Bob Skiinner 21 Grievous Angel

by Quintin Jardine

  ‘Listen,’ I said, ‘I’ve been told that I have a few virtues to counterbalance my faults, but patience is the one I’ve had to work hardest at. I’m getting there, though. There may come a time when Mr Jay’s career is in my hands. And then . . .’

  She pulled me towards her, and kissed me, for quite a long time. ‘You’ll do nothing,’ she whispered, as we surfaced. ‘I see you with your daughter and I know that as hard as you are on the outside, you’re a softie at heart. You won’t do anything in cold blood.’

  ‘No?’

  We kissed again. ‘No,’ she repeated, after we’d paused for breath once more. ‘On the other hand, my dear, I am as ambitious as you, and if the day should ever come when his career is in my hands . . . I’ll rip his balls off and enjoy listening to him squeal.’

  I grinned. ‘You’re quite a scary lady, aren’t you?’

  ‘Mmm. Just as well you’re not in love with me.’

  ‘That isn’t everything. Close and comfortable’s good too. I know plenty of couples who’ve built a life around that.’

  ‘You’ll never be among them, though. You have to be in love, Bob. You still are, even after eight years; I could see that in your eyes tonight. That’s why we’re safe with each other. I want sex, not love, and sex is all you have to give.’

  I drained my glass. ‘In that case,’ I murmured, ‘let me be generous.’

  Nine

  It was good, no denying that. Sex with Alison was energetic, enthusiastic, strenuous, and a whole lot of other adjectives, with the exception of acrobatic. We tired each other out after a while and fell asleep, with a window left open slightly to let us breathe.

  I don’t know how long I’d have slept if my bed-mate hadn’t been wakened by the sound of the milk truck skidding round Goose Green, just after half past seven: in those days we had the fastest milkman in the east. I came to with my hand on her breast, my thumb massaging her nipple, very gently. ‘Bob,’ she murmured, ‘it’s morning.’

  ‘And?’ I mumbled. ‘Since when did you only do it in the dark?’

  We were out of bed by eight, though, at least I was, having insisted on first go in the shower so that I could get breakfast under way. By the time Alison emerged at eight fifteen, her short, blonde-tinted hair still in damp disarray, Alex was up too, scrambling eggs and grilling bacon and tomatoes, while I made tea and toast. ‘Not for me, please,’ Ali said. ‘I’m a cereal only girl.’

  She relented, though. My kid has always done very good scrambled eggs. It’s an undocumented fact: one-parent families do not have room for a bad cook.

  Breakfast over, we got on with our weekends. Alex left first, to walk to Daisy’s place. She told me they were going food shopping in Haddington so I gave her forty quid and a list and told her to pick up some stuff for us. At thirteen I’d have trusted her with a debit card on my account, but legally she was too young to sign the slips. After she’d gone, I tidied in the kitchen, while Alison dried her hair, and packed her bag.

  ‘You don’t have to go,’ I pointed out, once more. ‘You could just chill out here, and wait for me.’

  ‘No, I can’t. Apart from anything else, I was air-dropped into a new office yesterday, and unlike you, I had no warning. I’m going in this morning as well. I need to read up on our current investigations. We’ve got a couple of pub break-ins on our hands, and one serious assault that might turn into murder. That’s a break from the norm. Two young male victims, stabbed, last Saturday: one’s unconscious, on life support, but the other’s wounds were superficial. At first he said they were attacked, but the story kept changing. Eventually he admitted that he and his mate tried to mug a gay bloke, but got it badly wrong.’

  ‘In Grove Street?’

  ‘Yes. The witness thought he was a dead man, but someone turned into the street and the guy ran off.’

  ‘I read about that in the Saltire,’ I recalled. ‘There was no mention of the poofter aspect, though.’

  ‘Poofter?’ she repeated, raising an eyebrow. ‘Are you homophobic, Bob?’

  ‘Do I have a fear of homosexuals?’

  ‘You know what the word means.’

  ‘Alison,’ I told her, deadpan. ‘I treat everyone the same, regardless of creed, colour, gender or sexual orientation.’

  ‘Good,’ she said. ‘Just for a second, I thought you sounded really bitter. No,’ she continued. ‘Mr Grant held that back from the media. He’s got officers out tonight going round the gay pubs and discos. The two would-be muggers said they saw their prey coming out of one in Morrison Street and followed him.’

  ‘Have you got a description?’ I asked.

  ‘Orange hair and heavy eye make-up, that’s all.’

  I laughed. ‘You may take it that by now the hair will be a different colour and the kohl will be gone.’

  ‘That’s what I thought,’ she agreed, ‘but I’m the new girl, so I kept it to myself.’

  I considered the situation. ‘Between you and me, I’d have given the press everything.’

  ‘Why?’

  ‘Because all kidding aside, this man sounds dangerous. Your two victims probably intended no more than to rough him up a wee bit and nick his wallet, but what they got in return . . . Gay man out on a Saturday night tooled up? That’s hardly typical of our pink community.’ I paused. ‘You’re not part of the pub trawl, are you?’

  ‘No, it’s boys only, Superintendent Grant said.’

  ‘So you could come back here tonight?’

  She shook her head. ‘No. I’ve got something on. I’m going to my friend Leona’s for dinner. She’s married to an MP, he’s away to South America on some parliamentary jaunt or other, she’s pregnant, and we’re having a girlie night.’

  ‘What’s his name?’

  ‘Roland McGrath. He’s a real prick; I can’t stand him.’

  I sensed bitterness. ‘Let me guess: he tried it on with you.’

  Her eyes turned grim. ‘A week before their wedding. The stag and the hen nights merged into one later on. Everybody was a bit pissed and Roland caught me in a quiet corridor of the hotel and offered me what Leona was going to be getting for the rest of her life; that was how he put it. He wouldn’t take no for an answer, so . . .’

  ‘So? So what?’

  She laughed, suddenly, beautifully. ‘So I threatened to arrest him. He didn’t believe me until I cautioned and cuffed him.’

  ‘You took your handcuffs to a hen night?’ I gasped.

  ‘I surely did. We’d been going to have a rag with Leona, but we thought better of it. Yes, I cuffed him and it was only then that he said he’d been joking all along.’

  ‘How did it turn out?’

  ‘Eventually it was me that made the joke of it. I left the cuffs on him for the rest of the night and told everyone I was showing him what marriage was all about. I’ve never told anyone the real story until now.’

  ‘Not even Leona?’

  ‘Especially not Leona. She thinks that the sun shines out of his fundamental orifice.’

  ‘Will you tell her about you and me?’ I asked her.

  ‘I have done, a while back, when we first started . . . seeing each other.’

  ‘What did she say?’

  ‘Well,’ she began, ‘she wanted to know if you were a good shag, and I said you are, then she wanted to know if I was in love with you, and I said that I wasn’t. She said that was a shame, because you were probably looking for someone just like me. And I told her that was absolute bollocks, because you were looking to make chief constable, just like me, and that we both know that any relationship that competes with that ambition in either of us will be doomed to failure.’

  I wasn’t sure I’d wanted to hear myself summed up so bluntly, or so accurately. Oh yes, she was right, but still, there was one difference between us that she’d overlooked. Elvis had never sung about her. She’d never woken crying in the night, from a dream of grievous loss, to the realisation that it had all been true. She’d carried her ambition from the st
art, untarnished. Mine was a substitute, even if it did burn bright in those days.

  I smiled, though, and ruffled her carefully composed hair. ‘You keep on telling her that, but be sure you add that I’m going to get there first.’

  ‘Oh I do, but the glass ceiling’s there to be shattered.’

  ‘And you’re the woman to do it. You have a good night and don’t spare the gossip.’

  ‘No danger of that. Call me.’

  We left together, each in our own car, but her Nissan was out of my sight in the Discovery by the time I reached Aberlady.

  I arrived in the office at quarter to ten. McGuire, wearing black jeans and a muscle-hugging polo shirt, was at his desk, and Martin was waiting for me, his green eyes full of life. ‘It’s Saturday,’ I said, ‘and the rugby season’s over. But if it wasn’t . . .’

  ‘The job comes first, boss. I still play rugby at top club and district level, but I’ve told the national selectors that I’m no longer available.’ Recalling the awe in Alf Stein’s voice when he’d described the young man’s playing style, I realised that if he had taken that step, then I was looking at someone whose career ambitions matched Alison’s and mine.

  ‘Okay. I promise I’ll do my best not to let work interfere. What other games do you play?’

  ‘Squash and golf; that’s all.’

  ‘Me too. There’s a squash court in this building; we’ll need to work each other over some time.’ I turned to business. ‘Any calls since you got here?’

  ‘One from Stevie Steele. He and Brian have been down that manhole since eight. Bella’s been down to the shops for rolls and milk and the Daily Record, and there was someone with her. A very large bloke; a Chieftain tank on legs, Stevie said.’

  I grinned at the answer to a question I’d been asking myself. How would Tony Manson have reacted to the news of Marlon’s murder? I’d come up with one proposition. He’d have had the same thought as me: like son, like mother? But he wouldn’t be relying on the police to protect his woman.

  ‘In that case, we don’t need to bother about her safety.’

  McGuire looked at me. ‘You know who he is, sir?’

  ‘I do. He’s the best insurance policy I can think of.’

  ‘Did Manson send him?’ Martin asked.

  ‘Yes. I know where Tony is, Andy, and when he’ll be back. I’d like this business sorted out before he gets here, otherwise it will get messy.’ I headed for the door. ‘Come on, let’s knock a couple of doors. I’ll drive.’

  I’d parked the Land Rover in front of the building rather than round the back. As we stepped outside I saw that the chief constable had arrived after me, and thanked my stars that I hadn’t nicked his space.

  Martin tried to stay impassive when he saw my wheels, but couldn’t quite cut it. His eyebrows rose, very slightly, but they did. ‘Pile of old shit,’ I told him, ‘but it doesn’t stand out in a crowd. I put a couple of the dents in it myself, for added authenticity, so to speak. It’s reliable under the bonnet, though; our garage makes sure of that.’

  The DC smiled. ‘It’ll never catch a getaway vehicle, though.’

  ‘It doesn’t have to, son,’ I pointed out. ‘It’s got a police radio in it.’

  As I drove out of headquarters, into Fettes Avenue, my mind went back to Alison’s division’s open investigation. ‘Andy,’ I began, ‘do you live in Edinburgh?’

  ‘Yes. Haymarket.’

  ‘And you’re a young single guy, so you’ll get out and about?’

  ‘Yes.’

  ‘Got any gay friends? Or doesn’t your faith allow that?’

  The question took him aback. ‘I’m not that Old Testament, boss. There’s a gay couple that are regulars in Ryrie’s Bar, part of the crowd. We’re not bosom buddies . . . bad choice of phrase . . . but we talk. Why?’

  ‘Do they ever say anything about anti-gay prejudice in Edinburgh? We’ve got this image as a tolerant society, but there are bigots everywhere. Is there a problem that we don’t know about?’

  I glanced at him and saw him frowning. ‘Well,’ he replied, thoughtfully, ‘those blokes are body-builders, both of them, but one of them did say something about there being parts of the town where they always go together, just in case. Look, is this important? I’ve got a date tonight, but I could go into Ryrie’s early on, check if they’re there.’

  ‘Nah,’ I said. ‘Don’t do that. It’s not our business, just something I heard.’

  ‘Okay, but if it would help anyone, I’ll do it.’ He paused. ‘Where are we going, sir?’

  ‘We’re paying a house call,’ I told him, ‘on a man called Douglas Terry.’

  ‘Are you sure he’ll be in?’ he wondered.

  ‘A practical man, eh, Andy. I’m not certain, but I don’t think that Dougie sees much of the day before noon, not at the weekends, at any rate.’

  ‘What does he do?’

  I had to think about that. ‘Do you read much?’ I asked him.

  ‘A bit.’

  ‘My dad brought me up on short stories,’ I said, ‘almost all of them American. He liked Thurber, Dorothy Parker and Damon Runyon, but his number one favourite was William Sydney Porter, who wrote under the pen name O Henry. Of all his stories, the one that’s stuck in my mind is called “Man about town”. That’s what I would call Dougie Terry . . . a man about town. You might call him a freelance. He does a bit of everything for everybody, but mostly he’s involved with a man called Jackie Charles.’

  ‘I know that name,’ Martin murmured.

  ‘You should. For a start, it’s over a big car showroom down in Seafield Road, specialising in high-value vehicles. But that’s his public face; he also owns a chain of bookie’s shops under the name John Jackson, and a couple of taxi firms, Carole’s Cabs, and Sherlock Private Hire. The first one’s called after his wife, the second he bought from Perry Holmes, the guy that Bella Watson’s brother Billy tried to kill.’

  ‘You seem to know a lot about him.’

  ‘Oh, I do.’ I felt my mouth tighten as I thought of Jackie Charles. He had been a neighbour of mine at one time, out in Gullane, before he went upmarket and bought a big pile in Ravelston Dykes. Myra and Carole were part of the same crowd of young women in a group called the Housewives’ Register . . . God knows who came up with that name . . . so we often went to the same parties. I’d found them a bit awkward, though, and eventually I stopped going; I’d stay home and babysit while Myra went without me. My hesitancy came from what, by that time, I’d learned about Jackie’s other activities. He was what might be called a business angel, in that he put up the capital, and lent organisational skills to entrepreneurial ventures. The problem was that these ventures were armed robberies, not just in the Edinburgh area but all over Britain, but Jackie was too smart ever to be linked to any of them.

  I didn’t tell any of this to my young colleague though, not then, because it would have taken him into areas of my life that I wasn’t ready to share with him. ‘Dougie Terry works for Jackie,’ I said. ‘He looks after the below-the-parapet businesses, but he does other stuff as well, disciplinary matters, let’s say.’

  ‘Charles is bent?’

  ‘Charles is one of the two big players these days in organised crime in Edinburgh, the other being Tony Manson.’

  Martin frowned. ‘Are you saying that he might have had Marlon killed?’

  ‘That’s what’s perplexing me,’ I confessed. ‘There’s a loose business relationship between Jackie and Tony. Charles stays out of the pubs, drugs and prostitution and Manson doesn’t step on his toes.’ As I spoke I pulled up outside a house in Clermiston Road. Once it had been council property, but now in the aftermath of the Right to Buy, it had been augmented with every build-on imaginable, save for a machine-gun turret. I parked behind a Ford Mondeo and across the driveway, blocking the exit of a Mercedes S class saloon, with a personalised registration plate.

  I walked up to the door and gave it the policeman’s knock. Martin started to count, but
I told him not to bother. ‘There’ll be nothing to hide in here.’ And then I smiled. ‘By the way, there’s something I forgot . . .’

  Before I could finish, the door was opened by a slim woman in her late thirties with a soft perm and hard eyes. ‘Morning, Jane,’ I said. ‘We’d like a word with Douglas.’

  ‘I’m sure you would. Come in then.’ She didn’t argue about it; she’d got past that stage years before. ‘Douglas,’ she shouted, at the foot of the stairs. ‘Police.’

  She opened the door to a well-furnished sitting room. ‘I’ll be off out,’ she declared. That was par for the course. On the three or four occasions that I’d rousted Dougie at home he’d always made her leave, so that under no circumstances could she be called to witness anything that might be said: super-cautious.