Free Hand for a Hand by Frank Muir

you’re doing.”
    Jimmy Reid grimaced. “Just hold the fucker steady. Is that too much to ask?”
    Wee Kenny scowled as Jimmy placed the red-hot poker flat against the skin. Black smoke curled into the air as he pressed down and rolled his wrist to ensure a deep brand.
    “What’s the matter, wee man? Never smelt burning meat before?”
    Wee Kenny put a hand to his mouth. “That’s fucking honking, so it is.”
    Jimmy returned the poker to the brazier, slid grimy fingers across his forehead and licked the sweat from them. He seemed always to be sweating now. He had a touch of the flu. That was all. He hawked phlegm from the back of his throat and spat a gob of green into the brazier where it hit with a hard hiss then bubbled and popped. Then he removed a flat tin from his pocket and fingered tobacco onto a strip of Rizla paper. He evened it out, rolled the paper, ran his tongue along the edge. He pulled the poker from the fire and held it to his face. As he drew on his cigarette, acrid smoke forced his eyes to water, and he slapped the poker back onto the skin.
    Wee Kenny jumped, but kept his grip.
    Jimmy held his cigarette in one hand, stirred the poker in the brazier with the other. Cigarette smoke shifted in the still air. He half-closed his eyes. The heat from the brazier felt as hot as the Spanish sun. He hated the sun. The sun was no place for a man to sit out in. He stabbed the poker at the coals. Sparks flickered then died in the night air. He felt a sudden need to just get on with it, and drew the tip of the poker across the skin in a curve.
    Curling fingers of black smoke rose into the darkness.
    “What’s it say, big man?”
    For a moment, Jimmy thought of pressing the poker to Wee Kenny’s face. That would shut the fucker up. But he gobbed again and worked in silence, laying the poker on the skin, twisting and branding, taking pleasure from Wee Kenny grimacing from the stench of burning skin and putrescent meat.
    When it was done, he eyed his handiwork.
    Wee Kenny squinted at it. “Blood-what?” he asked. “Is that how you spell blood?”
    “It’s not blood.”
    “I thought it said—”
    “Don’t be so fucking stupid,” he snarled. “Just wrap the fucker up.”
    Wee Kenny pulled a polythene sheet from the box and did as he was ordered.
    Jimmy took a final drag, the short stub crimped between the tips of his thumb and forefinger. He sucked in hard, felt the dowt’s burning heat, then flicked it into the brazier.
    Wee Kenny glanced up at him, then returned his frightened gaze to the poker, staring at the handle sticking out of the red coals, at the tip glowing white-red. He knew Wee Kenny was scared of him. That was the way it should be with goffers. Wee Kenny had seen him in action before, seen him with his brother, Bully. He told Wee Kenny that you could never tell with Bully. But you could never tell with himself either.
    You just never knew the minute.
    Wee Kenny hugged his gruesome parcel to his chest. “Is that us?”
    Jimmy hawked another gob onto the brazier. “That’s it, wee man. Let’s go.”

Chapter 10
    G ILCHRIST PEERED AT the digital display.
    5:01. Bloody hell. He reached for his mobile phone and pressed Connect .
    “Gilchrist.” He tried to sound awake, but his voice betrayed him.
    “We’ve got another body part, sir. Report’s just come in.”
    Gilchrist slid his feet from under the quilt. “Whereabouts?” he growled.
    “Near the Golf Museum.”
    “On the Old Course?”
    “No, sir. By Golf Place.”
    Opposite the R&A clubhouse. Not a bunker in sight. “Who’s at the scene?”
    “PW Lambert, sir. She called it in about a minute ago.”
    Dorothy Lambert . Dot to friends and colleagues. “Which part is it this time?”
    “Leg, sir.”
    Gilchrist grimaced as Nance’s words came back at him. Watt’s started a sweepstake . “You called anyone else?” he asked.
    “Not yet, sir.”
    “Have Nance meet me at the scene,” he growled. “And don’t call Watt