The Deep Dark Sleep

I decided it was best if I sat too. I preferred to have something substantial like a desk, or a continent, between me and McNab. I watched the door, waiting for some burly Highlander in an off-the-peg Burton suit to come in after McNab: one of the privileges of rank was that you didn’t have to do your own beating of suspects. To my surprise none came.

‘To what do I owe …?’ I asked McNab.

‘You know exactly why I’m here, so don’t piss me about.’

‘I tell you what, Superintendent, just so’s we’re clear, why don’t you spell it out for me?’

‘You’ve been sticking your nose into this Strachan business. You ought to know by now that I get to hear everything that goes on in this city, and anything that’s of special interest to me, I find out fast. What have you found out?’

‘Nothing of interest to the police,’ I said.

‘Who are you working for?’

‘Sorry. Client confidentiality.’

‘Oh aye, client confidentiality.’ McNab nodded sagely, as if appreciating the concept. ‘Do you know why client confidentiality and the shite are very similar?’

‘I’m sure you’ll enlighten me.’

McNab did six foot three of standing up and leaned across the desk, bringing his face close to mine.

‘Client confidentiality is like the shite because both can be knocked out of you in the cells at St Andrew’s Square.’

I found it interesting that McNab and Hammer Murphy, although on opposite sides of the criminal justice fence, had the same approach to my professional ethics.

‘You know something, McNab?’ I said. ‘I don’t think so. A year or two ago you could maybe have gotten away with that, but I don’t play in that end of the playground any more. I’m a respectable businessman.’

‘You reckon?’

‘I reckon. But that’s not the only reason I don’t think that will happen. You’ve come up here on your own and without due cause to arrest me, so why don’t you tell me the real reason you’re here? I’m sure it has to do with Strachan, but there’s something odd in the ether.’

Despite the assurance with which I said it, I was surprised when McNab did sit back down. He took out a packet of Navy Cut and lit one. After a moment’s thought, he offered me one.

‘No thanks,’ I said, more because I was taken aback by the offer than anything else. ‘I want to be able to speak tomorrow morning. What’s the deal, Superintendent?’

He took off his trilby and threw it onto the desk.

‘Lennox, you and I have had our moments. I don’t like you and you don’t like me. But one thing about you that I’ve noticed is that every time I’ve tried to get information from you, you’ve risked a beating or jail time by telling me where to go. So I suppose you have your own code of ethics, no matter how bollocksed-up they may be. You know I dug the dirt on you from your time in Germany after the war. That German black-marketeer who ended up face down in the harbour, for example. The one the Military Police suspected was your business partner …’

‘Is there a point to this character analysis, McNab?’

‘I don’t care what happened in Hamburg, but I care what happens in Glasgow. Joseph Strachan murdered Charlie Gourlay. He gunned him down in cold blood and I want to see the bastard swing for it.’

‘But he’s dead, Superintendent. Officially, legally dead.’

‘You don’t believe that shite any more than I do. That wasn’t Joe Strachan at the bottom of the Clyde. I can’t prove it, but I know it. Strachan was too clever to be caught, and he was too clever to be topped by one of his own team.’

‘So whose bones were dredged up?’

‘I don’t know. But they weren’t Strachan’s, I’ll tell you that. Listen, Lennox, I’ve been a copper in this town for nearly thirty years. I’ve dealt with some of the hardest, most vicious bastards ever to foul the Earth with their presence. I’ve put a noose around the necks of over a dozen men: from kiddie-fiddlers to professional killers, from psychopaths to razor gangs. I’ve seen every type of fiend and monster you can imagine. But Joe Strachan is out there in a league of his own.’

‘Is he?’ I decided to play dumb. ‘From all of the “Gentleman Joe” crap you hear, and the way he’s idolized by every crook in Glasgow, you’d think he was some kind of folk hero.’