Tony Black - Long Time Dead

She flagged me down, went over to Shaky. ‘You know he’s been up to all kinds of shit…’ She pointed at Gemmill. He looked ready to bolt. ‘He was supplying Ben Laird with drugs behind your back!’

Shaky started to laugh. ‘Nobody does fuck all in this toon behind my back, darlin’.’ He stood up, walked over to Gemmill, said, ‘Danny here’s on my payroll and he knows a good thing when he sees it… unlike some.’ He turned back to Amy. ‘You’re a braw-looking lassie, hen. Ever think ay coming to work for the likes ay me?… Set you up in one ay my saunas no trouble.’

Amy spat at the ground. Shaky laughed. Danny followed suit.

‘Okay… okay… I’ll take that as a no.’

Amy started to speak again: ‘That’s not all-’ but I grabbed her arm, pulled her to me and clamped a hand over her mouth.

‘Wise move,’ said Shaky, ‘that lassie’s gonna get you lot into trouble… more trouble, that is.’ He looked at Hod. ‘Where’s my money, y’cunt?’

Hod stepped forward, went into his pocket and withdrew a manila envelope stuffed with notes – I knew at once it was the money we’d taken from Gillian Laird, to find her son’s killer. Shaky grabbed the cash. ‘What’s this, best part ay a grand?… That’s no’ gonna buy you much time.’

‘You’ll get the rest,’ Hod told him.

I could sense the wheels turning in Shaky’s head. He looked at Gemmill and then he looked back to us. ‘I want the rest ay this, mind…’

‘You’ll get it,’ said Hod.

Shaky pocketed the cash, started to button up his overcoat. ‘Oh, I know I will…’ he walked over to Amy, eyed her up and down, ‘one way or another.’

My fists clenched. I was ready to lay into him, but the part of the brain that deals with self-preservation was holding me in check. The pug pushed us aside as Shaky headed for the door.

‘One last thing,’ he said, ‘this Laird laddie… I don’t want to hear you’ve been poking about in his death again, got me?’

I looked at Gemmill; he was staring at his shoes.

‘Why, what’s it got to do with you?’ I asked.

Gemmill suddenly came to life for the first time: ‘You’ll just do what yer fucking told, Dury!’

Shaky laughed, ‘Don’t mind him. He means well, just a wee bit sparky. He’s right about one thing, though: I hear you’ve been poking about in the Laird boy’s death again, Dury, and your girl-friend’ll be walking Leith Links… in black.’

A LIFT BACK TO THE city was way too much to expect. Shaky and his crew bailed on us without so much as a backwards glance. We all watched as the Bedford pumped blue-grey smoke into the countryside and rattled up the dirt track.

‘Where the fuck are we?’ said Mac.

He was looking at Hod, but didn’t get an answer. I tried friendly, verging on optimistic: ‘Well, we’ve got a nice day for a walk.’

Amy looked pensive. She scratched her elbow as she began to speak, ‘There’s something you should know…’

Now she had our attention.

‘Go on.’

‘When I was talking to Danny… before the date, he told me that Ben Laird owed him money.’

‘He what?’

She dropped her arms to her side, ‘I know he’s shitting it that the police will find out.’

I cut in, ‘He’s no danger there. Plod is officially sweeping this one under the carpet.’

Hod spoke, ‘Aye, but Shaky doesn’t know that.’

It was the first bit of room we’d had to manoeuvre. There was no getting around Shaky’s threat to stay away from the case, but now we knew what was behind his threat, we could act on it. ‘He’s running scared, then…’

‘Do you think Gemmill’s had something to do with the murder?’ said Mac.

I didn’t know the answer to that, there were far too many variables floating about, but I knew one thing. ‘He looked scared enough to have.’

‘Aye, but you’d be looking scared too if you had just pissed off Shaky in that fashion,’ said Hod.

He had a point.

‘Maybe we should start taking a closer look at Danny Gemmill,’ said Mac.

‘Well, somebody should…’

‘What do you mean by that?’

I walked to the edge of the building, took out my mobi, dialled.

Ringing.

An answer: ‘Fitzsimmons.’

‘Are you glad to hear from me?’

‘Jaysus, Dury…’ He lowered his voice. ‘What have I told you about ringin’ me on the landline?’

‘Never mind that. I need to meet you.’

‘Out of the question. I’m up to me eyes in it here.’

‘I have some very interesting information about that case… one your nephew is involved in.’

A gap on the line.

Long exhalation of breath.

Sighs. ‘Okay, give me a place.’

‘How about the Regent… top of Abbeymount.’

‘Christ Almighty, that’s a feckin’ fruity bar!’

‘Yeah, I know… Don’t go changing. I thought it would be the last place we’d be expected. Say about eight tonight?’

Fitz agreed, hung up.

I motioned the others back to the dirt road, said, ‘Get those thumbs out – gonna need them.’

I traipsed down the Mile, past a shower of crusty, dreadlocked fire-eaters and a unicyclist in a jester’s hat. Never ceases to amaze me the characters this Festival attracts – every one a total bell-end. I turned eyes to the sky, longing for the day this annual nonsense would all be over.

There was a jakey with a paper cup full of coins sitting outside the Hootsman building. He smiled a toothless grin at me; I matched him with my own, dropped in a few pence.

‘Thank you, sir… have a nice day now.’

Fuck me, it had come to something when even the beggars in this city had completed customer appreciation courses. I marched through the front door, rocked up to the wall panel that had replaced the receptionists, and buzzed for Rasher.

In the elevator I removed the can of Guinness I was carrying in my jacket pocket, took a reassuring belt on it. The smooth liquid soothed me as it went down, but I knew there was a deeper craving calling out to be settled. I couldn’t give in to it, though; if I did, it might just be my last.

Sky News played in the newsroom – some twenty-one-year-old was reading the day’s headlines in a cocktail dress and push-up bra. I shook my head. There was a big picture of Rupert Murdoch on one of the monitors as I passed. The place was abuzz with the announcement that he was going to start charging for web content on his newspapers’ sites. ‘Quality journalism doesn’t come cheap…’ was his explanation. I had to laugh: he owned the Sun . And he’d aged so much he now looked like Yoda’s sack.

Rasher greeted me in the middle of the floor. ‘Gus lad… good to see you.’ It was all a bit forced, but welcome none the less… I needed all the help I could get.

I returned the bonhomie with some good Scots derision: ‘What you after?’

‘Nothing… nothing.’

He’d be telling me he was just being friendly next. Never trust a friendly hack – rule one in the manual.

We strolled through to his office. The newsroom had been decimated. Even thinner than the last time I’d been around, said, ‘Where the fuck is everyone?’

‘Ah, we bumped the sub-editors.’

‘You what? How do you put out a paper without subs?’

I could tell he was still trying to figure that one out. ‘The reporters write into boxes… read over each other’s copy.’

I almost laughed. The idea of a reporter writing a paragraph that didn’t need rewriting was a stretch. ‘And what happens when the first big court action comes in because your eighteen-year-old hack missed the legal?’

Rasher frowned, looked skywards. ‘Upstairs have budgeted for that.’