Craig Russell - The Deep Dark Sleep

Sneddon looked past me again and jerked his head towards the door. ‘Go wait outside with Singer, Twinkle.’

‘Okey-dokey,’ said Twinkle behind me, somewhat mournfully. ‘Sorry, Mr Lennox …’

‘It’s okay, Twinkle,’ I said, still taking short breaths. ‘I know it’s just business.’

‘Okay… enlighten me,’ said Sneddon, after we were on our own.

‘I can’t prove any of this … and you’ve got to understand that I don’t want to prove any of this. All I want is to know who’s been trying to kill me and why.’

‘Go on …’

I groaned a little first. My shoulder sockets hurt like hell and I still felt sick from Twinkletoes’ punches. His half-heart-edness about beating me up hadn’t been transmitted to his fists.

‘Let’s go back to the Empire Exhibition robbery in Nineteen thirty-eight,’ I said. ‘It was the biggest raid in Glasgow history. One of three robberies, all record breakers. I am now one hundred per cent certain that it was Gentleman Joe who pulled them all off. Gentleman Joe and his band of anonymous merry men. But that copper got killed and everything went to hell. Four of the gang get the wind up, but Strachan and his apprentice, the so-called “Lad” keep running everything by the book. From what I’ve been able to find out, it was the Lad who did most of Strachan’s enforcing but, like the rest of the gang, his identity was kept well hidden from everyone.’

‘Get to the point, Lennox.’

‘Let’s say Strachan was the shooter. Killing that copper put a rope around everyone’s neck. So there was an argument. Before he died, Stewart Provan told me that the gang split up after the raid and arranged to meet up a week later at the Bennie Railplane hangar. The three reckon they’re going to be double-crossed by Strachan and the Lad, so they do a bit of double-crossing themselves. Emotions are running high because of the murder and shots are fired. Strachan or one of his crew ended up dead. My money has always been on Strachan, because the bones they dredged up fit with a taller man. So he takes the deep, dark sleep at the bottom of the Clyde and no one gets to know where the money is. Except that doesn’t make sense, because Strachan’s wife and twin daughters get a grand apiece, every year on the anniversary of the Empire Exhibition robbery. So my guess is someone did get to the money. The whole pot. And kept it stashed nice and safe over the war years.’

‘And who do you think that someone was? From what you’re saying, it sounds like I was right and Gentleman Joe survived,’ said Sneddon.

‘Not necessarily. There was a member of the Empire Exhibition team who was even more of a ruthless son of a bitch than Strachan. The one they called the Lad. He sits tight. Maybe does his war service, while all the time he knows that when demobilization comes he’ll be sitting on a gold mine. Enough money to … well, what could he do with money like that? He could set himself up in some far-flung part of the world, but keep looking over his shoulder, or he could build a power base that would make him the one to be feared. The one whom others look over their shoulders for. So that’s what he does. He becomes the richest, most powerful organized crime boss in Glasgow. You’re the King of Kings, after all, aren’t you, Mr Sneddon? You had the viciousness and the ambition all along, but now you had the working capital. It was you: you were the Lad. And you know all about the money the twins get every year because you send it, don’t you?’

I grinned. I was a smart guy. I had it all figured out and I had to go and prove I had it all figured out. I was so smart that I’d talked my way into an early grave. Sneddon didn’t call for Twinkletoes. He would do this himself. No one could know what I knew.

‘And what makes you so sure of that?’ he asked in a quiet, calm voice.

‘I came to you to ask where I could find Billy Dunbar, and during our talk, I tell you that I’m looking into Joe Strachan’s disappearance. The next day, I’m jumped in a foggy alley by someone who tells me to drop the whole thing. The only people I suspect of having dropped me in it are the police: I never, for a second, think that it might have been you. Then I see Billy Dunbar who spins me an elaborate line of bull that just might be true. But he lets it slip that you put him onto the gamekeeper’s job because you knew about the vacancy. You knew about it because you created it when that gamekeeper stumbled on you, Strachan and the others practising for the Exhibition job.’

Sneddon laughed. It was something I’d never seen him do. ‘You know, Lennox, you’re really something. You really want to rush headlong into an early grave, don’t you?’

‘Maybe I’ll get some peace there,’ I said. It wasn’t a wisecrack.

‘Go on,’ said Sneddon.

‘My guess is that you killed Strachan when you went back to the hangar, and probably Mike Murphy too. Then you hunted the others down, ending with a bomb in Stewart Provan’s car today. But back to Dunbar … you and Billy Dunbar are old mates, and Dunbar doesn’t have two pennies to rub together, so you concocted the whole Strachan as an officer crap. You knew that I would have found out about Strachan’s gimmick of impersonating officers at the end of the First War, and how he could pass himself off as anyone, anywhere. It was wild enough for me to swallow it. In the meantime, you hire some officer-type ex-commando to scare me off and when that doesn’t work, you tell him to kill me.’

‘You think you’re such a clever cookie, don’t you, Lennox?’ said Sneddon.

‘I was just complimenting myself on that very fact.’ My voice was dull now. I was exhausted. And I knew that I was going to die.

‘Why do you send the money to the girls, Sneddon?’ I asked. ‘I can’t believe you have any kind of conscience. Sending that cash exposes you, so why?’

He smiled. I didn’t like that. Not one bit. He came around behind me. I was going to get it in the neck, or the back of the head. I looked up at the chains: there was nothing I could do. At least it would be quick.

Suddenly I was on the grimy floor, coils of chains cascading down on me. Sneddon had unhitched the gear, releasing me. He was round in front of me again. He pocketed his gun and sat back down on the chair. Twinkletoes burst through the factory door.

‘Everything all right, boss?’ he asked, looking across to me. ‘I heard some cacko-phoney .’

‘Everything is fine. Twinkle. Mr Lennox and I have sorted out our misunderstanding. Wait outside, we’ll be out in a minute.’

‘I don’t get it …’ I said, for once out of wisecracks. I eased the chains from around my wrists.

‘No you don’t, Lennox. You’re right: I was “the Lad”, all right. Joe Strachan taught me everything I know.’

‘So you did take part in the Triple Crown robberies?’

‘There are some things I’m not going to admit to. Some things that are locked up tight for good. You draw your own conclusions. But know this, Lennox. I didn’t kill Joe Strachan. Yes, it’s me who sends the twins the cash every year. You’ve asked why, and I’ll tell you. I send them the money because they’re my half-sisters.’

‘You’re Strachan’s son?’

‘I tracked him down. I don’t fool myself that I wasn’t one of the many bastards that Strachan had fathered. I found out later that my Ma had been a real looker when she was young. And Joe Strachan always had an eye for the ladies. They have a thing going and she gets knocked up. She dumps me as soon as I’m born and I end up being raised in an orphanage. That’s where I learn that you’ve got to be top fucking dog or you’re nothing at all. It took me an age to find my Ma and then Gentleman Joe. I took a length of lead pipe along to our father-son reunion, but things turned out all weird. I swear he was nearly in fucking tears when I told him I was his son. He just had the twin girls, you see, and Strachan was full of that crap about passing something on. A son to inherit the empire. So yes, I was the Lad. But he didn’t call me that because I was his apprentice, I was his son. So when I told you I took over his wee empire,’ said Sneddon, ‘that’s exactly what I did. I inherited my father’s estate.’