The Quaker

by Liam McIlvanney

  Billy patted his top pocket. ‘You want to get onside with Maitland you’ll need to go higher than that. Glen Grant’s what he drinks. Nothing but the best.’

  Cranhill was a fifties scheme of roughcast tenements and porridge-coloured tower blocks hemmed in by the new motorway. It was the kind of glorious future that the city’s slum-dwellers had been promised, back in the thirties. Nowadays the only futuristic feature was the big square water tower on Bellrock Street. McCormack parked beside it. He left his hat in the car. If you needed a hat to tell he was a cop then what were you doing in Cranhill?

  The address in Bellrock Street was a three-storey tenement. Washing was draped over brown-brick balconies. A dog rooted around in the uncut grass behind the front railings. The hollow ticking sound was a stick being dragged along the railings by a blond-haired boy. Two more boys had their heads pressed to the windows of a red Ford Zephyr, hands clamped on to their foreheads like twin salutes to kill the glass’s reflective glare. McCormack climbed to the second floor, flipped the letter box of the left-hand apartment.

  A boy of maybe four or five opened the door and looked glumly up at him. He was dressed in a grubby pullover and rumpled grey shorts, black sandshoes with elasticated tops. At the far end of the narrow hallway a big man was shrugging into a dinner jacket and watching McCormack in the mirror of a hall-stand. He smoothed down the jacket’s satin collar and turned and came striding towards the door.

  ‘I’m on my way out, copper. Some of us have jobs to go to.’ He rested his palm on the boy’s head. ‘Go on through and see your mammy, wee man.’

  The boy toddled off. McCormack nodded. His hands were plunged in the pockets of his raincoat.

  ‘You might be a wee bit late tonight,’ he said. ‘I’m sure your boss will make allowances.’

  The two ends of a bow-tie were hanging down on the man’s white shirt-front and he grasped them in his big fingers and started to fold.

  ‘Let’s see it, then.’

  McCormack found his warrant card, flipped it open. The man studied the card as he finished with the bow-tie, tugging on the ends and craning his neck.

  ‘McCormack. You one of Flett’s boys?’

  ‘I’m Flying Squad, aye. Do I get to come in?’

  The door swung free and McCormack followed the man’s broad back down the short hallway and into the kitchen.

  A half net curtain on the window. Dishes in the sink. A smell of lavender from somewhere. A bottle of Glen Grant on the dresser and on the fold-away table, nestled in soft cloth, two lovely fearsome objects: a chisel, with its bluish blade and a bright stripe of light along its bevelled edge; and, yes, here was the fabled rasp – a varnished handle of orangey wood and the long flat slab of a blade with its rows of tiny teeth.

  The man followed his gaze, said nothing.

  ‘Tools of the trade?’ McCormack offered.

  ‘I’m building something.’

  ‘Aye? What are you building?’

  ‘A hutch. For a rabbit. The boy wants a rabbit.’

  They both knew that these tools were destined for less innocent tasks than the construction of a rabbit-hutch, but McCormack nodded. He fished into his pocket for his notebook just as the man reached into his hip pocket. McCormack flinched and bumped back into the doorframe, knocking a picture from the wall.

  ‘Easy, tiger.’ The man snorted. A metal comb glinted in his fingers and he stepped to the wall-clock and started fixing his hair in its glassy convex face.

  McCormack set his notebook on the table. He bent to retrieve the flimsy wooden frame and fixed the picture back on to its nail: King Billy on his white charger, crossing the Boyne, his sword held aloft in a straight-armed salute.

  ‘You’re Walter James Maitland?’

  The comb paused in mid-air. ‘Sunday names, is it? Yes, I’m Walter Maitland.’

  ‘You work as a bouncer at the Barrowland Ballroom, Mr Maitland. Is that correct?’

  ‘Nope.’ Maitland kept combing his hair.

  ‘You’re not a bouncer?’

  ‘I’m a ballroom supervisor,’ Maitland said.

  ‘Right. Forgive me. You’re a ballroom supervisor. You were working as a ballroom supervisor on the night of twenty-fifth January. The night Marion Mercer was killed.’

  ‘This is the Quaker stuff? We’ve been through all that. I gave my statement at the time.’

  A blast of noise from the living room, the nasal whang of caroming bullets from a TV western. A door closed and the sound died. Was it his imagination or did Maitland look positively relieved? As if he thought McCormack was here on some other errand.

  ‘So you can give it again. You were working that night?’

  ‘If you say so.’

  ‘Did you speak with Marion Mercer?’

  ‘I was working till one in the morning. I’ve got one or two people can confirm that. Like maybe three or four hundred. I think they call that an alibi.’

  ‘That’s not what I asked you.’

  Maitland frowned. ‘Did I speak to her? There’s twelve of us on the door. Four hundred punters. Did I speak to one particular woman? Who’s gonnae remember that?’

  The comb had been stowed and Maitland was buttoning the dinner jacket. He looked both incongruous and entirely at home in the shabby little kitchen.

  ‘The manager’s statement,’ McCormack said. ‘The manager said there was a fracas at the payphone, an altercation that night. You sorted it out. Is that true?’

  ‘A guy wouldnae get off the payphone. Somebody in the queue was getting shirty. Yeah, I sorted it out.’

  ‘He also said, your manager, that this was the only disturbance of the evening. It was a very quiet night for the bouncers. Excuse me, the ballroom supervisors. You had nothing to do. Plenty of time to check out the talent, study the punters. So take your time. Think back. It was a company of four. Two men, two women at a table. One of the men wore a woollen scarf, a regimental tie. Might have been a soldier.’

  ‘I don’t get into their life stories, pal. I chuck them out when they start fights.’

  ‘Right. And hit on the women? Do that too?’

  ‘What you on about?’

  ‘Perk of the job. Get your pick of the birds at chucking-out time. Is that not how it works?’

  ‘I’m a married man, copper. You want to look to your own. That’s where most of the trouble starts, if you want to know the truth. Off-duty polis, throwing their weight around. Hitting on folks’ birds.’

  ‘So you don’t remember Marion Mercer. What about the other ones? Jacquilyn Keevins? Ann Ogilvie? Were you working those nights?’

  ‘You’ve seen the rosters, copper. You know I was working. There a point to all this?’

  McCormack looked again at the painting on the wall, the foppish royal in his floppy, feathered hat, the white horse with one daintily raised hoof. Was there a point to all this? Yes, you fucker. The point is to piss you off. The point is to put you out. Put down a marker. Remember this face. I’m coming for the lot of you. Once this Quaker shit’s finished, you’re my special project. You and your boss and all your scummy underlings, all your toy soldiers.

  ‘Three women are dead, Mr Maitland. That’s the point.’

  The door at McCormack’s back clicked open and the boy stood there. He was in his pyjamas now, uncertain whether to go to his father, glancing at the strange man standing by the sink. Maitland tugged the knees of his trousers and dropped to his haunches, arms wide. When the boy slammed into his father’s chest, Maitland hoisted him high, the slippered feet kicking, and lodged him in the crook of his elbow. Secure in his father’s grip, he looked down boldly at the man in the raincoat, big-eyed, unblinking.

  ‘So how come you’re back to see me? Why am I getting it?’

  ‘Well, we didn’t know we were dealing with a celebrity.’

  Maitland said nothing.

  ‘How long have you worked for John McGlashan?’

  ‘Who?’

  ‘Uh-huh. OK, Mr Maitland. You li
ve in Cranhill. You work the door at the Barrowland. But you don’t know who John McGlashan is.’

  Maitland lowered the boy to the floor. The boy skipped back through to the living room.

  ‘I know who John McGlashan is. I just don’t know why you’re bringing him up. You gonnae let me out of my house now, copper?’

  ‘You don’t work for McGlashan?’

  ‘I’m trying to work. If you’d fucking let me.’

  Maitland bounced on his toes just then, and the boyishness of the gesture somehow offended McCormack. It was all just a game to this guy. All the collecting and the hurting, all the threats and pleas and beatings, it was just a way of keeping score. Well, some games had forfeits. McCormack stowed his notebook in his pocket.

  ‘You seen Jimmy Kane lately? Give him my regards.’

  Maitland was lighting a cigarette and he paused, the tiny bud of flame on his gold lighter. He took the unlit ciggie from his mouth. ‘I fucking knew I knew you. You’re the teuchter. It was you that put Kane away.’

  ‘Aye. That’s me. Well, we’ll know each other next time, Mr Maitland.’

  They left together, walking in silence, McCormack crossing to the Velox. The kids who’d been lounging around the railings straightened up as Maitland came down the path. A boy in a Harrington jacket and a Rangers scarf stepped out from the little crowd. Hands in his jacket pockets, he spread his arms, displaying the tartan lining.

  ‘Good as new, Mr Maitland. Naebody’s been near it.’

  Maitland dug a hand into his trouser pocket and spread his fingers as he brought it free. A clutch of coins spread glinting in the failing light and fell to earth. The boys were crouching and scrabbling in the gutter before the coins hit the tarmac.

  The red Zephyr’s engine turned and Maitland roared off, flashing a grin. The teuchter. It could have been worse, McCormack thought: I could have been the Fenian. McCormack watched the car climb west, heading for the lights of the city. Actually, it could have been worse than that. He repeated the registration to himself, fishing in his pocket for his notebook.

  15

  When McCormack got back to the Marine the Quaker Squad were discussing the Glendinnings job.

  ‘Some stones,’ Adam Farren was saying. ‘Walk out the front door, broad daylight, a hundred grand in the tail.’

  ‘Be a shame to catch them, almost,’ Doug Gemmell said. ‘Make them give it all back.’

  ‘Stones?’ McCormack slung his jacket on the back of his chair. He had spoken with more force than he intended. The rest of them looked up at him.

  ‘Balls, my friend,’ Farren said. ‘Audacity. Romance, for fuck’s sake. Four blokes in overalls. Hundred times your annual salary.’

  McCormack sat down, jockeyed the chair a little closer to the desk and flipped open the folder he’d been reading before lunch. ‘Five,’ he said.

  ‘What?’

  ‘Minimum. You’re forgetting the driver. It’s five, not four. Six, if there’s an insider. And what you’d admire is technique. The timing. The execution. The intel and planning that made it come good. It’s a job of work, Detective. Fuck all to do with romance.’

  He kept his eyes on the witness statement but you could tell they were grinning among themselves, waiting to see who would run with the ball, make the next move.

  ‘Anyway.’ Doug Gemmell spoke up. ‘Mibbe it’s only fifty times your annual salary. You Flying Squad boys. High fliers.’

  McCormack said nothing.

  ‘You earn it, though. No doubt about it. I mean us fucking plodders, we just see what’s in front of our faces. But you, you’ve got the bird’s-eye view, you see the whole story. Just like that. Like it’s a job of work.’

  Could you be bothered? Was it worth the effort to engage with this shit? McCormack sighed.

  ‘I see it’s a robbery, if that’s what you mean. I see it’s a bunch of gangsters. I see that. Scumbags.’

  ‘You’re saying it’s the same, though?’ Farren was frowning. ‘What this guy does and what these guys did? They’re all just crims?’

  ‘You mean these pricks are Robin Hood?’

  ‘Compared to him they’re Robin Hood. Compared to him they’re Florence Nightingale.’

  Somewhere out there, somewhere in the dirty city, people were doing actual police work. They were chasing down this Glendinnings crew, rousting McGlashan’s soldiers, grilling the nightwatchman, lifting prints from the railings and the safe, trying to trace the gelignite, trying to trace the van, leaning on the employees till they found the insider. He could have been helping them, instead of listening to this dipshit.

  ‘Fine then.’ McCormack leaned back in his chair, pushed the folder away from him. ‘Who do you think these guys are, actually? As a matter of interest. I mean, who do they work for?’

  They were all grinning now, big ignorant smiles pasted on their faces.

  ‘Why don’t you tell us, Professor.’

  ‘Well, I think you already know, Detective. Unless you’re thicker than you look. Which seems unlikely. Probably they’re with McGlashan or they want to be with McGlashan. Let’s say they kick up to McGlashan. Ten, fifteen grand. He puts some of it out on the street, at six hundred per cent interest. To sorry fuckers who can’t pay him back. He spends five grand on heroin from his Liverpool connection. Another five boosting his stable of whores. Maybe some of it finds its way into the pockets of the City of Glasgow’s finest – present company excepted – and the next time there’s a raid on his big hoose in Pollokshields, well, fuck me, it’s clean as the pure driven. No guns, no drugs. He’s free to keep spreading his poison.’ McCormack tapped the desk. ‘That twenty grand ruins more lives than the Quaker could dream about. Do I think it’s the same? These guys and the Quaker? I think these guys are a lot fucking worse than the Quaker.’

  The door banged open and Cochrane’s head appeared. ‘Right, gents. Let’s be having you.’ No one bothered with Cochrane, everyone still clocking McCormack.

  Cochrane looked around the faces.

  ‘The fuck’s happened here? Somebody died?’ The heads craned round. Cochrane was grinning. ‘Look lively, lads. Boy in the lobby needing handers.’

  They all piled out of the Murder Room and clattered down the stairs. At the back of the group, McCormack could hear the ruckus echoing up the stairwell. High hooting shouts. He emerged into the lobby to see two detectives grappling with a youngish man in denims. The man was cuffed but kicking out and twisting, hollering, flexing his shoulders as the two cops gripped his elbows. A sort of rumbling cheer went up from the Quaker Squad and they surged forward. Hands grabbed the man’s legs and arms and the detectives bore him through to the cells like the captain of a cup-winning team.

  In the gloom of a white-tiled cell they uncuffed him, tossed him down on the concrete floor. He sprang up and faced them in a battle stance, his skinny legs planted apart, arms flexed, fists flashing open and shut. The cops sidled in and spread out along the wall on either side of the door.

  It could have been anything – domestic, drunk and disorderly, breach of the peace – but McCormack knew already what it was. Something in the defiant shine of his eyes, the torn neck of his navy-blue polo shirt.

  ‘Met this upstanding young man on the Way,’ one of the detectives was saying. ‘Friendly bloke. I’ll give him that.’

  The grins spread along the line of cops. They looked down at the floor, shaking their heads. This was going to be good.

  ‘Wanted to know the time, for some reason.’

  ‘That’s original.’

  ‘Maybe his own watch had stopped.’

  ‘Time for what, sweetie-pie? Time for a quickie?’

  McCormack felt sick. He couldn’t be here. He couldn’t be part of this. Whatever this turned out to be. He looked down the line of cops, teeth bared like dogs in their sick grins.

  A black leather wallet lay on the floor. It had slipped from the man’s hip-pocket as he twisted and writhed. Now Farren stepped forward and stooped to pick it u
p.

  The man stood there, catching his breath. He swept his hair from his face and lifted his chin, half-defiant, half-afraid.

  ‘Hey! Hey!’ Farren had a driving licence between finger and thumb, wagging it in the air like a referee showing a card. He could hardly speak for laughing. ‘It’s the cunt’s birthday! It’s his fucking birthday!’

  The cops cracking up.

  ‘Give him his dumps!’

  ‘This calls for a toast.’

  McCormack turned to see one of the detectives – Doug Gemmell, it looked like – slipping out of the cell. Farren tossed the wallet on to the concrete pallet that served as a bed.

  ‘Now the rest of it,’ he said. ‘Turn out your pockets.’

  The man drew a comb from his back pocket and threw it to the floor. A biro from his left-front pocket, folded handkerchief from the right.

  ‘And the ticket pocket.’

  The man worked two fingers into the ticket pocket and drew out a square cellophane wrapper. The cops jeered. The Durex landed on the floor with the rest of his stuff.

  ‘Just the one? Selling yourself short, boy.’

  ‘Fuck you! Fuck the lot of youse!’

  A delighted chorus of high-pitched, outraged squeals.

  ‘Don’t get him angry.’

  ‘So butch.’

  Gemmell was back in the doorway, brandishing a stack of plastic cups. Farren seized it and plucked a cup from the top and the stack made its way down the line.

  McCormack glanced at the doorway. Cochrane was gone. The stack of cups was thrust at him and he took one, his neighbour snatching the others from his hand.

  McCormack was frowning. He didn’t see what the joke was. Then Farren had his flies undone and was pissing into a cup. It overran and spattered on the floor and he fumbled his cock back in with one hand. He stepped forward with the brimming liquid held high. ‘The queen!’ he cried. ‘And all who sail in her!’ Then he jerked his wrist and the urine lashed on to the man’s face and neck. He staggered back, sputtering, retching.