Mental Health Act, instructed a petition to the First Minister for my release. But my counsel also pointed out that all this time I had been a patient and a ward of the state, not its prisoner, and he argued that I was as entitled to have my medical confidentiality preserved as any other individual. This was referred to the Court of Session for a ruling on precedent, and at a hearing held in camera, three senior judges decided that my counsel was dead right. The case went back to the First Minister. As it happens, Seb McTigue, the present chief executive of this country, is a former Glasgow City councillor, and a former colleague of mine. But we go back longer than that; he was another of my message boys, before I spotted something in him and got him into politics. With my file on his desk, he was only too keen to confirm my release, and even keener that it be afforded the privacy I sought.' The Lord Provost smiled at the recollection.
'So I left Gartnavel,' he said, 'and moved across the city, to this place. When I heard it was on the market, I had Duncan buy it for me, not to make any point to you or Susie at all, but because I've always liked it. I built it, remember: this conversion was a Gantry project.
More than that, I was actually its first owner.'
'You were?' I exclaimed, taken aback.
'Oh it wasn't in my name. Remember the woman who sold it to you and your poor late wife, son? She was an old girlfriend of mine. I set her up in this place, put it in her name, and then, when I became enamoured of someone else, and we split up, I let her sell it and keep the money.'
He held up a hand. 'Incidentally, son, whatever I may have said when the balance of my mind was disturbed, I was not responsible for your wife's death. I admit that at the time I wanted to send the two of you a wee warning, but what my messengers actually did was a breach of my instruction. They've both paid for it since, anyway.'
He had strayed into an area that broke my trance. 'And what about your nephew?' I asked bitterly. 'I don't suppose you killed him, either.'
'Oh aye,' he chuckled. 'I did that all right. But it was genuinely self-defence, and almost accidental. He came to me demanding a ridiculous amount of money, and when I refused he came at me with a blade. It's a blemish on this city, you know, the number of our young people who carry knives. Anyway, the boy picked the wrong place. I had a rack of Kitchen Devils within reach and I used one to fend him off. He ran right on to it.'
I let it pass. He might even have been telling the truth. 'So what's your status now?' I asked him.
'Same as yours. My consultant comes to see me once a month, for a chat, and I'm still on light medication, supervised by Manolito, who really is a nurse, but I'm a free citizen, son, entitled to vote if I chose to register. But I don't. I'm only interested in politics when I'm running the show, and I'll never be seen to be doing that again.'
I waved a hand, abstractly. 'And what about all this? All these trusts, all leading back to you? All these lawyers operating in vacuums? Did your Curator bonis set them up while you were inside?'
'No, no. Duncan set those up for me years ago. Actually when he was appointed Curator, it was really just an extension of what he'd been doing for me all along, and still does. I was his first major client, and I may still be his biggest.'
He leaned forward in the chair, as Mr. Yoakam began, appropriately,
'The Home of the Blues'. 'It would be a great mistake to assume that the holding in the Gantry Group, which I put in trust for my daughter, represented all my wealth. It didn't, not by a hell of a long way. The bulk of it remains under my control, in a way devised by Duncan to preserve my anonymity in my business dealings. Would you believe I own two newspapers and a radio station? I'm not telling you where, but I do.'
'And you wanted to own the Gantry Group again as well, didn't you?'
'I have a hankering for it, yes.'
'But why go about it this way, by plotting against your own company?'
He stared at me: no smile, no cackle, only those cold blue eyes behind the fancy specs. 'Since you'll never prove it, son, I'll tell you. I did it for Natalie, in part. Why Natalie?' His voice hardened appreciably. 'Because, Oz, when I was in Carstairs, and then Gartnavel, the only people who ever came to visit me, apart from Duncan, and Kevin Cornwell, who's always been a friend… as well as a message boy… were James Torrent and his niece. I've been a sleeping partner in Torrent from its early days; I funded its growth with loan capital and I even had Joe Donn sign some photocopier contracts that were no more or less than a means of shovelling money to James by the back door. After he died, Natalie kept on visiting me. I've been a sleeping partner of hers for a while too, in a literal sense.'
'So you're the reason she ditched Ewan Capperauld?'
'He did himself no favours. You actors are all Jessies at heart, you know.'
I laughed. 'I wouldn't say that to Miles Grayson if I were you.'
Gantry cackled again, louder than ever. 'Son, with Manolito behind me I'll say whatever I like to whoever I like, even that big pal of yours, Everett Davis.'
He was overmatching Manolito there, but I let it pass. 'So for Natalie, you set out to break the Group,' I challenged him. 'You had that letter-bomb sent to the office.' He rolled his eyes and looked at the ceiling. 'You recruited your message boys and sent them to buy into New Bearsden, them and their own message boys.'
He shook his bald head. 'No, just the three of them; the others were just a rumour.'
'Big deal. You recruited Aidan Keane, through Jock Perry, his bookie, as your inside fixer.'
'Well done, or was that a guess?'
'A guess, but thanks for confirming it.' I took another shot in the dark. 'And you killed Joe Donn, because he found out that you were out and what you were up to.'
'Wrong there. Joe didn't have a clue that I was released. Anyway, he's the last man I'd have wanted dead.'
'Whatever,' I said. 'The real bottom line is you maybe did some of this for Natalie, but you did it for yourself too, and at the same time to stab Susie in the back.'
'Hardly. The millions she'd have got for her shares would have gone straight into her trust fund. I might even have let her keep it. But not now, though, and it's thanks to you, you clever big bastard.'
I shook my head. 'They let you out too soon, Jack,' I exclaimed, hoping, I suppose, to rile him. 'Susie's trust fund is ring fenced.'
'Ah,' he sighed, 'my poor lad, you're no' as clever as you think.
Duncan,' he called out, then leaned back, as the slim, silver-haired solicitor came into the room. 'Tell the boy about Plan B,' he instructed.
'Certainly, Jack.' Kendall smiled at me like a barracuda; I found myself wanting to rip his gills out. 'The terms of the trust under which your wife is the beneficial owner of a majority shareholding in the Gantry Group specify that Mr. Gantry has passed this interest irrevocably into the control of his daughter, Susan, and in succession any children she may have.' He paused, knowing that I had caught the emphasis placed on a single word, and letting me guess what was coming.
'Regrettably,' he continued, when he was ready, 'it has been alleged to Mr. Gantry that Susan is not in fact his daughter, but is a belated byproduct of his late wife's previous marriage to Mr. Joe Donn. It is unfortunate that Mr. Donn is himself recently deceased and thus unable to confirm this, but I do have evidence that your wife has referred to Mr. Donn as her father on a number of occasions.'
He took a breath, for effect, as if he was in court, although I knew that guys like him hardly ever stand up before a judge. They cover their bets by hiring specialist QCs. 'To sum up,' he concluded, 'I have been instructed by Mr. Gantry to petition the court to wind up the trust on the basis of this…' He gave a light laugh. '… misconception. My petition will be heard, Mr. Blackstone, and the court will certainly require your wife to provide a DNA sample. My advice to my client is that we will win and that the majority holding in the Group will revert to its rightful owner. The way it's constituted and worded, there can be no other outcome. We will argue that it would be wrong for us to leave it unchallenged.'
I took a long breath and looked at Jack. 'There is another way of making the trust all legal and proper. You could adopt Susie, formally.'
He snorted. 'What? After she returned my letters to her, and eventually had me barred from writing to her at the hospital! I should give her a hug and adopt her? You don't know me at all, boy.'
'She was rather pissed off at you,' I pointed out. 'Apart from killing her cousin, she also found out that you'd been using the Gantry Group nursing home division as a front to obtain prescription drugs for cutting and sale on the street. She also didn't like it that her cousin and his pals had been fencing the gear the poor punters stole to buy
