Read Online The Long Glasgow Kiss by Craig Russell - Free Book Online Page B
Authors: Craig Russell
Ads: Link
never much one for moral imperatives.
C HAPTER F OUR
It was getting late but I thought I’d call into the Horsehead Bar for a snifter before heading home. The Horsehead had become my unofficial second office. At one time my main office, but recently I’d been trying to make at least a half-hearted stab at legitimacy and had been spending less time there.
When I arrived, Big Bob the Barman grinned at me. I grinned back. He was a good sort, Big Bob. I’d often wondered if he’d become a barman for the alliterative effect; that if he had been known as Fat Fred he would have become a fireman. Whatever Big Bob had been before his time behind the bar, he was a tough son-of-a-bitch now. So close to the war, there was a bit of an unspoken rule: you recognized other men who’d been through the mincer and you didn’t talk about it. You identified each other as a common breed, but you didn’t talk about it.
‘Well fucking well.’ Bob poured me a Canadian Club. ‘Where have you been? I thought you’d fucked off back to Canada.’
‘You working for the New Brunswick tourist office too?’ I asked, he frowned. ‘I’ve been busy, Bob. Anyone been asking for me?’
‘Naw … just Little Bollocks over there.’ He nodded in the direction of a youth at the end of the bar. I beckoned for him to come over.
‘I take it he’s been nursing that half all night?’ I asked Bob, who gave a knowing look and nodded. ‘Give him a fresh pint.’
‘How’s it going, Mr Lennox?’ Davey Wallace beamed at me as he came round to my end of the bar and Big Bob handed him his beer. Davey was about five feet-seven, as fresh-faced as the Glasgow atmosphere would allow, and dressed in a too-big second-hand suit that had been expensive once. A war and a generation ago.
‘Hi, Davey,’ I said.
‘Business good?’ he bubbled with enthusiasm. ‘Any new cases?’
‘Same old stuff, Davey,’ I answered with a smile. Davey Wallace was a dreamer. A good kid, but a dreamer. For many within its boundaries, Glasgow was as much a prison as a home. The bars that confined them were the class system and, in almost every case, the lack of any viable alternative to a life of manual labour. The shipyards and the steelworks devoured the city’s young: I’d often wondered if Rotten Row, Glasgow’s appropriately named maternity hospital, simply put ‘apprentice’ instead of ‘boy’ on birth certificates.
Davey was an apprentice – an apprentice welder – working the morning shift in the shipyard. Started at fifteen and would most likely work there until he was sixty-five, by which time he would have given up his passion for Rock’n’Roll, probably because he’d be deaf from the constant riveting before he hit forty. But now, Davey Wallace, seventeen years old, parentless at seven, in an orphanage until fifteen, unmarried and with no kids yet to bind him further to an ineluctable industrial fate, escaped into the cinema every afternoon and Saturday night, where he would meet up with a different gang: Bogart, Cagney, Mitchum, Robinson, Mature.
When Davey had found out that I was a real-life enquiry agent, he had approached me in the bar like a Greek shepherd approaching Zeus. Since then, he had taken every opportunity to remind me that if I was ever looking for help …
‘Thanks for the pint, Mr Lennox.’
‘You’re welcome, Davey. Shouldn’t you be in bed? What about your early shift?’
‘I sleep in the afternoons, mostly.’ Then, as if correcting himself: ‘But I’m always available … you know, if you needed any help on one of your cases, Mr Lennox. I’m always here.’
I exchanged a look with Big Bob, who grinned.
‘Listen, Davey,’ I said. ‘It’s not like you think it is. It’s not like in the movies. There’s nothing glamorous about what I do for a living.’
His expression dulled. ‘You should try working down at the shipyards. Anything’s glamorous compared to that.’
‘Really,’ I grinned. ‘I would
C HAPTER F OUR
It was getting late but I thought I’d call into the Horsehead Bar for a snifter before heading home. The Horsehead had become my unofficial second office. At one time my main office, but recently I’d been trying to make at least a half-hearted stab at legitimacy and had been spending less time there.
When I arrived, Big Bob the Barman grinned at me. I grinned back. He was a good sort, Big Bob. I’d often wondered if he’d become a barman for the alliterative effect; that if he had been known as Fat Fred he would have become a fireman. Whatever Big Bob had been before his time behind the bar, he was a tough son-of-a-bitch now. So close to the war, there was a bit of an unspoken rule: you recognized other men who’d been through the mincer and you didn’t talk about it. You identified each other as a common breed, but you didn’t talk about it.
‘Well fucking well.’ Bob poured me a Canadian Club. ‘Where have you been? I thought you’d fucked off back to Canada.’
‘You working for the New Brunswick tourist office too?’ I asked, he frowned. ‘I’ve been busy, Bob. Anyone been asking for me?’
‘Naw … just Little Bollocks over there.’ He nodded in the direction of a youth at the end of the bar. I beckoned for him to come over.
‘I take it he’s been nursing that half all night?’ I asked Bob, who gave a knowing look and nodded. ‘Give him a fresh pint.’
‘How’s it going, Mr Lennox?’ Davey Wallace beamed at me as he came round to my end of the bar and Big Bob handed him his beer. Davey was about five feet-seven, as fresh-faced as the Glasgow atmosphere would allow, and dressed in a too-big second-hand suit that had been expensive once. A war and a generation ago.
‘Hi, Davey,’ I said.
‘Business good?’ he bubbled with enthusiasm. ‘Any new cases?’
‘Same old stuff, Davey,’ I answered with a smile. Davey Wallace was a dreamer. A good kid, but a dreamer. For many within its boundaries, Glasgow was as much a prison as a home. The bars that confined them were the class system and, in almost every case, the lack of any viable alternative to a life of manual labour. The shipyards and the steelworks devoured the city’s young: I’d often wondered if Rotten Row, Glasgow’s appropriately named maternity hospital, simply put ‘apprentice’ instead of ‘boy’ on birth certificates.
Davey was an apprentice – an apprentice welder – working the morning shift in the shipyard. Started at fifteen and would most likely work there until he was sixty-five, by which time he would have given up his passion for Rock’n’Roll, probably because he’d be deaf from the constant riveting before he hit forty. But now, Davey Wallace, seventeen years old, parentless at seven, in an orphanage until fifteen, unmarried and with no kids yet to bind him further to an ineluctable industrial fate, escaped into the cinema every afternoon and Saturday night, where he would meet up with a different gang: Bogart, Cagney, Mitchum, Robinson, Mature.
When Davey had found out that I was a real-life enquiry agent, he had approached me in the bar like a Greek shepherd approaching Zeus. Since then, he had taken every opportunity to remind me that if I was ever looking for help …
‘Thanks for the pint, Mr Lennox.’
‘You’re welcome, Davey. Shouldn’t you be in bed? What about your early shift?’
‘I sleep in the afternoons, mostly.’ Then, as if correcting himself: ‘But I’m always available … you know, if you needed any help on one of your cases, Mr Lennox. I’m always here.’
I exchanged a look with Big Bob, who grinned.
‘Listen, Davey,’ I said. ‘It’s not like you think it is. It’s not like in the movies. There’s nothing glamorous about what I do for a living.’
His expression dulled. ‘You should try working down at the shipyards. Anything’s glamorous compared to that.’
‘Really,’ I grinned. ‘I would
Similar Books
