The Meating Room

by T F Muir

  ‘But the sensors might be inside the barn. The dogs are locked outside.’

  ‘So why does he need the dogs in the first place?’

  ‘As a deterrent?’

  ‘Maybe. But I still think it’s a risk worth taking.’ He looked at Jessie and Stan, and they both nodded. ‘Right, we head out as soon as it’s dark. And no airwave sets. We’ll use our mobiles. I’ll pick Jessie up from home, then we’ll take Stan’s car.’

  ‘One last thing,’ Jessie said. ‘What about the guns? Purvis has access to them.’

  ‘What guns?’ Stan asked.

  ‘There’s a cache in the cottage,’ Gilchrist said. ‘A couple of shotguns and a rifle, all registered in the name of James Watson.’

  ‘Who’s he?’

  ‘Good question.’

  ‘Just playing devil’s advocate,’ Jessie said, ‘but what do you want me to do if I see Purvis walking towards the barn with a loaded shotgun?’

  What indeed, Gilchrist thought. Running into the night could be their best option. On the other hand, they could remind Purvis that shooting police officers was still a criminal offence, no matter whose land you were trespassing. Although the fact that there are no trespass laws in Scotland would likely mean nothing to a man like Purvis.

  At length, Gilchrist said, ‘Warn us, then call for back-up.’

  ‘Want me to organise back-up before we go, boss?’

  ‘No. The fewer people who know about this, the better.’ Which all sounded good and well, except that they would be unarmed. Securing weapons needed the signature of the Control Room Inspector after approval from the Silver Tactical Commander. But if they kept away from the cottage, Purvis would be none the wiser. At least, that was the theory. ‘Once the dogs are taken out of it, we’ll be safe,’ Gilchrist pressed on. ‘So dress appropriately. Black everything. And wear body armour.’

  Stan nodded. ‘Okay, boss. Let’s do it.’

  Gilchrist raised an eyebrow at Jessie.

  ‘I like wearing black. It makes me look slimmer.’

  ‘Right,’ Gilchrist said. ‘We’re on.’

  But as he watched Stan shut down the computer and remove his memory stick, he could not rid himself of the dark feeling that he had overlooked something.

  CHAPTER 28

  Back in Fisherman’s Cottage, Gilchrist was surprised to see his old answering machine blinking. No one other than cold-callers phoned his landline these days, so he switched on the kettle, popped two slices of bread into the toaster, and opened a tin of tuna.

  He sat down with his sandwich and a cup of tea and played the messages back.

  The automated voice announced the time and date of the first call, then he jumped at the sound of Cooper’s voice. ‘Andy, can you give me a call on my new mobile number?’ As she read it out, he thought her voice sounded strained, as if she’d been crying. ‘I can’t talk now,’ she said, rushing. ‘I’ve got to go.’

  The call ended.

  He stared at the machine as the next message kicked in – same number, same date, but two hours later. This time Cooper said, ‘Just calling to let you know that Max has decided to leave.’ Maxwell now shortened to Max. ‘I can’t really talk over the phone, but we’ve tried to work it out, and we both realise that what we used to share we now no longer have.’ The distant call of a seagull told him she was probably walking along the beach, which she liked to do to clear her mind. ‘Of course, if you’d rather not call, then I understand. Maybe this is a chance for all of us to make a clean break.’ A sniff, then, ‘But I think you have the right to know.’

  The message ended.

  Gilchrist jolted back to life and found a pen. He replayed the first message and wrote down Cooper’s new number. Her voice sounded stronger on the second message, as if she had already accepted a life of separation. But her parting comment brought a frown to his forehead.

  I think you have the right to know.

  Know what? That Mr Cooper was leaving? That her marriage was over?

  He played the message one more time, but it still failed to make sense.

  I think you have the right to know.

  At the far end of the lounge Gilchrist peeled back the curtains. Light spilled over the bed of crocuses, now past their best, the hard green stems of daffodils competing for space. A glance at his watch confirmed the second message was already an hour old. But why had she phoned his landline, and not his mobile? Because she had not wanted to talk to him, came the answer, just to leave a message to see if he would call back. It was a test, of sorts, to measure the strength of his feelings for her, perhaps.

  The sound of the doorbell brought him back to the present.

  He opened the door to a skinny man with long hair and a pasty face. Black jeans, worn grey, hid pipe-cleaner legs. A loose combat jacket with holes in the sleeves covered a skeletal frame. Every time Gilchrist met Jakie he was left with the impression that the man did not have long to live. He stood aside to let him in, feeling the rush of cold air as he brushed past into the warmth of the hallway.

  In the lounge, Jakie scanned the walls, the floor, even the ceiling, as if surprised to find himself still standing – or maybe alive. ‘Nice house,’ he said.

  Silent, Gilchrist closed the door behind him.

  Jakie sniffed and retrieved a brown-paper package from the innards of his combat jacket. ‘Twa steaks with enough thiopental to give you at least sixty minutes, Mr Gilchrist, sir.’

  Thiopental was a fast-acting barbiturate. Gilchrist took the package. It felt supple, pliable, and probably weighed less than a couple of pounds. ‘Without killing them?’

  Jakie sniffed, gave a nervous twitch. ‘Should be all right.’

  ‘I don’t want to kill them.’

  Another sniff. ‘That’ll knock them out, no kill them. But you don’t want tae fuck around when it comes to they Rottweilers.’

  ‘How quickly will it kick in?’

  ‘It’ll shut them up within a few minutes, yeah? Then they’ll start going wobbly like, and keel over.’

  Gilchrist raised his eyebrows. ‘How much?’

  Another sniff. ‘Spot me forty,’ he said, and looked to the floor.

  Gilchrist knew he was being ripped off, but Jakie looked as if he could use the money, maybe food, too. ‘You cold?’ he said, handing over two twenties.

  Jakie snatched the money, stuffed both hands into his pockets. ‘S’fucking freezing.’

  Gilchrist smiled. ‘I can give you a sandwich,’ he offered, ‘and a cup of tea to heat you up.’

  ‘Naw. Got tae go.’

  Gilchrist opened the lounge door and led Jakie along the hallway.

  Jakie pushed past him and skipped across the threshold, then slunk away without a word of thanks, or goodbye, or even a backward glance.

  Back in the kitchen, Gilchrist peeled open the brown paper to reveal two steaks that glistened with blood. He laid the package on the draining board and separated them. Then he wrapped each individually in cling film, and placed them in the fridge.

  Next, he called Stan. ‘Are we good to go?’

  ‘I’ve got the body armour and torches. And I’ve just had it confirmed that the Ford Focus you mentioned was captured on Tentsmuir Forest’s CCTV on Thursday night.’

  ‘When?’

  ‘Entered at nineteen-fifty,’ Stan said, ‘left at twenty-forty. It fits, boss.’

  The times certainly did fit, which opened up another nest of possibilities. But he said, ‘I’ll pick up Jessie and we’ll meet in the Office in an hour,’ and killed the call. It would take about thirty minutes to collect Jessie then drive to the Office, which gave him time to make a phone call.

  He dialled Cooper’s new number.

  She answered on the fourth ring.

  ‘I got your messages,’ Gilchrist said. ‘Are you okay?’

  A heavy sigh, then, ‘My marriage has been on the rocks for a long time, Andy. It’s been coming to a head, and we . . . I . . . need time apart, to think things through, work
out what I want to do.’

  Gilchrist let a healthy five seconds pass before saying, ‘And do you know what you want to do?’

  ‘You’re doing it again. Talking in questions.’

  He tried to find some other way to keep the conversation going, but questions were just about all he had. How could he learn what she meant by I think you have the right to know if he was not allowed to ask?

  ‘I can’t meet you tonight,’ he tried. ‘I’m working on a case.’

  ‘That’s a bit presumptuous, don’t you think?’

  He gritted his teeth. ‘Well, trying to avoid asking requires presumption.’

  ‘You sound smarmy.’

  ‘It’s not intentional.’

  ‘Really?’

  He almost snapped a nippy response, but bit his tongue. Cooper was still emotionally raw. The break-up of any marriage – particularly one as strong as hers had been – was always painful. Instead, he said, ‘Maxwell is leaving.’

  ‘Yes.’

  His mind was full of questions. When? Is there any likelihood he’ll return? Is it over for good? What exactly do you think I have the right to know? Instead, he tried, ‘When Gail left, and took Maureen and Jack to Glasgow, I felt lost for a while.’ He paused for a response, but she seemed happy to let him go it alone. ‘The strangeness of an empty bed,’ he went on, ‘an empty house, and quiet weekends that felt all wrong, with no one to talk to during the week, I thought I would never get used to it. It took months before I was able to accept the loneliness.’

  Still nothing.

  ‘But it gave me time to reflect on my relationship, the failings and successes of our marriage, and that helped me understand that we really were doomed from the start—’

  ‘Are you suggesting my marriage was—’

  ‘All I’m saying is that time apart, time you can use to think things through, is often worthwhile.’

  ‘Even if it brings Max and me back together?’

  ‘If the end result is that you manage to save your marriage, and that is what you want, what you truly want,’ he added, just to ensure he was not planting seeds that could cultivate against him, ‘then, yes, even if it brings you and Max back together.’

  ‘And if I felt that you and I needed time apart, too?’

  Well, there he had it. He had walked straight into it, with no way out but to wade in deeper. ‘If that’s what you feel you need to do, to help you understand what you want—’

  ‘It is.’

  Silent, he held on to the phone. During their relationship, he had enjoyed their bantering back and forth, the nip and tuck, the thrust and parry, the spice it added. He had always seen Cooper as his intellectual equal. But he was no match for her now.

  ‘Are you still there?’ she asked.

  ‘I’m still here.’

  A pause, then, ‘I think I do need some time by myself.’

  For a moment he was tempted to challenge her, his pedantry telling him that if she only thought she needed some time alone, then she was not sure. Instead, he said, ‘Take as long as you want.’

  ‘I intend to.’

  He was about to ask what she had meant by I think you have the right to know when the call ended with an abruptness that left him wondering if she had expected more from him. Should he have offered a shoulder to cry on? Should he have said he would call in a day or two to check she was okay? Instead he had done none of that, and shown no compassion for or understanding of the pain she was suffering.

  He thought of calling her back, but a glance at the clock confirmed he really had run out of time. Cooper with her marital problems would have to take a back seat. Meanwhile, he needed a quick shower and a change of clothing before driving to Jessie’s.

  I think you have the right to know.

  He laid his mobile on the table and walked to the bathroom.

  Jessie place a hand on Robert’s cheek and mouthed, I love you.

  Robert shrugged a nod, then turned back to his computer.

  ‘Come on, Robert,’ she said. ‘I said I’ll take you to the pictures next week. I promise.’

  Although he could not hear a word, it felt good just speaking to him. She stared at the back of his head, at his dishevelled dirtyblond hair – morning bed-head, she would call it, although night had already arrived. Even seated, Robert looked tall and lanky. Not like his father, for all she could remember of him. She’d been drunk when he’d shagged her on the floor, with the lights off. She wondered if Robert’s physique had come from her own father’s side. She had never met him, or even knew his name. She had asked her mother once, but she refused to tell her, which prompted Jessie to accuse her of not knowing which of the hundreds of drunks she’d shagged was her father. There was no love lost between Jessie and her mother.

  She had left home shortly after that, and joined Strathclyde Police as a secretary at seventeen, after giving birth to Robert. Through a combination of hard work and a favour or two, she worked her way up to detective constable. Her career seemed to be going well, until she met Chief Superintendent Lachlan McKellar. She had dropped her knickers for him just once – too much drink was involved again – but since then Jabba had been obsessed with getting back into them. So Jessie had applied for a transfer to Fife Constabulary.

  But moving from Glasgow to St Andrews was not just about getting Jabba out of her life. Robert was a teenager now, and it would be increasingly difficult to keep her family’s criminal past a secret if they remained in Strathclyde.

  She kissed the top of Robert’s head, but he never even flinched.

  In her bedroom, she opened the wardrobe and pulled out a pair of black jeans and a black turtle neck. Dress appropriately. Black everything, Andy had said. Did that extend to bra and knickers? She imagined him thinking of her. But she knew she was not his type. Still, it was a nice thought, even if for only a fleeting moment.

  Her smile died as her thoughts flashed to the Rottweilers, and a shiver of ice ran through her veins. Ever since she’d seen that wee girl’s savaged body, she’d had recurring nightmares. She closed her eyes, took a deep breath, tried to steady her nerves. Christ, just the memory of their demented growls had her hands trembling.

  She opened her bedside cabinet, and removed a hair-dryer, three hairbrushes, a pile of magazines and, to her pleasant surprise, a silk scarf and a pair of tan leather gloves – so they hadn’t been stolen at that party after all – to uncover a polished wooden box. She opened the lid to reveal a Beretta 950B 22 Short.

  She had never used the gun, never registered it. How could she, when she had stolen it from her brother, Terry, who had probably stolen it from someone else? It was small, fitting neatly into her hand, and sleek. It was Italian, after all.

  She could lose her job if she took it with her. But only if somebody found out.

  Ah, shit, she thought.

  And closed the lid.

  Jessie slipped into the Merc’s passenger seat, dressed all in black – boots, jeans, sweater, anorak, scarf and gloves, to fight off the bitter cold of a Fife March night. Perfect for carrying out night-time surveillance work.

  ‘How’s Robert?’ Gilchrist asked.

  ‘On his computer,’ she said. ‘Sometimes I wonder if he even knows I’m his mum.’

  ‘I’m sure he loves you.’

  ‘But does he know I’m his mum, and not someone who just turns up every now and again and makes his dinner?’

  ‘Is Angie sitting for you?’

  ‘Don’t know what I’d do without her.’

  Stan was already waiting when Gilchrist drove into the car park at the East Sands. Without fuss, he parked the Merc and slipped into the passenger seat of Stan’s Audi. Jessie jumped in the back.

  ‘Right,’ Gilchrist said. ‘Let’s go.’

  CHAPTER 29

  Stan slowed the Audi to forty as they approached Jason Purvis’s cottage.

  ‘Lights are on,’ Gilchrist said.

  ‘Doesn’t mean he’s in,’ Jessie countered.

>   Stan kept the speed steady as they drove past. A Ford Focus was parked in the driveway at the side of the house. Purvis was home.

  ‘You think he might go out later?’ Stan asked.

  ‘That would be too simple,’ Jessie said.

  Gilchrist weighed it up. ‘We’ll enter round the back, from the adjacent field, as close to the barn as we can. But Jessie, you need to get close enough to the cottage to report any activity the instant it happens.’

  They decided to park well off the road and out of sight of the cottage. From there, Gilchrist and Stan would walk across the fields while Jessie worked her way along the back of the hedgerow that lined the road until she found a spot from where she could monitor the cottage, and remain hidden from the headlights of passing cars.

  About a hundred yards along the road, the open entrance to a field was too good to pass up. Stan reversed into it and switched off the lights. The sky was clear, and Gilchrist worried out loud that the half-moon might throw too much light on the surrounding fields.

  ‘Where’s the Scottish weather when you need it?’ Jessie asked.

  ‘We’ll be all right as long as we keep low,’ Stan said.

  ‘What if the dogs hear you and start barking?’

  ‘That’s a chance I’m prepared to take,’ Gilchrist said. ‘Remember, they kept quiet when we approached them this morning.’

  ‘That was in daylight. In the dark it might be different.’

  ‘If they start barking and it’s obvious they’re going to alert Purvis, then we’ll abandon it and try something else later.’

  ‘Like handcuff and lock him up?’ Jessie suggested. ‘That would simplify things.’

  They each checked their mobile phones were switched to vibrate. Although the phones’ screens would still light up when they received a call, as long as they kept their backs to the cottage, Purvis would be unlikely to see them. And once inside the barn, they could talk freely.

  Outside, the crisp night air stung. Stan clapped his gloved hands. ‘Bloody hell, boss, I’d almost forgotten how cold it can be in March.’

  ‘A brisk walk across the fields will heat us up,’ Gilchrist said.

  They set off, Jessie beside the hedgerow, Gilchrist and Stan into the heart of the open fields. The approach to the barn proved more difficult than Gilchrist expected. Hollows and ridges small enough to avoid in daylight were large enough to jar bones and jerk the breath from their lungs in the darkness. Bands of cloud doused the moon, which helped keep them hidden, but made their trek more troublesome.