‘Jesus Christ. If you have any other contributions to make, keep them to yourself.’

‘Sorry I bothered.’

‘Let’s just get on with it – shall we?’

‘That’s it!’

‘That’s what?’

‘Charlie Brewster. He used to have this saying: “the hotter the war the sooner the peace”.’

‘What?’

‘It sort of means that the darkest part of the night is just before the dawn, I think. It will get worse before it gets better. That sort of thing.’

‘And how does this help me to cross-examine Mr Thomson?’

‘Not directly, perhaps. But it makes you think. Doesn’t it?’

‘Donald, have you ever thought of becoming a philosopher?’

‘Not really, no.’

‘Very wise!’

An hour into his cross-examination, James Muirhead was getting nowhere fast. Barclay Thomson resolutely maintained that he knew what he had seen. He had an uninterrupted view of the incident. He had the gunman in sight for about a minute. He had a good opportunity to see his face. He may have been tired, having been up all night, but he recognised the man he saw. Not quite the minute he saw him but certainly by the time he turned away from the car after the bangs. He had not been alarmed at that stage because he thought he was watching the making of some television programme.

By the time he phoned the police he realised he had witnessed something very serious and that he knew one of the people responsible. He was quite confident about his identification. He had been at the same secondary school as Gallagher. They were in the same year and had attended the same classes. No, they were not friends, but there had never been any problems between them. He did not like him, did not dislike him. His feelings were entirely neutral.

He readily accepted that he had not spoken to Gallagher since their school days, but he had seen him in and around Glasgow and was in no doubt that he knew who he was and that he had been the man with the gun. He was quite confident he was not mistaken.

The atmosphere in the court had taken on rather a different character. Lord Cowden was sitting back in his chair. He had long since put down his fountain pen. For once in this case Muirhead was producing nothing which was worthy of noting.

Gallagher was becoming increasingly agitated. He sat hunched forward in the dock, his hands tightly clasped in front of him. At several aspects of Thomson’s evidence, he vigorously shook his head. He avoided any eye contact with the witness. He knew that if he looked at this bastard in the witness box he would explode. If he could just get his hands round his throat he would get the truth out of him – then kill him. He was fighting an internal battle to hold on to his self-control. He also wanted to tell his useless fucking QC what he thought of him. The guy in the witness box was trying to bury him and his lawyer was doing nothing about it. For the first time in the trial, the Advocate Depute looked relaxed and confident. There were no skeletons in Thomson’s cupboard. There could surely be no suggestion that he had been got at. On the face of it, he was an independent eye-witness and the fact that he actually knew the accused was a bonus. And what a bonus.