A Deviant Breed (DCI Alec Dunbar series)

by Stephen Coill

  If any aspect of the case so far harked back to that dark period when lawless Reivers ruled the region, the grisly sight that greeted them was it. What barbarians our ancestors were that such things were once a common sight the length and breadth of our islands, he thought. Little wonder then that their legacy lived on, at least in the warped minds of some.

  Eugene was all but finished. A line search had already fanned out from the crumbling dry stone sheep pen and in the distance Dunbar could just make out a couple of dog-handlers quartering the rugged terrain and issuing curt, clear instructions to their German shepherds.

  ‘Alone, Eugene – nae Laughing Boy?’

  ‘The on-call SOCO was needed elsewhere and Duncan didnae answer his phone.’

  ‘Not as stupid as he looks that lad,’ Dunbar joked. He turned and looked east, then west and frowned. ‘Only two dogs?’

  ‘Four!’ Eugene answered. ‘Two more fanned out into the area south of the burn.’ Dunbar nodded his approval. ‘I’m done here, can I bag and tag our friend?’

  ‘Be my guest, Eugene. Oh and take him to Donnie Salkeld at the path lab, pronto. He loves jig-saw puzzles. It’ll be driving him crazy that this piece is missing.’

  Eugene rolled his eyes at Dunbar’s irreverence as he snapped on a fresh pair of latex gloves. Dunbar turned to Tyler. ‘What have we got? What do we need? In the gap between those two questions we’ll find the identity of the killer,’ he said, scanning the area again as much for the view as inspiration.

  ‘We need a lucky break,’ she offered wearily.

  ‘Counting on luck is a last resort, Detective Inspector Tyler,’ he growled. She shared a knowing look with Eugene as Dunbar circled the ancient dilapidated sheep pen.

  ‘Wrong side o’ the bed?’ Eugene whispered.

  ‘Leg’s giving him gyp.’

  Dunbar snatched his phone from his coat pocket. ‘Falk!? – Well put him on then.’ He waited impatiently smartphone pressed hard against his ear. ‘Falk, grab a DC – get down to Archie English’s house, ask him to accompany you to Edinburgh for a wee chat with me and the DI. ‘And hey – not under arrest – he’s attending voluntarily, got it? I dinnae want him on the clock until we have something to charge the bugger with.’

  ‘What if he doesnae want to come, sir?’

  Dunbar bristled. ‘He’s coming in, Falk. Use your considerable powers of persuasion.’ He ended the call to save any further argument and found himself staring across the pen at Tyler. ‘It’s not him!’ It was clear that he was in no mood for dissent, so she chose not to respond. ‘But maybe he’s the catalyst.’

  ‘We’ve got the PM to –’

  ‘By the time Falk’s made that round trip we’ll be done at the path lab, and it won’t hurt to have the bugger stewing for a wee while if we’re not.’

  The low cloud had lifted and their vantage point gave them an almost three hundred and sixty degrees view of East Lothian, broken only by distant higher summits. Dunbar took a few deep breaths, tapped the side of his aching leg more gently this time. ‘Are ye familiar with the writings of Ram Dass, Briony?’

  ‘And he is?’

  ‘A Zen philosopher.’

  ‘Must have missed that lecture at Tulliallan,’ she responded, with a smirk.

  They were friends again. ‘Really? It was on one of my CID command courses that his writings were recommended to me. His and Sun Tzu’s a Chinese military strategist. Clever fellas.’

  She eyed him suspiciously. ‘As I’m sure you know. I haven’t done my CID command course – yet! ’ Maybe they weren’t friends after all.

  ‘Ach, that’s right, but seriously! That irritating, overused, thinking outside the box, expression is just philosophy rebranded. Listen to any of them, y’know those media and corporate and political fakers. I mean, really analyse that shite they spout and you’ll find that it has its roots in philosophy – sort of. They just play around with it and distort it to suit their particular agenda.’ He scanned the area. She opted for tactical silence. She was not going to be drawn into a discussion about a philosopher she had never heard of. ‘Well, I dunno’, maybe the tranquillity up here brought him to mind. Wherever you are – be there.’ He swung his walking stick in a wide arc towards the glen below. ‘We’re here! And so is the answer.’

  ‘Didn’t have you down for a student of Zen Buddhism.’

  ‘Just a dinosaur then.’

  ‘No, I just –’

  ‘I’m neither,’ he cut in with a grin. He was toying with her, trying to ease the tension he had created. She could live with that. ‘The old sage could have been talking about a crime scene when he coined that little gem. Put yourself in the killer’s shoes – in this place. Why here? And why these particular victims? What’s the motivation? What external forces were at play when those poor bastards the professor is so fixated on met their fate? Are they still at play? Is the bloody history of this glen what influenced our killer’s actions?

  ‘Got to be!’

  ‘Has it? Is the killer being driven by that ancient blood feud? Granted, it looks that way but what if that’s what they want us to think? Either way, the history of this place is a distraction and gives the bugger an advantage.’

  ‘Maybe that’s all part of their game plan, but why Farish? Why like this? Why take the risk after all this time?’ Tyler wrinkled her nose as she watched Eugene ease the head from the pole. It made a dreadful sucking noise and she shuddered.

  ‘It makes no sense,’ she gulped, turning away as Eugene bagged it.

  ‘Unfortunately few cases I investigate do.’ He looked her in the eye and sighed. ‘I always seem to get the weird ones.’

  She turned and fixed him with a wry smile. ‘Now you tell me.’

  ‘Trust me, Briony. If the investigation proves complex, so will the answer. This is one of those cases when you definitely have to leave any preconceptions in your desk drawer. Experience will only get you so far on a job like this.’

  ‘Do I detect a concession to my lack of experience, sir?’

  ‘Help me close the book on this and I’ll let you know.’

  He limped back down the glen, pondering the case. What was the explanation? There will be one, even if it only makes sense to the twisted mind responsible for these horrors. And what is the killer’s tragic story? There usually is one. What connects the three – if it is only three heads? And does it really hark back to what took place here three hundred years earlier? More questions than answers, way more. But each individual will have their own story to tell, and if he could establish a link, that might lead him to the perpetrator.

  ***

  Shelagh Geary had regained her composure. She distracted herself and her team of two by walking them through their dig site to discuss future phases of the dig.

  ‘Note the orientation of this glen from this point. See how it tapers, flanked by almost sheer, rocky yet heavily wooded crags,’ she explained, pointing to the features in turn. Zoe and Shaggy were following her directions but it did not look to Dunbar as if they were actually taking it in. ‘A small disciplined force could quite easily defend the position and overcome a greater force, or so they thought. However, this is not a battlefield.’ She fixed them and then cast her eyes towards the two detectives. ‘It’s a killing field, and it still evokes the sensation of a trap waiting to be sprung, but unfortunately for Morag – her enemies knew that. They came with such strength of numbers as to negate her strategic advantage and overwhelm her defences. Short of the remaining analysis data, I am convinced the majority, if not all of the skeletal remains we have uncovered were almost all victims of the Inglis Clan and that the myth of their ungodly activities is in some part true.’

  ‘The cannibalism and –?’ Shaggy began to ask.

  ‘Almost certainly. As for why the bodies are headless? Removed and mounted like our friend up there, across the region as a warning to others.’ Zoe baulked on being reminded. ‘I know, I’m sorry. But imagine a traveller or rival clan coming across su
ch a sight. Proof, if proof were needed that they were passing through an ungovernable, lawless, much disputed land – the notorious Debateable Lands, that’s a powerful message, a warning of their potential fate.’

  ‘So where are the bodies of the executed?’ Shaggy asked, looking around the field. ‘Why are we only finding Morag’s victims?’

  ‘Unworthy of burial in the eyes of their God-fearing persecutors, they were probably scattered for carrion across these hills or taken to local towns to be displayed as a warning.’

  The three of them turned to face Dunbar and Tyler. ‘And now we have yet another twist to the strange tale of Obag’s Holm,’ he added, having caught the latter part of her theorising.

  ‘Indeed we have, but then again, as I always say: the unexpected is the rule rather than the exception at archaeological sites.’

  ‘And crime scenes alike.’

  Geary looked around. ‘The minute I got here I felt that this place had the oppressive atmosphere of a charnel house, and that was before we unearthed enough bodies to fill a small cemetery. Cut off as it is from civilisation, the cries of the dying would disturb only the crows. I can picture her Pele Tower – her vantage point on the ridge, a dark, foreboding sentinel. I doubt many travellers that passed this way reached their intended destination.’

  Dunbar nodded his agreement. ‘Aye, it’s not exactly the place you’d pitch a tent for a happy weekend’s camping, is it? Anyway, we’re heading back to Edinburgh. We have a post mortem to attend.’

  ‘How do you do it, Dad?’ Zoe asked, looking at him blankly.

  Her question threw him for a moment but he responded with a reassuring smile. ‘It’s not all that different from what you guys do. Except, that in your case the bodies have been lying around a lot longer.’ His answer did not satisfy her. ‘We’re no different than anyone else, Zoe. We’re just conditioned by the job, to deal with this stuff in a detached, dispassionate way but it does get to us too sometimes.’ Tyler nodded her agreement. He looked at each of them in turn and around the vast site. ‘I think maybe you should take a break from this place.’

  ‘I can’t just walk away from this. Anyway we’re on a tight schedule, especially if that blasted wind farm gets a green light.’

  ‘I meant –’ he began to say, only for the Professor to talk over him.

  ‘You’re only concerned with three corpses, Chief Inspector Dunbar – three! Whereas, we’re seeking an explanation for mass murder, a three and half centuries old mystery and – well, you’ve seen what we’ve seen. The parallels are axiomatic don’t you think?’

  ‘Self-evident,’ Tyler whispered.

  Dunbar knew that and gave Tyler a stern look before nodding in his daughter’s direction. ‘Actually, I was talking to Zoe, but what I said applies to you all – if only in the interests of your safety.’

  Professor Geary gagged, looked at the pale face of his pretty daughter and nodded emphatically. ‘Sorry, yes of course, I – it is perhaps a good idea, Zoe, but I must carry on.’

  ‘No! This is my first dig, I’m not letting some heid-case put me off,’ Zoe protested.

  ‘We’ll talk about it later then. Meanwhile, would you two mind putting our equipment back in the vehicle? I think today should be one of reflection not investigation.’ Zoe flashed a defiant glance her father’s way as she and Shaggy began to gather up their gear.

  Dunbar ran a hand over his daughter’s shoulder as she passed him. She stopped and met his worried look.

  ‘I’m okay, it’s just another freaky twist to all the other freaky shit that’s gone on around here,’ she said, before walking away. Dunbar watcher her go. It saddened him to think of how distant they had become, mainly on account of her grandfather’s unrelenting pain at the loss of his beloved daughter.

  ***

  Maggie’s death was officially recorded as accidental. A selfish act of attention seeking that went horribly wrong was how the subtext of the report read. It brought Jim some comfort to believe that in her drunken stupor Maggie had not realised just how many pills she had popped and Dunbar had learned to live with that, even if he still believed that she fully intended to end her life. Maggie was effectively trapped in a cycle of uppers and downers invariably washed down by vodka or gin. Dunbar had been aware of her drinking but not of its extent. After her death he had found empty bottles concealed all over the house, once he finally got around to clearing it out. It was his father-in-law’s more painful charge had proved less easy to shake off, because it was possibly – no, probably true.

  ‘That bloody quack had nae right prescribing such strong sedatives and them valiant tablets.’ Jim never could get the word right. ‘Maggie needed you, Alec, not that quack’s drugs. She needed her husband – at home, not out boozing with his polis pals.’ Yet another uncomfortable truth heavily laced in a father’s denial. It was that mantra that Jim had repeated over and over again that slowly drove a wedge between him and Zoe. Maggie did need Valium, as well as other antipsychotic drugs. But Jim was right about their relationship. He should have spent more time at home.

  ***

  Once they were out of earshot, Professor Geary continued. ‘As for me, I feel it is even more important that I try to discover the truth of what happened here. If it is what is motivating the person you seek, it might also help you.’

  ‘I know you’re itching to get back into your trenches but that old guy up there, he was murdered in his home, Professor, and his body dismembered in the undertakers’ mortuary. This isn’t just a case of trying to find out who buried a couple of heads anymore, I –’

  ‘And Allyson has compiled some fascinating data,’ she cut in. ‘Just look at what the science has told us already.’ The combined pressure of frustration and ego was getting the better of her. ‘We’re not randomly scratching around in the dirt, Chief Inspector. Archaeology has developed techniques of remarkable sophistication, so as to arrive at the best and most accurate conclusions to the meaning of all this, and we are always thorough. We do hate it when someone else comes along at a later date with a contrary opinion – much like you, I imagine.’

  ‘The difference being that you make intellectual assumptions based on historical records, artefacts and educated guesswork. I have to go with observable evidence: evidence that will stand up to scrutiny in a court of law, and of defence lawyers who are paid to hold contrary opinions.’

  Geary conceded the point but wasn’t giving up. ‘Not only that, I have a field full of murdered souls no less deserving of closure. Just because they’ve been dead longer doesn’t detract –’

  ‘You sure that’s what this is about?’ Dunbar cut in. Geary bristled at the implication. ‘Sorry – uncalled for. But while we’re on the subject of science, thoroughness and explanations, just remember, the only people that care about your bones are academics, historians and students of history. You’ll probably never know for sure who killed the people whose fate you’re investigating, whereas I’ve got the Chief Constable, the Justice Secretary, press and Joe public waiting for answers from me – and a chance of catching this killer. So! This enquiry takes precedence. If I say back off, you back off. And I’ll see what I can do about a permanent police presence while you work, just in case. But not today – today this place is going to be crawling with polis. Go study your artefacts and bones some more.’

  ***

  The tablets had done their job and he was back behind the wheel. They were more than half way back to Edinburgh when ‘the shout’ came. One of the dog-handlers tracking south and west had apprehended a man acting cagey and evasive. The officer described the man as in his late twenties, possibly early thirties, wearing camouflaged army surplus clothing with a full-face balaclava and gloves in his pockets. Tyler could barely contain her excitement. Dunbar remained sanguine.

  ‘Poacher maybe.’

  ‘No dogs, no gun, what looks like dried blood on his sleeve,’ Tyler countered.

  ‘Corpses don’t bleed.’

  ‘Not out of the
question that there’s been transfer from the body to the sleeve of his jacket.’

  ‘Nae.’

  ‘But?’

  ‘No buts – just doubts.’

  ‘Too much of a coincidence,’ she added, clinging to hope.

  ‘He was heading in the wrong direction.’

  ‘The wrong direction – away from the scene?’

  ‘Yeah, sounds to me like he was keeping away from the roads.’

  ‘Having seen all the police activity.’

  ‘Our killer has to be using a car. He wouldn’t abandon it. All it takes is a PNC check and the games up but – never look a gift horse in the mouth, they say. Tell them to bring him in – to us, not via the nearest nick.’ DI Tyler was happy to relay that order. ‘And then ring Falk, see if he’s got hold of Archie English yet.’

  12

  In all his service, little he had encountered smelled worse than an expertly eviscerated human body. It was a stench that seemed to permeate every fibre of his clothing for hours afterwards. Professor Donnie Salkeld would insist that the sensation was entirely in Dunbar’s imagination. He argued that he kept company with the recently and not-so-recently departed day-in-day-out, and had yet to detect the stench of death on himself afterwards.

  ‘Like farmers,’ Dunbar had countered. ‘They spend their working days paddlin’ around in cow shite and they cannae smell themselves either.’

  Add harsh lighting and gleaming stainless steel to the nauseating milieu and you had the ingredients for the least favourite aspect of the DCI’s job. The fetid atmosphere and glaring lights of the pathology lab always threatened to bring on a migraine. Donnie Salkeld knew this only too well, having imparted his expertise to Alec Dunbar on countless occasions. As a result, while they awaited Salkeld’s arrival, seeing Dunbar pinch his nose and close his eyes was being misinterpreted as squeamishness by Tyler and the lab assistant Stella. They shared knowing smirks every time he did it. Or was there more to the assistant’s smile than Tyler was attributing to it?