Bitter Water (13 page)

I whistled. ‘Are these details available to the public?’

‘At the court offices.’

‘But none of yours?’

She flushed, the freckles round her nose fading into the pink. ‘No. I’ve not . . . I’ve not been that busy lately. Been having some time off. But to tell the truth, none of mine was found innocent.’

I leaned over to her and put my hand out to hers. She drew it back as though I was a fully charged lighting rod.

‘Sam, you’ve had a rough time. Take it easy.’

Her eyes glistened. ‘Damn it, Brodie. It’s been four months! It’s stupid!’

‘It’s not.’

‘Look at
you
! Not a care. A new job. Everything going for you. And I’m glad. I mean it.’

I took out my cigarettes, gave her one and lit them both. It steadied us both. I shook my head.

‘You were right at the weekend, Sam. I’m drinking too much. Hardly surprising, working alongside Wullie McAllister.’ I pointed at the untouched lemonade. I grinned and got a small smile in return. ‘The booze helps me sleep. Sometimes. The stuff I dream about!’

‘Good! No, I’m sorry. I mean it’s good that you’re not immune. That you feel . . . something.’

I lowered my voice and leaned closer to avoid being overheard. ‘It’s not guilt though.’ I wanted her to understand. ‘Maybe war blunts the conscience. All I know is that Gerrit Slattery was going to kill you. And me.’ I didn’t mention the other blood on my hands. Sam knew there had been violence at Dermot Slattery’s farm in Fermanagh but I’d never told her the details, and she’d never asked.

‘Like this lot?’ She tapped the paper in front of her.

I sighed. ‘That’s the thing, isn’t it? Who am I to talk?’

Her mouth turned up. ‘You should be in the clear. Ishmael’s work is cold and calculating. Premeditated. Whatever happened between you and Gerrit was self-defence. I’m worse than you. I wanted those scum dead. What they did to those wee boys . . .’

‘And you, Sam. And you.’

I had stomach-churning picture of her pale face with far-off eyes, lying in the bottom of a boat as she was carried away from me. The same image must have passed through her mind. Her eyes filled. She waved her hand.

‘He didn’t rape me. I’m not dead. I just wish I could get on. I’m sure I’m already getting a reputation; if you want to get a conviction, pray that Sam Campbell is the defence lawyer. I’m getting fewer instructions from Glasgow solicitors. My stable in Edinburgh has been dropping hints that maybe it’s time to close this particular outpost. Bring me into the fold. Keep an eye on me, more like.’

The prospect of her moving to Edinburgh seemed like a terrible idea. ‘Rubbish, Sam. Do you have anyone to talk to about it? A doctor?’

‘And say what? My doctor said it was nerves. He gave me some pills. They made me throw up.’

‘Friends?’ She’d mentioned girlfriends before.

‘Oh, I’ve had them all round. Maggie Dalrymple, Moira Rankin. The gossips. Sorry, that’s not fair. They’re old pals and they’ve been kind. Moira even stayed a couple of nights to make sure I didn’t swallow my whole prescription at once. That, and nosiness. Wanting to know all about Douglas Brodie, scourge of gangsters and corrupt cops.’ She gazed at me with a furious intensity, as if daring me to laugh.

‘They say talking helps.’

She shook her head. ‘Not when you can’t discuss it all. Not when there are some things that can’t be said.’

I wondered how much she did know, or guess? She suddenly stubbed her fag out and took a couple of deep breaths. She took off her glasses, rubbed the bridge of her nose and focused her limpid blue eyes on me again.

‘Brodie, how’re your digs?’

I blinked at the change in topic. ‘They’re fine. I mean the landlady gives me a hard time about taking my turn cleaning the stairs. And the gas meter eats shillings. But it’s fine.’

I didn’t tell her it was a top-floor hovel up a spiral of worn concrete steps and falling plaster. That I looked out on a barren back close with a midden heap in one corner. That the ground-floor houses seemed to be occupied by a large number of over-made-up lassies who had visitors at all times of day and night.

‘Because if you needed . . . I mean if you ever had to . . .’

‘Sam, what are you saying? Spit it out.’

She pushed back from the table, eyes blazing. ‘My house is so bloody big and so bloody quiet and so bloody empty it’s driving me bloody crazy and I can’t talk to anyone else about what happened and I hate drinking alone . . .’ She stopped, took a deep breath, then, ‘Do you want your old room back?’

I hid the smile that threatened to split my face. ‘Well, I’d need to give notice. And I couldn’t afford to pay much . . .’

‘Don’t you play hard to get with me, Douglas Brodie! Unless you’ve got a rich benefactor who’s putting you up at the Ritz, this is a great offer. Hand over your ration card and two pounds a week and it’s a deal. I’ll feed us. I might even get a woman in to clean for us, like I used to. The place is like a tip. We split the whisky. Not that we’re going to be drinking much.’ She stared contemptuously at my glass.

‘How could I refuse?’

I hadn’t had such an offer since basic training when my sergeant major asked me if I’d mind terribly much doing a further twice round the assault course with full pack for failing to get back from two days’ leave on time. Irresistible. Except of course for one thing: wee Morag. What was I going to do about her? Sneak her back to my bedroom past my new landlady? Why not? It wasn’t as if the landlady in question was offering me anything other than a roof over my head.

‘Sod you, Brodie, if you don’t want to . . .’

‘Sam, Sam, nothing would give me greater pleasure. Would this weekend do? I won’t need a van for the flitting. Nor even a barra’. Why are you crying?’

‘I’m not.’ She dabbed at her eyes, sniffed and pointed at the list of names. ‘Good. That’s settled. So what are we going to do now, Sherlock?’

I liked the use of
we
. ‘See Big Eddie.’

FIFTEEN

I
found Eddie in his den behind his ransacked desk.

‘Murder and havoc, Brodie! Don’t you enter these sacred portals unless you have a tale of gore and outrageous effing depravity.’

‘I’ve got an angle, Eddie. On this vigilante case.’

‘Spit it oot.’

I told him about the match between the victim list and the acquittals without mentioning Sam’s role; she didn’t want any limelight.

‘. . . and I’d like to put a column out that shows this connection.’

‘Bloody brilliant, Brodie! I can see how you did well in the polis!’

‘I’ll write it up. I also want to make sure we’re the only paper he talks to.’

‘He?’

‘He or they. But as far as I can tell, no other paper’s getting those charming epistles. We want to keep it that way.’

‘How?’

‘I’d like to offer them a chance to go into print themselves. Make a personal appeal inviting them to write a letter to the
Gazette
agreeing to give up their evil ways.’

‘You think they will?’ Eddie looked disappointed.

‘Not a chance. But that’s not the point. They’ve twice contacted us. We should respond directly. Make this a dialogue. They’re looking for publicity and we can control it. I’m also scared that unless someone reins them in, people will die.’

I watched his face. His eyes scuttled round his office, then: ‘Ah’ve had nothing from McAllister for days. We’ll do yours as an editorial. Write it. Show me.’ He yanked out his watch. ‘Two hours. Go.’

It took me an hour. It was already in my head. But it was as though someone else was writing it. Amanuensis or mild schizophrenia? The dark side of me kept asking why I was trying to put a stop to an effective, if irregular form of crime reduction. But the saner part had control of the typewriter. After a sharp and educational encounter with Sandy’s blue pencil, this was what went to press on Wednesday:

There then followed the list of names of the men who’d been found innocent in law but had nevertheless been cruelly chastised by person or persons unknown. I had little hope of getting a reasoned response from these letter-writing maniacs, far less a full
mea culpa
, but it might get some sort of reaction.

That evening I sat in Sam’s library sipping some ruthlessly diluted whisky and reviewing the column with her. In advance of fitting in at the weekend I’d gone round to talk about her contribution to the revelations. We had the Home Service on in the background. I placed the paper down on the side table between us.

‘I have to confess to feeling a wee bit hypocritical about this.’

Sam peered over her glasses and picked up the paper. ‘That conscience again, Brodie?’

‘Last vestiges.’

‘Tosh.
You
were rescuing a damsel in distress. This is different. Ishmael and his gang’ – she stabbed at the paper – ‘are sadistic loonies. When I met him he was already burning with righteous certainty. I wouldn’t be surprised if he thought he had a direct line to God. It’s the sort of thinking that got old dears burnt at the stake for keeping cats.’

‘That’s why we’re trying to get a stronger line to him. It’s only a matter of time before someone dies.’

‘You think he’d go that far?’

‘Why not? All it takes is for someone accused of murder to get off, and these loonies, as you call them, will don the black bonnet. They’ve already shown a penchant for playing with rope.’

Sam shivered. ‘But why would they give up just because the
Gazette
asked them to? Aren’t they more likely to feel vindicated with all this publicity? He’s probably lapping this up.’

‘Loving it. What really worries me is that the great Glasgow public are beginning to see the Marshals as heroes. Stand at any bar in the city and you’ll hear them referred to in the same rank as a Scotland captain after a win against the auld enemy. The simple fact is that there’s something appealing to Joe Public about bypassing the long-drawn-out legal machinations, especially if they think it came up with the wrong result in their opinion, and giving the baddies a good hiding.’

Sam nodded. ‘Even worse if the message gets out and crime starts to drop.’

‘Exactly what’s giving me qualms. There are nineteen men here’ – now I pointed at the paper – ‘who’re so incapacitated that even if they had evil written through their bones like Rothesay rock, there’s bugger all they could do about it for a while.’

I got up and retrieved the bottle and topped us both up to a level above homeopathic.

‘I’ll do four more laps in the morning.’

Sam studied me over her specs. Then we sat silently, sipping away, thinking about the consequences of the vigilante action. Knowing that taking the law into your own hands was wrong. Unless it seemed to be the better option.

SIXTEEN

T
here are pivotal moments in your life, usually when you don’t realise it. A small change that leads to a bigger shift that causes a seismic upheaval. The Big Signalman throws a lever and switches the points. Suddenly you’re on a completely different track, picking up speed, destination unknown.

On Saturday morning I went for a glorious wake-up swim. Then I went back to my squalid flat and packed my entire belongings in my one case, wrapped my set of sheets, pillow and towels – a Co-op special offer – in brown paper and string, and left my digs without a backward glance. I’d paid up to the end of the following week. One pound 15 shillings down the drain but I didn’t regret a farthing. The harridan who owned the entire close sent her factor to try to strong-arm me into paying a month in lieu of the short notice. When I pointed out that my job at the
Glasgow Gazette
meant I could turn the spotlight on any criminal activity I liked, including tax-dodging, rent-overcharging and running a bawdy house, the factor grabbed the week’s rent and ran for it.