18 - Aftershock

by Quintin Jardine

  Lock’s eyes narrowed as she looked at the print. ‘How long?’ she murmured.

  ‘Ten to twelve days, the pathologists reckon.’

  ‘Cause of death?’

  ‘Single shot to the back of the head from a small-calibre weapon.’

  The lawyer leaned back in her absent boss’s chair and stared at the ceiling. ‘Oh, no,’ she moaned. ‘There’s another of them.’

  ‘It looks that way, doesn’t it?’

  Her eyes switched back to the detective. ‘You don’t think so?’ she asked.

  ‘Oh, yes, I do. We’re agreed that Daniel Ballester was responsible for the other four murders. The confession contained in his suicide note on his lap-top was almost certainly faked, or he was forced to write it, but there was so much evidence in and around his house that it had to be him. The real clincher, though, were death photos of all the victims: they were found on the computer too.’

  ‘What about the man you think killed him? Couldn’t he have planted it all?’

  ‘No,’ McIlhenney replied firmly. ‘We’ve checked that out. The man who did Ballester, and who set the trap that killed Detective Inspector Steele, couldn’t have committed any of the four murders. When Stacey Gavin died he was in Taiwan, and when the other three were killed he was in Jamaica. We’re pretty much certain of that.’

  ‘So why did he kill Ballester?’

  The detective superintendent smiled. ‘There’s an even better question than that, if you think about it.’

  Lock gazed back at him, puzzled, then her forehead creased in concentration. ‘How did he know to kill Ballester? I remember now: your team didn’t identify him until very late in the day. They were looking for him under another name. Are you saying that he was Ballester’s accomplice, and that he did him in to protect himself?’

  ‘No, I’m not. The guy didn’t have any accomplice. The man who killed him had his own sources of information. His father had dealings with him before; as soon as he saw his image, he knew who he was, and put specialists on to tracing him.’

  ‘You’re talking about Zrinka’s brother, aren’t you?’

  ‘Yes, and we can prove it. Forget him: let’s address the things that are troubling me.’

  ‘What are they?’

  ‘For a start, the degree of similarity, and the speed with which this copycat’s appeared. It took almost a century for the second Ripper to emerge. Ballester’s last kill was less than three months ago.’

  ‘They didn’t have electronic media in the eighteen eighties.’

  ‘No, nor police officers smart enough to keep the details of those murders from the press that did exist at the time. We did, though, or at least we held on to some of them; we released the cause of death, but we didn’t say anything about the calibre of weapon used. Nobody ever described the way the three women were killed, or the way their bodies were laid out. Yet this new murder differs in only one respect, the fact that the body appears to have been concealed.’

  ‘What do you know about the victim?’

  ‘Nothing. We haven’t linked her to any missing person yet. We don’t know who she is.’

  ‘So you don’t know if she’s an artist?’

  ‘That goes without saying, doesn’t it?’

  ‘I suppose so, but if she is that would tie it up, wouldn’t it?’

  ‘Tie what up? In the Ballester investigation, we started off looking for a serial killer with a down on female artists, and wound up with a disillusioned hack who’d murdered two women with whom he’d had affairs and who’d dumped him, and who’d taken out two other people just because they were in the way. What have we got here? What’s the motive? So far, all I can see is that we might have someone who’s taking the piss!’

  ‘Or someone who doesn’t know what Ballester’s real motive was, and who thinks he’s carrying on his mission in some bizarre way.’

  ‘That may well be so,’ McIlhenney conceded. ‘Meanwhile . . . and this is the real reason I wanted to see Gregor . . . I need something from you. I want you to identify everybody who could possibly have seen your report to the Crown Office. I’m doing the same thing at my end. It may all be a coincidence, but it looks to me as if this second killer might have had access to inside information.’

  Eight

  ‘That list of members looks pretty formidable,’ said Becky Stallings. ‘There must be a few hundred of them.’

  ‘Yes,’ DS McGurk agreed, ‘but I can shrink it if I cross-reference it against playing records to identify those people who’re known to have been on the course in the period when the woman was killed.’

  ‘Do that, Jack, but I doubt if it’ll be that simple. Sure, we might get lucky and find an eye-witness who saw the woman and her killer and can give us a description, but still, our first job is just to identify her. So we need to find out from the members, not just those who were on the course that day, whether she used that path regularly, and if she did, whether any of them knew who she was.’

  ‘That’s assuming she walked it at all. Maybe she was taken there at gun-point.’

  ‘Across the golf course?’

  ‘Through the woods: you can get in there from the other side of the hill, off Clermiston Road.’

  ‘From what I’ve been told, they’re pretty thick. They’re also bounded by the zoo to the north. No, let’s start with the premise that she went there of her own accord.’

  ‘Regularly.’

  ‘Why?’

  The detective stretched his long body in his chair. ‘As I see it, she either knew her killer, and he was with her, or he followed her. If he did that, my gut tells me that he didn’t pick her at random. He was watching her, he got to know her movements, and he chose his moment. From what we’ve been told, Daniel Ballester was meticulous in his preparation for each kill. He caught his targets off-guard every time, with nobody else around. I’d say we assume that the mark-two version is doing the same.’

  ‘Then let’s get after him, and let’s be meticulous ourselves. Prioritise if you want, but we need to interview all the members and staff as quickly as we can. Luckily we have telephone numbers for all of them, so we can do it that way. I want a dozen uniforms and a dozen phones, mobiles if necessary; give them each a batch of names and a question template.’

  Stallings turned to look at a young officer seated at a desk behind her, a telephone held to his ear. She waited for him to finish. ‘Sauce,’ she said, when he had, ‘how are you getting on with putting together that list of artists?’

  ‘I’m getting there, ma’am,’ Detective Constable Harold Haddock replied. ‘I’ve contacted seven art galleries so far and built up a list of female painters on their books aged between twenty and thirty-five. So far I have eleven names.’

  ‘Did you factor in hair colour, given that our victim’s was jet black?’

  ‘She was female. Who knows what colour it was the day before she died?’

  ‘Are you cheeking me, son?’

  ‘No, ma’am. I didn’t think it was worth doing at this stage, that’s all. I’ll call them all back, if you want.’

  Stallings grinned. ‘Don’t bother, Sauce; you’re right. And don’t mind me either. I’ll jump to the defence of my gender at a moment’s notice. Anything else to tell me?’

  ‘Yes. I’ve spoken to Mrs Dell at High-end Talent; she was Zrinka Boras’s agent. She has several other painters on her books; four of them are on my list, and she’s seen three of those within the last week, so I can score them off. I’m also just off the phone with the principal’s secretary up at the Edinburgh College of Art. She’s going to put together a list of female painting graduates over the last ten years, plus current mature students in the age-group we’re looking at, and email it to me. She made another suggestion, too.’

  ‘What’s that?’

  ‘Schools. She said we shouldn’t forget art teachers either. I explained that we were actually looking at working artists, but she said that many teachers supplement their income if they can.’<
br />
  ‘What’s the nearest school?’ the inspector asked.

  ‘The Royal High,’ Haddock replied, ‘on the other side of the Queensferry road.’

  ‘No,’ McGurk interposed, ‘not quite. You’re forgetting Mary Erskine.’

  Stallings frowned. ‘Who’s she?’

  ‘It: one of the oldest girls’ schools in the world, one of three run by the Edinburgh Merchant Company. It’s just across the road from the entrance to the golf club, not much more than a hundred yards away.’

  ‘Would it have an art department?’

  ‘Bound to have.’

  ‘Okay.’ Stallings turned back to Haddock. ‘Sauce, close the gap. Ask the education authority for a list of all female art teachers within the age limit, then contact this Merchant Company thingie, and ask them for the same information.’

  Nine

  ‘Do you think I’m a hypocrite?’

  She looked up at him, unable to contain her surprise. ‘Do I what?’ she gasped, spluttering as she failed to suppress her laughter.

  ‘You heard. Do you think I’m a hypocrite?’

  ‘And why the hell should I think that?’

  Bob Skinner gazed at her.

  A new Bob Skinner, she thought, yet again. He was sun-bronzed, and his blue eyes sparkled. He was ten years older than her, nearer fifty than forty, yet he seemed to have grown younger in the time they had been together. The network of care lines around his eyes had faded until they were barely noticeable. He was slimmer in the waist, thicker in the chest, and the tension that had emanated from him in waves a few months before had gone, replaced by an air of easy relaxation. She thought back to the man he had been in the depths of winter and marvelled at the change in him. And yet, for all that, he looked sombre.

  His right hand lay on the restaurant table, his fingers toying with the stem of his wine glass, the big vein that ran down his bicep from beneath the sleeve of his short-sleeved shirt twitching with the movement. ‘Because I do,’ he murmured.

  Aileen de Marco chuckled. ‘You’ll need to run that one past me again, love,’ she said, in her soft Scots tone. ‘You are a very complicated guy, sure, but strip all that away, and you’re also the straightest, most honest man I’ve ever met. You’ve done some serious things in your life, but I’ll bet you’ve never done anything that you didn’t believe was right. You and hypocrisy don’t belong in the same bed . . . unlike you and me,’ she added. ‘Knowing how you feel about the double standards of politics, there are still times when I wonder how you and I got together.’

  He grinned. ‘Fishing for them, are you? Aileen, my darling, you are the one politician I know who confounds all the stereotypes, and you’re the only one I’ve ever admired, apart, maybe, from Bill Clinton and Barack Obama. You do not have a duplicitous bone in your body.’

  ‘Well, if you have,’ she retorted, ‘I’ve never found it . . . and I’ve been over all the territory by now. Come on, where’s this nonsense coming from?’

  ‘That reminds me of a joke I heard in Canada at Easter,’ he said, as he picked up his glass and drained the last of the Raimat Clamor, his regular choice from the wine list of Trattoria La Clota. ‘There’s this Saskatchewan girl, on a plane out of Toronto, sat next to a power-dressed big-city woman. Once they’ve taken off, the Saskatchewan girl, being friendly and all, says to her neighbour, “Where you from?” The power lady replies, “From a place where they know not to end a sentence with a preposition.” The Saskatchewan girl thinks about this for a few seconds and then she says, as friendly as before, “Where you from, bitch?” ’

  Aileen’s laugh caused the heads of the couple at the next table to turn in their direction. She waited until they had returned to their own conversation, then moved closer to him. ‘Very funny,’ she murmured, ‘but now you’ve come out with that bolt from the blue, don’t think you can kick my question under the table. Explain yourself, Deputy Chief Constable Skinner. That’s an order from the First Minister.’

  ‘Hey,’ he exclaimed. ‘We’ve been through that one. The First Minister can’t give coppers direct orders.’ He paused. ‘On the other hand, my partner . . . I suppose that’s a different story.’

  She blinked. ‘You’ve never called me that before.’

  ‘You don’t like the term?’

  ‘No. I mean, yes. I mean, I’ve got nothing against it.’ Her eyes met his. ‘Sounds more official than girlfriend; more dignified, too, more suited to our age and station.’

  ‘Wouldn’t you prefer “wife”?’ he asked her.

  They looked at each other for a long, lingering moment, locked in the kind of silence that brooks no interruption. John, the proprietor, read the sign, and his move towards their table was aborted in mid-stride. ‘Was that a proposal?’ Aileen whispered eventually.

  ‘I suppose it was. Not the most gracious one I’ve ever made, I’m afraid. I’m sorry, it wasn’t planned. It just slipped out.’

  ‘Then slip it back in again,’ she said. ‘I am very happy as we are, love. We’ve been together for little over half a year: there’s no need to rush fences. Let’s just enjoy being together and let things take their course.’

  ‘I’ll take that as a “no”, then.’

  ‘Take it as a “not yet”. Take it as a “maybe”. Take it as “You’re the man I love, we’re a couple, and that’s all I’ve ever hoped for.” Besides, you’re still coming down off your sabbatical. Wait till you get back to work; you’ll be too busy to think about things like that.’

  ‘You’re supposed to be pro-marriage,’ he challenged, smiling broadly as if to reassure her that he had not been wounded by her rejection. ‘Isn’t that the party line?’

  ‘The party line is toleration of all sorts of permanent relationships: formal, informal, straight, gay ...’

  ‘Sheep, chickens . . . ?’

  Her giggle was girlish, unlike her; in that instant he felt privileged, knowing that he was seeing her as no-one else ever did. ‘We’re not that modern,’ she replied.

  ‘So are you saying that I’d be a high-risk husband?’

  ‘No!’ she protested. ‘I wasn’t saying that at all.’

  ‘If you were, you’d be right. Look at my track record. On that evidence, I’m terrible at husbanding. That’s where I fear my hypocrisy lies.’

  ‘Explain.’

  Bob leaned forward, until they were only a matter of inches apart. They were sitting at right angles to each other at the small square table so that each could have a view across L’Escala’s moonlit marina. The night was hot and the air was heavy; he swatted a buzzing fly away from his face as he gazed at the throng of boats, side by side on their moorings.

  ‘I’ve been married twice,’ he began. ‘If I say that Myra, my first wife, played around, I’d be understating things. She was international class, as I discovered years after her death. Yet in truth, even if I’d known the whole story, everything, as it was happening, I’d have forgiven her. Why? Because I worshipped the damn ground she walked on, that’s why. There was one blip, when we were engaged and very young, but I was faithful to her all through our marriage and, in truth, for quite a while after she was dead. I was never there for her, though: I was too busy career-building. Don’t let anyone tell you that success came my way by accident. I had my eyes fixed on command rank from the day I joined the force, and I worked my arse off getting there. Myra suffered for it, Alex suffered . . .’

  ‘That’s not what she says.’

  ‘Uh?’ The trademark eyebrow rose.

  ‘Your daughter told me that you were the best single parent she’s ever encountered. She says that she never once felt excluded, or starved of your time and your love, and she never once felt that she was any sort of a burden to you.’

  ‘Alex is loyal.’

  ‘Alexis Skinner is a straight-shooter, just like her dad.’

  ‘When did she tell you this?’

  ‘About three months ago, one day we had lunch together.’

  ‘You and my k
id do lunches? I never knew that.’

  ‘As often as we can. I didn’t bring the subject up either, she did. She said that I shouldn’t be surprised to find you missing the kids while they’re with their mother in America, even though they’re with you all the rest of the year. She said that’s the kind of dad you are. So Alex didn’t suffer at all; that’s not a stick for your back. As for Myra, from what you’ve told me, and from what Alex has let slip, she was a danger junkie.’

  ‘That’s true,’ Bob conceded, ‘but it’s beside the point. If I’d known I’d have lived with it.’

  ‘If you’d known, you’d probably have scared off any potential partners. No, delete “probably”.’

  He let out a wry snort. ‘You’d be amazed at the courage that a hard-on can give a normally timid bloke.’

  She laughed. ‘No, I wouldn’t, but there’s courage and then there’s a death-wish.’

  ‘Be that as it may, I’d still have stuck with her; I chose her over Louise Bankier, for Christ’s sake.’

  ‘What? Neil McIlhenney’s wife?’

  ‘Yes, but long, long ago. Lou was my blip, at university. It taught me that Myra and I were joined at the heart. From that point on, I never contemplated life without her.’

  He shook his head. ‘I should never have married Sarah, though. I never treated her as I did Myra; I never even thought of her that way. I drove the wedge between us; when she had her flings, I should have been able to live through them too, but I couldn’t. Not that I was the only wronged half of that marriage. I’ve told you, I strayed a couple of times too, once very indiscreetly. That must have humiliated her when it all got out, yet, do you know, I don’t recall ever telling her that I was sorry? No, Aileen, I should never have married her . . . and here I am having the bloody nerve to threaten you with the same. I apologise, that was hugely presumptuous of me. No, it was downright bloody cruel!’

  He paused, but only for a second or so. ‘Now do you see why I feel like a hypocrite? The way I treated Sarah, it was unforgivable.’