Irvine Welsh - The Blade Artist

— Thanks for coming tae the funeral. Frank Begbie turns to face his seasoned comrade. — Sorry I had tae abscond early before we had a chance to chat. And thanks for getting rid of Morrison. Water off a duck’s back tae me, but it upset some ay the family.

— He’s aw mooth. Eywis wis.

Franco isn’t interested in discussing Cha Morrison, or much else with Nelly. It’s Anton he wants to meet. — Listen, mate, it’s good tae see ye n aw that, but ah’m no really in the mood tae socialise.

— Neither am ah, Nelly grimly replies. — Tyrone wants tae see ye, Frank.

— Aw aye?

— We kin dae this the easy wey or the hard wey. Nelly stands up, rippling with muscle, as the barmaid takes a couple of discreet steps back towards the till.

— Tell ye what, Frank Begbie says, raising his hands in a surrender gesture, — lit’s dae it the easy wey, ah’m way past the cowboy stuff these days. Besides, he laughs, squeezing Nelly’s biceps, — ah dinnae really fancy ma chances. Lookin good, buddy boy!

— Top man, Nelly grins. — Aye, ah’ve been takin care ay masel. He flushes with pride. — You n aw, he says with an appreciative once-over at Franco. — Nae hurry though, and he looks at the barmaid and orders a pint of lager. — You no drinkin?

— Sacked the peeve a while back. Helps ye tae see things a bit mair clearly, Franco smiles, then nods in the direction of the toilets. — Back in a minute, got tae get a pish.

— Nae sneakin away, Nelly chides.

— Ye’d only find me, Franco chuckles, pointing at him.

— Count on it.

Franco heads off to the toilet. He drains his bladder and thinks about the old days with Nelly. They’d always had a rivalry, sometimes friendly, sometimes not so, since they were boys back in Leith. Then, after that, even working together as enforcers for Tyrone hadn’t quelled the competitiveness between them. Well, he was now out of that scene. That field was all Nelly’s.

At the bar Nelly is settling into his pint of Stella, enjoying the first couple of cold swallows. Something stings his back, like an insect bite. It burns deeper and then he can see the terror in the eyes of the barmaid in front of him. He tries to rise, but an arm has locked round his neck, and the pain grows more intense, ripping into the core of him. As the grip relaxes, Nelly’s head swims and he crashes to the floor, his blood oozing onto the tiles.

Frank Begbie pulls out the bloodied knitting needle, with its sharpened point. — Changed my mind, he sneers at the prostrate, bleeding figure. — Let’s dae it the hard wey.

He looks to the terrified girl behind the bar. — Phone the ambulance, no the polis. Hurry, cause ah spiked his liver, he says, thinking about how easy precision made things. It astonishes him just how much of an amateur (albeit a highly enthusiastic one) he’d been in his previous life, getting through on sheer aggression rather than calculated design.

Then Frank Begbie waves a fifty-pound note in front of the two old guys and winks, placing it in the pocket of the more familiar of them. — Right, Franco, the old villain says cheerfully, as if he’d just purchased a few sweep tickets.

Yes, he wanted to be found, but not by Tyrone, and he glances at Nelly, now semi-conscious and groaning at his feet. — Adios, amigo , he says, then quickly steals out the door and heads down the cold, grey street.

After dropping off Melanie, Grace and Eve that morning, Jim had driven straight back to the beach. He had Guns n’ Roses Appetite for Destruction on the car stereo, preferring it to Mahler. Their truck was parked in the same spot, and he pulled up about twenty yards to the rear of it. It was unoccupied. Then, scanning down the shoreline from behind the stone-built observation deck, he spied them, down on the still-deserted beach. They were heading away from him, towards the rocky promontory of Goleta Point. Instead of immediately following them, he headed back to their beat-up Silverado pickup truck. He took the Alaskan Alpha Wolf hunting knife from his denim jacket, stuck it in his belt, then removed the garment and rolled it round his hand, smashing through the truck’s side window.

As the glass shattered, he looked over at the cluster of buildings, only about fifty yards away. Melanie had told him that they housed the university’s marine biology facility. But it was Independence Day weekend and they were empty, with no vehicles parked outside. He let himself into the truck. It was full of junk; old wrappings, empty cans of beer and soda. But in the glove compartment there was a handgun. Jim thought that he knew little about firearms, had only once held one in his hand, but realised from his prison training in the library’s True Crime section that it was a Glock semi-automatic. It was lighter than he thought. He pulled out the magazine. It was loaded with eight bullets. He pointed it at the dashboard, pulled back the safety catch. Then he placed the gun in his jacket pocket, also putting the knife back in with it.

The leg, that wrecked limb that hadn’t healed right, not since the accident when he’d been hit by the car, storming after Mark Renton, held him up as he stole along the clifftop towards the rocks at Goleta Point. By approaching them from above and behind, he’d be able to ensure that the coast was clear of both beachcombers and solitary student stragglers before he engaged. Timing was all. They had turned the corner around the stony headland, and the tide was coming in quickly. Jim walked faster; it seemed that the fleeter he got, the less he noticed the leg. From his vantage point on the cliff above he tracked them moving between two of the bigger rocks at the end of the jagged peninsula, which reached out to the Pacific Ocean like a small, broken quay. It provided perfect cover, shielding them from any eyes above, as the sea swirled in.

He hurried down the beach and along the top of the rocks, until he was standing over them. Jim quickly glanced back above him to the cliffs, then down the beach towards Devereux Slough; all clear, and then his attention was fully on the men, as he stepped forward into their view. They were preoccupied as the blond one had a crab on his knife; he had stabbed it through the shell and it wriggled in its death throes. It looked like a red rock crab, with its brick-coloured top and rusty blotchings on the white underside. He’d taken to identifying the different types of marine life on these trips with the kids. — Think it knows it’s going to die? He pointed at the crab.

The two men looked up as one, saw him standing over them on the large rock. Took a step back as Jim jumped down, landing in front of them on the soft sand.

— What the fuck? said the smaller, blond man, Damien Coover. — Look, we don’t want no trouble. .

Jim Francis pulled out the gun. — Too fucking late for that, and he lurched forward and squeezed the trigger. A shot rang out, then a crack, the gulls taking to squawking flight, as Coover toppled over, tumbling to the rocks and sand. He screamed out in agony, against the sound of the sea, the waves dashing on the rocks. Jim gazed out across the ocean; no boats, just Holly, the oil platform, way out on the horizon to his right. The other man, Marcello Santiago, was moving back against the huge black rock face, as the tide swarmed around his shins. — C’mon, man. . look. .

Jim ignored him, glancing briefly behind him, still all clear, then back to the men. Coover was moaning softly, clutching his leg. Jim saw he had managed to shoot him above the kneecap. Blood seeped through denim, onto rock and into sand and salt water.

— Never shot anybody before, Jim Francis said. — It’s as I thought it would be. No pleasure in it. A fucking shiteing cunt’s weapon. He shook his head, looking at Coover in abject disappointment.