Their Final Act

by Alex Walters

  Douglas shook his head. 'This was a while ago. He disappeared off the scene again for a good few years. Then, a couple of years ago, he began to make another comeback. Mainly just unpaid open mic slots at first, apparently. Just to get back into the swing of it, and get himself noticed, I suppose. The word was he'd kicked the booze and was fully sober, and that seemed to be evident in his performances. Like I say, he's a genuinely funny guy. Knows how to work an audience – nice balance between getting them behind him but gently goading them. Never too cosy. Can handle the hecklers. So he gradually worked his way back. I was more than happy to give him a go. Not that much of a risk, to be honest, because even if it had been a car crash, the punters would have enjoyed seeing him die–' Douglas stopped, reading McKay's expression. 'What is it?'

  'I'm sorry, Mr Douglas. I should have made it clear before now. Mr McGuire's body was found early this morning. Just round the corner from here, down on Bank Street.'

  Douglas was silent for a moment. 'Shit. I mean, I heard the sirens. What happened to him? Some sort of accident?'

  'That's what we're trying to ascertain. But, no, at present, we don't think that it was an accident. We believe he was unlawfully killed.'

  'Christ. You're kidding.' For a moment, Douglas looked genuinely shaken.

  'I think even Mr McGuire might struggle to make a joke out of this,' McKay observed solemnly. 'Was there anything notable about Mr McGuire's behaviour in here last night? You mentioned he didn't respond well to not being top of the bill.'

  'Yes, but that was just a few acerbic comments when he first arrived. To let me know he wasn't happy. After that, he was professional enough. Did his set. Went down well, as I said. Not sure after that. I saw him in the bar briefly afterwards, but he was only drinking fizzy water. You get thirsty up there on stage. I didn't see him later, so assumed he'd pushed off to his hotel.'

  'Do you know if he had any contact with your top of the bill?'

  'Maggie? Not particularly, as far as I know. I mean, they might have rubbed up against each other backstage, as it were. There's not a lot of space back there. But I didn't see them talking or anything. She was with me after the gig. We had a bit of a chat over a few drinks in the bar. I was trying to persuade her to take part in our post-Edinburgh shindig.'

  'Do you know what time she left?'

  'It was after midnight. I offered to walk her back to her hotel but she was insistent I shouldn't.'

  'Where's she staying?'

  'Place just along the river. We have a deal with them. Here…' Douglas ducked into the box office and returned holding a business card. 'This is the place. She and McGuire were both staying there.' He glanced at his watch. 'Don't know if she'll be up yet. She was planning to have a wander round the city today and then fly back this evening.'

  'London?'

  'Aye. She's from Glasgow originally, I think, but lives down there now. It's where the work is.'

  'You've presumably got contact details in case we can't catch her at the hotel?'

  'I've got a mobile. Otherwise, it's through her agent. Do you really need to speak to her?'

  'We'll probably need to talk to anyone who might have had contact with McGuire last night. Including your staff here and any other acts.'

  'There were just the two of them last night. Thought that would be enough to attract an audience. I can give you a list of the staff who were on duty.'

  'I'll get someone to pop in and pick that up later. Any punters we should be talking to? Regulars, or anyone you saw talking to McGuire?'

  Douglas hesitated for a moment. 'Not really. When I saw McGuire in the bar, he was very much on his own. He didn't come across as someone who liked to shoot the breeze, if you get my drift. We have a few people we see in here regularly, but I couldn't tell you their names, let alone give you any contact details. It's a varied crowd. Students, stag and hen parties, office get-togethers or just couples or groups looking for a different night out. And people who are just fans of a particular comic. Maggie's got some dedicated followers, and I dare say a few people came to see McGuire out of curiosity.' Douglas paused. 'Well, it'll be a small claim to fame, I suppose. Being present at his last gig. Poor bugger. Unlawfully killed, you said? You mean murder?'

  'Too soon to say that.'

  'I mean, he's had his issues over the years, but I can't imagine why anyone would want to kill him.'

  'We don't know that anyone did. We don't know if he was targeted deliberately. Or if he was just in the wrong place at the wrong time.'

  'Was it a mugging?'

  McKay held up his hands. 'Best if I don't say any more for the moment, Mr Douglas. We'll no doubt be issuing a statement in due course. It's still early days. I'm just following up the most immediate leads for the moment.' He turned towards the door, indicating that the conversation was over. 'Many thanks for your time. We may well need to speak to you again. I take it we can find you here?'

  Douglas nodded. 'Aye, I don't get much time away from this place.'

  'Ach, well. At least you get a few laughs.'

  McKay stepped back out into the street, blinking at the bright sunlight. Church Street was already looking busier, a mix of late commuters heading into work and early shoppers stealing a march on the day. He hadn't really been expecting to learn much new at the club, but he was still kicking his heels waiting for Henderson and his team to finish their work and it had seemed the obvious place to start.

  The one new thing he'd learned was that McGuire had had a drink problem. Even if he'd put it behind him, it might be a line worth pursuing. In McKay's experience, drunks were often prone to making enemies or storing up trouble, especially if they ran up debts chasing their habit. The next question was whether McGuire had any family – a wife or partner who might, eagerly or otherwise, be awaiting his return home. McKay had already set someone checking that out back at the office. Apart from anything else, they'd need to get a formal identification as soon as they could.

  He walked slowly down towards the river, enjoying the feel of the unaccustomed sun on his face. Like most Scots, McKay was instinctively mistrustful of warm weather, always assuming that the dreich days would follow. If the fine weather went on for too long, he felt uneasy, as if it was a breach in the natural order of things. For the moment, though, he was content, energised as he always was by the prospect of a major enquiry. He could see Ginny Horton waiting for him at the end of the street.

  'Assume Henderson and his gang haven't finished yet?' McKay said as he reached her.

  'Reckoned they weren't far off.'

  'Probably dragging his heels deliberately just to annoy me.'

  'I imagine so. Anything new from your visit to the club?' McKay had briefly interrupted Horton taking the young men's statements to update her on McGuire's identity.

  'Not really. Other than that McGuire had had a drink problem, though was supposedly back on the wagon now. And that he was second on the bill last night. Or, given there were only two acts, bottom of the bill. Top was someone called Maggie Laing.'

  'I've seen her on TV. On one of those panel shows. She was pretty good. Made the male comics squirm, which is always good to see.'

  'I'll take your word for it. Different generation from McGuire, presumably.'

  'Very. How'd McGuire go down last night?'

  'Not bad apparently. Guy up there reckons he was a decent comedian, even if past his best. But wasn't entirely happy at not being top of the bill.'

  'You think that might be relevant?'

  McKay shrugged. 'Who knows? He wasn't the easiest of characters, by all accounts, so I suppose he could have had a run in with someone. Take a lot for that to escalate to this level though. The guy up there hadn't noticed him talking to anyone in particular.'

  'So what next?'

  'I need to update Helena, especially as it looks as if this might be of some interest to the media. And we need to set up the enquiry properly, now we know what we're dealing with.'

  'Do we know what we'
re dealing with?'

  McKay grinned. 'Nothing straightforward anyway.'

  'Which is just how you like it. Want me to have a chat with Maggie Laing while you're briefing Helena?'

  'Aye, that would make sense. Be good to catch her while she's still at the hotel. I don't imagine she'll have much to tell us, but don't want to be chasing across the country trying to get a statement from her.' He handed over the business card that Drew Douglas had given him. 'This is the place.'

  'Okay. Let me know if you decide to head back before I'm done. If you take the car, I can always get a lift from one of the lads here.'

  'Don't get a lift with Henderson. You never know where he's been. Well, you do. That's the trouble.'

  She shook her head indulgently. 'Have fun, Alec.'

  'Oh, I will. I promise you that.'

  9

  There was a long silence before Netty Munro responded. 'I've always been Netty,' she said. 'To my family and friends. Natasha was just for the public.'

  Elizabeth came further into the room. 'Yes, but Natasha Munro. That's awesome.'

  'I'm delighted you think so, dear. It never really felt that way to me, though it had its compensations.' She was gazing at Elizabeth with an odd expression, as if they were engaged in some contest that Jane couldn't appreciate. She had the sense that there was some game being played, but she couldn't imagine what it might be.

  'I can see now how you can afford a place like this. How you can afford to do what you do.'

  'Perhaps,' Munro said. 'Though this place was an inheritance originally. An uncle of mine who died childless. I thought at first I'd use it as a holiday home. Maybe even turn it into apartments and let it out. But I came here and fell in love with it.'

  Jane, sitting beside her, was looking baffled, as if the other two were speaking a language she didn't understand. 'Who's Natasha Munro?'

  'I am, dear. Or at least I was.'

  'She was famous,' Elizabeth said. 'One of the first big female country rock stars. And an actress. I don't know why I didn't recognise her straightaway.'

  'Probably because I'm much older than I was then. And all of that is something of an exaggeration. I was hardly a star. Just a Christian singer-songwriter who got lucky and had a few hits. And then got asked to appear in some largely mediocre films. To be honest, I'm surprised that someone as young as you even recognises my name.'

  'My father was a huge fan.'

  'Ah, well, that makes more sense. He'd have been the right generation. It's nice to be remembered.'

  Jane was gazing at her, her expression even more awestruck than Elizabeth's. 'You were a singer?'

  'I still am, from time to time. I might even inflict it on you, if you're not well-behaved.' She laughed. 'I just don't do it in public for money any more. Which is a great relief.'

  'But it must have been amazing.' Elizabeth pulled out a chair and sat down at the table next to them. 'Travelling the world. Meeting all those other stars. You must have millions of stories.'

  'A few,' Munro said. 'A few of them even repeatable in polite company. And I might inflict some on you too if you're not careful. You're right though. It was exciting at first. When you're young and you get the chance to go places you've never dreamed of. But after a few years it gets wearisome – just an endless trail of tour buses and planes and airports and identical theatres. I was big in the US Bible Belt, and frankly it doesn't get more tiresome.'

  'Is that why you stopped?' Jane asked.

  'Partly, and partly because people weren't listening anyway. I had some hits on the US country charts. A couple of them crossed over and I sold a lot of records on the back of them. But then the hits dried up and I wasn't selling as many records any more. Fashions had moved on, and people were listening to other things. And my Christian stuff was perhaps just a bit too wholesome.'

  'But your stuff was timeless,' Elizabeth said. 'I used to love it as a teenager.'

  'That must have been a good few years after my heyday. You're right, in that it wasn't really just chart material. The hits were flukes initially. The first one was almost a novelty record. But they sold my albums. I imagine I could have continued a career if I'd wanted to. Focused on the songwriting and selling smaller venues on the basis of people vaguely remembering my name. But I'd really had enough by then. Wanted to jump off and do something different.'

  'Farming?' Elizabeth said.

  'As I said, that was mainly an accident. Most of my life has been really. One chance encounter or event that's led me from one thing to the next. I've tended to go with the flow. While this place fell into my lap, I decided to try to make a go of it. I had a fair bit of money stashed away, so I was able to invest in new machinery and carry out some repairs that were needed to the building. I knew nothing about farming, but I found a man who did, so I paid him to run the place and, in the process, teach me what he knew. Or at least the most important bits of what he knew. And that's how it happened.'

  'You don't regret giving it all up?' Jane asked.

  'Not in the slightest. It's not as if I was ever going to be a megastar. I'd had my moment in the sun, and it was time to move on. It was hard work, getting the farm back up to speed. But it was so different from what I'd been doing that it hardly felt like work at all. I wish that were still true, but I think now I'm beginning to be really past it.'

  'Do people recognise you in the street?' Elizabeth asked.

  Munro laughed. 'Not often these days, I'm relieved to say. Once upon a time they did, when I was appearing on Top of the Pops. I occasionally see people do a double take, as if they know they've seen me from somewhere but can't think where.'

  'That was how I was,' Elizabeth said. 'When I first saw you outside. I thought you must be someone I'd met somewhere.'

  'Is that right?' Munro said. There was an edge to her voice, Jane thought, though she had no idea of its significance. 'I've had people engage me in conversation about their family or their pets or what they did on their holidays, because they think they already know me but can't work out how. But I can bore you with my wealth of fascinating stories some other time. Shall we take a walk outside so I can show you what we have?' Without waiting for any response, she rose and picked up a pair of walking boots she'd left in the kitchen doorway. 'What kinds of shoes do you have?'

  'I've just got a pair of trainers,' Elizabeth said.

  Jane nodded. 'Me too.'

  'That should be okay for the moment.' Munro stooped to pull on her own boots. 'The ground will be dry, given the weather we've been having, so if you avoid the very muddy patches you should be fine. Go and get them on and we'll go outside.'

  * * *

  A few minutes later, they were standing outside the back door of the farmhouse. There was a large open storage barn on their right, containing various farm machinery. To their left, a newly seeded barley field stretched away, slowly descending in the direction of the firth. 'So,' Munro explained, 'the fields over here are given over to barley and some wheat. The barley is used in the whisky industry, so it goes to a good home. Some of it eventually makes its way back here in liquid form. We've just planted this year's crop. That faint sheen of green across the surface is the first shoots beginning to appear.'

  'It's huge,' Jane said, staring out in the direction of the water.

  'We have a fair few acres.' Munro led them further down the farm track, past the barn. Behind the barn, Jane could see a small shanty town of other wooden buildings, presumably more storage. There was another large barn across the field. Munro gestured to their right, where grassland stretched up towards the elevated horizon. 'We have sheep grazing up there normally. They've been taken inside in preparation for lambing.'

  'You have lambs?' Jane said. 'Will we be able to see them?'

  'Of course. You can even have a go at feeding some of the smaller ones, if you like.'

  To Jane, this just seemed like further proof that she'd stepped into a different world. Up to now, farming had meant little to her. A word used on
supermarket packaging. Something she'd seen on TV in a documentary or a soap. She was standing in the middle of one, gazing in mild wonder at the tractor in the barn, the array of imposing but unidentifiable machinery beside it. It looked as if there would be livestock for her to gaze at and even to touch.

  'It's not a large farm by local standards,' Munro said. 'But it's enough to eke out a living, especially after I invested to bring it up to modern standards. So that, combined with my royalties from songs and recordings, keeps me comfortable enough.'

  'She must be loaded,' Elizabeth whispered to Jane. 'Place like this.'

  'I–'

  Munro clearly had sharper ears than the two girls realised. She turned to gaze at Elizabeth 'I wish I were,' she said. 'But you don't make big money in farms. Not up here. I've a little stashed away from my previous life. But mostly in investments and probably nothing like as much as you'd think.' Her eyes were fixed on Elizabeth, as if she were issuing a warning.

  'I'm sorry, I didn't mean–'

  'No, dear. I know you didn't mean anything. I just like to make things clear.' She had already turned and was heading back towards the farmhouse. Elizabeth tried to catch Jane's eye, but Jane had decided that she didn't want to appear complicit with Elizabeth. She had no idea what Elizabeth's game might be, but it seemed unlikely that she would remain as a long-term guest. Jane wanted to do nothing that might place her own position at risk.

  As they reached the corner of the farmhouse. Munro paused and waved her arm airily in the direction of the firth below them. 'That pastureland down there belongs to the farm too. Now, let's go inside, and I'll get us a cold drink. We can take advantage of the fine weather and sit out on the decking for a while.'

  She led them back into the cool of the kitchen, and busied herself getting items out of the fridge. 'We can have something stronger later, but maybe just some home-made lemonade for now? I made this earlier.' She placed an earthenware jug on the kitchen table and fetched some tumblers from one of the cupboards. She poured lemonade into each of the tumblers and pushed them towards the two young women. 'Let's go outside. I'll open the patio doors in the living room.'