DS Hutton Box Set

by Douglas Lindsay

  ‘What?’ he says.

  ‘How many of there are you?’

  ‘What d’you mean?’

  ‘In the party? How many of there are you in the party?’

  He swallows, looks a bit lost. It’s not getting to me though. I’m not about to feel bad for picking on him. If you’re going to go around sticking your noses into people’s lives at ten o’clock on a fucking Friday evening, at least know what the fuck you’re talking about.

  ‘I’m not sure,’ he says.

  ‘Jesus...’

  ‘Take a leaflet,’ he says, holding it forward.

  ‘No.’

  ‘Please.’

  Holy crap. Seriously, I could have drunk a glass of wine in the time I’ve spoken to this fucktard.

  Snatch it off him, don’t look him in the eye again, close the door quickly in his face. Fuck me. Stand there for a second, then walk through to the kitchen.

  Jesus. What a dick. And I mean me, not him.

  He’s just doing what he wants to do. Some harmless conviction, and it’s not like the independence movement doesn’t need an alternative. And what the fuck do I know about federalism?

  Glass in hand, my phone pings. Mutter grimly, for all the world like my life is plagued by interruptions, take a drink, phone out my pocket, read the message.

  No Sender. That’s who it’s from. It says No Sender, as though I have the name No Sender in my phone as a contact.

  You seem stressed. Relax. Maybe turn on the news. Something I prepared earlier.

  Close my eyes. Fuck. Immediately it seems obvious it’s from the same person who’s been sending the e-mails. An anonymous communication. That makes sense. And straight away, I think of Kramer, stupidly Kramer, the last person who I spoke to in relation to the investigation.

  Except, I wasn’t stressed. How would he know I was stressed? I sat in a fucking hotel bar, drinking vodka, talking about Game of Thrones.

  The FSN guy? What? Close my eyes. Picture him. The cycling helmet, the beard. The glasses. He was wearing glasses, so inconspicuous I barely noticed. And the bad teeth. He had noticeably bad teeth. And the gloves. He was wearing gloves.

  Straight back to the door, look out onto the landing. No sign of him, no sign of him having been here. Stand still, listening for the sound of footsteps, or laughter.

  He’s gone.

  Maybe turn on the news. Crap.

  Close the door, back inside. The glass of wine still in my hand, I down the rest of it in one, and turn on the TV.

  21

  Back into the station.

  Have you ever noticed how your life is like a sitcom? Sitcoms are low-budget TV, generally filmed in front of an audience. Therefore they mostly take place on a restricted number of sets. The work place. The bar. The trench in Blackadder Goes Forth, the sitting room in Big Bang Theory.

  And here’s my sitcom life. The sitting room. The station. The café. The bar. Other short, vague parts of it conducted on the street or in the bathroom or on the doorstep, pre-filmed and shown to the studio audience on a monitor.

  Taylor is sitting at my desk, talking to Morrow. He stands when he sees me approach. I’m tired and I don’t want to be here, but thought I’d better. I didn’t call in or anything, just came back as soon as I saw the news. I expect some sarcasm from him, but he just nods.

  ‘You saw it, then?’

  A body found in a basement in Milton of Campsie, as yet unidentified. Had been there for a week or so.

  ‘What’s the score?’ I ask.

  ‘On close inspection, this one seems a little different. I mean, Connor and me were with the suits in Riverside, and not really getting anywhere, when news of this came in. Fourth day in a row with a murder in the Glasgow area. That turned the tide in our favour at least. But looking at it, I’m not so sure. The other three were all murders in the last three days. This one... the victim has been dead at least a week. Haven’t got all the details yet. So, it could be... fuck, who knows, it certainly doesn’t seem to fit the bill.’

  I take out my phone, the text is still up there. Hand it over. He reads it, his expression hardens, he passes it on to Morrow.

  ‘What does it mean, you seem stressed?’

  I’ve been giving it thought on the way in here. Had to walk, after all, couldn’t bring the car with this much alcohol in me. Very circumspect. Would happily have done it in the past.

  ‘Three options,’ I say. ‘It’s someone who just happens to follow me, day to day, on the job. They’re going to know I’m stressed. Second, earlier tonight I had a drink with Kramer, so it would make sense. Except... I really wasn’t stressed. I know I wasn’t. I don’t think I would have come across that way to him, and it’s the only time I’ve seen him. And, of course, how would any of these people know I hadn’t already seen the news? Which leaves the third option. Thirty seconds before I got this text I’d had some political canvasser at the door.’

  ‘On a Friday night? SNP?’

  A reasonable assumption. They’re the only ones putting people out on the streets anymore.

  ‘Said he was from the Federal Scottish Nationalists.’

  ‘The who?’

  I shrug, having not already checked. We look at Morrow, Morrow turns to the go-to guy in anybody’s room, Google.

  ‘So what happened with the guy?’ asks Taylor.

  ‘I got annoyed at him. Didn’t want to take any of his shit, eventually closed the door in his face.’

  ‘You looked stressed?’

  ‘I dare say.’

  ‘And when did you get the text?’

  ‘Pretty quickly afterwards. Within a minute. I was standing at the door – you know the front door opens straight into the sitting room – and he would’ve heard there was no TV playing.’

  ‘What’d he look like?’

  ‘That’s the thing. Everything about him said disguise. Middle-aged man in Lycra, ostensibly. Lime green, like one of those sad fuckers you see out on his bike. Wearing gloves, bit of a beard, glasses, still wearing his cycling helmet. If you were expecting someone in disguise, he looked like it. But I wasn’t. Brain was switched off. Seems really obvious now, but at the time, well he just looked like a sad fucker, doing sad political shit at ten on a Friday night. Yet remove all that shit, am I going to recognise him?’

  Of course, I’ve been thinking about that as well.

  ‘Well, are you?’ asks Taylor, and we both know what he’s asking.

  ‘I don’t know.’

  ‘No such party,’ says Morrow.

  Taylor looks back at the phone message, puts his hands in his pockets, walks off a little way, turns back, head down.

  ‘Something I prepared earlier...,’ he says.

  ‘What about the house where the body was found? The owners?’ I ask.

  ‘They say they know nothing about it, and you know... well, at the moment we’re inclined to believe them. A couple in their 80s. The man looked confused, the woman looked like she’s ready to sue someone. The police, if need be, like it’s our fault.’

  ‘And the victim?’

  ‘They claim no knowledge of her.’

  ‘How’d she die?’

  ‘She’d been bound with duct tape, but the duct tape equivalent of the girl getting painted gold in Goldfinger. Completely bound, completely covered, head to foot. They’re presuming she’ll have suffocated at some point, but we’ll see.’

  ‘I guess it wouldn’t have taken very long. I mean, to die.’

  ‘Possibly not. Waiting on that as well.’

  Taylor starts tapping the desk.

  ‘So, are we losing the case, anyway?’ I ask. ‘I mean, if it’s being centralised?’

  ‘No decision, but it’s likely. The Clarkston guys are super-reluctant to give up their racial hatred, double beheading, despite not having got anywhere. Everybody’s the same, Connor too, really, but we’re the little guys. Ultimately, I think we’ll find by tomorrow afternoon it’s off our hands. As usual, with one of these things, we
just have to do as good a job as possible, hand over as much as we can, and hope we haven’t missed something glaringly obvious they discover in the first ten minutes.’

  ‘And what if...,’ I begin. The words fail. Taylor’s looking at me, waiting for me to say it. Morrow’s staring too, although he doesn’t know what’s coming.

  Fuck it.

  ‘What if it’s Clayton and it’s aimed at us?’ I say. ‘Me... aimed at me. Jesus, really, what if it’s not Clayton and it’s aimed at me?’

  ‘Did you think your political guy looked like Clayton?’

  And there’s the question.

  He looked like a door-to-door saddo in a cap with a beard. Any guy could look like that. Look at the Groucho mirror scene in Duck Soup.

  All right, they were brothers, but the principle’s the same.

  ‘I don’t know,’ is all I’ve got.

  ‘WHO SENT YOU?’

  The last syllable emerges as a high-pitched ejaculation, as the beak of the crow stabs into the side of my head.

  I can’t see it – I can never see it – but I can sense he’s looking at me, his head tilted to the side.

  ‘What?’

  Take a breath. At least I’ve managed to get him to stop. Maybe if I can keep him in conversation, I’ll recover my strength, be able to get up off the forest floor, before he can do it again.

  ‘Who sent you?’

  ‘What d’you mean, who sent us? Get outta here! You some kinda schmuck or what?’

  I stare at the trees above, the leaves moving in the wind. Unattractive trees. Vague trees. Impossible to tell what kind they are. Maybe if I close my eyes again it will all go away. The damp. The trees. The crows.

  ‘Fuck!’ I blurt out, as the beak stabs into me again. The same spot. Is it my imagination, or is the crow starting to get somewhere? Can I actually feel my skull weakening in that area? Is my brain beginning to feel the cold, right there, through the thinning skull?

  ‘Jesus,’ says the crow, ‘will you just relax?’

  ‘How can I relax? You’re stabbing my skull!’

  ‘We’ve been over this,’ says the crow. ‘Every goddam night. I really don’t know why I keep coming back here. Why don’t you just wake the fuck up and we can all get on with our lives?’

  ‘It’s not that easy.’

  ‘Jesus,’ he mutters.

  He grabs my ear with his beak, bites and pulls, and I yelp at the pain.

  I wake up. Eyes open, staring at the ceiling. Sweating and uncomfortable. My ear hurts, like it’s been bitten, and my hand goes straight to it. I feel sick.

  22

  Saturday morning. I’m heading into the office, but have decided to stop off at the church at the top of Cambuslang. The Old Kirk. Haven’t been back here since last year. I realise I’ve missed it.

  Woke up at 06.30. Headache, the dull throb right bang where the crow has been pecking away at me. I know it doesn’t make sense. I mean, you get hit in your dreams, why should you be in pain once you wake up?

  Yet, where’s the crow coming from? It must be coming from inside me, inside my head, my imagination, my guilt, my something. He’s there for a reason, and he’s causing me pain. Pain in my head, inside and out.

  Mundanely, I take two paracetamol and the pain fades by the time I’ve finished eating breakfast.

  Drive the car into work, taking the five-minute detour to the Old Kirk on the way. It’s only 07:45, but somehow it doesn’t seem surprising the gate to the church is not chained up, and the front door is open. Must be something going on, which seems strange, given the church is no longer in use for regular services.

  Wedding or a funeral.

  Park the car, then stand in the car park for a few seconds, looking up at the old building. A nice morning. Summer. A freshness still in the air, but the day will be warm and not too muggy. The steeple is etched against a hazy blue sky.

  Through the gate and up the path to the front door. Look over at the two graves that caused all the fuss the previous November. The grave I dug up with the body of the young girl, and the new grave, where the body of church member Maureen Henderson was buried in a hasty ceremony to make sure the graveyard did not slip into obsolescence.

  I’ve followed the story, presumed that once the fuss had died down, the church in Cambuslang would make sure the body was reburied elsewhere. Instead, the matter has become buried in the courts, and Maureen’s body remains where she was interred. The longer she stays there, one feels, the greater the chance she stays there for good.

  I open the door and enter. Immediately feels cooler in here. Take a moment, listen for any sound, and then walk through the short hall, open the door on the right and into the nave.

  She’s there at the far end of the church, arranging flowers at the altar. She turns at the sound of the door, a scowl on her face, which immediately relaxes when she sees me. She turns back to what she’s doing, rather than watch me walk towards her.

  The old place looks emptier than before, although the same quiet calm remains. Hands in pockets, I stop when I get to the front of the church, and Mary Buttler turns and smiles.

  ‘Hey.’

  ‘I thought you’d be back eventually,’ she says, ‘although I was beginning to wonder. What brings you here today?’

  Reply with my shoulders.

  ‘Not sure. I guess some part of me knew instinctively you’d be open. Wedding or funeral?’

  She gives me a bit of an eyebrow, glances at the flowers and then looks back.

  ‘You can’t tell?’

  ‘No idea,’ I say.

  ‘Funeral,’ she says.

  ‘An old parish member?’

  ‘Jean,’ she says. ‘Lovely woman. Been in a home for the past ten years, hadn’t been here in a long time.’

  We hold the gaze for a second, then she turns away and continues to work with the flowers. I watch her for a short while, and then walk further towards the back of the church, up the steps, to where the choir used to sit.

  ‘The place looks... I don’t know, seems emptier than before.’

  I look up at Jesus in blue as I say it. Jesus, whose name I mention so often. I expect he doesn’t mind. He’s the forgiving sort...

  She tuts, and when I look round she’s shaking her head.

  ‘The St Stephen’s lot have been up here. Take what they like, move it down to their dreadful building. They’re like... they’re like ISIS. No respect. They won the war, they won the peace, and now they just do what they like. I’m sick to death...’

  Another loud tut, she takes a moment from what she’s doing – probably not a great idea to work with flowers when you’re thinking about strangling someone – deep breath, then returns to the job.

  ‘Won’t be my problem for much longer,’ she says.

  ‘Why not?’

  She doesn’t answer immediately. Funny, I came here for peace, and thought I’d get it, but not unsurprisingly walk straight into the continuing bitterness of the old church merger.

  The peace really only comes from an empty building. As soon as people are involved, there it goes...

  ‘They said all combined posts in the church had to be advertised. Due process they called it. It’s the law, they said. So my job was opened up to everyone, not just in the church, of course. Thirty-seven people applied, but only two of those were from within the church community. Myself, and one person from amongst the St Stephen’s crowd. Guess who got the job.’

  ‘Ah.’

  She looks up. Eyes a little red. Seems like a reasonably open wound onto which I’ve just poured salt. Crap. Had to ask. Well, she wanted me to, I suppose.

  ‘How long have you got left?’

  ‘This is my last duty. I hand over the keys on Monday morning. I need to move out of the house by the end of June. Not that she’s getting the house, she doesn’t need it. Lord knows what they’re going to do with it, but whatever it is, we can guarantee it’ll be to their benefit and no one else’s.’

  She straig
htens up, a pair of scissors in her right hand.

  ‘I could bury these in someone’s head,’ she says, ‘and the only thing stopping me is not knowing who to do it to first.’

  ‘I think there might have been enough murder over these churches,’ I say, but there’s no condemnation in my voice. I find myself on her side, completely.

  I walk back down towards her. There’s a tear on her cheek. Jesus, how stupid do I continue to be? How self-centred. I came here for me, that’s all. If the place was open, what was I expecting? Peace and quiet? Solitude?

  Yet, naturally, I walk into someone else’s problems, and they seem so much more intimately significant than mine.

  I walk over beside her and take her into my arms. And it’s not the asshole me who’s holding her. It’s the not the dickhead who would, under other circumstances, be happily banging her over the back of a pew while Jesus watched, looking somewhat perturbed.

  I just hold her, she presses her cheek into my chest.

  I’m comforting her, but she’s comforting me too. It feels safe and warm. And fleeting.

  Over her shoulder I look up at Jesus. He’s looking sceptical. He knows me after all, but I give him the nod. We’re good here, I say. He relaxes.

  There’s just the three of us, and we’re all joined by the same melancholy. The passing of the years, the changing of the guard. The things you need to do to get by.

  23

  The politics have arrived.

  Summoned into Riverside. Me, Taylor, Connor. Morrow left behind to work the case. No one in particular in charge, not that there generally needs to be.

  There are thirty-three people in the room. The Chief Constable of Scotland standing before us. An Edinburgh man through and through, and there will be plenty here wishing he’d fuck off back where he came from.

  This really is turning into the Crows business all over again. Fuck, what do I care? Don’t care about the politics, don’t care about who’s in charge. At some point it will all be over, and I’ll be back on the domestic violence and pub violence and petty theft that makes up a majority of what we do.