‘I know that name,’ Martin murmured.
‘You should. For a start, it’s over a big car showroom down in Seafield Road, specialising in high-value vehicles. But that’s his public face; he also owns a chain of bookie’s shops under the name John Jackson, and a couple of taxi firms, Carole’s Cabs, and Sherlock Private Hire. The first one’s called after his wife, the second he bought from Perry Holmes, the guy that Bella Watson’s brother Billy tried to kill.’
‘You seem to know a lot about him.’
‘Oh, I do.’ I felt my mouth tighten as I thought of Jackie Charles. He had been a neighbour of mine at one time, out in Gullane, before he went upmarket and bought a big pile in Ravelston Dykes. Myra and Carole were part of the same crowd of young women in a group called the Housewives’ Register… God knows who came up with that name… so we often went to the same parties. I’d found them a bit awkward, though, and eventually I stopped going; I’d stay home and babysit while Myra went without me. My hesitancy came from what, by that time, I’d learned about Jackie’s other activities. He was what might be called a business angel, in that he put up the capital, and lent organisational skills to entrepreneurial ventures. The problem was that these ventures were armed robberies, not just in the Edinburgh area but all over Britain, but Jackie was too smart ever to be linked to any of them.
I didn’t tell any of this to my young colleague though, not then, because it would have taken him into areas of my life that I wasn’t ready to share with him. ‘Dougie Terry works for Jackie,’ I said. ‘He looks after the below-the-parapet businesses, but he does other stuff as well, disciplinary matters, let’s say.’
‘Charles is bent?’
‘Charles is one of the two big players these days in organised crime in Edinburgh, the other being Tony Manson.’
Martin frowned. ‘Are you saying that he might have had Marlon killed?’
‘That’s what’s perplexing me,’ I confessed. ‘There’s a loose business relationship between Jackie and Tony. Charles stays out of the pubs, drugs and prostitution and Manson doesn’t step on his toes.’ As I spoke I pulled up outside a house in Clermiston Road. Once it had been council property, but now in the aftermath of the Right to Buy, it had been augmented with every build-on imaginable, save for a machine-gun turret. I parked behind a Ford Mondeo and across the driveway, blocking the exit of a Mercedes S class saloon, with a personalised registration plate.
I walked up to the door and gave it the policeman’s knock. Martin started to count, but I told him not to bother. ‘There’ll be nothing to hide in here.’ And then I smiled. ‘By the way, there’s something I forgot…’
Before I could finish, the door was opened by a slim woman in her late thirties with a soft perm and hard eyes. ‘Morning, Jane,’ I said. ‘We’d like a word with Douglas.’
‘I’m sure you would. Come in then.’ She didn’t argue about it; she’d got past that stage years before. ‘Douglas,’ she shouted, at the foot of the stairs. ‘Police.’
She opened the door to a well-furnished sitting room. ‘I’ll be off out,’ she declared. That was par for the course. On the three or four occasions that I’d rousted Dougie at home he’d always made her leave, so that under no circumstances could she be called to witness anything that might be said: super-cautious.
We waited for five minutes, before Terry appeared. He was around forty, stocky with heavy chiselled features and a chin that was in want of a shave. ‘Mr Skinner,’ he greeted me.
I nodded an acknowledgement. ‘This is DC Martin.’
Terry turned to him and offered his hand. As they shook, he said, ‘Good morning, son. Do you know what kippers are? Fish that need a lot of sleep. Did you like my wife? I first met her in the tunnel of love. She was digging it at the time.’
‘Dougie!’ I shouted. ‘Enough! What I was telling you on the doorstep, Andy; we call this guy the Comedian. Whenever our colleagues have him in for a chat, they ask him a question and he tells them a joke. That’s how it goes until they get pissed off and chuck him out. Chic Murray’s his favourite.’
‘Not always,’ said Terry, looking at me. ‘Did you hear the one about the couple in the old folks’ home?’
‘Dougie,’ I told him, seriously. ‘I am not your local CID; I’ve got no sense of humour. You try that routine with me, and I will knock your fucking head off. Then you’ll wish you’d had breakfast before we arrived.’
‘No fun you, big man,’ he grunted. ‘Sit down then.’ He sat, we followed suit. ‘What can I do for you?’
‘You can convince me that Jackie Charles didn’t have Tony Manson’s driver killed.’
I studied his face. His eyes widened, and his mouth opened for a second in a gasp. He didn’t put that on. ‘Now it’s you that’s fucking joking,’ he muttered.
‘You know me better than that.’
‘When?’
‘Very early Wednesday morning, in Infirmary Street Baths.’
‘That dead bloke was Tony’s guy?’ he exclaimed. ‘Are you fucking serious?’
He was scared, and that interested me.
‘That’s who it was. Whoever did it was very determined.’ Slowly and deliberately, I described how Marlon had died.
‘Jesus Christ,’ he said, when I was finished. ‘Are you sure it wasn’t Tony himself?’
‘I can’t be a hundred per cent certain that it wasn’t, but Tony’s rogering the boy’s mother. Plus, he’s sent big Lennie Plenderleith to bodyguard her until he gets back. So, Dougie, go on, tell me. Is Jackie upset with Manson over something?’
‘No,’ he insisted. ‘No way. Jackie’s fine wi’ Tony.’
He was rattled all right. If I had turned up on his doorstep asking that question, then it could only be a matter of time before Manson came to ask it as well, and his interrogation techniques weren’t subject to the same limitations as mine.
‘Then prove it to me,’ I challenged. ‘Get out there and ask questions. Two guys in a Transit van; we don’t know the colour and we don’t have the number, but that’s what they drove. Who are they and who were they working for? You’ll find me at Fettes; Serious Crimes office. Make it soon.’
We left him in his armchair, pondering the gloom that was darkening a sunny day outside.
‘Will we get anything from him?’ Martin asked.
‘We’ve got something already. From Terry’s reaction in there I know for sure that Jackie Charles isn’t involved. That’s a start. He might come up with something on the van. To be realistic, he’s got more chance than we have. There isn’t a door in Edinburgh that’s closed to him. He’s tight with Charles and he’s on fairly good terms with Manson. That gives him a lot of clout.’
I unlocked the Land Rover. The Mondeo had gone, probably in the direction of Jenners: Jane Terry was a designer dresser. ‘On to the next,’ I said.
‘Where’s that?’
‘Slateford.’
‘What’s in Slateford?’
‘The new generation.’
I drove across town, with the volume on the CD player turned up so that I didn’t have to talk. I was too busy thinking about Marlon, and what he’d known, or done, for him to die that way, thinking about Alison, and thinking about our next port of call. Eventually I pulled up outside a pub in Slateford Road. It was called Caballero’s, a fanciful name if ever I’d heard one, and it occupied much of the ground floor of a tenement building with three storeys of flats above.
‘Ever been here?’ I asked Martin.
He nodded. ‘About a month ago, with the rugby team, after a game at Myreside.’
‘You didn’t cause any trouble, I hope.’
‘None, boss. Most of the tales are exaggerated.’ He laughed. ‘Most of them.’
I led the way inside, and looked around. The place had been refitted since my last visit. The old island bar had gone, and had been replaced by one that ran most of the length of the back wall. There were booths on either side, but the floor was clear apart from two raised platforms, about four feet high, each with a pole in the centre running all the way up to the ceiling. There were no dancers in place though, too early for that, only a couple of barmen, one per customer.