He can see nothing, except some feet and grey flagstones, as he is pushed into the back of a vehicle. From the step and size of it, he envisions some kind of large SUV. Then he feels his seatbelt being snugly fastened across him, like he would do with Grace and Eve. Not a single glimpse of the faces of any of the men who have taken him, just the awareness that there is one on each side of him in the back seat, as the vehicle accelerates away.
28. THE DELIVERY BOY 4
It was the day after the incident with Johnnie when I next saw them. I was walking home from school and I looked in the windae of the Marksman Bar in Duke Street. There they were, through a fug of blue cigarette smoke, sitting drinking, full of cheer. It was that euphoria that always came from gloating at the suffering brought down on some rival. I sensed it in others as I grew to feel it in myself: that arrogant, showboating impulse, where you feel invincible and revel in your own power.
Grandad Jock saw me as he looked up from his pint, his snidey eyes locking onto mine. I could tell that he caught something in them. He smiled, and I was scared.
Johnnie’s body was found two days later. A security guard had seen an unusually big flock of seagulls around the dry dock, fighting, squawking, attracted by the corpse. The rats had also been busy, so the identification took a while or so some locals said. A lot of cunts would probably have been delighted to envision Johnnie’s handsome face eaten off by scavengers. That grinning face that would have hovered over many of their wives and girlfriends, as they moaned in pleasure beneath him.
It was in the Evening News and on Scotland Today. When Grandad Jock came round with Carmie and Lozy for the card school, I asked them about it. Jock tippled that I knew more than I was letting on. — Good riddance tae bad rubbish, he said softly, not looking up from his hand of cards.
— I thought Johnnie wis yir pal!
There was a silence around the table. Then my dad looked at ays with a drunkard’s mean scowl. — Keep your neb oot, son. Ah’m telling ye. . he slurred, — keep it oot ay things you ken nowt aboot!
But he was the cunt that kent nowt. My grandad raised his head and winked at me. — Naw. . it’s okay, he said to my dad, and he rose, gesturing me to follow him oot intae the hall. We went through the kitchen oot to the wee paved backcourt where the bins were. It was cold. He seemed not to feel it. He lit up a fag, gave me one.
— Mind that dug yir faither came hame wi, ages ago?
Ah minded ay Viking, the German shepherd dug ma dad brought hame one time fae the pound when he was pished. A barry dug, but he bit everybody n we hud tae get him destroyed. — Aye.
— Ye loved that dug, mind? But it bit ye. Dug couldnae help it. Eh loved ye, but eh still betrayed ye.
I nodded. Viking sank his teeth into my ankle for no reason. We’d been running in Pilrig Park and he just turned oan ays and bit me. Probably got too excited and couldnae control himself.
— Wisnae really the dug’s fault. He took a big drag, blew the smoke oot into the cauld air. — Wis jist his nature. People are like that tae, boy. Thir yir friends. . then he bared his teeth at me, — till thir no. Ye understand that, pal?
— Aye, I told him.
— Good. Let’s get back intae the warm, and we stubbed oot our fags and returned tae the front room, him tae his game ay cairds.
But that night I did something ah’d never done before, and would vow never tae do again. I went doon tae the phone box and called the bizzies.
29. THE YOUNG WARLORD
In some ways the silence on the drive suits him. In others it’s worrying, indicating that he’s subject to a chilling restraint and professionalism. Power’s wankers wouldn’t have the discipline to maintain such a hushed silence. At the very least, they would have been compelled to scoff at his Tesco mobile phone. He estimates three men, one driving, two in the back with him. But instead of trying to work out where he’s going, he focuses on his breathing, slowly, through the hood, warm on his face, and he lets his thoughts drift off, away from the unwelcome interventions of his grandad, to his wife and daughters. If he was finished, he was going to bow out thinking about them.
Under that dark hood, he is lifting Eve high over the sand dunes, then holding up an aggressive, pinching rock crab for Grace’s attentions. She is laughing, dancing in front of it with delight. Then Melanie is in his arms, as they salsa across the floor, to the girls’ enchantment. He wants to show his daughters that this is what real men do with their sweethearts — that this rapture, beauty and fun is what they are entitled to expect of love. He is breathing evenly, he is at peace. The constant stopping at the lights tells him he’s still in the city, but they might be taking him anywhere. Then, suddenly, he feels familiar cobblestoned bumps under the SUV, knows the sequence of them. This is followed by the rumbling of a grid.
They are at Leith Docks.
They stop the car and help him out. They handle him firmly, but not over-aggressively. As the hood is pulled from him and he blinks into a fading light, a dark, short-haired, flinty-eyed man in his early twenties comes into focus, facing him. The man is well dressed, not in casual or gangster fashions, but like a young professional. His face is fresh and unblemished, apart from a thin scar above his top lip. Franco thinks of the person who gave him that scar. Was he gone for good, or perhaps strutting around a different town with impunity? — You must be Anton.
The young man nods. There are two other men with Anton, almost flanking him, maybe a step behind. In clothing and bearing they look like cheaper, inferior versions. Frank Begbie is instantly less impressed. He now reads their silence as deference to a disciplined leader, rather than inherent competence.
— A wee bit ay advice, Franco says nonchalantly, — get yourself checked oot. The STD clinic.
Anton Miller’s face is still impassive, though one eyebrow slightly raises. His henchmen bristle, the chunkier one stepping forward. — What was that? he says, his fists balling.
— The lassie Flanagan, Frank Begbie says, completely ignoring the other man, never taking his eyes off Anton Miller. — Decent pussy, but pits it aboot too much. Larry’s been thaire, n he wis ey a bareback man. Doubt that’s changed.
Anton Miller nods slowly, in mild appreciation. It’s as if Frank Begbie has passed a test, or maybe two: of insight and bottle. — I’ve no brought ye doon here tae discuss my health. Ah wanted tae look you in the eye and tell ye something straight.
— Ah think ah ken what it is, Franco says, — that ye had nowt tae dae wi Sean’s death. Well, ah’d figured that oot for masel.
Anton lets both his brows rise. — Aw aye, n how did ye come tae that conclusion?
— Too many bams aw singin fae the same song sheet. Orchestrated by a cunt who ey does that sort ay thing. Whae’s been daein it since the year dot.
— Power, Anton scoffs.
He notes the stockier henchman, the one who’d come forward, exchange a look with the other guy; thinner, hook-nosed. — Golden rule: that fat cunt says sugar, I think shite, Franco half smirks. — Never had that many rules that stood me in good stead. Wish ah’d remembered that yin mair.