“I was hoping I was mistaken,” Doyle said after Ian explained the note. “But how the devil did she know what I was going to say?”
“Evidently she knows you better than you think,” Ian replied, slipping the note into his waistcoat pocket.
“It’s easy enough to confirm her story about the emergency, so I imagine she is telling the truth. Even so—”
“We’ll speak nae mere on it,” Ian said, imitating his aunt’s Glaswegian dialect. “Are you thirsty?”
“I thought you’d never ask.”
Opening the roof hatch, Ian called out to the driver.
The man’s face appeared in the opening. “Where to, sir?”
“The White Hart, please.”
“Right you are, sir,” he said, and the cab rattled off into the night.
Edinburgh taverns were hardly temples of propriety, but the White Hart was one of the more respectable ones, popular with university students and professors alike. It also catered to a somewhat rougher crowd, and late-night carousing was not uncommon. The evening was young when Ian and Doyle arrived, and the rowdier elements had not yet arrived. They selected a table in the back, and as they walked toward it, Ian caught a flash of movement out of the corner of his eye. He turned just in time to catch Terrance McNee, a.k.a. Rat Face, slipping out the back door.
“Excuse me a moment,” he said to Doyle, darting back through the front entrance and down the narrow close along the side of the building. Short of climbing the fence behind the pub, his quarry was trapped. As McNee turned the corner into the alley in his attempt to escape, he could not hide his expression of astonishment at seeing Ian.
“Fancy meeting you here,” he said with an unconvincing smile.
“Would you like to explain yourself?” Ian said, barring his way.
McNee cleared his throat and looked around nervously. “Ah, yes, sorry about that. I found myself with a second engagement the other night, and no time to contact you.”
“Why don’t you save us both time and tell me what really happened.”
The little man swallowed nervously. “Perhaps another time. I really must—”
“I’m afraid I must insist,” Ian said, grasping him by the collar. “The two gentlemen who did show up gave me a beating, and might have done worse had I not escaped.”
“Oh, dear,” said Rat Face. “That is most unfortunate.”
“Why did you not show up for our meeting?”
“As I said, I was overbooked—”
“It was your idea in the first place.”
“Alas, something pressing came up at the last minute.”
“Did you know I was to be attacked?”
“I swear I didn’t.”
“What, then? What frightened you so much that you decided not to come?”
“Please,” Rat Face said. “You don’t know what you’re asking.”
“Tell me, then.”
He looked around furtively.
“No one is watching us,” said Ian.
“The walls have ears,” Rat Face said weakly.
“What is it, Mr. McNee? What has happened?”
He licked his thin lips. “There is . . . how can I say it? A change in the criminal community, a new . . . presence, I suppose you would call it, that no one seems to be able to identify, and yet its effect is felt everywhere.”
“Is it a person?”
“No one knows. It seems to be a unifying force of some kind that knows all, sees all, and is bent on controlling what happens in the criminal world.”
“Is there a new gang in town? One of the Glasgow crews, perhaps?”
“I think not. It would be impossible to hide an entire group of people.”
“A man, then?”
“It could hardly be a woman, but as I said, no one seems to have actually seen him. And yet his effect is felt everywhere—he gives orders, instructions, warnings.”
“He must have lieutenants.”
“They all claim never to have actually seen him.”
“They are lying. Someone has seen him.”
“If they have, they are not admitting it.”
“So why did you not come to our meeting?”
“I received a warning not to show.”
“How did you know it was from him?”
“I knew.”
“Do you have the warning note?”
Rat Face shook his head. “There was no note. The message was whispered to me as I walked along a narrow close such as this one, but when I turned to look, there was no one in sight.”
“Do you believe he was responsible for the attack on me?”
Rat Face squirmed uncomfortably. “Please don’t ask me anything further. I could be in danger just from speaking with you.”
“You have Jimmy Snead to protect you.”
“He’s no match for—”
“For what, McNee?”
“A Glasgow smile wouldn’t be very becoming on me, I’m afraid,” he said with a nervous little laugh. Ian could smell fear oozing like sweat from his pores.
“So he’s behind Nate Crippen’s death?”
“What do you think?”
“What about Brian McKinney?” said Ian.
“What about him?”
“He’s dead.”
McNee’s eyes widened. “What? How?”
“Smothered in his own bed.”
He gave a rodent-like squeak. “I know nothing of that, I swear.”
“Why did you want to meet me yesterday? What did you intend to tell me?”
“I really must be off,” Rat Face said, wrenching himself from Ian’s grasp.
Realizing the man would tell him nothing further, Ian stepped aside to let him pass. As he watched him scurry down the street, he pondered what or who could terrify an entire community of thieves, blackguards, and rogues.
CHAPTER FORTY-THREE
The girl was a mistake. He knew it moments after it happened. He had lost control, which was something he had vowed never to do. He had succumbed to anger, his privacy violated by her nosiness. Ordinary human emotions were his enemy, something he had foolishly forgotten in the heat of the moment. He would not make that mistake again. He did not enjoy killing—or so he told himself—but he had an overwhelming need to maintain control, a drive so deep he could not separate it from other, more basic needs like eating or sleeping. Years ago, he would have included women in that list, but he had weaned himself from them, training himself away from the pull of sexual attraction. Not because he was without desire, or even because it had proved disastrous in his life, but because it was another step away from total control. To desire a woman was to become vulnerable, to put oneself in her power, and that was a step into chaos.
He would have weaned himself from food and drink, if he could, but as that was impossible, he ate sparely and drank only occasionally. As for sleep, he had never needed much of it, fortunately, and had conditioned himself to function with even less. Tobacco was the one pleasure he allowed—it sharpened his mind and senses. He was as close to a purely cerebral being as was humanly possible, he thought as he closed the heavy drapes just far enough so he could peer out of the flat’s tall windows, but no one could see in.