Steele, who had a raging thirst, looked regretfully at the brightly lit ale and lager fonts. ‘I’m driving, I’m afraid.’
‘Have something non-alcoholic, then.’ Herr reached over the wooden bartop, picked up a pint glass and filled it almost to the top with dark cola from the soft drinks dispenser. ‘That’ll no’ do you any harm,’ he muttered, handing it to the policeman.
‘Cheers,’ Steele acknowledged. ‘Now, about Arlene Regan . . .’
‘Ah yes,’ said the steward of the Territorial Army Club. ‘Our Arlene. A real personality girl, if ever I saw one. She let me down, though.’
‘How was that?’
‘She left me in the lurch, about a week ago. She didn’t appear for her evening shift. I spent all night rushed off my feet, all the time expecting her to phone me to explain where the fuck she was, but not a word did I hear from her. When she didn’t turn up the evening after that, I called her, to be told by BT that her number had been disconnected.
‘So I can’t really say I’m surprised that you’re here asking questions about her. What’s she done?’
The detective shrugged his shoulders. ‘Arlene hasn’t necessarily done anything. It’s her boy-friend that we’re after. Do you know anything about him?’
‘I know he existed,’ said Herr, ‘but I’ve never met him. They lived not far from here, so she usually walked home after work. She didn’t talk much about him though, not when she was flirting with the Weekend Warriors. As far as I know he worked in a shop.’
‘That’s right. Raglan’s.’
The man’s eyes widened. ‘What? The place that had that big robbery . . .’
‘. . . on the day Arlene and her boy-friend disappeared. That’s right.’
‘Jesus! No wonder you want to talk to him.’
Steele sipped his cola. ‘Do you know, Mr Herr,’ he went on, ‘whether Arlene did anything more than flirt with the customers?’
The steward frowned and looked at the carpeted floor. ‘I doubt it,’ he replied at last. ‘She could be a bit loud, but behind all that she was a nice girl.’
‘In what way?’
‘She was a decent, friendly, honest lass. The till was never a problem with her. She never struck me as the type to have two-timed her boy-friend. Mind you, she worked here for about three years. She was only living with him for the last two. Maybe at the start there were one or two she took a shine to.
‘There was a big red-haired bloke fancied her; that was his nickname, too. Big Red, his pals called him. But she never treated him as any more than one of the lads.’ He paused.
‘There was another guy she talked to quite a lot, though. He wasn’t a member, but the Paras brought him in every so often. Hamburger, they called him . . . they all had nicknames. Arlene liked him; I could see that. If she was playing around with anyone, it’d have been him, I reckon.’
‘The Paras?’ exclaimed the detective, in surprise. ‘Are they based here?’
Herr laughed. ‘No, that’s what they call themselves. Some of them were once, mind you. They’re a bunch of ex-regulars who joined the TA after they were discharged. Most of them are still in. There are half a dozen of them: Big Red’s one . . . although he hasn’t been in for a while . . . Bakey Newton, he’s another, Rocky Saunders, Big Mac, Tory Clark, and, and . . . Curly Collins.
‘They were always chatting up Arlene, that lot. We have other Friday regulars, but they were the ones she talked to the most.’
‘Would any of them have an idea where she might be?’
‘You could ask them, next time they’re in. They usually meet up on a Friday night, and sometimes on other nights during the week. I haven’t seen them for a week or so, but I expect they’ll be in again soon.’
‘Do you have home addresses for any of them?’
‘No, but they’re all in . . . or they were in . . . the Lowland Territorial Infantry Division. You could try them.’
Sergeant Steele drained his glass, and reached into his pocket. ‘I’ll do that, Mr Herr,’ he said, taking out a calling card and a pen. Scribbling on a pad he continued, ‘Meantime, there are my office, mobile and home numbers. If any of them, or this Hamburger guy, come in over the next couple of days, give me a call.’
59
The rays of the sinking sun shone red on the western horizon, but a heavy blue-black cloud hung over Gullane. Bob and Sarah Skinner sat in their conservatory watching the breaking storm, listening to the heavy raindrops as they splashed on to the glass roof.
There were a few cars left in the Bents park; as they watched, their owners, most with dogs on leads, came rushing up from the beach to the shelter they offered. One by one, lights went on; one by one they drove away, until all of the green space behind the beach was empty, save for two deer which broke cover from a clump of buckthorn bushes and raced blindly towards the east, away from the direction of the storm.
‘The end of summer, do you think?’ Sarah asked.
‘Could be,’ her husband answered. ‘The rain’s certainly overdue. Since we’ve been back from Spain the golf course green-keepers have been the only people I’ve heard complaining about the weather.’ He looked up at the roof, and at the heavy cream sun-blinds which hung from it. ‘That should shut the buggers up for while,’ he chuckled, as the rain began to run from the sloping glass in sheets.
He squeezed her hand. ‘What sort of a day have you had then, my love?’
‘Quiet, for a change. I was able to study most of the day. Joe e-mailed me the final report on the Saunders autopsy, to give me a chance to comment before he sent it to McGrigor. But apart from that . . .’
‘Lucky you,’ said Bob, with feeling. ‘The biggest problem I have with doing Jimmy’s job is not having any time to sit back and think. Maintaining a strategic overview of CID is part of my function, but it’s going by the board, with the in-tray, the politics, and the bloody phone ringing. Andy’s out there on his own, and it’s not fair.’
‘What, are you saying that Andy can’t think for himself?’
‘Of course not, but he deserves support. Yet in the midst of the biggest series of crises I can ever remember, I find myself just tinkering around the edges.’
‘To some effect, though. You’ve had significant input to the judges’ investigation, for a start.’
‘No I haven’t. All I’ve done is smooth things with Archie and interrogate Norman King.’
‘You got a result though.’
‘Andy and the team did.’
‘Okay,’ Sarah responded. ‘You say you don’t have space to think. In that case, there’s no time like the present. The boys are in bed, there’s nothing worth watching on television. Think, man, think.’
He laughed. ‘If only it was as easy as that.’
‘Why shouldn’t it be? Tell me: what’s worrying you right now?’
‘What isn’t?’ He leaned back deep into the cane sofa, slipping his left arm round Sarah’s shoulders. ‘Well, to begin with, I had a call from the Lord Advocate just before I left the office tonight. He’s decided to charge Norman King formally on Wednesday afternoon. He’ll appear before the Sheriff immediately afterwards, for remand.’
‘Fair enough, but why should that worry you? You’ve put all the evidence before Lord Archibald, but the decision’s his.’
‘Yes, but . . .’
‘But nothing. The evidence is there. If you were on a jury would you convict on it?’
‘Probably, but I’m not a jury member, I’m a copper . . . and I like things beyond even an unreasonable doubt, which this isn’t.’
Sarah leaned her head forward and bit her husband lightly on the chest. ‘You always want to catch your villains with a smoking gun in their hand, don’t you.’
‘Aye, I suppose so; but that’s no bad thing, is it? I’m dead certain that I’ve never put away an innocent man. I’m proud of that record, and I want to keep it. I’ve got a niggle about King, that’s all.’
‘Look, the evidence against him is ve
ry strong, isn’t it?’
‘Yes.’
‘And there aren’t any other recently dead judges lying about, are there?’
In spite of himself, Bob grinned. ‘No, I guess not . . .’ In an instant, the smile left his lips, his eyes narrowed, and he frowned. ‘Wait a minute, there is one.’
Sarah pushed herself upright. ‘Are you serious?’
‘Yes, I am. Remember old Lord Orlach? Had a place down in Aberlady? He died a few months ago, when you were in the States. He was buried along by, in the Kirk yard.’
‘Were there any suspicious circumstances?’
‘None that I knew of at the time. But maybe there are now.’
‘Hold on, Bob,’ she protested. ‘He was an old man. And what connection could he have with the other two?’
‘Just that, my love,’ Bob answered at once. ‘His age. Orlach, Archergait and Barnfather were the senior Supreme Court judges. Just suppose that there’s something connecting the three of them that led to all their deaths.’
‘But even so, how can you go about investigating Orlach’s death after all this time?’
‘I know where to start, at any rate.’ He jumped up and paced out of the conservatory, returning a minute later with his address book and the remote telephone handset. He flicked through the book, then dialled a number.
‘Miss Dawson?’ his wife heard him say. ‘It’s Bob Skinner here. Very well, thank you. That’s kind of you.
‘Listen, I’m sorry to disturb you at home, but there’s something I have to ask you. It’s about Lord Orlach’s death.’ He paused. ‘That’s good. First, can you recall the certified cause?’ He sat in silence for a while, nodding automatically. At one point, the watching Sarah saw his eyebrows rise.
‘Indeed,’ he said at last. ‘There’s just one other question, in that case. Who signed the death certificate?’ As he listened to the reply, he made a note at the back of the address book. ‘Ah, I guessed it might have been her.
‘Thank you very much, Miss Dawson. There may be nothing in this, but if anything does develop, I’ll let you know. You look after yourself, now.’
Sarah was looking at him intently as he finished the call. She knew of Christabel Innes Dawson, QC, and of the important part she had played in her husband’s life. ‘What did she have to say?’ she asked.
‘Heart attack. He was alone in his house in Aberlady when he died . . . that was going to have been my second question but she beat me to it. The cleaner found him dead in bed when she came in in the morning. She called in Dr Street, from the surgery three doors along, and she did the certification. There was no post-mortem.’
He smiled, up towards the roof. ‘The funny thing is that Christabel was shocked that he should die so suddenly, even at his age. He had regular health checks . . . BP, heart function, lungs . . . and he was always fine. They did a lot of walking together. In fact the old boy was the patron and honorary legal adviser of the Scottish Rights of Way Association, so they were always off proving some path or other.
‘The thought crossed the old lady’s mind that there might have been an intruder involved . . . he was always leaving windows open apparently . . . but eventually she decided that she was being daft, and let it go. But when I called her there, she guessed what I was on about right away.’
He looked at her. ‘Do you know much about this Dr Street?’
‘I met her once. She’s in the Aberlady practice, as you say, in her early fifties and not, I’d say, given to using too much initiative.’
Bob scratched the end of his nose. ‘If you were called in to examine an old bloke, dead in his bed, what would you think?’
Sarah stood, and walked slowly to the window. It was very dark now, and solid sheets of water were pouring from the roof. She looked out, then turned to face him. ‘If his lips were blue, I’d probably think heart, given his age. I’d take his medical history into account, though. From what you’ve said, Lord Orlach must have been quite fit.’
‘Yes, he was. Now let me ask you another. If you’d certified heart failure, but you’d cocked it up, what might you have missed?’
‘Any number of things. Cerebral involvement possibly, or if you’re looking at murder, some form of poisoning by injection. The likeliest though would probably be simple asphyxia; suffocation with a pillow. In those circumstances, if I’d diagnosed heart failure, I’d have missed tiny petaechial haemorrhages . . . ruptured blood vessels . . . around the lips and face. Actually, it might not be too difficult to overlook them in an old person.’
Her husband’s eyes were gleaming. ‘Okay,’ he went on. ‘Let’s suppose that’s what happened, and that your patient’s been under the ground for a few months. If we had the body exhumed, could we still determine that he’d been asphyxiated?’
‘Of course you could. All you’d have to do would be to look in the chest. If there was no sign of a coronary occlusion, or other major damage to the heart, and if the lungs were distended, then suffocation it would be.’
Bob smiled up at his wife. ‘See what happens when you start me thinking?’ he said. ‘I think I’ll have a word with this Dr Street. D’you reckon her number will be in the book?’
‘No,’ said Sarah, ‘but her husband’s will. She’s married to a retired naval officer, and they live in Dirleton.’
‘In that case, I think I’ll call her and make myself an appointment for first thing tomorrow morning.’
60
‘What’s put you in such a cheery mood this morning?’ asked Andy Martin.
Skinner beamed at him across the coffee table. ‘Let me put it this way. You know our time-honoured phrase when we’re after a warrant to search someone’s pad, “Let’s dig up a Sheriff.”?’
Puzzled and intrigued, the Head of CID nodded. ‘Well tonight we’re going to have a variation on that theme. We’re going to dig up a judge.’
‘Eh!?’
Quickly, he explained his interest in Lord Orlach’s death. ‘I went to see Dr Street this morning,’ he went on. ‘She admitted that her examination was a bit perfunctory. She said that he wasn’t normally her patient, so she wasn’t aware of his history, only his age, and it was on that basis, coupled with his physical appearance, that she made her decision.
‘I also had a chat with the old boy’s cleaning lady, She remembers that on the morning she found him dead, there was a window open at the back of the house.
‘So, I’ve decided to take a chance. I’ve instructed our legal people to obtain an exhumation warrant from the Sheriff in Haddington. We’ll carry it out at midnight tonight, and have the post-mortem done immediately. Unless we need to wait for lab work, my aim will be to have Orlach back underground within twenty-four hours . . . forty-eight at most.’
Martin looked doubtful. ‘Bob, isn’t this a hell of a big kite you’re flying, on a hell of a short string.’
The big DCC laughed out loud. ‘The formula for a crash, you mean? Sure it is, but what’s new?’ His expression grew serious once more. ‘I just feel we owe it to Norman King: shit, we owe it to every defendant to turn over every stone in our investigations.’
‘When you put it like that, I suppose you’re right,’ his friend conceded. ‘Will Sarah be taking part in the autopsy?’
‘Absolutely not! I feel too close personally to this one for her to be involved. Anyway, it’ll be done in the middle of the night and I intend to be there, so she’ll have to mind the boys.’
‘Won’t the grave-diggers talk about it?’
‘They would if they were involved; I’m going to use police officers. Do you want to be there?’
‘Digging, d’you mean?’
‘If you want,’ laughed Skinner.
‘No. I’ll give this one a miss, with or without a shovel.’
‘Your choice.’ The DCC picked up his coffee. ‘But here,’ he said, ‘I’m not the only one looking perky this morning. What’s put the spring in your step?’
‘You’re going to like this,’ Martin grinned
. ‘I may have a lead to the robbery team. Remember McGrigor’s murder? The man Saunders? It turns out that he bought his girl-friend two and a half grands’ worth of sparkle at Raglan’s, just before the place was done.’
‘But he was . . .’
‘. . . on the dole; that’s right. Sammy and Karen are up there now, speaking to Mrs Hall. I reckon there’s a fair chance that when he was making his purchase, he was casing the place as well.’
Suddenly, Skinner’s smile was as wide as that of the DCS. ‘You don’t say. What’s John been able to find out about him?’
‘Next to fuck all so far. He didn’t have any friends in West Linton, it seems, nor any family that anyone knew of. The last people to employ him, a big building firm, described him as a good worker, but said that he kept himself to himself. So did his landlord. He didn’t keep a bank account, as such, only a deposit account in the Dunfermline Building Society.
‘I’ve told McGrigor to do better today. He can start at the Dunfermline, and go on from there.’ Martin took a breath, and looked at his colleague.
‘Do you have any thoughts about it, Bob?’
‘He was a plumber, they said?’
‘That’s right.’
‘So where did he learn his trade? Find someone who knew him as a kid, and you’ll learn more about him.’
The Head of CID nodded. ‘Good idea. I’ll let McGrigor follow his own lines and put my two on to that.’
‘How about the Regan girl?’ asked Skinner. ‘Any trace of her?’
‘None so far, but Stevie Steele’s made contact with the parents, and let them know that we want to speak to her. He says the father seems like an upright bloke, who’ll probably co-operate with us. The old man was astonished to hear she was missing at all. He got nothing from her day job, but the manager of the TA Mess where she worked was quite helpful.
‘He gave him the names of some lads she was friendly with. You never know; she might have let something slip to one of them.’
‘I doubt it, since she didn’t even tell her parents. But as you say, you never know.You’ve told Steele to get on it right away?’
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