Questions flew at him. The first which he took was from an old friend, John Hunter, a veteran freelance. ‘Mr Skinner,’ John was suitably formal, although they were occasional golfing partners, ‘are you consulting other forces in the course of your enquiries?’
‘Yes, we are looking, with colleagues in other areas, throughout the UK, at the possibility that this might be a serial killer.’
He caught a few puzzled looks around the room.
‘Since Saturday’s murder we have been seeking information from other forces, checking for groups of similarly brutal unsolved killings in other communities. We have been in touch also with Interpol, and with the FBI in Washington. One or two lines of enquiry have emerged, but I have to say that none of them look promising.
‘There’s something else to remember. It’s one thing knowing that you have a serial killer on your patch. It’s something else catching him. As soon as an obvious pattern emerges in one area, he usually moves on. That’s why some have lasted so long in the States. Strings of forty or fifty murders have come to light, but rarely more than four or five in a single location.’
‘So are you saying that if we have had a serial killer here, he may have run his course?’
‘It’s possible, John. But no one should make that sort of assumption. It could be fatal.’
Skinner looked around the room.
‘Groups of unsolved murders aren’t as uncommon as people think. Look at the Rippers. The first one was never caught, and the second went on for years. So did Neilsen. And look at Bible John.’
One or two of the old lags nodded. Bible John was a mystery man from the early Sixties in Glasgow, who had murdered a number of young women. Several witnesses had spoken of seeing victims with a young man whose most memorable feature had been a readiness to quote from the Bible, a trait which still makes a man stand out as an oddity in a Glasgow disco.
‘You don’t think there could be a connection here, Mr Skinner?’ asked John Gemmell of the Express, ever keen for an angle.
‘Do me a favour! If Bible John is still around, and I hope fervently that he is not, he’d be well over fifty by now. These killings are the work of someone who is agile and pretty strong. Another thing: Bible John’s method was the same every time. This guy varies his methods.’
An English TV reporter, a newcomer to Skinner, raised a hand.
‘Chief Superintendent, are you checking on recent releases from secure hospitals?’
‘Yes, we have done that, and we’re looking further back. But the fact is that when people are released from a secure mental hospital, they normally take time to readjust to society. They are cautious, and tend to stay indoors most of the time. An orgy of violence such as this is most likely to occur in the course of an escape. But even then, few escapees get more than a few miles. They put all their efforts into planning the breakout, then once they’re on the outside, they realise that they haven’t a clue what to do. I have the feeling that we are dealing here with a man who plans every step he takes.’
John Hunter again. ‘Does that mean there could be a motive?’
‘On the face of it, no. But if there is, we’ll find it.’
There were several more questions of detail, on timing, about the murder weapons and about the backgrounds of the four victims. The press conference was dragging naturally to a halt, when William Glass, of the Scotsman, raised a hand. Skinner considered Glass to be arrogant and pompous. He also admitted to himself, grudgingly, that the man was a first-class investigative reporter.
‘Chief Superintendent, with due deference to you, might one ask why the Chief Constable himself is not here, and why he has not been seen to have taken personal charge of such an important investigation?’
There was a shuffling of feet among the other journalists. John Hunter looked across angrily at his colleague.
For a time it looked as if Skinner would ignore the question. He glared at the man with the same look he had fixed on hundreds of suspects as they protested innocence, until Glass broke the eye-contact and looked away, flustered.
‘Mr Glass.’ A formal address by Skinner was his form of rebuke to the media and they all knew it. ‘The Chief is in charge of this enquiry. I report to him as Head of CID. I am also answerable to the public. That’s why I’m here talking to you when I could be out knocking doors with my lads.
‘I have been the spokesman since the first murder. The Chief Constable feels that it is important that I continue in that role, as the man with the most detailed knowledge of the enquiries. That is the channel of communication which he wishes to maintain.’ His voice rose and hardened. ‘If you want to maintain it you will oblige me by ensuring that your questions are relevant and pertinent.’
Skinner looked around the room. ‘Thank you, ladies and gentlemen; this conference is closed!’
As the door closed behind him, Skinner heard John Hunter begin to harangue Glass, to murmurs of approval from his colleagues. He knew that he should have kept his temper in check, but it had been a hard week.
He was still seething quietly when he reached the gym. Since his teens karate had been one of his favourite sports. He had maintained it on reaching high rank, partly as an example to his troops, but also because it compelled him to keep up a high standard of fitness. He changed into his whites, tied on his black belt, and went into the gym, to the club which he had helped to found.
The instructor was a newcomer. He was an army drill sergeant who had been sent along, at Skinner’s request to try to improve standards. Skinner was prepared to stay in the background, his normal practice, and work on coaching beginners, but the soldier, with a trace of cockiness, singled him out.
‘Shall we work out, sir? Let’s show these people what it’s all about.’
Skinner sighed and nodded. They exchanged bows and moved to the centre mat, surrounded by a group of around twenty policemen and women in white tunics. Skinner was aware, suddenly, for the first time ever, that he was the oldest person in the room.
The thought was still in his mind when the man kicked him painfully on the left calf.
‘Just trying to get your mind on the job, sir.’
Cheeky bastard, thought Skinner. But he did not react. The cocky look grew in the man’s eyes. Another flashing kick caught the tall detective on the right thigh.
‘Still haven’t got your attention, sir.’
Skinner feinted to his right, then pivoted on the ball of his left foot. His right toes, bunched, jabbed the inside of the soldier’s thigh, with force. The foot swept up, the outside edge slamming into the testicles. The leg retracted, then swung up and round, until the foot slammed into the soldier’s left temple. Clutching his groin, the sergeant collapsed in a crumpled heap.
‘You’re wrong, son,’ said Skinner to the white-clad figure. ‘I couldn’t take my bloody eyes off you. Class dismissed!’
He took a quick shower and caught up with Andy Martin in his office. One of the detective constables in the class had beaten him there from the gym, carrying the news that the boss had kicked the shit out of the karate instructor.
Martin eyed him warily. ‘You all right? Or are you still in your Bruce Lee mode?’
Skinner cocked an eyebrow at his assistant. ‘Never better, Andy. Let’s drink some lunch. Fancy a pint in the Monarch?’
They found a Panda car heading out on patrol. It dropped them outside a big grey pub which was situated on the edge of one of the city’s worst crime spots, and which boasted one of the biggest beer sales in the East of Scotland. Skinner had no doubt that the two statistics were related.
When the two policemen entered the public bar, several patrons drank up fast and left by the nearest available exit.
‘Thanks very much, Mr Skinner,’ said Charlie, the manager. ‘Not even the Salvation Army can clear this place quicker than you can. Thought you’d be up the High Street the day, onyway.’
‘We won’t catch anyone up there in the daylight, Charlie. And the way our luck’s
been, we wouldn’t spot the bastard if he was running down the High Street waving a chainsaw.’
‘Naw, youse’d probably jist think he was yin o’ thon Labour cooncillors. By the way, ah wis sorry tae hear on the radio about the young polis.’
‘Thanks, Charlie.’
Skinner ordered and, despite Charlie’s protests, insisted on paying for two pints of McEwan’s 80 shilling ale. He took a bite out of the thick, creamy head, and motioned Martin over to a table. The inspector could see that the unaccustomed black mood had gone.
‘You know, Andy, all of a sudden I feel optimistic. Daft, isn’t it. Not a clue, almost literally, yet there’s a voice in here that’s telling me we’re going to catch this guy. There’s still something there that I’m missing, but I’ll get it. And when I do, I’ll get him.
‘I think that this man’s too intelligent to be killing just for fun. There has to be something behind it. Let’s assume that neither John Doe the Wino, or wee Mrs Rafferty, or even Mortimer had stumbled over the truth behind the Kennedy assassinations. So what else can it be?
‘I’m going back to square one, with Mortimer. I’m going to see David Murray, and go through his professional life, trial by trial.’
Martin looked at his boss. Bob Skinner’s success was founded on intellect and powers of analysis, two of the three secrets of successful detection. The third, Andy knew, was luck, and history showed that Big Bob made his own.
Skinner had been Martin’s role model almost from the day he had joined the force. He had shocked his parents, both doctors, by turning his back on Chemical Engineering, his original career choice, after graduating twelve years earlier from Strathclyde University with an honours degree.
Instead he had joined the Edinburgh police force, having seen enough of Glasgow, and had been thrown on to one of the toughest beats in one of those areas of which the City Fathers do not boast to tourists. He had pounded the pavements for a year and a half, before being allowed the luxury of a Panda car.
Community policing for Andy had meant putting a cap on vandalism, breaking up drunken domestic disputes, sorting out youth gangs, keeping an iron hand on solvent abuse and looking out for the introduction of cannabis and harder drugs into his patch by the capital’s many pushers.
He was well equipped for the job, physically and temperamentally. He stood a level six feet in his socks. He was broad and heavily muscled, although he dressed to hide the fact. His eyesight had just been good enough to meet entry requirements, but equally, had he not been an outstanding candidate for the force, it might have been bad enough to fail him.
He had joined the force’s karate club at an early stage in his career, when he realised that shift work would mean an end to his hopes of playing rugby at a high level in Edinburgh, and of carrying on what had been a promising career as a flank forward with the West of Scotland club.
As a beginner in his new sport, he had been taken under the wing of Detective Chief Inspector Bob Skinner, and had progressed speedily through the grading structure.
The two men had hit it off from the start. Martin had heard all about Skinner’s war on drugs in Edinburgh and about his outstanding arrest record. Talking to the Big Man — an occasionally awarded Scottish nickname which has as much to do with leadership as with size — had convinced Martin that CID was for him. And Skinner had recognised in the younger man a commitment to the job and the simple desire to catch the bad guys which marks out good detective officers.
Two years after joining the force, Martin had been transferred to CID, on Skinner’s drugs squad. From that time on their careers had progressed in parallel. After a further two years, Martin had been promoted to Detective Sergeant, just at the time of Skinner’s appointment as Head of CID. Five years later, Skinner had chosen him as his personal assistant, with the rank of Detective Inspector and the responsibility of liaison with the various units which made up the Criminal Investigation Department.
Close as they were, when Skinner changed the subject in the Monarch, Martin was astonished.
‘Andy, can I ask you to do me a couple of favours. The first is to do with the CID dance this Christmas. Sarah and I think that it’s time to come out of the closet, and so we’re going together. The other is maybe more difficult. It’s about that terrible all-night piss-up that the students have in Glasgow. Daft Friday, they call it. It’s at the end of the first term.
‘You remember I took Alex to the dance last year. Well she’s determined to go again, and to go to this Daft Friday thing. The only thing is, she needs a partner for both. She’s still a bit shy, so she asked me if I would ask you if you’d like to take her.’
Skinner ended, awkwardly. Martin was at a loss tor a word.
Skinner misunderstood his silence. ‘Look, Andy, forget it. She’s only a lassie yet. It’s not fair of me to put you on the spot.’
‘Look, Bob, don’t be daft. I’d be honoured. And by the way, lassie or not, Alex is closer to me in age than Sarah is to you!’
Skinner looked at him in surprise. He grinned, then muttered: ‘Just you remember that poor wee broken soldier boy back at the Karate Club!’
11
Later that afternoon, four men sat in the Dean’s room within the Advocates’ Library; David Murray himself, Skinner, Martin and a second advocate Peter Cowan, who held the elected post of Clerk of Faculty. Before each was a photocopied list summarising every criminal trial in which Michael Mortimer had led for the defence.
Cowan explained: ‘I’ve prepared this report to help you gentlemen determine whether you should continue to explore the premise that Mike might have been killed by or at the behest of a dissatisfied client. I imagine that subsequent events make this possibility much less likely, but let us proceed anyway with our analysis.
‘My findings bear out the Dean’s view. Mike Mortimer was a very good criminal advocate. That’s a matter of record, not just of opinion. Even those who were convicted, tended to receive below-average sentences. Here’s a good example. A man convicted of a series of mortgage frauds: sentence three years. Now I happen to know that the Crown took a very hard line in that prosecution. Mortgage fraud isn’t common, but it’s easier to bring off than most people think, and they wanted an exemplary sentence.’
‘I know,’ said Skinner. ‘My fraud guys investigated that one. It involved obtaining twelve houses through fraudulent mortgage applications, renting them, often to DSS cases, to service the mortgages, and eventually selling on at a profit. The building societies were screaming bloody murder.’
‘Right,’ said Cowan. ‘So there’s the Crown, with a unanimous conviction, having dropped heavy hints to the judge, one of the harder Senators, by the way, that ten to fifteen years might be about right, and Mike gets to his feet. Next thing the Advocate Depute knows, the accused is a simple soul who had no real criminal intent, a poor chap whose wish to put roofs over the heads of homeless young people just got out of hand. The fact that he was enjoying their sexual favours as part of the deal was never led in evidence by the Crown. They didn’t think they needed it. By the time Mike has finished, there are tears in the eyes of the hanging judge, and his client goes whistling off to Saughton with only a three-stretch.
‘Here’s another: Strathclyde Police round up a really nasty tally man, a loan shark of the worst kind. The charges include serious assault, extortion, you name it. But the police witnesses were a bit sloppy, and one or two of the victims were clearly a bit wide themselves. Mike goes on the attack, and his client goes back to Castlemilk a free man, on a Not Proven verdict, to his astonishment and joy.
‘Then there’s the Chinese job. A young Japanese student at Strathclyde University - the daughter of an industrialist, resident in this country — is found raped and strangled. Two Chinese waiters are arrested. One of them has the girl’s knickers in his pocket. Mike and Rachel Jameson defend one each. They put up a lovely impeachment defence. First, they claim that the girl was into group sex, and produce three witnesses to that effect, one
Chinese, two white. Then their clients allege that there was a third boy involved. Neither of the other two knows his name. They claim that the girl was a willing participant, that they left her behind with this bloke, and that he must have done it. Forensic evidence — semen samples and so on — confirms that there was a third person involved and the two lads are acquitted, fifteen — nil.
‘I’ve been through the rest of Mortimer’s court work. There is nothing else of any significance. One or two small-timers in jail for shorter terms than they expected, others free and happy, and absolutely no sign of anyone swearing vengeance.’
Skinner and Martin sat deep in thought. Murray looked frustrated.
‘Thank you, Peter,’ said the Dean. ‘Faced with that, we are forced more and more to the conclusion that Mortimer just happened to be in the wrong place at the wrong time. Such a damn waste. I almost wish you had found a link.’
But Skinner’s optimism had not dissipated. ‘I agree, David, I can’t see anything there either. Still, there is something. I know it, and I’ll nail it, and I’ll nail him. Can you find me transcripts of those three trials?’
12
As Skinner’s meeting was taking place, his team had their first small stroke of luck. An early-shift railway worker, interviewed by uniformed police at the end of his day’s work, produced the first possible sighting of the quarry.
‘Aye, it would be a bit before six o’clock. Ah wis on ma way to that early mornin’ roll shop in Cockburn Street for ma breakfast. Ah was walkin’ over Waverley Bridge when this fella goes tearin’ off doon Market Street as if he had jist landed a big treble, then heard that the bookie was packin’ his suitcase.’
‘Can you describe him?’
‘Well it wis dark, ken, but he looked like wan o’ they ninja fellas. He wis wearin’ a black suit and some sort of black bunnet. Ah couldnae see his face.’
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