Gallowglass (2 page)

TWO

A
month later Wullie blundered into the newsroom of the
Gazette
, a tetchy Boadicea in his chariot, causing mischief and hilarity and wanting his old job back. As I was now occupying it, I was filled with a mixture of delight and bolshiness. Glad to see him back but not ready to give an inch. Eddie Paton – our editor in chief – had ducked the decision as usual and simply assigned me to broader duties as well as covering the crime circuit in tandem with Wullie. It suited me fine; I was happy to spread my wings and give rein to my opinions on politics and world news, though in the lightest possible way to avoid reader indigestion over the porridge.

Whatever was driving my good mood these days I wasn’t going to question it. I’d vowed never again to take for granted a sunny day or a good night’s sleep. On the wireless this morning I’d heard a new song by Sinatra and couldn’t shake the dratted thing out of my head:

It might have earned me funny looks from my fellow Glaswegians if I’d tried to serenade them first thing on a workday morning. So I stuck to just whistling the tune as I stalked down Mitchell Street and climbed the stairs to the newsroom.

I strolled to my corner desk across the office. The room was already filling up. The early secretaries were clashing and tinkling away at their typewriters and a few of my fellow journalists were sucking on first fags and mugs of tea, hoping for inspiration to arrive with the nicotine and the caffeine. The small and increasingly rotund figure of the editor was loitering with intent over one of the desks. Bum in the air, elbows on the desk and fag hanging from his lips, Eddie was hunched over the vacant desk of Jimmie Livingstone, the paper’s football reporter. Eddie was picking away at the scraps of paper – Jimmie’s handwritten notes of the weekend’s results – seeing if there was any mileage left in any of the triumphs and disasters. Between them, Eddie and Jimmie could milk a full week of polemics out of an iffy offside decision at Parkhead. Eddie lifted his head and removed his fag.

‘Morning, Brodie.’

‘Good morning, Eddie. No sign of the wild man yet?’

‘Your pal, McAllister? Wheesht, Brodie. To speak his name is to summon the de’il. Let’s enjoy the quiet for as long as we can.’

‘Can you no’ just remind the man he’s supposed to be retired?’

Eddie stubbed out his fag, drew himself erect to his full five feet two inches and pulled down his tartan waistcoat. I noted it was filling out nicely again. Soon he’d be back to his former stature and we could start calling him ‘Big Eddie’ again. At least in circumference.

‘It’s no’ that easy, Brodie. McAllister took an awfu’ hammering in the line o’ duty, so to speak. We cannae just throw him on the scrap heap. And technically, of course, he didnae actually get round to retiring before his heid got bashed in.’

‘Well, it all adds to the gaiety around here. Is he really knocking out a column or two? I mean, how does he get the stories? Has he commandeered his own tram?’

I knew his companion-cum-brother, Stewart, had a fulltime job as a teacher and was nobody’s Man Friday.

Eddie visibly shuddered. ‘Taxis. He’s got a deal with one o’ the taxi boys. Costing us a bloody fortune, him whizzin’ aboot like a dervish. Chasing crime, he says. But if you’re worried about being edged oot of a job, Brodie, dinnae fash yersel’. Wullie is just part time for a while until he works oot his notice. Once we gie him it, of course. Besides, you’ve got this new column to play wi’.’

World affairs, was how Eddie had explained it. The bosses of the paper thought it was time to raise the profile and quality of the paper and expand the readership by tackling the big events in the world outside Glasgow. Outside Scotland even, if that wasn’t too big a step. The
Gazette
had taken an ad hoc approach to it in the past; when something big happened, like dropping the first atom bomb or the Nuremberg trials, they’d run special columns. Now they thought there was enough incoming material from the wireless and ticker tape to merit a section on its own. Snippets, they said. A round-up of major news items from across the continents. I was their guinea pig. When I’d asked why me, Sandy Logan, our lanky sub-editor, chewed on his inner cheeks for a while and then explained:

‘You’re seen as somewhat more worldly, Brodie. If you take a glance over the last twelve months or so, I think you’ll agree that you’ve been at the centre of some of the more
outré
events round here. Is that fair?’

‘Do I detect a wee hint of accusation, Sandy?’

‘Naw, naw. I wouldnae say that. Just that you seem to be singularly good at attracting exotic headlines. Usually violent.’

‘You mean the hunt for Nazis in Glasgow?’

‘There’s that. Then there’s the number of senior polis you’ve managed to get banged up for corruption. Not to mention the councillors that began dying like flies just as you began delving into their wicked ways.’ Sandy shook his long head. ‘You’re not so much a reporter of news, Brodie. More the instigator.’

‘And that’s what the bosses want from me? For this new column? Someone to stir things up?’

‘Good God, no. Just report, laddie. Just report. You’ve got a broader world view than some. And then there’s your degree. Other than the fair Elspeth you’re the only man on the staff wi’ one. The bosses like a man of letters. As for your writing…’ He paused, took a pull on his fag. ‘. . . I’ve seen worse.’

‘I’ve had more ringing endorsements for my talents, Sandy. But it sounds interesting; it should be fun.’

‘Fun? You’ve got the wrong idea, Brodie. This is a serious column. But of course not
too
serious. And absolutely nae Latin. We don’t want to lose our old readership. Think of it as an everyman guide to foreign parts and foreign doings.’

‘No big words.’

‘You know fine that good journalism is about simplicity. Just tell the story. Like that fella you rate, Hemingway. Though I’d encourage the odd adjective or two to gie your piece some colour.’

‘And what about the crime stories? Are you taking me off those?’

‘Not a bit. The management want to give Wullie a few months to see out his time properly. Besides,’ he sighed, ‘there’s enough crime oot there to warrant the attention of the pair of you for a while.’

I made my way to my desk where I was working up stories that neatly covered both camps. On the larger scene, I was trying to find something exciting to say about America’s Marshall Plan. In terms of newsworthiness, the timing could hardly be bettered. The plan was coming into being on this
very day, 5 June 1947. But high finance and international economics had little relevance to the average
Gazette
reader struggling to muster enough ration coupons to feed her family on powdered milk and Spam.

The details had still to be hammered out with participating nations like Britain, France and Germany but essentially it was an aid programme for the reconstruction of Europe. The idea was George Marshall’s, the US Secretary of State. One of their better generals – and a visionary. It wasn’t altruism. America recognised that her own prosperity and democracy would only thrive if the other Western nations did. Moreover, America wanted a solid bulwark against Communist expansionist plans across Europe. They were even offering aid to the Soviets, but Stalin didn’t want to be in anyone’s pocket. Not if it curtailed his plans to fulfil Churchill’s prophecy of installing an iron curtain across the Continent ‘from Stettin in the Baltic to Trieste in the Adriatic…’ The endless machinations, double-dealing, back-stabbing and power grabs by the Communists made Glasgow councillors seem like models of fair-mindedness and graciousness.

More parochially, I had a column half written about the resurgence of gang warfare in Glasgow; the walking wounded were still trickling into the Royal after the Old Firm match on Saturday. But there was nothing new in that. I needed something fresh.

At lunchtime, I took my paste sandwiches to my favourite bench in George Square to enjoy the sunshine and admire the girls in their summer frocks. It lightened an old man’s heart. But as I sat there, trying hard not to gawp too much, I was treated to one of my favourite acts from Glasgow’s repertoire of street theatre. It was a one-man show with unwitting audience participation. I only knew this strolling player by his nickname, Sticky.

Sticky didn’t get his name from the adhesive quality of his manky donkey jacket and greasy bunnet. Brutally and
inevitably, as per the mores of the streets, he was named for his most prominent feature: the loss of both legs above the knee in the Great War. A medal for courage under fire was scarcely fair exchange, but Sticky wore it proudly on his threadbare breast pocket. His chosen method of propulsion was a pair of sticks: cut-down brooms that kept the stubs of his thighs just a couple of inches above the pavement at the apogee of his swing and allowed their leather pads to take his weight as he rocked forward on to them. A human crankshaft.

Sticky’s physical loss had made no dent in his humour or his enterprise. He made a living from his own form of green-grocering. He’d pester stallholders in the Barras until they filled his knapsack with their over-ripe, about-to-be-jettisoned produce and then Sticky would click and stump his way to wherever punters gathered. Today it was George Square at lunchtime.

I heard him clacking towards me. He rocked past, pistoning away, and chose a sheltered spot by the Scott column. He settled down and produced an old rag from his inside pocket. He spread it carefully in front of him. Then he dug into his knapsack and laid out his wares on the suspect cloth, and waited. His eyes flicked across the passers-by until he spotted his prey. He went still. A middle-aged woman was hirpling towards him, carrying a string bag filled with her messages. Not too filled, Sticky would be hoping.

‘Hie, missus,’ he called out. ‘Has yer man still got his ain teeth?’

The wee woman froze in her gait, alarmed by this seer’s insight. Sticky knew his clients, knew their afflictions.

‘Naw, he husnae a wan.’

Sticky nodded in sympathy, carefully surveyed his cornucopia, and selected two squidgy handfuls.

‘Then, hen, these pears are for him.’

His performance deserved applause but I knew Sticky would appreciate a more tangible tribute. I walked over to him.

‘Any apples left?’

He squinted up at me. ‘I’ve been keeping one back. Just for you.’ He grinned and held out a mottled Granny Smith. I took it and gave him a florin. He began sifting through his small pile of coppers.

‘Naw, that’s fine.’ I smiled at him. He flung up a smart salute. I reciprocated, then left him to ply his trade.

THREE

M
y good humour lasted until I left the office at six, contributions to both world and local crime news fulfilled. Wullie hadn’t come in but I expected to find him in his new favourite perch in the Horseshoe Bar just round the corner. It was opening time and Wullie had nearly nine months to make up. I stepped into Mitchell Street. It was a dry bright evening and I thought briefly about skipping the pub and strolling home early with the chance of phoning Sam in her Edinburgh digs.

She was summing up for the jury today and hoped to persuade them that her client was a lost soul, led astray by his poor choice of friends rather than the dyed-in-the-wool villain suggested by the Procurator Fiscal. It was an uphill job given that the well-known defendant had only been out of prison for three months and that his face had been plastered over the papers three years ago for the armed robbery of the very same post office. It confirmed my experience as a reporter and former copper that Glasgow criminals were creatures of habit and stilted imagination.

As I turned to head up to Gordon Street I saw a man walking purposefully straight towards me. He wore a smart suit and carried a cap. His face was set and serious. As though he’d been waiting for me. We stopped and stared at each other some two yards apart. I waited, ready to throw a salute or a punch.

‘Mr Brodie?’

‘Yes?’

He looked nervous, shifty. My brain ran through a selection of possibilities; something had happened to Sam? An upset reader with an axe to grind? More likely a messenger from Percy Sillitoe, head of MI5. I still carried the King’s commission as a reserve officer. I’d been warned that it could be activated at any time. My stomach flipped. Whatever it was, it looked like bad news.

‘Sir, would you kindly step this way? Lady Gibson would be grateful for a moment of your time.’

Lady Gibson? That rang a bell. He nodded up the street towards a big Humber Pullman. There was a figure in the back seat but I couldn’t make it out.

‘What about?’

‘Lady Gibson will explain, sir.’ He kept glancing away, wrestling with his cap. I now saw it had a peaked brim: a chauffeur’s cap. He took a pace back, turned and expected me to follow. Like a peewit trying to lure a fox away from its nest. Why not? What did I have to fear from a smart car and a title? My reporter’s antennae were twitching. I followed him to the car. Its chrome glittered and its spotless grey flanks reflected our approach. He got there first and held open the rear door. I peeked in.

A stylish woman crouched in the far corner wearing a hat with the veil pulled down. All I could see was a pair of perfect red curves of lipstick and a smooth jawline. A scarf hid her neck. Her smart grey frock stopped just above nylon-clad knees – nice knees. She held a handkerchief in her hands. It was twisted and knotted. The woman spoke. Her voice was strained and breathy as though she’d only just stopped crying.

‘Mr Brodie? I need your help. Badly. We don’t have much time. Would you please join me?’

She lifted her veil and dabbed her cheeks. Her dark eyes were red and the mascara lightly smudged. But it scarcely
detracted from her looks. Waves of dark hair fell from her hat and framed strong features. A woman in her late forties, I’d say, more handsome than lovely, more interesting than pretty. Just past her peak.

She patted the seat beside her. Next she’d be offering me an apple:
Bite this, try me
. I looked around. If this was a trap I was a sucker for the bait; I liked an older woman’s poise and hint of a dangerous past. And if my life were at risk rather than my reputation they’d do it from a van not a chauffeur-driven Humber. I ducked down and slid on to the capacious slab of leather. I sank into the soft coolness and heard the door close behind me with a nice expensive clunk. The subtle waft of her perfume breached the remainder of my meagre defences.

‘Lady Gibson, I presume?’

‘Yes. Sheila Gibson. My husband… My husband—’ Her breath caught in her throat and choked off her answer. She dabbed her eyes and tried to regain her composure. I heard the driver’s door close and the next thing we were in motion.

‘Hie, you! Driver! Stop!’

I leaned over and grabbed his shoulder. The car began to slow down and then stopped. Her light fingers touched my arm. Light sparked off the diamond ring next to the gold band.

‘Mr Brodie. Please.’ She’d found her voice again. ‘I want to explain. But I need you to come with me. To my home.’

Her grip tightened. Small but powerful hands. I thought for a second. It was a very elaborate way for a married woman to pick up a man. And looking at her tortured eyes, I doubted she was after my body.

‘Just tell me what this is about. Then maybe I’ll go with you.’

She took a deep breath, gathered herself. ‘My husband is Fraser Gibson. Sir Fraser.’

‘Scottish Linen Bank?’ I asked, now understanding the Humber Pullman.

She nodded. ‘Fraser is the Chairman and Managing Director.’

I knew that; I banked with them in their head office in St Vincent Street.

‘What about him?’

Her face contorted again. ‘He’s been kidnapped.’

I sank back in the leather. Why was she telling me this? What did she want from me? Among the many fragrant notes of her perfume I smelt trouble. And it stirred interest in me. An alcoholic sniffing a single malt. But, hell, this was a scoop. Eat your heart out, Wullie McAllister.

‘All right. Let’s go, driver.’

I could see his eyes in his mirror. A small smile lifted the corner of his mouth. He nodded at me and pressed the accelerator. The Pullman’s big nose rose up and we sailed off. As we drove, Lady Gibson began to let it pour out.

‘Fraser comes home for lunch every day.’

Lunch?
Dinner
, where I come from.

‘He came home as usual today. About half past twelve. We’d just sat down when the doorbell went. Janice took it.’

‘Janice?’

‘Our maid.’

‘And the
we
. . .?’

‘Just Fraser and me. We’d had a glass of sherry in the lounge and had come though to the dining room.’

How nice. How different from my own house and how its master – my father – came and went. Depending on which shift he was working, Dad would set off with his battered piece-box, a treasured tin that once held Rothesay Rock, my parents’ only souvenir from a three-day honeymoon. Apart from me. He’d come home ten hours later, blackened by coal dust and ready for his grub, be it tea or breakfast. But first the tin bath would be hauled out and kettles boiled until there was enough water to sit in and sluice off the grime. I’d help carry out the filthy water and pour it away while Dad got
towelled and clothed in his faded collarless shirt and trousers. He’d sit by the fire, legs roasting, with a huge mug of tea in hand, fag in the other, hair wet and flattened as though with Brylcreem, while Mum magicked food over the range.

The picture her ladyship had flashed up was a Hollywood set: gleaming cutlery and glasses on a white damask tablecloth; exquisite small glasses drained of their sherry, the crystal decanter standing on the sideboard in case either fancied a second libation
pour aider la dégustation
. Sir Fraser in his starched collar and tails as befitted a senior banker. Or perhaps he slipped into a velvet smoking jacket until the car picked him back up again for another hard afternoon counting his money? Lady Gibson, freshly made up and perfumed, would be directing kitchen operations from a distance to avoid sullying her soft hands or scraping her perfect nails. A smiling servant would deliver steaming bowls of vegetables and plates of finely cut meats.

Were they happier than Agnes and Matthew Brodie in their kitchenette with the bed-in-the-wa’? Impossible.

‘Who was at the door?’ I asked.

She clasped her hand to her mouth. ‘Them. Two of them. Janice opened it and they burst in. We heard this shriek. Fraser was on his feet in a flash. He grabbed the carving knife but before he even reached the door they’d barged into the dining room. Masked, you know, with balaclavas. And in overalls.’

‘Were they armed?’

She nodded. ‘Both of them. They’d dragged Janice along and pushed her in first. They made her sit down at the table. I thought they were going to rob us. They waved guns at us and told us not to move. Then the men pointed to Fraser and told him to drop the knife. They would kill him if he didn’t. For a moment he looked like he would have a go at them. He’s like that. He’s not afraid of anyone or anything. But he could see that Janice or I could get hurt. A stray bullet or something.’

‘So, your husband dropped the knife. Did they take him then? Did they say anything?’

She nodded. ‘They shouted at Janice and me to shut up and stay seated. Then they grabbed Fraser, put a gun against his head and marched him out of the door. The one that was doing the talking turned to me as they went out. He said’ – I saw her searching her memory – ‘
Don’t, whatever you do, phone the police. This is a kidnap. It’s about money. It’s only money. Just do as you’re told and your husband won’t be harmed
.’

‘What exactly were you told?’

‘To wait for a phone call. This evening at seven. With instructions. And not to phone the police. Or else.’

‘Else what?’ Though I knew the answer.

Her face crumpled. ‘They’d kill him. They said they’d kill him.’ She dissolved in tears.

I waited till she got a grip. ‘So did you? Did you call the police?’

She shook her head vigorously. ‘Of course not! Why would I risk my husband?’

‘Because that’s what every kidnapper says. You need the police. This is what they’re trained for.’ I said it, but I didn’t believe it. Not the amateur blunderers that comprised Glasgow’s finest.

‘I couldn’t risk it.’

‘Do you want this in the
Gazette
? Is that why I’m here?’

‘No! For God’s sake, no!’

‘Then why did you pick
me
up?’

‘You’re…’ She struggled for words. ‘I’ve read about you. You know these sorts of people.’

Right. She meant they were
my
sort of people. What a reputation to have. My pain must have registered.

‘I don’t mean that in a bad way. It’s just you’re used to dealing with them. You’re a have-a-go hero, Mr Brodie.’

Have-a-go Brodie
was how my old army boss had described me after I’d taken out the Panzer unit that had kept my
platoon bogged down for days outside Caen. There was nothing heroic about it. I’d just got fed up and angry. A moment of madness that led to a medal. This character flaw had been much in evidence this past year in one scrape after another. But it was wrong to confuse heroism with pig-headedness and impetuosity.

‘Hardly, Lady Gibson. But what do you want me to do if I can’t write the story?’

‘I want you with me at seven, when I take the call. I need you to help me decide what to do.’