‘What can I say, Harry? The little sod was just too quick for me. I’m not as young—’
‘Yeah, yeah,’ said Harry with a curt wave of the hand. ‘He’s not that important anyway. But if Porridge Boy loses the tart as well, I’m twenty-five grand down the toilet.’
He returned his attention to scouring the street for any sign of MacFarland and the woman, and Delia wandered over to the room service trolley and picked up one of the two remaining pints of lager. He took a sip and then removed the aluminium lid from one of the plates. He eyed the panini, chips and onion rings with suspicion and tried a chip. As he’d suspected, it was stone cold.
‘’Ang on a minute. What the…?’
At the sound of Harry’s voice, Delia replaced the lid over the food and looked up. Harry had his right cheek pressed against the window and was wiping his condensed breath from the glass with his sleeve. He seemed to be straining to get a better view of something which was on the edge of his range of vision.
‘He’s only sat on a bench ‘avin’ a good old chat with some bloody tramp,’ said Harry, his voice distorted by the pressure of the glass on the side of his mouth.
‘Who? Mac?’ Delia joined Harry at the window and pushed his own face against the glass, scanning the area outside until he spotted the bench in question.
* * *
‘Where the fuck ’ave you been?’ said Harry when MacFarland hobbled into the room. ‘More to the point, where’s the tart with my twenty-five grand?’
MacFarland hopped to the nearest bed and slumped, his face contorted in pain as he massaged his foot. ‘She got away. Sorry, boss.’
‘What’s the matter with your foot?’ said Delia.
‘Stupid bitch ran over it.’
‘Never mind his bloody foot. Just tell me she didn’t get away with my money.’
‘Believe me, boss. I only wish I could.’
‘Jesus wept,’ said Harry and slapped his palm hard against his forehead. ‘So you wanna tell me how a big tough Glaswegian hardman like you managed to get shafted by some bloody tart – and an unarmed bloody tart at that?’
MacFarland opened his mouth to speak, but Harry motioned him to silence. ‘And while you’re at it, you might want to put some serious thought into givin’ me one good reason why I shouldn’t separate you from your precious meat and two veg with a fucking chainsaw.’
By the time Harry finished the sentence, his voice had increased in volume to such an extent that he was screaming like a jet engine on full thrust. His face had turned a vivid shade of crimson, and every visible vein seemed to have more than doubled in size.
MacFarland swallowed. ‘Thing is, boss,’ he said, ‘it wasnae just her. The wee bawbag was there too. I couldnae figure out why ye’d let him go.’
Delia couldn’t remember ever having seen Harry flustered before – or even mildly embarrassed – so his reaction on this occasion was one to be treasured in the memory. He transformed the beginnings of a smirk into a cough as Harry said, ‘Never mind that. Just… just get on with it.’
Taking a deep breath, MacFarland explained how he’d gone with the woman to her car and about the tricks she’d used to try and escape. When they’d got to the car, he’d kept his gun on her while she’d opened the glove compartment, which is where she’d said the money was. The next thing he knew, the dog tried to take a chunk out of him and—
‘Dog? What dog?’
‘She had a dog in the back o’ the car. Big bastard too. Teeth like ye’ve never seen.’ He went on to describe in some detail how the dog had launched itself at him and the woman had used the distraction to grab a pistol from the glove box. By then, the dog had MacFarland’s gun arm clamped between its massive jaws, so the weapon was useless. With his free hand he’d knocked the dog unconscious with an uppercut and, at exactly the same time, lashed out with his foot and sent the woman’s gun flying. But just when he’d thought he’d got the situation back under control, he’d felt a heavy blow to the back of his head. ‘I must’ve been out for a coupla seconds because when I came to, the bastards were driving off. That’s when they ran over ma bloody foot.’
As if to reinforce the point, he bent down to give it a rub, although Delia suspected this was simply a sham to avoid Harry’s piercing stare. There was a lengthy pause, the only sound coming from Harry cracking his knuckles, one… by one… by one…
‘So ‘ow d’you know it was our bloke that jumped yer?’ Harry said at last.