Water of Death by Paul Johnston Page B

flat. But it was all a bit mechanical.
    â€œHow about whisky? Frankie was a big fan of that.”
    She blinked involuntarily. “Whisky? We don’t keep any.”
    Marijuana clubs exist to supply soft drugs to the tourists. Even on these premises clients are restricted to three joints per person per day. The only alcohol they’re meant to sell is low-strength beer – known throughout the city as “Golden Drizzle” – so that the customers don’t get too wrecked. But it’s common knowledge in the guard that tourists with a big wallet can get anything they want.
    I decided to play with a concrete ball. “All right, Knox 42, here’s the story. Frankie Thomson’s dead.” I watched her closely but she was being a good auxiliary and impersonating a block of granite when tension mounts. “There’s a chance that he drank himself to death and I want to know where he got the whisky.”
    â€œCitizens earn vouchers for Supply Directorate spirits,” she said in a monotone. “Why do you think he got his whisky here?”
    I wasn’t planning on telling her about the bottles of the Ultimate Usquebaugh we’d found. “Look, Knox 42, we both know you get supplies of top-quality whisky for seriously loaded customers. Give me the paperwork, please.”
    She did. I made sure she stayed where she was while I went through it. It didn’t take long. She had only twenty-three bottles in stock, none of them with the same name as those in the dead man’s flat.
    â€œAre you sure there’s nothing more you can tell me about Frankie Thomson?” I said as I got up to go.
    Knox 42 shook her head slowly. “He was just a cleaner. He came in the morning, cleaned the bogs – not very well – and the tables and floors. He didn’t pilfer drink, he didn’t get his hands on reefer butts and he didn’t bring his friends in. I very much doubt that he had any friends, citizen.” She may well have been right; that squared with what Drem had told Davie.
    I went back out into the smoke and aural thunder zone. My side-kick was behind the bar writing in his notebook, a barman in a frizzy blond wig staring at him moodily.
    â€œAre you done?” I asked in as loud a voice as I could manage.
    He nodded. “Just about. I’ve checked the cellar and the rest of the rooms. They’ve got twenty-three bottles of the hard stuff, none called  . . .”
    I raised a finger to stop him just in case the barman could lip-read.
    A few minutes later we shouldered our way out past a group of excited Russian tourists with clippered hair and tattoos on their forearms. I was willing to bet that the stock of whisky was about to take a big hit. And that the rock chicks were in for a lot of sedentary bump and grind.
    The music had changed but not for the better. Now they were playing “Mistreated”.
    â€œWhat next?” Davie asked as we got back to the guard vehicle.
    â€œYou tell me.” My throat was dry and the walk had made me short of breath. Or perhaps my lungs had contracted something virulent from the atmosphere in the club.
    â€œThe archives again?”
    â€œWho’s a clever boy then? I want to see Frankie Thomson’s ordinary citizen file. Maybe we’ll strike lucky and find someone he used to get pissed with.”
    â€œAnd more likely we won’t.”
    â€œDon’t be so pessimistic.” I climbed in and beat him to the bottle under the driver’s seat.
    â€œBastard,” he said. “That’s my water.”
    I sluiced down my throat. “Now, now. Citizens and auxiliaries have equal rights in Edinburgh nowadays.” I handed him the bottle and watched as he tried to laugh and drink at the same time. Not many guard personnel took that line seriously.
    â€œRight?” Davie said, starting the engine. “You have the right to spend the rest of the day sweating in file