Read Online Gallowglass by Gordon Ferris - Free Book Online

delivering killer blows.
    ‘Ah do have solid grounds.’ He waved his thumb at me. ‘For one, he was hinging aboot the crime scene. What was he doin’ there? How did he get there before us? Then – coincidentally – we find a gun stuffed up his jooks. Said weapon had just been fired; I smelt it masel’. Lastly, his pockets were fu’ o’ bullets and kidnap demands.’
    ‘They weren’t kidnap demands, Sangster!’ I’d had enough.
    ‘It’s a simple fact. My constable found them.’
    ‘Then they were planted on me!’
    He sucked in his cheeks and leaned forward. ‘They a’ say that, don’t they?’
    ‘Look, it’s easy. I was acting for Lady Gibson. Just ask her.’
    ‘In due course. She’s no’ fit to be questioned. You can imagine how the pair wumman is feeling after seeing her man with a bullet hole in his heid. She’s taken to her bed.’
    ‘Well, ask her chauffeur, Cammie. He picked me up two days ago, when Fraser Gibson was kidnapped. He ferried me around yesterday with a bag full of money to pay off the kidnappers. Or Lady Gibson’s maid. She’ll tell you.’
    Sangster was nodding in that infuriatingly patronising way of his.
    ‘Oh, we’ll get to them. But they’re looking after Lady Gibson. We’ve been asked not to disturb the household. They’re in mourning.’
    ‘But you’re happy to disturb me, Sangster!’
    He grinned. ‘Oh aye. Anything else, Miss Campbell, before we tuck Mister Brodie back in his wee cell?’

ELEVEN
    T he cell was wee. And getting wee-er, as I paced its six by six concrete floor and contemplated the tiny high barred window from the bunk. I could push my cot close to it and reach to pull myself up to look out. But all you could see from any of the cell windows was the inner courtyard. At least it allowed some daylight to angle in.
    The sense of injustice burned. Why was everybody lying or hiding? I kept trying to piece together a clear consecutive run of images of the events in the tenement but I couldn’t bridge the gaps. My brain wouldn’t let go of the puzzle that was Sheila Gibson. Why hadn’t she simply confirmed I was working for her; that I’d been carrying the ransom? Pure and simple grief at the loss of her husband? She’d seemed tougher than that. Or was she terrified that the murderers were still out there, might come after her? Maybe she was confused; what story had Sangster spun her? Had he blamed me for letting the kidnappers kill Sir Fraser?
    Sam came to see me later in the day. She didn’t bring good news. When she entered my cell her tight face said it all. It was no surprise.
    ‘Forensics say the bullet came from the gun they took from you. And of course the serial number of the gun matched the War Office records of the gun issued to Lieutenant Colonel Douglas Brodie, six months ago.’
    I could only nod, sitting hunched forward on my bed-bench.They seemed to be pulling out all the stops. Unusually competent for this lot.
    ‘OK, it was my gun. What else?’
    ‘It has your prints on it.’
    ‘Of course it does. It’s mine.’ I didn’t add that I’d stupidly handled it after I picked myself off the floor.
    ‘Well, it doesn’t need much else to prove a prima facie case, does it?’
    I shook my head. She continued.
    ‘Then there’re the ransom notes they found on you. Drafts, they said, for the real thing.’
    ‘That proves this is a set-up. All I had were scribbled directions from a couple of kids, sending me on a wild-goose chase round Govan. Conveniently timed for the Govan Fair, I might add. I didn’t have ransom notes per se. There were no notes. The demands were all done by phone. The notes must have been planted. When I was out cold on the floor at Marr Street.’
    Sam just looked at me, tight-lipped. She didn’t have to say how far-fetched that would sound to a jury. And suddenly the thought took shape, became live. Me in the dock and a jury. Alice in Wonderland: ‘Sentence first –verdict afterwards.’
    ‘This is