Quintin Jardine: Stay of Execution

‘Still am. I’ll talk about him when it’s right, don’t worry. James Andrew and Seonaid. . and Mark; even though he’s adopted and has a living granddad of his own. . should know about him, about who he was and what he was. It concerns me when I hear of sections of family history dying with successive generations. Did I ever tell you I had an ancestor who was press-ganged to fight against Napoleon? That story was given to me by an aunt, but she never wrote it down, so now even if I was inclined to try to trace him, I would have trouble.’

‘Come on, man,’ Neil McIlhenney chuckled. ‘You’re a detective.’

‘Maybe so, but you know as well as I do. . or you bloody should, Inspector. . that every investigation has to start somewhere. I don’t even have a name I can be sure of, never mind a place and year of birth.’ He grinned, laugh-lines crinkling round his eyes. ‘I might still write a book about him one day, though.’

‘How can you, if you can’t trace him?’

‘I might do what a few unscrupulous coppers have done before now: falsify the evidence.’

‘Eh?’

‘Make it up. I’m talking about fiction, Neil. It’s a long way off, though; writing’s one of my retirement dreams.’

McIlhenney frowned. ‘You’re not thinking about writing your memoirs, are you?’

‘No way! I’d have to leave too much out.’

‘How’s Sarah?’ Louise asked suddenly. ‘You haven’t mentioned her all evening.’

‘Fine,’ Bob replied absently. ‘She’s fine. So are the kids; the bold boy Jazz has started school now, God help them.’

‘Fine she may seem,’ his hostess interrupted, ‘but she must still be feeling the loss of her parents.’

‘Of course. It’s been a lousy year for her: for both of us, for that matter, with my health scare as well. We’ll be glad to see the back of it.’

She smiled. ‘Well, here’s something that might cheer you up. This old lady’s pregnant.’

Bob sat bolt upright in his chair. He stared at her, mouth agape, then at Neil. ‘You what?’ he exclaimed. ‘Congratulations. Nah, that doesn’t go far enough, at. .’ He stopped abruptly.

‘At my age, were you going to say?’ Louise teased.

‘No, of course not!’

‘Of course yes, but it doesn’t matter. We’ve taken medical advice, I’ve had every physical you could imagine and we’ve been assured that everything’s fine. I’ve been told not to run any marathons this winter, but that wasn’t on my game plan anyway.’

‘Well, that’s just great. What do Lauren and Spence think of it?’ Neil’s children from his first marriage were watching television in the room that Lauren insisted on calling ‘the study’.

‘I suspect that my daughter thinks it’s disgusting,’ said her father. ‘Kids her age think that people our age are supposed to stop all that stuff, but they’re both acting pleased.’

‘Too right. Does anyone else know?’

Louise shook her head. ‘You’re the first other than them through the wall. We’re going to tell Mario once he gets back from his New York trip.’

‘I hope you ask him to be godfather. He’ll be great.’

‘He is,’ Neil reminded him. ‘He’s Spencer’s god-dad. But if he’s to do it again, we might need to put a word in for him with Jim Gainer. I don’t imagine he’s his Church’s favourite son at the moment, being separated and everything else.’

Bob shrugged. ‘That’s between him and his conscience. . and Maggie to an extent, although I’ve spoken to both of them and their separation does seem amicable.’ He looked his friend in the eye. ‘Between you and me, is she involved with anyone else?’

McIlhenney hesitated. ‘She’s been out with Stevie Steele a couple of times, but just for dinner; no afters. They’re friends, and that’s all. Stevie’s got a girlfriend on the go just now, anyway.’

Skinner gave a snorting laugh. ‘Steele’s always got a girlfriend on the go: and I doubt if that would stop him.’

‘It won’t arise in this case.’

‘What won’t?’ Bob’s right eyebrow rose.

His friend caught his meaning. ‘Not that or anything else. Like I said, they’re pals, and that’s as far as it’ll go.’

‘You seem sure.’

‘I am. I know the whole story behind the split.’

‘Is it something I should know?’

McIlhenney smiled ‘No. It won’t be a problem for you. Maggie isn’t into men right now, and that’s all there is to it. She’s fully focused on her career.’

‘Okay,’ said Skinner. ‘That’s good enough for me.’ He finished his Amaretto, pushed himself out of his chair and peered through the curtains into the impenetrable murk. ‘Ouch!’ he murmured. ‘What a night. Thanks again, you two, for giving me a bed.’

‘That’s all right,’ Louise replied. ‘You have an important meeting tomorrow, I’m told. It would never do if you got lost in the fog on the way there!’

If wee Moash Glazier had been possessed of a slightly larger vocabulary than the one that he had picked up on his short, sad and furtive journey through life’s shady valleys, and across its rain-drenched plains, then he might well have agreed with the prosecutor who had once described him in the Sheriff Court as ‘an opportunist thief’.

As it was, he had understood the woman to have called him ‘an awfy stupid thief’, and had shouted, ‘Ah’m no’!’ across the room, to the immense displeasure of the Sheriff and at a consequent cost of a further thirty days for contempt, added to his six-month sentence for various offences.

Moash regarded himself as a working man. He supported himself, his greyhound, and his ferret, by stealing any everyday item that had been left unsecured and in his path by a negligent owner, and by selling it on at a knock-down price to unfussy buyers in the pubs that he frequented. He kept on the move; the speed with which he disposed of his haul, and the type of customer he found, meant that his arrest rate was relatively low.

He had a genuine dislike for the unemployed, or at least for those who made no attempt to find work, and he stole from them as readily as from anyone else within his field of vision. Moash applied a simple principle to his business life. He never lifted anything that was sufficiently unusual to attract attention, or so valuable that its owner became seriously excited about its loss. He was also circumspect about those from whom he stole, never forgetting a housebreaker acquaintance who had been unwise enough to have burgled the house of one Dougie ‘The Comedian’ Terry, and who had been the victim of a fatal fall from his own fourth-floor living-room window less than a week later.

His cautious approach did not always keep him out of trouble. Occasionally he would be caught in the act, or with goods still in his hands; he was familiar with the inside of the Sheriff Court and with the hotel accommodation in Saughton Prison. However, since he was never worth jailing for too long, he took such minor blips in his stride. His most serious and most embarrassing mistake came one evening in a bar in Newhaven where he attempted to sell a plumber the tools of which he had relieved him two hours earlier. That had earned him a kicking which he had found much harder to take than a few weeks’ jail time and which had kept him out of action for even longer.

He had not been deterred, though, and had continued to ply his trade, without further serious mishap.

Where others might have been reluctant to go to work in severe weather conditions, wee Moash regarded them as windows of opportunity. People were distracted and tended to be even more careless than usual. Frost made them bundle up in thick overcoats, which could be easily nicked from restaurant waiting rooms, while rain made them keep their heads down, and much less likely to notice him as he went about his business.