by WHS McIntyre
‘You mentioned something about having a problem?’ I said, peeling the gold foil from the bottle, and thinking it was about time we came to the reason I’d been summoned.
‘I’m dying,’ she said.
That was certainly a problem, if not the one I’d expected. I didn’t know what to say. I poured and waited for the foam in our glasses to settle.
‘Yep, life is a real comedian.’ Ellen snatched up her drink and took a long pull at it, leaving bright red lipstick around the rim. ‘Ellen, I’ve got good news and I’ve got bad news. The good news is that you’ve won the lottery. The bad news is that you’d better spend it fast because you’ll be dead in three months.’
‘What’s the matter?’ I asked.
‘Blood cancer. The bad kind.’
‘And they’ve only given you three months?’
‘Three good months or twelve bad months with treatment, and I’m not spending a year traipsing back and forward to a cancer ward, being pumped full of chemo, no hair and plenty spewing. I’m going out with style and I have the money to do it.’
She took another sip and set her drink down again on the glass table between us. As she leaned back she winced, and pressed a hand to her side.
‘Are you okay?’
She waved away my concerns, and, as though on cue, the bedroom door opened and a woman entered the room. She was tall with beautiful auburn hair, her slim figure and long legs covered by an all-in-one, light green trouser-suit that had a small white logo with a red cross embroidered on one of the collars. She gave me a polite smile before turning her attention to Ellen. ‘Mrs Fletcher, I hope you’re not overdoing it,’ she said, with a pointed stare at the bottle of champagne. ‘It’s four o’clock and time for your nap.’
‘I’m fine,’ Ellen said. ‘I’ll sleep plenty when I’m dead.’
‘Come on now, Mrs Fletcher. I think forty-winks would be just the thing.’
Ellen reached for the champagne bottle and poured herself some more bubbly. ‘Away and stop treating me like a child.’
The nurse paid her no heed. ‘I’m going to turn your bed down, and if you’re not through in ten minutes I’ll be back.’ The severity of her tone was mitigated by the wink she gave me as she returned from whence she’d come.
‘You’ve not got much time,’ I said, adding hurriedly, ‘I mean, not much time to tell me why I’m here.’
‘Freddy,’ she said.
Freddy Fletcher, Ellen’s spouse, had been a well-known conman. In the conning business that’s the worst type of conman. Ideally, the mark should never see you coming. Freddy had tended to arrive with all the surreptitiousness of a cruise-liner sailing down the Forth and Clyde Canal.
‘What about him?’
‘I want to see him.’
It seemed to me that, assuming Ellen’s prognosis correct, she’d be seeing her husband soon enough, for Freddy Fletcher had gone missing over a year ago. Disappeared, as I recalled, owing Jake Turpie a large sum of money and in the process breaking Jake’s first commandment, “Thou shalt not bump me.” It was a law that was not so much written in stone as set in concrete – a bit like everyone suspected Freddy was.
‘And how are you going to do that?’ I asked.
‘I want you to find him.’
It was sad. It’s said that every wife takes her husband as she finds him and then spends the rest of her life trying to change him. Ellen had married Freddy in the hope she could reform him, and every time he’d gone to prison she’d waited for him to come out so that she could try again.
‘I want you to find him and bring him home to me,’ she said. It had to be the fizzy wine talking.
There weren’t too many ways of saying it. ‘Freddy’s . . . well, he’s dead. Isn’t he?’
‘That’s what I thought.’ Ellen knocked back her flute glass in one swift movement and set it down on the low table. ‘Until last week.’
I took a sip of champagne. It was good. Not as good as whisky, but with some practice you could get used to it and I was prepared to put in the hours.
‘I know what you’re thinking.’ She was right. ‘But Freddy doesn’t know about me winning the lottery. No-one does. Just you. I was strictly no publicity.’
‘Ellen, there are bound to be people working on the inside who leak that sort of information. Do you think Freddy was the only conman out there? Who told you he’s alive? Has he been in touch? Don’t tell me. Someone has said they’ll find him for you for a small fee. Is that it? Can’t you see it’s a scam?’
‘It’s not a scam. I’m telling you. He’s alive.’
I didn’t like to argue with a sick woman, especially not one who was paying privately for my services, and with fine champagne thrown in, but surely she had to see the bigger picture? She had to realise she was the target of a con. How could I put it delicately? ‘So, to recap. Freddy, having conned Jake Turpie out of . . . how much money?’
‘A lot.’
‘Runs away, without telling you, his wife, where he’s going, and, after a year of complete radio silence, by sheer coincidence, happens to appear back on the radar straight after you’ve won—?’
‘Half a million. But it’s not like that.’
‘Yes, it is. It’s exactly like that. Can’t you see what’s happening here?’
But Ellen wasn’t listening. She laughed. ‘When I think of the names I called Jake Turpie, accusing him of murdering Freddy, and he just kept denying it.’ The laugh developed into a cough. She clutched her side. ‘Turns out he was telling the truth.’
There was a first time for everything. I didn’t think this was it. ‘So, where is Freddy?’
‘Prague.’
‘Then let me guess. This person who told you that Freddy is in the Czech Republic would like you to go over there and visit him?’
‘No, I’m not going away over there,’ she said. At least she wasn’t completely stupid. ‘You are.’
‘Me? Go to Prague? To do what? Say hello to the conman who’s pretending to be your husband?’
‘I’ve told you. It’s not a conman. It’s Freddy.’
I knew what she meant, even though the two terms were not mutually exclusive.
‘And you, Robbie,’ she said, ‘are going to bring him back here. Don’t worry, I’ll cover all your costs.’
I replenished our empty glasses. ‘Okay. Let’s say I do go and bring Freddy back. Won’t Jake find out?’ If Jake Turpie had missed Freddy the first time around, it was very unlikely he’d be so careless given a second chance.
‘That’s why, before you go, I want you to go see Jake. Don’t let on to him that Freddy’s alive. Just sound him out, you know . . . hypodermically.’
‘Hypothetically?’
‘I don’t care how you do it. Just find out what it would take to sort things between him and Freddy. It’ll come down to money. Everything does with Jake. Find out how much he wants and then bring Freddy back to me.’
‘If you’re so sure it’s Freddy, why don’t you go and see him yourself? It’s only a three-hour flight. You could travel first class. Take your nurse with you.’
‘No, it’s better if you go and tell him things have been cleared with Jake. He’ll believe you.’
‘Why would he believe me? He knows I’m Jake’s lawyer.’
‘That’s why he will believe you. Come on, Robbie. I’m offering an all-expenses-paid trip to Prague. Make a holiday out of it. The only thing I ask is that you bring my husband back so that I can spend my last days with him.’
‘You want to spend them with the man who’s not bothered to contact you for the last twelve months? If he does come back, it will only be for your money.’
Ellen lifted her newly filled glass, watched the bubbles for a moment, and then tossed it down her throat in a oner. ‘I don’t care if he just wants my money. I’m going to leave it to him anyway, and I’m going to need a lawyer to draw up the papers. So there will be more legal work for you.’
‘Ellen, I’m not that k
ind of lawyer.’
‘You’ve got a law degree, haven’t you?’
‘Yes . . . I suppose . . . but . . .’
The woman in the light green trouser-suit appeared at the bedroom door. Ellen smiled, reached across and took my hands in hers. ‘I need a lawyer and I want the best. In my book that’s you.’
Even I couldn’t argue with that.
6
‘Prague? You don’t go to Prague for a honeymoon.’ Joanna’s Uncle Ted might have been a posh lawyer, but her dad, my father-in-law-in-waiting, was as down to earth as a planet-killing meteorite. Jim Jordan was a builder. He had his own small construction company. As a wedding gift he’d offered to build his daughter and new son-in-law a house. He just needed some land to put it on. That’s where my own dad came in. When he’d bought his cottage on the outskirts of Linlithgow, it had arrived with an acre and a half of land. Part of it he’d fenced off to form what he laughingly referred to as a lawn: a patch of scrub grass that he tried to keep in check and where he practised the deadly art of chipping, something that along with a highly imaginative handicap had won him many a golf game. The rest of the land was left to run wild. It was ours if we wanted it. We did. Meantime, Joanna had sold her flat and was now sharing my room in my dad’s cottage. Outline planning permission having been granted, Saturday morning, Jim had called out to show me the detailed drawings he was about to submit. Joanna and her mum had taken my daughter Tina swimming. Malky, my brother, was eating toast.
‘It’s not a honeymoon,’ I said. ‘We’re just going away for a few days. It’s a city break.’ I was beginning to wish I’d never mentioned it.
Jim spread the drawings for the new house across my dad’s kitchen table with a hand the size of a frying pan.
Malky came over, munching and staring down at the blueprints as though he knew what it all meant.
‘Prague’s a great place for a stag night,’ he said. ‘Full of strip joints and—’
‘What I think you mean, Malky,’ Jim said, brushing crumbs from the blueprints, ‘is that Prague is a great place for a stag night for men who are not marrying my daughter. I mean, what’s wrong with Paris or Rome or Venice? Somewhere romantic, with a bit of culture.’
‘Me and your mum went to Aviemore for our honeymoon.’ My dad stared out of the window and into the distance. ‘Bloody freezing it was. We went ice-skating and she got a blister, so we tried skiing and I fell and broke my ankle. He blinked a few times and smoothed his moustache with thumb and index finger. ‘Happy times.’
‘How often have I got to tell you?’ I said. ‘It’s not a honeymoon or a stag night. It’s just a short break to a city of culture. There’s tons to see and do in Prague and spring is the best time to go, before it gets too full of tourists.’
‘I don’t know why the pair of you don’t wait and go somewhere straight after the wedding. That’s what you’re supposed to do,’ Jim said.
My dad was straight in there. ‘Oh, don’t you know, Jim? The week after the wedding, Robbie has a really important case only he can do. Don’t you, son?’
‘There’s an element of delectus personae,’ I said, hoping that Latin would slam a lid on his sarcasm. It didn’t.
‘Deflect us what? Save the lingo for talking to dead Romans. You know fine well you could have someone else do the case. Stop mollycoddling your criminals.’
‘Leave him, Alex,’ Jim said. ‘He’s like Joanna. They think they’re indispensable.’
‘Aye, well, the cemeteries are full of indispensable folk,’ my dad said. ‘I don’t see what the big fuss is. I’m sure another lawyer could get his client the jail just as easily.’
‘Well, you see, Dad, if my client had wanted a different lawyer, he wouldn’t have instructed me. And, anyway, Joanna won’t be able to get the time off right after the wedding because she’s starting her new job. Not only that, but we have a lot of saving-up to do for the new house. I can’t thank you and Jim enough but we’ve all the fixtures and fittings, kitchen appliances, furniture and all that sort of stuff to get. It adds up, and an exotic honeymoon, just like a big lavish wedding, is an unnecessary expense.’
‘Don’t, Robbie. You’re making my heart go all fluttery with your romantic notions,’ Jim said.
There had been a few awkward discussions with my in-laws-to-be about the wedding. Joanna’s older sister had married a year or so earlier with all the frills and tassels. Joanna’s parents had not been hugely happy at our decision to go for a much smaller affair, one we insisted on paying for ourselves.
‘Look, what the pair of you are doing for us far outweighs a one-day extravaganza. You’re giving Joanna, Tina and me a home.’
That settled for the umpteenth time, I stuck the kettle on.
‘Oh, and I was supposed to tell you that Ted was on the phone to Joanna’s mum this morning,’ Jim said. ‘She told him I was seeing you today and I’ve been asked to find out if you know what’s going on with Annie Brechin. I think that was the name.’
‘Annie who?’ my dad asked.
‘I think Jim means Antonia Brechin,’ I said. ‘She’s a young lawyer who works for Joanna’s Uncle Ted. She was arrested at the awards dinner the other night.’
‘I’ve been at a few dos like that,’ Malky said. ‘Do you mind when I won player of the year after my first season with the Rose?’ On that occasion a few of my brother’s more experienced Linlithgow Rose F.C. teammates hadn’t been too chuffed about a seventeen-year-old beating them to the annual prize. Things had become slightly heated and there had followed an impromptu re-arrangement of furniture, most of which had not been aeronautically designed.
‘Aye, I remember it,’ my dad said. ‘Someone would have phoned the cops if I hadn’t been there already.’
‘Any message I should pass on to Ted?’ Jim asked me. ‘The girl’s not been in touch with him, and he thought that you or Joanna might know something.’
Each time I thought back to Thursday night I had conflicting emotions. I felt sorry for the young trainee of the year, but the look on Brechin’s face as the handcuffs snapped around the wrists of his darling granddaughter had sent a sadistic thrill through me and I hated myself for it.
‘Oh, I’ve got a message all right,’ I said. ‘Tell him the last person Sheriff Albert Brechin would ever let his granddaughter take legal advice from is Robbie Munro.’
‘Robbie!’ Joanna’s voice from the front door. Why was she back so soon? Had there been an accident? I sprinted from the kitchen to see her standing in the living room. By her side, dressed more casually today in jeans, a shapeless burgundy sweater and a pair of serious walking boots, was Antonia Brechin. Her hair was tied back and held in a clasp. She didn’t look like she’d seen much sleep recently.
‘Antonia called me when I was on the way to the sports centre,’ Joanna said.
‘I’m really sorry to bother you on a Saturday, Mr Munro,’ Antonia said. ‘It’s about what happened on Thursday night. I’m in need of some advice.’
7
It was one of those fresh, spring mornings that Scotland does best. Sun shining, distant hills etched against a bright blue sky, wisps of cloud drifting here and there and the soft scent of green barley carried on a gentle breeze that was cold enough to strip the flesh from your bones.
Once we’d established that I was Robbie and that Mr Munro was the puzzled face staring out at us from the kitchen window, I decided to come straight to the most important point. ‘Does your grandfather know that you’re here?’ I took her screwed-up face as a no. ‘Then, I think I should tell you, in case you hadn’t noticed, that the little disagreement we had the other night . . . it wasn’t down to too much drink. We do sincerely hate each other.’
Antonia sighed. ‘The only lawyers I know deal with corporate tax, finance and banking, competition law, that sort of thing. I don’t know who to turn to, Robbie. I’m in trouble. Really big trouble. Well, not big trouble, I mean it might not seem all that big to you. I haven’t murdered anyone or an
ything like that, but—’
‘Before we come onto your life of crime,’ I said, ‘can I ask you what your grandfather is saying about all of this?’
We walked down the garden path at the back of the cottage to a makeshift gate. The latch was a piece of orange twine, hooked over a wooden fence post. I lifted it off and opened the gate to let Antonia through onto a rough track that wound its way between two walls with fields either side.
‘He’s not saying anything,’ she said. ‘I haven’t spoken to him since I was released yesterday afternoon.’
‘Then there isn’t much point you speaking to me. Your grandfather is going to have his own ideas, especially about which lawyer to instruct. I’m probably . . . no, not probably, I’m definitely the last person he’d want you to take legal advice from.’
My phone buzzed. I excused myself and extracted it from the pocket of my jeans. A text message from Joanna. I opened it. Stop being awkward. Help her. *frowny face* Were all women psychic? It would certainly explain a lot.
‘Listen, Antonia. It’s not that I don’t want to help. But you’ve got to see how things are between me and that old . . . I’m sorry, I mean your grandfather. I’d be more than happy to recommend you to another lawyer. Someone he might actually approve of. Just about anyone apart from me should fit the bill.’ I tried a little laugh. Antonia didn’t follow my lead. Instead she stopped and dug a hole in the dirt with the toe of a hiking boot.
‘I know what my granddad is like,’ she said. ‘I shadowed him for a week when I was a student and saw him in action. He’s quite tough.’
If by ‘quite tough’ she meant mercilessly brutal, she’d hear no opposing argument from me.
Antonia fixed me with determined eyes. ‘All I know is that the defence lawyer he complains about the most is you. I only realised your first name was Robbie when I met you on Thursday. Up until then I thought it was Bloody, as in that Bloody Munro has appealed me again!’ This time she did laugh, though it would have been easy to miss.