”
“Archie was a sorry excuse of a man,” Billy agreed quietly, “but he was human enough to care what happened to his only living legacy. He didn’t know me from Adam, but I think that’s what he saw in me, a second chance for his genes to make a better go of it.” He stared at Mr Keane, at Conall, at me. “I never opened that envelope. Not in three years.”
A quiet knock at the door interrupted us at that point, and I got up to relieve the MIB of the offered tray. As I handed out the drinks, Mr Keane took up where they’d left off.
“But you let Ferguson have the envelope, because Archie said you should.”
A nod. “There was nothing in it except a photo. They showed it to me, asked if it meant anything to me. It didn’t, and I told them that.” The unmistakable ‘pshhh fizz’ noise as he opened his can broke the dialogue there, and we all waited as he took a few good pulls. “It was just a shot of an old stone, a bit over a foot high, half-buried in some grass. It had the name “Ogilvie” engraved on it. An oddly shaped gravestone, maybe?” He looked very lost and confused as he related this. “Ferguson told me that Archie had saved my life after all, if that made me feel any better. It really didn’t. Then he warned me that he’d have people watching me. That if I ever spoke to the police about their visit or tried to disappear again, he’d make sure my whole family paid for my mistake before he came after me again.” He started to tremble as those words tumbled out. “Then he told me that if Archie’s last message to him panned out, he’d let me know we were all straight. He didn’t have to tell me what would happen if it didn’t.”
“But we secured the McGregors before we came for you, Billy. So that’s not ever going to happen, is it? You’re all safe now.” Mr Keane waited for him to look up again, a rabbit caught in the headlights. “And then he was happy. He patted you on the shoulder, so to speak, told you he could see you knew better, that you were a sensible lad. Is that when he offered you something for the pain?”
Billy managed to break the stare and took another, nervous drink.
“I didn’t want anything from him. Archie warned me what he was like. He didn’t push it, just poured me a glass of my own whiskey and watched me swallow it down. That’s when Mike asked if he could go yet, or if they still needed him. Ferguson told him to get on home. We were all good there.”
“I expect you started to feel a bit funny pretty quickly after that. Went out like a light? I imagine he spiked the bottle after he’d poured himself a glass; before you even got there.” All in a calm, measured voice. “They wanted to make sure you really understood how easy that kind of thing was for them, Billy. Make it clear that they could let themselves into anyone’s home, spike anyone’s drink, do whatever they liked. They left pictures of your brother and sister where you’d see them when you woke up, right?”
Archie hunched further in on himself. “Yes.” His voice cracked a little.
“How many hours did you lose, Billy? Had they moved you somewhere else?”
“No, I was still in my house. About fourteen hours, I think.”
Mr Keane sighed and leaned forward a little.
“That’s a long time, Billy. Too long for a spiked drink. They must have given you something
else too, an injection maybe, once you were out. Easy enough to hide a little mark like that, with all the bruising.” An uncomfortable thought that clearly hadn't occurred to Billy before. Mr Keane turned to Conall. “You must remember Tommy McGann’s little brother, Inspector? The one with the yappy little lapdog? What was his name?”
“Barry,” Conall told him. “Barry McGann.” I wondered if he’d noticed his fist clench spasmodically, squashing his empty takeout cup. Billy certainly did.
“That’s right. Barry McGann. Honestly, there are so many scumbags of Ferguson’s type around Glasgow, it’s a wonder anyone remembers them all.” Mr Keane fixed his hypnotic gaze on Billy again. “Barry was a whole different level of sick though Billy. Mike Gordon and Jimmy Crawford,” a wave at the photos, “they both worked for him for a while a few years back. Barry had a set of custom-made branding irons he liked them to use. Real, old fashioned, permanent reminders for anyone who crossed him.”
Mr Keane stood and picked up his folder to walk around the table and open it, allowing Billy alone to view whatever photo he’d held back until then. Billy’s eyes stared up at him with horrified fascination as he gathered up the other photos and tucked them away again.
“I expect your bruises looked something like that. Nasty tumble off a patch of black ice? Drunken fall down a flight of stone stairs? Not much in it really. A word of advice from me to you, Billy. Let our doctor run a few tests. Better safe than sorry. You can pick up all sorts of nasty little infections from a dirty needle.” Billy gave him a slow, mute nod of assent. “Well, I must say you’ve been enormously helpful to us.” Keane gave him a friendly little smile. “Thank you, Mr McIntyre. My colleagues will take you off to your safe house now. Hopefully, we’ll have you home again in a few days.” He offered Billy his hand and, to my surprise, the lad rose quickly and shook it energetically.
“Sir?” he hesitantly asked. “What happened to Barry McGann, if it’s alright to tell me?”
“Him?” Mr Keane shrugged. “He got a ten-year sentence after an undercover agent presented a good, solid case against him. He didn’t last six months though. I don’t think the other inmates liked him very much. Sometimes, Billy, men like that end up in places where they might bump into people they’d rather not. Terrible understaffing problems in our prisons these days.” He tipped his head slightly and offered the lad a little smile. “As I said, Billy, you’re all safe as houses now.”
Once he’d seen Billy off with the MIBs, he turned again to find Conall holding out an imperious arm. Wordlessly, he handed over the folder. “Christ, Shay! That’s nasty, even by your shitty standards.” Conall snapped it shut again and thrust it back at him. “Do all your fake photos have to be so brutal?”
No, I wasn’t sorry I hadn’t seen it. Conall’s reaction was quite enough for me. Mr Keane just shrugged.
“Whatever does the job, Con. It’s amazing what special effects can achieve these days, isn’t it? Look, the lad needs to get tested. How would you go about getting him to agree to that without airing the possibility we’re not discussing? A little trickery in a good cause is no weight on my conscience.” He seated himself, sipped at his tea, pulled a face and opened a water bottle instead. “Besides, it’s far healthier for him to see himself as a survivor rather than a victim. It’s not like I’m going to let anyone bully him into testifying. Do you think he saw me as any kind of a victim, Sergeant Murray?”
“No, Mr Keane, I do not,” I told him, “but I can’t say you seem like much of a role model either.” He laughed delightedly and reached down to retrieve a case I hadn’t noticed from under his chair. He must have had it put there earlier. “Was that true?” I asked Conall. “About Barry McGann?”
“No.” A long-suffering sigh. “He does things like that. He made Tommy McGann and his brother up. Barry was the first name that came into my head.”
“Fast as ever too, Con.” A cheerful little grin. “Tommy and Barry… sounds about right to me. Lord! Can’t you picture the proud parents? They’d be a right pair of weegie gangland morlocks.” His laptop was state-of-the-art tech if speed was any measure of such things. It had finished booting up and was ready to go by the time I’d got round to where Conall was sitting. Mr Keane tapped through a couple of folders and pulled a plan up onto the screen. Conall stared at it.
“That’s new to me. What are those crosses?”
“The possible locations of the old Ogilvie boundary stones, before and after different pieces of land were sold off.” Two, over on the west side of the plan, were circled. One was just on the Kerr side of the burn, the other up towards the top end of the field that Gareth Ramsay had been killed in. Now that was rather interesting, after what Billy McIntyre had just told us.
“Anyone with a copy of the title pack for the estate could work this out?” Conall asked and got a brief nod.
“Given a bit of time, if they’re smart, yes.” Could Ferguson or any of his people have such a copy? I had no idea, but something must have made that seem like a possibility to both of them. Conall’s next question was a change of subject though. I’d have to ask what all that was about later.
“Are you heading back to the camp next, Shay?”
“Well, after a hair wash, a change of clothes, and a switch of vehicles, yes.”
“Right. Anything to add to the list you’ve already given me before we part ways then?”
“Why, thank you for asking, Inspector, as a matter of fact, there is. Let’s see if we can flush out our treasure hunters. Send someone up to the Ramsay farm to show our photos around and warn the Allen’s and the hands that you’ll be sending a team to do a bit of poking around down there on Monday. And then do the same at the Kerr estate. You never know, other people might have had threatening visits from Ferguson and friends by now. They’d want eyes and ears close by.” He shut down the laptop which took mere seconds, and packed it up again. “You’d better alert James McKinnon that I’ve been sent here too. We’ll need a 24/7 team watching the farm from a discreet distance from here on in, and you don’t have the people for that.”
“It’d be a lot more efficient to get your people to contact McKinnon directly,” Conall demurred. “They’d have to anyway, to back my story up.”
“Alright, that makes sense. Here.” Mr Keane fished in his pocket and tossed a set of keys over. “Spare set. Can you have my Ford picked up from the Eastgate car park in an hour? Find a good spot near the village hall for it?”
Conall nodded. “Why the camp again, though?” he asked curiously, “What precisely do you think you can achieve from there now? I thought we’d already vetted them all?”
“Up to a point, yes, but I’m not done there yet. Call it a bit of quid pro quo if you like. Now that I’ve tied up most of your resources helping to chase my quarry down, I might as well see if I have any luck trying to find your murderer for you while I’m waiting for a break. Just let me know if you want me to dig into anything in particular.”
“You don’t like Ferguson’s bunch for it?” I asked, more than a little surprised.
“Not if your theory about someone deliberately luring Gareth out to the slaughter holds any water, Sergeant Murray. We shall have to see.” That was a bloody good point.
I turned it over in my head as we went our separate ways. No, Pete Ferguson wouldn’t have wanted to do anything that would attract our attention to that field, or anywhere near it. He might be a ruthless, self-serving scumbag with no qualms about using hired muscle to make his points for him, but he’d also shown himself to be capable of great patience and long-term planning.
Gareth Ramsay’s murder had been timed and placed far too inconveniently to suit his purposes.
Twenty-One
I wasn’t feeling at all happy as Caitlin drove us back to the station. Assisting Shay playing at being one of The Ids was always a little depressing, it was just so unnatural and creepy to see him like that, and his parting observation was really bugging me. It could still have been Ferguson, ca
ught off guard, unexpectedly; there was a good chance Gareth might even have recognised his brother’s old ‘pal’. But I doubted that Ferguson would have had him killed there. More likely, in that scenario, Jimmy Crawford would have choked Gareth out, and they’d have gagged and immobilised him while they calmly dug up what they’d come for. By the time they were done with that, Ferguson could have planned out a natural accident for Archie’s brother and the discovery of Gareth’s body in the morning would have been no more than a personal tragedy for the Allens. Caitlin must have been having similar thoughts, from the expression on her face.
“What’s our next move on the Ramsay case, Conall?” she asked, after a few minutes. “Your charming old acquaintance pretty much hit the nail on the head back there, didn’t he?” Oh dear, where had all the warm fuzziness of yesterday’s encounter evaporated to? I don’t think Caitlin liked the version of Shay she’d met today very much, which was understandable.
“Good question.” I wished I had a brilliant answer ready, but I didn’t. Our suspect pool was still reasonably limited, and I didn’t want to expand it beyond the farm and the estate just yet. Not until we’d dug a little deeper. “If forensics can get a clean DNA sample from Davie’s gleanings, and no matches pop up in the database, we’ll get everyone who was on the estate and the farm tested, alibis or no alibis.” She’d already have thought of that herself. If at least three people had been there that night, they could all be covering for each other. Maybe they were as good at acting as my cousin was? “And I think I’ll cash in on Shay’s offer to help us out. Doesn’t it strike you as a little odd that the kind, generous and universally liked Gareth Ramsay, a man always willing to lend anyone a hand, did nothing to help his own brother out of the pit he fell into in his teens? Your changeling can do some digging into our victim’s past, see if anything crawls out from under a rock.”
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