Jack in the Box, page 11
‘Whereabouts is he?’ Lomond marvelled at the cleanliness of the car: the dangling air freshener, the lack of dust on the dashboard.
‘Apparently he’s out delivering stuff in Yorkhill, Dumbarton Road, Great Western Road and the good old West End. Scheduled drops starting in somewhere called Regent Moray Street, near the Art Galleries.’
‘Odds that someone’s tipped him off?’
‘Not bad, I suppose. Though when we rang up, we got routed through a call centre. Had to spell the name repeatedly. Guessing they don’t all sit among each other in the canteen.’
‘Mechanised,’ Lomond said, then pondered awhile.
Slater’s complexion was Scottish pale. Sunshine didn’t suit him. In the pictures Lomond had seen of Slater and Meghan on holiday, he looked as if he should be wearing a hazmat suit rather than sunnies and flip-flops. But while he was lean, skinny and whiter than a plain loaf, he had never looked quite so tired.
‘Feels like we’ve not really spoken for a bit,’ Lomond said.
‘Eh? It’s been a day, or something. Last time we spoke to this character, in fact.’
‘How’ve you been taking it?’
‘Taking what?’ The eyes narrowed; he glanced over at Lomond.
‘This case. We’re going to get busier. Worst one since the Ferryman.’
‘Well, y’know. We know the form. How’d you get on with the guy at Avalon King?’
‘The woman. The “King” bit comes from Nicole Kingsley. Raglan’s daughter.’
Slater snorted. ‘Christ. And how was she?’
‘Charming. A bit frosty, but nothing like her da. Or anyone connected with him. Impression you get: successful businesswoman, all the trimmings. Dresses well, polite. Wouldn’t have thought she was from the bad end of Blackhill.’
‘If she agreed to speak to a polis, that’s a bit of a change of gear for the Kingsleys. Her dad’s meant to be the guy who crucified that boy in Possil. Full crucifixion job down to the crown of thorns. Everything apart from the rising from the dead bit.’
‘Aye. Legend has it. He’s currently in retirement somewhere leafy. Old dears doing their crochet, making jam or whatever, and he’s sitting there in the corner.’
‘They probably say “What a nice man he is”. Bit like that one horrible kid in school who all the mums thought was lovely.’
‘I thought you might have been that one kid, Malcolm.’
‘Cheers for that. What are we thinking, Laybourn our man?’
‘Well, he was out and about on the day Kath Symes died. And he knew the woods; that’s his own admission.’
‘You doubt it though, eh?’
‘I’ll see what’s what. No gut feelings or anything. Bit that doesn’t really stick is how the guy got in, because we can’t square that. No trace evidence either. Nothing. And Daniel Laybourn didn’t strike me as a meticulous sort of guy.’
‘He is mental, though. Ghosts?’
‘Nah, it was the Finch girl who talked about ghosts. He was the UFOs guy.’
‘Course he was. Definite space cadet.’
‘Let’s see what he has to say for himself. He’s linked to both sites, plus . . . I pulled out his record. Former soldier. Para reg. Maybe something else that isn’t on the books.’
‘Christ. He one of those SAS guys who can’t tell you he’s in the SAS?’
‘Nah, he’s not one of those guys.’
‘How do you know?’
‘He didn’t tell us he was in the SAS.’
‘Which might mean he actually was in the SAS.’
Lomond drummed his fingers on the door frame. ‘I’ll get it out of him. Anyway, when you go into those regiments, they tend to tell you how to kill people. Sneaking up on them, that kind of thing. Bit like our guy.’
‘Well, if he was SAS he’s put those skills into good use, driving a van.’
‘Makes you think, that. About how your job will get swallowed up. Happens to everyone eventually.’
‘Won’t happen to us, though. Robots? Robocop, and that?’
‘Could do. If they work out how to police people with drones and AI, they’ll do it. Same with every other job.’
‘Nah, doubt it – where are they going to get the charm from?’ Slater grinned mirthlessly. ‘That’ll keep us in a job.’
‘There’s probably a better reason than that.’
‘What’s that, then?’
‘We’re cheaper than robots.’
‘But harder to get spare parts for. Mind you, Tait’s ready to replace the lot of us. Hang on . . . is that a delivery van I see before me?’
‘Blue, white door?’
Slater squinted. ‘Blue, yes . . . not sure about white door.’ Kelvingrove Art Galleries appeared to the left, all red sandstone under the blue, an illuminated manuscript brought to life. Slater sped up, skirting round the traffic in front as it came to a halt at a set of lights. On the other side of the road, angry faces behind glass, raised palms. Slater gave a wolfish grin and waved.
‘Bit naughty, Malcolm,’ Lomond said.
‘We’re in hot pursuit, gaffer! It’s allowed.’
‘It isn’t.’
‘C’mon, it’s a car chase! I did the advanced driving. It’ll be a laugh.’
‘It is not a car chase.’
‘But that is a white door, right there.’
Lomond triggered the button for his window. There, in the driver’s seat of the van next to him, framed with no little distinction by the dirty glass in the white spare-parts door, was Daniel Laybourn. He turned an expression of mildly stoned interest, no sense of surprise, to the car cutting into the opposite lane at the bottom of Argyle Street.
‘Pull over,’ Lomond said. ‘Police. Remember me? We want to talk to you.’
Then the eyes flared, and Laybourn shot through the red light.
‘Oh, you absolutely have to be joking,’ Lomond said, head dropping into his hands.
‘Right!’ Slater growled. ‘We’re on!’
There were some near misses, red lights cut, brakes slammed on, and Lomond’s heart kicked into a very high gear.
‘Should get some lights on the go,’ Slater said conversationally as Charing Cross blurred past, the Mitchell Library shoved behind them with almost indecent speed. ‘Fancy sticking your head out the window and going nee-naw?’
‘This is not a car chase, Malcolm,’ Lomond said sternly. ‘We are not in a film.’
‘It is a car chase, though, gaffer. He is definitely trying to get away from us, and we’re chasing him. That’s the facts, and that’s the criteria. Full marks. C’mon, let’s claim it.’
‘For God’s sake, there’s a bunch of school kids up there! Stop!’
Slater did – and so did Laybourn. Both vehicles idled as a crocodile of children all wearing hi-vis were led across the road by smiling teachers and classroom assistants. A couple of them waved. Lomond waved back.
‘Right, we’ve got him now.’
They hadn’t. Heavy traffic and lights cut them off. The van was close a few times, distant at others. Fortunately, that strange, off-bluey-purple colour gave it away every time. Lomond wanted to say it was cobalt, but he’d have to check online to be sure. He even resorted to ringing Laybourn’s mobile.
‘Now, stop being silly,’ he said, dredging up an earnest yet stern primary school teacher voice that Slater had never heard before. ‘Give yourself up, stop the van and we’ll have a wee chat. There’s no point to this. Don’t make us get the roadblocks out.’
‘Roadblocks!’ Slater shrieked, once Lomond hung up, face reddening. ‘How about a helicopter? Honest to God, I’ll never get over this.’
It was a while before they finally caught up with the van, parked near some ancient Anderson shelters beside the allotments out near Blairdardie. A solid wall blocked off the allotments, every inch of it covered in graffiti tags.
‘Where the hell is he?’ Slater said.
‘Now it gets interesting,’ Lomond remarked, getting out of the car.
‘Yeah. You should’ve let me cut him off on Great Western Road, I told you . . . now we need to find him on foot.’
Lomond stopped short. ‘Oh, for the love of God.’
Around the corner, Daniel Laybourn stood facing the wall. His piss was cutting furrows in the remaining patches of snow at his feet. He turned his head, and removed one hand to wave at the two policemen.
‘Sorry, gents,’ he said, ‘this is my usual spot for a nature break. Nice and quiet, just the way I like it . . . There we go. Now, what can I do for you?’
26
‘Thing is, there are some vibrations that get intense, you know? Like there’s something off. I get it a lot. I mean, it doesn’t happen all the time. This old dear, I had to deliver a tea set – she was giving everything away before she died – she wanted me to post it to her pal, or a cousin or something. She’d wrapped it up in all these bits of paper, and I’ll tell you something – one of the cups came undone a wee bit, so I was rewrapping it, and you know what year it was on the bit of newspaper she’d torn out? Nineteen ninety-one. That long ago. Talk about Ravenscraig. So I got good vibrations off that. It had history. When I’m delivering stuff for the big shops – you know, video games or that, anything made of plastic – I get nothing off it. No life to it. It’s just poured into a mould.’
Sitting on the opposite side of the table, Slater looked as if he was the one being questioned. He leaned forward, his chin on his hand. ‘Can you tell us what kind of vibes you got with the dead guy in the fridge in the back of your van, Dan?’
Laybourn sighed. ‘I was coming to that.’
‘Can you come to it a wee bit faster?’
‘Obviously it gave off bad vibes. Obviously. Weird job, but that’s just looking back on it, isn’t it? In hindsight. In retrospect.’ He pronounced this last word as if he’d imparted a great secret. ‘But then I get all kinds of jobs. I’m in employment.’
Lomond said, ‘Tell us about your employment. You work full-time with the big shops?’
‘I don’t work for that company that winds its way through South America.’ He twirled his two forefingers in the air, tracing the bows and elbows of a waterway. ‘I work for myself. Sometimes there’s things going for some of the bigger companies. They always need people. If I don’t have a job to do in my own right, then I’ll see what they’ve got going. They know me. I’m reliable.’
‘So it’s a zero-hours contract?’
‘That’s a new name for it. Aye. I phone up, see what they’ve got. If there’s a shift on and I’m available, I do it. Decent money, weekends and evenings.’
‘And tell us about your other work,’ Lomond said. ‘How does that come about?’
‘Old-fashioned way – I advertise. Notice boards. Church halls. Newsagent windows. Council offices. Everywhere. These wee news-sheets that double up as parish leaflets; I advertise there. Pays for itself, you’d be surprised. My rates are good. I do house clearances, trips to the council tip, you name it.’ Laybourn grew animated as he said this. It was a business pitch. His eyes seemed to flicker under the interview-room lights.
‘And what can you tell us about the job with the fridge?’ Slater asked.
‘I get the phone call. Can you come and pick something up? A storage unit. To go from a lock-up garage to Hazell Court. I says to him at the time, “Hazell Court’s empty, son, you sure about that?” Says he’s sure. Hazell Court, he says. Special delivery. Cash up front.’
‘You said “he”,’ Lomond said. ‘Can you tell me about the voice?’
‘Just a guy,’ Laybourn said. ‘Maybe a wee bit rough, but I couldn’t be sure. Just a guy.’
‘Young? Old?’
‘Neither, or both. Hard to say. I can say he was local. Glasgow. That’s for definite.’
‘How did he get the money over to you?’
‘Posted it – cash in an envelope.’
Slater laughed. ‘Seriously?’
‘Seriously. We don’t all live in the world of bank transfers and direct debits, son. I take my wages when I can get them.’
Lomond said, ‘Do you still have the envelope?’
‘I doubt it. I’ll look.’
‘Did he leave any instructions with you? Anything written down, a printout? Voicemail messages?’
Laybourn shook his head. ‘All by phone. I wrote it down, got it all straight. Bit weird, like, but they can be. I moved caged birds one time – that was mental. You know that kind o’ pigeony smell you get on the underground lower level? It was a bit like that.’
‘Speaking of which,’ Lomond said, ‘did you smell anything unusual in your load that night?’
‘No, nothing unusual.’
‘Tell us about how you picked it up.’
‘This is the thing – I thought I was going to meet someone at the lock-up when I picked it up. But there’s no one there. Bear in mind I’ve already had a hundred and fifty pounds in an envelope through my door just to show up. The lock-up was in Carnwadric, down a wee lane. The fridge had just been left there. I wondered if I was going to get jumped. Quite a lonely place, you know? After dark, as well. Anyway, there’s this fridge. Wheels on it. Sealed, fibreglass. Kind of thing you see in big storage units, with a keypad on. But there’s no keypad, just a big padlock. He was lucky it never got tanned. Looked new, you know?’
‘And then what?’
‘It took a bit of time to pull it onto the ramp and I nearly put my back out, but I’m used to that kind of work. Got one of these motorised numbers in the van – it took the weight, and I got it in. Then over to Hazell Court. I had to go there for eleven p.m. It was specific. Had to be that time. I was just after the deadline.’
Slater sat back in his seat, hands behind his head. ‘No one challenged you?’
‘There was security. I was expecting it. But the guy on the line told me to get the thing up to the second floor and leave it there. There was an opening in the fence. I took the fridge through.’
‘How did you get it up the stairs?’
‘I took the lift.’
‘You couldn’t have,’ Slater said. ‘The lifts were out of order. Power was cut weeks before.’
‘Ah, see, that’s what I was told as well. But there’s another lift shaft, left of the ground floor. Taped off, but there’s still juice going through it. Or there was that night.’
Lomond made a note. ‘Go on.’
‘So I got it to the second floor, dumped it near the door. Swear to Christ, I don’t scare easy, right? Lonely places, I’m drawn to them, like I told you before. Wanderer, me. I follow the ley lines. I take the overgrown path. I go where the trees are thick. But I didn’t like that place. Bad vibes all round, man. Smelled a bit – like there were rats. I know that smell. Old warehouses. People had been there too. All sorts of mess and wreckage. I didn’t hang about.’
‘And then what?’
‘Couple of days after that, the rest of the cash arrives. Job done. I forgot about it.’
‘Do you have any receipts?’ Lomond asked.
‘Nah. Just what’s on the chit.’
‘The what?’ Slater barked.
‘Chit,’ Laybourn said. ‘The docket. The document. The one I make out. My own records, my own files. I’m not that disorganised. I take notes of my jobs. I’m diligent, me.’ He coughed. ‘I could murder a cup of tea, boys. This isn’t going to be much longer, is it?’
Lomond shook his head. ‘No, you can go soon.’
‘I’m not lifted or anything, am I?’
‘Just taking a statement, Dan,’ Lomond said soberly.
‘So I won’t need a lawyer? I’m glad about that. Don’t have good vibes about lawyers. I mean, just be straight with people, that’s the deal, isn’t it?’
‘You’re probably right,’ Lomond said. He tapped his notepad with a pen. ‘Mind if I ask you one more thing?’
‘Ask me anything, brother. This is brilliant, in fact. Most I’ve nattered in ages!’
‘What sort of service did you have in the army?’
Laybourn’s smile never faltered, but his eyes did, for a second or two. Then he said, ‘That’s classified, I’m afraid.’
27
Lomond liked Lorna McGill. She reminded him of someone, but he wasn’t sure who. Maybe from his schooldays. The common cruelty had it that she could defeat Popeye at arm-wrestling, but her smile transformed her face, and transformed yours in turn. She had kind brown eyes. Lomond knew that this was bias, a weakness, something that would leave him vulnerable at some point. He had to remind himself at times that he wasn’t there to make pals. But he knew too that McGill got people to open up. He also knew that Slater felt the same way about her as he did.
Lomond collared her without ceremony in the canteen over coffee. ‘How’d you get on today?’
‘How d’you mean, sir?’
‘With Slater. How was he, out on the road?’
‘Fine.’ She took a sip of coffee. Her nails were the kind of purple that worked best with velvet. ‘Well, maybe not his usual self. But his usual self can be kind of unbearable. I mean that in a nice way.’
Lomond smiled. ‘I know what you mean.’
‘He was a bit distracted. Messing with his phone.’
‘He didn’t mention anything to you about that?’
‘Not exactly. I did sort of ask, said he looked tired.’
‘And?’
‘He just said he had a lot on at home.’
‘Right,’ Lomond said. ‘Sure it’ll sort itself out.’
‘What’s your thinking, sir?’
‘About?’
‘The case. The deaths.’
‘William Ross was a first shot, I think. Maybe a practice. Looks like Ross was living rough – toxicology results will be interesting. Hard to build a picture. Looks as if he dropped off the radar just about everywhere. No friends. No family.’ Lomond shivered a little, trying to imagine the alienation, the hopelessness. ‘Where it gets interesting is, our man then pulls the same thing with Kathryn Symes. I get the impression that was well planned. But, don’t worry, he’ll have made a mistake.’
‘Laybourn?’
