The Second Strain

by John Burke

  ‘If he’d been a real man, he’d have taken matters into his own hands. Treated his wife the way she deserved to be treated. And that fornicator Erskine.’

  ‘The way you treated your daughter? And Daniel Erskine?’

  ‘I’ll not be speaking of that.’

  ‘Not even when you realize Erskine had nothing to do with your daughter’s pregnancy? That you murdered him for nothing?’

  ‘I’ll say no more.’

  But he sagged gradually as Lesley went on remorselessly spelling out the true tale of his daughter and Erskine.

  ‘When she came back, ditched, did she actually tell you it was Erskine who had made her pregnant?’

  ‘She wouldnae tell me, but I kent fine.’

  ‘We’ve got Erskine’s DNA as well, and there’s no connection between him and your daughter’s unborn child.’

  ‘So you killed Erskine,’ said Rutherford, ‘for nothing.’

  ‘I’ll no’ believe that. He was well out o’ this world. And where he belongs. On the floors of liquid fire in hell.’

  ‘And you felt you were appointed by God — personally appointed — to send his mistress after him?’

  ‘I never laid a finger on that slut. Never.’ Buchanan seemed genuinely indignant. Lesley sensed, along with Rutherford, that before long he was going to confess — proudly confess, now there was no way out — to the murders of his daughter and of Daniel Erskine. But his rage over this other accusation rang just as surely as the resonance of guilt in everything else he had been denying.

  Rutherford turned off the recorder and indicated that Lesley should follow him into the corridor. ‘I’ll get a uniform to sit in with me. You take Elliot along with you to Lowther’s shop, and see what he’s got for sale. Or what bargain offers he can come up with today. Especially about his duet partner. I want to know more about them making beautiful music together. And why it all went out of tune. Have I got the jargon right, Les?’

  *

  Nick Torrance stared out over the view that he had learned to love. But now it was contaminated. His bird’s eye view of the stage and the taped-off area was partially obscured by the roof and open doors of the police van. Another murder had happened on his property. He was the laird, he ought to be in charge. Or at least liaising with the police after they came on the scene. But it had been too much — going down after that first alarm was raised, seeing what lay in the shadows, and wanting to throw up over the grass. Coming back here, he could think of nothing to do but wait for them to come and report and interview him. Yet what could he tell them?

  He thought of Adam Lowther going down the stairs with Mairi. It had been obvious they were still in a sensual daze, and he knew what Mairi could be like in that mood. And remembered what the music had done for himself and Lesley.

  He couldn’t just sit here or stand here, waiting. There was routine work to be done. The festival had ended — more brutally than anticipated — and there were loose ends to be tied up, bills to be looked at, farewells to be said.

  Adam Lowther ought to be attending to that.

  But did Adam Lowther know what had happened to Mairi? Had he been told yet? After he had left her, had someone been waiting, hating, ready to pounce? Or . . . No, he wasn’t going to let that even cross his mind. Mairi, aroused, might be capable of violence. But not awkward, meek little Adam.

  He had to see Adam. It was something to do.

  He half expected to find the police there, but the shop door was closed and there was no sign of life. Nick had to ring the side doorbell in the pend. When Nora came downstairs and opened the door, her eyes were blank and unwelcoming.

  ‘Is Adam about?’

  ‘No, he’s not.’

  ‘Has he gone to see the police?’

  ‘Why’d he do that?’

  ‘Mrs Lowther — Nora — may I come in?’

  She turned mutely and led the way upstairs. In the sitting-room she seemed incapable of offering him a chair, but stood there like a housewife who wished she hadn’t let a salesman on to the premises and now only wanted him to leave.

  ‘You haven’t heard?’ said Nick. ‘Adam . . . he hasn’t heard?’

  ‘He’s gone.’ Her voice was flat, almost bored. ‘Gone off with that woman. I knew he would, in the end.’

  ‘He hasn’t. I can assure you he hasn’t.’

  ‘What would you know about it? They’ve been planning it ever since she got here. Ever since she . . . they . . .’ She made a vague gesture down at the floor, towards the shop underneath.

  ‘He hasn’t,’ said Nick. ‘She’s dead.’

  ‘No. That doesn’t make sense.’

  ‘What time did he get in last night?’

  ‘I don’t know.’

  ‘After that recital, you must have been here when he got back. The two of you must have had things to talk about.’

  ‘I’ve been sleeping in the spare room since . . . since I knew what was going on. I don’t know if he came back at all. You ask me, I’d say they went straight off, just the way they’d been planning it.’

  ‘Mairi McLeod,’ Nick emphasized, ‘is dead.’

  Doubt stirred in his mind. She was so frozen, so sheathed in something impermeable, some armour of her own stubbornness, that it was impossible to tell whether she was in a state of shock . . . or denying, as murderers are often said to do, what she had just done.

  Could she have been the one to murder Mairi?

  He didn’t believe it.

  Nora, still remote, managed a curl of the lip. ‘Dead or alive, I can tell you one thing — there’ll be his fingerprints all over her.’

  ‘But where is he? Nora, the police are liable to show up any time now. They’ll want to know.’

  ‘That’s their job, isn’t it? Up to them to find him.’

  The doorbell rang. Nora Lowther went back down the stairs and opened the door.

  ‘Mrs Lowther, is your husband at home?’

  Nick recognized the cadences of Lesley Gunn’s voice.

  Chapter Three

  Nora Lowther had answered questions about her husband’s possible whereabouts with a vague flutter of her left hand. A couple of times she raised it to her lips like a child just about to suck its thumb. Whatever had happened to Adam or to Mairi McLeod seemed to be a matter of complete indifference now. She had reached the end of a road which had promised little in the first place. She either didn’t know where she was, or where Adam was, or she didn’t care. The past was something to be smudged over because it didn’t matter any more. And the future didn’t matter because there was no such thing as a future.

  She came out with only one helpful remark. ‘They’ve been planning to go off and sort through Daniel Erskine’s papers. He’s very proud of that. I think it means more to him than she does . . . than she did.’ It might have been a last strand of comfort, but was hardly worth the effort of holding on to it. ‘Well, they won’t be doing that now, will they?’

  Back in the caravan, Rutherford was waiting for Lesley. He was happy that Buchanan, now deciding after all that he needed a solicitor before saying another word, must have realized the game was up. He was safely locked away with time to think, probably pondering whether to be arrogant and try to bluff it out or to be arrogant and boast of his rectitude in slaying his sinful daughter and sinful Erskine.

  ‘One thing, though,’ said Rutherford. ‘He’s been twice as gabby on the subject of Mairi McLeod. Not sorry for the deaths of the first two. But quite adamant that he had nothing to do with the McLeod woman. So . . . what have you come up with?’

  She told him. And told him that she had checked that Adam Lowther’s car was missing, and that he had filled up at Marshall and Corsock’s at just after seven this morning.

  Rutherford barked an instruction to the girl at the switchboard to put through a call to the Northern Constabulary in Inverness. He was far from satisfied with the result. ‘They’ll try to spare a man to keep an eye on the house at Altnalarach.’ He emphasized th
e words with heavy sarcasm. ‘But their resources are stretched at the moment, puir wee dears. Two days of a big demo along the north coast, protesting about Dounreay poisoning the firth. Some real tough troublemakers out for a punch-up. But they will try.’

  ‘And if they don’t get there in time?’

  ‘In time for what?’

  ‘We don’t know what Lowther may get up to once he’s there. If that’s where he’s going.’

  ‘Where else would he go?’

  ‘Exactly. That has to be it. But if he’s aiming to get into the house and start going through papers or scores . . . Is he out to steal valuable manuscripts — or destroy them, d’you suppose? Works by Erskine, or Strepka, or —’

  ‘Here we go again. Les, the sooner that stuff is destroyed, my heart won’t bleed for it. Probably better for the listening public, too.’

  ‘But don’t you see, it could be valuable evidence. Could be the whole story of who wrote what, and whether Erskine was a cheat, and what part Mairi McLeod really played in transcribing the work — or faking it somehow.’

  ‘That’s a matter for some music critic, not for us.’

  ‘It’s a little matter of murder,’ she reminded him. ‘And the motive for Erskine’s murder and Mairi McLeod’s could well lie in those manuscripts.’

  Rutherford grunted. ‘We’ve got three stiffs on our hands right here. And when Buchanan cracks, you’ll find that the first two were simple cases of personal vengeance. Family stuff — the way it is in most cases. And as for the third, Forensic will come up with enough from the McLeod woman without us needing any musical theories to convict Lowther.’

  ‘But don’t you want to know . . .?’

  ‘Not specially. Just background music, as far as I’m concerned.’

  ‘But if Adam Lowther destroys that evidence, and then disappears —’

  ‘We’re playing this by the book, Les. We put out a call to all traffic patrols between here and Sutherland. You’ve got his car registration number?’

  ‘Yes.’

  ‘Good. Then settle down to chasing it. That’s police procedure, Les. Nothing to do with fugues and fantasies or whatever. The Northern Constabulary will round him up before long, mark my words. There aren’t many places he can run in that ruddy wilderness. And if you ask me, he’s the sort to give himself up. Once he faces up to what he’s done, he’ll just collapse and give himself up.’

  ‘I still think one of us ought to be up there — someone who knows him, and what he’s likely to be doing.’

  ‘Oh no, Les. No way. I’ve let you go wandering off too many times already. You do not go chasing off into someone else’s territory. When we send anyone up there, it’ll be as escort for a prisoner who’s already been taken by our oppos on the ground.’

  The phone rang. The constable at the switchboard said: ‘Sir, Mr Wilson’s arrived at the nick. Enoch Buchanan’s solicitor. He’s asking for you.’

  ‘I’m on my way.’ Rutherford patted Lesley condescendingly on the arm. ‘And right now, you can make yourself useful checking reports from the A9 patrols and plotting possible escape routes.’

  *

  Nick Torrance edged the Laguna up on to the pavement to allow the dustcart to grind its way out of a courtyard, and found himself a few yards from the incident caravan. Lesley Gunn was standing on the top step, her head back as if desperately breathing fresh air into her lungs — though the smell from the truck wouldn’t have helped very much.

  He said: ‘Want a lift?’

  Dragged back from whatever it was that she had been contemplating, she looked at him the way she might have sized up a stranger. ‘Where to?’

  ‘Altnalarach.’

  Her laugh was mirthless. ‘I’m supposed to be having a coffee break and then sitting by the phone waiting for news from that part of the world.’

  ‘I’m prepared to take you to that part of the world personally.’

  ‘Why do you want to go?’

  ‘Somebody has to. You know that as well as I do. Better than your hidebound colleagues do, maybe?’

  ‘I’d lose my job if I —’

  ‘Good. But I’ll tell you one thing. You’ll lose your prey and a lot of important evidence if you don’t come. Right now.’

  She slid into the seat beside him. ‘This is crazy. I don’t know what I’m doing.’

  ‘You do know damn well that if we don’t get there in time we may lose something invaluable.’

  She couldn’t argue. He could tell she was not going to. But he could also tell that, now she had committed herself, she was terrified of the outcome.

  There was no point in vague conversation. They both knew the main object of this drive, and nothing else was worth discussing.

  Nick wondered if they might even catch Adam before he reached Altnalarch. Unlikely, but the Laguna was capable of speeds a lot higher than Adam Lowther’s clapped-out old estate, worn down over recent years by the weight of musical instruments, loudspeakers, disco equipment and keyboards.

  ‘If I get pulled in for speeding,’ he said, ‘I hope you can flash your warrant card at them and tell them what it’s all about.’

  ‘They’ll be even tougher if they find out that I’m trespassing on their patch.’ Lesley glanced along the fascia board. ‘May I use your earphone?’

  ‘Go right ahead.’

  She murmured a brief message for DCI Rutherford, and then said: ‘Can I switch it off so that we don’t get him replying and threatening me with a firing squad?’

  ‘Done.’

  As they crossed The Mound, the sun came out from behind a thin veil of clouds and shot sparks of light like pebbles skimming across Loch Fleet. It was a day for relaxing under a display of changing, skittish skies. As the road hugged closer to the sea, the brightness intensified, and the broom burned more and more golden on the slopes. But they were not on holiday. Not this time, thought Nick.

  He broke the long silence. ‘Since you’re expecting to lose your job, isn’t it time we talked about —’

  ‘For the time being I’m a serving police officer. I’ll complete this investigation and prove to them why it’s important, and then I’ll take my leave.’

  ‘Yes, officer. All right. But maybe on the way back we can talk.’

  ‘On the way back,’ she said, ‘I hope we’ll have company.’

  *

  The fitful sun was setting the western skies over Ben Loyal aglow as Nick manoeuvred the Laguna along the winding single-track road. Ahead, the hunched white shape of the house at Altnalarach darted from left to right as the road twisted from west to north, to the east and back again. When it was held steady for a few moments, there seemed to be a spiralling wisp of cloud above the house. As they came closer, it was clear that smoke was pouring from the chimney: not the blue tinge of lazy peat smoke, but dark fumes full of flecks of torn, burning paper which fluttered away like crippled birds across the lochans.

  It was not until the Laguna had swung in beside the house that they saw the police car already there. ‘Beaten us to it,’ said Nick.

  The door was ajar. Inside, a uniformed police constable lay stunned across a coffee table which Nick remembered from that first visit, when Mairi had been alive . . . vibrant with life. A fire was roaring in the grate, fed with a wedge of music manuscript slowly blackening in the middle and shredding into flaring fragments round the edges.

  Lesley let out a small sob and took a pace towards the fireplace.

  ‘Stay where you are.’ Adam Lowther was holding out a canister at arm’s length, his thumb trembling. ‘You know what this is?’

  ‘CS gas,’ said Lesley.

  Nick said: ‘Don’t be stupid, Adam.’

  ‘I don’t want to have to use it.’

  ‘Then don’t,’ said Lesley. ‘It’s police property, Mr Lowther. You’ll be in serious trouble if —’

  ‘I thought I was in that already.’ He spluttered a shrill laugh. ‘Is this going to make it any worse?’

  ‘Prob
ably not,’ said Nick. He kept it calm and compassionate. ‘Adam, exactly how much do you know about the death of Mairi McLeod?’

  They waited for him to deny it, to say they were crazy, he loved Mairi and was here only because she had asked him to come and sort some things out for her. To pretend, maybe, that he didn’t even know she was dead and didn’t know what they were talking about. Instead he looked back at them with what in the army might be condemned as dumb insolence. His eyes were not denying; just not registering. Nick marvelled that in this state this man could have driven safely this far. Trying to jolt him out his trance, he said: ‘How many more manuscripts did you hope to destroy?’

  ‘Perhaps it would be simpler,’ said Adam dreamily, ‘to burn the whole place down.’

  Suddenly Lesley said: ‘Mr Lowther, aren’t you worried about your wife?’

  ‘My wife? What’s she got to do with it?’

  ‘Mairi McLeod has been murdered. Your wife had as much cause as anyone to want her out of the way.’

  Shocked, Nick tried not to look at her. He had not realized she could be so ruthless. Without seeing her face, he knew it must be as he had seen it once before — the feral face of a predator, laying a trap and poised for the kill.

  But it worked. Something flickered behind Adam Lowther’s staring eyes. ‘Nora? You must be mad. Nora would never summon up the energy to kill anybody. She’s too . . . well . . .’

  ‘Too nice? Too gentle? A perfect wife?’

  ‘She’d never have the guts.’

  ‘People can be driven over the edge, you know.’

  ‘Yes, I do know. But leave Nora alone. I’m not going to have her blamed for any of this. Leave her out of it. She’s innocent.’

  ‘You’ve got reason to be sure of that?’

  ‘Yes.’

  ‘And any reason for who did kill Miss McLeod?’

  The gas canister in Adam’s hand trembled even more. The policeman stirred, groaned, and began to grope his way up to his knees.