‘You remember this?’ I asked. ‘I think your life is in more danger because of this photograph than the whole business with Macready. I believe this is someone who has made a great effort never to have his face or anything about him recorded, anywhere.’
‘Who is he?’ asked Downey.
‘I am pretty convinced that this is someone called Joe Strachan, although everybody seems to want me to believe it isn’t. Everybody wants me to think it’s someone called Henry Williamson, but I don’t know if he ever existed. What I can’t work out is why the people who have lied to me about it, lied to me about it.’ I thought back to the twins’ reaction, or lack of it, to the photograph when I had shown it to them.
‘The name means nothing to me,’ said Downey. ‘I don’t know anything about this man except I was given a description of him and told to try to get a picture of him.’
‘By this man you say hired you? The man who called himself Paisley?’
‘Yes.’
‘How did he find you?’
Downey looked afraid. Or more afraid. ‘I didn’t tell you everything,’ he said and looked as if he was expecting me to hit him.
‘It’s all right, Paul,’ I said. ‘You can tell me now.’
‘Mr Paisley turned up when we were setting up the camera in the cottage. You know, the way Iain had asked us to do so we could get pictures of him and Macready. Somehow Mr Paisley knew all about what we had planned. He said he would make sure that the police got to know what we were up to if we didn’t do as he asked. He also told me that he knew all about my betting debts and who I owed the money to. He said he could make that all go away, that he could square everything with the loan shark and he wouldn’t come after me any more for interest.’
‘He seemed well-informed.’
‘He knew everything. He said we could go ahead with our plan and we would end up keeping anything we made instead of handing it over to the shark.’
‘He didn’t ask you for a cut, for a percentage?’
Downey laughed. ‘It would have been small change for him, from what I could see. He arrived in a huge Bentley and his clothes were very expensive.’
‘He was alone?’
‘Yes.’
‘And you went along with him, just like that?’
‘Yes. Even with the clothes and the car, you could tell he was someone you didn’t want to mess with. He looked hard. And dangerous. He had this scar on his cheek, like he’d been in a razor fight.’
‘Right or left cheek?’
Downey thought for a moment. ‘Right. The other reason we didn’t kick up was it seemed easy money. We were on the estate anyway and Mr Paisley said that the man I was to look out for should turn up in the next few days.’
‘And all you were to do was to take a photograph of him?’
‘That’s all. The best I could manage. Mr Paisley said that we would be paid well, but if we ever talked to anyone about it, we’d end up dead. Do you think it was him who killed Frank?’
‘Honestly? No, I don’t think so. Tell me, Paul, is there any chance that the man you photographed spotted you? Knew that you’d taken his picture?’
‘No. Or at least I don’t think so.’
‘No, nor do I,’ I said, remembering how difficult it had been, even with years of army training and combat experience, to give him and his goons the slip in the woods.
‘What happens now?’ he asked.
‘You have to disappear for a while. And not to where you were. The people who are after you now wouldn’t take long to track you down. I’m going to take you out of town. We’ll find you somewhere to hide out. But you hide out, is that clear?’
‘Clear.’
Largs was on a narrow strip of coastline squeezed between the sea and a massive shoulder of rock known as the Haylie Brae, which rose precipitously behind it. It was a dismal day and the rain started to come down in sheets, turning everything into sleek shades of grey.
Before I drove all the way down the Ayrshire coast to Largs, I had not made any ’phone calls or asked anyone for help or advice. Not even Archie. I had no idea why I had picked Largs, which was a good thing: no one else could put together a logical sequence that would lead them to my random choice. Although I supposed there was some logic to it: I had had it in the back of my head that a coastal resort was ideal for anonymous and by-the-night accommodation and I had had a vague notion to make for one of the many guest-houses that lined the promenade. The only thing that concerned me was that most Largs guest-house landladies exercised the kind of discipline and adherence to regulation that made the average glasshouse sergeant-major look easy-going. And two men booking a room off-season, particularly when one of them was Downey, could end up attracting the attention of the police.
After the war, the British had developed a renewed passion for caravanning, which had started to gain some popularity in the Thirties. Now there were caravan parks springing up alongside any seaside resort or on Highland estates, where holiday-makers could enjoy the experience of sitting in cramped conditions looking out at the rain, instead of sitting at home in cramped conditions looking out at the rain. I suppose I understood it in a way. The trips abroad so many had been obliged to take in the previous decade had probably blunted the nation’s wanderlust.
I had gotten the idea as we approached Largs along the ribbon of coast road. Between Skelmorlie and Largs a large open field, backed by a curtain of cliff, had been converted into a caravan park. A drive led to a cabin that bore a sign telling you that it was the ‘reception office’. Half of the field beyond was occupied by ten to a dozen identical two-tone cubes arranged in ranks, looking out over the sea to the hulking grey mass of the Isle of Arran. On the other half of the field, next to the identical caravans, was a largely open space, populated by two boarded up, larger caravans. I guessed one side of the park was for visitors bringing their own vans, while the other was for caravans to rent. Across from the ‘reception’ shed was a largish, red-sandstone villa.
I told Downey to stay put in the car while I went into the park’s office cabin. There was no one there, but a sign above a large hand-bell, the kind ye olde worlde town criers would use, instructed me: IF NOBODY’S HERE IT DON’T MEAN A THING, PICK ME UP AND GIVE ME A RING.
So I did.
A minute later, a woman in her early thirties came across from the villa, hurrying as much as her tight pencil skirt and high-heels would allow. She had light brown hair and pale grey eyes and a smile that told me I could be her special guest. That made things easier and I flirted as I booked in. I explained that the caravan would be occupied mostly by my young friend, who had been ill and needed the sea air to recuperate.
‘We get a lot of that from Glasgow,’ she said, nodding gravely but keeping her eyes on mine. ‘So, will you be staying at all yourself, Mr Watson?’ she asked, reading the fake name I’d entered into the register. ‘I’m Ethel Davison, by the way.’
‘I hadn’t planned to,’ I said, hamming up the wolfishness as I shook her limp hand. ‘But maybe I should keep an eye on my friend.’
‘We’ll look after him. I’m here all of the time and my husband is here when he’s not at work. He works nights,’ she explained helpfully.
‘I wouldn’t worry too much about my friend. He has a pile of books and really wants solitude as much as the sea air, which is why I chose your site. It really is a lovely spot you have here,’ I said, and looked appreciatively out of the cabin’s window to the sea, just as a beer lorry rattled past the road end.
I gave her a week’s rent in advance, which she was delighted with. ‘If your friend needs to stay longer, that’s not a problem at this time of year,’ she said. ‘Or if you wanted a caravan for yourself, we could do a special combined rate …’
I smiled and told her it wouldn’t be necessary, but I really would make sure that I checked on him regularly. Probably in the evenings.