Lennox

CHAPTER TWENTY-ONE

By the time I got to the Horsehead Bar it was already an hour after closing time. Which meant this was the time that the Horsehead did its best business. Discreetly. I gave the knock I’d learned and Big Bob let me in. A ‘lock-in’ was a quaint British custom that made use of a loophole in the licensing laws which allowed the licensee to lock the doors and privately ‘entertain’ bona-fide friends without charging. In other words, that’s when the coppers called for their free drinks and turned a blind eye to the left-open cash till and the other ‘bona-fide friends’.

My fucked-up evening stayed true to form. I was greeted by a six-foot-six scowl from the bar.

‘Good evening, Superintendent McNab,’ I said as un-wearily as I could manage. I thought of asking McNab if I could buy him a drink, but he looked happy with his half of pale ale and his scowl. Also, I wasn’t mad on the company he was keeping: there was a capless and chinless army major and a sergeant at the bar with him. The sergeant’s cap sat on the bar and it was my least favourite colour: red.

Towards the end of what had been, admittedly, a rather colourful military career I had spent quite some time in the company of the Military Police. In many ways it had been the same kind of experience that I’d had since with the civilian police: sitting in a thick-walled room with a couple of guys who want to kick the shite out of you. The difference with the redcaps was they couldn’t, because I had been an officer.

It was as if McNab had been reading my mind. ‘Lennox here used to be an officer, you know. Captain, wasn’t it?’

I nodded.

‘Aye…’ McNab eyed me up and down. ‘He used to be a gentleman and an officer. Now he’s just a gobshite.’

The little redcap sergeant grinned. I smiled too. What I wanted to do was punch McNab in his big stupid copper moon face. But I smiled. ‘If you don’t mind, Superintendent, I won’t call on you for a character reference.’

‘And he’s a smart-arse. You know what you are, Lennox? You’re a sewer rat. You scuttle around in this city’s shite. But the fact is you get to hear things. Things I don’t.’

‘Is there a point to this, NcNab? To be honest I don’t care to be insulted by the likes of you.’ I turned square on to him. I started to weigh up the beating in the cells I would get if I busted McNab’s jaw and it was becoming an increasingly acceptable bargain. I looked at the little redcap sergeant, then at the major and successfully made the point that if I went for it, I’d make it worth my while and go for a job lot. The sergeant stopped smiling and the chinless wonder with the pips looked like he was wishing he was back in Chelsea. McNab took a step forward.

‘Fancy your chances, Lennox?’

‘Let it go, Lennox…’ Big Bob had moved up to our end of the bar. ‘He’s not worth hanging for.’

I don’t know if it had been the sudden suggestion that he might not survive the encounter, but McNab looked a little less sure of himself. Just a flicker of uncertainty behind the tight expression.

‘I’ll ask you again, McNab. Do you have a point?’

‘Steady on, old chap…’ The MP major, looking even less sure of himself, eased between me and McNab. He had one of those plummy accents that I thought were only made up for comedy effect by the likes of Basil Radford and Naunton Wayne. ‘The Superintendent suggested we come here on the off-chance we could have a word. If you’re… connected, so to speak, it might be that you have heard something on the grapevine.’

‘About what?’ I kept my gaze fixed on McNab.

‘There was a clothing warehouse broken into last night,’ said McNab. ‘Not much taken and it wouldn’t normally be a major inquiry, but it’s what has been taken that’s important. The warehouse was used by a company that supplies uniforms. Army, air force and police.’

‘So what was taken?’

‘They were very selective. They picked up separate items that would account for five police uniforms and three army uniforms.’

‘And you think someone’s planning an IPO job?’

McNab broke his gaze and sipped his pale ale. ‘That’s what it looks like. They were just uniforms, mind. No badges or insignia on either the police or the army stuff.’

‘I’ve not heard anything,’ I said and McNab gave me a look. ‘That’s the truth, McNab. But I have to say that I don’t think it would be any of the Three Kings. Impersonating police officers gets headlines. Attracts attention and stirs up you boys more than the usual brown envelopes can calm down.’

McNab looked as if he was going to take a poke at me. I grinned: I’d said it to yank on his chain.

‘Anyway,’ I continued, ‘it’s not something I think they’d get into. Do a robbery in a police uniform and that’s another ten on your stretch if you’re caught.’

‘I want you to ask around,’ said McNab.

‘And why should I do that, Superintendent?’

‘Because it could make your life easier.’

‘And it could make it a lot more difficult if word got out that I was a grass. But maybe I will. I have an idea the Three Kings won’t like someone pulling this kind of stunt on their territory.’

There wasn’t anything else to say and I moved round to my usual end of the bar without taking my leave. McNab and the two redcaps drained their glasses and left. After Big Bob unbolted the door to let them out he came over to me.

‘Listen, Lennox, you’re a good customer. And a friend. But if you ever square up to a fucking copper in here again I’ll bar you for life.’

‘Point taken, Bob. That fucker McNab knows how to push my buttons. I don’t think we’ll see him in here again. You hear what he was on about?’

‘Aye. You’re right. The Three Kings wouldn’t get involved in an IPO job. This is an outside firm. Or just a bunch of youngsters acting the cunt.’

‘I don’t think so. Sounds like they had a shopping list.’ I drained my whisky and Big Bob refilled my glass without being asked.

‘On the house,’ he said. ‘You look like you need it.’

‘It’s been a long, long day.’

‘There was someone in looking for you earlier. About eight. Didn’t leave a name.’

‘What did he look like?’

‘Fuck… I don’t know…’ Big Bob rubbed his chin thoughtfully then an expression of enlightenment lit up his face. ‘He was a big ugly cunt. Really big and really ugly. Oh aye… there was something else: a big fucking razor scar. Right cheek. Like he’d been chibbed in the past.’

‘A big ugly cunt with a razor scar…’ I repeated. I thought of half of the hard men I did business with, their mothers, even some of the women I’d been with since I’d arrived here. ‘This is Glasgow, Bob,’ I said. ‘You’re going to have to be more specific.’

Big Bob laughed. ‘You wouldn’t miss him. Really, really big fucker. Bigger than me.’

‘Any message?’

‘Just that he wanted to talk to you. Business.’

I thought for a moment. ‘You said he had a scar. Not recent? He didn’t by any chance have a dressing on his cheek?’

‘Naw. This was old. Hard-looking bastard though. Oh aye, there was one thing… he was wearing a pinstripe suit. Like a businessman.’

‘Don’t they all,’ I said and sipped my whisky. Because it wasn’t the guy I’d chased all over town it didn’t mean it wasn’t one of Lillian’s associates. I had a funny feeling I’d be hearing from them soon. They hadn’t scared me off and I smelt a deal in the air.

He was waiting for me outside: the monster in a pinstripe suit. I had thought Bob’s description rather vague but on seeing him I realized that nothing could fit better than ‘a big ugly cunt with a razor scar’. He was leaning against a car, presumably his, and it wasn’t the 16HP.

I closed my hand around the sap in my pocket. I don’t frighten easily and I had been prepared to smack McNab and take the consequences, but this fucker was a whole new ball of wax. He was at least six-seven and comparisons with brick shithouses were totally inadequate: I reckoned he could have killed me just by falling on me. But it wasn’t just his build that bothered me. He had the look of a life-taker. A killer. I was glad I had my sap but wished I had had something more substantial, like my tyre iron, or my gun. Or a tank. Mind you, I reckoned that the last time he’d been in a fight he’d been probably been poleaxed by a little Jewish boy with a slingshot. He stood up from leaning on his car when he saw me and I was surprised to see he hadn’t dented the wing.

‘Mr Lennox?’ he asked in a baritone that must have rattled windows in Paisley. At least he was a polite killer.

‘Who wants to know?’ I asked, trying to work out how tall six cubits was. And a span.

‘Mr Sneddon sent me. Me and Twinkletoes is supposed to look after you. I tried to find you earlier but you wasn’t at home.’ He walked over to me and just kept getting bigger. He was an ugly son-of-a-bitch all right. It looked like he’d beaten up half the population of Glasgow using his face as a blunt instrument. He also had the scar that Bob had talked about: a long and deep crease in his cheek. I was impressed with the reach of the ambitious, and probably now deceased, Glaswegian that had put it there.

‘Please tell me you didn’t call at my digs?’ I imagined Mrs White opening the door and wondering why it hadn’t let the light in.

‘Naw… naw… I seen your car wasn’t there. Mr Sneddon told me to be discreet. I’m to let you know that we was watching your back and that if you need any help you’s just to shout like.’

I suppressed a smirk at the idea of discretion coming in a six-foot-seven, twenty-three-stone package. ‘I could have done with you today. You know anyone who drives an Austin 16HP?’

Goliath shrugged. This was impressive, given the size of his shoulders.

‘It’s just that I had a run in with someone in a 16HP. He’d been following me all day and I just assumed it was one of you guys.’

‘Naw.’

‘If you’re going to be watching my back, could you keep an eye out for it? Dark blue or black Austin 16HP.’

‘Nae problem, Mr Lennox.’

‘I’m going home now. I’ll be fine tonight.’

‘Okey dokey,’ Goliath said pleasantly in his Richter-scale baritone. ‘But I’ll follow you home. Just to make sure like.’

‘I take it you’re Semple,’ I said as I unlocked my car. ‘Mr Sneddon told me about you. What’s your first name, by the way?’

‘Everybody calls me Tiny,’ he said without a hint of irony. ‘Tiny Semple.’