Laidlaw jl-1

by William McIlvanney

  As they climbed the stone stairs to the landing, they heard a droning noise. The double doors closed behind them in green baize. The motif was gambling. There were cushioned dice along the walls for sitting on. Each wall light held a poker-hand in glass. The floor of the small stage for the go-go dancers was a mosaic of a roulette wheel. At the end of the room the barcounter was an enormous up-ended domino, double six.

  ‘Love would appear to be a lottery,’ Laidlaw said.

  The noise was coming from a Hoover. The woman who worked it had her back to them. Context gave her an unconscious poignancy. She was elderly and fat. Each bare leg was a complex of varicose veins from too many children. Just by being there she was commenting ironically on all this jumped-up sophistication.

  Laidlaw crossed and touched her shoulder. She was halfway to the ceiling before she realised what was happening. The kicked Hoover gave out gradually like a mechanical heart-attack.

  ‘Oh my God, son,’ she said. ‘Ye should tell ma next o’ kin before ye do that.’

  But behind the feminine flummox, she was smiling already, a face as welcoming as an open fire.

  ‘I’m sorry,’ Laidlaw said. ‘We’re looking for Mr Rayburn.’

  ‘Aye, he’s in. He’ll be up in his office, likely. Oh dear, that’s the most excitin’ thing that’s happened tae me since Ah fell out the shawl.’

  They went up the few carpeted stairs to the bar area. There was a corridor on the left. Behind the third door they knocked at, a voice shouted, ‘Hullo therr.’

  Laidlaw opened the door. The room was well carpeted, curtained, nicely furnished. Opposite them, behind a desk, a young man was sitting in a swivel-chair. He was sallowfaced and his lank hair had more grease than a chip-pan. A black leather jacket sat on his body like a suit of armour. His calf-length boots rested on top of the desk. He was cleaning his fingernails with an ornamental knife.

  ‘Aye, whit’s the gemme?’

  ‘We’d like to see Mr Rayburn,’ Laidlaw said.

  ‘Ye got an appointment?’

  ‘What is he?’ Laidlaw said. ‘A dentist?’

  The young man was concentrating on looking very tough.

  ‘Put your sneer away,’ Laidlaw said. ‘It’s getting faded. Keep it for a good thing.’

  The young man swung his feet onto the floor, stood up without haste, letting what he imagined was the tension build. He came out from behind the desk, knife vaguely drooping. Laidlaw flashed his police-card.

  ‘How’s that for a counter-punch?’ he said. ‘Son. You are about to lose in two ways. If you don’t stop playing at Jack the Rippers, I’ll take that paper-knife off you and shove it up your rectum. Then I’ll arrest you in an ambulance. Tell him to come out of his hidey-hole.’

  The young man put the knife on the desk.

  ‘Ah’m supposed to check on people for Harry.’ He was like a boy complaining that the game isn’t being played according to the rules. ‘Ye can get some weirdies in here.’

  ‘I see that,’ Laidlaw said, and waited.

  ‘Harry! It’s the polis.’

  The door across the room opened and Harry Rayburn emerged. He would be in his forties, big and tired-looking, the black curling hair long and decoratively streaked with grey. He wore a shirt like an action-painting, sleeves rolled up to show impressive hairy forearms. Melted down, the silver buckle of his belt could have saved the economy.

  ‘Mr Rayburn?’ Laidlaw showed him the card. ‘I’m Detective Inspector Laidlaw. Crime Squad. This is Detective Constable Harkness. We’re investigating a murder.’

  Rayburn nodded.

  ‘What’s the connection with us?’

  ‘Well, it’s a girl called Jennifer Lawson. From Drumchapel. She was murdered on Saturday night. We believe she came dancing here that night. If she did, it’s odds on she met the man here.’

  ‘It’s their money we take, no’ their photies. Eh, Harry?’

  Laidlaw looked at the young man as if he was a headache. Harry Rayburn looked impressively annoyed.

  ‘Can it, Lennie! A lassie’s dead.’ Then to Laidlaw, ‘Is there any way you think we can help?’

  ‘This is the girl.’ Laidlaw passed him the photograph. ‘It’s a million-to-one chance but we have to take it.’

  Harry Rayburn shook his head.

  ‘I’m sorry. But these young girls all look as if they came off an assembly-line to me. See one, you’ve seen them all.’

  Laidlaw passed the photograph to Lennie who glanced at it and laid it on the desk.

  ‘How many evening staff do you employ in here?’

  ‘It’s a variable. In general? Say, three behind the bar.’ He seemed to find it difficult to work it out. ‘A couple of go-go dancers when we’re having that. They spell each other. Two on the door. Maybe two other stewards.’

  Lennie shook with voiceless laughter and whispered, ‘Stewards’, to himself, shaking his head.

  ‘You can give me a list?’

  That seemed to be a problem.

  ‘Not off-hand. Some of the boys are just doing it for a bit extra. Casual, like. You know? It’ll take me time. The bloke who handles all that isn’t in.’

  ‘You’re not the manager? It’s your own place?’

  Harry Rayburn smiled.

  ‘Every crack in the ceiling’s paid for. I started with “The Maverick” years ago. And now this place.’

  ‘All right. Thanks for your help. I’m afraid you’ll be getting more visitors. They can collect the information.’

  He picked up the photograph.

  ‘You don’t know her?’ Harkness asked.

  ‘Naw,’ Lennie said. ‘Fanciable. Too late now, though, intit?’

  ‘And what about this vibrantly sensitive young man?’ Laidlaw said. ‘What does he do for you, Mr Rayburn?’

  ‘Lennie’s only in in the mornings. Looking after food and drink that comes in. That kind of thing.’

  Rayburn seemed to be only just managing to contain his anger. When Laidlaw and Harkness had closed the door on them, they heard the anger break over Lennie’s head.

  ‘I think that Harry Rayburn could be a hard man,’ Harkness said.

  ‘Come on, Brian. Hard man? Mary Poppins with hair on her chest.’

  ‘How do you make that out?’

  ‘I saw him putting on his tough face at the door. It was a bad fit, too. That’s the kind you get out of a book. Fig. 1: Curling the Upper Lip. It’s for hiding something.’

  ‘So what’s he hiding?’

  ‘After we’ve looked for somebody I want to see, you can check in, Brian. See what’s happening.’

  ‘So what’s he hiding?’

  ‘So what’s he hiding?’ Laidlaw said. ‘When found, make a note of.’

  20

  For Harkness lunch in the city-centre meant a pub. There were plenty to choose from. But ‘Miranda’s’ was an old-fashioned unlicensed restaurant. He hadn’t been in it before. He wasn’t sorry. There were a lot of women with shopping-bags and a few businessmen who looked as if they weren’t doing much business. The waitresses wore black with white collars and cuffs.

  Harkness drank a glass of grapefruit juice that was oily enough to cook with, and said, ‘So what’s the idea?’

  Laidlaw looked up from his soup. Harkness looked round the restaurant.

  ‘The eating-house that time forgot. What’ve you got against yourself?’

  ‘Some women,’ Laidlaw said, ‘take Sweetex in their coffee after a five-course meal. This is my pathetic token gesture. The best thing on the menu here’s no drink. Any word?’

  ‘There’s nothing yet. I saw Bob Lilley. Says to tell you they nailed those blokes at Dumfries. Know how they were doing it? Very cute. Left their own car, stole two others. Drove into England, did the jobs. Met, transferred the stuff into one car, abandoned the other one. Brought the lot back to Dumfries, did the final transfer, abandoned the other stolen car.’

  ‘Simple,’ Laidlaw said. ‘I wish we were up against something as straight
forward as that.’

  ‘We didn’t get much this morning, did we?’

  ‘How could we? Just now we’re plumbing puddles.’

  ‘Not a thing.’

  ‘You don’t know that. We’ve got to keep all the possibilities in the air just now. Don’t let any of them fall out of mind. We just keep walking and talking.’

  ‘Asking questions.’

  ‘It’s the questions you don’t ask that count. People don’t give answers. They betray them. When they think they’re answering one thing, they’re giving an honest answer to something else. Our problem is we don’t know enough yet to work out what they’re saying. So we have to try to remember everything till some kind of shape emerges. All we’ve got so far is that Harry Rayburn is too inefficient, too casual, too hard. That’s maybe something, it’s maybe nothing.’

  Their waitress put down Laidlaw’s roast beef, Harkness’s fish.

  ‘What is your secret, great man?’ Harkness asked.

  ‘Brains. Let’s eat.’ He looked at his roast beef. ‘In a manner of speaking.’

  After a couple of forkfuls, Laidlaw said, ‘John Rhodes. That’s who we’ll go and see. He’s an honourable thug. He won’t like this kind of thing. He might lend us his eyes and his ears for a week.’

  ‘I’ve heard of him.’

  ‘I would hope so. Have you met him?’

  ‘No.’

  ‘You were talking about hard men. I’ll show you hard. When he’s in a bad mood, you phone the army.’

  21

  Lennie said, ‘The heid bummer wis called Laidlaw. An’ the ither wan wis some Harkness.’

  Matt Mason sat very still at his desk. Only his right hand moved, exactly aligning the edges of the three desk diaries that contained no entries, re-positioning the pen-set that was never used. He hardly needed diaries when he had a memory like a telephone directory. He hadn’t much use for pens when he could write a cheque with his mouth or serve notice with a nod. But they were furniture he liked, like the filing-cabinet nobody else had ever seen inside, the drinks-cupboard in the corner and the racing-prints on the walls.

  Lennie looked out of the window. Because the office was a basement, all he could see of West Regent Street was a parade of legs. He passed the time by picking out the ones he wouldn’t mind being between. Through the wall in the main office the tannoy was whispering its commentary on the two o’clock at Newmarket.

  ‘That’s some Laidlaw as well,’ Mason said. ‘You can take it from me. I don’t specially want to mess about with him. He’s bother. How big did Harry handle him?’

  ‘Very quiet. Ah think maybe Harry wis feart. But no’ me.’

  Lennie was laughing. Mason wasn’t.

  ‘Very clever,’ Mason said. ‘What did you say?’

  Lennie shrugged. He sensed the ambiguity of Mason’s attitude but he couldn’t resist the bravado.

  ‘No skin off my arse if some scrubber’s coughed it. Ah let ’im know that.’

  ‘Clown!’ Mason gave him the word as if it came out of a blow-pipe.

  ‘Whit’s wrang, boss?’

  ‘You’ve got no brains, son, that’s what. If you met Goliath, you’d put the head on his kneecap. What do you want to cause trouble for? People don’t like trouble. Be nice to people. Then when you’re not nice, it means that wee bit more.’

  ‘Be nice tae the fuzz? Are you gettin’ saft, boss?’

  Lennie’s laughter ran against a silence. He tried again, ‘Eh-heh,’ like someone knocking at the door of an empty room.

  ‘You want to find out?’ Mason’s voice was so gentle it wouldn’t have broken a cobweb.

  ‘Whit’s the gemme? Ah wis only-’

  Mason held up his right forefinger.

  ‘I could beat you with that.’

  ‘But. Listen-’

  The finger moved down to point at Lennie.

  ‘No. You listen. Wee. Silly. Boy. Any more cheek out of you, and I’ll stop your comic money. You better get brains, son. Even if you’ve got to steal them. I don’t pay you to be stupid.’

  Lennie said nothing, stayed perfectly still, knew himself hanging over the sheer drop of Mason’s anger. Mason sat over his desk, staring at it.

  ‘Surrounded with balloons,’ he said, fogging the glass top. ‘What am I?’

  Lennie said nothing. He knew the way Mason sometimes used people like a mirror in which to examine himself. Mirrors shouldn’t talk back.

  ‘I’m a legitimate bookmaker. I’ve got my shops. I run the business. All right. But you know and I know that I’ve got other interests. And if we know, do you think the C.I.D. have no idea? I’ve got fingers in a lot of pies. If I get just one of them cut off, I lose the lot. Because the blood’ll bring them to me. And that could be nasty. I’ve had to arrange some accident-insurance along the way. Some people live awful careless. Never underestimate the polis, son. They’re not daft. They’re waiting for me. I’d like to keep them waiting.’

  Lennie stayed silent.

  ‘I don’t want them encouraged, I want them turned away politely. I live in a big fancy house, son. But it’s made of exploding bricks. Set one of them off and the whole thing’ll come down on my head. Delicacy. That’s what you need. That’s why I don’t go in for heavy breathing. That’s why the carry-on about this lassie is such a mess. It could blow up.’

  Mason took out a cigarette, threw one to Lennie. Leaning over for a light, Lennie supposed he had permission to speak. But he had no idea what to say because he couldn’t begin to see what the problem was. To him Mason was worrying without cause.

  ‘But whit’s that lassie got to do wi’ us?’ he asked. ‘Ah don’t get it, boss.’

  Mason smoked, looking at him.

  ‘How long have you been with Rayburn, now? Months. Right? And what are you there for?’

  ‘Tae keep an’ eye on him. Without him knowin’.’

  ‘Wee test, son,’ Mason said. ‘Just to see if you’re keeping up with your work. This morning. Has Harry Rayburn done anything unusual?’

  Lennie wondered.

  ‘He seems kinna nervous.’

  Mason was waiting. Lennie knew he had to think of something.

  ‘There wis a wee thing. Nothin’ much. He asked me to go out an’ get some grub for ’im. An’ then he changed ’is mind. Said no’ tae bother. He’s never asked me tae do anything like that before.’

  Mason nodded.

  ‘The food,’ Mason said, ‘was for the fella that killed that lassie from Drumchapel.’

  Mason watched Lennie’s eyes, seeing the implications jostle impossibly in Lennie’s mind like a football crowd all trying to get through the Boys’ Gate at one time. He sat and let it happen.

  ‘But. Ye mean?’

  Mason nodded again and thought he’d better relieve the congestion.

  ‘It was Harry’s boyfriend that killed her.’

  ‘That means?’

  ‘That means he’s dangerous to me. So I want to know where he is. Rayburn’s bound to go and see him again today. He won’t be able to keep away. You follow him and tell me where the boy is.’

  Suddenly realising he was a participant in a drama he hadn’t known existed, Lennie struggled for a stance that would match events, wanted to rush the centre of the stage.

  ‘Ah could duff Harry up a bit,’ he said. ‘Get it out him that way.’

  ‘Grow up, son.’ Mason was very angry. ‘That’s all you ever want to do. Lay into people with your wee jumping-jacks. Listen. Very carefully. The last thing you do is upset Big Harry Rayburn in any way. Because if you do, you’ve had it. If he even suspects you’re interested, you better catch the next train to the moon. You’ve got today and that’s all. You have to tell me the night where that boy is. See that you do.’

  Lennie was still paralysed by the implications of it all.

  ‘When ye find ’im,’ he said. ‘Are ye goin’ to. .?’

  His eyes were wide in enthralled anticipation of violence. It was what he had instead of an orgasm
, Mason thought.

  ‘Lennie!’ Mason held up both hands. ‘Don’t think beyond what you have to do today. I don’t want your head seizing up with two ideas. Just do what I’ve told you. And do it well. On your way out, tell Eddie to come in and see me.’

  The betting-shop was busy. That was one reason why Lennie had difficulty locating Eddie in it. The other was Eddie. He was a natural member of any crowd, an identikit of middle age. He was one of those experience doesn’t sharpen into facial idiosyncrasy, just erodes into anonymity. Lennie didn’t find him. He found Lennie.

  ‘Punters is mugs,’ Eddie said at Lennie’s ear. ‘Aren’t they?’

  ‘The man wants you,’ Lennie said.

  Eddie turned and went. Lennie worked his way through the people in the shop and came up into West Regent Street very carefully, as if invisible cameras were tracking him. In the private office Eddie waited patiently while Mason sat staring at the glass-top of his desk. The room was chilly with silence. Eddie was glad Mason wasn’t thinking about him.

  ‘Eddie. A bad situation. It was Harry Rayburn’s boyfriend that murdered the girl from Drumchapel.’

  ‘That’s oor pigeon?’

  ‘No. But it could lead them to our loft.’

  ‘Harry Rayburn’s no’ directly connected wi’ us.’

  ‘But he has been. All right, he was pensioned off. But he didn’t hand his memory in at the pay-desk.’

  ‘You think Big Harry wid shop you? Where wid he find the guts? His hert widny fill a contact lens.’

  Mason didn’t mind Eddie’s questions. They were the measurements a good workman makes before he tackles a job. Eddie was a tradesman Mason respected, a competent fixer of things whose curiosity went no further than the necessary dimensions within which he would work. He brought no more tension to the job than a plumber would. He was a contented man, who did his work and took his wages, drank a bit and liked the television.

  ‘I don’t know. But his boyfriend might.’

  ‘He knows about you?’

  ‘I’m not sure. But there’s pillow-talk. Who knows what the big man didn’t say when that bastard was half-roads up his arse? His head could’ve unravelled like a ball of wool.’