“Bloody hell. You haven’t changed a bit,” the older of the two men announced. “You’re Billy Neeps.”

“Ha! No. Well, yes. Well, not for a long time,” Billy said. He stood up. His glasses, which he’d pushed up onto his head while he worked on the fiddly close-up stuff, fell and landed on his nose with a mildly amusing thunk.

It hadn’t been deliberate. He hadn’t meant for it to happen. Things like that just happened on their own to Billy Neeps.

Whether it was his trousers splitting at precisely the wrong moment, his shoes inexplicably developing a high-pitched squeak that only appeared during funerals, or that time he’d found himself hurtling down Douglas Street on a carelessly placed skateboard, Billy was tormented by that sort of thing on a daily basis. It was a curse of some kind, he was sure of it. If there was a god of unintentional slapstick, Billy often thought he must have done something to really get on his tits.

“Sorry, you are?” he asked.

The older and much larger of the men produced a wallet with an ID card inside. “My name’s Detective Chief Inspector Jack Logan,” he said, confirming what had already been quite a firm suspicion on Billy’s part. “Do you mind if we take up half an hour of your time, Mr Pinnock?”

“Uh, well…”

“It’s quite important. I’m afraid we’ve got some bad news to give you.”

Billy started to sit, but stopped himself in the nick of time. He checked behind him. Sure enough, his chair had rolled away when he stood up. That was a close one.

“Oh, dear. That’s a shame,” he said, pulling the chair back into position beneath him. He managed to lower himself onto it without any embarrassing incidents. “Then, of course. Please… go ahead.”

“It might be best if we maybe go somewhere more private,” the policeman suggested. “Or at least lock the door?”

“You can if you like,” Billy said. “But nobody comes in, anyway. You’re the first drop-in I’ve had in weeks.” He fished out his keys and placed them on the counter between them. “But, by all means, go ahead. Just… just… What is this all about?”

The DCI picked up the keys, considered them, then set them back down again. “Tell me, Mr Pinnock,” he said. “When was the last time you saw Archie Sutherland?”

* * *

Back up the road in Fort William, Hamza was trying to figure out where the money had come from. This had involved several thus far fruitless calls to various banking officials, none of whom had been of any help whatsoever.

“We’re going to have to kick this one up the chain I think, sir,” he announced, slamming down the phone after arguing with yet another complete and utter banker. “They are ‘not prepared to give out any information at this time.’”