Hour Of Darkness

by Quintin Jardine

  Three seats were arranged at a table, in front of a flat-screen monitor, on which an image was frozen.

  ‘What we have here,’ the team leader explained, ‘is the view from the camera that looks up Orwell Terrace. As you probably know, that leads up to Caledonian Crescent. The time is five minutes past midnight on the day after your review window. Now look here.’ He pressed a control on a black box on the table and the screen became active.

  As Pye and Haddock looked on, they saw a dark-coloured saloon drive towards the camera, and then pass out of sight as it took a left turn into Dalry Road.

  ‘Okay?’ Halliday murmured, eagerly. ‘Now.’

  As he spoke another vehicle appeared on screen, travelling in the opposite direction, making the same turn, but right, into Orwell Terrace, much more awkwardly than the car had done. It was a light-coloured van, without markings.

  ‘That’s a Renault Master, long wheelbase,’ their host advised them. ‘Now look.’ He touched another control and the screen froze. ‘I think you’ll find that the registration number is quite legible.’

  Haddock leaned forward and read aloud. ‘Eight, zero nine five H N J.’

  ‘Exactly,’ Halliday agreed. ‘And I think you’ll find that that is a Spanish plate. That’s what you wanted, isn’t it?’

  ‘Absolutely,’ Pye told him, feeling his day take a turn for the better. ‘Not just that, it’s when we wanted it, and where. Thanks, Johnny.’

  ‘I’m not done yet. Hold on.’ He pressed some more buttons and a second view appeared on screen. ‘We don’t have a camera in the crescent itself, I’m afraid, but there is one at the exit of Caledonian Road, and this is what it shows looking up towards Haymarket. This is what it showed fifty-seven minutes later.’

  He activated the player; within a minute the same van swung into view once again, heading away from the camera.

  ‘Outstanding,’ Haddock exclaimed. ‘We’re pushing our luck, I know, but do you have a shot that lets us see the driver?’

  ‘Unfortunately not.’ The man was slightly crestfallen, but only for a few seconds. ‘However,’ he continued, ‘I can tell you where it went. We have footage of it heading along Queensferry Road and then later in Granton. We lose it in Marine Drive, but I’m confident that it didn’t come back into the city after that.’

  He leaned back. ‘I read the newspapers, chaps,’ he said, familiarly, ‘so I know what this is all about. If you in turn know that area, you’ll be aware that there’s a walkway along the foreshore that runs off Marine Drive. In theory it’s pedestrian and cyclists only, but the gate is a bit loose and it can be accessed by a vehicle, even one as large as a long wheelbase Renault Master van. If you’re trying to work out where that poor woman’s body was dumped, my guess is that you’ve found the very spot.’

  Fifty-Three

  There were times when Karen Neville reckoned that she had been too generous to her ex-husband during the negotiations over their split. She had no complaints with the generosity of his child support payments to Danielle and Robert, and he had agreed to her taking all of the substantial profit from the sale of their house in Perth. Yet as she settled into a work routine that involved constant weekend shifts, she had moments when she thought how pleasant it would be to be a full-time mother, at least until both children were at school. When these moments came she wondered whether if she had been a little more aggressive, a little less reasonable when they agreed that their marriage was terminal, she might have secured personal alimony that would have made it possible.

  But those feelings never lasted for long. The truth was that she liked her job. The truth was that she had been a full-time mother and had found it trying and frustrating. The truth was that she had come to believe that she had as much right to a career as Andy and had become resentful that he had assumed without discussion that she should be the one to make the sacrifice. The truth was that their relationship had begun in the workplace and had thrived there. Domestically, whenever they were vertical rather than horizontal, they had bored each other witless.

  And so, when he came to collect the children on a Friday evening, the only topics in their brief conversation, beyond the deeds and needs of their daughter and son, were usually professional.

  As he stood in her kitchen watching Danielle putting on her jacket, unassisted, Andy asked the inevitable question. ‘So, what sort of a week have you had?’

  ‘I’m in the middle of it, remember,’ she replied. ‘So far it’s been relatively unproductive. I’ve only caught one bad guy, and I didn’t really catch him, I just did the interview with Jack.’

  ‘What was that about?’

  ‘It was a man called Booth. You must have heard about it, even in your network. He walked into his flat and found Sammy Pye and Sauce Haddock there talking to his girlfriend. He pulled a gun and she was shot. He denied meaning to shoot her; his main line of defence seems to be that he was trying to shoot Sauce, and I don’t think that’s going to get him very far.’

  Andy laughed. ‘It bloody well will; probably as far as Peterhead Prison. You’re right, I have heard of Mr Booth, but not through your investigation. Sammy and the lad went to interview him about the Bella Watson murder and accidentally came across a chain of crystal meth that neither we in the SCDEA nor the Edinburgh drugs team had known anything about.’

  ‘So you’re involved now?’

  ‘Only in trying to trace the source, which, thanks to the forensic scientists, we know is in Spain, and probably in a specific region. My people are helping the Guardia Civil to track it down. As you’d expect, Booth’s singing his head off, but he doesn’t actually know that much. It’s a well put together operation, and the late and unlamented Bella was a part of it. She handled the money, Booth collected the gear from someone else and sold it in and around Edinburgh.’

  ‘I know all that,’ Karen told him. ‘I’m involved in the investigation. It was me that identified Watson, remember, when Tarvil and I were sent to her flat by our esteemed coordinator.’

  He grinned. ‘You don’t like Mr Mackenzie, then.’

  She frowned back. ‘You could say that. Don’t tell me you do.’

  ‘I can’t tell you anything, Karen. The fact is I don’t care about the man. I’m told he has a down on me for some reason. If so, he’s welcome. Been making waves in the city, has he?’

  ‘Not this week. He’s on leave. Actually it’s a bit odd; you’d expect that the divisions would have known about it in advance, but none of us did. “Sorting out some personal issues” is what we’ve been told, but there’s a whisper that he’s had his arse kicked by the ACC and been sent to cool off.’

  ‘Rather him than me; Mario’s a formidable arse-kicker.’ He glanced at his daughter, then back at his ex-wife. ‘You said you’re involved in the Bella investigation?’

  ‘I am this weekend, standing in for Sammy and “the lad”, as you call him. Don’t underrate him, by the way. He’s got “future ACC” written all over him.’

  ‘That’s if his choice of partner doesn’t get in the way.’

  ‘What do you mean?’

  ‘Never mind; no gossip between us, Mario said. Ask McGurk if you want to know. What have you got on your plate with the Watson thing?’

  ‘Plate. A good choice of word. I’ve just had a call from Sammy.’ She paused. ‘Actually, now that I think of it, it might interest you. If you know all about Booth’s drug route you’ll be aware that the deliveries were made in random locations by a woman driving a van with Spanish plates. Sammy says he’s placed the van, through CCTV, in Caledonian Crescent on the night that we think the murder happened. My big task tomorrow is to trace the owner.’

  ‘Too right it interests me,’ Andy said as Danielle tugged at his sleeve. ‘It lets us track down this crew from both ends.’

  ‘Take it over by all means,’ she offered.

  ‘No thanks, you’re doing fine as it is, and besides, I don’t want to make an enemy of Sammy Pye. But let me know what you find out,
as soon as you do.’

  ‘I will do,’ Karen promised, ‘but I do have other things on my plate. A couple of days ago I took a mouth swab from a kid who was born in Edinburgh but thinks he’s West Indian.’ She smiled. ‘I suppose he is in a way, more than Scottish, since he’s spent most of his life there. His name’s Marlon Hicks, but he was born Marlon Watson Junior. He’s Bella’s grandson.’

  ‘That’s interesting.’

  ‘But not nearly as interesting as this. The boy denied ever having heard of her, and his maternal granny says that’s true. But forensics ran his DNA profile anyway.’

  ‘And placed him in Bella’s flat?’ Andy asked, intrigued, as he picked up his daughter and let her sit in the crook of his arm.

  ‘No. They did find grandson DNA there. But it wasn’t his.’

  ‘So? He has a brother?’

  ‘Yes he does, but not by Marlon. Bella has another grandson, but we have no idea where he came from. It wasn’t from Ryan, Marlon’s brother, we know that.’

  ‘I don’t suppose the stork brought it, so have you looked at the daughter?’

  She stared at him, blank-faced. ‘What daughter?’

  ‘Jesus,’ he gasped. ‘And Sammy Pye’s supposed to be bright. Bella Watson had a daughter.’

  ‘Then nobody’s ever mentioned her to me. Are you sure?’

  ‘Sure?’ he repeated. ‘I’ve met her, my dear. I was part of the team that investigated Marlon’s murder. It’s going on twenty years ago, but I remember Bob taking me with him when he went to tell her about it. She was a presenter on a local radio station, called Airburst. It doesn’t exist any more, but that’s where we went.

  ‘Yes, I remember now; she was estranged from her family, she told us. She was just about to go on air, but she said she’d be all right, and that she wouldn’t break down or anything, because she hadn’t seen her brother for twelve years.’

  He frowned. ‘There was something else. Before we saw her, we went to visit Bella in that Wild West street where she lived at the time. She talked about her but I noticed that there were no photographs of her in the house.’

  ‘It was the same in the Caledonian Crescent flat,’ Karen told him, ‘so time didn’t heal anything. Where is she now, do you know?’

  ‘I have no idea.’

  ‘What was her name?’

  ‘Mia. She had a professional surname; I can’t quite recall it but that was her real Christian name. She was bloody gorgeous,’ he murmured, ‘I remember that much about her.’ Then his eyebrows rose. ‘And something else.’

  He put his daughter down, on a worktop. ‘Danielle, sit there for a minute please. Daddy has to make a phone call.’ He looked at Karen as he took out his mobile. ‘I’m going to put this on speaker.’ He held the phone in his left hand as he found a contact and called the number.

  ‘Andy.’ Alex Skinner’s voice, given a metallic tone by the small speaker, sounded in the kitchen. ‘What’s up? Are you stuck somewhere? Do you need me to collect the children?’

  ‘No,’ he replied. ‘I’m at Karen’s. This is a professional call.’

  ‘Your profession or mine?’

  ‘Ours. It relates to something Karen’s working on. Do you remember Mia Watson, from when you were a kid?’

  ‘Mia Sparkles?’ She paused. ‘That’s one from the past.’ Andy had the odd feeling that she was talking to herself rather than them. ‘Oh yes, I remember her. I was her number one fan.’ She hesitated again. ‘Well, number one equal, maybe,’ she murmured, as if to herself.

  ‘Do you know what happened to her?’

  ‘Only that she left. She didn’t turn up for her programme one day and she was never on that station again.’

  ‘Did you ever hear of her again?’ Karen asked.

  ‘No. Not that I’ve ever tried to find her, mind you. Someone else came on the radio and I moved on, like you do when you’re thirteen. Besides . . .’

  ‘Besides what?’

  ‘I’d gone off her by then,’ she said, abruptly. ‘I was a fickle child, as Andy will tell you.’

  ‘You said you were fan number one equal. Who was the other?’

  ‘Oh,’ Alex replied, casually, ‘that was just me being waspish; the other was probably Mia herself.’

  ‘Okay, thanks,’ Andy said. ‘See you tomorrow, yes?’

  ‘Yes. Are we still going to the Botanics?’

  ‘Sure. So long.’

  ‘So long, Alex,’ Danielle echoed, just as the line went dead.

  ‘There you have it,’ he said. ‘Mia Watson, Mia Sparkles; take your pick, but she does exist and she’s all yours. She’ll be mid-forties now, I think.’

  ‘Thanks,’ Karen murmured.

  He read something unsaid in her eyes. ‘What?’ he asked.

  ‘Oh, it’s nothing, just . . . I’m not looking to pick a fight and you know her much better than I do so you’ll probably say I’m talking nonsense, but I’m standing here thinking that there’s something your lady never told us.’

  Fifty-Four

  I made it home from Glasgow in time to keep my word to my boy. The weather was fine and there was enough light in the day to let us play a full eighteen holes on Number Three.

  In fact we made it round in under two and a half hours; James Andrew hits it pretty straight and I was playing only iron clubs to match his distance, so there was no time spent searching for balls in the rough. I gave him two shots a hole and he beat me, no problem. He might have only just turned nine, but he’s a better putter than me already and he always will be.

  We’d been playing for a fiver . . . five pence in his case, five pounds in mine . . . and so Sarah, watching from a window, could tell the outcome as soon as he stepped out of the car. Incidentally, he gets very pissed off these days about having to use a child seat, but until he outgrows it physically, which will probably be soon, that’s how it will be.

  ‘How many?’ she asked me as I came into the kitchen. When she returned to Scotland from her sojourn in America she bought a place in Edinburgh. The arrangement was that the kids would stay with me on schooldays and be with her at the weekends, but after the reconciliation that had taken both of us by surprise, that was beginning to go by the board, and Sarah was spending more and more time in Gullane.

  ‘Little bugger beat me four and three,’ I confessed. ‘He wanted to play for another fiver over the last three holes, but I drew the line at that. Just as well; he won them all.’

  ‘You might have to start hitting proper shots,’ she suggested.

  ‘It’ll make no difference. In another five years he’ll be giving me shots.’

  ‘And you’ll be very proud of him when that happens.’ She kissed me and handed me a bowl of chilli con carne. ‘You had a phone call,’ she said.

  ‘Just the one?’ (So had my life become.)

  ‘Yeah, it makes a change. Maybe people have other things to do on a Friday night than bother you. It was your friend Jim, the guy who used to work in New Register House. He said you should call him back.’

  I did, on the phone in the garden room, as soon as I’d finished my chilli. And that was the start of my weekend from hell.

  Jim answered so quickly that I suspected he’d been beside the phone waiting for me to ring.

  ‘Have you got something already?’ I asked. ‘On a Friday night?’

  ‘The impossible I do at once,’ he replied, then spared me the punchline. ‘It took me no time at all. Julie Austin. Mrs Allan; she does indeed have a brother called Magnus. He’s married to a woman named Julie Smith, which must make family dinner parties a little confusing, and they have issue, two of them, Richard Edward and Cheryl Mary. Does that give you all you need?’

  ‘Oh hell yes,’ I said. ‘I’m in your debt. And you must send me a bill; to my office in Glasgow. This is now a police matter.’

  ‘In that case,’ he replied, as cheerfully as ever, ‘I’ll do so as quickly as I’ve answered all your questions.’

  As I’d told Jim, I did have all
I needed. Through his wife, Max Allan was Cheryl Mackenzie’s uncle. Cheryl’s relationship with David went back to their teens.

  They were all bloody family, and beyond any reasonable doubt . . . in my mind at least . . . Uncle Max had smoothed the way for young David’s entry into the police force, by concealing a history that might well have ruled him out, even with Tom Donnelly’s name on his application.

  I could have let it lie there undisturbed, and forgotten about the whole business. Indeed I might have, if Mackenzie had been a stable, reliable officer doing a job that was of value to his force. But he was none of those things, and to cap it all off, he was missing.

  I thought about calling Maggie straight away. Mackenzie was on the Edinburgh payroll, not mine, and she had a right to know. But I put it off, and took out my mobile to look up a number. I was about to call it, when Sarah came into the room, and read the look on my face.

  ‘Trouble?’

  I nodded.

  ‘As in weekend-screwing-up trouble?’

  ‘I fear it might be.’

  She smiled. ‘And I said not so long ago that it had been a quiet night. I should a known.’

  I made the call, and Father Donnelly answered; there was background noise, of the pub variety. ‘Bob,’ he said his voice raised, ‘hang on. I’ll have to go outside.’ I waited, then heard a sound that might have been a door closing, and the babble disappeared. ‘That’s better,’ he said. ‘What can I do for you?’

  ‘You could begin by telling me how you know that David Mackenzie hasn’t harmed his wife,’ I suggested.

  ‘No I can’t,’ he replied, ‘I really cannot; not even after a couple of pints of Coors.’

  His insistence was enough stop me pressing any harder. ‘Fair enough,’ I conceded. ‘But can you tell me how long you’ve known that Max Allan and Mackenzie are related, through his wife being Cheryl’s aunt, her father’s sister?’