Tooth for a Tooth Read Online Free PDF

council house on Tom Morris Drive, south of the West Port. The garden either side of the slabbed path looked neat and tidy, but on closer inspection had about it the look of an old man’s face after shaving in the dark.
    Sammy answered the door wearing a worn woollen coat and flat cap, its tip finger-blackened smooth. For a moment he struggled for recognition, then showed his false teeth. ‘It’s yourself, son,’ he said. ‘In yous come.’
    ‘Were you going out?’ asked Gilchrist.
    ‘Naw. The bloody place is freezing. Have to wear a coat to keep the heating bills down.’ He turned and stepped down the hall, his voice echoing, thickened with phlegm. ‘Scandalous, so it is, the bloody price of stuff.’ He gave a cough that seemed to shake his body to his toes. ‘Can hardly afford to buy myself a bloody half these days.’
    Gilchrist walked along a dark hallway redolent of burned toast. Doors lay opened to bedrooms long since transformed into storage rooms. Cardboard boxes, plastic crates, clothes folded badly, rows of leather boots, shoes, half a library of paperbacks, bicycles by the dozen, littered the floors and climbed the walls. In the far corner by a curtained window he glimpsed a scythe, its curved wooden handle grey with age.
    They followed Sammy into a room with drawn curtains. The floor was cramped from more junk, except for a cleared space in the middle of a threadbare carpet. A television sat on an upturned milk crate, a wire aerial perched on top. A fuzzy black-and-white picture filled its screen, faced by a wooden chair with a single cushion.
    ‘I’d offer you a seat. But I’ve only got the one.’
    ‘We’re used to standing,’ said Gilchrist.
    ‘Do yous golf?’
    Gilchrist followed Sammy’s gaze to a bundle of knotted plastic bags on the floor that bulged with the pimpled swelling of what had to be hundreds of golf balls.
    ‘A way to make some spare cash, son, without the taxman knowing. I walk the golf courses, like. But I’m no stupid. I know where to look. See?’ He tapped the side of his head. ‘Gives me money for beer.’
    ‘How much do you sell them for?’ Stan asked.
    ‘Three for a pound. Thirty-five pee each.’
    Stan peered at the rows of bags. ‘Any Titleist Pro V-1s?’
    ‘Aye, son. But they’re a good ball.’ Sammy coughed again, a heavy burst of phlegm that had Gilchrist thinking the old man had pneumonia. From a box behind him, Sammy pulled out another plastic bag. ‘I have to charge fifty pee each for these ones, son. That’s two for a pound. Take as many as you like.’
    Stan took hold of the bag.
    ‘While Tiger’s going through the stash,’ Gilchrist said, ‘I’d like to ask a few questions. We’re here about Hamish McLeod’s funeral.’
    Sammy scowled. ‘I hope they make as much fuss about my funeral as they’re making about that miserable old sod’s.’
    ‘What was your relationship to Hamish?’
    ‘I wisnae related to—’
    ‘I know that, Sammy. But why did you go to his funeral?’
    ‘As a mark of respect, like.’
    ‘I thought you didn’t like him.’
    ‘It wisnae out of respect for that thieving bastard,’ growled Sammy, his eyes taking on a distant look. ‘It was for Lorella. She was a fine-looking woman, son,’ he said, and stared at some spot on the wall.
    Gilchrist thought he now understood the reason for Sammy’s dislike of Hamish. He waited until the old man’s gaze returned to him with a couple of blinks, as if surprised to find he was still alive. ‘We’re trying to establish the names of everyone who attended the funeral. Could I ask you to go through them again?’
    ‘I done that last night, son.’
    ‘Maybe a name or two came back to you in your dreams.’ He tapped Stan on the arm. Stan pulled out his notebook.
    Sammy shut his eyes and recited each name in turn, Stan ticking them off as he did so. The old man’s eyes flickered as if watching some action on the back of paper-thin eyelids, each name followed by a nod. At