Dead And Buried

Twenty-eight

‘Mr Charnwood,’ Bandit Mackenzie asked, ‘how long had you worked for Gareth Starr?’

The wiry clerk looked at him across the café table. ‘Seven years,’ he said. ‘Seven years and six months.’

‘Were you friendly, or was it just a boss-employer relationship?’

‘We didn’t visit each other’s houses, if that’s what you mean, but we’d have a pint together after work now and again.’

‘Did anyone else ever join you? Did he have any other associates that you were aware of?’

‘No; as far as I know, after his wife left him his circle took in me, Big Ming, and occasionally Oliver Poole, the lawyer. In the pub, it was often just the two of us.’

‘So you got on.’

‘Sure. Gary valued me, and he let me know it. I’m good at what I do, better than most.’

‘What was your job?’

‘I took the bets, and I kept an eye on how things were going on each race, looking out for fluctuations.’

‘What do you mean?’

‘Heavy betting on a particular horse or dog: outsiders usually. In the business you get a lot of rumours, alleged whispers out of stables and the like, about specific runners. Tips that they’ve been run down the park in their last couple of races. .’

‘What do you mean by that?’

‘The jockey doesn’t try too hard. As a result, the horse doesn’t get a lot of weight lumped on it by the handicapper; when they reckon it’s peaked in training and it’s nicely off on the weights, they turn it loose.’

‘That’s illegal, isn’t it?’

‘It’s well against the rules, that’s for sure,’ Eddie Charnwood conceded.

‘Does it happen a lot?’

‘I doubt whether it actually does, but the whispers are enough. When they start in your shop and you see money being piled on an outsider, you can’t afford to ignore it, especially if you’re a small operator like Gary. It’s not just punters that get taken to the cleaners.’

‘If you see it happening, is there anything you can do about it?’

‘Sure. We can lay it off: spread the action out to bigger bookies to limit our risk.’

‘I see.’ Mackenzie smiled awkwardly. ‘I’m an innocent when it comes to gambling, I’m afraid. My grandfather, on my mother’s side, was a big punter, bigger than he could afford, and not very good at it. It caused a lot of problems: my mum never forgot it, and she made bloody sure I didn’t inherit the habit.’

‘Good for her.’

‘How are you for coffee?’ the detective asked. ‘Want another?’

Charnwood glanced at his mug. ‘No, I’m fine, thanks.’ He had suggested the meeting place, just off Bonnington Road, as it was close to his home at Powderhall and to the late Gary Starr’s shop.

‘Have you had any whispers recently, any runs on outsiders?’

‘No. There’s been a lot of publicity about race-fixing in the last couple of years and a lot of people have been done, so the rumour mill’s been quiet lately.’

‘Any big losers?’

‘Not as far as I know. Where we are we tend not to get big bets. To tell you the truth we don’t encourage them either. We’re a local bookie’s, Mr Mackenzie: our customers are people of modest means.’

‘So you have plenty of them?’

‘Enough.’

‘You must have. Gary Starr made a good living, enough for a nice house up in Trinity.’

‘I suppose. Gary did the totals at the end of the day: I can’t tell you for sure how much he was clearing.’

‘What happens now?’

‘What?’ The detective’s question seemed to take Charnwood by surprise.

‘Well, you’re out of a job as far as I can see. There’s nobody to carry on the shop, unless you and Smith can take it over yourselves.’

Charnwood laughed softly. ‘Big Ming may be a closet philosopher, but there’s no way I’d go into business with him. I won’t deny that since Saturday the thought’s gone through my mind of getting in touch with Mr Poole and asking him if he’d consider renting the shop to me for six months, to see how I managed on my own, but I don’t think I’m going to do that.’

‘Why not?’

‘It’d be a gamble, that’s why not. I’m like you, Mr Mackenzie: I see the other side of betting. Sure there are the bright eyes of the winners, but there are far more of the others, the ones with hurt and disappointment written all over their faces. That’s why I don’t bet myself, not any more at any rate. If I took on the shop, it would be the biggest punt I ever had, and if I was laying odds, they’d have to be against my succeeding. Five years ago, I might have thought differently, but today. . there’s competition that we never had before, with Internet bookies and now super-casinos on the horizon. Gary managed to hold on because the shop’s well sited, and because around here there are still people who like to come out for the afternoon and put their bets on over the counter. But they’re dying out. I don’t think he could have held on here for ever, and I don’t think I’d last either. I could be wrong, but I have a wife and a wee boy, and I can’t put them at risk by trying it. So I’ll get a job somewhere else, with one of the bigger bookies, probably.’

‘Are you fairly sure of that?’

‘Yes. I made a few phone calls this morning: I’ve got an interview already. Gary was known about town, and so am I.’

‘Good luck to you, then.’ Mackenzie stood. ‘Come on, let’s walk round to the shop and you can open that safe for me.’

Charnwood nodded. The two left the café and turned into Bonnington Road, then round the gentle curve until the Evesham Street junction came into sight. ‘I know that Starr’s marriage was behind him,’ said the detective, as they walked, ‘but did he have a girlfriend? There were no signs of a female presence in the house.’

‘Nor would there be; there was a girlfriend, somebody he met in the shop, but he kept her at arm’s length. Her name’s Mina Clarkson and she lives in Saughtonhall. Gary was pretty bitter about marriage. Truth be told, Gary was pretty bitter about most things. He wasn’t the sort to take much pleasure out of life.’

‘From what my colleagues tell me he took pleasure out of whacking that boy’s finger off last Friday.’

‘Yes, that was well out of character; he could be abrupt, but never aggressive. I can only think that he panicked.’

‘Panicked? He hacked him with a fucking bayonet!’

‘He must have felt really threatened, in that case.’

‘He saw the threat off, then. Did you know that he had the bayonet?’

‘Yes, but I thought nothing of it. That and the toy gun, they were just for show.’

Mackenzie stopped dead. ‘What toy gun?’

‘He had a replica Luger: looked real, but it was plastic. He used to keep it and the bayonet under the counter.’

‘You’re not kidding me, are you?’

Charnwood looked astonished. ‘Why would I do that? What’s the fuss about anyway?’

‘Starr told my colleagues, at the shop and in his interview, that the robber had brought the gun into the shop and threatened him with it. Eddie, I’m going to need a formal statement from you after all.’

‘No problem: I’m doing nothing else today.’

They walked on until they reached the shop. Padlocked steel shutters covered the windows and door, but Charnwood produced a bunch of keys from his pocket, and within a minute they were standing inside. It was gloomy, but the clerk found a switch, flooding the room with white neon light. ‘The safe’s in the back office,’ he said.

It faced them as they opened the door, built into the wall: there was no lock, only a dial mechanism. Charnwood moved round behind Starr’s desk and spun the wheel four times. After the fourth, it opened with a click and he eased it open.

‘Jesus Christ,’ he gasped.

The detective stepped alongside him, and took an involuntary breath himself. The strongbox was packed with money, wads of used notes held together with broad elastic bands, and with packs of white powder, wrapped in plastic. He took a pair of clear plastic gloves from his pocket, slipped them on and eased one of the packages out.

‘What is it?’ Charnwood asked.

‘It’s not fucking talcum,’ said Mackenzie, ‘that’s for sure. Eddie, I’m afraid we’re going to need to have a much longer talk than I’d reckoned with you and with Big Ming. You say that Starr didn’t have any associates other than you two and Poole. In that case, who put this lot there?’