For a man in his exalted position, I was amazed at his lack of political correctness; I thought it had pervaded every hierarchy in the country by now.
‘Come on, then, up to the Mile.’
We stationed ourselves in as near as you got to a greasy spoon on the city’s main tourist thoroughfare. Fitz ordered a coffee for me and a pot of tea for himself. ‘God, I used to fooster my days away in these places when I was on the beat.’
We both knew those days weren’t so long ago — Fitz had ascended the ranks rapid-style with my help. I’d handed him clean arrests aplenty. I’d turned his success to my own advantage more than a few times, though.
The drinks came. Fitz took the lid off his teapot, stirred. I spooned the froth off my coffee, said, ‘So, here we are.’
‘Here we are indeed.’
There didn’t seem any point messing about. I went for the jugular: ‘The other day, when you told me to be careful.’
Fitz played it cool, kept stirring. ‘Uh-huh.’
‘You told me Davie Prentice was connected.’
‘Did I?… I don’t remember.’
I grabbed his hand. His eyes went to mine. ‘Fitz, put the fucking spoon down — it’s stirred already.’
He lowered the spoon, replaced the lid of the teapot. ‘Stirred it is.’
I had his attention now, said, ‘I had a visit… not the kind of visit I like to get.’
‘Now who would that be from?’ Fitz’s meaty neck quivered above his shirt collar. He tried to play it casual but his colour flushed a little too much to make the move convincing.
‘Ronnie McMilne.’
He ran his tongue over the front of his teeth, spoke softly: ‘The Undertaker.’ He said the name all too casually, as if it had been one he’d batted about quite a bit recently.
‘The very same.’ I sipped my coffee, lowered the cup again. ‘Now, I’m taking a wild guess that when you told me to be careful, when you told me that fat Davie was connected, you were thinking of…’ I lowered my voice to Fitz’s level, ‘our man with the interest in coffins, the Undertaker.’
‘All right, Dury, we’ve heard the name, don’t think there’s any need to mention it again.’
In the years I’d known Fitz, I’d been impressed with the way he had grown. The man of old would have been cursing and blasting me for presuming to have sussed him out like this. The mature Fitz had learned to keep schtum — he’d picked up a few tricks at all the meetings and seminars.
‘No need at all,’ I said.
Fitz poured out his tea. We had a routine for the exchange of information. I gave him something, he gave me something and nothing. This time the rules were different. Fitz knew I wasn’t working an angle on him, he knew all I was after was peace of mind. I could see the years we’d known each other accounted for something with him; he felt for my loss.
‘I have taken control of the investigation myself,’ said Fitz.
‘You have?’
He reached for the sugar bowl. ‘It’s, er, well, let’s just say it touches on another aspect of my current portfolio.’
‘Cut the shit, Fitz. I don’t want a PowerPoint presentation.’
‘Y’what?’
‘Gimme it in plain fucking words… minus the management speak.’
He spooned in some sugar, stirred it up. ‘Our man — the McMilne fella — we have a task force that’s been following him about and they report to me.’
‘How did you make the connection to Michael?’
‘By chance… Isn’t it always the way.’
‘Go on.’
‘There were some reports of… intimidation of workers.’
I’d seen the workers: couldn’t imagine any of them raising police complaints when they were living under a crime lord in a Leith kip house. I let this slide, wasn’t about to overburden Fitz with information when I didn’t know how he was going to use it. Plus, I wanted to keep his focus on the Undertaker: figured he’d have a better chance of success there than I would.
‘Intimidation of workers… reported to the force?’
‘After a fashion.’
He had a snitch. Someone on the inside was talking. ‘Are these workers still employed by my brother’s firm?’
He shook his head. ‘No. No. These are people that have moved on.’
People like Ian Kerr. ‘You mean they were punted…’
A nod. ‘That’s about the size of it.’
They knew something that they shouldn’t, that was clear. ‘So, McMilne gave them a scare. Why?’
‘My information was that our fella was running a racket through the factory’s transport channels. Some of the drivers played along, some didn’t. In the end, they all did.’
Until a few days ago, I’d thought my brother’s business was totally kosher. I couldn’t conceive of any kind of dodge, least of all one in league with the criminal underworld, one that had cost lives. ‘What’re you saying, Fitz?’
‘They were trucking in contraband in the company vehicles.’
I couldn’t take it in. The Undertaker didn’t touch the drugs game in the city, I knew that. ‘Trucking in what?’
Fitz took a sip of his tea. ‘You fucking name it: fags, booze, Tommy Hilfiger knock-offs… anything they could get their hands on. Black market’s exploded lately.’
My mind burned. Did Michael know about this? I couldn’t believe it. Sure, there were the red letters looking for payment, Jayne joking about straitened times… but cosying up to Ronnie McMilne? I just didn’t see Michael being capable of it. ‘If you know about this, why haven’t you shut it down?’ I said.
Fitz looked to be clamming up again. ‘This is all, what you might say… recently acquired information.’
I ran my hands through my hair. My head hurt. I felt blood rising in me. I squeezed my fingers; the pressure piled on my skull.
Fitz sipped at his tea, lowered the cup and added some more from the pot. I felt tempted to smash the lot over his head, not out of any anger towards him but out of my desperation to know what he knew.
‘I want the name of your snout,’ I said.
For the first time since we’d met up, Fitz lost his cool. His face inflated. ‘Are ye out of yer feckin’ mind?’ The Irish in him came to the fore: ‘I’m no feckin’ informer, Dury. Ye can forget it! Go way outta that!’
I stood up so fast that my chair scraped noisily along the floor, attracted glances. ‘Okay, I’ll go it alone… But expect more blood.’
I went for the door.
He called me back: ‘Dury.’
I halted.
Fitz rose, walked to within inches of me. ‘Stay away from McMilne.’
I tutted, ‘Shuh… thanks for the warning.’
As I turned he grabbed my coat sleeve, ‘I’m not kidding: the man’s… lethal.’
I snatched back my arm. ‘He’s not the fucking only one.’
Chapter 15
I tanked it up the Mile, each step on the cobbles an explosion. I held the Grouse bottle in my pocket so tightly that I thought it might shatter in my hand. I didn’t care. I would have blood on my hands soon enough. I was ready to kill for my brother. The Undertaker, fat Davie, some unknown fucking Czech crim working out of the factory
