So I lay smoking in the dark thinking about Rothesay and Saint John. About bike rides and canoe trips along the Kennebecasis River. About my exclusive education at the Collegiate School. About the big turn-of-the-century house I grew up in that always smelled of rich, aged wood. About the kid with big ideas and bigger ideals who had died in Europe. A casualty of war.
I hadn’t been the only casualty. As I lay in the dark feeling sorry for myself I heard the soft, muffled sound of a woman sobbing. From Mrs White’s flat.
The morning sun again struggled to make its presence felt through the grey plumes of mill and factory smoke that drifted over the city. I took the car down to Newton Mearns, to the south of Glasgow. The formation of the state of Israel was still big in people’s minds and the latest joke was to refer to Newton Mearns, because of its largely Jewish population, as Tel-Aviv on the Clyde. It took more than a few concentration camps to kill the good old anti-Semitic gag. But, to be fair, one of the things that I liked about Glasgow was the openness and friendliness of Glaswegians. Glasgow was a hard and dark and violent place, and it was always difficult to reconcile this with the warmth of its people. Glasgow was probably the least anti-Semitic city in Europe. But less than ten years after the liberation of the camps, that was a very relative statement.
Glasgow’s Jewish community owed its origin largely to deception: many Jewish families, escaping the nineteenth-century pogroms of Russia, had been disembarked at the Port of Glasgow and told by disingenuous ship captains that they had arrived in New York. One such family who had eagerly searched Clydebank for a glimpse of the Statue of Liberty had been the Cohen family, who had learned from bitter experience a fierce and uncompromising toughness. One grandson of the original settlers was Jonny Cohen. Handsome Jonny.
The second of the Three Kings.
I had ’phoned Jonny before coming down to see him. We arranged to meet at his home. Unlike Sneddon’s mansion, Jonny Cohen’s house was modern, designed by some up-and-coming London architect. It looked more like something you would expect to see sprawling across a lot in Beverly Hills.
There were no drainpipe-trousered hoodlums in Jonny’s drive. No hint of anything other than here resided a successful businessman and family man.
I rang the doorbell. The door was opened by a tall, tanned and dark-haired man. His face was big and hand-some with a cleft in his chin he could have carried small change in. Jonny Cohen had the kind of looks normally associated with the more masculine Hollywood leading men. They were the kind of looks that women swooned over. Pointlessly. As a husband Jonny Cohen was the model of fidelity; as a father he was loving and fiercely protective; as a gangster he was by far the most intelligent of the Three Kings. Intelligent, ruthless and highly dangerous. But hospitable.
‘Hi, Lennox,’ Jonny said in his rich baritone and beamed a bright smile at me. ‘Come on in…’
There are some people you come across in life whom you can’t help liking in spite of yourself. Jonny Cohen was exactly that type of person: you found yourself putting to one side the fact that he was a violent villain. There was no doubt that Jonny was someone you would be wise not to cross and the Cohen firm had supplied its fair share of custom to the city’s hospitals and, on the odd necessary occasion, mortuary. But according to Einstein everything is relative and in Glasgow you couldn’t hold a couple of murders against a guy’s character. And anyway, Jonny had his own code of ethics. He didn’t run loan sharks like the other two Kings; his money came from illegal gambling, prostitution and a string of restaurants and clubs. Most of all, Jonny Cohen was a robber baron: his success lay in the cruel efficiency of the armed robberies he sponsored, planned and on more than one occasion led.
Jonny showed me into a large, open-plan living room. It was populated with Modernist furniture similar to the stuff in the Andrews’s house. Again there was a television in the corner. He caught me looking at it.
‘Rachael’s idea,’ Jonny explained. ‘She nagged me to death to get one. A Ferranti T thirteen-twenty-five. Cost me fifty-eight bloody guineas. They’re going to televise Princess Elizabeth’s coronation. You got one?’
I laughed at his over-estimation of my financial clout. ‘No… it’ll never catch on. I’ll stick with the wireless.’
He invited me to sit. That was the kind of gangster Handsome Jonny Cohen was: he invited you to sit. He was an amenable kind of guy, so long as he wasn’t standing on top of a bank counter with a stocking mask to hide the film-star looks and waving a sawn-off in your face.
‘What can I do for you, Lennox?’
‘I’m looking into the Tam McGahern killing. I wondered if you could help me.’
‘I heard the police had you pegged for doing his brother.’
‘They pegged me wrong. I had a run-in with Frankie the night he was killed. He wanted me to find out who killed Tam. I told him I wasn’t interested.’
‘So why are you doing it now?’
‘I’m contrary. It’s what makes me an interesting and complex person. People in blue uniforms kept telling me I should stay out of it.’
Jonny went over to a trolley that looked like it should have been on a spaceship. He poured us both a Scotch whisky and soda. ‘So who’s paying for your time?’ he asked, as if he didn’t know.
‘Willie Sneddon.’
Jonny smiled wryly. ‘If you’re working for his outfit you’ve just increased their brainpower by a thousand per cent.’
‘I don’t work for anyone’s outfit. You know that, Jonny. But he’s hired me to do what the police can’t or won’t do.’
‘How can I help?’
I ran through most of what I knew about Tam’s killing. I also told him about Wilma Marshall’s disappearance from the sanatorium in Perth and the handsome, cheerful lug who had made himself known to me before spiriting her away. I hadn’t told Sneddon about Wilma’s conviction that the wrong twin had been shot; that meant I had to leave it out of my explanation to Jonny.
He sat for a moment and contemplated his Scotch.
‘Tam McGahern was a bad bastard. We all hurt people in this business, Lennox. But that’s what it is… business. McGahern hurt people, and worse, because he liked it. Really liked it. His brother Frankie was a bampot. Look at him the wrong way and he’d start farting fire. But that’s all he was, a nut-job. That’s why it fits him coming at you that night the way you said. But Tam was more. Tam had something going on up top. Do you know that Tam never did time? Nor did Frankie. Christ knows how many times they were both questioned but neither was ever arrested, or so much as held overnight.’
‘They weren’t in a cerebral kind of business,’ I said. ‘Loan sharking and protection rackets. If they avoided doing time then it was just down to luck.’
Jonny shook his head. ‘Luck had nothing to do with it. You would never have guessed it to look at him, but Tam McGahern was as smart as they come. Tam made it to sergeant in the Desert Rats. Got decorated. Believe it or not there was talk of him being made an officer. Story goes that when he was in the army this head-quack tested Tam’s IQ and it came out astronomical. But the same psychologist kiboshed Tam’s promotion chances by putting on record that he reckoned he was a complete fucking psycho. There again, we all knew that. Tam always enjoyed hurting people that little bit too much and it often got in the way of his judgement. But the truth is he was really sharp and was slowly becoming a bit of a threat. Anyone can be a hoodlum. But some hoodlums graduate out of the streets — instead of just kicking the shite out of everything and hoping it bleeds money, they start to think things through. To plan. To come up with schemes. That’s what was happening with Tam McGahern.’ Jonny drained his Scotch and got up to pour himself another. I shook my head when he nodded towards my glass. He paused thoughtfully before continuing. ‘Did Sneddon tell you that the three of us got together to talk about Tam McGahern?’
‘No. He didn’t,’ I said.
‘I’m not surprised. I don’t want to confuse things, but we did have a sit down to
discuss whether we needed to do something about Tam. Something permanent, if you know what I mean. The alternative was to accept that one day Tam might have become powerful enough to constitute a threat to the Kings.’
‘What was decided?’
‘To leave him alone for the meantime. So long as the threat was contained. Tam knew not to step out of line or he’d get squashed.’
‘Maybe one of the other Kings decided to deal with the problem alone.’
‘Well, I didn’t do it. I don’t see Sneddon hiring you to poke about in this if he had arranged it. Even if he contracted a hit from out of town. And Murphy… Hammer Murphy is incapable of doing anything with discretion or subtlety. If he had done either McGahern, we would all know about it.’
I knew what Jonny meant: Hammer Murphy was the King with whom I least liked having dealings. Much of what Jonny said about Tam McGahern could apply to Hammer Murphy. Except the intelligence. Michael Murphy’s nickname suited him; he was the human equivalent of a blunt instrument: dense and it hurt when you collided with him. Jonny was right though. Murphy always made sure he got full credit for all the brutal acts he was behind. And he was behind many. But I was keeping an open mind: whether it had been Tam or Frankie who had got his head pulped in the Rutherglen garage, it did fit with Hammer Murphy’s MO.
‘Anyway,’ Jonny continued, ‘we were all keeping a lid on Tam McGahern’s operation. He didn’t like it, but as long as the three main firms worked together, he couldn’t do anything about it.’
‘I hear Tam had a hanger-on of sorts. A guy called Jimmy Wallace. I don’t think he was involved much on the business end of things but Tam was supposed to have indulged him.’
‘Jimmy Wallace?’ Jonny shook his head thoughtfully. ‘Can’t say I’ve ever heard of him.’
I sipped my Scotch. It was good Scotch but I would rather have had a rye. I was hearing nothing that I didn’t already know. Jonny seemed to pick up on this.
‘Not much help, huh? Sorry. I would help if I could… even if you are working for the wrong people.’ He paused. ‘There is maybe one thing. Tam McGahern liked his women. This Wilma may have got you nowhere, but McGahern normally liked his girlfriends to be professionals. Experienced, as it were.’
‘I’ve already tried Arthur Parks,’ I said. ‘Nothing.’
‘Arthur Parks is a front man for Sneddon. McGahern would never have gone there. And he was never in one of my places. There was a group of girls working independently somewhere in the West End. What the Yanks would call “call-girls”: everything arranged discreetly for high-paying clients. Classy girls. McGahern provided security for them. He didn’t run them, more that they paid him a cut to supply heavies, et cetera. The rumour was that McGahern was pretty cracked up on one of them. The tart that ran the house.’
I thought about what he was saying. Classy girls. In Glasgow, and talking about women who fucked for cash, it was a relative statement. I thought of Wilma Marshall’s look.
‘You have an address or number?’ I asked.
‘No. Like I said, it was all done very discreetly and we stayed out of it. Hammer Murphy wanted to force protection on them, but he didn’t know where to find them. Added to which, it would have meant a war with McGahern. There were also rumours that these whores were keeping the police sweet. Or that they had high-level contacts. The odd thing is it was almost as if they disappeared from view. Not that they were much in view to start with.’
Jonny made a ‘that’s it’ gesture with his hands. I hadn’t told him all I knew and he probably hadn’t told me all he knew. But that was the way it worked and I had at least got some new information.
‘Listen, Jonny, you can maybe help me with something else. Not connected at all with McGahern. Have you ever seen this woman before?’ I took out the picture John Andrews had given me of his wife. ‘I think she’s a professional too. She’s called Lillian Andrews now but God knows what she went by before.’
‘What’s the deal?’ He took the picture and examined it. ‘Nice.’
‘Only to look at,’ I said. ‘She’s married to a man called John Andrews, who owns a big export business. Something’s rotten in the state of Bearsden and there’s a smell to the whole set up. Andrews is a scared man and I think it’s entirely possible she’s blackmailing him or has got some kind of hold on him.’
Jonny looked at the picture again. ‘You know something… I think I’ve seen her somewhere before.’ He shook his head, clearly annoyed that he couldn’t recall. ‘Can I hold on to this photograph for a day or two? Do a bit of checking?’
‘Sure. But I need it back. It’s the only one I’ve got.’
We switched to general chat for a while and then I thanked Jonny for his time and we made for the door. On the way out I saw a photograph of his parents on the bookcase. They were sitting outdoors at a cafe table under a sun that had never shone on Glasgow.
‘How are your folks?’ I asked.
‘They’re fine, Lennox. Thanks for asking. I worry about them. All the trouble with the Arabs.’
‘You never fancy it yourself?’ I asked.
‘Israel? Naw. You can’t get a decent fish supper there. Anyway, I was never political. That was my dad’s thing. I remember, before the war, he was always talking about the trouble in the Mid East. I could never work out what the fuck was happening in Falkirk that worried him so much.’
I laughed.
‘But,’ he said, ‘God knows I didn’t expect them to emigrate at their age…’ He shrugged, looking at the photograph. ‘Just goes to show you never can tell what the future holds.’
I smiled. I was talking with Jonny the devoted son, not Jonny the gangster. The son who had financed his elderly parents’ emigration to Israel. The Jewish boy from Newton Mearns who had served with the Second British Army in Germany and had walked through the gates of a camp on the Luneburg Heath forty miles south of Hanover with a name no one had heard of before. Belsen.
‘Nope, Jonny. You never can tell.’
I had a clear goal when I left Jonny Cohen’s. More a target. And after an hour sitting in my car outside the Highlander Bar I caught sight of it. I crossed the road and intercepted Bobby and his two chums, all of whom were still carrying the signs of our previous encounter, just as they were about to enter the bar. Dougie, the biggest of the trio, obviously still fancied himself as tasty.
‘What the fuck do you want, Lennox?’ he said, placing himself between me and Bobby and squaring his not insubstantial shoulders. ‘We told you fucking everything we-’
I interrupted him with a sharp head-butt to the bridge of his nose. He slumped against the wall of the pub. Pete, ever his loyal companion, turned on his heel and ran. Bobby again was frozen to the spot.
‘I cannot abide coarse language,’ I explained to Bobby as I grabbed his upper arm and frogmarched him across the road, leaving the still-dazed Dougie propped against the wall.
I shoved Bobby into the passenger seat and drove down to the Clyde. Clydebank was still gap-toothed from wartime air raids and I parked on one of the half-cleared bombsites by the river. I hauled him out of the car and down to the pier. We stood near its edge, the water below black and sleeked with rainbow-swirls of engine oil.
Bobby eyed me sulkily through the eye I hadn’t closed. ‘One of these days you’re going to push the wrong person too far.’
‘Oh really? Well, until that day comes I’ve always got you.’ I shoved him and he staggered back towards the edge of the pier. His hideous winkle-picker boots scrabbled on the rough rubble.
‘This is very simple, Bobby. You held out on me. I told you I wanted to know everything about Tam McGahern.’
‘I didn’t hold out,’ he protested. ‘I told you everything I know!’
I gave another shove to his chest and he tilted precariously backwards. I grabbed a hold of his bootlace tie.
‘I can’t swim!’ he bleated.
I laughed at him. ‘This is the fucking Clyde, Bobby. You’ll die of heavy-metal po
isoning before you have a chance to drown. Anyway, shite floats. Now talk to me… what about the whore McGahern used to go to? The one he provided heavies for?’
The hate and fear on Bobby’s face didn’t leave much room for any other emotion, but for a moment something like confusion crossed it.
‘What whore?’
‘The classy operation in the West End. The one McGahern was giving one to.’
The penny dropped.
‘Oh, aye… her. I didn’t even think about her. I didn’t think it was important. I wasn’t holding out on you. I just didn’t think about her.’
I yanked his bootlace tie and pulled him clear from the water’s edge. In a way I was disappointed not to be throwing him into the Clyde. ‘What was her name?’
‘Molly. I don’t know her second name.’
‘Tell me about her.’
‘I can’t. I never met her. Tam had another heavy that he used as a chucker-out. He said me, Dougie and Pete wasn’t smart enough for a job like that.’ Bobby looked hurt and straightened his tie. ‘I don’t know what was so fucking special about being a chucker-out for a bunch of whores.’
‘Who was this guy?’
‘I don’t know. Never met him.’
‘So you don’t know where this brothel was?’
‘I didn’t say that. One night Tam was supposed to be up seeing this tart, but he got held up at the Imperial. He got me to order him a taxi by ’phone. The address was in Byres Road. Or off it. I can’t remember exactly.’
‘That’s a long road.’
Bobby shrugged. ‘It was a long time ago. I can’t remember the number. I don’t think it would do any good anyway.’
‘Why?’
‘I heard Tam on the ’phone to Molly one night, about a month before he was killed. I got the impression that she was winding the business up. Or moving.’
I nodded, remembering what Jonny Cohen had said about the operation seeming to drop from view. ‘What gave you that idea?’
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