The Barbershop Seven

by Douglas Lindsay

  'Aye, fine,' said Mulholland.

  James Strachan stared at them for a few more seconds. Shrugged, felt the cold.

  'Thanks for your help,' said Mulholland, as another door closed.

  Pointless, he thought. Proudfoot thought the same, though neither of them spoke.

  A mirror of virtually every place they'd been. The majority hadn't seen Barney Thomson; the minority had seen him, but still had been no help whatsoever.

  From nowhere, the long fingers of the coming storm slowly reached out, and snow began to fall, in sparse, swirling, white fluffy flakes. They turned and started to walk down the road. Freezing, dispirited, unhappy, the mood and general pointlessness of their current occupation even infiltrating Sheep Dip. They were feeling useless; and unaware that the Cape Wrath Hotel was another mile and a half away.

  Along Came A Spider

  'Psst!'

  Darkness. No sound but the muffled howl of the wind outside. Late at night or early in the morning, Barney Thomson did not know. He had lost all sense of time, except that it had been dark for many hours, the monks long since in their beds. A day hidden in the attic above the library; after removing his brush and bucket, so they would have nothing to raise suspicions as to his location.

  Cold up there. Dark, damp; lonely. Spiders for company; creatures unseen that brushed past his face. Scuttling noises from near by, but the darkness was impenetrable, no amount of time had allowed his eyes to grow. Yet he had no fear of any of that, Barney Thomson; no phobias. A simple man. But knew he couldn't live forever in the cold, damp attic of the monastery. Some warmth reached there from the floors below, but not much. He would eventually die of hypothermia. He'd realised after a time that once the monks were all in bed he could safely come back down below. To lurk in the shadows, plunder the kitchen. Now he'd had his fill of bread and cold meat; more stashed away inside his cloak for later, for the following day, as he could see nothing but another day in hiding.

  Hours alone in the darkness allowed you time to think, and Barney Thomson had done a lot of thinking. Regrets. Mistakes he'd made. What the future held. He was a fish out of water in this place; like a priest at Ibrox, as Wullie always used to say. And it is of Wullie that he continued to think. Which he found funny. He had hardly given him a second's thought in all those months. Between March and November, once the initial danger had passed. Wullie had been gone, and that was that, and he would never have given him another thought had not the body of Chris Porter been discovered.

  So now, regrets. Regrets that he hadn't made a better job of hiding Chris Porter's body.

  'Psst!'

  And was he the worse for it now, this regret? Regrets about his actions after killing Wullie, not about the death itself. Accident it might have been, but he'd still killed a man. That was what had started it all off. He'd thought, as he'd sat frozen in his miserable hideout, that this was his penance; his hairshirt. So much for avoiding detection, when he had to hide away in conditions that were worse than he would experience in prison. The blizzard would not last forever, but it might last long enough for him to get caught. He had spent some of his day in the dark wondering if there might be some higher force at work. A God after all; vengeance to be taken.

  'Psst!'

  At the third attempt there was a stirring in front of him. The body shifted under the sheets. A low grumble, a hand moved, there was a mutter which sounded like, you're not using enough cream, Sarah.

  Sarah? All the brothers had secrets. Barney Thomson had realised that much.

  'Psst! Brother Steven!' A forced whisper. He had been in the room for a couple of minutes and had already lifted a blanket from his own bed, and any clothes which had come easily to hand.

  Finally the brother's head moved, and he raised himself from the pillow. He squinted into the apocalyptic darkness.

  'Who's there?' he said. Plucked from the depths of sleep. Still hadn't got around to remembering where he was. Could have been in any one of a hundred beds he'd woken up in.

  'Brother Steven! It's me. Jacob. Brother Jacob,' he added, to avoid confusion. Was glad that Brother Steven had not succumbed to the killer's rampage as he had once suspected.

  A small gasp, sheets were moved back; Barney saw Steven sit up. Shook his head, ran his hands across his face.

  'Brother Jacob? Everyone's looking for you, man. Where've you been? We thought you'd run off into the blizzard.'

  'Hiding,' he said. 'Look, Brother, I know what everyone thinks, but it wasn't me. I didn't have anything to do with they murders.'

  'You didn't?'

  'Naw, I didn't. I'm not that sort of bloke.'

  'Well, why did you run, then Brother? Everyone thinks you're guilty. Maybe they wouldn't have, because we're not judgemental here, but after you disappeared...'

  'I had to. I knew what everyone was thinking. What with the murders starting just after I arrived, and my barber's tools getting used for to commit them. I'm no mug.'

  'So where've you been, Brother?'

  Barney hesitated. He had decided to trust Brother Steven to find out exactly what was going on, but was not going to trust him all the way.

  'It doesn't matter. Just hiding. I just need to know a few things, you know? Are there no other suspects? Is that bastard Herman just after me, 'cause if you ask me, that bastard's got something to do with it. And all they other suspicious-looking ones, like Martin and Goodfellow and Ash and Brunswick. They're all dodgy.'

  No immediate reply. He could see Brother Steven move forward slightly on the bed.

  'Do you mean what you just said, Brother?'

  'Aye. Why, what do you mean?'

  Another pause. Barney felt the eyes of Brother Steven upon him, even in this sepulchral darkness.

  'Brother Ash is also dead.'

  'What?'

  'They found his body in the forest not far from the body of Brother Babel. Head bashed in.'

  'Holy fuck!'

  'Yes, Brother, indeed,' said Steven. 'No more the subtlety of a knife in the throat from our killer friend. He's changed his whole bag. What goes around comes around, and all that. I remember old Ash saying he was going to live forever. Forgetting that old Horace thing: Pallida Mors aequo pulsat pede pauperum tabernas regumque turres. Yep, you can't argue with that.'

  'Aye, right,' said Barney, then added, 'Holy fuck. And I'm getting the blame for all four of these murders now?'

  'I'm afraid so, Brother. The Abbot's already sent Brother David out on a mission to get to Durness and contact the police. To be honest, I don't know if you have to worry about that, because the guy's a dead man. Not a chance he'll make it in this weather. The poor Abbot must be really desperate. I don't think Herman was too happy, but that's his authority hang-up.'

  'Aw, shite, that's all I need. The blinking police turning up here.'

  'Indeed, Brother. Are you in trouble with the police as it is?'

  Barney Thomson. Cool in a crisis. 'Me? Wanted by the police? Are you kidding? What would I be wanted by the police for? I mean, me? The police? What do you think, that I look like the kind of bloke who'd kill the people he worked with? The police? No chance.'

  'All right, Brother. Then if you didn't kill our brothers, you have nothing to fear.'

  'But they all think I did. You've got to know human nature, Brother. I've got no defence, not a leg to stand on.'

  He could see Brother Steven nodding in the dark.

  'Got you, Brother. It's that whole guilt-innocence trip. It's like what Bacon said: For what a man would like to be true, that he more readily believes. I suppose it's just more comfortable for us all to believe that it's the newcomer who's guilty, rather than someone among us who we've grown to love over the years.'

  'So you think I'm guilty 'n all?'

  'Guilt, innocence, that whole bag; you know, Jacob, I haven't a clue, man. I've not known you too long, but we get along all right, don't we? It's not like I had you pegged for a killer or anything, but then I've no idea who I might suspect. I
don't think any of the brothers really has the genocidal edge in their eye. If I say it's definitely not you, then I have to accuse someone else. I just don't know, man. I'm trying to be in the zone on this one, but it's a tough call.'

  Barney hesitated, then asked the burning question.

  'You won't turn me in, Brother, will you? I need to wait until they've found the real killer.'

  'Don't worry, I'm not turning anyone in. It's every man for himself out there. But they're not looking for anyone else, Brother, and if someone else dies, they're going to assume it's you who did it, because they don't know where you are. You have a long road ahead of you, my friend.'

  They stared at one another, each man barely able to make out the other in this biblical darkness. This was what counted for friendship in this bloodied place, thought Brother Steven. But what did Barney Thomson know about friends? They nodded, a gesture which penetrated the night, and then Barney was gone, out into the Gothic black of the long hallway outside. And so, once more, he began to wander the corridors of doom, a fugitive from someone else's reality.

  Brother Steven settled back down under the coarse blanket. Eyes open, staring at the ceiling. He thought of Brother Jacob, running from something which had brought him to the monastery in the first place, now running from something within. A tortured soul. It was like Catullus said, he thought, Now he goes along the darksome road, thither whence they say no one returns. That was about it for Brother Jacob.

  He closed his eyes, feeling the tiredness come over him, and soon he was once again slipping into the arms of Sarah Connolly on a warm summer's afternoon.

  ***

  Barney Thomson huddled in his corner in the attic. Extra clothes retrieved, food in his stomach. Fortified for the rest of the long night, and another bitter day ahead, when he would have to stay out of sight of the rest of the monks. He was glad that he had not told Brother Steven his whereabouts, but also pleased that he'd been to see him. He felt he had at least one friend in the world.

  And so, Brother Ash was also dead. Four down, twenty-eight to go. He wondered if the killer would aim to do away with the full complement of monks, one by one, until there were only two of them left, with both denying everything.

  But Brother Steven was right. Any further deaths would be blamed upon him. The only thing for him now, if the weather was to prevent his escape from this place, was to find the murderer himself. Only then would it be possible for him to have his reprieve. Only then would he be able to prevent the police from turning up in their hundreds.

  Barney Thomson: a man with a mission. He did not know the full weight of accusation against him, only knew that he must do everything to clear his name. He was not guilty of any of the monastery murders, so he must prove himself innocent; something he could only do by turning in the real killer, and that is what he must discover. Then he could hand him over to the Abbot and the police, and at the same time turn himself in; that was his latest decision after more time in the black of night.

  Then he could stand trial for the crimes of the past, for another hour of lonely reflection in the darkened attic had given him hope. He had persuaded himself; had been a spin doctor to his doubts on behalf of his earlier deeds. He could hand himself into the police and get a good lawyer. What exactly had he been guilty of? Murder certainly, but accidental murder. No more than manslaughter, and not by any dangerous or foolish act of his own. Wullie had slipped into a pair of scissors he'd been holding; Chris had fallen and cracked his head during the course of a minor stramash of which Chris himself had been the instigator.

  Disposing of the bodies instead of informing the police had obviously been a mistake, but perhaps it could be forgiven. As for disposing of the bodies of his mother's victims, surely any jury would understand that act. Could anyone stand to see their own mother vilified as a serial human butcher? Virtually all his actions had been those of a desperate and panicked man. Horrible, perhaps, but also understandable.

  That was what he had persuaded himself. So he had a plan. Find the monastery murderer and turn him into the Abbot, so that when the police arrived he could hand himself over to them with at least a decent reference from the man of God. There was nothing he believed he couldn't prove himself innocent of. Of course, he hadn't seen the following morning's selection of newspaper headlines. The Sun: Thomson Slaughters Ninety-Eight Women in Terror Week; the Times: Sadat Assassination – Thomson Accused; the Star: Barber Surgeon on Kidnap Spree; the Guardian: Barney Thomson Quits Tories; the Daily Record: How Barber Surgeon Made Goram Let in Five Against Portugal In '93; the Scotsman: Uproar as Boffins Set to Clone Barber Surgeon; the Herald: Wave of Naked Bank Robberies Pinned on Thomson; the Express: Thomson Kills Seventeen More; the Mirror: 'Cool' Killer in Downing Street Invite Mystery; the Mail: Barney Thomson Wore My Daughter's Skin, Claims Upset Mum; the Aberdeen Press and Journal: North-East Man Goes to Dentist.

  He would have to be quick and discreet; he would have to use the sum of all his investigative powers and intuition. He'd need to cut a swathe through the confusion, the deceit and the treachery. He would have to become all that he had run from; the prey would become the predator. He'd need to be a leopard, ready to pounce upon the wounded wildebeest of the truth; a lion, poised to plunge his jaws of revelation into the warm flesh of veracity; a panther, suspended on the doorstep of betrayal, the slashed and gouged hyena abject prey to the incisors of integrity; a behemoth, hovering at the graveyard of inevitability, the cruel fangs of rectitude and probity a brutal witch-smeller pursuivant to the calumnious obloquy of injustice; a wolf, slavering at the tombstone of fealty, vengeful vitriolic teeth plunging brutally into the blackened wasted heart of the Little Red Riding Hood of vituperative denigration. He would have to be savage, cunning, astute and shrewd. He'd need to mix the deviousness of Machiavelli with the guile of Sherlock Holmes; the vigour of Samson with the finesse of Ronaldo. He'd need to scale the peaks of intellect, while at the same time abrade the depths of artifice. This would need to be Barney Thomson's finest hour.

  'Well, I'm fucked,' he muttered to himself.

  He closed his eyes and let his head fall onto his chest in an almost comfortable position; and soon sleep came to take him away to a world which was even darker and colder, a world inhabited solely by killers and their victims.

  Derailment

  The tide was in on the Kyle of Durness, the long stretch of beach covered by a wash of deep, choppy sea. Low cloud, so that the water was dull and cold grey. Mulholland looked over the sea to the dark shapes of the hills beyond from his room in the Cape Wrath Hotel. Another pointless day gone by, his foul mood given way to resignation and acknowledgement of probable defeat. It had always been hoping to chance to come all this way across Sutherland expecting to meet the infamous Barber Surgeon face to face. And so he was thinking of abandoning the search. There was no point in going towards Aberdeen now, since Thomson had obviously headed north. Maybe Shetland or Orkney, but he was not sure and was too dispirited to make a decision. He could decide in the morning when he had a clearer head; his mind was fudged by a bottle and a half of wine.

  The door to the bathroom behind opened and Proudfoot emerged. He continued to stare out at the dark, black night. She joined him at the window; stood next to him but did not touch. A mellow evening, away from arguments and endless discussion on the motives and mind of Barney Thomson – deranged criminal mastermind or unfortunate idiot? A three-hour meander through aimless conversation on life and all its iniquitous injustices. Mulholland's marriage; Proudfoot's loves and mores; Rangers, Celtic and the Great Divide that polluted the city; a list of twenty-seven good reasons for not being in the police, as opposed to a list of two for remaining there; plain chocolate versus milk; Stallone versus Schwarzenegger; the Beatles versus the Stones; and, as the wine had taken over, Meryl Streep versus the Wombles; why sugar was a poor alternative to paint; how Scotland could have beaten Holland by three goals in Argentina if Alan Rough hadn't had a perm and if Graeme Souness had brok
en Johnny Rep's knee-caps with a baseball bat in the first minute; the effectiveness of Mollweide's projection as representative of a globe. Three bottles of Australian Sauvignon blanc; brie in breadcrumbs, chicken in honey and white wine, raspberry crumble with ice cream, a large and varied cheeseboard; coffee.

  They watched the sea. Listened to the sound of the waves crashing on the rocky shore a hundred yards away. White spray breaking into the night, disappearing. Could see the cold outside, could feel the warmth of the hotel and the evening. Their shoulders touched. Mulholland was relaxed at last, weighed down finally by his melancholy.

  They knew the time was right. No advances needed to be made, no rejections to be risked. Inevitable. They would have each other, and they could consider the consequences the following day. Sex after food; a glorious pleasure.

  'So,' she said. Left the word hanging in the air, with the spray and the snow and the few seagulls still haunting the freezing night.

  He turned and looked at her. Eyes that danced. Felt it all over his body, but he hesitated. Savouring the moment. How long since he'd had anyone other than Melanie? Couldn't think about her now.

  Proudfoot; no make-up, soft lips, a body to be tied up and smothered in something sweet.

  'So,' she said again, 'you going to fuck me or what?'

  He smiled. Neck stretched a little. Lips hovered.

  There was a knock at the door.

  They continued to hover, their lips a fraction apart, not wanting to give in to the reality. Could be nothing, but was it ever nothing in a policeman's life? The knock came again; the moment snapped like a brittle bone. He pulled away. There would be other moments. In about ten seconds' time.

  'Did you order another bottle of wine?' he asked.

  She laughed. 'I was about to ask you the same thing.'

  She looked out of the window again as Mulholland went to the door. He opened it, looked at the old woman waiting. Curlers in her hair, an old cardigan pulled tightly round her bountiful chest. They stared at each other.