"Who said I need an incentive? Has my Mum been talking about me?"
"Actually, she's been singing your praises. She says you're just like me when I was your age. What bigger compliment could there be? It's not quite true, though. When I was your age I wasn't your height and I still spoke with a bit of a squeak."
"Do you think I'm too young to have a girlfriend, Uncle Oz?" he asked me, seriously. I guessed that he and Ellie had been in a confrontation, and I knew automatically that he'd lost.
This was the chat I'd been meaning to have with him. "I think you're too young to have sex with a girlfriend," I told him, slowly, 'especially if she's under sixteen too, however arbitrary you may think the law is in this matter. I don't think you're too young to have a special friend who is a girl, as long as you keep the physical side of it under control. The danger is, when your manhood is pointing skywards most of the time, that can be very difficult. I remember that all too well."
"Did you manage?" he asked boldly. "You and Aunt Jan?"
"That is none of your damn business, boy," I told him. "But as a matter of fact we did, although I admit it was more down to her self-control than mine. I'll tell you something else too. It was all the more worth it in the end. Self-control is the second most difficult art for a man to master, but when we do we find that we're in control of more than ourselves."
"What's the most difficult?"
"Sincerity. As Bob Monkhouse said, master that and you've cracked it."
As I spoke we passed out of Pittenweem and I took a right turn. "Where are we going?" Jonny asked. I said nothing, but drove. Not far along the road, a sign pointed right again, to Arncroach; I swung the Lotus into the narrow road.
"Uncle Oz." I could feel the panic rising in him. "Where are we going?" he repeated.
"You know where we're going, Jonny, don't you?" I had to raise my voice above the sound of the engine and the rush of the air. He simply nodded, and then the tears began. His wide, but still bony shoulders started to shake, and he buried his face in his hands. There was an opening ahead, a recessed farm gate that served as a makeshift lay-by.
I slowed and pulled in there.
"Do you love your Granddad that much, son, that you did that for him?"
"I didn't mean to," he whispered.
"You were listening to us, weren't you?" I asked him. "That day in Elie when we were in the pub, talking, and you were outside; you were listening." I could picture it in my mind; our table, an open window.
"I didn't mean to do that either," he sniffed, 'but I thought it was strange you not asking me inside when there was hardly anyone there.
And I could tell there was something wrong with Granddad too; he wasn't acting like himself at all. I thought he must have cancer or something, and I was frightened. I heard it all, Uncle Oz; all that he said about those terrible people threatening him. And I heard how afraid he sounded."
He wiped his eyes. "I hoped you would go and beat them up, make them stop."
"I did, son, I did… only they didn't stop."
"I know. After that I started going to see him as often as I could. I would get on my bike after school and cycle over to Anstruther. We'd talk like we've always done, but I could tell he wasn't right. He was bad-tempered, and once he even hit Colin. I couldn't tell him that I knew, of course. I just had to look at him, sitting there worrying, but having to keep it hidden from everybody. I felt so sorry for him and so angry with them."
"So you called them. You phoned them up, didn't you?"
"Uh-huh." He nodded. "I found their number in the book and I phoned them. He answered. I tried to make myself sound older and I said "It's Mac Blackstone. Okay, I'll pay you, but I don't want to be seen." And I told them both to meet me… to meet Granddad… at the farm. I didn't know whether they believed me or not."
"Obviously they did. How did you know about the farm, son?"
"The farmer's the uncle of a boy I'm at school with. He and I went there one day, on our bikes. I knew there wouldn't be anyone there, not in the evening at least."
"And the gun? Where did you get the shotgun, Jonny?"
"It's my dad's. He bought it and got a permit and everything when he joined that shooting club, and then when we moved to France he took it.
Everyone's got a shotgun there. When we came back, it was packed with our stuff by mistake, in its wrapper, and the shells in their box. I took it in my light golf bag, over my shoulder, on my bike."
I threw my head back, banging it against the seat's restraint. My daft sister. Keeping an unregistered firearm in the house. "Mum was going to give it back to him the first time he came to St. Andrews; but he never has."
No, he hadn't, had he. Allan Sinclair, would-be country sportsman and father of the year.
"I only took it to frighten them, Uncle Oz, honest." Jonathan was wide-eyed; he is also incapable of lying. "They turned up all right, when I said. I was hiding in the sheds, and when they got near I stepped out and I pointed the gun at them. I remember shouting, "You leave my Granddad alone, do you understand, or else." The man just laughed at me. She wasn't so sure, but he just laughed and he came to take the gun away from me. He grabbed the barrel and tried to pull it out of my hand… and it went off!"
As he spoke, his voice had risen, and risen. I put a hand on his shoulder, to calm his hysteria.
"It was awful, Uncle Oz." Jonny was crying again. "There was a huge bang, and he fell down. He rolled about for a bit, but then he was still. Honest, Uncle Oz, I didn't even know the gun was loaded."
"Fuck me," I whispered. Allan Sinclair, would-be country sportsman who was so incredibly stupid as to leave a loaded shotgun in a house with kids in it.
"She started screaming then," Allan's son, my nephew, continued, 'and so did I. The gun had a sort of a pump thing on it; I was frightened so I pulled it, and then the gun just went off again. She was further away and it hit her in the chest and face. Ahh!" The boy screamed again, at the memory. "It was awful. And then she was dead, they were both dead."
I waited for his sobs to subside; it took a while. "So you hid them in the pig troughs?" I asked him, quietly, once I thought he was ready.
He nodded a silent 'yes'. "It was hard, but I did. I was scared stiff, Uncle Oz. I still am. I'll go to prison, won't I?" he asked, his child's eyes big in his young man's face. It appalled me that in a few minutes our conversation had come from the sexual confusion of the average adolescent, to this dark place.
I reached out an arm and hugged him, awkwardly in the confines of the car. "No, son," I told him. "You won't go anywhere. If you'd only spoken to me, though."
He looked at me, sideways. "I was afraid that if I did you might have killed them, and then you'd have got into trouble."
I felt tears well in my own eyes. "Aw, Jonny, love. So you wound up killing them yourself instead." It was a while before I could speak again.
When I could, I told him that I had sent Jay up to get rid of them. I told him that he had found a note in the cottage about the meeting, and I told him that he had made everything all right. I even told him that Jay thought I had done it, and that I wasn't about to advise him otherwise.
"You don't have to worry, son," I promised him. "Ever. That doesn't mean that you forget, though. You will never speak of what happened at that farm again, as long as you live. But you'll remember it always.
It's your own private burden to carry for ever. You've got the strength for it; you may doubt it now, but believe me, you have. Never forget this either, though. Those people were as bad as you could ever imagine, but they were not worth risking your life over."
"But I did it for Granddad," he protested.
"He's not worth it either, nor am I. You are more precious than the two of us put together, and don't you ever forget it. Remember this too.
Don't you ever go tackling trouble alone, not as long as I'm alive."
I let him think about that for a while as I looked at him. Be it by accident, terror-stricken panic or whateve
r, he'd killed two people, this lad, this gawky boy. And yet he'd been brought to it by the purest motivator of all: love.
I don't care how anybody else might look at him. As far as I'm concerned he's a bloody hero.
"Now," I demanded, forcing myself into action and starting the car once more, 'about this gun. Where is it?"
"Back at St. Andrews. I didn't want my Mum to know it was missing, so I put it back."
I drove there as fast as I could, and I made him give it to me. "What about Mum?" he asked. "She'll notice it's gone, eventually."
"When she does, you'll tell her that you told me by accident that she had it, and that I went bananas and made you give it to me. That's the truth, more or less."
I took it and the ammo, put it in what passes for the trunk of the Lotus and drove the two of us back to Anstruther, for the weirdest family dinner I ever had. I couldn't take my eyes off Jonathan as we sat across the table from each other in the Craw's Nest dining room. He was paler than usual, and he didn't say much, but there was a quiet dignity about him.
And as I studied him, I thought of my own big problem, and I knew there was only one way for me to deal with it. I'd have come to that conclusion eventually anyway, but the example of the boy's unshakeable courage in defence of what he had thought was his grandfather's honour, left me, as I see it to this day, without any choice.
Forty-three.
I swung the BMW into the empty parking space. Saturday had come and gone, a day of golf in the morning, lazing in the afternoon and dinner in swank and splendour in the evening. Susie was still in St. Andrews, happily; she and Ellie have become almost as close as my sister was to my first, dead, wife, and that pleases me very much. I had told her I had left something at home that I needed, and she hadn't questioned me at all.
I was pleased that the parking spaces were empty. Almost certainly, it meant that he was alone, apart from the man mountain that is, if he counted as company.
Manolito answered my pressing of the buzzer. "Yesss?" he hissed. It was the first time I'd heard him speak, I realised.
"You know who this is," I said. "Put him on."
I didn't have to wait more than a second or two. "Yes, son," said Jack, metallically. "What can you do for me?"
"Deal," I told him.
"Sensible boy. Come on up."
"No bloody way am I stupid enough to come up there and be alone with you two. You come down and we go for a drive. Besides, I want it on my turf; I've got a reason."
I caught a moment's hesitation. "You realise Manolito will be coming with us?"
"Fine, as long as he doesn't overpower us with the intellectual purity of his discourse."
Jack cackled at that. "Don't worry, he won't say a word. Pull your car as close to the door as you can."
I did as he asked. There was nobody around when they emerged; that made me happy. Jack climbed in beside me and Manolito got in the back, blocking out most of the view in the mirror. I put the complex machine in Drive, and moved off.
Jack said nothing for a while. Instead he just looked out of the window, first to one side of the motorway, then to the other, gazing at the city, some of which he had helped to build, and over which he had presided, officially or unofficially, for years.
"Glasgow," I heard him whisper, as we passed under the sign for the airport turn-off.
"You're wise, boy," he said, finally, as we crossed the Erskine Bridge, deserted as always. "We both know you'd have been gubbed in court."
"That's my legal advice too," I admitted, seeing no reason to bullshit.
"How's Natalie?" I asked him. "Seen her since Mr. Perry met his end?"
"No. She called me when she heard about it. She was a bit upset, and more than a bit scared; she seemed to think I had something to do with it. Not that I had, of course." Hint then denial, I had learned that that was his way. It struck me also that he might suspect that the car was bugged.
"How about Kendall? He'll be working on your petition, I suppose."
"No. He'll be on his boat as usual, I suppose. I told him not to go any further at this stage. I was pretty certain I'd be hearing from you."
He didn't say any more; nor did I until we reached the estate. I didn't need to.
The gate opened automatically at the press of my remote control, and closed again after us. "Very nice," said Jack as we cruised up the drive and parked in front of the big house.
"It is," I agreed. "Let me show you around," I offered as the three of us stepped out into the late afternoon sunshine.
I gave him the complete guided tour of the house, including both conservatory wings, the office and the pool. He clucked and nodded all the way round.
"Very chic," he said as we finished.
"There's more," I told him. "The fun bits are outside." The buggy was parked at the back, not far from the area that Jay and I had chosen for the playground. One of the structures was in place, and the foundations were dug for another and part-filled with concrete. The cement mixer lay idle nearby.
With Manolito crouched on the golf bag platform, I drove us out and across the estate, until we came to the three-hole golf course. A bucket of balls lay on the ground and a set of clubs that I'd carelessly left out there. I took out a four iron and began hitting shots, aiming at the furthest green, and striking long and hard and straight. I noticed, though, that when I'd picked up the club, Manolito had positioned himself between me and his boss; sorry, his patient.
"What's the deal?" I asked quietly as I watched another Titleist arrowing towards the flag.
"Twenty pence a share, and that's pretty generous," said Jack.
"Have you any idea of current market value?"
"Of course I have. And are you familiar with the term "fuck all"? I'm sure you are. Well, that's the alternative."
"Elegantly put." I laid down the club and began to stroll across the grounds. "Now here's what I'd like." We were near the estate's high boundary wall and the trees that grew around it, planted to protect the owners' privacy still further. I threw out a hand in a sweeping gesture. "I'd like this place, and that's all. It belongs to the Gantry Group officially, but it's our home, and Susie and I love it."
The back gate lay open. I wandered towards and through it, Manolito a few paces behind, but Jack beside me, seeming to be considering what I'd said. "I can accommodate that," he announced, at last, 'if the value lies within the parameters of my offer. If it doesn't, you'll have to find some cash."
"Yeah, Jack?" I said, and I laughed. "Well, fuck you."
He stopped. "You think you can hard-ball me, son?" he exclaimed, sounding truly incredulous.
We had walked thirty yards or so down the path. "I think you're at it, old man," I told him.
He looked around. "You do, do you." He pointed to the marshy ground on either side of the track. "I may be a townie, but I know about these places, the bogs around Loch Lomondside. Have you any idea how deep they are?"
I shook my head.
"No," he said, almost greedily, 'and neither does anyone else. There's a right few of Glasgow's grimier citizens gone into these things, I'll tell you. Christ, you were feared to come up into the flat with us …"
A look of sheer mirth crossed his face '… and yet you were stupid enough to take us here."
He glanced over his shoulder, nodded towards me, and then towards the bog on our right. "Big fella," he called out. "Time to do some nursing."
I still hadn't seen Manolito smile, but there was a hint of one on his face as he started steadily towards me. I backed away from him, but then my foot seemed to catch on something. I fell backwards and rolled over.
The shotgun was there, where I'd planted it, hidden behind a log, partly wrapped in towels, to muffle the noise as best I could. It was in my hands as I spun and sprang to my feet.
I'd doctored the cartridges, putting extra pellets into each, but it wasn't until the third shot that Manolito stopped coming for me. That one went off with the barrel jammed into his throat, and it
separated his head cleanly from his shoulders. He didn't drop right away, though; instead he stood for a few seconds, twitching, until the message, or rather the lack of a message, got through and he crumpled up.
Before he'd hit the ground, I'd hit Jack; in the belly with the butt of the gun, winding him and sending him back in a heap on the track.
"Stay there," I warned him. I laid the weapon on the ground, clean lifted the thing at my feet and tossed it into the bog. Actually, it wasn't as impressive a feat as it looked, since the foreshortened Manolito was about thirty pounds lighter than before. He landed with a soft 'splodge' and disappeared beneath the black, gluey surface almost at once.
I turned back to Jack. He had recovered some of his composure, but not much of his breath, as he stared up at me. "Where do we go from here?" he gasped at last.
"You don't," I told him. "You stay here." I nodded sideways, at his grave.
"You're crazy," he whispered.
"That's a laugh coming from you."
"You'll never get away with it," he protested. "I'll be missed."
"By whom?" I asked him. "Natalie? I think not; she knows what you are now. Duncan Kendall? He'll be so busy fighting off Law Society complaints that he won't have time to think about you. Wylie Smith?
I've got news for you. Wylie had a chat with my friend Greg the other day. It could lead to him joining McPhillips and Company as a partner, but even if that doesn't happen, he wants no more to do with you and Duncan, and that is for sure. How about your old message boy, the First Minister? No, Jack; I reckon if he was here right now, he'd be holding my jacket."
A desperate, crafty look crept on to Gantry's face. "Aye, but what about Kevin and Mark? They'll be looking out for me."
I laughed at that. "I've just bunged Kevin and Mark ten grand for nothing. And what have they got with you gone? Glasgow between them, that's what." I took a step to the side, leaned over and picked up Manolito's head by the ears; even in death, his face was unblemished. I held it for Jack to see, and watched as he cringed away from it. Then I heaved it into the bog. "Anyway," I said to him, as it vanished, 'do you seriously think that I'm afraid of those two guys?"
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