The Last Darkness

by Campbell Armstrong

  ‘I read it was a suicide. Perhaps quote. The big maybe.’

  ‘Want the truth? It was no suicide.’

  ‘Somebody killed him? Do you know who?’

  ‘Not yet.’

  Miriam uttered a tiny sound of surprise. ‘I think I need a drink. You want anything?’

  ‘Water’s fine.’

  She opened the door to the kitchen. Perlman saw her take a bottle from the refrigerator. He was conscious of the height of the ceiling, where a skylight the length of the loft permitted a view of the wintry sky. This space diminished him. He felt like a speck. He noticed stacked canvases, squeezed-out tubes of oils, brushes stuck in old coffee tins, rags.

  Miriam came back with a shot of vodka and a glass of water. Perlman drank the water in an unbroken gulp.

  ‘You have any idea of the motive?’ Miriam asked.

  ‘None,’ he said. He wanted to back off, leave her be. Maybe what he had to talk to her about could be postponed for a while. He thought of Wexler again, pictures that kept coming at him, blood in chill blue water. ‘This is a rotten time for me to come here, Miriam. Colin’s on your mind, you’re worried, you don’t need …’

  ‘Let me be the judge of what I don’t need, Lou.’

  ‘Okay. It’s Wexler. Artie Wexler.’

  ‘Something’s happened to him? Tell me.’

  Perlman walked to the big window. Pigeons on ledges, sparrows on chimneypots. He watched the birds and he told her. A stabbing; he quit there. He left out the decapitation.

  She said, ‘No,’ and placed a hand flat against her chest, and then she sat on the floor with her back to the wall and her knees drawn up. ‘Christ, Lou, who the hell would kill Artie Wexler? I saw him only yesterday. He came with me to the fucking hospital. You saw him. You were there. One minute he’s driving me to see Colin, the next he’s this puff of smoke?’

  ‘And Lindsay was his bosom buddy. Two puffs of smoke.’

  Miriam closed her eyes. Perlman longed to kiss the mounds of her eyelids. He heard a sound of bells and wondered if for a moment he was having an auditory hallucination associated with his flood of feelings.

  Choral voices floated above the bells. ‘O Come All Ye Faithful.’

  ‘The floor below,’ Miriam said. ‘Choir practice. Some church group. Every day at this time. Bright little voices and handbells.’ She drank her vodka.

  ‘That would unravel me completely,’ Perlman said.

  ‘I’m so used to it I barely hear it.’

  Joyful and triumphant. ‘I wish I could bring you sunny news,’ he said.

  ‘Two puffs of smoke, you said. The killings are connected, Lou?’

  ‘I think it’s very likely.’

  She looked directly into his eyes. There was a sadness in her face he yearned to eliminate. The deaths, had they made her sorrowful? Sure, but it seemed to him that there was another level of unhappiness inside her, one that wasn’t related to the killings. He stroked her hand and then, a little surprised by his own boldness, he took a few steps back. ‘How did it happen that Wexler went to the hospital with you?’

  ‘He phoned to ask for news about Colin. He insisted he wanted to keep me company.’

  ‘Did Wexler see Colin recently?’

  ‘Not for years. Four, five, whatever. He never called, never visited. Then Colin has a heart attack and Artie hears it on the grapevine and suddenly he can’t stop phoning me. How’s Colin? Is he going to be all right? On and on.’

  ‘Why didn’t he keep in touch?’

  ‘Why do people ever lose touch? Why do they drift away? You’d know better than me.’

  I probably would, he thought. He wished the infernal choir would quit. They were at it again. Bells. Angelic young voices. Come ye, O come ye, to Bethlehem. ‘Were they avoiding one another?’

  ‘I can’t think why.’

  ‘A falling-out? A fight?’

  ‘Colin didn’t say. Artie just … faded from the scene.’

  ‘They were best friends from the old days, Miriam. They had a strong common history. Then for no apparent reason they stop seeing each other. They live in the same city, what – two or three miles apart, and they don’t meet? Then Wexler just pops back into your life. How did he seem to you?’

  ‘Gloomy one minute, a kind of forced cheer the next. Maybe a wee bit edgy. Mood-swings. He’d talk fast, then fall into a melancholic silence. I wonder how Ruth is taking this. Don’t answer. It’s a stupid question.’

  ‘I don’t know how people take grief,’ he said. ‘The loss of a spouse. The loss of a kid. I don’t know where they find the resources to cope.’

  ‘They always manage somehow, don’t they?’

  The Christmas bells again. He felt an affinity for Quasimodo going fucking mad in his belfry. ‘Let’s talk about Lindsay for a minute. What did he and Colin discuss when he came to your house?’

  Miriam stood up, empty glass in hand. ‘You expect me to remember that far back?’

  ‘Try for me. Colin said they had a client in common. He’d forgotten who.’

  ‘What has this got to do with Wexler, Lou?’

  ‘Let me work that part out, Miriam. I’m only asking for a name.’

  ‘Colin wouldn’t want me to tell tales.’

  ‘Two men are dead, Miriam. Your loyalty’s priceless, and I admire you for it, but it isn’t helpful.’

  She was quiet for a while. Her face registered indecision. She walked up and down in a troubled manner, twisting her glass in her hand. Then she sighed long, as if she’d resolved some demanding problem. ‘Okay. You’re such a smooth talker, I can’t resist … A man called Bannerjee.’

  ‘As in the discredited MP?’

  ‘Right. Lindsay handled some property transactions for him, I believe. Look, I didn’t pay much attention to their business chat. That sort of stuff causes a crust to form over my brain. Colin had an investment fund, and Bannerjee was going to put a very large sum of money into it, and Lindsay was handling the details. That’s all I know, Lou. I doze easily.’

  ‘Lindsay, our nondescript little solicitor handling money matters for the jet-setter MP?’

  ‘I’d guess Bannerjee trusted Lindsay. Maybe he knew his affairs would be dealt with honestly. The quiet family solicitor might be a better bet than some flash lawyer.’

  ‘Could be,’ Perlman said. Colin had avoided mentioning Bannerjee. Easy to understand. Who wants to be affiliated with disgraced figures? The fallen politician, the tarnished golden boy. Guilt by association. When an MP tumbled, he usually dragged others down, secretaries, hangers-on, advisers. Colin had been responsible for other people’s gelt, a lot of it, and therefore had to be perceived as trustworthy. An association with Bannerjee might have ruined him. Okay. Fair enough. Business was played that way. Businessmen dined every day on the carcasses of former allies. Yesterday’s pals were today’s fricassee of beef.

  Miriam asked, ‘Does that help?’

  ‘I don’t know yet,’ Perlman said. ‘I’m looking for a road map. Colin and Lindsay and Bannerjee, fine. It’s money, it’s investments. Lindsay and Wexler, they met once a month like clockwork – why? what did they discuss? Why did Wexler persist in seeing Lindsay, when he didn’t stay in contact with his boyhood pal Colin? I’m missing the glue, Miriam. I’m not getting these people to stick together the way I want.’

  ‘You can’t force some things,’ she said. ‘You can’t make everything fit the way you’d like.’

  ‘In my meshuganey wee world, dear, I’m always jamming square pegs into round holes. Sometimes what you get surprises you.’

  ‘Maybe Wexler and Lindsay enjoyed one another’s company. Not everything in the world is sinister, Lou.’

  Perlman watched a pigeon flap in panic across the skylight. Probably the bird had OD’d on Christmas carols. ‘Do you think Wexler knew Bannerjee?’

  ‘Lindsay had Bannerjee as a client, there’s always a chance that Lindsay introduced his pal Wexler to his pal Bannerjee, isn’t there?’


  Perlman thought: Twenty or less days to Christmas, and he had violent death in a city whose inhabitants were expecting a fat fellow in a red suit and a gang of reindeers and a whiff of goodwill on earth. Oy. Another thought struck him: What if Colin was in danger from something other than Rifkind’s surgery? Maybe that was a step too far, and Colin wasn’t a target of whoever had killed Wexler and Lindsay – but Perlman had a sense of unease on his brother’s behalf. Money, secret affiliations, business deals – perhaps something bound Colin to the dead men.

  ‘Time to leave,’ he said. ‘I’ll call the hospital this afternoon and see how Colin got on.’

  ‘I’ll be there around four o’clock.’

  He touched the side of her face. ‘You’ve got paint on you. Purple suits you.’

  She placed a hand over his and said, ‘I love Colin.’

  ‘Why are you telling me something I already know, Miriam?’

  ‘I felt like saying it. Maintaining a perspective, Lou.’

  ‘I’m not sure what that means.’

  ‘Don’t you?’

  She smiled, walked with him to the door. He raised a hand in farewell and left without looking back. He felt awkward, a bumbler. Was she reminding him of the inexorable fact he had no chance with her? Only if she knows what I feel, he thought. Only if she’d managed to see inside the bolted chamber of his heart. Had he given himself away unwittingly? He was embarrassed in the peculiar stinging, cringing way of adolescence. He thought he felt blood rush to his face, a blush. What was this – retarded development? You’ll be writing wee love-notes next on scented paper, never to send them. You’ll be strolling midnight parks in the misery of knowing your love was not only doomed, but that the object of your love had discovered your feelings and, effectively, had spurned you.

  Spurned. I’m even thinking like a romance magazine. He went down the stairs. Halfway, he sneezed. Light fell through a stained-glass window and he saw the fine spray of his sneeze hang a moment in the air like powder. I love Colin.

  Of course she does. And always will.

  34

  He moved along the lobby to the street door. He could still vaguely hear the choir at practice, but faint now. He reached for the handle, turned it. His exit was blocked by the figure of a man in the doorway.

  ‘Did you shag her stupid, Sergeant? Did you make her come and scream, Mr Polisman?’

  Perlman took a step back. He was aware of Eric ‘Moon’ Riley holding something in one hand, a stick, a length of metal, he wasn’t sure at first. Riley was short, built like a concrete cube; he had a face that looked as if it was compressed by a nylon stocking mask. No beauty. No charm.

  What did Sadie see in this gargoyle? Only dope and terror.

  ‘Are you following me, Riley?’

  ‘Did she suck your willie, Sergeant? Did you ram her up the arse with your hot rod?’

  ‘What the fuck are you talking about?’

  ‘She slept at your house, right?’

  ‘She told you that?’

  ‘Our relationship relies on trust, Perlman.’

  ‘Trust my arse. You hit her, didn’t you? You beat her, didn’t you?’

  ‘I didn’t raise a hand.’

  ‘I’m sure.’ Perlman felt the day was caving in completely. It had become a landslide of slurry. He was up to his neck. He looked at the object Riley carried, a twelve-inch length of lead pipe. He imagined it cracking his skull. ‘If you hurt her, you fuckwit, I’ll come after you.’

  ‘On your white horse, Sergeant? I shake. Look.’ Riley rolled his little eyes and shivered. His red leather jacket creaked. He had a brass buckle on the belt of his black jeans. ‘Perlman’s coming after me. I better get my arse outta town. Sheriff Perlman wants my ballocks in a sling. Oooo.’

  ‘Is that the pipe you hit her with, Riley?’

  ‘Naw, naw, I carry this for my general welfare, Sergeant. There are some rough punters in this town.’

  ‘Where’s Sadie?’

  ‘Sound asleep.’

  ‘Where?’

  ‘The Sergeant and the Junkie. What a romantic story. You’ve got a thing for her, eh? I’m here to tell you only one thing. Hands off. You got that, Louie? Hands fucking off. She’s my property. She’s a no-go zone, bawheid.’

  Riley flicked the air with the lead pipe. It passed within an inch or two of Perlman’s face. Perlman reflected on the fact that in these times of broken-down authority you could no longer say I’m a police officer, stop, do what I tell you or you’ll be in trouble with any hope of making it count. Say it, and you got whacked on the nut anyway. You might as well wave a lace doily.

  ‘Tell me you get my message and I’m gone, Jewboy.’

  ‘I get your message,’ Perlman said. ‘Here’s one for you. You hurt her, you’ll answer to me. I swear to God.’

  ‘Hurting Sadie’s like kicking your cat, for fuck’s sake. Give her enough junk and she doesn’t feel a fucking thing. She’s a mindless hoor. What do you think? You’re on some mission to save her? I pee laughing. She’ll fuck anything for dope money. If I let her.’

  Perlman had an urge to go for the throat, throw himself at this jerk, this moronic dod of humanity. The pipe was a major deterrent. ‘You harm her –’

  ‘Instead of handing out warnings, why don’t you pay some attention to that poor arsehole with his head cut off out there in the suburbs?’

  ‘How did you hear about that?’

  ‘The radio. Always keep a wee tranny handy.’

  So it had slipped out. It was public knowledge. You couldn’t keep Artie Wexler’s death in a padlocked box. Perlman imagined he heard the city draw a collective breath of astonishment. Everyday murder was one thing – the knifing, death by broken bottle, even the occasional gun – but this was the kind of slaying you expected in secretive Middle Eastern kingdoms where people had fingers hacked off for farting in public.

  Not here, not in dear old heathery Scotland.

  Riley turned towards the door. ‘I hope you’ve listened, Perlman. I’m a vicious cunt when I’m upset.’

  He was gone in a flicker of light. The door swung shut behind him. Perlman stood in the dim lobby, hands thrust into his pockets. The collar of his shirt stuck to his neck. He composed himself, controlled his breathing, stepped outside. He walked to Virginia Street, where he’d parked his Mondeo.

  Sadie, he thought. What can I do for you, and where can I find the time to do it, lassie? I’m devoured.

  Under the dull pearl light of a fading Glasgow afternoon, he sat in his car and lit a cigarette, thinking how the city, which he loved as a man might an unreliable mistress of vast and varied experience, sometimes coated him in a film of scum.

  35

  BJ Quick said, ‘Good grass.’

  Furf said, ‘Cool.’

  ‘Let’s have the joint back, big man.’

  Grass made Furf talkative and loose. ‘You do the hokey-cokey and you shake it all about,’ he said, and passed the blackened joint to BJ Quick, who toked deeply.

  They were wandering along Anderston Quay on the north bank of the Clyde. The early-afternoon air over the river was tinted a little by a grainy mist. The giant Finnieston Crane, built in the 1930s to heave locomotives on to ships, stood like a forgotten metal cathedral.

  They strolled past the glassy tower of the Moat House Hotel and the shell-like structure of the Exhibition and Conference Centre, known locally as the Armadillo. They paused and surveyed the river for a while before Furf said, ‘I lived over there years ago,’ and pointed with a gloved hand. ‘Lorne Street.’

  BJ Quick sucked on the grass. Smoke escaped through his nostrils. Dope made him feel a strange clarity. He knew it muddled the senses of most people, turned their brains to semolina, but it acted on him differently.

  Furf said, ‘There used to be a brothel over there. The Pox Palace. Got myself a bad case of the crabs there. See here, do you think I’ve got rabies?’ He showed Quick the little bruises left by Dogue’s bite.

  ‘Rabies,
fuck off,’ Quick said. He coughed, then spat in a long arc. A neon light went on and off in his head: club farraday club farraday club farraday. He’d already decided to give his first interview, when the club opened, to the Sunday Express, because it hadn’t harassed him like some of the other papers, such as the Daily Record or the Sunday Mail.

  ‘I think we’re getting away from business,’ he said.

  ‘So we are. We were discussing … Abdullah, right?’

  ‘Here’s what I want to know. How is it the names I pass on to him come to unhappy endings? Lindsay, okay. They say he did away with himself. Who knows if that’s true? But this other punter, Wexler, was definitely murdered. So what does it mean when I give the names of two people to our mate Abdullah and they both turn up dead, eh? Coincidence? Not on your life.’

  Furf frowned. He was having a hard time staying on track. ‘I saw Abdullah go inside Victor Morris this morning. Tattooheid Jack, a kid that hangs around there, said he bought a knife. Then I saw him jump in a cab –’

  ‘Fucksake, that’s the third time you’ve told me. Your memory’s shot every time you smoke grass, Furf. Now where was I? Righto. Do you know what’s been crossing my mind? I’m thinking, okay, somebody sent Abdullah here to kill these people in the photos.’

  ‘Kill them?’

  ‘Why else are they feeding him the bloody names and addresses and photos? To deliver Christmas presents? You heard how Abdullah sounded off about Lindsay. Killed my father, deserved to die, blah blah blah. But the Arab’s always too fucking late. Something happens to these people before he can get to them. First Lindsay pops his clogs, then the second bastard gets his head chopped off. I’m beginning to think he’s not meant to reach his bloody targets. He believes he is, but somebody else gets in there ahead of him. He’s one step behind the action.’

  Furfee studied his worrisome hand again. ‘Who the hell sent him here anyway?’

  ‘Good question. And who’s beating him to the punch? And who the fuck asked me to be the go-between? I mean, basically this job is delivering envelopes, and they’re willing to pay twenty thou? How come my name was picked out of the hat?’