“Run the footage, Frankie.” DC McKenzie pushed play on her laptop, swinging the screen around so both John Ackerman and his solicitor could see footage of him walking around the outside of the laird’s house, followed by inside camera views before the final shots of him leaving the house, his jacket a lot bulkier than it had been. The solicitor rolled his eyes and painstakingly removed his pen once more, opening his file and writing in small, neat script.
“That’s not me!” Even the solicitor forgot to keep a poker face, incredulity writ large across his bespectacled features.
“Fingerprints.” Corstorphine said just the one word, as if this alone was sufficient for a conviction.
Frankie passed over a set of prints, clearly photographed on the broken window pane where Ackerman’s fingers had picked out slivers of glass before entering. She passed over another set of official prints, clearly identified as Ackerman’s for comparison.
“There are more in the house,” she added before John Ackerman or his solicitor could interject, “and we fully expect the blood sample we found on an interior door handle to match your DNA.”
John Ackerman’s left hand instinctively covered a cut on his right. He looked hopefully at the solicitor sitting beside him, only to receive a slight shake of the head in response.
Corstorphine almost felt sorry for the gamekeeper, the way he slumped dejectedly into his seat.
“I’d gone there after seeing you. I was still angry that the bastard had his gamekeeper set me up. That was one of his fucking birds and he knew it!”
“Did you have an argument with him?” Fiona questioned.
He looked at her in that same way he had before, wondering why a woman was asking him questions. “No, there wasn’t anyone at home. That’s when I decided to break in and try and find some evidence.”
The solicitor was holding up a hand in a futile attempt to stop the flow of conversation. “I’d advise no comment to any further questions.”
John Ackerman continued as if the solicitor wasn’t there. “I couldn’t find anything. The bastard’s too clever to leave anything incriminating around. So I took a shooting trophy, solid silver, thought that would be payback.”
The solicitor sat back with a show of disinterest. If his client wanted to incriminate himself against his advice there wasn’t much he could do.
“Where were you between Friday 9th May and Sunday 11th May, John?”
“You’ve already asked me all this crap. I told you where I was!”
Frankie opened her notebook, reading the dates she’d written down before responding to his outburst. “You told us where you were from Monday 12th through to the day Oscar died, Friday 16th. We now believe that whoever was responsible for Oscar’s death set the snare sometime over the previous weekend. What were your movements?”
John Ackerman sat up in his seat. “You’re not pinning that on me. I had nothing to do with his death. What is this?” He looked at the solicitor in appeal.
“Are you accusing my client of possibly being an accomplice to murder, officer?”
Corstorphine watched Ackerman shrewdly. He didn’t have the composure to hide anything. If he had killed Oscar it would be as plain as day.
“Not for the moment, but we are charging you with breaking and entering, criminal damage and theft from Mr Anthony McCallum on Monday 19th May. You’d better remember what you were doing that weekend and who you can provide as witnesses, otherwise you could find yourself in deep water.”
“I’d like a word alone with my client, given the nature of these fresh allegations you’re making.”
Corstorphine turned off the voice recorder whilst Frankie collected her laptop and paperwork.
“Is ten minutes enough?” Corstorphine directed this to the solicitor, who nodded sharply in his direction. He shut the door on them and walked back to stand in front of the crazy board with Frankie.
“What do you make of him, sir? Do you think he could have killed Oscar and the minister?”
“It’s possible. Sometimes it’s the most unlikely people who turn into killers. I guess we all have it in us if we’re pushed hard enough.” Corstorphine was puzzling over the board. “I don’t think Ackerman’s our man, though, Frankie. Being wrongly accused for poisoning raptors and losing your job, that’s bad enough, but is it sufficient motivation to risk a long spell in prison? I don’t think so. Then there’s the minister. There’s no obvious link between them. No, our murderer is someone who’s capable of cool planning and has an eye for making the punishment fit the crime. Whoever it is, they have planned this for a long time.”
“And they’re a dab hand with clockwork mechanisms,” Frankie added. “The clock repairer mentioned a French clockmaker based in Toulouse as the only person he knew who could make anything like this.” She pointed towards her desk where the boxed mechanism still lay.
“Our reporter’s French,” Corstorphine mused out loud.
“Why would there be any connection to France?” Frankie queried.
Reluctantly, Corstorphine added another name to the board – Josephine Sables. “I don’t know, Frankie.” He stroked an imaginary beard, deep in thought. “There’s something we’re missing, something we’ve not been told.”
Without warning, Corstorphine started pulling at the crazy board, lifting photographs and coloured string off in handfuls. “We’re looking at this all wrong. The orphanage is the common factor. The orphanage and the children who were abused and killed there.” He drew a rough circle in the middle of the board and labelled it ‘Orphanage’.
“These are the children we know about. Oscar, Simon Battle in Barlinnie and our butcher, William Booth.” Their names and photographs radiated out from the bottom of the central circle. “And these are the people who were either in charge, involved or accused of being abusers.” The minister, the laird, Lord Lagan and the old DI were placed at the top of the board. “The minister has been killed.” He drew a red line obliquely across the minister’s name, then did the same with Oscar. “If it’s someone looking for retribution then we should be concentrating on the orphans who are still alive.”
“Wasn’t Oscar one of the victims, though, sir?”
Corstorphine nodded. “Yes. Victim and also muscle for one of the alleged abusers.”
Frankie looked confused. “How does this relate to the death of June Stevens twenty years ago?”
“You say her notebook contained allegations of who was involved?”
“That’s what I was told, sir. Without getting our hands on the book we have to go with what the Courier tells us.”
“OK. Let’s assume for the moment they’re telling us the truth. Then where are the names of the children? Why are we having so much trouble tracking down any of the orphans who were at the orphanage?”
“Maybe Margo has some of that information, sir. She could be drip feeding it to the paper for money?”
“That’s entirely possible. I think we’re going to have to have another chat with Margo. She wasn’t particularly forthcoming when I went to see her.” He checked his watch. “They’ve had their ten minutes. At least we can charge John Ackerman for breaking and entering. When the laird reappears, we can find what’s missing – add burglary to his charge sheet.” They walked back to the interview room together. “I’m going to have to open a line of enquiry into June Stevens’ suicide; it’s the only way I can requisition that notebook.” Corstorphine didn’t sound overjoyed at the prospect.
He formally charged the gamekeeper, accepting the solicitor’s plea that he be allowed out pending trial. As far as Corstorphine was concerned, John Ackerman was just a distraction. Somewhere out there was a killer who’d already struck twice and he didn’t want any more murders on his patch.
“See if you can track down any more of the orphanage children, they must be out there somewhere.” Another thought finally crystallis
ed in his mind, “And get in touch with that local company that undertakes geological surveys. I want the old orphanage garden scanned with ground penetrating radar in case that’s where all of our missing children ended up.”
Corstorphine left Frankie working at her desk, frustrated at the lack of any solid leads in the case. He was also concerned that the ACC would be down on him like a ton of bricks as soon as he heard the reporter’s suicide was being reopened. Couldn’t be helped. Her death was the key to the murderer, he was sure of it. The Courier believed that Oscar had murdered her twenty years ago, something he attached a high probability to – especially since Oscar had possession of her notebook. What made it more likely that Oscar had murdered her, in his view, was the amateur way the scene had been left to make it look like a suicide; a scene that the old DI couldn’t possibly have been taken in by. Which left him with the inescapable conclusion that Brian had been ‘got at’.
His mobile interrupted his train of thought, the number not one he recognised.
“Corstorphine,” he announced. There was the slightest delay on the other end before a woman’s voice replied.
“Hello, James, it’s Jenny. I was wondering if you were free for a drink later on tonight?”
A brief moment’s panic ensued. Should he? Did he have time? Did they even have anything in common? What did she want? His wife sat on his office desk, legs crossed, looking down at him in that way of hers. “For God’s sake, James, get out there and enjoy yourself for once!”
He smiled at her ruefully. “I don’t really want anyone else. It’s you I want. It was always you I wanted.” The conversation was happening in his head, he knew that – it didn’t make it any less real.
“Face up to it, James. I’m gone. I’m never coming back. You made me a promise. You said you’d live life for both of us.”
“Oh, hi, Jenny. Yes, that would be good. I could do with a break from work. Where were you thinking?”
“Same place as last time, if you like. The food wasn’t too bad and it will save me having to cook for myself. Shall we say eight?”
“Eight is fine. I’ll see you then.” He added as an afterthought, “Looking forward to it.”
“Me too. See you then, bye.”
Corstorphine sat at his desk, aware of his wife’s pleased expression looking down from her perch beside him. “OK, you win. Now let me try and make some sense out of these bloody murders before I lose my job.”
He sat at his desk, computer waiting with infinite machine patience for his input. He’d previously attempted to use the police VALCRI system for a search on bone gears, without success. This time he tried Google with Toulouse as a search term. Within seconds he had found references to the clockmaker, Henri Dupont, together with photographs of bizarre clockwork mechanisms fashioned from animal skeleton remains. Not all of them were timepieces. His most celebrated creations were mechatronic animations with a macabre bent. There was a small dog: mostly skeleton apart from the head and two paws clutching an even smaller guitar. The video link beckoned and the dog became alive – gears whirring in place of a heart, strings plucked and the head inclining towards the camera from where glass eyes observed him with an air of studied boredom.
The site confirmed that the clockmaker had died 5 years ago, with a note suggesting his creations had soared in value ever since as collectors scrambled to buy them. The guitar-playing dog, entitled Bonzo, was reputedly worth half a million Euros. Corstorphine shook his head, partly in reaction to anyone spending that much money on a clockwork dog, partly because the trail was a dead end. On a whim he searched for any assistants or staff, but Dupont had apparently preferred to work alone. Only one photograph showed the secretive clockmaker at work, bent over the lens of a large illuminated magnifying glass mounted on his bench. A young girl stood in the background, out of focus and almost lost in it. The photo was captioned ‘Henri Dupont and his daughter, Joie’. Corstorphine squinted at the photograph in an attempt to bring the daughter more into focus, she must have been about ten years old. That was another line of enquiry reaching a dead end. He stretched, checked the time and logged out – time to go home and grab a shower before his second date with Jenny. A fleeting smile crossed his face as he left the station, a small glimmer of hope that his heart might be made to beat again.
XXIII
WEDNESDAY 21:04
The room was getting darker and the laird checked his phone – Tuesday 20:14. The dogs had started pawing at the door, looking at him through unfathomable eyes and exchanging whines. “Lie down!” The dogs responded immediately to his barked command, but how long would they keep obeying him if thirst and starvation overcame their training? He didn’t like to dwell on what the next few days might bring, preferring instead to keep the hope alive that he’d be noticed missing before too long. As the building fell into darkness for the second day of his confinement, he slid into an uncomfortable sleep, curled up on the cold flagstone floor with only his tweed jacket to deter the worst of the night’s chill. A sound brought him fully awake, eyes straining in the complete blackness, unable to make out anything other than a faint outline of the slit windows where the dark was less oppressive. The dogs were raiding the crisps. He could hear them crunching packets and contents all in one go. Fumbling for his phone, he keyed on the torch, catching two pairs of watchful eyes reflecting the light. “Leave! Go and lie down!” The dogs left the crisps, taking position back at the door and panting loudly as if they’d been exercising hard. “Damn them.” The floor was covered in crisps, torn packets and bits of cardboard where they’d chewed through the box. His mouth felt dry, and the image of a cool glass of water appeared in his imagination, accompanied by a desperate thirst. He licked his lips, which were already starting to crack, and noticed his tongue felt strangely dry and swollen. This wasn’t good. He’d only been trapped in the building for two days and he was already craving water. The dogs didn’t look any better, not helped by however much salt they’d just ingested. He stayed sitting, watching the dogs for the remainder of the night, until Wednesday’s dawn made its presence known, with the first birdsong accompanying a sky turning gradually lighter. The third day of his confinement began.
Getting to his feet was a struggle, his muscles complaining after another long night spent on cold stone. He hoped the aches and pains he felt were nothing to do with dehydration and was reassured by his bladder insisting on being emptied as soon as possible. With a feeling of distaste, he pissed against the wall in the corner that the dogs had already decided would be their toilet. The animals watched him without any reaction as a stream of dark urine splashed against the whitewashed wall. A stomach cramp hit as he finished, causing him to double in agony for the few seconds it lasted. “God, not the time to get the runs.” He pressed his face against the window glass, seeing a constricted view of the woods outside. There was no movement, no sign of anyone in the vicinity, but why should there be? The path was so far off the beaten track that the only time it was ever used was when the hunting season started in earnest, when he could charge grossly inflated prices for those who enjoyed shooting the stupid, overfed birds. He shouted anyway, just in case someone was within earshot. His voice sounded weak and croaky, his throat hurt with the effort.
As he held onto the wall for support, for the first time the laird seriously considered that he might actually die in this single-roomed cottage. The thought scared him, causing him to search for words to a God he’d long ago given up believing in. “I don’t know if you exist, but for God’s sake help me.” That sounded wrong and he made another attempt. “I know I’ve not been a good man, I know I’ve made mistakes and have sinned, but please, God, please find it in your heart to look down on me and save my soul.” That sounded better, he was quite pleased with that.
His moment of self-congratulation evaporated as quickly as it had arrived when one of the dogs stood up, baring sharp incisors and walking towards him on stiff legs. “Si
t down. SIT DOWN!” The animal’s eyes narrowed in a most human fashion, assessing how much of a pack leader he was, who was the stronger. The dog sat, its companion watching the interplay and remaining motionless, conserving energy.
The day stretched out in front of them, followed by another night. The dogs held no moral scruples, this was always going to be about survival. Their owner just hadn’t realised it yet. On the floor, the hourglass leaked red sand from the top glass through to the bottom. He estimated there were one or two days of sand still to go and meanwhile, he and his dogs were keeping an uneasy truce. The cold store was now smelling putrid. He’d had to add his own excrement to the dogs’ smaller piles. He’d noticed neither dog had passed urine since the previous day, and just now when he’d managed a meagre piss, his own urine was dark, almost brown. His phone had run out of battery just as dawn broke, so he had to guess the time at around 12:00, give or take a few hours. He’d been suffering with cramp during the night and even now his body ached in a way he’d never experienced before. His lips had started to crack – he’d tried licking them to provide some respite to the dreadful thirst he was experiencing but there was no saliva left in his mouth.
He watched the egg timer, red sand still trickling at an almost imperceptible rate from one side to the other. He’d come to associate the timer with whatever time was left to him, judging that at the rate it emptied he had one day left. Unless he’d lost track of the days, that took him to Thursday when he’d be missed at Inverness Sheriff Court for sure. He just had to survive until then. An inscription he hadn’t noticed before caught his eye as the sun made a welcome intrusion into the room. Words were carved around the base of the hourglass – Children Suffer. He felt as if his heart had been gripped in an ice-cold fist. One hand went to his chest, willing his heart to not give up now, the other turned the base around to reveal more of the inscription – The Little. The Little Children Suffer. Was it a message from whoever had trapped him in here?
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