Strange Loyalties jl-3

by William McIlvanney

  His security was the insecurity of others. Like a lot of us, his security might be his weakness. He was a careful man. He had his family safely to one side. He helped Matt Mason but not so that you would notice him doing it. He opened doors. Others went through them to do whatever was to be done. You wouldn’t catch Eddie out on small things. But if Mason fell, you could maybe bury Eddie in the debris. I wondered if I could frighten him with that.

  For perhaps Eddie had been too careful. He had never been in prison. He had never even stood trial. Elaborate security can be a trap. You can spend so much time making sure that others can’t get in, you may not realise that you can’t get out either. I didn’t think Eddie could survive outside the life he’d made for himself. He was habituated to its forms. Prison would destroy him. Conviction would destroy his family. I wondered how the very contemplation of such things might affect him. We would see.

  He was there. I saw him through the window, seated at a table at the back, facing towards me. I paused beside the menucard and watched. He was framed in the O of Rico’s, like a photograph of father in the family album. He had his glasses on. He was reading the newspaper. I went in.

  Rico’s is a café bar that opens early in the morning for breakfasts. It lets in a lot of light and it’s spacious. With the unpretentious metal-topped tables and the mosaic paintings on the wall and the bottles behind the bar, it imparts that civilising sense of being in a bistro. The rack of newspapers suggests you needn’t hurry. The place can give you the feeling that mornings are not a bad idea. It evidently gave Eddie Foley that feeling. This was where he regularly came for a late and leisurely breakfast.

  He didn’t look up as I reached his table. He was halfway through a croissant and his coffee-cup was almost empty. The paper was the Daily Mail.

  ‘What’s the news, Eddie?’ I said.

  He looked up over his glasses. Something that was perhaps caution came into his eyes and went. He smiled. He had a nice smile. He looked as if children would like him.

  ‘Jack,’ he said. ‘You going to join me?’

  ‘Oh, yes.’

  ‘Ah haven’t seen you for a while.’

  ‘Ah’m livin’ quiet.’

  I had sat down opposite him and a dark-haired waitress came up to ask me if I wanted anything. She had such an attractive, unforced pleasantness, you felt your day had earned a bonus just by meeting her. I ordered coffee.

  ‘Yourself, Mr Foley?’ she said. ‘How are ye doin’?’

  ‘Ah could use a refill, Jennifer. Add this to mine.’ She took his bill-tab as she went. Eddie folded his paper with one hand and pushed it to the end of the table. He took off his glasses and stowed them carefully in a soft red leather case and put it in an inside pocket. He looked slightly less avuncular that way.

  ‘Here,’ he said. ‘Ah heard about yer brother. Ah’m sorry. That was bad.’

  ‘Aye.’

  It struck me suddenly that I had been thinking of Scott in a different way in the past few days. The obsession had subsumed the grief. That was one way to staunch your tears.

  ‘That was a waste.’

  ‘It was,’ I said. ‘But he hit the car more than the car hit him. Laidlaws can be careless people, Eddie.’

  ‘Not all of them.’

  ‘Listen. I don’t think I’m going to win any medals as an insurance-risk.’

  Jennifer came with the coffees. I milked and sugared. Eddie took his as it was. He broke off a piece of croissant, began to chew.

  ‘You don’t want something to eat?’ he said.

  ‘I’ve eaten, thanks. So what’s the word of yourself, Eddie?’

  ‘Same as ever, Jack. Same as ever. But you know that, don’t you?’

  ‘Hm?’

  ‘Jack. When did Ah get on to your social calendar?’

  ‘This is true.’

  ‘So what’s this about?’

  Jennifer was back with the amended slip. She laid it beside Eddie and went away. I reached across and lifted it to look. It was printed in that faint blue type that looks as if it’s dissolving. I could just about make it out. It said £5.50.

  ‘Ah’m gettin’ that, Jack,’ Eddie said.

  ‘Okay.’

  He was watching me. I continued to hold the slip of paper in my hand, studying it.

  ‘This bill’s wrong, Eddie,’ I said.

  He took it from me and looked at it. He had to get out his glasses. He counted his way through the small column of figures.

  ‘No, it’s right,’ he said.

  ‘The bill’s wrong.’

  He looked at me over his glasses.

  ‘You owe a fuckin’ sight more than that, Eddie Foley,’ I said.

  ‘An’ ye’re gonny pay.’

  His right hand took off his glasses in slow motion. He looked round Rico’s. He looked back at me. I nodded.

  ‘Time to divvy up,’ I said.

  His hand slowly abandoned his glasses on the table.

  ‘What’s this about?’ he said.

  ‘It’s about the firm you work for is going to go out of business in the next few days. I’m the liquidator.’

  He turned his head slightly sideways to look at me. He seemed to be trying to see past my words to the joke that must lie behind them.

  ‘Could I see your credentials, please?’ he said, smiling.

  ‘You’re seeing them. Me. Believe them or don’t. And don’t smile, Eddie. Don’t smile. Or I’ll arrange for you to lose your teeth.’

  It was the strangeness of the threat that convinced him. We had never spoken to each other before except either in a friendly way or through an agreed ritual of jocular enmity. He knew that I had changed the terms on which we were meeting. I watched his eyes try to work out where he now was.

  ‘What’s happened?’ he said.

  ‘You know what’s happened. You always did. The difference is that now I know as well.’

  His breathing wasn’t relaxed.

  ‘Like what?’ he said.

  ‘Your boss has lost it, Eddie. Talk about misjudging the market? He’s killed two people in the last three months. I think it’s called over-extending yourself. Who the hell does he think he is? Attila the Hun?’

  ‘Ah don’t know what ye’re talkin’ about.’

  ‘That’s fine. Just as long as I do.’

  ‘Ah don’t. Ah really don’t.’

  ‘Dan Scoular. Meece Rooney.’

  ‘Ah don’t know what ye’re talkin’ about.’

  ‘Hey! What d’ye think this is? A lavatory pan? Talk shite somewhere else.’

  ‘But Ah-’

  ‘Eddie!’

  He froze. His eyes were nervous as a mouse along the wainscot where there is no exit.

  ‘Don’t do that. This is away past telling wee fibs to the polis. Stay quiet if ye want. But let’s not sit here saying what we both know is crap.’

  He subsided gently, staring at the table.

  ‘Listen. I’m making an assumption about you. That you didn’t actually do the things. That you weren’t directly involved. That’s not what you do. If I’m wrong, then you’ll know I’m wrong. And when I go out this door, you better move fast and far. Because it’ll be you I’m looking for. But I don’t think you did.’

  He had no impulse to talk now. He looked as if he was seeing his lawyer in his head.

  ‘Because I think I know what you’re like. Know what I think you’re like, Eddie? You’re like a maintenance worker at Dachau or somewhere. You might convert the showers to gas. You might make sure the doors lock properly. But you wouldn’t actually kill anybody. You’re nice that way. You do a practical job and go home and forget about it. Seems a few of them did that there. In those places. Go home and play with the kids. Forget about it.’

  He was fingering his glasses.

  ‘Well, I’m here to remind you, Eddie. Time to stop playing at wee houses. You owe. Now there are two ways you can pay. Reluctantly or of your own free will. The first way will come dear. I’m going to get Matt
Mason. I know he’s the head of what happened. Who the obedient bodies were, I don’t know. But I will. You stand in my way, you’re going, too. Everything goes. Your lifestyle. The way your family think of you. The lot. If you help, you get to keep your family’s sense of you. You stay out of jail. That’s it.’

  His hand was gripping his glasses, clouding them.

  ‘You’re right, Eddie. You’re not on my social calendar. I don’t like you. You’re like a permanent flu virus in everybody else’s life. You leave them vulnerable. But Mason’s cancer. I’m going to cut that bastard out. You can be part of the operation or part of the tumour. No other choice.’

  I made to sip my coffee but it was getting cold. I took out a cigarette and lit it. I knew Eddie didn’t smoke these days. Maybe it was so that he would be there when his grandchildren came. I had said what I had to say. The way he took it was the way he took it. I would be going on from here, whatever. I smoked for a time.

  ‘I’m not agreeing with anything,’ Eddie said. ‘But could you be more specific?’

  ‘There’s a way I can do this where you’re not directly involved. Only you and me’ll know. And maybe a colleague that I know I can trust.’

  ‘What if I don’t trust him?’

  ‘Hey, Eddie. I’m making this contract. You sign it or don’t. That’s all. Who told you you had rights here? You gave them up when you took them off other people. You’re with me or I’ll fuck up your neat life permanently. The way you’ve helped to fuck up other people’s. Like to the death.’

  He looked at his coffee. He looked at his newspaper.

  ‘So what would be involved?’ he said.

  ‘I don’t know yet. For the next two or three days, we keep in touch. You give me your number. If David Ewart leaves a message, that’ll be me. You don’t get back on it soon, I’ll know you’ve renegued. But when you get back, you phone me in my own name at the Grosvenor.’

  ‘What kinda deal is that?’

  ‘It’s the only one I know how to make just now.’

  ‘But Ah don’t even know what ye’re askin’ me to do.’

  ‘Neither do I. I just want you there in case I need you.’

  ‘For what?’

  ‘Whatever it is, it’ll meet the terms I’ve stated. Nobody’ll know that you’re involved.’

  ‘How can you say that if you don’t know what ye’re askin’ me to do?’

  ‘Because when I ask you, you can judge. You don’t like it, you get out. I’ll just have to waste your life. You’re covered.’

  ‘Oh, thanks. David Ewart?’

  ‘David Ewart. It’s a harmless name.’

  He put his glasses in their case, put them in his pocket. He took the glasses back out and put them on. He reached for the newspaper at the end of the table. He tore off a piece of the margin. He wrote his telephone number on it and passed it to me. I checked it and folded the paper neatly and put it in the ticket pocket of my blazer. Eddie replaced his glasses in his pocket. We sat together, feeling apart.

  I wasn’t fooling myself about what had happened. So far, this meant nothing. All Eddie had done was play for time. All he had given me was a phone number. I could have found that in the book. He had made a gesture that was either a handshake or a wave but nobody knew which yet, not even him. But at least I’d caused a draught in his safe house. There was a broken window somewhere he hadn’t known about. He would be wandering around his premises for a time, trying to work out where it was and if there was anything he could do about it.

  ‘What about Matt Mason?’ I said. ‘What’s happening just now?’

  Eddie’s look told me to back off. He wasn’t working for me just yet.

  ‘He’s in Glasgow?’

  ‘He’s not in Thailand.’

  ‘Nothing happening?’

  ‘Oh, yes,’ Eddie said. ‘There’s a big caper on tomorrow.’

  ‘What’s that?’

  ‘A children’s party.’

  ‘A what?’

  ‘A children’s party. Matt’s got twin nieces. They’re eight tomorrow. He’s very fond of them. So he’s havin’ a big party for them in the house. He’s got more room than their parents. Millie’s going.’ Millie was Eddie’s wife. ‘It’ll be her first time in the house.’

  ‘You not going?’

  ‘Ah’m supposed to go to the football. Ah haven’t seen a game for a while.’

  ‘A children’s party? Nice.’

  ‘It will be,’ Eddie said. ‘It’ll be great fun for the kids. All the twins’ friends. Some of their parents. It’ll be quite a houseful. You’re not plannin’ to raid it, are ye?’

  I put out my cigarette.

  ‘Okay for you to get the bill, Eddie?’

  ‘Ah thought that was the idea.’

  We looked at each other.

  ‘Eddie,’ I said. ‘I know what’s happened here. Between us. You can go away from here and tell Matt Mason everything. Tell him to protect himself. It’s your choice. But that would be a foolish one. You know why? Either I’m serious about this or I’m not. If I’m serious and you don’t tell him, you can save your family’s peace of mind. If I’m serious and you do tell him, your life’s over as you know it. If I’m not serious, who needs to know about this anyway? This conversation might never have happened. One last tip. I’m serious, Eddie. I didn’t know Dan Scoular. I wish I had. But I like people who liked him. That’ll do me. I’ll take their word for it. Dan Scoular’s dead. I’m going to lay Matt Mason’s future at his grave like a bunch of flowers. It’s up to you to be part of the bouquet or not. Thanks for the coffee.’

  As I came out, Jennifer called goodbye and waved. I was sure Eddie would give her a good tip. He was generous that way.

  29

  Hunting is largely waiting, I suppose, whether you’re hunting animals or people or understanding. I remember Tom Docherty telling me how he went about writing. It was in a letter, the only one he ever wrote me. He suffers from what he jocularly calls epistolary paralysis. That time he was living in Paris and experiencing the moody glooms.

  ‘Writing? Who needs it? When you write, here’s what you do. You go alone. You build your hide round yourself from whatever is available — broken relationships, gathered hurts, remembered joys, wilful routine. You wait. You try many different baits. You let everything escape — no matter how good it looks or what praise the catching of it would bring you — but the one you’re waiting for, the one you know you must get. You’re prepared to lose yourself rather than it. Meantime, you feed on whatever scraps there are to hand, iron rations of the self.’

  I was thinking of him as I came back to the hotel. One of the pleasures of his presence in my life has been that he is a great completer of half-thoughts. You offer him a vague perception and he takes it from you, cleans off the gunge and gives you it back, having shown you how it works. He clarifies you to yourself.

  Here he was, doing it again, even if he didn’t know it. For I saw in his description of where he had been a clarification of where I was. Eddie Foley was part of the bait. But what he was designed to catch wasn’t really the quarry I was after. I wanted Matt Mason all right. But he was just a stop along the route, not the destination. If we caught him, he was for Brian and Bob. He was what they were hunting. Let them take the credit.

  I was waiting for something bigger, at least bigger in my terms. I was looking not just to catch whoever had snuffed out two lives but whatever it was that had snuffed out a lot of lives, though it might have left them still moving around. I wanted to locate the source of the defeat in David Ewart’s eyes, the remorseless hardness in Dave Lyons’, the avid self-interest in Anna’s. Had the death of Scott’s idealism been suicide or murder?

  As I ate my lunch in the downstairs restaurant of the hotel, I also experienced an echo of the loneliness Tom had been writing about. There had been a message left by Brian Harkness that they had some leads on Marty Bleasdale. Instead of making me feel part of a team, the communication had left me feeling more i
solated. I thought of Bob and Brian doing what they do and knew that they were pursuing ends different from my own. False proximity becomes a measure of real distance.

  That feeling had been intensified by my call to Jan before I sat down to eat. I had phoned her at the restaurant and she was there and able to talk, though not for long. We agreed that we would meet at the Bona Sospira tonight for dinner.

  ‘How will I recognise you?’ she said.

  ‘It’s only four days, Jan.’

  ‘They’ve been long ones. Tell you what. Why don’t you just come as yourself? I hope you’ve worked out who that is by now.’

  Had I? Maybe, in Tom’s sense, I had lost myself rather than lose the thing I was after — at least lost my comparatively familiar sense of myself. It wasn’t just time I had put between Jan and me but emotional distance as well. She obviously felt it. And so did I. I wanted very much to meet her but I wasn’t sure how fully we could meet. In examining the terms of Scott’s life, I had been examining the terms of my own. The price you pay for arriving at a personal vision is the loneliness of having to live with it. I had a suspicion that my bill was on the way.

  I looked round the restaurant. I saw an elderly couple eating with dignified slowness, a family whose children were just managing to impose public standards on what was normally a domestic experience, what I assumed were three business women, an American couple nearby whose clothes suggested they had confused Glasgow with Miami. The apparent completeness of their involvement in ordinary things made me feel even more isolated and alien.

  My hotel room didn’t help. I found myself opening drawers as if I might find there a clue to my identity, a personal equivalent of the Gideon bible. I found, appropriately enough, emptiness. I was reminded again of Tom Docherty. He has written a lot in hotel rooms. His theory is that they are such sterile and anonymous places that they make him write, if only to react against the void, to prove to himself that he exists. I looked at the hotel pen and the sheets of hotel paper. But I opted for the phone.

  I phoned the BBC for the third time today. If Michael Preston were there, I was only a couple of hundred yards away. I could catch him before he escaped. But Mr Preston, it seemed, was still out on location somewhere in Glasgow. They couldn’t tell me where.