He nodded. “Your things are back at the ranch. I’ll have someone bring them here.”
He put out a hand.
As I shook it I felt the tender skin where I’d burned him.
“The offer’s a life time deal,” he said. “Come back any time you want to redeem it.”
“I wish you hadn’t said that,” I replied.
I was only half joking.
The youths, every one of them, decided to take Arcand up on the offer.
Broken Nose came over and shook my hand before leaving.
“Thanks big man,” he said. “Because of you, we’re going to be free.”
“Are you sure about this?”
“Surer than anything else I’ve ever done.”
“Can I take a message back to Glesca for you?”
He didn’t even think about it.
“No. I’m finished wi’that shit hole.”
He raised his head and howled at the sky. The other youths joined in.
“I think you’ll fit right in,” I said.
“Come back in a year or two,” he replied. “I’ll be top dog.”
They drove off in a small convoy, the jeep, the 4x4 and the van, leaving Arcand and myself alone on the shore as the sun came up.
I got back to Glasgow two days later.
Betty wasn’t happy, George was rebuilding a wrecked bar, and I had to spend two days in Partick police station going over the same ground until they got bored and threw me out.
But I’d found a check for one hundred thousand dollars in my pocket on the flight home, so it wasn’t all bad news.
Twelve
DOG TIRED
When I felt ready for it, I visited Mark Turner in hospital.
He looked pale and wan, but managed a smile when I entered the room.
“Mr. Adams,” he said. “I didn’t think I’d be seeing you again.”
“I had to come,” I replied. “I owe you a story.”
I ate his grapes and told the tale. He took it all, without speaking. When I’d finished, he nodded.
“Thank you,” he said.
“For what?”
“For not letting them kill me in the bar for one. And for telling me the full story.”
“That’s not all I came for,” I replied.
I handed him an envelope.
“There’s a check for thirty grand in there. The rest went to George for services rendered.”
“I can’t take that,” he said.
“You can, and you will. It’s my price for helping you.”
Turner actually laughed.
“Well, it’ll cover most of what the bookies ripped me off for,” he said. “Looks like you took my case after all Mr. Adams.”
“Looks like I did at that son,” I replied. “And I’ve got a souvenir for you.”
I handed him the remaining silver clasp.
He had a tear in his eye as he turned it over in his hand.
“I miss it,” he whispered. “Dear God forgive me, I miss it.”
“Well lad, you know where to go,” I said quietly as I left and closed the door gently behind me.
As I walked away along the corridor I knew exactly how he felt.
Since my return Glasgow has been nothing but cold, gray and empty. I’m just going through the motions, sifting paper, answering the phone, and not getting any work.
I daydream, of open spaces, hills and streams, of moonlight on water and the smell of pine in the wind.
Every night I find myself reading Fraser’s Journal. And every night the last line haunts me.
It haunts me still.
I feel the call of the wild.
The End
The Forth Protocol
A Midnight Eye Files Story
By William Meikle
The Forth Protocol
I do some of my best work when I’m drunk... and some of my worst. The trick is to know which is which.
The night the case started, I scarcely knew my arse from my elbow. My on-again, off-again, relationship with Liz was currently off, Doug was away at a conference on medieval middens somewhere in Germany and I had money to burn... or rather, to drink. I arrived in The Twa Dugs at lunchtime, and didn’t intend leaving until I had to. George at the bar kept anyone who looked like they wanted to talk away from me, and I drank, whisky chased down with beer and smoke. As my old mum would say, I was scunnered and crabbit – no fit company for man nor beast.
Beer helped. Beer always helps, if you have enough of it. I hadn’t had enough of it yet, but I was working on it.
Some time in the late evening I became aware that there was a man I didn’t know sitting across the table from me. He looked thin, to the point of emaciation, and intense, with a stare that told me he didn't like to be crossed. Everything about him, from the set of his mouth to the cut of his suit, looked too tight. He had a half-pint glass of beer in front of him, which was enough to tell me he wasn’t a local. And he drank like an amateur, with small, careful sips, wiping the froth fastidiously from his lips each time. I already didn’t like him, and he hadn’t even spoken yet.
“Mr. Adams,” he said. There was an accent there, for sure, but I couldn’t quite place it. “I have a proposition for you.”
“If it involves bending over in the lavvie, then there’s a lad at the edge of the bar who’ll see you right,” I said. Much to my dismay it didn’t annoy him... either that or the proposition was more important than any slight he might have taken.
“My needs are more of a spiritual than a physical nature,” he said, as if I’d just asked after his religious sensibilities. “But I have no problem with money, and I have plenty of it that could see its way into your wallet... if you are interested?”
It had taken me long enough, but I started to pay attention. I didn’t stop drinking though, so perhaps my attentiveness wasn’t all that it should have been. I only found that out later, of course. That first evening, the story had sounded plausible enough. I lit a fresh smoke, ordered another beer, and let him talk.
“I need you to find me a book,” he started.
“You’ve got the wrong man for that,” I said. “And there’s a few big buildings full of them in the Town Center...”
He didn’t seem to mind my interruption, but went on as if I hadn’t spoken.
“I’ve been burgled,” he said.
That told me a lot more than he thought. He didn’t want the police involved, so something wasn’t quite kosher... and he’d come looking for me in particular, so it was probably something funky. My reputation was getting around. It kept me in work, but I was starting to yearn for the days when the strangest thing I encountered was a cat in a coat or a husband in his wife’s underwear. But I also needed to work.
I had missed a bit while ruminating and forced myself to pay attention.
“It was taken from my boat in Leith last night,” he said. “And I need it back, urgently. There is a certain time constraint in play here. If I do not have it in forty-eight hours, then I will never need it again. If you are willing to undertake a promise to return it to me on time, I am willing to promise you five thousand pounds on delivery.”
The rest was unspoken.
No delivery, no payment.
I’d read that much in his eyes. I don’t usually work that way. Then again, I don’t usually earn five grand for a couple of days work either. I nodded, and put out a hand to be shaken. He looked at it as if it was a small naughty dog.
“I don’t do physical contact,” he said, primly.
“I’d guessed that already,” I replied, but the innuendo went straight past him without stopping. “Tell me about the book.”
He took another small sip from his beer. I was near the bottom of mine, but he’d barely supped half an inch from his. I considered offering him another, but old age might get me before he got round to finishing it. Then, for the first time in our chat, he showed some animation as he talked of the book; his eyes lit with fervor, and something that
looked too close to fanaticism for my liking.
“It’s Fifteenth Century, and about so big,” he said, outlining a ten inch box with his hands. “It can hardly be taken for anything other than what it is; a diary, of a sailor; a tall tale to be sure, but one of which I have developed a great fondness.”
That is the moment when I should have walked away. I can see that now, looking back on it. But a combination of booze and the thought of making an easy five grand had me bewitched. I just sat there as he described some peculiarities that would ensure I would recognize the book when I found it.
I ordered another beer for myself, he passed me a business card, nodded briskly, and left.
E. Penderton, Antiquities, and an Edinburgh phone number. I turned it over. There was no address. I considered following him to check him out, but I couldn’t trust myself to be discreet with so much booze in me. I concentrated instead on my beer.
At some point later I staggered home and fell asleep.
I didn't dream.
The next morning arrived bright and clear, which was nice, for I was neither.
The prospect of spending a day in Edinburgh didn’t improve my mood any.
Like many people from Glasgow I have an ambivalent relationship with the capital city. I can admire the architecture, the castle and the classical beauty of the New Town. But it’s hard to ignore the shrill yet expert fleecing of the hordes of tourists, or the too-loud claims of artistic excellence that emanate like noxious farts from the mouths of punters in the faux posh bars. And don’t get me started on estate agents.
All fur coat and no knickers.
That sums Edinburgh up for me. It looks lovely on the surface, but there’s something sleazy that always makes me yearn for the rough and ready streets of Glasgow, and I’m always glad to leave. The fact that I was having these thoughts as my train pulled in to Waverley Station did not bode well for the rest of the day.
My reception was as I’d have expected given my mood. I stepped onto the platform, took out a cigarette, and had my first encounter with the accent.
“You will not be lighting that up, young man.”
I knew even before I turned round that it was going to be a well-groomed, elderly lady with too strong a sense of her own importance, and I was not disappointed.
I got out my lighter, smiled at her, and applied it to the end of the smoke. The lady looked like she might have a fit.
“Well, I never,” she said.
I gave her a mock salute.
“Surely not, madam? I’m sure you were better looking when you were younger.”
I left her in my wake before she could think of a rejoinder, and suddenly I was feeling a bit better about the trip. Seeing blue skies stretch over the castle lifted my spirits further, and I was almost jaunty as I headed for my first port of call in Leith Walk.
Sadly that was as good as the morning was going to get.
I should have known it wasn’t going to be my day after the bookshops did their three wise monkeys act on me. It seemed that accusing a bookshop owner of fencing stolen materials was a hanging offence in these parts, and I was told, in no uncertain terms, never to darken their doors again. Back in Glasgow, I’d have known exactly which shops to visit and the people I had to speak to. But over in the East, I was lost without a compass.
I yielded to the inevitable at lunchtime and went to the one place where I would feel most comfortable—the nearest bar. Even here the differences between Scotland’s two largest cities could be clearly felt. The bar I entered was one I hadn’t been in before. It was neat, clean and polite; three things rarely found in such close proximity back in the West. And the beer tasted different somehow; with less malt, and a burnt taste that wasn’t exactly pleasant.
One thing remains constant, no matter which city you were in. Barmen are always willing to talk, if the price is right. I used George’s name and that opened some other doors for me.
“Give me half an hour,” the barman said, and made my twenty vanish into his pocket as he turned away. I took my beer outside to a walled back yard that had a bench, a parasol and two dead pot plants in what they had the cheek to call a garden. It also was the only place I could light up without becoming a pariah. I sucked smoke and stared at the walls, switched off and idling in neutral for a while. Nobody bothered me, and that suited me just fine.
I made the beer last the full half an hour, having to fight the urge to get another one in. When I went back in to the bar, the barmen had an address for me, written on a beer mat. He handed it to me.
“Tony Jones. You’ll find him there. He’s just a lad really,” he said. “But word is he did a job for a gentleman from out in Linlithgow, a special request... for what he called a wee scary book.”
“And this is kosher?” I said, putting the mat away in an inside pocket.
“It cost me ten of your twenty, so it had better be,” he replied.
I thanked him, and headed back out into the city to look for a cab.
I found Tony Jones right where the barman said he’d be - playing pool in a dockside bar in Leith. He was wary of me at first, concerned I might be the polis, but a few free pints of lager, and the mention, again, of George’s name brought him round. I even let him beat me, twice, at pool before we settled in a table near the window where we wouldn’t be disturbed.
“It was a piece of piss,” he said as he downed a liberal gulp of lager, as if afraid I might take it off him at any second. “In and out in two minutes, and two hundred quid in my pocket that same night.”
“And who paid you?”
“A guy fae Linlithgow,” he said. “The whole thing was set up ower the phone at first. Then, when the job was done, I delivered the book to him there... he was waiting when I got off the train. I gave him the book, he gave me the cash, and I was on a train back here five minutes later. Sweet as a nut.”
I’ll give him this, he was the proudest wee burglar I’d ever talked to. He wasn’t helping me much though.
“Can you describe him?”
“Soft,” the lad said. “Soft all over, like a lump of wet dough. And posh... you know? Fae one of those schools where they talk funny, I thought. About your height, but fatter. Grey hair and big lips.”
Like I said... not helping much. I bought him another lager and left him to it. It was only when I was on the train to Linlithgow that I realized I should have asked him where he’d been when he had burgled the book. That way I’d at least have known where my client berthed the boat.
Linlithgow is fifteen minutes out of Edinburgh by train, and about fifty years away. It’s dominated, like Edinburgh, by an old building, a palace in this case, but the streets are mostly quiet, calm even. When I walked into The Three Queens I was the only customer in the place, and the barman was as pleased as a particularly excited puppy to see me. He liked the color of my money too, and made a twenty vanish as fast as the one had earlier.
“I’m looking for a man,” I said, then sighed as he gave me a smile and a wink. “No, not like that. There’s a guy I need to speak to.”
I gave him the description, and to my amazement he immediately gave me, not just a name, but an address.
“You want Mr. Drake. He’s a regular - two pints of shandy and a packet of cheese and onion after a game of bools in the afternoon. He lives just round the corner. 221 Manor Drive. You cannae miss it. He’s a neat old bugger.”
He was right on that. The front garden of the house was a perfectly square, perfectly mown piece of lawn with a diamond shaped hedge, again trimmed to within an inch of its life. When he answered the door the man proved to be as neat as his horticultural habits. He wore a suit and tie; both crisp and ironed to a crease-free perfection. His pencil-thin moustache had been trimmed so neatly it could almost have been drawn on with a marker pen, and his skin looked like he scrubbed it daily with fine sandpaper. I don’t believe I’d ever seen anyone so tidy – so clean.
He pre-empted anything I might say before I had a chance to s
peak.
“You’ve come about the book.”
It wasn’t a question, and only needed a nod in answer. He turned away, leaving me on the doorstep. I stayed where I was. From where I stood the hallway gave the impression of having been scrubbed daily with bleach, and the carpet was as fluffy and soft as the day it left the factory; which might have been this morning given how pristine it looked. I’d only have spoiled the place with my presence – I was surprised he ever dared to open the door, for fear of possible contamination.
He came back seconds later, carrying a brown paper parcel in his hands. I didn’t have to look at it to know that it had been wrapped and sealed with military precision.
“Tell him it won’t work,” he said. He handed me the parcel, and closed the door without another word. I resisted the temptation to pish through his letterbox and went back to The Three Queens.
The barman was just as pleased to see me as he’d been twenty minutes earlier. I had him pour me two pints to keep him busy, and took the first over to the phone. I took out the business card he had given me and dialed the number on it. My client answered on the first ring. There was no preamble; he seemed to know it was me who had rung.
“You have it?” he said.
I followed his lead and kept it terse.
“Yep.”
“Bring it to me, tonight,” he said. “You’ll find the address on the card.”
I was about to complain, but he didn’t give me a chance. He hung up on me. I slammed the phone down, just to show it I was still in charge. I turned the card over in my hand. There, in a fine stylish hand, was a berth number in Leith Docks. It hadn’t been on the card just five seconds before, and it faded even as I read it.
“Nice trick,” I muttered. Somebody was jerking me around, and I wasn’t in the mood to take any more shite.
I took my beer back to the bar, drained it quickly and started in on the second.
“A third?” the barman asked eagerly.
“No, this’ll do. I don’t want to work you too hard.”
Luckily for my liver, three thirsty lads fresh off a shift arrived a minute later. That gave me a chance to head for a quiet corner with my beer.
The Midnight Eye Files Collection Page 61