Butcher by Campbell Armstrong Read Free Book Online

him facing the bowler’s end of the lane. Danny struggled fiercely but pointlessly against the ropes. Chuck removed the blindfold without looking into Turpie’s eyes. The men, having stewed too long in the adrenalin of delayed violence, hurried back to the top of the lane and picked up dusty old bowling balls from racks.
    Chuck had done a lot of violence when he was a younger man, but he’d lost the appetite for it and, besides, there were problematic questions involved – when you hurt somebody for their stupid obstinacy, what were the repercussions in the greater scheme? For example: did you fuck up your own reincarnation?
    I’m no comin back as a silkworm, no way.
    He looked on. He had no choice. He couldn’t show weakness in front of the big men. They were a cunning gang with predatory instincts, and if they caught a whiff of vulnerability in their Boss, they began to lose respect. He’d still be the Big Man, sure, but there would be noticeable differences – the men would be slightly less responsive in obeying orders, or they’d talk behind his back and clam up dead silent as soon as he approached.
    Worst case, they might begin plotting against him.
    So he was tough. Because he had to be.
    He watched the black bowling balls thunder down the lane at great speed. They screamed toward Danny, and clattered into his face, skull, groin, knees. Danny shouted a couple of times. A few gutterballs missed him completely, small mercies. A second fusillade began. The balls racketed and vibrated and kept coming, ten, twenty, more, black cannon-balls. Danny’s leather jacket was scarlet and blood puddled around him.
    Chuck said, ‘That’s enough, boys.’
    He walked to where Turpie lay and nudged him with his foot.
    Turpie didn’t move.
    Chuck stared at the mass of flesh formerly Danny’s head. Shattered nose, hair matted like red webbing, eyes shut, mouth wide. Danny was deid .
    He glanced at his crew with a look of recrimination, then gazed back down at Turpie. How come Stoker, himself dead and buried, could maintain such loyalty from beyond the grave? You had to admire the fortitude of Danny Turpie’s vow, if not his obstinacy. He wondered if any of his boys would do for him what Turpie had done for Stoker. He had his doubts.
    â€˜Clean and lock up before you leave, boys.’ He walked away from Turpie and in frustration kicked the jukebox and it cranked into action. An old Lonnie Donegan tune played: ‘Nobody’s Child’. He kicked the jukebox again but the song wouldn’t quit.
    Somebody said, ‘Mental wee cunt, Turpie. Always a heidcase.’
    Chuck stepped outside. The night rain had stopped and the air smelled clean. He thought about the access numbers to Bram Stoker’s bank accounts, and how they’d died with Danny Turpie. Mibbe.
    Ronnie Mathieson, tinted glasses, jaw as smooth as glass, drove Chuck in the Jaguar to the Number One Fitness Centre, situated in a small business park in Crossmyloof, south of the river. Chuck paused before he got out and turned to Mathieson.
    â€˜The bank’s the Clydesdale, Ronnie,’ he said. ‘The branch on Buchanan Street. Find out who runs it.’
    â€˜Will do.’
    As Chuck climbed the steps to the aquamarine glass doors of the Fitness Centre he was struck by the realization of how many more interests he had than before. Apart from an upmarket bistro and a chain of health spas and a factory supplying bootleg Aberdeen Angus beef, all of which were in his possession before the deaths of Curdy and Stoker and their various underlings, he now found himself the owner of a fleet of buses equipped for the transportation of the handicapped, a squadron of taxis and minicabs, several brothels, a casino, an underground pharmaceutical concern geared to produce E and speed and assorted designer drugs, a textile company in need of reorganization, plus four boutique hotels scattered throughout