‘Anyway,’ Laidlaw said.
He found himself hoping more words were on the way. The word had declared he wasn’t interested in Rhodes’ strictures. He had taken over the room. Now he had to work out what to do with it.
‘Whit is it ye want?’ John Rhodes asked.
He hadn’t a clue. But, blessedly, the man he had hoped to see was there. There was Macey, immobile with nerves, trying to act as if his face didn’t belong to him.
‘Macey,’ Laidlaw said. ‘I want you to come to the station with me.’
Macey was brilliant. He swallowed his panic in one lump and did the classic accused Glaswegian’s act, palms up as if testing for rain. His face went round them like a begging-bowl. He turned it to Laidlaw still empty, an expression of the world’s lack of charity.
‘Gonny gi’es a brek?’ he said. ‘Whit’s this about?’
Laidlaw understood the danger he had put Macey in. Plucking a tout from the company of other criminals like this could be like asking him to advertise in the paper. But Laidlaw improvised as expertly as Macey had. He stared at Macey with a stern, forensic expression.
‘There’s been a wee job done. I think it’s your M.O.’
‘M.O.? Whit’s that? A medical orderly?’
Macey had got it right. In taking the mickey out of Laidlaw, he made the others feel him very much part of them. Their appreciation disarmed suspicion. Laidlaw maintained the role Macey had given him.
‘M.O. Modus operandi. Your way of working.’
Laidlaw felt a certain aesthetic pleasure in how well they were working together. He thought of something else that must be making this look even more convincing to the others. They would know he had been involved in the Veitch case. His failure there would make them see this as his search for petty compensation.
‘No way,’ Macey said. ‘When did this happen?’
Laidlaw hoped Macey wasn’t going to overdo it and make him forget his lines.
‘Recently.’
‘When’s recently.’
‘Recently’s recently.’
‘There ye are then. Ah haveny been workin’ fur ages. The boys here’ll vouch for me.’
‘Uh-huh,’ Laidlaw said. ‘And then we’ll get Bluebeard to alibi for Jack the Ripper. You coming?’
Macey looked at John Rhodes.
‘On ye go, Macey. Ye better go.’
As they were going out, John Rhodes said, as a final barb at Laidlaw, ‘See you in half-an-hour, Macey.’
In the street, Macey couldn’t believe the injustice of the world. As they walked, his words were just articulated froth.
‘Mr Laidlaw. You off your head? Does Big Ernie know about this? Ah’m gonny see ’im. What a liberty! Ah mean, ye might as well give me an award on the telly. Tout of the year. Holy Jesus. That’s ma life you’re playin’ games wi’. These men don’t kid. First thing ye know, ye’ve got yer head in a poke to play wi’. Oh my. Ma hert’s gaun like a lambeg drum.’
‘Macey, I’m sorry.’
‘Oh, very good. That’s smashin’. Make all the difference on the headstone, that. No, that isn’t on.’
‘We got away with it.’
Macey stopped and looked at him.
‘We think we did, Mr Laidlaw. But if we’re wrong, who’s gonny find out first?’
Laidlaw took the point.
‘It was all right, Macey. Come on.’
‘Aye, Ah think it was. Ah think we’ve knocked it off therr. But two o’ that Ah don’t need, Mr Laidlaw. Ye know?’
‘Agreed, Macey. Never again. Look. I’m not as daft as you think. Well, probably not quite. There has been a break-in in Pollokshaws. Quite a big job. That’s what I was quizzing you about. All right? I’ll give you the details.’
‘So what are we doin’ here?’ Macey asked. ‘Ah mean, Ah hardly know you.’
They were at Laidlaw’s car.
‘In you get, Macey.’
‘What for?’
‘In you get. I’m not going to kidnap you. I’ve got nowhere to keep you.’
While Laidlaw drove to the entrance to Ruchill Park, he told Macey about the break-in.
They got out and climbed the hill to the small stone pillars of different sizes and sat there. Macey had been huffily quiet. Laidlaw had let him be. Some children were playing on the swings. Laidlaw gave Macey a cigarette, took one himself.
‘You told Milligan where to find Tony Veitch,’ Laidlaw said.
‘Ah didny say that.’
‘I’m saying it.’
‘Look.’ Macey threw the cigarette away, hardly smoked. ‘What is this? Ah speak to Big Ernie. That’s who Ah speak tae. All right? No offence, Mr Laidlaw.’
Laidlaw knew how unacceptable what he was doing was. Trying to hone in on somebody else’s tout was a serious breach of the code, something that would get you lionised in the force to roughly the same degree as rabies. But Laidlaw suspected he had perhaps achieved professional ostracism already.
‘Who told you where Tony Veitch was, Macey?’
Macey was whistling under his breath, looking away, as if he had just happened to sit beside a loony in the park. ‘What’s that going on in the Crib? That’s a weird get-together.’
‘Some kinna bother.’
‘About Paddy Collins?’
‘Don’t know. Ah wisny listenin’.’
‘There’s going to be more serious bother, Macey. And you could be right in the middle of it.’
‘Well. It’s a way of life, intit? You know it’s trouble when trouble comes, don’t ye?’ Macey was smiling, looking away. Laidlaw’s left hand grabbed his lapel like a grappling iron, hooking him off his seat.
‘Listen, fuckin’ bawheid,’ Laidlaw said. ‘I’m on serious business. I don’t need the Chic Murray kit. You want to be a comedian, practise somewhere else.’
Laidlaw slammed Macey back on to his concrete seat so hard he felt his coccyx might be a lump on his head.
‘You’re overheads in the shite, Macey,’ Laidlaw said. ‘You’re an accessory to a murder. That’s what you are. Clever tout. It’s up to you. You answer a coupla questions. Or I’m going to huckle you into the station right now. And get you charged. That’s the message.’
Macey couldn’t help being interested. He had the tout’s bug-eyed sense of survival, as if the thyroid had gone berserk.
‘How do you mean?’
‘You know what I mean,’ Laidlaw said.
The two of them watched a small red-haired boy argue with his black-haired friend about whose turn it was to push the swing. The black-haired boy won.
‘What are the questions?’ Macey said.
‘Actually, they’re more than a couple,’ Laidlaw said. ‘What’s going on in the Crib?’
Macey watched the boy swinging as if his attention could put him back there.
‘Mickey Ballater,’ he said, and Laidlaw understood Ballater’s wound. ‘He claimed Hook. Thought Hook had been arsin’ him about. Cam and John are havin’ a council of war. But nothin’s been decided.’
Laidlaw listened to the black-haired boy complain about the way his friend was pushing him, decided he didn’t like him.
‘Macey,’ Laidlaw said. ‘Were Dave McMaster and Lynsey Farren the first to tell you about Tony Veitch?’
‘Naw,’ Macey said. ‘Cam talked about him first.’
‘But only Cam?’
Macey shifted a little, as if his conscience had piles.
‘Macey!’ Laidlaw said.
‘Big Ernie knew. He showed me a phota.’
‘What phota?’
‘Tony Veitch. He was readin’.’
Laidlaw was briefly aware that Harkness had given Milligan the photograph and decided it didn’t matter much. There were more important things to find out about.