Mission: Barry

I plug in a CD. Barry Manilow. I write the songs that make the whole world sing… Great song. I sing along as I wait. Some people say Barry sucks but I think he’s great. Lovely voice, real feeling in it, yeah? So there I am, singing along to ‘I Write the Songs’ and ‘Copacabana’ and then I get out the car and shoot the guy.

Yeah, ‘I shoot the guy’. It makes it sound simple, a job any ordinary nine to five Joe could do. But this job isn’t easy; it’s an art and a science. There’s the art of tailing someone; getting to know their habits and hangouts; picking the place and the time for the hit; choosing the right equipment.

Yeah, the equipment. That’s where the science comes in. It’s not like the movies, using a cool gun that you carry in an attaché case and then piece together just before you kill the guy. You choose the weapon to suit the job and you hide it good - in your luggage, in the car, in some bathroom somewhere. I have one that can fit inside a walking boot. Whatever weapon you select, you have to be able to use it, yeah, but also maintain it, repair it, take care of it.

So I shoot the guy, like I say. When I get back to the car I see there’s a message on my cellphone. Another job somebody wants done. Might involve travelling to Europe. I didn’t know it then, but the job would take me to Scotland. Back then I didn’t know where the hell that was.

I switch on the hi fi again. Mandy. Beautiful, just beautiful.

Barry - he writes the songs, it’s what he does.

Me? I shoot guys. That’s what I do.

Oooooh, Mandy...

Last Christmas

I’m no Scrooge, don’t think that. I don’t hate Christmas itself. No, it’s the overture to Christmas that really irritates me. It’s ‘overture’ I mean, isn’t it? The thing that comes before the main thing?

You know how it starts. Quite early in November, when there are still bangs and whooshes from fireworks every night, go into any shop and, with the entire oeuvre (if that’s the word I mean) of Sir Paul McCartney to choose from - say, Yesterday, Eleanor Rigby, Penny Lane or Maybe I’m Amazed - the one that hurls out of the speakers is Wonderful Christmastime. The schedules of Channel 5 (not that I ever watch it) clog up with heartwarming made-for-TV American family Christmas films (‘Ghost Santa’) and I turn up at Newlandsfield for a perfectly ordinary Pollok v Petershill league match and find half the crowd in Santa hats and Noddy Holder bawling ‘Merry Christmas!’ over the PA like he’s challenging me to a fight.

Then, when you think it must be nearly all over, you realise that it’s just December 15th. More than a week to actual Christmas.

Oh, I forgot to say, I’m Malky Kennedy. Or, officially, Professor Malcolm Kennedy, Head of the Faculty of Applied Life Sciences at the University of South Glasgow (Your Learning, Your Degree, Your Life). I’m held by some - including, happily, my bosses - to be something of an authority on forensic science. A handbook I wrote, DNA Profiling - Methods and Procedures is widely used by police forces in the UK and abroad. Or, at least, lots of them have it sitting on a shelf somewhere.

On this particular December 15th, I had already waved goodbye and Merry Christmas to most of my academic colleagues. The university was nearly empty of students and I was in my office catching up with paperwork, admin and the like. It’s a funny thing about colleges and universities; if you turn out to be any good at lecturing they take you away from it, put you in charge of people who aren’t as good at it and give you paperwork and make you go to lots of meetings.

I wanted to get my university work finished so that I was free to enjoy the nativity festivities, but I also had something else I needed time to think about. On the weekend before Christmas I had been asked to go to a Langlands Parish Church of Scotland houseparty thing. No, I’m not one of the God Squad but a friend of mine is, and then some, and it’s him I need to introduce to you. You’d never believe me if I told you what he was like so it’s better for me to show you. And, conveniently, it was as I laboured away in my office in the growing gloom of a Glasgow December afternoon that he breezed into the room.

Tall, gaunt and bony, Revd Melville Wodrow Knox was clean-shaven and had a matching, gleaming, immaculately-shaved cranium. He wore a plain dark suit with a clerical collar. He always did. Knox was ages with me - early fifties, since you ask - but had the air of a much older man from a much earlier age. I liked to think, anyway.

He sat on the chair across the desk from me with a mournful expression like he was visiting a kirk member whose life was ebbing away. ‘Malky, I wonder if you are free to discuss your input to the Langlands Church Nativity Away Weekend?’

Yes - ‘Nativity Away Weekend’. That’s what the thing was called.

‘Knox, I’m kind of in the middle of stuff, here. Couldn’t you and Margaret come round for coffee some evening and we’ll discuss your church jolly?’

‘Oh,’ he shook his head, ‘it won’t be jolly.’

‘I bet it won’t.’

A silence fell - and this was quite a trick for silence - with an audible thud.

‘I would simply ask that you speak for a short while to our younger teenagers, and give them some insight into the opportunities available for them in Higher Education, also answering their questions.’

‘Yes, Knox, I knew that, and if you come round when I’m not busy you can explain how many of them there are likely to be, what their predominant interests are and so on, and I’ll gear the talk towards them…’

‘Of course, you and Jane and the twins are all welcome to join us for the entire weekend, including your accommodation and food.’

‘I know that, Knox, I’ve already signed on the dotted line and everything.’

He was there for an hour before I could get rid of him, and even then I had to pack up and drive him home. And so, on a Friday evening not long before Christmas, I found myself driving Jane somewhere out beyond Milngavie, beyond the Campsie Fells, to a restored country house that wasn’t near anywhere or anything. The twins had opted out (‘Like no way! We are so not going to some mad church thing!’) and were off staying with respective school friends.

A brown tourist sign led off the Aberfoyle road towards ‘Glenkillearn Christian Centre’. As we followed the driveway through the trees a view of an enormous, hideously gothic pile, garishly floodlit, opened up. In the entrance hall, a desk was set up and a couple of cheerful middle-aged ladies registered us (yes, including name badges fixed with a safety pin) and directed us to our rooms. For we weren’t staying together.

I found my room, and opened the door which was not only unlocked but didn’t have a lock. I had guessed by now. I was in a room smelling of stale sweat and feet furnished only with six one-up one-down bunks and some storage drawers. There were also some seats and about eight men were tightly gathered in a circle over by the bay window, seated round a low table. There was a murmur of voices.

I dropped my luggage on the floor and felt strangely heartened. It couldn’t be such a starchy Presbyterian event if several of my room-mates were already involved in a card school. I went over said, ‘Hi, I’m Malky - any chance of dealing me in?’ but even as I spoke I realised my mistake.

One of the men, still leaning forward, said, loudly, ‘Amen, Lord, amen!’ and the rest followed suit. They all unbent and turned towards me. ‘Ah, Professor Kennedy,’ said a small, balding man in a shiny suit and a Rotarian tie, ‘Revd Knox told us to expect you!’

Jane’s a geology lecturer at Strathclyde and is used to living rough when she’s out in the wilds looking at stones and things, but this was a dreadful throwback for me, back to Youth Hostelling days, sharing a room with a dozen or more strangers, snoring and sniffing and farting keeping you awake all night.

Actually, the days at Glenkillearn weren’t bad and there were lots of activities - a ropes course, orienteering you could do at a walk, that sort of thing. But as it bucketed rain all of Saturday everyone stayed in and drank coffee or drove off to Aberfoyle and had coffee somewhere else. There were some scheduled ‘worship and teaching’ sessions which we excused ourselves from.

My ‘Come to South Glasgow Uni, Kids!’ talk went off well, with some alarmingly earnest and brainy youngsters asking me questions I had to think about. Knox sat up at the back of the seminar room, like a figure of death who had forgotten to bring his scythe, while I performed. Some fairly starchy kirk elders had relaxed enough to wear t-shirts and chinos or jeans on this fun weekend but Knox dressed as he always did.

‘That was splendid, Malky,’ he said afterwards. ‘Come and let us have a coffee, and I will discuss something else with you.’

We managed to find a quiet spot in the café, which was open to non-residents and evidently quite busy most weekends when there was no monsoon. ‘Are you aware, Malky, of the International Evangelical Presbyterian Movement?’

‘Don’t be daft. Of course I’m not.’

He sighed before continuing. ‘Every two years they hold a major international conference. Next year, in September, it is to be held in Scotland, in Perthshire at the Hydro. The theme is “Sin and Justice”.’

‘It sounds like a riot.’

‘I would like to invite you to make a keynote address, on the general theme of the role of science in pursuing justice, drawing on your own experience and research.’

‘Why are you asking me now? Specifically now? Was this thing here an audition?’

Knox denied nothing. ‘It was important to me to make sure that you knew how to comport yourself among believers, given your frequent tendencies towards drunkenness and vulgarity.’

‘Knox, if there was anywhere to get drunk now, I’d get drunk.’

Next morning as we gathered with about a hundred Langlands Parish Kirk people in addition to those from the centre in singing Christmas carols and listening to a lengthy sermon from Knox (actually, cancel that, I nodded off during the sermon) the weekend drew to an end. As Knox worked himself to a frenzy in his peroration, Jane gave me a sly glance, and I could see that she had earphones furtively in place.

And that’s how I ended up on the cast list at a conference that would become national news and which would draw us into one of our most baffling cases. At the time, of course, this was all just a blur. As we left Glenkillearn after a hurried sandwich lunch, I jested to Knox along the lines of ‘Same time, same place, next year!’ He simply smiled and said, ‘We are not having a houseparty next year, Malky.’

Like I care, I thought.

‘However, we are planning a different kind of activity to celebrate our Lord’s Nativity. We are very enthusiastic about it.’

He clearly wanted me to ask him what it was going to be but I didn’t. In any case, I found out eventually and that really was another story. Which we’ll come to eventually.

Knox and the Humanist Celebrant

Christmas and New Year came and went as they always do. I was back at the university and with some staff absences - I almost called them ‘hangovers’ - I actually found myself doing some lectures again, a pleasant escape from the dreaded office work. Which I’d still have to find time to do, sometime, of course.

I rarely saw Knox but I knew we’d meet up at a wedding we’d both been invited to. It came up soon enough, on a Saturday just before January faded into February. I had to miss Pollok’s Scottish Junior Cup tie to go to the wedding, but whenever I mentioned this sacrifice, Jane just cuffed me round the head. ‘That’s domestic abuse!’ I responded and was ignored.

The vows had been exchanged, the bride and groom had kissed, and they had retired into the Lesser Hall to sign the register. Then they re-emerged; the groom was a portly, shaven-headed middle-aged man in a Windsor grey suit with top hat and bow tie, while the bride was the same age, thin with a short lawn of grey hair on top. The faced the congregation briefly and then turned their backs on them again to face the lectern.

The celebrant had returned to the lectern from the register signing and stood up. He was a slim man in his forties, his dark (and probably dyed) black hair contorted into an absurd quiff that at the time would have been fashionable on someone twenty years younger. He wore a dark suit and a black shirt buttoned all the way up.

‘Dear friends!’ he said, ‘Brian and Delia are back among us. It was their particular request that we conclude our marriage celebration with a brief period of quiet for reflection and silent joy.’

There was a brief murmur of puzzlement among the congregation.

The celebrant’s lip seemed to curl. ‘If there are any among you who maintain some form of religious observance, you are welcome to use this time for prayer or any other silent religious practice which seems appropriate to you.’ Knox was sitting along from me, with Jane and Margaret in between, but nonetheless I could sense him bristling.

Delia Winters, the bride, had been a colleague in the faculty at USG and now her daughter, Kelsie, was one of my students. Kelsie had delivered the invitation to, at my office, early in November.

‘Brian’s another divorcee,’ she’d said. ‘He’s all right, but a bit up himself. One of those angry new atheists. It’s going to be a humanist ceremony. Mum has invited Knox as well. That should be fun.’

Yes, I thought, it should. Knox had a scientific background prior to the ministry, and even now sometimes came in for occasional lecturing in the Divinity Faculty, so he was well known to university staff and students, past and present. I knew he wouldn’t be able to resist the opportunity for a bit of arguing with some militant humanists and atheists.

And I was right. For weddings he usually opted for the full kilt outfit (in Knox tartan, of course) but this time he turned up in his full black ministerial fatigues. It was noticeable, of course, that the obsessively secular humanist celebrant was dressed almost identically, albeit without the clerical collar. Knox’s cranium was especially noticeable, seemingly polished to see-my-face-in-it shininess.

After the time for reflection, during which I expect Knox did, indeed, pray (I’d been thinking ahead to the meal which I hoped wouldn’t be vegan or vegetarian; my past experience of angry atheists told me that lots of them enjoyed rabbit food), the bride and groom processed down the aisle to Led Zeppelin’s ‘Kashmir’. Then we all waited outside the Co-operative Hall, exhaling frosty breath or fag smoke or vaping fumes, while the photos were taken in the council gardens across the road. Finally, Brian and Delia climbed into the car - mainly for a heat, I’d suspect - and were driven the five hundred yards to the Tontine Hotel.

Actually the meal was good and featured lots of dead animal, so no complaints there. When the tables were being cleared for the dancing, I noticed the humanist celebrant marching confidently up to Knox. A clash, I feared, was imminent, so I edged over towards them.

‘Kelvin Orchard,’ he said to Knox, holding out his hand. Knox actually took it and shook. I had suspected he might not. Orchard continued, ‘I gather you were a colleague of Delia’s. But I see you are in a similar line of work to me.’

‘No I am not. I serve the Lord. I do not know whom you serve.’

‘Ah, yes, of course, but as you’ll appreciate, I’ve gone beyond all that kind of thing.’

‘And yet you affect to dress like those of us who work in “all that kind of thing”.’

Just when I thought we were going to have a fight, Knox’s manner relaxed and he astonished me as he said, ‘I am convening a major Presbyterian conference in September, in Perthshire. The theme is “Sin and Justice”. I have been looking for someone of a disposition that is opposed to the Lord to contribute to a seminar discussion. It can be helpful to hear from a variety of viewpoints.’

I began to wonder if there was anyone that Knox wasn’t inviting to this conference.

‘I’ll get paid, yes?’ said Orchard, slyly.

Afterwards, when Margaret and Jane had been swept up into a vigorous Dashing White Sergeant, Knox said, ‘This should be a lively conference, Malky. I shall require much Christian patience to wait another eight months.’

‘Isn’t that the enemy you’ve just invited, Knox?’

‘We shall see how ebullient he is when surrounded by two hundred godly people, Malky,’ he said, ‘and you, of course.’

Perhaps the conference will never come, I thought.

Sadly, it did.

Malky in the Lions’ Den

September. I arrived on the second day of the conference and during the lunch break I was strolling through the grounds of the Perthshire Hydro Hotel with Knox.

‘In my experience, those criminals who beg for mercy seldom deserve it,’ I said.

‘No one deserves mercy,’ replied Knox, ‘Nonetheless, mercy is available.’

We had been talking about crime and sin and wrongdoing, as usual, and it had ended up in an argument, as usual.

The Perthshire Hydro dated from the Victorian railway age and the original building, in salmon-coloured sandstone, was still in there somewhere, but was now engulfed by a clutter of extensions and annexes reflecting various architectural periods and styles.

It was usually a cheery place for all that, but today it had a black-clad, sober ambience, like many of its occupants. Knox and I strolled on in silence through an outbreak of neat green space with wooden trellises supporting creeping plants and little ponds with ornamental fish - the ‘Japanese Garden’, the signs called it. From here we could see the massive hoarding near the main entrance to the hotel which read:

The Perthshire Hydro Hotel

Welcomes

The 23rd International Conference of Evangelical Presbyterians

September 9-12

Sin, the Gospel and Justice

The last line would put me off coming for a golfing break as an ordinary punter but I didn’t say this to Knox. My address had seemed a very distant prospect back in December but now, after the lunch break was over, I’d be on. I asked Knox, ‘Your people aren’t going to scowl at me and resent an unbeliever in their midst, are, they?’

‘Of course not, Malky, they will welcome the alien and the stranger in their midst as Scripture requires that they do,’ answered Knox.

Knox and I, his accompanying alien, came past the spa building. Part of the swimming pool extended into the open air and a number of Presbyterian ministers of a certain age and waistline were splashing about and whooping in a surprisingly jolly manner. Outside the buildings, a few people were seated on wooden park benches that surrounded a small square of grass. One of them waved to us; it was Kelvin Orchard, the humanist celebrant.

‘Ah, Malcolm, the other rational voice from the Godless Squad at this conference, eh?’

‘I suppose I am. When are you on?’

‘I’m being thrown to the lions just before dinner. A discussion entitled, if I recall correctly, “Sin and Justice - Opportunities for Humanist/Evangelical Dialogue.” That shouldn’t take long…’

‘At least you have been provided with a platform,’ said Knox, in his sonorous preaching voice that seemed to come from two floors down. ‘I imagine few Evangelicals have ever been asked to contribute to events run by the National Humanist Council.’

‘Don’t pick a fight, Knox,’ I said, ‘It was you that invited Dr Orchard.’

‘He invited me so that he could pick a fight,’ said Orchard.

There were forced smiles all round. Peace had broken out. We left Orchard to his musings. I couldn’t help noticing that he was wearing his full faux-minister rig again. He blended in very well.

‘As you know, Malky, this is the first time the conference has convened in Scotland. I was instrumental in choosing the theme and so I will have the privilege of introducing your presentation.’

‘Oh,’ I said.

‘Consequently,’ he carried on, ‘I will be able to lower your audience’s expectations accordingly.’

This was probably an example of Knox’s deadpan humour, but I could never be sure.

The after-lunch leisure time unrolled slowly and easily until eventually we gathered in the vast meeting room (the largest the hotel could offer) for the afternoon session. It’s never easy being the first speaker after lunch, with everyone sleepy and distracted following a hefty intake of calorific finger-food, but as I saw this sample of world Presbyteriana filing into the rows of seats, I felt more than usually nervous. Even so, I thought, surely they couldn’t be a tougher audience than a hall packed with 200 first year students ready for their first lecture in higher education? And I coped readily enough with that.

The conference chair was Revd Lucy McBride, a bright young female minister from somewhere near Glasgow, but, as threatened, on this occasion she merely introduced Knox briefly. Knox then approached the lectern slowly and solemnly, as if he were about to announce that a delegate had just suffered a heart attack in the toilets.

‘Ladies and gentlemen,’ he said, sounding like a radio newsreader breaking a story about a crashed airliner, ‘many of you will know of my interest in the theological aspects of crime and my occasional consultancy work for the police in criminal cases. This interest started many years ago when I worked as a research assistant in the Biological Sciences Department of Edinburgh Forth University. A young colleague then was starting to make some important advances in the application of life sciences to forensic work, among those that were soon to revolutionise the field. It was he who first sparked my interest in the discipline. He is the author of DNA Profiling - Methods and Procedures, a handbook used by most police forces in the United Kingdom and is now the Head of the Faculty of Applied Life Sciences at the University of South Glasgow and is here with us now to speak on Science - the Friend of Justice? He is a most stimulating speaker, so please do not be deterred by his undistinguished appearance.’ There was a mild susurration of laughter at this last remark, indicating that this audience was better able to detect when Knox was trying to be funny. ‘Ladies and gentlemen, Professor Malcolm Kennedy!’

There was a polite round of applause and I launched into what was actually my standard presentation for secondary schools when I was out hunting for potential students, only for this audience I had dumbed it down a bit and left out some of the gorier slides that the teenagers especially enjoyed. After I drew things to a close, Revd McBride thanked me - Knox having slunk off into the body of the Kirk - and invited questions from the audience.

There were a few polite but humdrum enquiries that I handled easily, and then the microphone was handed to a man who sat near the back, and I could sense the room taking a sharp intake of breath as he prepared to speak. The man was young, no more than forty, wearing a smart but conservative suit, a tie rather than a dog collar, and, if you’ll believe me, a colossal white Stetson hat.

‘Revd Mitch Wildfire, of Salem Independent Presbyterian Truth Church, Houston,’ he said in an unmistakeable Texan drawl. ‘Professor Kennedy, have you accepted the Lord Jesus Christ as your personal saviour and do you seek to commit each day to his service?’

Someone sitting not far away from this specimen punctured the ensuing silence with loud and spluttery laughter. I had just enough awareness, as my mouth flapped open and shut, that the fellow doing the laughing was Kelvin Orchard.

Lucy McBride came to my rescue. ‘Professor Kennedy comes here to share with us his wealth of professional and academic experience, Revd Wildfire. That is his qualification, and I think he has amply rewarded us this afternoon with a fascinating and stimulating talk which I’m sure will keep us thinking and discussing over coffee! Show your appreciation, ladies and gentlemen, for Professor Malcolm Kennedy!’

There was another pleasing burst of applause in which, I suspect, Stetson Guy did not join. The room filled with the familiar post-session murmur and I chatted a bit to Revd McBride and the others in the platform party before hurtling out to the foyer for the cuppa I badly needed. The assembled Presbyterian masses were generous in their thanks and a few apologised for the ill manners of the Stetson Texan. Then the announcement was made that people should begin returning to the hall for the next session - Justice in the Minor Prophets by the Revd someone-or-other - and as the crowds thinned I was able to pick out Knox.

‘A most excellent oration, Malky,’ he said as a pretty East European waitress poured out my restorative cup of tea, ‘and you will be pleased to know that you did not let me down.’

‘I’ll take that as the highest praise you’re capable of offering, Knox,’ I said, ‘but who was that crazy Texan guy?’

In fact, as Knox started to explain what he knew about Wildfire, I saw the man himself emerge from a group and come over towards us. He was accompanied by a couple of similar men, in similar suits and with similar wavy, glossy hair, but without Stetsons. Perhaps the hat indicated status, like a cardinal’s or a bishop’s.

‘Say, Pastor Knox,’ he began, pointedly bypassing me, ‘I hate to make a fuss and all, but you gotta try to understand how hard it is for guys like us here. I mean, like, you talk about justice but here in Europe you can’t even shoot back if some bad guy shoots you. And then you invite some unbeliever to the conference and he goes on to us about socialism and evolution and everything...’

‘I don’t think you do, Revd Wildfire,’ said Knox, coldly.

‘Hey, wait a minute, I didn’t mention socialism or evolution!’ I said, and was completely ignored by both of them.

‘Don’t think I do what, Pastor Knox?’ said Wildfire.

‘I don’t think you hate to make a fuss,’ said Knox, grabbing my arm and propelling me swiftly towards the main conference room. A trail of spilled tea led back from us to a group of open-mouthed American pastors. And that’s how I came to learn more than I ever cared to about the minor prophets of the Old Testament.

I didn’t go, after that, to the seminar that Dr Kelvin Orchard was involved in and nor, from what I gathered, did Wildfire. By all accounts it was a perfectly civilised discussion, not warm and fuzzy exactly, but nobody threw stuff or got chucked out. Knox told me, with evident pleasure, that Orchard had exposed himself as being rather authoritarian on matters of crime and punishment. ‘If you will not wait patiently for God to judge,’ he told me later, ‘you are likely to long for judgement now.’

If I wasn’t at the event itself, I did witness the rather sour aftermath. I was in the bar sipping a (non-alcoholic) drink when the doors of the seminar room opened and the platform party emerged, followed by the audience. Wildfire and two of his hangers-on were standing in the lounge area just beyond the bar and the fluid dynamics of the crowds carried Orchard and the sturdy minister he was talking to close to Wildfire.

‘That’s what I mean,’ said Orchard to his companion, while pointing towards Wildfire and his stetson. ‘He’s the sort of fellow we think of when we consider you evangelicals as a community. And, I mean, look at him…’

‘Just whaddya mean by that, eh pal?’ said Wildfire, giving every appearance of squaring up to Orchard. ‘Easy, Mitch,’ said one of his attendants. The flare-up subsided. But as he headed for the lift, Orchard continued speaking to the minister; ‘I fear violence and threats of violence are part and parcel of evangelical religion.’

This conference was becoming more and more like being on the terracing at a tense Pollok-Auchinleck cup tie.

I’d been invited to stay for that evening’s conference dinner and had accepted, not knowing at the time about Mitch Wildfire and his posse. I had booked a room at the hotel to save me the long, late drive back to Glasgow which also meant, I now thought, I could try to obliterate the worst memories of the afternoon by imbibing suitable refreshments. Though not too many. Not with 200 pairs of beady Presbyterian eyes on me.

‘What will this dinner be like, Knox? I’m imagining a kind of medieval monastic refectory with one of the company reading an improving devotional book while we keep silence.’

Knox sniffed. ‘The hotel is particularly renowned for its seafood which is delivered fresh each day from Fife.’ After a pause he added, ‘And do try not to overdo the alcohol, Malky.’

My main worry was the seating arrangements at the meal, and the possibility of Mad Mitch sitting opposite me firing questions from the Shorter Catechism. As it turned out, there was a seating plan, as if we were at a family wedding, and I found myself positioned between Knox and Lucy McBride. Those sitting opposite us seemed genial and welcoming, too. ‘What do you make of us as a group, Professor Kennedy?’ asked a minister from Nigeria in a rich, booming voice like James Earl Jones. ‘Do we conform to stereotype?’

‘You conform to all kinds of stereotypes,’ I said.

‘Most diplomatic!’ laughed the Nigerian.

They voiced sympathy for the handling I’d received from Mitch Wildfire. ‘I take it you know why Mitch and his guys are here, Knox?’ asked a hefty South African minister who looked as if he’d just climbed into his clerical togs after playing a vigorous half of rugby.

‘I assumed they were attracted by the excellent content of the conference.’

‘Maybe they are,’ continued the South African, ‘but I was stuck with them at breakfast this morning and they’re planning on planting a church in Scotland.’

Knox went even paler than usual. ‘They told you this?’

‘Ja. Somewhere in Glasgow, I believe. That’s your neck of the veld, isn’t it?’ Knox fell into a mournful silence.

I pulled myself away from the revelry after coffee to phone Jane, and returned to the dining room hoping to find the company moving towards the bar. In fact, the room had emptied, so I headed unilaterally for the bar which, apart from a few odds and ends, wasn’t much busier. All good Presbyterians had, it seemed, gone to bed. Unfortunately, among the drifting flotsam in this stagnant by-pool were Wildfire and his two minders. My heart drooped as Wildfire saw me and beckoned me over. I joined them at their table where I saw that they were sipping their way through orange juices. They didn’t offer me anything.

‘Just wanna apologise for any offence, Mr Kennedy,’ said Wildfire. I would have preferred ‘Dr’ or ‘Professor’ to ‘Mr’ but I let it go in the prevailing spirit of toleration. ‘We’re still trying to get our bearings in Europe and it sure is hard for guys like us to get around your socialism and gun control and welfare and stuff. But we’re coming here to change things.’

‘So I’ve heard,’ I said, wondering when I’d escape long enough to order something powerfully medicinal from the barman.

Wildfire contemplated his orange juice thoughtfully and continued. ‘I guess you intellectuals think we’re kinda backward.’ He spoke the word ‘intellectuals’ the way many people would say ‘paedophiles’. ‘The truth is we’re just simple guys trying to serve the Lord in his way. Nothing sinister, huh?’

I smiled and nodded and then pointed to his two immaculately turned-out companions. ‘Do they talk?’ I asked.

Wildfire gave me a look and then turned from me towards his companions so that I knew I was dismissed. Gratefully I stood up and positively sprinted for the bar, no doubt as Wildfire would have expected. I had a few stiff ones, but I’d lost the will to get seriously wellied which, in any case, isn’t much fun on your own. About 11 o’ clock I decided to pop up to Knox’s room and see if he was still awake and up for a natter.

He was still awake, still dressed, and watching Question Time on BBC 1.

‘I’ve just been talking to your mate Wild...’

‘Shhhhh!’

I’ve always found Question Time dull stuff; deadbeat politicians repeating what their spinmeisters have coached them to say regardless of the actual questions. But Knox was riveted. The speaker was a small, squat, wobblingly corpulent man, probably of middle years but completely bald, clean shaven, beaming, and wearing clerical robes and a dog-collar. He looked like an obese baby, perhaps the son of a vicar who had dressed up in his father’s working clothes.

‘The questioner has asked,’ he was saying, ‘“What relevance does religion have today?” I confess I’m not sure how or what to answer. Many of us in the church have moved beyond belief in the supernatural - an all-powerful ‘God’ and a personal ‘Devil’ - but many have not and while such backwardness persists, it is difficult to see how the church can have any relevance...’

Knox switched off. ‘There are enemies on all sides, Malky.’

‘Who’s the fat vicar, then? I gather you’re not a fan.’

‘That, Malky, is Nick Heywood, a Church of England cleric currently without a parish, who writes crime novels and has a dubious reputation as a criminologist. He is, as you have heard, extremely liberal in his theology and also stridently celebrates his homosexuality. He regularly appears on Question Time, Newsnight and various other radio and television programmes.’

‘You old homophobe, Knox. And you’re just jealous because he’s the BBC’s go-to dog collar and you’re not.’

Knox sniffed, obviously caught a whiff of what I’d been drinking, and made a withering remark about drunkenness. I could sense a sermon on the way, so made my excuses and left.

I slept late next morning, and headed for breakfast while, I assumed, the Presbyterian hordes were already undergoing their first session of the day. Then I saw Knox arrive at the entrance to the restaurant, accompanied by two uniformed male police officers and a middle-aged woman with short, steel-grey hair. The woman wore a smart a grey trouser suit. It looked strangely as if Knox were under arrest, but when he saw me he came directly over to me, followed by the woman. He was in a strange mood.

‘Er, Malky, this is DI Sandra MacAlpine, CID, from Police Scotland. I told her you were in the building and that your contribution would be valuable.’

‘What’s up, Knox?’

It was MacAlpine who spoke next. ‘There’s been an incident, Professor Kennedy,’ she said, ‘a suspicious death.’ She spoke in the unmistakeable language of the Scottish police officer, the accent growlingly working class but the words stilted and formal, like a football manager who has taken classes in dealing with the media.

Neither of them would tell me any more and so I followed them out of the restaurant, already lamenting my lost visit to the hot buffet, and along corridors and up a flight of stairs. I did try asking a couple of questions but Knox shushed me both times. Eventually we stopped outside a room where a uniformed constable stood guard.

‘Anyone in?’ asked MacAlpine.

‘No, ma’am. SOCO are on their way, I’ve been told, but there’s no sign of the pathologist yet.’ said the constable. MacAlpine nodded, the constable opened the door for us, we swept in, and the door closed behind us.

It was a perfectly ordinary hotel room, a snapshot of away-from-home living in the first half of the 21st century. There was a king-size double bed, unmade and clearly slept in, a large desk with a mirror and a hospitality tray, a couple of chairs, a wall-mounted flat screen television, doors that led, presumably, to a bathroom and to storage, and a set of French windows leading onto a balcony. And, sprawled on the balcony, lay a man’s body.

There were some pegs for hanging coats just inside the door. On one of them hung a white Stetson.

Seconds later I was crouching over the body of Mitch Wildfire.