The Last Witness (11 page)

13

The moon was reflected on the sea far below as he opened the back of the Transit van that had been left for him at the cottage. It was one of four vehicles he’d had the use of. On the surface these were all taxed and insured, completely above board, apart from the fact that their registered keepers were either dead, or in some other way indisposed. On a piece of waste ground in the East End of Glasgow, the burnt-out wreck of an old Honda Civic was being pored over by police forensic teams.

He preferred to travel at night, which was handy, since at this time of the year night seemed all encompassing in Scotland. He’d always liked the dark, even as a child. While his friends shied away from the blackness at the end of the day, the lowering gloom that enveloped the tenements and high-rise flats where they lived, he revelled in its silky anonymity. Even though Glasgow was a city, there were still nooks and crannies the streetlights couldn’t penetrate.

One of his favourite haunts had been an old church cemetery, not far from his home. The ancient graves were moss-covered and crumbling, in most parts overgrown, and the lettering that granted the dead their earthly immortality was worn thin by rain, wind and the passage of time. He
would trace his fingers along the loops and lines of the words. Soon he taught himself to decipher the names of the dead by touch alone. He remembered each tomb and its eternal occupant; he spoke to them one by one as he made his nightly round of the cemetery.

One gravestone fascinated him more than any other. As he traced his fingers over the gothic lettering, he had discovered a symbol: a skull and crossbones. Underneath, he deciphered the name of a boy. John. He even managed to make out that the first letter of the surname began with an ‘M’. The thick briar that curled around the stone tore at his fingers, but he was determined to discover its secret. He knew the name belonged to a child, as he’d been able to uncover the part that confirmed the boy had been three years and four months old at the time of his death. He reckoned that the skull-and-crossbones motif must represent some dire illness or tragedy that had overcome the infant, though as he passed amongst the tombs he realised that dead children were by no means in the minority.

What fascinated him most about this grave though, was what was written further down the stone: another name. This time the script was clearer, less weathered, as the vegetation that had overgrown the base of the monument had protected the inscription. One cold night, when he had been bored, and most of the mysteries of the small graveyard were no longer secrets, he decided to pull away the grass and briars to read what lay underneath, expecting the usual platitudes of sympathy and regret.

It turned out that another child’s body lay in the grave. This boy had lived longer, surviving to the ripe old age of seven years and eight months. His name was James. With a
shaking hand, which he couldn’t explain, he was able to trace the family surname from this undamaged portion of the stone.

As his dirty child’s forefinger traced out the letters, a chill penetrated his heart. The ‘M’ was clear – it was the first letter of the name Machie. His own name. For a long time he had sat on the damp grass over the grave, as though chained to the ground by spirits beneath.

Eventually, he had managed to pull himself free from the invisible bonds cast by the dead boys and return home. For many nights after, his dreams were only those of the dead brothers with his name.

It had taken his young brain some time to work out what the final sentence on the gravestone meant.
Together at birth, united once more in death
.

One night, sometime after, when the screams of the children who had died so long ago awoke him from his sleep in a Glasgow multi-storey, he realised: they were twins.

He never visited the graveyard again, though the ghosts of the Machie twins of so long ago stayed with him always.

14

Donald sipped at a glass of expensive red wine as he stood by the kitchen window in the dark. His wife was at another night class – this time ancient Greek. She had bought into his struggle for self-improvement completely, having already attempted conversational Italian, art history, classical studies and watercolour painting. But Donald wasn’t too sure of her heartfelt commitment to this personal renaissance. He knew she was much happier with the glass or two of wine that she and her friends enjoyed in the pub after class than with the journey of cerebral improvement on which they had jointly embarked. So what? They had made new friends, moved in a more elevated circle, and could now both talk with great assurance on a number of diverse topics over dinner – the crucible of his success. Well, that and the old, less refined requisites, necessary for the long climb up the greasy pole.

The moon penetrated his kitchen with its eerie luminescence, making it easy for him to trace the route along the granite worktop towards the bottle of wine and pour himself another glass. He had discovered that he could drink as much as a bottle a night without encountering the baleful effects of a hangover the next day; any more though and the familiar
feeling of disconnection would impinge upon the important tasks of the following day. He was too dedicated to success to let this happen, but too stressed to do without the restorative salve of alcohol as part of his nightly relaxation. As a result, he was regimented in his discipline as far as self-medication with the fruits of the vine was concerned.

He had a lot on his mind. The spectral resurrection of JayMac was something he could have done without; he had enough to deal with as it was, especially with the jockeying for position that the introduction of this new ‘national’ police force was prompting. Many senior officers would be casualties, lured into early retirement by the prospect of enhanced pension deals and golden goodbyes. These incentives though, were not for him. Every problem is the dawn of a new opportunity: this was the mantra he had discovered as he rose through the ranks, part of a code he would never abandon.

As he appreciated the forest berry palate of the Grenache, his mobile phone vibrated in his trouser pocket. He hoped it would be his wife, however, his instinct told him otherwise. He furrowed his brow as the phone’s display illuminated his face in the semi-darkness of the room.

‘Speak,’ was his pre-emptive greeting.

‘Our friend has contacted us,’ came the brief reply, the voice foreign, the English halting.

‘How?’

‘By the usual means,’ said the voice, nearly as curt with its answers as the questions it was being posed.

‘How have you responded?’ Donald’s voice was edged with a trepidation that his colleagues in the police force would have found most unusual.

‘We are arranging a drop. It will be in the next two days. We will inform you when.’ The accented voice paused, trying to find the appropriate word. ‘It is organised.’

‘This is not a good time, not at all,’ Donald responded in a shouted whisper.

‘Good or bad, what is it mattering?’ came the reply. ‘In this we have no choice.’

The line went dead. Donald massaged his temples, much in the way he had seen Jim Daley do in an effort to relieve the unremitting stress he always appeared to be under.

‘Our friend’ had disappeared in a speedboat as the authorities in Kinloch discovered the true extent of the illegal trade in narcotics funnelling through the town and its environs. The part he played in this venal trade was important, and it was essential that he evade capture – but for that he had needed help. Now it was time for Donald to pay the price of assistance.

Donald lifted the wine bottle again, noting with irritation that it was nearly empty.

Maybe it was time for a nightcap of the hard stuff; this was surely a suitable opportunity to break his code of alcohol consumption. He left the kitchen and walked into his large, well-furnished lounge, where he removed a bottle of Ardbeg from the cabinet. As the warm spirit numbed his lips, he angled his head back, eyes closed. Had he gone too far? Was this one calculated risk too many?

15

He looked himself up and down in the long mirror on the inside of the wardrobe door. He remembered a TV programme from his childhood where a cartoon figure donned a new costume every week and did the job that matched the outfit.

He had no intention of doing this job.

The heavy jacket didn’t match the clothes underneath. He replaced his woollen hat with a blue baseball cap and transformed his appearance yet again.

He picked up the gun with its silencer from the bedside table, left the bedroom, switching off the ceiling light, then, now in the small lounge, drained the last drops of whisky from the cracked tumbler.

The cottage was isolated enough not to be in the path of many passers-by, but he decided to leave the light in the old standard lamp burning.

‘You never know what crooks are on the go.’ He smiled at this thought, prompted by the old saying of his mother’s, and walked out into the moonlit night.

Scott was standing on the hill behind the farmhouse with Frank MacDougall. A pall of cigarette smoke curled into the
night as the two old neighbours looked down the hill and across the river to another rise thickly crowned by commercial forestry. The world was silent, monochrome; the faint tinkle of the burn barely sounded over the distant rumble of the sea as it broke on the rocky shore.

‘Dae ye believe a’ this shite, Scooty?’ MacDougall asked the policeman. ‘Oor lassie thinks this is a’ part o’ the mind games o’ the Witness Protection, tryin’ tae get me oot the way abroad. I mean, that’s the second time Gerald Dowie’s died, no’ tae mention yer man.’ He paused, as though the very mention of his name might conjure him up.

‘Well, I’ll tell ye this,’ replied Scott, drawing at his cigarette, ‘they’ve done a fuckin’ good job o’ it. Ma heid’s well and truly fucked up wi’ it an a’.’ He flicked the cigarette butt down the hill.

MacDougall hawked and spat copiously. ‘If it wisnae for the wife, I’d probably take their advice an’ dae one. But ye’ve seen her – wan mention o’ goin’ abroad an’ she goes mental.’ He rubbed his mouth with the back of his hand. ‘Who wid’ve thought that evil bastard wid be able tae cheat death? Fuck knows, he cheated everything else. I suppose we should-nae be that surprised.’

‘It’s a shame she’s . . . ye know.’

‘Aye, it’s mair than a pity, a’ right. The trouble is I cannae abandon her noo; the docs have a’ready said she’ll need tae go intae . . .’ Now it was MacDougall’s turn to pause. ‘Into a place, ye know?’ He looked Scott squarely in the face, the moonlight picking out the lines on his forehead in greater relief.

‘No’ a nice prospect. No’ nice at a’, Francis,’ said Scott, shivering in his borrowed jacket, as an owl piped up from
the trees. ‘Aye, an’ stop ca’ing me Scooty, ya cunt. That bastard Donald’s a’ready picked up on it.’

‘Nice tae see he hasnae changed much. Still the arrogant swine he wiz six years ago – worse, in fact.’

‘Of that, my friend, ye can have nae doubt.’ Scott raised his head sharply. ‘Did ye see somethin’ move there? O’er by that wee boat doon in the river?’

‘Whit? MacDougall whispered, squinting into the distance. ‘Aye, there it is again.’ He pointed his finger across to the other side of the burn, crouching as he did so.

Scott, who also ducked, grabbed MacDougall by the arm and steered him slowly back down the hill. ‘DS Scott tae all stations. Positions over?’ One by one the five Support Unit personnel replied, their voices issuing distantly from Scott’s radio, which he had turned down to a whisper.

‘We’ve got company,’ Scott murmured into the mouthpiece, ‘across the river at the back o’ the hoose. Who’s nearest?’

Scott and MacDougall lay flat on the cold ground, peering over the crest of the hill.

‘When the unit boy arrives up here, I want ye tae go back tae the hoose. Make sure everybody’s where they should be. OK, Frankie?’

‘Gie me a shooter, Scooty. If that’s that cunt, it’ll be my pleasure tae blast his fuckin’ heid aff,’ said MacDougall defiantly.

‘Aye, I’ll just gie ye a gun, an’ count the days until I’m banged up in Barlinnie. Just dae as I say. We’ve won a watch here, he widnae be expecting anybody tae see him.’

A rustling noise from behind startled the two men. They turned to see a figure dressed in black creeping towards them up the hill.

‘The house is being secured, gaffer,’ he said, no trace of anxiety in his voice. ‘Best if you accompany me, Mr Robertson.’

‘Ye nearly gied me a fuckin’ heart attack,’ said Scott, doing his best to sound put out with a whisper. ‘Take Frankie back tae the hoose, an’ I’ll stay here an’ keep an eye oot for this bastard. Don’t be long, mind. I’ve no’ got a weapon, remember.’ Scott’s clearance to carry a sidearm had not yet come through from divisional HQ, much to his frustration. ‘That bastard Donald couldnae have planned this better; me here on a fuckin’ lonely hillside, being stalked by the ghost o’ Christmas past, an’ only a baton fir company.’

‘Best o’ luck,’ said MacDougall, already sneaking back down the hill with the armed officer.

Scott squinted down the glen. The brightness of the moon had been dulled by a passing cloud, adding to his tension. He reached for his mobile phone, cupping the screen with his hand so that its light would not be visible to the prowling figure somewhere out in the darkness.

The dialling tone sounded in his ear, and the call rang briefly on the other end before it was answered.

‘Jim, it’s me.’

‘Why are you speaking so quietly?’ came the breathless reply.

‘I’m on the hill behind Frank’s hoose. We’ve spotted something moving. The unit boys are getting the MacDougalls sorted, then we’ll try an’ find the bastard.’ Scott spoke quickly. ‘By the way, how come you’re so oot o’ breath? Has she had ye oot jogging?’

‘Something like that, Brian,’ Daley said enigmatically. ‘Listen, you get back to the house. You’re not armed. Leave
this to the Support Unit. I’ll get over to the hotel and rouse the rest of them. We’ll be able to get there in two cars quite quickly. But get yourself back to the house.’