Dark Briggate Blues Read Online Free PDF Page B

connect me to the crime.’
    ‘So why use my gun?’ He realised he was barely breathing. He was a minnow swimming next to a shark.
    ‘I never claimed anyone did, Mr Markham,’ Carter corrected him. ‘If you think back, I never said that at all. Your gun disappeared, shall we say, and a man was shot. I’ll leave you to guess whether those two events are connected.’ He frowned. ‘But a wrong guess could be fatal, of course.’
    ‘So what do you want from me besides co-operation?’
    ‘You did well during your National Service, I understand. They wanted you to stay on in military intelligence. Someone like that can be an asset to my business. You have a mind, Mr Markham. That’s what I was told. I can use a good mind. The only thing I did was put you in a position where you can’t refuse.’
    ‘What if I go to the police and tell them all this?’ he asked.
    ‘Then a certain weapon appears. As simple as that. Do you really want to gamble that your weapon wasn’t connected to a crime?’ He raised an eyebrow.
    For a long time the only sounds were the clatter of glasses and the low murmur of voices from the bar.
    He sighed. ‘Like you said, I’m in no position to refuse.’
    ‘I’m glad you see it my way, Mr Markham. Martyrs are such tedious people. I’ll be in touch very soon. I have a use in mind for you.’
    ***
    His first thought was to run. To leave Leeds and never come back. But the gun would appear and the police would find him. Or he could do what Carter wanted, whatever use for him the man might find.
    No. It was as simple as that. No one was going to use him. He was going to fight back. And he was going to beat the bastard, whatever it took.
    ***
    For the most part Markham steered clear of pubs. He rarely drank, he’d never seen the joy in them. But by eight he was standing in the public bar of the General Elliott, squashed between men wanting their orders filled, voices loud next to his ear. The place was full, a thick fug of smoke hanging beneath the stained ceiling.
    Michael Doughty was sitting alone on the other side of the room, huddled into a booth where the red velvet had worn away from the seats. He was a man who heard all and said nothing unless someone paid him. Words seemed to find their way to him, names, places and dates, every one of them lodged in his head.
    He was barely noticeable, so ordinary that eyes passed over him, but that was how he liked to be. Doughty always wore a cap, and with an old shirt, a jacket that was frayed at cuffs and heavy boots, he looked exactly like a working man who’d just finished his shift, bags sitting heavy under tired eyes. The only giveaway was his clean, soft hands. A flat pint of mild sat on the table in front of him. Markham put another beside it and Doughty looked up.
    ‘Slumming it?’ he asked with a smile.
    ‘I was looking for you.’
    ‘Come to cross my palm with silver?’ He always seemed amused by life, the working man who dressed the part but made a living from secrets and tales. A hidden man. ‘I hear you’re in trouble.’
    ‘Don’t believe everything people tell you.’
    ‘Oh, I don’t, Mr Markham. I’m too long in the game for that. But this is from a very good source.’
    ‘I’m here, aren’t I? It can’t be too bad.’
    ‘We’ll still make it cash, if you don’t mind. What do you need?’
    ‘David Carter.’
    Doughty sucked on his dentures.
    ‘If he’s giving you problems, then you’d do right to be worried.’
    ‘How much?’
    ‘A quid,’ the man said after consideration. ‘That’ll get you everything I know.’
    Markham opened his wallet and took out a pound note. In a second it had vanished into Doughty’s pocket.
    ‘Well?’
    ‘I don’t know where he’s from, so there’s no point in asking. Posh, though, you can tell that. Started out here about nine months ago. You remember Nat Early? He ran that club down on Wellington Street.’
    ‘The Kit Kat?’
    ‘That’s the one. All of a sudden he had a