Tony Black - Loss

I’d disturbed the balance of the truck — it started to slide on the road.

‘Whoa, whoa… Cool the beans there,’ said Mac.

I locked it down, sat back in my seat. Davie toppled over. His knees hit the ground, his legs buckled under his weight. I grabbed him by the collar, hauled him up. He winced in pain, shrieked, ‘I haven’t done anything wrong…’

‘Shut it.’ He sounded pathetic. I couldn’t believe the way he was still yabbering, after all he’d done. After all the grief that Davie’s antics had brought to me and Debs, to Jayne… the death of Michael, and Andy, and Ian Kerr. And now there was Alice. Oh Christ, Alice. The snow was falling heavily now: she couldn’t survive much longer.

‘Davie, let me say this only once.’ I tried to keep my voice steady, but it quivered, betraying my emotion. ‘The Undertaker has my niece bound and gagged in a field, there is a hole in the ground dug for her. The only hope for that girl is you. Do you understand?’

Davie’s face froze, turned white. His lips tightened into a knot and refused to let out any words. He nodded.

‘When I hand you over, Davie, I don’t care what he does to you. I don’t care whether he demands money or puts you in the ground… All I care about now is Alice.’

The words seemed to register with him; he turned away. Davie stared out of the window like a man who was watching his final moments in slow-mo. I hoped he was thinking about what he had done. About how his actions, his greed, had hurt so many others, and was hurting them yet. I wanted Davie to feel the pain I felt. I knew he hadn’t murdered my brother but he had played his part, and I wanted revenge.

The roads grew busy but Mac pushed on and flashed the oncoming traffic as we powered through the town. The snow pelted down, and the sky darkened with cloud covering; if there were night stars out, they weren’t shining over us.

Christmas Eve revellers started to appear, groups of lads tanked up on designer lager and barely dressed young girls staggering from bar to bar. In an hour the blokes would be singing ‘Danny Boy’ and the girls walking barefoot, their heels in their hands. There would be barf swimming in the gutters and aggro in the kebab shops. Just another Christmas Eve in Edinburgh, but it stung me to think of anyone enjoying themselves while Alice faced a grim death.

I looked at the thermometer in the dash: it was eight-below.

‘Can’t you go any fucking faster?’ I yelled.

‘Trying… trying.’ Mac rounded the bend onto the Grassmarket. A tart in reindeer antlers was touching up a guy in a Santa hat; they stood bang middle of the road, going for it. Mac slammed on the anchors, yelled out, ‘Get up a close!’

The wee hingoot twisted her face and Santa hat pulled in his belt, headed for the car. Mac yanked on the handbrake, opened the door. The guy strutted as he walked towards the truck. He put back his shoulders, gave Mac a come-ahead flick of the fingers. Mac managed three or four paces on his sore ankle, let the guy get closer on his own. When he drew up to the bumper Mac put him down with one sledgehammer right. It was clinical. He dragged him to the side of the road and got back in the cab, gunned the engine. The tart took off her antlers as we passed.

The end of the road looked like a Hieronymus Bosch painting, bodies seething everywhere. Queues from the pubs spilled onto the road. Mac blasted the horn and swerved. The Hilux mounted the kerb as we drove onto West Port; we hit fifty before Tollcross. The truck skidded to a halt outside a busy pub, folk queuing to get in already.

I leaned over and opened Davie’s door, said, ‘Out!’

He was silent now, accepting.

Mac hobbled behind me on his one good ankle, jangling the car keys. ‘Right, let’s fucking nash.’

The snowfall was heavier than I’d seen it all year, and it was the harshest winter I could remember. I thought again of Alice, out in that field, tied to a rusting tractor axle. She was so thin, so frail. I couldn’t believe she wouldn’t perish. I tried to focus, to get moving. I knew I was her only hope — but I just couldn’t shake the sight of her, the image that the Undertaker had shown me on that phone haunted me.

I pushed Davie in the back. ‘I’m telling you now, Davie, anything’s happened to my niece… you’re fucking well done for.’

He slipped in the street, fell. The knees of his beige Farah trousers turned black. I put a grip on his belt and hauled him to his feet. His soft shoes slid about all over the pavement as he walked, glancing back at us.

‘Just fucking get going,’ said Mac.

At the Undertaker’s lap-dancing bar in the Pubic Triangle a flannel-shirted Scouser was arguing the toss after being refused entry. I didn’t recognise the doorman, but I recognised the type. I fronted up, said, ‘We’re expected.’

‘By who?’ He put in some attitude.

We didn’t have time for games and Mac knew it. His chest went out. ‘Ronnie fucking McMilne… Don’t play wide, y’arsehole, or I’ll hand you yer eyes.’

The lump did a mental calculation, nodded us inside. We got pointed up the stairs and told to turn left at the mirrored door. ‘Ronnie’s in the office, down the end of the hall.’

I pushed Davie up the stairs. He was dripping wet now as the snow melted on him. He stumbled and dropped into a crawl for a few steps. I put a hand under his arm and yanked him up. He gasped for air as we reached the landing.

‘Down here,’ said Mac. He led the way to the end of the corridor, pushed open the Undertaker’s door. He was the first to be greeted as we walked in.

‘It’s yer bold self,’ said McMilne, ‘Mac the Knife, indeed.’ He sat on a leather chair, his feet up on the desk as Only Fools spat canned laughter from a wee portable. Dartboard and Sammy picked over the remains of a pizza box that Sammy held in his hands like a chav laptop. They laughed at the telly as Del Boy and Rodney appeared in Batman and Robin costumes.

‘Ron,’ said Mac.

‘Haven’t seen you for a while, you still…?’ He made a slicing motion in front of him, as though he was carving someone with a Stanley blade.

Mac shook his head, turned to me.

‘Can we get down to fucking business?’ I said. ‘I thought it was this cunt you wanted to see.’ I dragged fat Davie to the middle of the room.

The Undertaker sat up in his chair; he put those falsers of his on display. ‘Ah, you found him.’ He seemed unimpressed, turned back to the telly. Dartboard and Sammy picked anchovies off the pizza, dropped them in the box. They got in the way of the telly and the Undertaker kicked off. ‘Get oot the fucking road!’

I looked away. A black-and-white monitor showed pictures from the floor of girls with their baps out, dancing round poles. I tried again. ‘Yeah, so… I’ve done my bit,’ I said.

The Undertaker looked irritated, turned and sized me up. ‘So fucking what?’

A bolt of adrenaline hit me, the flash of heat going to my head. I stormed over to the desk and slapped down my palms. As I moved I felt Mac pull me back but I shrugged him off, roared, ‘I want my fucking niece and I want my brother’s fucking killer!’

The Undertaker lifted a thin leg, then another, lowered his feet to the floor. He sat forward in the leather chair and made a steeple of his long fingers. ‘And just what’re you gonna do if I say no, laddie?’

Dartboard and Sammy threw down their pizza slices. I stepped away from the desk and looked at Mac. He squared his shoulders. Fat Davie trembled so much beside me that I could hear the change rattling in his pockets. The television blared on; Only Fools had finished — they started singing about Hookey Street being magnifique.

The Undertaker stood up. He was the tallest in the room by a head, but his frame was stooped as his neck jutted forward. He looked like a lamp post that had been struck by a car. ‘I’ve missed the end now,’ he said. ‘I fucking like that show as well.’