Stonemouth полностью

‘Yeah, I guess some people would,’ she agrees, eyes narrowing briefly. ‘So, no, not really. I mean, for about an hour after I got over the initial shock, I thought about how I could take over, run the business down, wean everybody off the hard stuff, blah-blah-blah, but…That’s never going to happen. For one thing, I don’t know that Murdo, Fraser and Norrie would have it: taking orders from me, I mean. And even if they did and you tried the whole running-down-the-illegal-side idea — and got them to agree to that, which is probably the least likely…proposition in any of this — and you got Mike Mac onside to do the same thing at the same time — which is probably less unlikely — you’d find demand being met by somebody else, somebody more ruthless, more profit driven. It’d be seen as a sign of weakness, too; you’d be taken over, sidelined at best, more likely found in a ditch one morning with a couple of bullets in your head.’

‘Fucking hell, El.’

‘Like I say: Murdo and the boys would want to keep going anyway, so it’d be kind of academic. What could I do? Murder my three remaining brothers so I have a clear run at a scheme that isn’t going to work anyway? Kill Mum first to spare her the grief? So of course I’m saying no. But Don’s even more unreconstructed than the boys are; can you imagine how little faith he must have in them as the heirs to the family firm if he’s seriously contemplating turning everything over to me?’ She blows her breath out again. ‘Thing is, I think Dad’s worried Murdo’s getting impatient, wanting him to stand aside, take a back seat; leave him, Fraser and Norrie to run things.’ She shakes her head. ‘Stewart, my family has as good as run this town for nearly a quarter of a century and in a bizarre kind of way we can be proud of how we’ve done, but in the end…it’s still based on nothing more than the threat of violence and the market for drugs. For all his faults it’s been Dad who’s held it all together and exercised the restraint required, but there’s no…no rightful authority, no democratic control, no oversight or checks and balances, no…It’s all…There’s no legitimacy. Violence and a market just mean…nothing. And I can’t see Murdo or the twins acting with any restraint at all, not once it’s all theirs. They think they’re ambitious and they talk about expansion and they use phrases like “grow the market”, but …’ She shakes her head again, lapses into silence.

Shit, what the hell am I supposed to say?

‘Maybe the law’ll change before it comes to any of that,’ I suggest. ‘Maybe it’ll all get legalised and you can turn legit, or just go back to running the property and transport businesses.’

Ellie shakes her head. ‘Maybe. Who knows. Maybe it’ll turn out our politicians aren’t all cowards or on the take.’

‘Aye, well, put like that, I wouldn’t hold your breath.’

She shrugs. ‘Things change, though. People are taking fewer drugs. Dad makes as much money through fake fags these days as he does from the properly banned stuff. Not sure any of us saw that coming, though we should have.’

‘Really?’

‘Ha! A packet of fags costs a pound fifty to make and six-fifty to buy, legit. You could charge half-price and still coin it in, not that Dad or Mike Mac are that generous, or stupid; it’d be like opening a discount warehouse for crims across Scotland.’

‘I had no idea.’

She nods. ‘Half the fags in the Toun — even more of the loose tobacco — never trouble Customs and Excise with the bother of collecting the revenue. It’d be a hundred per cent if the cops could live with it, but at that level even the doziest journo’s going to scratch their heads and think, Wait a minute …’

I do the cheeks-full, breath-blowing-out thing too.

After a while I say, ‘Course, there’s always Grier.’ I look for a reaction but El’s just staring ahead. ‘She might be up for it.’

‘Careful,’ El says, ‘for you tread upon my nightmares.’

I can’t help laughing. ‘She wouldn’t.’ I think about it. ‘Would she?’

El smiles. ‘No, she wouldn’t. And the boys certainly wouldn’t take orders from her. Plus, knowing Grier, this would be too small beer for her anyway. Too local, too limited, too…legacy-ridden. Mostly, though, too not all her own work.’

‘Do you two not get on at all, then?’

‘We get on fine,’ El says, almost indignant. ‘When we meet up.’ She shrugs. ‘We just take some care to make sure we don’t meet up too often.’

A hare darts across the road five metres in front of us and we do the first part of an emergency stop, tyres chirping, then the hare’s gone, missed by a half-metre or so — I catch a glimpse of it in the side mirror, leaping into the heather — and we’re accelerating smartly away again.

‘Fairly easy these days anyway,’ El says. ‘She’s never home. Posing naked on some tropical beach, as a rule. Which is what she’s supposed to be doing at the moment, of course. We did miss that hare, didn’t we?’

‘We did.’

‘Yeah. Good. Didn’t feel a bump.’

‘“Supposed to be”?’