by James Oswald
‘Don’t be mean, Bobby. This is my colleague Detective Constable MacBride. I think you may have spoken to him on the phone earlier. Or was that Eric?’
‘They not feed you at work, MacBride?’ Bobby held out a hand to be shaken.
‘You’re Bobby Innes?’ MacBride shook, found his hand immediately engulfed by Bobby’s other one.
‘Ah. This one’s a fan!’ Bobby pumped MacBride’s arm up and down until the constable shook, then took a step back and looked him up and down, still holding him by the outstretched arm. ‘Strange, you don’t look like you eat at all.’
‘Saw an article about you in the Scotsman.’ MacBride retrieved his arm. ‘You got a Michelin star for your place down in Leith. I’d no idea …’ He let his words tail off, eyes roaming over the kitchen.
‘This is where it all started. Well, not here exactly, but in Bonnyrigg. My dad ran the chippy in the High Street. But you’ll know the story. Everyone likes rags to riches, eh?’ Bobby turned to the two young lads with the vegetables. ‘Keep an eye on that stock, all right? I’m just going to find Eric.’
He led them out of the kitchen, back through the hall of patiently queueing homeless, and into another big room beyond, talking all the while.
‘It’s been far too long, Tony. Why you never come to the restaurant any more? You find someone else to cook your favourite food now?’
‘Kind of lost the habit of eating out after Kirsty died, Bobby.’
‘It shows, you know.’ Bobby slapped his enormous gut. ‘Lucky I eat enough for two, yes?’
The room they had entered was painted in institutional beige, with a big picture window looking out on to a darkening back garden covered in snow, glimpses of the Pentland Hills through the tall cypress trees that delineated the boundary with the neighbouring property. Several tables took up one end of the room, arranged like a restaurant with half a dozen simple chairs around each. At the other end, a welcoming fire crackled in a large open fireplace, sofas and comfortable armchairs circling it like a wagon train. There were very few people in here; most of them queueing up for their soup in the hall outside. One table was occupied though, two people sitting not quite side by side. McLean recognized them both. Eric was Bobby’s partner and the brains behind the business. Like Bobby, he was a large man, but most of his bulk was muscle rather than Michelin-starred food. He had a small laptop computer and a mobile phone on the table in front of him, but was talking to the other man, who looked up as they all came into view.
‘Inspector.’ Gordon Johnson, Gordy as he’d introduced himself before, looked better than the last time McLean had met him, but he still had a haunted look in his eyes. He sat on the edge of his chair, tense, ready to flee at the slightest sign of trouble. No fight left in him, McLean could see that. This man who had served his country in countless battles was broken, utterly.
‘How’re you doing, Gordy? They feeding you enough in here?’ McLean took one of the remaining seats, pulled it out and settled himself into it. Nodded at the other man sitting at the table. ‘Eric.’
‘Long time, Tony. You want a minute alone?’
McLean saw Gordy stiffen at the question. ‘No. I’m not here to cause any trouble. Just wanted to let Gordy know we’d found his friend, Billbo.’
Gordy’s eyes widened, darted from McLean’s face to Eric’s, then to the point where MacBride was standing a few paces behind, before returning to McLean. ‘He’s dead, isn’t he?’
‘Yes. I’m sorry.’
‘Told you. It was the dark angels. They took him. They were coming for me, but he stopped them. They took him instead.’
‘We’re trying to find them, Gordy. The dark angels. We need to know where you were when they came for you and Billbo.’
‘Wasn’t here.’ Gordy looked up at Eric. ‘Safe here.’
‘Was it in the city? Nearer the centre?’ A nod. Which would explain why he’d ended up at McLean’s station, rather than rambling on to someone in Loanhead or Dalkeith.
‘You reckon you’re up to showing us?’
Gordy’s eyes widened even more, the fear threatening to tip him back over into full-blown madness. Eric reached out and placed a hand on his arm, gently. The contact seemed to give the ex-soldier strength, at least a little.
‘In your shiny car?’
‘It’s not so shiny, but yes. In my car. If you can show us where it happened, you won’t even have to get out. I’ll bring you straight back here, or take you to the barracks if you’d prefer.’
Gordy looked at his hands, clenched into fists on the table top. They were shaking for a while, but he brought them under control before shifting his gaze back up to McLean, his eyes clear with determination.
‘Aye, I’ll do it. I’ll show you where it happened.’
32
‘How on earth do you know Bobby Innes, sir?’
It was just as well that DC MacBride wasn’t tall. He’d squeezed into the back of the car without complaining, but McLean could see that there wasn’t a lot of room. Gordy sat in the passenger seat, stiff and upright, his madness and fear bubbling just below the surface. McLean didn’t want to think what was going through his fractured mind.
‘He used to share a flat with Kirsty, back when we were both students. We helped him decorate his first restaurant. Christ, I’ve not thought about that in a while.’
McLean stared through the windscreen, watching the first flurries of snow fall between the street lamps. It shouldn’t have been dark for another hour yet, but the sunlight hadn’t really managed to penetrate the thick cloud all day and now seemed to have given it up as a bad job. Even so, they’d made reasonably good time back into the city, only to be stuck in the slow crawl of traffic now they were near the centre.
‘Never realized he ran a soup kitchen. And out in Bonnyrigg of all places.’
‘It’s a bit more than a soup kitchen. More of a halfway house. Somewhere people can stop a while if needs be, get themselves back together. I’m guessing that’s what you were doing out there, eh Gordy?’
The ex-soldier flinched at his name, eyes going wide as if he’d been sleeping with them open and had been rudely woken. ‘Eh? What?’
‘You were at the shelter in Bonnyrigg,’ McLean said. ‘Trying to get yourself sorted out?’
‘Trying to get away from the dark angels. City’s not safe for the likes of us.’ He dropped his head low, craning his neck to look up at the invisible monsters that lurked on the roofs of the tenements. ‘Not safe for anyone.’
‘Well, we’ll make this as quick as possible, OK. You want to tell us where they took Billbo?’
‘That way.’ Gordy pointed towards the West End and the New Town. ‘I’ll know it when I see it.’
It took another half-hour just to get to the far end of George Street and down towards Dean Village. With each passing set of traffic lights slowly negotiated, McLean’s suspicion deepened that he knew exactly where they were headed. When he took the next turning without any instruction from Gordy, it was confirmed. They drove slowly past Andrew Weatherly’s empty terrace house. Its windows were dead eyes staring up at a snow-filled sky.
‘Here, on the right.’ Gordy’s flailing hand almost smacked McLean in the face. He braked a little too hard, felt the car slide on snow-greased cobbles, overshot the narrow alley he wouldn’t have been able to get down anyway. For a moment he thought he was going to hit a black Transit van parked half on the pavement, but he missed it by just a few inches.
‘Down there?’
‘Aye. Down there.’ Gordy’s voice was cracked, an edge of hysteria breaking through. McLean checked his rearview mirror, and found it full of detective constable. It wasn’t as if you could see much out of the back anyway. There was a space up ahead, though, probably double yellow lines but obscured by the snow. He pulled over and switched the engine off.
‘I’m going to have a look, OK? You want to come, or stay here?’
Gordy’s answer was to pull the door handle, unclip his s
eat belt and haul himself out into the street. A blast of cold air filled the car, sending a shiver through McLean’s whole body. He got out, tilted his seat forward to let MacBride follow him. By the time they’d sorted themselves out, Gordy was already halfway down the alley.
‘They’re not here now,’ he said as they reached him. McLean didn’t need to be told. The alleyway cut between the terraces, giving access to the large private gardens at the back. Ornate wrought-iron gates stopped any riff-raff from getting in, a heavy chain and padlock hanging around the bars. Off to one side, a smaller service gate had a sophisticated entry phone and camera system. Looking up, McLean saw a security camera trained on the main gates too, but he didn’t hold out any hopes that there’d be footage available.
‘Where exactly were you, Gordy?’
‘Over there.’ The ex-soldier pointed at a doorway, partly blocked in by large wheelie bins. McLean walked over to the spot, turned around a couple of times, then hunkered down. It was sheltered, well out of the view of the camera, and best of all a ventilation duct blew warm air out into the night. Sure, it smelled bad, and there was a constant noise from the fan, but it was warm and dry. He shuffled into the doorway itself, then looked back towards the gates. You could barely see them, just the tops, and the dark trees beyond, skeletal branches reaching up into the night sky like bony fingers. Fat flakes of snow spiralled out of the black, caught briefly in the light from the street lamp, then disappeared again into shadow.
‘How did you find this place?’ McLean stood up, walked back out into the cold alleyway. ‘It’s a bit off the beaten track, isn’t it?’
Gordy’s eyes glinted in the darkness as he turned his head to face McLean. He’d been staring at the gates as if they opened up on to hell. ‘You get to know the city’s hiding places if you walk its streets long enough. You should know that, copper. Tramps and polis, we’re the ones who know where everything is.’
McLean had to concede that the man had a point. ‘Why’s no one else using it, then?’
‘Marked it, didn’t I.’ Gordy pointed at the stonework beside the door. Sure enough, now that he’d been shown them, McLean could see the dark charcoal lines scratched on to the building.
‘Staked your claim?’
‘No. That’s a warning. Anyone who knows how to read the signs would keep well away.’
‘So what happened here, Gordy? Where did they come from, the dark angels?’
At the words, the ex-soldier stiffened. His hands started to shake and he looked around the alleyway as if only just realizing where he was.
‘They came out of the walls. They were everywhere. Their eyes glowed red like fire and they had tails that sparked and crackled and stung. I was stuck there, couldn’t move. It was just like the war. Thought I was back there. And then Billbo comes in roaring like a … like a …’ Gordy trailed off, his words having exhausted him. His shoulders slumped and McLean thought he was going to drop to his knees, but he just stood there, swaying slightly as fat lazy snowflakes spiralled down all around him, slumped like a puppet thrown over the back of a chair, waiting for its master to come back and take up the strings once more. When he approached, McLean could see tears running down his cheeks.
‘Come on,’ he said. ‘We’ve seen enough. Let’s get you away from here, aye?’
Gordy turned his head slowly, sniffed. ‘They’d come for me. It was my turn. But Billbo went instead. Why’d he do that?’
33
McLean watched the squad car drive out of the station car park, turn right and head south towards the bypass and Bonnyrigg beyond. He’d have taken the ex-soldier himself, but the drive there and back would have eaten up yet more of the day, even if he could get in and out of the place without being accosted by Bobby or Eric. They’d always been Kirsty’s friends more than his, and he’d shunned her friends more even than his own when she had died. When he’d realized where Gordy was hiding out, he’d thought it would be awkward seeing them again, that it would bring the pain and the despair back. Instead he’d found himself wondering why he’d never made the effort to catch up with them before.
‘McLean. My office. Now.’ Detective Superintendent Duguid might simply have been passing by as he stepped through the back door, or more likely he’d been lying in wait for just this moment. Either way, his flat, unemotional tone brooked no argument. A raging, unreasonable Dagwood he could deal with; the cold, calm manner McLean found more difficult to manage.
‘If this is about Detective Sergeant Ritchie—’
‘Not here. My office.’ Duguid cut McLean off mid-sentence, turned away and headed up the back stairs at a speed surprising for one of his advancing years. McLean followed, the ever-present dull ache in his hip turning into a series of sharp stabbing pains with each further step. He was soon several paces behind his boss, the irony of the role reversal not lost on him at all. When was his next physiotherapist session? Not soon enough.
‘You just can’t do it, can you, McLean?’ Duguid slumped into the seat behind his overlarge desk when they finally reached his office. McLean stood, not that there was much option.
‘Sir?’
‘Subtlety. It’s not your style.’
‘I’m sorry, sir, but I really don’t know what you’re talking about.’
‘Dammit, man. This.’ Duguid picked up the newspaper that had been lying at one corner of the desk, folded up. He flicked it open and dropped it down in front of McLean with a smooth action. The headline was answer enough. ‘Family Slaughter MSP in Sex Romp Scandal!’ It looked like the senior editor at the Evening News was on holiday again.
‘This case was meant to be closed. Tidied away under the rug with Minimal Fuss. Does this look like Minimal Fuss to you, eh? What the fuck did you think you were doing handing those photos to the press?’
‘What? You think I—?’
‘You spent an hour this morning with Jo Dalgliesh. This evening she hits us with this.’ Duguid picked up the paper, then threw it down on his desk again. ‘Where else did she get her information from?’
‘Oh dear God.’ McLean pinched the bridge of his nose, closed his eyes, hoped that when he opened them again, he’d be back at home and all this just a bad dream. It didn’t work, of course. Never did.
‘I spoke to Dalgliesh this morning, yes. I’ll admit it. But it was five minutes, maybe ten max. Bloody woman jumped me in the street as I was coming back here. Hit me with all this stuff about Weatherly. Thought if I told her to try to find out who was feeding her the pictures it might keep her off our backs for a while. Looks like she went for the easier option of giving us a good kicking.’
Duguid’s eyes narrowed, his face darkening as the hamster strained to squeeze out a thought. ‘If you didn’t give them to her, where did she get them from then?’
Good Christ, they put this man in charge. McLean rocked on his heels, trying to puzzle out what was at the root of Duguid’s current angry bluster.
‘Probably the same place I did, sir. Plain brown envelope delivered anonymously. No context, no accompanying notes. Just carefully selected images to push an agenda.’
‘But … If they’d already handed them to us … Why would they do that? What’s to be gained—?’
‘Other than fucking me and my team over? Making life bloody awkward for you? Uncomfortable for the Chief Constable? I’d have thought it would be obvious.’
Duguid’s scowl was a small reward. Not enough to make up for the bollocking, though. ‘Enlighten me,’ the detective superintendent said.
‘The man who gave me those photographs told me to keep digging even when the case was closed. He was Weatherly’s handler. Part of a team who managed his excesses. They tolerated what he did as long as he was useful. Tried to make sure he didn’t get too far out of line.’
‘Well, they fucked that one up pretty spectacularly, I’d say.’
‘So it would seem. There’s more to it than that, though. Someone searched Weatherly’s town house before we got there. They str
ipped all the hard drives out of his security systems except the ones they wanted us to see. They drip-fed us information, manipulated the investigation.’ McLean remembered his conversation after the last press conference. ‘I even think they’ve got Jack Tennant working for them, and that’s not something I ever thought I’d see.’
‘But that doesn’t make sense. Why give you this stuff if they want the case to go away? For fuck’s sake, why give it to the press?’
‘It’s all about the timing, I think. Something like this was bound to come out sooner or later. They just needed the process managed. Delayed until they were ready to deal with it. Weatherly’s not the only one in those photos. There’s bound to be others who need to be protected. Or dumped.’ Another possibility occurred to him as he spoke, and McLean felt that familiar cold churning in the pit of his stomach as the ramifications began to form behind it. ‘Either that or we’ve got two sides fighting a war, using us as proxies.’
‘Fucking politics.’ Duguid picked up the paper again, flicking it open so hard the front page tore. ‘Christ, but I hate being played like this.’
From anyone else, McLean would have been surprised, might even have protested that he shouldn’t dish it out if he couldn’t take it. But this was Dagwood, and the point would be completely lost on the man. Instead he just tried to let it all wash over him, suppressing his reaction until all that escaped was a quiet sigh. The torn page slid slowly to the floor, turning over a couple of times before coming to a rest at his feet. Upside down, the smug face of Andrew Weatherly looked up at him, a playful smile on his lips as if he were enjoying the trouble his actions had caused.
‘Me too, sir. Me too.’
‘Good Christ, what are you doing here, Sergeant? I thought you were meant to be on sick leave.’
McLean had popped into the CID room on his way from Duguid’s office in the hope of finding Grumpy Bob. Instead the pale, sniffing form of DS Ritchie looked up at him from her desk, eyes sunken, face thinner than could possibly be healthy. She gave him a weary smile.