Burnett thought for a second. ‘It’s long gone.’
‘Then you’re going to get it back.’
‘What do you need it for?’
‘I don’t — but she does. And you’re going to tell her you’re sorry.’
‘Am I fuck.’
Slowly Cafferty rose to his full height. He placed his right foot on Burnett’s left cheek and began to press down. ‘Shattered jawbone takes a while to heal. Milkshakes through a straw if you’re lucky.’ Burnett’s lips were mashed together so that Cafferty couldn’t make out what he was saying. Benny, holdall in hand, had taken a couple of steps forward, just in case he was needed. ‘I like you, Cole,’ Cafferty continued. ‘I like what I’ve heard about you. I think maybe we can come to an arrangement.’ He paused. ‘You know how things work in Dundee? Cuckooing, they call it. Find an easy target, set up a lab in their house, make the stuff quick and cheap and get it out on the street. Your hood’d be good for that — and I reckon you’ll know more than a few suitable locations. Give the phone back and I’ll bring you into the game. You’ll be a player rather than the ballboy. How does that sound?’
He didn’t ease his foot off, not straight away. But eventually he did. Burnett’s nose was running with a mixture of mucus and blood, his underfed chest going in and out, breath coming in broken rasps. Cafferty gestured to Benny, who grabbed the chair and righted it, none too gently. Burnett glared at his abductor, then at Cafferty.
‘Give me the other options.’
‘They’re right there in my associate’s bag.’ Cafferty nodded to let Benny know the holdall could now be opened and its contents made known to Cole Burnett.
Not much more than an hour later, Burnett was in his mate Les’s aunt’s place, swigging cheap alcohol, using it to wash down a few more pills. Nice buzz going, almost enough to distract him from memories of the garage. Les lived with his aunt. Burnett had wondered if he was even shagging her. They were related and everything and she had to be twenty years older than him, but she was still tidy. Les had always denied it, though, and whenever Burnett had tried giving her the chat, she’d told him to behave himself. She was out somewhere tonight and the usual crew were in her living room. The pizzas had been delivered. They had plenty of everything — except answers to the questions they were firing at Burnett.
‘Cafferty, though, man, what was he like?’
‘He give you that damage?’
‘Did you let him?’
Burnett hadn’t bothered wiping away the blood. He wore it to show them all who he was, what he’d survived.
‘He’s an old man,’ he advised them through swollen lips. ‘His time’s well past.’
‘What did he want, though?’
‘He coming for us?’
‘Better bring an army with him, eh?’
The can Burnett gripped in his right hand held super-strength lager. It had been out of the fridge too long and was beginning to get warmer than he liked, so he drained it. The voices around him took on the quality of chirruping insects. But there was another voice inside his head, and it was telling him to play along for now. Fetch the phone from the stash under his mum’s bed. Somehow get it back to its owner. Show willing. Be nice. He even had a few cuckooing houses in mind — he was sitting in one right now. Play along. Show willing. Be nice.
For now.
For now.
But not forever...
22
Ron Travis had kept the café open for them. Rebus had thanked him and asked him to sit in. The two of them carried trays over to the table, where Joyce McKechnie and Edward Taylor waited. Drinks and slices of cake were doled out before Rebus took his seat.
‘I’ve been through everything in Keith’s garage,’ he said, ‘and done a bit of reading on the internet, so I know now that Keith thought Camp 1033 stood for all such camps, and that they showed us ourselves, good and bad. The good is that the community welcomed people like Stefan, Joe and Frank, helped them make their homes here. But on the other hand...’
‘The poisoning?’ McKechnie asked.
‘I was thinking more of the shooting.’
‘Ah yes,’ Taylor said, ‘poor Sergeant Davies. He’d been seeing one of the local women.’
‘Helen Carter’s sister.’
‘Indeed.’ Taylor turned to McKechnie. ‘What was her name?’
‘Chrissy. Moved south around 1950.’
‘Still alive?’
‘You’d have to ask Helen.’
‘A detainee had certain feelings for Chrissy,’ Taylor continued. ‘Jealous of Sergeant Davies, he grabbed the man’s own gun and shot him in the head. Went to the firing squad for it.’ He studied Rebus. ‘Nothing in Keith’s notes?’ Rebus shook his head. ‘Well, you’re right — it was certainly a story that intrigued him.’
‘No connection to the gun behind the bar at The Glen?’ Rebus asked.
‘That was found much later by Joe Collins — washed up on a beach, wasn’t it?’ Taylor looked to McKechnie, who nodded her agreement.
‘Either of you remember the name of the man who went to the firing squad?’
‘Hoffman? Something like that,’ Taylor offered.
Rebus realised that he knew the name. ‘I saw a Hoffman mentioned on one of Keith’s lists — he was quite senior in the camp, wasn’t he? Deputed to make sure things ran smoothly?’
Taylor was nodding. ‘Germans kept the camp regulated. Separate quarters for officers and lesser ranks.’
Rebus noticed that Joyce McKechnie was playing with her watch strap, hinting that she had somewhere else to be.
‘Just a couple more things,’ he said. ‘I saw the calculations Keith had done. I know you wanted to turn the camp into something tourists would benefit from...’
‘Keith approached the Scottish government, Historic Scotland...’
‘And kept getting knocked back.’
‘It was pretty dispiriting,’ Taylor agreed.
‘And you couldn’t do it by yourselves without a lot of work and private funding. The land the camp is on is owned by Lord Strathy?’
‘The Strathy Land Trust, to be precise,’ McKechnie said, ‘but ultimately, yes, it belongs to the Meiklejohns.’
‘And did Keith have any direct dealings with the family?’
‘He tried, at least once. Never any answer to his calls and letters, so he drove over there. Don’t you remember him telling us, Edward? He interrupted some gathering or other — marquee on the lawn and all that. Reading between the lines, he made a bit of a scene. There were photos from the party in one of the glossies. I showed them to Keith and that’s when he told me they’d manhandled him off the property.’
‘Manhandled? Not by the gardener, by any chance?’
‘I’ve no idea.’
‘You don’t still have that magazine, do you?’
‘In a pile somewhere.’
‘I’d be grateful if you could...’
‘Effect some archaeology?’ McKechnie nodded and smiled.
‘You know about the golf resort?’ Taylor asked Rebus.
‘A little.’
‘Meiklejohn was never going to sell. If he has his way, everything will be flattened, landscaped or built on.’
‘Which would entail doing the same to the steading currently occupied by Jess Hawkins and his friends?’
‘Ah, how much do you know about that?’
‘I know one of his lordship’s previous wives currently lives there, which gives him yet another reason to hate the place.’
‘Hawkins does seem to be somewhat of a marriage wrecker—’
‘I did think,’ Travis interrupted, leaning his elbows on the table, ‘that the nights Keith slept at the camp, maybe there was an element of reconnaissance.’