by Val McDermid
The anger Alex had been buttoning down for days suddenly welled up in him. "Not cost effective? If there's any possibility, you should pursue it," he shouted. "It's not as if you've got any other expensive forensic testing to do, is it? Not now you've lost the only evidence that might finally have cleared our names. Do you have any idea what you people did to us back then because of your incompetence? You tainted our lives. He got beaten up—" He pointed at Weird. "Ziggy got dumped down the Bottle Dungeon. He could have died. Mondo tried to kill himself, and Barney Maclennan died because of it. And if Jimmy Lawson hadn't come along at the right moment, I would have had the crap beaten out of me, too. So don't stand here and talk to me about cost effectiveness. Just do your bloody job." Alex turned on his heel and marched out.
Weird stood his ground, not taking his eyes off Karen Pirie. "You heard the man," he said. "Tell Jimmy Lawson to reel in his line and keep us alive."
38
James Lawson slit open the belly and plunged his hand into the cavity, his fingers closing on the slippery guts. His lips twisted into a moue of distaste, the slithering of vital organs against his skin an offense against his basic fastidiousness. He drew the entrails out, making sure the blood and mucus stayed within the confines of the newspaper he'd spread out in preparation. Then he added the trout to the other three he'd caught that afternoon.
Not a bad result for the time of year, he thought. He'd fry a couple for his tea and put the others in the caravan's tiny fridge. They'd make a good breakfast before he set out for work in the morning. He got up and switched on the pump that supplied the little sink with a stream of cold water. He reminded himself to bring a couple of replacement five-gallon bottles the next time he came out to his bolthole on the shores of Loch Leven. He'd emptied the spare into the tank that morning, and although he could always rely on the local farmer who rented him the pitch in an emergency, Lawson didn't like to impose on his goodwill. He'd always kept to himself in the twenty years since he'd moved the caravan up here. That was the way he liked it. Just him and the radio and a pile of thrillers. A private place where he could escape the pressures of work and family life, a place to renew his energies.
He opened a tin of new potatoes, drained them and diced them. While he waited for the big frying pan to heat up for the fish and potatoes, he folded the newspaper fussily around the fish guts and thrust it into a plastic bag. He'd add the skin and bones after his meal, then tie the handles tightly and leave it on the caravan steps for removal in the morning. There was nothing worse than sleeping in the stink of the detritus of his catch.
Lawson dumped a chunk of lard in the pan, watched it sizzle into translucency then added the potatoes. He stirred them around, then, as they started to brown, he carefully placed the two trout in the pan, adding a squeeze of juice from a Jif lemon. The familiar sizzle and crackle cheered him up, the smell a promise of the delight to come. When it was done, he tipped his meal onto a plate and settled in at the table to enjoy his dinner. Perfect timing. The familiar theme tune of TheArchersbounded out of the radio as his knife slid under the crispy skin of the first trout.
He was halfway through his meal when he heard something he shouldn't have. A car door slammed. The radio had covered the sound of the approaching engine, but the closing of the door was loud enough to be heard over the everyday story of country folk. Lawson froze momentarily then reached for the radio and turned it off, straining his ears to catch any sound from outside. Stealthily, he eased the curtain back a fraction. Just beyond the gate into the field, he could make out the shape of a car. Small-to medium-sized hatchback, he thought. A Golf, an Astra, a Focus. Something like that. It was hard to be more accurate in the dark. He scanned the gap between the gate and his caravan. No movement.
The rap at the door made his heart leap in his chest. Who the hell was this? As far as he was aware, the only people who knew exactly where his fishing lair was were the farmer and his wife. He'd never brought colleagues or friends here. When they'd gone fishing, he'd met them farther along the shore in his boat, determined to maintain his privacy.
"Just a minute," he shouted, rising to his feet and moving toward the door, pausing only to palm his razor-sharp gutting knife. There were plenty of criminals who might feel they had a score to settle, and he wasn't going to be caught unprotected. Keeping one foot behind the door, he opened it a crack.
In the sliver of light that spilled out on to the steps stood Graham Macfadyen. It took Lawson a moment to recognize him. Since their last meeting, he'd lost weight. His eyes burned feverish above hollow cheeks and his hair was lank and greasy. "What the hell are you doing here?" Lawson demanded.
"I need to talk to you. They said you were having a couple of days off, so I thought you must be here." Macfadyen's tone was matter-of-fact, as if there were nothing unusual about a member of the public turning up on the doorstep of the Assistant Chief Constable's fishing caravan.
"How the hell did you find me here?" Lawson demanded, anxiety making him belligerent.
Macfadyen shrugged. "You can find out anything these days. You gave an interview to the FifeRecordlast time you were promoted. It's on their Web site. You said you liked fishing, that you had a place up at Loch Leven. There's not many roads that go close to the waterside. I just drove around till I spotted your car."
There was something in his manner that chilled Lawson to the bone. "This isn't appropriate," he said. "Come and see me at the office if you want to discuss police business."
Macfadyen looked annoyed. "This is important. It won't wait. And I'm not talking to anybody else. You understand my position. You're the one I need to talk to. I'm here now. So why not listen to me? You need to listen to me, I'm the man who can help you."
Lawson started to close the door, but Macfadyen raised a hand and pressed against it. "I'll stand outside and shout if you won't let me in," he said. The nonchalance of his tone was at odds with the determination in his face.
Lawson weighed up the odds. Macfadyen didn't strike him as potentially violent. But you never knew. However, he did have the knife if it came to it. Better to hear the man out and get rid of him. He let the door swing open and stepped back, never turning his back on his unwelcome visitor.
Macfadyen followed him inside. In a dislocating perversion of normal discourse, he grinned and said, "You've made it very cozy in here." Then his glance fell on the table and he looked apologetic. "I've disturbed you at your tea. I'm really sorry."
"It's OK," Lawson lied. "What was it you wanted to talk to me about?"
"They're gathering. They're huddling together to try to avoid their fate," Macfadyen said, as if it were an explanation.
"Who's gathering?" Lawson asked. Macfadyen sighed, as if frustrated at dealing with a particularly slow trainee. "My mother's killers," he said. "Mackie's back. He's moved in with Gilbey. It's the only way they feel safe. But they're wrong, of course. That won't protect them. I never believed in fate before, but there's no other way to describe what's happened to that foursome lately. Gilbey and Mackie must feel it too. They must be afraid time is running out for them like it has for their friends. And of course, it is. Unless they pay the proper price. Them coming together like this— it's a confession. You must see that."
"You might well be right," Lawson said, going for conciliation. "But it's not the sort of confession that works in a court of law."
"I know that," Macfadyen said impatiently. "But they're at their most vulnerable. They're afraid. It's time to use that weakness to drive a wedge between them. You have to arrest them now, make them tell you the truth. I've been watching them. They could crack at any time."
"We've no evidence," Lawson said.
"They'll confess. What more evidence do you need?" Macfadyen never took his eyes from the policeman.
"People often think that. But in Scots law, a confession on its own isn't enough to convict someone. There needs to be corroborative evidence."
"That can't be right," Macfadyen protested.
"It's the law."
"You've got to do something. Get them to confess, then find the evidence that will make it stand up in court. That's your job," Macfadyen said, his voice rising.
Lawson shook his head. "That's not how it works. Look, I promise I'll go and talk to Mackie and Gilbey. But that's all I can do."
Macfadyen clenched his right hand into a fist. "You don't care, do you? Not any of you."
"Yes, I do care," Lawson said. "But I have to operate inside the law. And so do you, sir."
Macfadyen made a strange noise in the back of his throat, like a dog choking on a chicken bone. "You were supposed to understand," he said coldly, grabbing the door handle and pulling it open. The door swung right back and banged against the wall.
Then he was gone, swallowed by the darkness outside. The damp chill of the night invaded the cozy fug of the caravan, smothering the smell of stale cooking and replacing it with the tang of marshes. Lawson stood in the doorway long after Graham Macfadyen's car had reversed erratically up the track, his eyes dark pools of worry.
* * *
Lynn was their ticket into Jason McAllister. And she wasn't leaving Davina with anyone, not even Alex. And that was why what should have been an easy forenoon run out to Bridge of Allan had turned into a major operation. It was amazing what had to travel with a baby, Alex thought as he made his third and final trip to the car, listing under the combined weight of the baby seat and Davina. Buggy. Backpack containing nappies, wipes, muslin squares, two changes of clothes just in case. Spare blankets, also just in case. A clean jumper for Lynn, because projectile vomit didn't always land on the muslin square. The baby sling. He was mildly amazed he'd gotten away with leaving the kitchen sink plumbed in.
He threaded the rear seatbelt through the restraints on the portable seat and tested its security. He'd never worried about the strength of seatbelts before, but now he found himself wondering just how reliable they might be under impact. He leaned into the car, straightened Davina's fleece hat and kissed his sleeping daughter, then held his breath in apprehension as she stirred. Please let her not scream all the way to Bridge of Allan, he prayed. He didn't think he could cope with the guilt.
Lynn and Weird joined him and they all piled into the car. A few minutes later they were on the motorway. Weird tapped him on the shoulder. "You're supposed to go faster than forty miles an hour on a motorway," he said. "We're going to be late."
Stifling his concerns for his valuable cargo, Alex obediently put his foot down. He was every bit as keen as Weird to drive their investigation forward. Jason McAllister sounded just the man to take them the next part of the journey. Lynn's work as a restorer of paintings for the national galleries of Scotland meant she'd become an expert in the sort of paint that artists used at different periods. It also meant she'd had to find her own expert who could analyze the samples from the original so she could make her match as accurate as possible. And of course there were times when there were question marks over the authenticity of a particular work of art. Then the paint samples had to be evaluated to check whether they were from the right time frame and whether they were consistent with the materials used by the same painter in other works whose provenance was not in doubt. The man she'd found to do the scientific end of the investigations was Jason McAllister.
He worked in a private forensic lab near Stirling University. Most of his working life was spent analyzing paint fragments from road-traffic accidents, either for the police or for insurance companies. Occasionally he'd have an interesting diversion into murder, rape or serious assault, but that happened too seldom to provide enough variation for Jason's talents.
At a private preview of a Poussin exhibition, he'd tracked Lynn down and told her he was passionate about paint. At first, she'd thought this slightly geeky young man was being pretentious, claiming kinship with great art. Then she'd realized he meant precisely what he'd said. No more, no less. What infused him with enthusiasm was not what was depicted on the canvas; it was the structure of the stuff used to make the painting. He gave her his card and made her promise she'd call him the next time she had a problem. He assured her several times that he'd be better than whoever she was using.
As it happened, Jason had struck lucky that night. Lynn was fed up with the pompous prat she'd previously been forced to rely on. He was one of the Edinburgh old school who couldn't stop themselves condescending to women. Even though his status was effectively that of a lab technician, he treated Lynn as if she was a menial whose opinion was of no importance. With a major restoration on the horizon, Lynn had been dreading working with him again. Jason felt like a gift from the gods. Right from the start, there had never been any question of him talking down to her. If anything, the problem was the opposite. He tended to assume she was his equal, and she'd lost count of the times she'd had to tell him to slow down and speak in something approaching English. But that was infinitely preferable to the alternative.
When Alex and Weird had come home with the bag of paint samples, Lynn had been on the phone to Jason within ten minutes. As she'd expected, he'd reacted like a child who's just been told he's spending the summer at Disneyland. "I've got a meeting first thing, but I'll be clear of that by ten."
As Alex had suggested, she'd tried to tell him they'd pay his fee privately. But he'd waved away her offer. "What are pals for?" he'd demanded. "Besides, I'm up to my back teeth with car paint. You'll be saving me from dying of boredom. Bring it on, woman."
The lab was a surprisingly attractive modern single-story building set off the main road in its own grounds. The windows were set high up in the brown brick walls, and CCTV cameras covered every angle of approach. They had to be buzzed through two sets of security doors before they reached the reception. "I've been in prisons with less security," Weird commented. "What do they do here? Manufacture weapons of mass destruction?"
"They do freelance forensic work for the Crown Office. And for the defense," Lynn explained as they waited for Jason to join them. "So they've got to be able to demonstrate that any evidence they take custody of will be held securely."
"So they do DNA and all that?" Alex asked.
"Why? Are you having doubts about your paternity?" Lynn teased him.
"I'll wait till she turns into the teenager from hell for that," Alex said. "No, I'm just curious."
"They do DNA and they do hair and fiber evidence as well as paint," Lynn told him. As she spoke, a burly man approached and clapped an arm round her shoulder.
"You brought the baby," he said, leaning over to peer into the carrier. "Hey, she's gorgeous." He grinned up at Lynn. "Most babies look like the dog sat on their faces. But she looks like a proper wee person." He straightened up. "I'm Jason," he said, looking uncertainly from Weird to Alex.
They introduced themselves. Alex took in the Stirling Albion shirt, the cargo pants with bulging pockets and the spiked hair, its tips bleached a blond never found in nature. On the surface, Jason looked as if he'd be home in any Friday-night pub, bottle of designer lager in his hand. But his eyes were sharp and watchful, his body still and controlled. "Come away through," Jason instructed them. "Here, let me carry the baby," he added, reaching for the carrier. "She is a beauty."
"You might not say that at three in the morning," Lynn said, her maternal pride obvious.
"Maybe not. By the way, I was sorry to hear about your brother," he said, glancing awkwardly over his shoulder at Lynn. "That must have been hellish."
"It's not been easy," Lynn said as they followed Jason down a narrow corridor, the walls painted eggshell blue. At the end, Jason led them into a daunting laboratory. Mysterious equipment gleamed in every corner. Worktops were neat and tidy, and the technician peering down the barrel of something Alex thought might be a futuristic microscope didn't move a muscle as they bustled in. "I feel like I'm contaminating the place just by breathing," he said.
"It's less of an issue with paint," Jason said. "If I was in DNA, you'd be getting nowhere near the sharp
end. So, tell me again exactly what it is you've got for me."
Alex ran through what Soanes had revealed the previous afternoon. "Soanes thinks there's not much chance of finding a match for the paint, but maybe you can tell something new from the shape of the drops," he added.
Jason peered at the slides. "Looks like they've kept them in good condition, which is a plus."
"What is it you'll do with them?" Weird asked.
Lynn groaned. "I wish you hadn't said that."
Jason laughed. "Ignore her, she just likes to pretend she's ignorant. We've got a range of techniques that analyze the carrier and pigment. As well as using microspectrophotometry to establish the color, we can go more in-depth to nail down the composition of the paint samples. Fourier Transform Infrared Spectrometry, Pyrolysis Gas Chromatography and Scanning Electron Microscopy. Stuff like that."
Weird looked dazed. "Which tells you what?" Alex asked.
"Lots of things. If it's a chip, what type of surface it came from. With car paint, we analyze the different layers and we've got a database we can refer to and discover the make, model and year of manufacture. With droplets, we can do pretty much the same, though of course we don't get the surface details because the paint was never stuck to a surface."
"How long is all of this going to take?" Weird asked. "Only, we're kind of up against it, time-wise."
"I'll be doing it in my own time. A couple of days? I'll be as quick as I can. But I don't want to do anything less than the best possible job. If you're right about this, we could all end up in court testifying about it, and I'm not taking any shortcuts. I'm also going to give you a receipt to say I got these samples from you, just in case anybody tries to say otherwise somewhere down the line."
"Thanks, Jason," Lynn said. "I owe you."