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‘Mrs Campbell,’ I began as brightly as I could, ‘I’m Oz Blackstone. I—’ She slammed the Rangers colours in my face. I sighed, and rang the bell again, taking half a step back. I began to count.
I had reached nine, when the door swung open again, suddenly and violently, framing a stocky, powerfully built man, dark-chinned, with a scar running across the bridge of his nose. He looked to be in his mid-thirties; he was balding and what was left of his hair was cropped very short. He wore jeans, like his wife, and an orange vest, showing off his collection of tattoos and his heavy shoulders. The instant I saw him, he reminded me of someone, someone nameless but nasty. Even if I hadn’t known about Malcolm Campbell’s record, I’d have treated him very carefully, just on general appearance.
His mouth was narrow and his tight lips barely moved when he spoke. ‘You don’t take a telling, pal, do you. I’ll give yis one last chance. Get down those effin’ stairs, or yis’ll crawl down them.’
I smiled at him, knowing something that he didn’t: that I was going to enjoy the next few seconds. ‘Mr Campbell,’ I said, evenly. ‘All I want is to talk to your wife.’
‘Well, she disnae want tae talk to you.’
‘She will, though.’ I held up my right thumb. ‘See that?’ I asked him, still grinning. ‘You’ve got no idea what I can do with that.’
He smiled back at me. His smile was even less pleasant than his threatening expression. ‘Show us, then.’ He clenched and unclenched his fists, rippling the muscles of his shoulders as he spoke, anticipating pleasure.
‘You asked for it.’ I raised my thumb again, jerked it towards me, once.
All of a sudden the landing seemed much smaller, and darker, as a huge shadow moved up from the staircase, and round the corner, to block out the light.
I remember the first time I saw Jerry Gradi in the flesh. Six feet, eight - tall, wide and deep. Three hundred and eighty pounds, all of them hard as nails. Dyed blond hair cropped short. Nose flattened into his head. Small piggy eyes. Pink ears which looked handmade. I’ll never forget that first flash of instant terror.
‘This is my pal, Jerry’ I said. ‘Jerry, this is Mr Campbell. He isn’t being very co-operative. He was going to give me a doing.’
‘Oh,’ grunted The Behemoth.
Malcolm Campbell’s mean mouth hung open as he gazed up at the GWA World Heavyweight Champion. For the first time, I was aware of Myrtle, standing behind him. ‘I’ll get the polis,’ he croaked.
‘How many you gonna get, and how fast you gonna get dem here?’ asked Jerry, in his wrestler voice.
‘I don’t think you’ve got many friends down the nick, Malcolm,’ I said. ‘Now let’s get reasonable, while you’ve still got a friend in me.’
I looked over his shoulder at his wife. ‘Come on, Mrs Campbell. A few questions, that’s all; there’ll be no comeback for you, I promise.’
‘Aye, okay then,’ she conceded, almost wearily, with a glance at her husband which promised consequences later for his surrender . . . a shade unreasonable, I thought. ‘Come on through, but tell your pet gorilla to be careful no tae stand on anything.’
She led us through the square hall and into a big living room. EastEnders was on the television and I knew at once who Malcolm’s lookalike was. ‘Sit down,’ she said, then looked doubtfully at Jerry. ‘Not you, though.’
I took one of the two armchairs, opposite Myrtle, while The Behemoth stood behind her husband, as he sat on the matching settee. ‘I’ll bet you’re no as tough as you look,’ Malcolm muttered. Without a word, Jerry stretched out the tree-trunks that passed for his arms, gripped the back of the heavy sofa at either side, straightened his back and effortlessly lifted it, and its two hundred pound occupant, three feet off the ground.
‘Stop that you!’ Myrtle shouted. ‘Put him down! And Malkie, you keep your mouth shut.’
Both of them did as they were told.
‘Right Mr Blackstone,’ she went on. ‘What’s all this about?’
‘How do you feel about Susie Gantry?’
‘Miss Gantry? I suppose I like her well enough.’
‘Even though she sacked you?’
‘She didnae sack me, Ah left.’
‘After you were caught smuggling photocopies of documents out to your old boss,’ I pointed out.
‘Aye, but she gave me the chance to resign. She said that if I did she’d give me a good reference. She did too, and two weeks’ extra pay over and above my holiday money and wages in lieu of notice.’
‘So if you liked Susie, why did you betray her like that? Why did you do that for old Donn?’
‘Ah didnae do it for Mr Donn. Ah did it for Stephen.’
‘Who?’ I looked at her, puzzled.
‘Stephen Donn, his nephew. He worked at Gantry’s for a while.’
I felt myself frown as I remembered. The young book-keeper installed by Susie’s father at the time of Joe Donn’s brief reinstatement. He must have worked there for such a short time that his name didn’t figure on the list Dylan had given me. It wasn’t only my memory that was triggered. In the silence, I realised that Myrtle was staring at me.
‘Blackstone, you said your name was. That accountant girl Miss Gantry brought in, she was called Blackstone too. Was she . . .’
‘My wife,’ I said, not looking at her, avoiding the expression which I knew was on her face, the one I had seen so many times before, the one that always brought it all back. ‘So why did you put your job on the line for Mr Donn’s nephew?’ I went on, quickly.
For the first time, she hesitated. ‘He just asked me,’ she answered, at last. ‘He said that Mr Donn was going to the papers to get even with Miss Gantry, but that he needed some stuff from the office.’
‘He just asked you,’ I repeated. ‘And you just did it? Why, for God’s sake? Why didn’t you tell Susie?’
‘You don’t know Stephen.’
‘No, I don’t. Tell me about him.’
She looked over at her husband. ‘He and I had a fling,’ she murmured. Malcolm’s eyes narrowed to slits. He began to rise from his seat on the sofa, until Jerry’s huge hand gripped his shoulder and slammed him back down.
‘It was when you were inside,’ Myrtle exclaimed, speaking to her husband with a plea in her voice. ‘I was really angry with you, remember? Ah told you we were finished, and at the time Ah meant it. It didn’t last long, only about a month.’
‘So?’ I knew I had to keep control of this discussion.
‘He threatened to tell Malkie about us if I didn’t do what he wanted.’
‘And you thought that if he did, Malkie would beat the shite out of him and wind up inside again? Is that it?’
She surprised me by shaking her head. ‘No. I was afraid that he would try, and get himself killed. Like Ah said, you don’t know Stephen.’ She glanced across at her husband again.
‘You’re a hard man, love, but you’d never really hurt anyone. No’ really hurt them, Ah mean. It’s not in your nature.
‘Stephen would, though. He’s a real bad bastard.’ Her voice tailed off, and her eyes moistened.
‘Remember that cousin of Miss Gantry’s?’ she asked me suddenly. ‘The one who came tae a bad end?’ Remember him? I can never forget him. I nodded.
‘Stephen was palled up wi’ him from way back. They were in the same rackets. Believe me, Mr Blackstone, you do not want Stephen Donn for an enemy.’
I decided to leave it at that. Malcolm Campbell showed us to the door, silently. As he was closing it on us, Jerry put a hand on it to stop him. ‘Don’t you go laying a finger on that little wife of yours,’ he murmured, ‘just in case I find out. ’Cause believe me, buddy, I can really hurt people too.’
Chapter 8
‘I didn’t like the boy, Oz. I know I was bound to resent him, given the way my Dad foisted him and his bloody old uncle off on me, after . . .’
She broke off for a second or two. ‘All that apart, though, I still didn’t like Stephen. He’s a good-l
ooking guy, a real ladies’ man - I’m not surprised wee Myrtle had a tumble with him - and on the face of it, he’s very pleasant. But I always felt that his smile was painted on the outside; that there was something different going on inside his head.’
Prim and I were sitting at the table in the dining room of Susie’s semi in Clarkston. She and Mike had been talking for two years about moving into the penthouse flat of the redevelopment of a classic City Centre church which her construction division was planning, but the project was still on the drawing-board. The Gantry Group’s influence with the Planning Department was not what it had been in the past.
‘What happened when you fired him?’ Prim asked, as Dylan topped up our wine glasses. ‘How did he take it?’
Susie frowned, as she replayed the event in her mind. ‘He was neither up nor down, as I remember. I saw his Uncle Joe and him together; I told them that I was now in total and permanent control of the Group and that I intended to do everything my way in the future.
‘That included putting my own staff in charge of financial management. I told them that they were being replaced by two people I had head-hunted from a major chartered accountancy firm, I showed them the severance terms . . . agreed with my lawyers and watertight, including the confidentiality clause . . . and I asked them to sign letters of resignation and clear their desks, there and then.
‘Joe went apeshit; he still thought of me as a wee girl, and thought he could treat me as such. He bawled and shouted that he had given the best years of his life to my Dad and his company, that I was an ungrateful wee whippersnapper, and that I would ruin everything he and my Dad had built up.’
‘Wind up with everything in ashes at your feet?’ I suggested.
‘Not in those very words, but that’s what he implied, yes.’
‘What did you say?’
‘Nothing. I let him shout himself hoarse then I showed him the interim report that Jan did for me. It was very nicely written, tactfully put, but basically it said that Joe was neither qualified nor able to serve as finance director of a major company and listed about twenty different reasons why. When he’d read it I told him that I had shown it to my auditors, and that they agreed.
‘Then I showed him his settlement figure. I pointed out that he’d already had a golden handshake the first time I fired him; and now here he was, thanks to my Dad’s stupidity, in a position to collect another. But I made it clear to him that if he walked out without signing that letter, I’d tear it up and he’d get statutory terms, which in the circumstances would have been bugger all.
‘There was a bit more bluster, but eventually he signed both the letter and the severance agreement, including the confidentiality clause.’
‘And what about Stephen?’ Prim asked. ‘What did he do while his uncle was yelling the place down?’
‘Nothing. He just sat there and let the storm subside. Then, when old Joe was done, he picked up his letter looked at the terms - six months’ pay, and he’d hardly been there any time - said “Fair enough” and signed without another word.’
‘No threats?’
‘Not one. He even shook my hand on the way out, and gave me that wee painted smile.’
I took a sip of my wine, a fairly expensive claret . . . I knew that, since I’d brought it. ‘You never thought about firing Myrtle Higgins at that time?’
‘Christ no. Myrtle’s a good secretary, Oz. On top of that it made sense to have her there to help the new guy settle in. When I did let her go I was sorry, but I didn’t have any choice. I could never have trusted her completely after that. Pity. All of it. Even old Joe; if only the silly bugger has decided to go off to a quiet retirement.’ She sighed, and in that moment I saw one of Susie’s strengths as a boss. She hated firing people, even when it was justified.
‘So now Myrtle’s saying it was Stephen who blackmailed her into stealing those documents?’ she asked me.
‘That’s right. She did it to keep her husband out of trouble.’
‘What’s he like, this husband?’
I had to laugh as I thought of the two Malkie Campbells; the one who was going to kick me down the stairs, and one who had come face to face with his worst nightmare. ‘Quiet and chastened. Big Jerry has that effect on most people.’
‘Er . . . he didn’t actually damage Campbell, did he?’ Dylan sounded slightly nervous.
I tapped my chest, over my heart. ‘Only in here. It had a hell of an effect on him, thinking that he was a hard man, then coming face to chest with someone who put everything into perspective.’
‘Maybe you should take him when you go to see Stephen,’ said Susie, with a faint grin. ‘Not that he struck me as much of a heavy. On the other hand, if he was mobbed up with my cousin . . .’
‘It’s academic,’ I told her. ‘The Behemoth’s off to the States on Monday, after this weekend’s programming. Prim and I will meet Stephen somewhere nice and public . . . if we need to see him at all that is.’
‘Why shouldn’t you?’ Mike asked.
‘Because we’re going to talk to Uncle Joe first. He’s already threatened Susie.’
‘I told you I fancy him for it.’
‘Sure, and even with your track record, there’s a fair chance you could be right. So we have to cover the possibility.’ He gave me a mock scowl.
‘Those papers, Susie,’ Prim cut in. ‘The ones Myrtle copied. What were they?’
‘Letters. From my old man to the Chair of the Glasgow Planning Committee. Read in a certain way, you could infer that Dad was trying to lean on him for a consent. I guess that Joe was going to pass them to his tame journo and claim that’s exactly what did happen.’
‘D’you think it might have?’
She grinned across at me over her glass. ‘No way. Read in another way, and forgetting who wrote them, they’re simple enquiries for the record. When my Dad wanted to nobble someone, he did it in private, without witnesses, and never, ever, in writing.’
‘Fine.’ I nodded. ‘That’s how we’ll see his old pal Joe as well: in private. If he did write those letters, then he’s an even bigger fool than his record says he is, and it shouldn’t be too hard to scare him into admitting it.’
Chapter 9
Although he was well up my ‘things to do’ list, Mr Joseph Donn wasn’t right at the top. I had a Sly Burr radio ad to record in Edinburgh, and a busy weekend, with two GWA shows, one live, one recorded, in Milan - of course, Prim had to come with me - before I could think about tackling the old duffer.
It wasn’t until the following Monday morning, five days after our council of war at Susie’s place, that we were able to get round to planning our approach to the former finance director of the Gantry Group.
Prim gazed at me across the breakfast bar, her nice, post-orgasmic smile still showing in her eyes from an hour or so before. ‘If you think you’re keeping all the fun for yourself, my boy . . .’ she chuckled. ‘It was one thing letting you tackle the Campbells without me . . . there probably wouldn’t have been room for me in their flat with Jerry along . . . but there’s no risk involved in this visit. Donn’s sixty-three, isn’t he?’ I nodded.
‘If there’s a chance that he is going to put his hands up and confess to writing those letters, I want to be there to hear it, and to witness his statement when we get it in writing.’
I was slightly concerned that when we confronted the old man we might find his nephew somewhere in the vicinity, but I could see that there was no point in arguing. Anyway, from what I had heard of Stephen, he didn’t sound like someone I couldn’t handle. I hadn’t been a part of the GWA circus for two years for nothing. Everett and Jerry had taught me some knock-down moves, and Liam Matthews, who had become a good friend after an awkward beginning, had shown me a couple of submission holds that he, in turn had learned on the for-real Bushido circuit in Japan. I might have been struggling against an experienced, head-butting thug like Malkie Campbell, but all I knew about the boy Donn was that he frightened women.
‘I’ve been thinking about that. I thought I might phone him and pretend to be a journalist, looking into the Gantry Group.’
‘What if he tells you to get stuffed? He’s got that confidentiality clause to restrain him, remember.’
‘I’ll charm him, my dear. I’ll tell him I only want background information on Jack Gantry, and that I won’t quote him. He’ll agree to see me, don’t worry. Then he’ll get a nice surprise when the two of us turn up on his doorstep.’
‘Okay,’ I agreed. ‘Give it a try. The sooner we get it over with the better.’
‘You really don’t fancy him for it, do you?’
I shook my head. ‘I’m not going to prejudge him. I’ve never met the man, and neither have you. Once we have we’ll know better, so go ahead and make that call.’
‘Okay.’ Prim reached across to our kitchen noticeboard and picked off a yellow sticky with Donn’s number, which Susie had given us the week before, then picked up her mobile from the work-surface, and began to dial. She had punched in four numbers when the door buzzer sounded.
She stopped as I picked up the handset, frowning at the small video-screen on the wall, in which the figure of a shirt-sleeved man was framed.
‘Yes?’ I said.
‘Special delivery for Mr Blackstone,’ a tinny voice in my ear replied.
‘Okay.’ I pushed the entry button. ‘Come on up. It takes a bit of finding; it’s the top flat.’
I went to the front door and waited. When finally he appeared in the hallway, the delivery man was out of breath. ‘Jesus,’ he muttered, more than a shade grumpily. ‘Could yis no’ have lived on the ground floor?’