The Unburied Dead

by Douglas Lindsay

  Drums his fingers on the steering wheel.

  'Fuck, I don't know, Sergeant…'

  We've talked ourselves in a circle, as you do. He descends into silence. Time to mention the other thing that I ought to have mentioned a few hours earlier.

  'All right…' I say. 'Then I've got Charlotte Miller to think about.'

  'What do you mean?'

  Hit the Erskine Bridge; and somewhere bells are ringing to herald the arrival of the New Year. Party. The snow starts to thicken once again.

  Here goes.

  'She asked me down there tonight. Frank's in Poland, apparently. I mean, who goes to Poland?'

  He looks at me. Fortunately not for too long, and turns back to the road.

  'And were you going to tell me this sometime?'

  'I'm telling you now.'

  'For god's sake, Sergeant.'

  What with him being right to be annoyed, I naturally go on the defensive.

  'What's the problem? You're jealous?'

  'Fucking hell. Where were we two minutes ago with this discussion? There are four officers dead. If it's not coincidence, if they're all dead for the same reason, and if it's not Bloonsbury who's done it and he's next on the list, it could be Miller. She knows you know. Why else would she ask you down there?'

  He may be right, but I have my defensive annoyance to think about. 'If she was going to do it, then why not do it before now, for fuck's sake? She's had plenty of opportunity.'

  'Fuck, I don't know, Sergeant. Just ask yourself why she's banging you in the first place.'

  'I told you! Because of the incident with her tits.'

  I look at him. The very act of describing the incident with her tits as the incident with her tits, makes me smile, but Taylor ain't smiling.

  Silence again. And he's right. The incident of the tits doesn't really explain why a superintendent is going for the likes of me, yet it still doesn't make sense that it should be to keep me quiet. I didn't know a thing about all of this when I first went down there on Christmas Eve.

  Nothing to say. The journey continues in silence; and the snow falls in ever more furious flurries, so that by the time we arrive in Hamilton we're driving through a white mass.

  Haven't been at Bloonsbury's house since he had a bachelor poker party two weeks after Beattie moved out. Really it was a poker/fuck movie/drugs/alcohol/whore party. The standard police fare. Filled the house up with a bunch of us, raided the warehouse and got what he could, dragged in a couple of tarts that they'd picked up specially the night before. You know the deal: 'come round and shag the lot of us tomorrow night or you're nicked.' Happens all the time. Anyway, sad to say, Detective Sergeant Hutton was in the midst of it all. Steaming out of my face, losing a shit load of cash at the cards, standing in the queue for the women. Jesus knows what number I was in line. Not a proud moment in my career. Some things are best forgotten.

  Pull up outside the house, get out of the car into the cold. Up the path, the tangled mass of vegetation that is the garden still evident despite the snow. Wonder what state of decay the house is going to be in.

  The place is quiet. Dead. No lights, no sound.

  'He's either out, or he's collapsed on the floor,' says Taylor as he rings the bell.

  'Probably out somewhere collapsed on the floor,' I say. Pull my coat closer around me; makes no difference. It's bloody freezing.

  He rings the bell again and we stand and wait. In vain. Tries the door handle. Locked.

  'You ready to put the door in again?' he says.

  'You're kidding?'

  'Come on, Sergeant, we're not standing out here all night waiting for the guy to wake up or come home.'

  'But he could have nothing to do with it. He might just be a drunken pish head. How's it going to look if we go breaking into his house and nothing comes out of it?'

  He looks at me – the Chief Inspector look.

  'Sergeant, break the fucking door down. I'll take the responsibility. Just do it. If someone is taking them all out, Bloonsbury could be lying in there dead, anyway.'

  Let out a long breath. Bloody hell, here goes. Glad I've got my boots on.

  Foot up, kick hard at the lock with the soul of my boot. The door gives slightly, while I lose my balance, slip and fall on my backside. Into a soft bed of snow. Taylor ignores me, puts his shoulder to the weakened door and pushes it open. Looks back.

  'Come on, Sergeant, off your arse,' he says, and walks into the house. Puts on the hall light, looks up the stairs.

  'Jonah!'

  I dig myself out the snow, brush it off best I can, walk into the house.

  'Jonah!' he shouts again.

  Dead quiet.

  'Right, up the stairs, Sergeant, I'll do down here.'

  Taylor walks off into the sitting room – the scene of a vast majority of the poker party – while I head up to the bedrooms; scene for another part of the poker party. Two bedrooms and a bathroom at the end is all there is up here, if I remember correctly.

  Have a vaguely embarrassed feeling, walking into the house of someone who may well be perfectly innocent. Half expect to find him in bed with someone from the station, and I'm going to feel like an idiot.

  To the top of the stairs, stop and listen. Nothing.

  'Jonah, you there?'

  No reply. Feels a bit creepy now that I'm here, even with the lights on. Vaguely unpleasant smell in the air. Wonder if it's death. Don't think so. Assume that anywhere Bloonsbury lives is going to smell vaguely unpleasant.

  Walk along the top landing, floorboards creak beneath my feet. Past the regulation police photo – the young Jonah with the Secretary of State for Scotland of the day. Ian Lang by the looks of things. His glory days were that long ago.

  Push open the door to the front bedroom.

  'Jonah?'

  Turn on the light. The place is a shit tip. The sort of state your room is in when you're twelve and your mother's forgotten to tell you to clean it up for the last year. The man lives like a pig. Hate to think what sort of lifeforms Taylor's going to come across in the kitchen.

  Walk into the room, start poking around his things. Clothes everywhere, blankets tossed off the side of the bed. Sheets and pillows stained. Wonder if he's changed them since the whores were here along with all the guys from the station. By the looks of things, not.

  Think I feel it first, rather than hear it. A noise; a whisper of sound. Niggling. Feel it in the shiver down my back. Drop the jacket, the pockets of which I've been looking through. Stand still. Silent. Taylor maybe.

  It comes again. A murmur of noise. The next bedroom. A strange sound. Not like a man or woman's voice, but still human. A whimper.

  Wish I had a gun again. Ought to start carrying these things around, but still the noise is not threatening. Out into the hall, and now I can hear it more clearly. Feel the pain of it. Hairs rise on the back of my neck.

  A noise from downstairs. Taylor stumbling into something, a low curse; calls out for Bloonsbury again.

  Stand outside the other bedroom. A second's hesitation. Wonder. Push the door open, no idea what I'm going to find. Half expecting to see a dog whimpering in the corner.

  Light on.

  Jesus Christ. The smell hits me as much as the sight of what is in front of me; get that instant shock like needles of water under a freezing shower.

  Ian Healy, manacled to the wall. Unshaven, cheeks drawn, barely recognisable from the man I spoke to a week ago. He is naked, his arms attached to the wall above him, and from these he hangs limply. His feet can touch the floor, but they offer no support. And around his feet are several days worth of his own faeces and urine and vomit.

  Take a step back, try to ignore the smell. He squints from the light, and then looks at me. Acknowledgement flickers across his face, a word tumbles silently from his lips.

  'Boss!' I shout, 'think you'd better get up here.'

  44

  Can hear Taylor labouring up the stairs. I'm about to plough my way through the
human detritus on the floor to let Healy down, when I decide to wait for the boss. He might look like a pathetic shambles of a human being, but he's still a killer. Ann Keller at least, although the truth of the second and third murders is beginning to kick in. Taylor arrives, stands at my shoulder.

  'Fuck,' he says to my back.

  Finally, after a week and a half of speculation and haphazard supposition, we have something concrete. A piece of living evidence up on the wall which is all the proof we need of Jonah Bloonsbury's involvement in the murders of three other officers. Fuck just about hits the nail on the head.

  Taylor comes into the room, walks up to Healy. The smell hits him.

  'Jesus,' he says. 'This is medieval for God's sake. You got your keys?'

  'Remember what this guy did to Ann Keller.'

  'We don't know he did anything to anyone,' he says.

  'Come on. Maybe the rest was a set up, but how did Bloonsbury get on to him in the first place? This guy killed Ann Keller. Think about what he did to her before you go letting him down.'

  He looks at Healy who stares blankly back. At a guess I'd say he has no idea what we've just been talking about. Dead eyes, mouth attempting to smile.

  'How long have you been here?' says Taylor.

  Nothing.

  'Healy, how long?'

  A whispered word passes his lips, drops out into the room, unintelligible.

  'What was that?' says Taylor. Voice still harsh. No time for naked psychopaths on walls.

  Healy's lips move again, and this time we can hear it. The chill, croaking voice.

  'Jo,' he says. 'Tell Jo.'

  *

  The threads of a story come from time to time together and make a picture in the web.

  Another one of Charlotte's favourites. Very appropriate.

  Half an hour later and we're back on the road. Called Ramsey and told him to get a few of the lads round. Impressed the delicacy of it all upon him. No one's going to like the truth of this. Got him to start the search for Bloonsbury and to have the guy brought in. Who knows what gutter he'll be lying in at the moment? Also told him that we'd take care of telling Miller, which is where we're heading right now. Down to Helensburgh, back the way we just came. Stopped for petrol and provisions in case we get stuck in the snow, and on our way.

  Eileen Harrison showed up at Bloonsbury's place before we left, still looking a bit dazed. Not sure that her expression changed that much on seeing Healy, but she was looking so completely out of it that her expression didn't really have anywhere else to go. There were three of those Neanderthal constables with her to take care of Healy, just in case the guy decided to get funny.

  Brief discussion in the car before Taylor shut up to concentrate on driving through the blizzard. We'd asked a few questions of Healy but he was in no fit state to answer anything.

  The pieces fall together, scraps of rubbish into a bin. Maybe it all starts when Crow tries to bribe Bloonsbury. That's a guess, but we know they had dealings in the last month, and it's a reasonable stab at it. Bloonsbury begins to panic about the truth of the Addison case getting out. Great career finally flushed down the toilet, starts to wonder what to do about it.

  Meanwhile, Healy murders Ann Keller. The same night, Bathurst finds out the truth of the Addison case. Maybe Bloonsbury gets wind of that, maybe not. Maybe he knows she goes to see Miller. Anyway, I put him on to Healy, he talks to the guy, realises he's our killer. Hatches his plan. Decides he'll get rid of all his co-conspirators. Who knows how quickly he worked it all out? So he gets hold of Healy some time after he'd tried it on with that stupid tart in Rutherglen.

  Early hours of Saturday morning he goes down to Arrochar, takes care of Crow. Bundles him into the back of the car, drives it to Dunoon. Gets back to Arrochar and his own car somehow. Stole another motor perhaps. Having dealt with Crow he then comes up to Glasgow and kills Evelyn Bathurst. Not sure how he knows where to find her, but then she was between her home and the station; not that much of a stretch. Does to her what Healy did to Ann Keller, planting evidence to incriminate Healy.

  Next up, he knows somehow that Herrod has been put onto Healy by Josephine Johnson. He waits for him, stabs him through the chest. Then the following day he does for Edwards in a drive-by murder.

  The story so far. Don't have too much proof of it all, but it falls into place. Feels right, and there have been plenty of times when Bloonsbury's not been around the station.

  So, Jonah Bloonsbury, come to this; and the confirmation of that hanging on the wall in his spare bedroom. The guy had been there a few days, Jonah's been at his house in that time. No set up, no bullshit, Bloonsbury's our man.

  Feel empty. Hollow. Don't want to be in the police tonight. Don't want to be here. If your life's going to be this shit, you might as well be living in one of those shit countries that don't even function, where despair is all-consuming, where despair isn't just defined by being unable to afford to renew your Sky subscription. Every one of us is going to look bloody awful when this gets out, and there'll be no one on the force thanking Taylor and me for having discovered it.

  Which brings us to the last big question. The involvement of Charlotte Miller. Which side of the tracks are we going to find her on? We could have phoned her, but this is the sort of thing you have to say to someone's face. Gauge the reaction.

  Don't really start talking about it until we're over the Erskine bridge, the snow has cleared and we're both chewing on nasty ham and cheese sandwiches we picked up at the petrol station. Nearly two o'clock.

  'How we going to play this?' I say eventually.

  He waves the sandwich at me.

  'What the fuck you buy these for, Sergeant? They're minging.'

  'It was after midnight. What choice d'you think there was?'

  He grumbles, continues to eat the sandwich.

  'Not sure, is the answer to your question,' he says. 'Been considering letting you go in yourself as planned.'

  'To see if she kills me?'

  'Aye.'

  'Thanks.'

  'Don't think it'll work,' he says. 'I mean, if she doesn't know anything about it, then she'll shag you and I'll be left sitting in the car freezing my balls off. And we'll both look like idiots when we have to tell her the truth. So, we'll just go in there, tell her what we've found. We think Jonah's been killing off everyone who knows about the Addison business, which means that she might be next on the list.'

  'And what if she's in on it and pulls a gun?'

  'Don't see it. What's her motive? Sure, if the Addison stuff got out it'd look bad, set her back a year or two, but how is she supposed to know if some of her officers are murderers? And she's Charlotte Miller, for fuck's sake. She can shag and connive her way out of anything. She doesn't need to conspire to murder her own officers.'

  Takes the left fork at the lights, heads down towards Helensburgh. I have to agree with him. The woman I've become close to in the last week isn't any confederate of Bloonsbury. What he's done is sickening, but he's such a mess of a man that however much your belief is stretched, there's still some credibility about it. But Charlotte Miller?

  'And if she is in on it,' he continues, 'which I really doubt, what's she to gain from doing anything to us? It's already out about Bloonsbury, everyone knows. No, if she's implicated she'll deny everything, get hold of Jonah and kill him so that he can't talk. That way, she suffers minimum damage.'

  Sounds right, but this is such a mess you never know.

  'So where's Jonah got to?' I say.

  He shrugs. 'Fuck knows? Lying in a ditch, maybe. If he realised from what I said earlier today that we were on to Crow, maybe he's just done a runner. Off to London to sleep under a bag with the rest of his kind.'

  'Or he could have come down to Helensburgh to kill Miller. The last of the people who know.'

  'We know,' he says. 'He's still got us to take care of.'

  Given the alacrity he's shown in polishing off the others, that's not the most comforting th
ought. Imagine my death at the hands of a crazed Jonah Bloonsbury. A drunk Jonah Bloonsbury. But fuck it, maybe death would be best at this point. The victim police officers will undoubtedly be hailed as brave heroes – like every other person who dies these days – while those officers not murdered during the course of this investigation will all be castigated for being a collection of criminally-inclined, incompetent wankers.

  Still pondering what it would be like to have a sword driven up through your insides, embedding you to a wall in the manner of the late and little-missed Herrod, when Taylor pulls up outside the mansion. Stops the car, switches off the engine. Looks at me.

  'This is it, Sergeant. Now, I know you usually have sex when you come here, but on this…

  'Fuck off.'

  He smiles and gets out of the car. I follow, once again feel the cold cut through the thin lining of the jacket. Boots crunch into the snow, an icy crust having formed on the top. Look up the path to the house. A couple of lights on, but don't see her face pressed against a window watching out for me. If she was expecting me, I'm a good deal later than she'd have thought I'd be arriving.

  Push open the gate at the bottom of the garden, start the long walk up the path.

  'Hope she's in,' says Taylor.

  'And alone,' I add. 'And unarmed.'

  'Jessie,' he says.

  45

  Stand on the doorstep, where I've been twice in the last week. Different kind of nerves tonight. Had hoped by this age I'd stop feeling nerves, but that doesn't appear to happen, no matter the shit that's gone before.

  About to ring the bell.

  'Wait,' says Taylor.

  Look at him.

  'Second thoughts?'

  'Got a feeling in your guts, Sergeant?'

  He's right. Police instinct. There's something wrong. Don't know what, don't know how. Just a feeling, but there's so much work done on the back of feelings like this. Something in your stomach; the hairs on the back of your neck; that extra sense that stops you walking into the unexpected, stops you getting a knife in the belly.