The Hanging Shed by Gordon Ferris

Author:Gordon Ferris [Ferris, Gordon]
Language: eng
Format: epub, mobi
Tags: Fiction, Mystery, Historical fiction
ISBN: 9781848877689
Publisher: Corvus
Published: 2007-01-02T00:00:00+00:00

TWENTY-SIX

I was at the counter of the Council offices at nine o’clock the next morning. They were helpful in that chatty-I’ll-no’-be-a-minute way that forces you to take a seat and wait till you’ve properly acknowledged the onerous nature of your demand before they hand over the information. Just when I’d reached the last stage of hopelessness and was contemplating throwing my chair over the counter, the clerk came back with the information I’d asked for. But it wasn’t what I’d wanted. The car was owned by a privately held company: Ireland Scotland Shippers. The clerk went the extra distance – it seemed like Edinburgh and back – and found out for me that it was an export/import company headquartered in Glasgow and owned in turn by another unlisted company owned by a certain Miss Elizabeth Reilly.

‘She’s the wife of one of Gerrit Slattery’s henchmen,’ said Sam, putting the phone down in her crammed office. She’d phoned the organisation that registers private and public companies in Scotland. ‘There are no accounts or other company information because it’s not a publicly listed company.’

‘And if I recall, Gerrit Slattery is—’

‘The brother of Dermot, yes.’

‘What else do you know about these characters? I heard of them �€€t, yeer …when I was in Tobago Street nick, but never came across them directly. Just some of their underlings. It was a running joke that if we couldn’t solve a particular crime then we blamed the Slatterys.’

‘Well, you know they’re Irish. Lived in Glasgow for years. They shared a huge house with their mother up in Bearsden. She’s dead now, and not such a happy family, apparently. They say Dermot, the elder brother, did time in Belfast for killing his father. Some sort of drunken fight, I imagine. When he got out, the brothers came here and used their muscle to set up a thriving drugs trade with sidelines in extortion and business insurance – with menaces.’

‘Well, at least we’ve made a connection with the missing Mrs Reid.’ I looked at her arching eyebrows. ‘I know, I know. It’s tenuous and doesn’t prove anything. But we know we’re on the right track.’

Sam ran her hands through her short blond hair and then thrust them out at me as though pushing me away. Which she was.

‘Brodie, I need to prepare this case or we’re going into court next Monday equipped with only a charming smile and a silent prayer. It’s over to you on the follow-up front. What’s your next step?’

‘Maybe it’s high time I visited the brothers Karamazov? Oh, and checked with our local sleuths how far they’ve got with the murder of Patrick Cassidy. Lastly …’ I paused at this; the prospect wasn’t something that made me glad and happy. ‘I’ll try to have a word with Fiona McAuslan.’

Sam looked quizzically at me over her glasses. ‘I assume you mean Hutchinson? Is that wise? What will you get from her?’

The question made me feel guilty. Which was ridiculous. ‘I haven’t the faintest idea. But no stone

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