War Games

by Douglas Jackson

  ‘Aye,’ Craig said carefully, moving towards the doorway. ‘But I doubt you’d want to hear what they’d say.’ He disappeared into the opening and I heard the word again. ‘Dark.’ But I knew he wasn’t talking about the dead girl.

  The sky still wept with a dull leaden drizzle when we emerged from the building, but the air felt clearer and the day lighter. Every blade of grass seemed bursting with life after the barren sterility of Threave Castle.

  ‘You said something about the Red Douglas?’ I said as we walked back towards the hut.

  ‘Aye, Threave was the stronghold o’ the Douglases for nigh on three hundred years. Ruffians and robber barons. Bled the place dry.’ He said it with relish and his accent noticeably thickened as he recited a tale he knew by heart. The vowels stretched and hundred came out as ‘huntert’. ‘Bishops and kings, they defied them a’, until James the Second came doon to sort them out. See the wall and the broken-down tower?’ We turned back to look at the castle. ‘They built that to stop him, even brought cannons ower frae France to protect the place, but bold James was too clever for them.’ He grinned. ‘Never underestimate a man wi’ a bigger cannon than your own.’

  I grinned back. I knew all about cannons. I’d seen them from the dangerous end. Craig continued the tale of the castle’s violent history with a droll humour that made him seem more stand-up comedian than historian. But he knew his stuff. He reeled off names and dates until I had to tell him to slow down. I took out a notebook and started writing. He liked that, and when he got back to the hut he offered to sell me a dusty guidebook. But I’d heard enough history and instead I passed him a couple of twenty-pound notes. ‘A donation, for whatever,’ I said, and he winked and slipped them into his back pocket and walked off towards the hut. ‘Oh, and does the phrase God’s Warrior mean anything to you?’

  ‘No.’ He shook his head. ‘Sounds like something those Holy Joes that come round the doors would put in their pamphlets, or a . . .’

  The rest of what he said was lost in a gust of wind and I followed him back to the little jetty. Once we were on the river, I asked the question that had been puzzling me. ‘That girl must have got on to the island somehow, but you said no one saw her, which means it wasn’t on this boat. Then again she couldn’t have walked on water. You’re a clever guy, Craig,’ I encouraged him. ‘You must have some kind of theory?’

  He stared at me and I knew I was right. He said nothing until we reached the far bank and I thought he was going to keep his secret to himself. He waited until I’d climbed out of the boat. ‘See that?’ He pointed to a chain and padlock hanging from a wooden pile on the bank where the boat must be secured at the end of the day. ‘It’s new. The police took the old one away. They reckon whoever it was carried the lass down here and unchained the boat and took her across. That was one of the reasons they thought it might be one of us.’

  I thanked him again and, after a last, long look at Threave Castle, I set off on the hike along the path back to the car. A long walk for Glen Savage, but a longer one for a man carrying a dead body. Shoaz Ahmad’s killer had gone to a lot of trouble to get his body to Roxburgh Castle. Now I had a girl with no name in a place she had no right to be – another castle – and another killer who’d gone out of his way to put her here. I’d been searching for links, well I’d found one now.

  CHAPTER 21

  The mobile phone chirruped in my jacket pocket and I took one hand off the wheel and fished it out to check the number. If it was Aelish I’d answer it and pull over; if it was anyone else I wouldn’t bother stopping. Sure, it’s illegal, but it comes low in the long list of crimes I’m prepared to commit. I figure that if my country will pay me to kill people it can put up with me using a mobile in my car. My heart sank when I recognised Assad Ali’s number.

  ‘Glen Savage,’ I acknowledged reluctantly.

  Mr Ali wanted me to know he was angry. His words came in clipped little sentences and his voice was sharp as razor wire. ‘Mr Savage, I am paying you to find my daughter. Why do I see you on TV? What has this boy to do with Gurya? I have many police here now. Suddenly they are interested in our story. They say you are a fraud, Mr Savage. I do not know what to say in reply.’

  It was less conversation than ticker-tape message, but I took his point. I wasn’t sure what to say myself.

  ‘Mr Savage?’

  ‘Yes, Mr Ali?’

  ‘Tell me why I should continue to give you my money?’

  I felt a chill run down my spine, but I put a smile in my voice so he knew I was still on side and I was still confident. ‘Mr Ali, the police are interested in Gurya because they believe there may be a link between her disappearance and Shoaz Ahmad’s death, but that doesn’t mean they will treat her as a priority. I can assure you that Gurya is my priority and that I’m making progress. Give me three or four days and I’ll be able to provide you with some solid evidence.’

  ‘You still believe Gurya is alive?’ he said cautiously.

  ‘I do, sir.’

  ‘I want a full report from you a week today. We will review the situation then.’

  ‘Thank you, Mr Ali,’ I said, but he’d already hung up.

  I had all of fifteen seconds to ponder the implications before the phone rang again.

  ‘Savage.’

  ‘Cheery today, eh?’ Willie Dewar’s voice was unmistakeable.

  ‘What have you got for me?’

  ‘Not now. We need to meet. You know the wee pub opposite the side entrance to Queen Street?’

  I understood he meant the Glasgow railway station, and I knew the bar, a low-ceilinged dump with yellowing paintwork that looked as if it had once been decorated by a hand grenade in a tin of Dulux. It’s the kind of place where the barmen are issued with a nervous twitch and your average customer is as talkative as a fugitive Nazi war criminal. It suited Dewar just fine.

  ‘Sure,’ I said. ‘When?’

  He said tomorrow at two. ‘And Savage?’

  ‘Yes, Willie?’

  ‘You might want to bring your toothbrush, know what Ah mean?’

  *

  The man had been studying his target for the last hour. A youth – a boy – hanging around with others of his kind outside a shop in a council estate far from, but within sight of, the bulk of the castle. Age was of no relevance to him – young or old the boy was still the enemy. And the voices said enemies must die.

  He waited until they split up, knowing the boy must eventually end up on his own. When he was certain of the route his victim would take, he drove a few hundred yards ahead and parked under a street lamp. After a few minutes checking in his mirrors to ensure no one was around, he got out and raised the bonnet to fiddle with the wires. He waited patiently until he could hear the footsteps and with a last furtive check made his decision.

  ‘You’re the very man.’ He raised his head with a smile as the boy approached. ‘Could you hold this for me?’

  He could tell the boy was wary, because he loitered suspiciously, but he held out a big wrench still smiling. ‘I think it’s something to do with the carburettor. It’s a fiddly job, but if you could take this for a second while I try to get the damn thing out . . .’

  As he spoke he bent his head over the engine again, still holding the wrench, as he prodded with one hand. He felt the moment when the young man came forward and the weight of the wrench lifted.

  ‘Thanks,’ he chuckled, working away at the wiring for a few moments and sensing the other hovering close by ready to hand back the tool. ‘I’ll just be a few seconds.’ Eventually, he stood up shaking his head. ‘Will you look at that . . .?’

  He moved back to allow the boy to take his place and curiosity pulled the youth forward over the mass of metal and plastic. He was still wondering what he was supposed to see when an arm hooked round and something soft and medical-smelling clamped over his mouth and nose. He struggled and flailed backwards with the wrench, but it took only a few seconds for the drug to work. He tried to shout, but the
cloth acted as a gag. He felt himself fading and the strength going from his arms and legs. The wrench dropped from his hand with a clatter. By the time the man took his body weight and eased him back and into the passenger seat of the vehicle his mind still worked but it was as if his entire body had been paralysed. Inside he was screaming, but he knew no one would ever hear.

  Before he drifted into blessed unconsciousness he heard his tormentor mutter beneath his breath in a language that was familiar:‘Dieu de gloire et de force, je viens devant toi dans la prière. Je viens de vous rappeler. Je viens vous remercier. Je viens d’être avec vous. Je suis un Croisé. Fais que je sois digne de ce nom.’ God of glory and strength, I come before you in prayer. I come to remember you. I come to thank you. I come to be with you. I am a Crusader. Grant that I may be worthy of that name.

  This one would act as a marker. A way post on the journey to glory for God’s Warrior.

  *

  Thursday, 14 June 2007

  Since I was still on Mr Ali’s expenses I could probably have sprung for something more luxurious, but the Millennium Hotel is about two minutes from Dewar’s dustbin of a Glasgow pub and handy for just about everything in the city centre. It’s nothing special but they were happy to let me check in just after one, and when I’d sorted myself out I walked past the pigeon-spattered statues in George Square and arrived at the bar just about on time.

  Dewar sat in the corner with his back to the wall and his eyes on the door. He hadn’t changed since the last time I saw him. Still the same pot-bellied, bad-tempered gnome with his whisky nose shining like a traffic beacon, only in a mottled shade of purple. I ordered a double Bell’s which would help keep it that way and a pint of 80 Shilling to keep him company.

  ‘Willie,’ I saluted, raising my glass.

  He nodded and raised his own, sucking the amber liquid through pursed lips as if it was a brand of upmarket tea that merited the attention of every taste bud.

  ‘Ahhh,’ he let out a long sigh. ‘First of the day.’ I smiled indulgently at the blatant lie and took a sip of beer as I allowed my eyes to surreptitiously sweep the mixed clientele of out-of-work gangland assassins and off-duty hookers. Dewar, the old-time copper, clearly enjoyed the unsettling effect he had on his fellow drinkers, but I resolved not to go to the toilets alone. This was a dive where you could be handed a hatchet with your change and I didn’t fancy ending up with a permanent centre parting.

  Eventually Willie decided it was time to get down to business. He lowered his shaggy head about six inches from the scarred table top, which forced me to do the same so I could make out his gravelly sentences. As if by common consent a hush fell over the bar, but Dewar had chosen his corner well. I reckoned any listener would be fortunate to understand one word in ten; I knew I was.

  ‘So, ye haven’t lost yer touch after all, Savage,’ he growled. ‘Ah had ma doubts, Ah’ll admit. Ye knew?’

  ‘About the heart?’ I nodded.

  ‘Aye, the heart. Removed from the body post-mortem – that would be after the lad was deid,’ he added unnecessarily, thankfully putting the lid on my crazed Aztecs theory. ‘The wound in his throat was a smoke screen. Actual cause of death was prolonged exposure to chloroform, resulting in heart failure. Ten-inch incision in the diaphragm with a large-bladed instrument, subsequent opening of chest cavity and severing of left and right pulmonary arteries and veins and superior and inferiorvena cavas.’ He grinned and invited me to applaud his surgical knowledge. ‘Butcher’s job. No finesse.’

  ‘So he snatched Shoaz off the street and drugged him. That means some kind of blacked-out transport? A lorry driver or delivery man?’

  ‘Not necessarily. He could have tricked the kid into his car and knocked him out later,’ Dewar pointed out. ‘Doesn’t even need to be a “he”, though I admit it’s most likely.’

  ‘What about the chloroform? I didn’t think you could get it these days. There must be better drugs? What about the date rape stuff, GHB or whatever?’

  He thought about it. ‘Takes time to work. Chloroform’s more or less instant if you have plenty o’ it. You don’t even need to buy the stuff. Anyone with a chemistry O-level, a bucket of bleach and a wee bit acetone could knock up a batch in a couple of hours.’

  ‘So we’ve got a crazy butcher with a chemistry O-level and a cleaning company?’

  He grinned. ‘And a big freezer.’

  ‘A what?’

  He laughed at my puzzlement, pleased to have caught me out. ‘A freezer. Kid was snatched a month ago. They reckon he was killed soon after, at most within an hour, then stuck in a deep freeze until he was needed. No sign of the body being forced into a small space, so it must’ve been a big freezer.’

  Something didn’t make sense. ‘You said “until he was needed”. That presupposes premeditation and planning. Why not just pick up the kid and kill him on the day? Less risk of being caught.’

  ‘He’s a nutcase,’ he said dismissively. ‘He doesn’t care about risk. Danger is a thrill to him. All part of the experience, just like removing the boy’s heart. That’s the key. That’s what makes this guy different. If you can find out why he kept the heart as a trophy you’re halfway to catching him.’

  ‘I’m not so sure. I think you might have been right the first time. “Until he was needed”. I think maybe the timing matters, possibly the place as well. Threave Castle.’

  ‘Eh?’

  ‘Threave Castle. I think that was where they found his first victim.’ I explained about the girl’s body dumped in the underground jail, the difficulty the killer must have faced getting it there and the advanced state of decomposition when it was discovered.

  ‘Aye, that fits right enough,’ he agreed. ‘By the time they found out how she’d been killed everyone outside the force would’ve forgotten she’d existed. No need for any horror stories in the papers, just a low-key investigation at their own pace. Only they didn’t figure on the bastard killing again. Ah’ll see if Ah can get a line on it and fill you in.’

  ‘What about the name God’s Warrior? Mean anything?’

  He shrugged. ‘Religious nutters. King Billy.’

  ‘King Billy?’

  ‘Those of the blue persuasion in this town reckon he was God’s champion. Champion? Warrior? You’re the mind-reader. Ah’m just an over-the-hill cop with a big thirst and an empty glass.’

  I bought him another double and myself a refill. By the time I got back to the table he’d spread a sheet of A4 paper on the surface. On closer inspection it was some kind of poster.

  ‘Ah thought it was time ye broadened your education,’ he chortled.

  Against the background of a Saltire flag the words ‘SCOTTISH DEFENCE ASSOCIATION’ screamed out in bold black letters above ‘SCOTLAND FOR THE SCOTS’ in slightly smaller type, with pictures of William Wallace and Robert the Bruce to either side. The rest was an invitation to a meeting in a local hall south of the river, not far from the area where Shoaz Ahmad’s family had their home. The date was today.

  ‘Jesus, Willie, why the hell would I want to go and listen to these bastards?’

  He shrugged. ‘G Division’s taking them seriously, maybe you should, too?’

  *

  What do you wear to a fascist knees-up? My SS Gruppenführer’s uniform was at the cleaners, but I knew that dark suits, dark ties and designer shades were all the rage because I’d seen them on the telly – that and football tops of a certain persuasion. On the other hand I didn’t particularly want to look like one of the faithful; tantalisingly bi-curious would do for starters. In the end I opted for bottom-line boring on the probably spurious grounds that a lot of the guys who ran the Einsatzgruppen death squads in Russia and Poland were Berlin and Hamburg civil servants, cops and court officials. Murder is just a state of mind. It helps if you disguise it as duty.

  The taxi dropped me off at the wrong end of a poorly lit street on the edge of a run-down industrial estate in Pollokshields. I knew it was the wrong end when the Asi
an kids with scarves hiding their faces stepped out of the shadows and began to crowd me so that every which way I turned I was looking into a pair of threatening eyes. The sheer physical presence of twenty or thirty bodies wrapped around me like a blanket. No one said a word, but I found the silent menace more intimidating than anything I’d faced in Ulster. My heart beat a little faster than is healthy and I felt the rising heat in my belly that usually heralds violence. I tensed, and for a few seconds I had a vision of two squaddies who’d driven into a Provo funeral parade on the Falls Road and never came out again.

  ‘So now we see your true colours, Mr Savage. Why am I not surprised?’ The young men in front of me stepped back far enough to allow me to breathe and I recognised Gulam’s bearded features with something like relief.

  ‘You’re an educated man, Gulam. You’ll have heard the saying “know thine enemy”?’ I tried to sound more dignified than I felt.

  His face took on an irritating, infallible certainty. ‘Oh yes, Mr Savage, I’m familiar with both the saying and the principle, and let me assure you that we do know our enemy. They are gathering in that hut along there on the left, the one behind the barbed wire. Please’ – he waved his followers aside, creating a path for me – ‘go and join your friends.’ I knew there was no point in arguing. As I walked forward a camera flashed in my face. Just what I fucking needed.

  Fanatics always tend to start their meetings on time; it’s a form of autism. My inner rebel insisted I arrive at the hut at least two minutes late. I recognised it easily from Gulam’s description and the Saltire hanging limply from a flagpole tacked precariously to the roof of the squat, prefabricated building. The barbed wire was actually only three strands strung on top of a six-foot chain-link fence, but the message was clear. All it needed was a motto above the gate to make it a proper home from home. Something about work making you free would be about right.

  The two men on guard had walked straight from a Quentin Tarantino movie set. Mobster chic on Neanderthal Man, right down to the designer sunglasses in the middle of the night. The one on the right was taller, with cropped dark hair and a face like a bulldozer; all chin, nose and forehead. His mate wore his hair long, in a ponytail, which seemed a bit pinko-liberal until you saw the look in his eyes and the breadth of his shoulders, which was matched by the width of his belly. Both of them wore shoes polished until you could see your face in them, which told me they were a certain kind of ex-squaddie, or wannabes of that ilk. I’m a certain kind of ex-squaddie myself and my boots haven’t made acquaintance with polish since 1986.