“I’m trying to get everything I can to make sure we get a conviction.”
“The papers say he’s gone missing.”
Maddy looked at the easel at the window behind Elaine, searching the room for something that might connect to the “exhibition” Whyte had mentioned. An artist’s pad was open, with a drawing of a Utopian housing estate on it. All yellows and soft pinks, children playing in a well-equipped park, friendly neighbourhood shops, cafe with terrace seats. “Looks wonderful. Did you do that?”
“Jim.”
“You must have a lot of paintings and drawings from over the years. Never thought of mounting an exhibition, the three of you?”
But there was no reaction – no pause, or frown. “We’re not those kinds of artist, Miss Shannon.”
Maddy decided she didn’t have time for any more of this fencing. Ask the question you need the answer to and move on. “Mrs. Docherty. Martin Whyte came to see me the other day.” Coulter would kill her. Nearly twenty-four hours since Whyte had accosted her and she still hadn’t reported it. Now she was pre-empting police enquiries. Elaine’s eyebrows arched. “At your office?”
“Nothing so banal. He stopped me. In the street. When he was out jogging. He said the police were looking in the wrong place. That they should look here.”
“Here? He said that? They should look here?” Elaine looked out the window in disbelief. “Is this the usual way a prosecuting lawyer acts? Coming to a witness’s house and accusing them?”
“What am I accusing you of, Mrs. Docherty? I’m trying to help you. Do you have any idea what Mr. Whyte might have meant?”
A stick – a memory stick! The flash drive Elaine had just let drop on her desk. Could that be what Whyte was talking about?
“Then why do I feel I’m being accused?” Elaine was flustered. “Perhaps I should call Jim.”
“Why is Mr. Whyte keeping away from the police?”
“I should call a lawyer. A lawyer of my own.”
The woman was right – Maddy had no business turning up here and having this conversation. Elaine made for the house phone on a table by the door. Maddy seized her moment and grabbed the USB. She clenched it in her palm. Raised her other hand in peace, and got up to go.
Elaine dangled the phone threateningly. “How do I go about making a complaint?”
Maddy stopped and turned at the door. “Open your mouth and shout, dear.” She stepped out into the landing. “Something I found harder to do when your business partner covered my mouth on a dark street.”
Belinda was in the house when she got back. It hadn’t dawned on Maddy that the woman might still be here when she got home, after visiting Nonno in hospital. With everything that happened today she still hadn’t told Coulter either about Belinda or Martin Whyte. She’d tried to. She’d phoned his number three or four times. It wasn’t the kind of thing you left a message about, and she certainly wasn’t going to talk to Detective Sergeant Russell first. Belinda called from the kitchen, “I’ve made some dinner for you.”
Seriously unacceptable that Mrs. Laird was still in her house, yet Maddy’s heart rose. How pleasant to open your door and hear a friendly voice. And smell proper food – she hadn’t consumed anything more than office and hospital coffee and biscuits, a sly ciggie or two in doorways, and red wine in over two days. And with Belinda instead of Louis she didn’t even have to worry about how she looked or what might happen at the end of the night.
“I’ll find that hotel for you.”
“Straight after dinner.”
Which turned out to be semi-raw vegetables in couscous. “It always seems so ungrateful,” Belinda said, watching her eat, “Nature bestows such riches on us and we boil them to death.”
“You’ve made arrangements for Paul?” Maddy asked, hesitantly.
Belinda nodded. “Funeral’s day after tomorrow.”
How was the woman paying for it? Maybe she’d asked the Kanes to pay. Belinda cleared the table, like a housemaid. “I’ll go straight back to Dundee, the minute it’s over.”
Maddy felt spent. The herb tea Belinda gave her was neither tasty nor invigorating. She eyed the bottle of wine by the fridge but didn’t want to give the earth mother here the idea that she was an alky. She let Belinda wash the dishes and went into the living room and turned on the computer. She checked her emails. Nothing from Louis. She took Elaine Docherty’s memory stick out of her bag and looked to see if there was a port for it anywhere on her computer. None that she could see. Her laptop was newer, so she hauled it out from its drawer and found a plug that looked right.
Outside the night grew around the trees. The breeze shuffling the leaves darkly. She got access to Elaine’s memory without much bother. A list of recent projects. Maryhill Housing Association, a list of city-centre shops, several of which Maddy knew; West of Scotland Anti Drugs Forum, a few more charities. Nothing as far back as Lochgilvie House though, let alone the Women’s Prison Committee. All the files – about thirty of them – had been created in the last six months.
Belinda brought her the herb tea she had left in the kitchen. “Maddy? I need someone to say a few words on Thursday. At the crematorium. I’ll say something obviously. And I imagine Des will, but I wondered if you…”
“No. Belinda, sorry. Totally inappropriate for me to—”
“I wasn’t going to ask you. I know that wouldn’t be right. Des and Veronica have asked if you knew a priest here, or a minister or something.” She smiled. “Personally I’d rather have a white witch, but I don’t think that’d go down too well.”
“I’ll ask my mum to get Father Jamieson. He’s young and he’s hip. At least he reckons he is.” She punched in the number. “I need to find out how my granddad’s doing tonight anyway.”
Nonna had told him to go wait by Carlo.
The two brothers had covered their walls with all the postcards and telegrams that came from far away: Pinerolo, Grenoble, Lyons, Paris, Boulogne, London. Vittore went to sleep every night with pictures of snowy mountains and motor cars, ladies in hats, children playing on grey beaches, the Eiffel Tower, aeroplanes flying. They got mixed up in his dreams so that the ladies flew over cities hanging from the tops of mountains, multi-coloured dresses fluttering. He saw his mother clad in finery and his father climbing the girders on the Tour d’Eiffel. For the last year and a half all the pictures had been of Inghilterra and Scozia. Pictures that didn’t reveal much: more mountains, cars, an old man leaning on a stick and dressed in a skirt.
Zia Francesca came over from Procchia every month or six weeks to help them word a short message in reply. Vittore’s Nonno and Nonna could manage a pen well enough, the problem was wording the notes. They wanted to tell Ettore and Antonella that all was well, that there was no need to worry, but not so well as to make their journey worthless. They missed out many events and problems, seeing no use in upsetting them unnecessarily. Everyone lived for Mamma and Papà’s letters – Nonna and Nonno, Vittore, but especially Carlo.
When Vittore was nearly eleven and proud of the inches he had grown, a postcard came from Marseille. Dad was coming home. He had walked through Scozia and Inghilterra, taken trains through Francia without telling them so that it would be a surprise when he got near to Elba. He was taking a boat that very morning and would be back to take his boys to their new land within the week.
Perhaps they should have got word to Ettore to let him know. To prepare him. But no one was sure how it should be done, or if it was a good idea or not. Most agreed that he would find out soon enough. And soon enough was too soon.
Carlo had battled against his sickness for nigh on three years. He nearly made it, too. He lived long enough to hear that his parents had arrived safely in the place that would be their new home. He told Vittore that night that it would never be his – that Vittore was to remain strong and eat well so that Mamma and Papà would at least have one son to help them in their new world. Before the next postcard arrived, Carlo had cried away his last day and was
buried. No one had the heart or the words to tell Ettore and Antonella. Not even Zia Francesca.
Giovanni Chiesa had come rushing up from Portoferraio last night to say that Ettore had arrived there. He stayed the night because it was late and he wanted to freshen up in Giovanni’s house to arrive smart, ready to see his big, grown boys.
“Go on, Vittore,” Nonna said. “Go down and wait for your daddy with Carlo.” Nonno had insisted that his brother was buried on Di Rio land. That he was still waiting for his Mamma and Papà; that he’d never given up hope.
Vittore went every day to the graveside to speak to his brother. He did so again now, telling him that Papà was on his way, he’d be here any minute to see his sons again. He saw Ettore in the distance, coming up over the brow of the hill. A little smaller than Vittore remembered. Not so tousled, better dressed. Carrying a neat leather case. He was walking fast and, although Vittore couldn’t see his smile from so far away, he could sense it in the man’s gait. His dad speeded up when he saw him. Then slowed down. Looked at his one boy, and stopped, saw the cross Vittore was standing beside. When he walked forward again, his step was slower, heavier, older.
Factories surround the city like decrepit sentries, spindly chimneys manufacturing the famous local greyness, sending a stream of murk over rooftops. Today’s a drab, dry Thursday, specially blended for a funeral.
Maddy could see the cortège below her as she came off the motorway. Wee Frances Mulholland, unheeded in life, celebrated in death for all the wrong reasons. Priest up front leading the procession. Behind him, mother Jackie and brother Darren – but Darren’s walking closer to Janet Bateman, as fat as he’s skinny, his state-appointed custodian. His hair blonder than the ashen light, a blur around his head, like a halo. A shilpit wee man just behind Jackie who must be the boyfriend, or fixer, Ricky Graham – a dismal streak of bad luck to spill into anybody’s life. Behind that sad little trinity, a procession of near on a hundred people. Maddy left the car outside the gate and cut across old graves on foot. She didn’t want to get too close, too early. Merely a professional paying of respects.
Frances today; Sy Kennedy and Paul Pacchini, interred separately, tomorrow. What’s the collective noun for funerals? An argosy of coffins, she’d heard that somewhere. A benevolence of mourners. They might not all be benevolent but there’s certainly plenty of them today. Young deaths always bring out the congregations. Murdered youngsters, even more. Reporters and photographers. Police. Ghouls who can’t resist the burial of a young girl on a dull morning. Coulter and Russell were arriving late, coming along from her right; they must have parked by another gate. Coulter nodded to her like she was a stranger. Russell managed an unaccustomed smile.
“These things always get me,” Russell said. “I mean it’s sad and everything, but—” Coulter and Maddy stared at him. “Oh come on. Kids like Sy Kennedy are the bane of everyone’s life. Can’t walk past a bunch of them in the street without getting dog’s abuse. Let’s not get over-romantic, eh?” He didn’t wait for a response, but took a couple of righteous steps away from them. Coulter coughed. Finally managed to meet her eye. “Getting all the info through okay?”
“Yup. Your people are talking to my people. A well-oiled machine. Police and the Fiscal – Together We Are Strong.”
He didn’t laugh, and they both looked over towards the open grave. “I heard your grandfather wasn’t well.”
“Stroke. Still in some kind of a coma.”
“How about Louis?”
“Don’t go there.” She’d meant it to sound jokey. It sounded grief-stricken. Alan frowned in empathy, but Maddy reckoned he’d be happy – married people always are when singles aren’t having fun. He searched in a pocket and brought out an envelope and handed it to her. “Photos of Paul Pacchini. IT are having problems sending them to you. You can give one to Belinda.”
His way of telling her he knew Pacchini’s mother was staying with her. Maddy felt her irritation rise. “Look. I put her up for a night or two. So what? She’s leaving tomorrow.”
Coulter put his palm up in peace. “Tell her we have positive sightings of her son. In Drumchapel.”
It was Monsignor Connolly doing the graveside prayers. He had his back to them, a black blur amongst the sorrowful, but Maddy recognised the pompous drone of his voice. The Church had sent in a big gun for the high-profile funeral. She could just hear him saying something about the jewel of youth. Darren was staring down into the gape of the grave like he wanted to jump in after his sister. Ricky Graham, the bidey-in, useless stepfather, was sucking on a fag, leaning against a tree. Jackie stared hollowly, the daughter she’d never managed to care for, gone… where?
“No news of Lennon?” Maddy didn’t think she’d meant it to sound like an accusation, but Coulter squirmed. “Not yet. You seen the papers today?”
“No.”
“Your man Casci’s had another murder in New York.”
They stayed for as long as was necessary, and left via Coulter’s car to pick up his pile of newspapers, then walked ten minutes to a greasy spoon, Coulter quiet while she read. The Herald only had a one-para Reuters report:
The body of a further victim in a series dubbed the Potters’ Field Murders was discovered yesterday in a disused car park in the Bronx district. The as yet unidentified black teenager was found shot in the head, and subsequently beaten, in a similar fashion to the seven or more previous unsolved cases.
The Times had the same report. The Scotsman had nothing. Only the Independent had a proper quarter-page article on the subject. The young man was estimated to be around fifteen or sixteen. There was severe bruising to his upper body and face, and evidence of a knife attack – all thought to have been inflicted either after death or during the death throes. Where he was cut – whether around the mouth area, like Sy and Paul – none of the reports said. Nor did they mention Commander Louis Casci. Quotes were simply attributed to NYPD or a police source or spokesman. Nor did they connect the killings to the Glasgow murders. Maddy got out her phone and began to text.
“We’ve been trying to get him since last night,” Alan said. “Either we just get lost in the system, or we get some underling saying he isn’t authorised to connect us to Commander Casci.”
“Maybe he isn’t.”
A middle-aged woman, too jolly for the occasion or the weather, took their order.
“We are, however, in constant touch,” Coulter picked up again when the woman had gone, “with Customs and Immigration, both here and across the pond.”
“You don’t think Lennon did this, do you?”
“Funny it should happen just when we lost track of him.”
“Hang on. You had him in custody last week. Are you saying he went home, poured himself a bowl of cornflakes and had a sudden impulse to kill a black boy in New York?”
“I’m saying…”
“He’d have to skip out the country – not an easy thing to do these days, even if you’re not tanned enough to be from anywhere east of Dover, and especially not if you’re Northern Irish with form. He then has to get himself to the Big Apple, find someone he wants to kill, and have it all done and dusted by… when?” She checked the paper, as Coulter waited patiently for the tirade to stop. “Two nights ago. All that in four days!”
“I’ve never said that Lennon is necessarily the killer of the American victims. I am saying that there’s clearly a connection.”
“He knows you think that. Maybe that’s why he’s done a runner.”
“He’s the key, Maddy. There’s enough evidence to tie him to three murders here, and to link him to the Potters’ Field killings.”
“Evidence? You can’t even find him! I’m sorry, Alan. Baskets and far too many eggs come to mind.”
Coulter stared out the window, his jaw stiff, while the waitress set out their coffees. “Don’t you give me lectures,” he said finally. “You’ve got a witness and a next-of-kin staying at your apartment. You might have blown the case before we even get
it started!”
Maddy had no defence for that. Coulter knew it, and softened his tone. “If not Lennon, then who?”
“I don’t know. But I was confronted in the street the other night by another suspect you’ve let slip.”
It took him a second. “Whyte? When?”
“He seems to think we’re looking in the wrong place, too.”
“You didn’t report this?”
“He didn’t mention any names. But he was talking about Jim and Elaine Docherty.”
“Jesus Christ, Maddy! What are you playing at?”
Both their mobiles rang at the same time. They chose to take their calls; turned away from each other and whispered into their phones. Like strangers. Or worse, adversaries.
Heading back to work, she hurried across the top of Cadogan Street, at a speed-walk pace. A police car was parked near the Docherties. Elaine must have realised by now what happened to her flash drive. If she doesn’t complain to the police, then Whyte had been telling Maddy something genuinely important. If, on the other hand, she does report the theft to the police, then that was the end of Maddy’s entire career. A billboard outside a newsagent’s stated in tall bold letters: “‘Brammer’ Khan Accused of Theft.” Bastards, Maddy thought. It had taken the press a little longer than she’d expected to discredit the Have-A-Go Hero. Give it a week, and they’d have something on Caprice. Then the birching and hanging mob will have the front pages safely to themselves again.
At the office she didn’t stop for niceties with Manda. Neither Dan nor Izzie were at their desks. She closed the door firmly behind her and started dialling before she sat down, struggling to take off her jacket with the receiver at her ear.
“Commander Casci, please.” It was half-past one here, half eight there. Louis should be in by now. The phone rang out for ages. She redialled, twice, tried to speak to someone else in Louis’s team, got two different voice messages asking her to call back, was put on hold and made to listen to tinny muzak. She dialled another number, asked for Information, and finally managed to speak to a real human being. The woman was pleasant in a professionally over-patient way.
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