Random (22 page)

Penman was a lanky guy with glasses and a nervous cough. Studious looking. I recognized an accountant when I saw one. Penpusher not drugs pusher.

Penman wasn’t the man.

Our jobs were safe, he said. Business as usual, he said. Even giving us a couple of new drivers. He owned other cab firms, he told us, so he wouldn’t be there all the time. He’d pop in regularly though, just to keep us on our toes. The radio controller would do the rest. And the new drivers, Tobin and McTeer. He knew them already and they’d help things tick over when he wasn’t around.

Nobody said much. Wasn’t much to say.

The radio controller was new too. A grumpy big guy with close-cropped hair and an angry, pock-marked face. Old Annie had gone into early retirement. Tollcross for her, not Tenerife. Spending the rest of her days smelling the McVities biscuit factory. Which was a bit ironic really.

Penman’s new drivers were sullen and sure of themselves. They only spoke to each other, seemed to drive when they felt like it and spent a lot of time holed up in the cab office with crabbit Robert the new controller.

A week went by and nothing much changed. I still drove a cab with passengers in it and Penman’s was the only name above the door. There were moans and mutterings amongst the drivers. I dodged most of the gossip because there were things I didn’t want to know. A name I didn’t want to hear.

Then on the third Wednesday, two weeks after Penman first showed up in the office, he was back.

I heard the sound of laughter as I went in. Penman was sitting on the edge of the desk, long legs crossed in front of him and arms across his chest. He was listening like everyone else, a smile on his face.

A few feet from him, a man with his back to me was holding court. All I could see was a smart suit stretched across broad shoulders, neatly cut hair and arms going. He was tugging at his cuffs as he spoke, then arms open wide. Inviting. Including.

The guys were laughing, lapping up the routine. They liked this guy. Funny man. Stand-up comic, stand-up guy. Written all over their faces.

I didn’t want him to turn round. Didn’t want to see him. Didn’t want him to see me.

I sidled round the side and joined the edge of the group. Stood next to Tobin, one of the new guys, who turned and took me in with a slow look, saying nothing.

The suit was still talking, winding up his spiel now. Saying how pleased he was to be an associate of Mr Penman, saying how things could go on as they were under Cammy, maybe be even better. Maybe more money to be made.

He threw in another couple of jokes and started glad-handing the troops. He shook hands with them, beginning at the other end of the line and working his way along. Chatting with some, listening to others as if they were saying the most interesting thing he had heard in his life, laughing at the funniest jokes he’d ever heard.

Eventually he got to me. Alec Kirkwood reached out for my hand and looked into my eyes, a smile playing on his lips. He didn’t say anything, just nodded. Placed his other hand over the one that was holding mine. Felt like I was being blessed by the Pope or measured for size by the Devil.

Held my hand. Held my eye.

All sorts of thoughts. Most of them bad.

I had been on the edge of Kirky’s world and that had suited me fine. Knowing people who knew people who knew him had been close enough. Now he was in my world and me in his. Glasgow’s two scariest men, some would say. Face to face, hand in hand.

Except I wasn’t scary. Not in my head. Not in my scary head. I was just me, doing what I had to do. He was a professional psychopath. He was in front of me and in my way. I was in front of him and in his sights.

Kirkwood had taken my hand with a knowing smile and released it the same way. All the time I wore my best dead look. Cold eyes, corpse expression. Nothing inside, nothing to read.

Still, he smiled and nodded as if I was an open book.

He moved on into the cab office and Tobin followed him. He too looked at me as if he knew something.

But they couldn’t. OK, they could but if they did then why slow-play their hand? Why not string me up and electrocute my bollocks or whatever they did? Maybe Kirkwood was being cute, wanted to be sure, wanted to flush me out. He knew where I was – right where he wanted me. I wouldn’t, couldn’t go anywhere. He was trying to unnerve me, break me.

Shit, if that was his game then I was playing right into his hands. Get a grip.

Kirkwood had been buying up private hire firms all over Glasgow, it was obvious he was the monopoly wolf. No surprise then that he bought out Cammy. Coincidence. And all he had done was smile at me. No more than shake my hand and look at me. Get a grip.

If Kirkwood knew then I would be dead. He was my boss now and I was on his radar as well as his payroll but that was it. Grip. Stay calm, give nothing away and it will all be OK. Being crazy wasn’t helping.

Yet all the time, a voice called to me, telling an old joke that wasn’t funny.
Being paranoid doesn’t mean they’re not out to get you
.

Funny thing. The newspapers were going on and on about the whole of Glasgow being terrified of the man they were calling The Cutter. All except me.

Me? I was getting scared of a man called Alec Kirkwood.

I hadn’t expected fear. Had thought that was an emotion that had gone along with others. I’d told myself that I was already dead inside, that he couldn’t kill me. He’d hurt Jimmy Mac badly but that hadn’t worried me too much. He’d done worse to Hutton than kill him and Hutton hadn’t done anything. What would he do to me?

I was getting some hints. There’s a pub in Royston called the Star Bar. I’d passed by it often enough but had never ventured inside. Probably just as well. It’s the kind of pub, once you get out of the city centre, that Glasgow specializes in. The sort that if you didn’t know any better, you’d probably take one look and think it had been closed down. The windows were boarded up even though they also had bars on them. Belt and braces Royston-style.

No bouncer on the door. None needed.

I’m told that inside the bar looks like any other dodgy dive in the city. Torn fake leather upholstery, sticky floors, mismatched chairs, a fruit machine and galleries stocked with ‘house’ spirits. It smelled rancid but if you drank there often enough then you didn’t notice. Or if you drank enough.

Any face that didn’t fit or wasn’t recognized was guaranteed hard stares and would be well advised not to go to the toilets alone. The staff stood for no shite from anyone except friends of the management. They could do what they liked.

The Star had the worst karaoke in Glasgow. Women in their sixties singing Tammy Wynette and Madonna like drunken cats. Nobody having the heart or the balls to tell them how bad they were. Suggestion like that in the Star is reason enough for husbands or sons to want to stab you.

Want anything? Get it in the Star. Drugs, a dodgy telly, guns, a house burned down, a new fridge, someone’s legs broken. But don’t ask if you’re not known. That will only get you a doing.

My info on the Star Bar came from Ally McFarland. He had managed to become a bit of a regular there through his shady mates and was happy to bump his gums about the place. Ally loved the idea that he was in with that crowd. He was someone who knew someone. He did favours for important people. He could get nods back from guys at the bar. He’d get chat.

Suited me of course that he did. Ally talked, I listened. I asked questions too, almost without him realizing it. With a man like Kirkwood on your tail, it pays to know some of what he knows. Forewarned, forearmed.

Ally had also told me before about the basement at the Star Bar. Told me what happened sometimes when last orders were called, when the place was cleared of drinkers and the lights in the bar turned off. Ally had been there.

Sitting on Royston Road, it’s a typical, big Victorian pub. Purpose-built for the job with a basement that had been big enough to take every barrel of ale that a drayman wanted to drop off from his wagon.

These days it was kitted out for a different purpose altogether. Once a month, groups of men gathered in the bowels of the Star. Under the street, deep down where a century of brick kept in the noise. And there was plenty of noise. The Star Bar was owned by Alec Kirkwood and he used the basement as home turf for dogfights.

Ally loved it. Not just that it was seriously dodgy and that he had an invite. That would have been enough in itself for Ally to get his rocks off but he actually loved the fights. He had bloodlust. He’d tell me about what went on in detail that made me squirm.

I know. Irony.

It’s amazing, man. You have to see it to believe it. These dugs tear at each other like wild animals. Fierce as fuck. There’s rules though. Got to have rules. The rules go back to like the 1800s. Amazing that, is it no?

It’s like a code of honour. Marquess of Queensberry for dugs. Kirky is a big man for the rules. It’s like ceremonial, you know whit I mean? And they take it pure serious. They train these dugs like naebody’s business. Have them running on treadmills and everything
.

Kirky’s like aye, let the cops ask me about the treadmills. Nae problemo, he says, just tell them it’s to keep the dugs fit. Says he’ll tell them he got the idea aff
Blue Peter
. Quality. Train up the dugs’ jaws and all. They have them chewing on tyres and wooden sticks to make them stronger. Crazy, man
.

They look after the dugs proper. They sometimes get some wido vet who they’ll bung to come in and treat them after the fights but most of the time they do it themselves. Have proper kits with staples and drips and all kinds of stuff though. They look after them dugs. People say it’s cruel but the Grand National is much crueller on horses if you ask me. The pit’s about twelve feet by twelve and it’s fenced aff with wooden boards about two and a half feet high. There’s carpet on the floor, General George’s finest offcut, so that the dugs can get a good grip. It’s like the fuckin’ Coliseum, man
.

They weigh them before the kick-aff. Dugs have got to be more or less the same weight. Stands to reason. They agree on a top weight beforehand and if either dug is over that then he’s bombed oot
.

They wash them down before the fight too. Stick a hose on them and give them a right soaking. That’s because some smart bastards have been known to put poison onto their ain dug’s coat so that when the other dug sinks its teeth in it would get a right dose of it. Soon be half asleep and there for the taking. Try anything some of them
.

The only folk in the ring are the owners and the ref. Everyone else is better off well oot of it anyhow. Time the dugs get into it then no one can go near them. These dugs are mental. Simple as that. They will tear into anything once they get a head of steam up. Herd of elephants? Nae bother. Bring it on
.