Banquo smiled. ‘Come on, Macbeth. What happened out there on the country road?’
‘Did they say anything about how long they would have to close the bridge for repairs?’
‘You might be able to lie to them, but not to me.’
‘We got them, Banquo. Do you need to know any more?’
‘Do I?’ Banquo waved away the stench from the stairs down to the toilets, where a woman of indeterminate age was standing bent over with her hair hanging down in front of her face as she clung to the handrail.
‘No.’
‘All right,’ Banquo said.
Macbeth stopped and crouched down by a young boy sitting by the wall with a begging cup in front of him. The boy raised his head. He had a black patch over one eye and the other stared out from a doped-up state, a dream. Macbeth put a banknote in his cup and a hand on his shoulder. ‘How’s it going?’ he asked softly.
‘Macbeth,’ the boy said. ‘As you can see.’
‘You can do it,’ Macbeth said. ‘Always remember that. You can stop.’
The boy’s voice slurred and slid from vowel to vowel. ‘And how do you know that?’
‘Believe me, it’s been done before.’ Macbeth stood up, and the boy called a tremulous ‘God bless you, Macbeth’ after them.
They went into the concourse in the eastern part of the station, where there was a conspicuous silence, like in a church. The druggies who weren’t sitting, lying or standing by the walls or on the benches were staggering around in a kind of slow dance, like astronauts in an alien atmosphere, a different gravitational field. Some stared suspiciously at the two police officers, but most just ignored them. As though they had X-ray eyes that had long-ago established that these two had nothing to sell. Most were so emaciated and ravaged it was hard to know exactly how long they had been alive. Or how long they had left.
‘You’re never tempted to start again?’ Banquo asked.
‘No.’
‘Most ex-junkies dream of a last shot.’
‘Not me. Let’s get out of here.’
They walked to the steps in front of the west exit, stopped before they came to where the roof no longer sheltered them from the rain. Beside them, on black rails on a low plinth, stood what appeared in the darkness to be a prehistoric monster. Bertha, a hundred and ten years old, the first locomotive in the country, the very symbol of the optimism about the future that had once held sway. The broad, majestic, gently graded steps led down to the dark, deserted Workers’ Square, where once there had been hustle and bustle, market stalls and travellers hurrying to and fro, but which was now ghostly, a square where the wind whistled and whined. At one end lights glittered in a venerable brick building which had at one time housed the offices of the National Railway Network but had fallen into disuse after the railway was abandoned, until it had been bought and renovated to become the most glamorous and elegant building the town had to offer: Inverness Casino. Banquo had been inside only once and immediately knew it was not his kind of place. Or, to be more precise, he wasn’t their kind of customer. He was probably the Obelisk type, where customers were not so well dressed, the drinks were not so expensive and the prostitutes not so beautiful nor so discreet.
‘Goodnight, Banquo.’
‘Goodnight, Macbeth. Sleep well.’
Banquo saw a light shiver go through his friend’s body, then Macbeth’s white teeth shone in the darkness. ‘Say hello to Fleance from me and tell him his father has done a great job tonight. What I wouldn’t have given to see Kenneth in free fall from his own bridge...’
Banquo heard his friend’s low chuckle as he disappeared into the darkness and rain on Workers’ Square, but when his own laughter had faded too an unease spread through him. Macbeth wasn’t only a friend and a colleague, he was like a son, a Moses in a basket whom Banquo loved almost as much as Fleance. So that was why Banquo waited until he saw Macbeth reappear on the other side of the square and walk into the light by the entrance to the casino, from which a tall woman with flowing flame-red hair in a long red dress emerged and hugged him, as though a phantom had warned her that her beloved was on his way.
Lady.
Perhaps she had caught wind of this evening’s events. A woman like Lady wouldn’t have got to where she was without informants who told her what she needed to know about everything that moved beneath the surface of this town.
They still had their arms around each other. She was a beautiful woman and might well have been even more beautiful once. No one seemed to know Lady’s age, but it was definitely a good deal more than Macbeth’s thirty-three years. But maybe it was true what they said: true love conquers all.
Or maybe not.
The older policeman turned and set off north.
In Fife the chief commissioner’s chauffeur turned off onto the gravel lane as instructed. The gravel crunched under the car tyres.
‘You can stop here. I’ll walk the rest of the way,’ Duff said.
The chauffeur braked. In the ensuing silence they could hear the grasshoppers and the sough of the deciduous trees.
‘You don’t want to wake them,’ Duncan said, looking down the lane, where a small white farmhouse lay bathed in moonlight. ‘And I agree. Let our dear ones sleep in ignorance and safe assurance. A lovely little place you’ve got here.’
‘Thank you. And sorry about the detour.’
‘We all have to take detours in life, Duff. The next time you get a tip-off, as with the Norse Riders, you make a detour towards me. OK?’
‘OK.’
Duncan’s index finger moved to and fro across his chin. ‘Our aim is to make this town a better place for everyone, Duff. But that means all the positive powers have to work together and think of the community’s best interests, not only their own.’
‘Of course. And I’d just like to say I’m willing to do any job so long as it serves the force and the town, sir.’
Duncan smiled. ‘In which case it’s me who should thank you, Duff. Ah, one last thing...’
‘Yes?’
‘You say fourteen Norse Riders including Sweno himself were more than you’d anticipated and it would have been more discreet of them to have just sent a couple of men to drive the lorry away?’
‘Yes.’
‘Has it struck you that Sweno might also have been tipped off? He might have suspected you’d be there. So your fear of a leak was perhaps not unfounded. Goodnight, Duff.’
‘Goodnight.’
Duff walked down to his house breathing in the smell of the earth and grass where the dew had already fallen. He had considered this possibility and now Duncan had articulated it. A leak. An informant. And he, Duff, would find the leak. He would find him the very next day.
Macbeth lay on his side with his eyes closed. Behind him he heard her regular breathing and from down in the casino the bass line of the music, like muffled heartbeats. The Inverness stayed open all night, but it was now late even for crazed gamblers and thirsty drinkers. In the corridor overnight guests walked past and unlocked their rooms. Some alone, some with a spouse. Some with other company. This wasn’t something Lady paid too much attention to as long as the women who frequented the casino complied with her unwritten rules of always being discreet, always well groomed, always sober, always infection-free and always, but always, attractive. Lady had once, not long after they had got together, asked why he didn’t look at them. And laughed when he had answered it was because he only had eyes for her. It was only later she understood he meant that quite literally. He didn’t need to turn round to see her, her features were seared into his retinas; all he had to do — wherever he was — was close his eyes and she was there. There hadn’t been anyone before Lady. Well, there had been women who made his pulse race and there were definitely women’s hearts that had beaten faster because of him. But he had never been intimate with them. And of course there was one who had scarred his heart. When Lady had realised and had, laughing, asked him if she had been sent a genuine virgin, he told her his story. The story that hitherto only two people in the world had known. And then she had told him hers.