He didn’t look up at her. ‘Well,’ he said. She waited. ‘Well,’ he said again.
‘Yes, sir,’ she said.
McIntyre sat back in his chair, his eyes riveted on the images. ‘I’ve seen many a thing but that’s . . .’
‘Downright weird?’ she offered when his voice tailed off.
‘To say the least.’
Roach smiled but there was little humour in it. She knew her boss was struggling to cope with this, just as she had. Still was, if she was being honest with herself. A body clad in traditional Highland dress – plaid, shirt, bonnet with a sprig of holly – was one thing. But the period claymore pinning him to the ground, shown in the pictures as straight and high as a standing stone, was something else again.
McIntyre finally tore his eyes from the tablet. ‘So, nothing on the victim to assist with identification?’
‘Nothing, sir. The clothes don’t quite fit, so we don’t think they were his.’
‘And the weapon?’
‘It’s in good condition, from what I could see. It’s bloody heavy, so whoever wielded it has a bit of muscle.’
‘So a man, then?’
Typical, she thought, thinking only his gender could have muscle. ‘Not necessarily, sir.’
‘Any other wounds or contusions on the victim?’
‘Not that I could see but the post-mortem will tell us more.’
His gaze dropped to the photographs again, distaste pursing his lips. He was too experienced an officer to feel revulsion at the sight of blood and death. No, Roach knew he was a typical cop who, like her, did not like a mystery. Straightforward violence was preferable and understandable – a man kills during a fight, a woman murders an abusive husband. But something like this, something premeditated, something both weird and unusual, was not welcome. It led to expense and paperwork and manpower.
‘Nothing obvious, in other words,’ he said, a meld of weariness and irritation crisping his voice. ‘So what the hell happened? He didn’t just lie there and let someone plunge that thing into his body, I’m sure.’
‘No, sir.’
‘No other signs of a struggle at the locus?’
‘We’re still searching but there’s no blood apart from what was around and under the victim. He may have gone there willingly and then been attacked. But no obvious evidence. It’s also possible he was incapacitated in some way, drugged maybe, and taken there to be left like that.’ She flicked a finger at the photographs. ‘My guess is he was taken there in a vehicle, then carried or dragged across the heather and laid down, then the sword business.’
‘Toxicology will confirm if he was drugged?’
‘Yes, sir.’
‘Access?’
‘Have you been to Culloden, sir?’
‘I have, but remind me.’
‘There’s a drive leading to the visitor centre. There are areas where you can pull in and not be seen from the main road, especially at night. The battlefield itself is not fenced off so it would be easy to move the body from a car to where it was deposited.’
‘But no physical evidence of that? Marks or disturbed earth?’
‘Lots of tyre tracks but that means nothing. It’s a popular spot. Nothing in the heather, no drag marks.’
McIntyre’s forefinger tapped rhythmically on screen as he studied it. Roach followed his stare and saw a close-up of the body, the sword prominent, the man’s eyes open, staring, always staring. For as long as the records exist.
‘The bloody media will be all over this,’ said McIntyre. ‘I hate it when they are all over cases.’
‘I’ll have to keep as much detail out of the public eye as I can, sir.’
He grunted. ‘Bloody reporters are a menace. You know, if it wasn’t impossible, I’d advocate that only three or four people know about murder inquiries. That way we could keep everything nailed down tight until we are ready to release it.’
‘I know what you mean, sir, but – as you say – impossible.’
‘You’ll have to give the media something. The fact that the body was found on a National Heritage site will have them wetting themselves – the Highland dress and the bloody sword will make it even worse.’
‘The clothes and the sword are two of the points I’d like to keep to ourselves for now, sir.’
He sighed. ‘Good luck with that, Val. Some idiot out there will be talking when he should be thinking, I guarantee it.’
She knew what he meant. A murder inquiry was a massive undertaking with a vast array of personnel involved at some point or other. In addition to the police officers, there were medical experts, forensics, civilians and lawyers. And when the interviews began the net would widen.
Facing the press was part of the job she hated. She knew in many ways they could be of assistance but in just as many, if not more, they could be a hindrance. Her job was to catch a killer. Their job was to get a story and outdo each other. They cited the public right to know, but really, during an investigation, the public only needed to know what the police needed – or wanted – them to know. After a trial and conviction, as far as she was concerned, they could print what they liked. Preferably accurately, but then there was never any guarantee of that.
9
Rebecca had almost made it to the office when she thought about Mo Burke. She still didn’t have her quote. She could simply phone the woman when she got back, which was always the preferred option of the company, but Rebecca felt the story was more important than that. Just as she had wanted to witness the demo for herself, she wanted to see the woman’s face when she asked her why she had taken such a high-profile stance given her family’s alleged criminal activities. It would be a difficult question to ask but that was the job: asking difficult questions.
She had reached the Raigmore Interchange, with the traffic speeding above it on the A9. As she headed towards the Longman Roundabout, surface spray from the wet road coated her windscreen and lorries roared past her towards the Kessock Bridge and the north. It occurred to her that she had been out of the office longer than she had intended and that Les Morgan would not be happy. Still, she thought, into everyone’s life a little rain must fall.
They called the area where the Burkes lived the Ferry – not to be confused with neighbouring South Kessock and Merkinch, which were also known by the nickname. Those who were born in Inchferry and who lived there most of their lives often viewed the nearby areas with disdain. ‘This is the REAL Ferry, ye know?’ was a phrase that had been uttered more than once to Rebecca. If you weren’t Ferry born and bred then you were likely to look on its residents with, if not contempt, then certainly suspicion. If you admitted to coming from the Ferry, you had to be a crook or an addict or an unmarried mother. Or all three. It was seen as a hell-hole, as a hotbed of crime, riddled with teen pregnancies and home only to the dregs of society. That was if you were in the habit of holding dinner parties, ate avocadoes and preferred your TV shows to be subtitled. The reality was that many of the residents worked hard for their money, had strong family units and the only drug they took with any regularity came in a tea bag. There were some, though, who gave their neighbours the bad name. Of the latter, the Burkes were the most well known.
There had been an actual ferry here, long ago, carrying passengers and goods across the Beauly Firth, but that, and others, had become surplus to requirements thanks to the Kessock Bridge. The housing estate had sprung up in the years following the Second World War, just as other council schemes had in cities all over the country. It became a gridwork of meandering streets that curved and criss-crossed each other with no apparent design. The housing was a mix of terraces and flats, some tenements four or five storeys high. Others were what they would call duplexes now, with the ground-floor flat accessed from the front and the upper apartment through a door at the side. In the 1970s many of the properties had fallen victim to a mixture of tenant and council neglect, as well as poor construction, but in the ’80s and ’90s, as the government’s right-to-buy
scheme took effect and grant money was thrown around like confetti, a few were transformed. Damp courses were squirted into walls, roofing was repaired, rendering was fixed and windows were replaced. The uniformity of the post-war era was made more individual by painting over the drab grey roughcast that had been so prevalent. Walls were now white or cream or, in one that she spotted as she drove, a bilious shade of pink. Even though some gardens had been paved over and transformed into driveways, there was still a sufficient number of cars parked on either side of the street, forcing Rebecca to manoeuvre as if through a chicane, the narrow passage wide enough only for one car. She had to stop two or three times to let a vehicle coming in the opposite direction pass.
The Burke house was a two-storey end terrace which had been recently painted brilliant white. Rebecca found a space a little way down the road and walked back, taking in the expensive black four-wheel drive parked in the roadway and then the house itself, with its sparkling windows, with what looked new uPVC frames, and matching door. Neat concrete slabs, with no grass or weeds growing through the cracks, led from the pavement across a small patch of grass which looked as if it had been trimmed with nail clippers. Her surprise at how fresh and clean the house looked was replaced with guilt. Why should she be expecting some hovel? She was obviously just as prejudiced as the middle-class trendies she had earlier mocked in her thoughts.
As she walked up the path, she felt the familiar nervous tingle and tensing of her stomach. Cold calling was not easy, but it was something she steeled herself to do.
The white-panelled door with two frosted glass panes swung open before she even reached it and Scott Burke was there to face her. At the demo that morning he’d been wearing a cheap-looking military jacket, but she noted underneath he’d obviously been sporting some expensive gear. None of your Primark for him. Unlike Rebecca. His blond hair was smartly cut, his face clean-shaven and now she was close enough she could see he was good-looking enough to front a boy band. Crooks R Us, maybe, or Nedzone. But there was that same smile she’d seen at the demonstration. The same smile she had actually seen him flash around in court. As if he was listening to some sick, perverted little joke that no one else could hear. She wondered briefly whether he’d opened the door by coincidence or if he’d seen her coming. Then she spied the black orb sitting on the wall above the door like a demonic wasps’ nest. Security camera. The windows were probably toughened glass, too. Maybe they had laser beams as a deterrent as well.
‘Hi,’ she said, giving him her best smile. ‘I’m looking for Mrs Burke?’
She had no idea why she made it sound like a question, as if she wasn’t certain Mo Burke lived here. Too many Australian soaps in her teenage years had affected her speech patterns and she resolved to cut that shit out.
He leaned against the door jamb, folded his arms. ‘Oh, aye?’
He looked her up and down. He wasn’t too subtle about it, either. There was an element of appraisal in his scrutiny, but she didn’t know whether he was assessing her level of threat, her reason for being there or the possibility of a sexual encounter. Rebecca didn’t have the kind of looks that made it onto magazine covers but she certainly didn’t frighten children, so had experienced men looking at her as if they were imagining her naked. It still didn’t make it right. Scott’s gaze both pissed her off and alarmed her in equal measure, but she was determined not to let it rattle her. The idea of staring pointedly at his crotch crossed her mind, just to see how he liked it. The thought was very quickly dismissed because he would probably see it as a come-on.
‘My name’s Rebecca Connolly, from the Chronicle?’
Again, that bloody rise in inflection, as if she wasn’t sure herself what paper she worked for.
‘Oh, aye?’ he said again, that smile still ghosting his lips. She waited for him to say something more, but all he did was idle in the doorway and stare at her with spectral amusement haunting his face.
Rebecca held onto her patience as if it was an umbrella in a high wind. ‘Is she in?’
He pushed himself upright and yelled over his shoulder. ‘Maw – you in?’
The answer came from somewhere within the house. ‘You know I’m bloody in. Stupid question. Who is it?’
‘Lassie from the Chronicle wants to talk to you.’
Mo Burke appeared. She was wearing a shapeless blue cardigan, jeans and a pair of woolly slippers that were somehow incongruous, given what Rebecca had heard about her. The rumours. Now that she and her youngest son stood side by side, Rebecca saw the family resemblance did not end with the colour of their hair. Except the mother looked at her with suspicion while the son smiled and smiled and smiled.
‘Mrs Burke, I wonder if you’ve got a minute to talk about the demonstration this morning?’
Mo’s eyes narrowed slightly. ‘I saw you there, right?’
Rebecca was unsurprised. Mo Burke was the type who would notice everything. That was the only way she could survive. ‘That’s right. I had to dash off on another story, but I hoped I’d be able to get a few words from you about your campaign.’
This time the woman smiled. ‘My campaign?’
‘Yes, isn’t that what you’d call it? You don’t want the council to rehouse—’
‘It’s no my campaign. It’s the Ferry’s. Nobody here wants kiddie fiddlers living beside their weans.’
‘I understand that, but you’re the spokesperson, right?’
‘Only because no other bugger would speak up. They wanted something done, but nobody else would raise even as much as a finger to do it. I had to step up. Me and my boys.’
She reached out and touched Scott’s arm, and he took it as his cue to step up again. He nodded to Rebecca. ‘Aye, they others out there pissed and moaned about it, sure, but when it came down to it they were too feart to do nothin’. So we did it. We organised the demo this morning, the petition, the objections to councillors and that.’
‘How did you do that?’
He smirked. ‘We spoke to the folks around here, a wee word in their ears, you know what I’m sayin’?’
Rebecca took a wild guess at how threatening some of those words in ears had been. But then perhaps they hadn’t needed to be. Perhaps she was judging the Burke family by their reputation. Perhaps they did genuinely have concerns and no heavy leaning on neighbours was required. Perhaps all those neighbours wanted was someone to take the lead and they would follow.
‘And Finbar Dalgliesh? How did he become involved?’
Mo’s eyes clouded and a darting glance at Scott seemed to stiffen the air between mother and son. Rebecca had seen Mo’s anger earlier that morning, when Finbar had taken over. She had seen that same glance in Scott’s direction. Obviously, he was the one who’d got the Spioraid leader on board.
When Mo spoke, her voice was casual, without rancour. She was not going to discuss Dalgliesh. ‘I’m no keen on you lot, you know?’ she said.
‘My lot?’
‘The press. The media . . .’ She pronounced it meedja. ‘You lot haven’t been particularly supportive of my family over the years. My man. My boys. Like wee flies, you lot, buzzin’ all around us and our business. Why the hell should I speak to you?’
‘I’m not here about your husband, Mrs Burke. Or your boys. Or your, eh, business. I’m not even here to talk about Finbar Dalgliesh, he’s well able to speak for himself.’ Rebecca was pleased to see a little light in Mo’s eyes. She was willing to put up with Dalgliesh muscling in but that didn’t mean she had to like it. ‘I’m here to talk about an issue that you’ve highlighted,’ Rebecca continued. ‘You’ve sent letters and you’ve raised the petition and you organised the demo. But if you want the authorities to take notice then you need us, Mrs Burke. We can bring your campaign to a wider audience. We can focus the attention of the whole of Inverness, of the Highlands – maybe even the whole of the country – on this.’
‘Aye. Just so you can judge us and sneer at us, maybe? The way you parade my boys’ names across the fron
t page when they’re up in court?’
Rebecca took a gamble, believing the woman would like straight talk. ‘Then maybe your boys shouldn’t get themselves charged quite so often, Mrs Burke. We’re only doing our job – justice not only being done but being seen to be done. That’s what the local press does, Mrs Burke. The same with your campaign. We don’t judge, we merely report. You want what you’ve done so far to mean something? Then let me report it. Don’t let Finbar Dalgliesh and Spioraid hijack the work you’ve done up to now. Tell me about it and I’ll report it fairly and accurately.’
Scott sneered, obviously unhappy with her dismissal of Dalgliesh. ‘Do you people know what fair and accurate is?’
She held his gaze. ‘We could be the difference between your message being ignored and heard, Mr Burke. Or twisted into something else.’
Mo Burke studied her for a minute, her face blank but her eyes flinty. Rebecca couldn’t tell if she’d missed her mark or if she had hit home. Finally, those eyes seemed to soften and the woman took a deep breath. ‘Mister Burke,’ she said. ‘I like that. Polite, so it is. Respectful. You’d be surprised how many folk think they can call my boy by his first name without asking him.’ She gave her son a nudge with the back of her hand and turned away. ‘Bring the lassie into the living room, Scott. Don’t have her standing on the doorstep like a bloody milk bottle.’
Scott’s little smile returned and he stepped aside, giving Rebecca a flamboyant wave as an invitation. ‘You heard her, step into her parlour.’
Rebecca eased past him.
As she did so, she heard him say, ‘Buzz, buzz, buzz . . .’
10
If she had been surprised by the pristine exterior, Rebecca was stunned by the interior. Again, she really did not know what she had expected. Drug paraphernalia lying around, perhaps. Enough mobile phones to open a branch of O2. Dodgy-looking dudes wearing baseball caps and covered in bling. A big dog, maybe. Instead she was shown into a spacious living room that looked out onto the street and the neat square of garden. The room was bright and airy, the walls delicate pastel shades, and dominated by a settee of soft brown leather that looked large enough to sub-let. There was a recliner armchair in similar soft leather, a square coffee table made of heavy wood and on the wall above a high wooden fireplace of dark wood was fixed a large flatscreen TV currently tuned to CNN. Rebecca saw the US president making a speech, his right hand gesturing, as Alan had once remarked, like a children’s entertainer who had forgotten his glove puppet.
The Blood is Still Page 5