War Games

by Douglas Jackson

  ‘Just a hint of a link to one more. I don’t have the detail,’ he admitted. ‘They’re trying to keep a lid on it because they don’t want the tabloids screaming the S-word. But there are already whispers in the canteen about the way the wee boy died. Maybe the body wasn’t all there, if you see what I mean?’

  It took me a few seconds, but I saw what he meant all right. A trophy killing. I know more about trophy killings than I’ve ever revealed to anyone alive, including Aelish, who thinks she knows all my secrets. I had a momentary vision of Hector de Mayo’s face, but I pushed it back where it belonged and firmly shut the door. I’d paid for that particular sin, and then some.

  Dewar’s ‘S’ stood for serial. A serial killer. And what he was telling me was that Gurya Ali could be his next victim.

  A serial killer is a psychopath who kills for pleasure, or who is driven to kill again and again by some inner compulsion, sometimes even by a separate inner personality. Their victims tend to die particularly awful deaths, because the manner of their passing influences the amount of publicity he – serial killers are almost always he – receives. They’re often attention seekers who find the tally of column inches in the newspapers as important as the number of their victims. Of course, some of them kill quietly – Fred West was one – and their toll of victims mounts as the world goes about its business unawares. But they are the exception. Serial murderers want their deeds shouted from the rooftops. If Dewar was right, this one would be no different. I tried to think of any recent unsolved death that would fit the scenario, but apart from a couple of particularly brutal drug-related slayings nothing came to mind.

  ‘What else have you got and where do I go?’

  ‘Not much more than I’ve told you. The kid had a history of walking out of the family home to hang out with some of the street rats down along the Broomielaw. Last time anyone saw him was a month ago. A couple of walkers found him this morning at some castle near a wee place called Kelso that the map tells me is just down the road from Savage Mansions.’

  Kelso? The market town was only a few miles away and wouldn’t take me much more than half an hour. I ran what I knew of the place through my mind. ‘There are a couple of castles near Kelso. Did they mention which one?’

  ‘Could it have been Rocks Burgh?’

  ‘Roxburgh, one word,’ I corrected. I knew the place. ‘It’s just a jumble of stones this side of the town.’

  Dewar grunted, not caring one way or the other.

  ‘What else have you heard? Who’s in charge? Anyone I’d know?’

  ‘What else do you want?’ he demanded. I could imagine the heavy brows wrinkling over deep-set, watery eyes. ‘The killer’s shoe size? If there’s a way, you’ll find it. You’re the fuckin’ genius.’

  ‘Thanks, Willie. I owe you one.’

  ‘Aye, add it to the pile,’ he snorted. ‘I’ll be looking for your name in the papers.’

  ‘You’ll see it.’ I laughed, hoping it was for the right reason.

  ‘And Savage . . .?’

  ‘Yes, Willie.’ I knew what was coming.

  ‘You look after that lassie, see, or you’ll have Willie Dewar to reckon with.’

  ‘I will,’ I promised, but he’d already rung off. As I reached for the road map in the top drawer of the desk my hand was shaking.

  CHAPTER 10

  The town of Kelso lies on the northern bank of the Tweed about ten miles downstream from Melrose and if I’d owned a canoe I could have paddled there from the bottom of the slope below the house. Instead, I had to choose between the Range Rover I’d bought when it became clear Aelish’s mobility was going to be affected, or the Capri. The Range Rover, with its four-wheel drive, would have been sensible. Glen Savage has been called many things, but sensible isn’t one of them. Aelish apart, the Capri is the love of my life. I bought her almost new, when her dark green livery was less chipped and when her 2.8 litre engine was top of the range and state of the art. She’s feeling her age now, but when I look at her, crouched low over those wide, low-profile tyres, I still see a panther waiting to pounce. I settled into the bucket seat, chose a CD track that suited my mood and gunned the engine. With the opening bars of the Rolling Stones’ ‘Gimme Shelter’ rattling the car windows I hit the road.

  The journey down the winding road beside the river gave me plenty of time to revisit my conversation with Dewar and my reaction to what he said. When you’re in the Army, you learn never to analyse your feelings; in the time it takes you to figure out whether you’re right or wrong you’ll probably be dead. But when you come back from a war, you never stop thinking about what you’ve done and why you did it. So, I didn’t have a lot to learn about myself. Or at least that’s what I thought. Looking back, there was something disturbing about the thoughts that had gone through my head when I realised what he was giving me. I should have been thinking about Gurya Ali and how this might be the first step to getting her back alive. Instead, the only thing on my mind was that Glen Savage had a chance to take centre stage again. Had I taken some sort of satisfaction from a child’s death? I remembered an almost physical surge of release, but surely that was only an old soldier’s semi-detached view of mortality? Hell, there’d been a damp morning on East Falkland when we’d joked about the ‘fry-up at Fitzroy’; it was the same day they buried thirty-two Welsh Guards who’d been trapped between decks on theGalahad and incinerated by Argentine bombs. No, I wasn’t taking pleasure from the boy’s death, but I was planning to take advantage of it. Maybe, just maybe, this was the chance to prove that Glen Savage was what he’d always claimed to be, and not the fairground fraud or TV spoon-bender the unbelievers whispered about. I thought back to all those moments when the unknown had become known to me in a flash like an exploding mortar round, or when the voices appeared in my head with all the clarity of a loudspeaker broadcast. Thirty-odd years and more I’d been knowing things that other people didn’t. It had brought me as much pain as it had popularity, but I’d grown to crave those moments like a man craves the cry of his first-born child.

  I chose the route that would bring me to the murder scene from the west, because that gave me a clean run to Roxburgh Castle. As I’d tried to explain to Dewar it’s not much of a castle, just a jumble of stones that tops a great mound in the narrow neck of land between the Tweed and Teviot rivers just outside Kelso town. I had a vague recollection that it had been important at one time, but now it was just a nondescript ruin.

  But it wasn’t the history of the place that interested me. It was the line of blue-and-white tape that sealed off the lay-by in the shadow of the broad-canopied oak trees that hid the hill and the castle ruins, and the big incident room truck and a few squad cars hidden discreetly away in a hollow in the field on the opposite side of the road. It was all very low-key. Usually, the cops like to advertise their presence; big budget productions to justify their big budgets. I slowed as I reached the tape and the uniformed cop behind it gave me the kind of look you reserve for the Jehovah’s Witnesses who appear at your front door on a hungover Saturday morning.

  ‘Just a minor incident, sir, nothing to interest you here.’ He was very young, with cropped brown hair under his flat hat, and he spoke in the bored monotone they teach at the police college. We stared at each other for a few seconds and I let my smile fade, replacing it with disappointment – not at a man who was only doing his duty, but at a world that seemed to have put us at odds.

  ‘I wondered if I could have a word with the officer in charge, constable?’ I tried to hit just the right balance between respect and authority the police use among themselves. On other hillsides at other times I’ve found it convenient to steep myself in the personae of the people I worked alongside. Them and us is a way of life for the cops. It makes life much simpler to be one of us. He gave me a long stare. His job was to get rid of people like me, but I’d placed a tiny doubt in his mind, which was what I’d set out to do.

  ‘I’m afraid that won’t be possible, sir. Chief Inspe
ctor Hastings is a very busy man, and, as I said, there’s nothing of interest here.’ He was still polite but his voice carried more of an edge. Now I should reveal my identity or drive on. But I wasn’t planning to do either of those things. I had a feeling I was already off the pace in this investigation. Sometimes a full-frontal assault is the only way.

  ‘Is the boy’s body still on the hill?’ I said it conversationally, but it was the verbal equivalent of a hand grenade. His body tensed and his eyes hardened. His tongue ran over his lips and I knew he was considering whether he should put the cuffs on me right there and then. Here he was at a murder scene no one was supposed to know about, and along comes a big guy with a bad attitude and information he has no right to have. Maybe I was the killer, maybe I wasn’t, but one thing was for certain, I wasn’t going anywhere. He half-turned so I couldn’t see his face and angled his head to whisper into the radio mike attached to the front of his stab-proof vest. I heard the staccato crackle as someone replied, but I didn’t catch the words. Whatever was said, it galvanised him into action.

  ‘If you could just exit the car, please, sir,’ he said briskly.

  ‘Maybe it would be more sensible if I parked across there first?’ I said, pointing to the other side of the road where the big white van was parked. ‘That way I won’t be blocking the traffic.’

  He gave me a look of irritation, but saw the sense in my suggestion and waved me towards an open gate into the field. By the time I got out of the Capri three more uniformed figures were marching towards me exhibiting the kind of body language that would normally have you looking for the exit sign. I’d been expecting trouble and I’d done what I could to prepare for it. I wore an olive-green Barbour jacket that had seen plenty of service, a pair of dark, tweed trousers and black thick-soled, sensible shoes. It’s the kind of outfit favoured by down at the heel country gentlemen – and detectives who spend time outdoors. I banked on the fact that whoever was in charge would find it familiar and unthreatening. The man in the centre was in his mid-thirties and wore the insignia of a chief inspector, which made him the boss. I stepped towards him with my right hand held out offering to shake his, as if I had every right to be where I was.

  ‘Chief Inspector Hastings? Good morning, sir. I’m Glen Savage.’

  A second earlier, his only aim in life had been to throw me off his murder scene, but the certainty in his eyes was replaced by puzzlement and his determined pace faltered. The name Glen Savage had registered, for good or ill, and the fact that I knew his name added an extra grain of uncertainty that was compounded by the hand I held out towards him. I kept my good-natured, helpful smile in place and my hand out. Dewar would have knocked it aside and rammed my arm up my back. He hesitated for a second before he took it.

  ‘Mr Savage,’ he acknowledged. His grip was gym firm and for a fraction of a second we had one of thosemano-a-mano squeezing contests that I always win. He loosed his hold with a thin smile. ‘Perhaps you’d like to explain what you’re doing here?’

  I took time to gather my thoughts and give him a chance to get used to my presence. He looked me over with interest. I knew what he was seeing. Tall – just over six feet – and dark, with maybe just a touch of battered rugby player showing around the nose and eyes. Thick untameable hair, peppered with grey, and a square chin that had taken a few hits in its time. A little worn, but not in bad shape. Ready – but for what? And were the eyes laughing at you, or at life? It was a lot to consider in five seconds, but I saw the thoughts cross his mind one after the other. ‘I was passing by and I thought I might be able to help; as simple as that. I have some experience in situations like this.’

  In most cases someone claiming to be ‘just passing by’ wouldn’t be believed for a second. In my case it’s different. What I do raises doubts. Does he or doesn’t he? Is he or isn’t he? Now Hastings was asking himself what had brought me here, and how I knew whatever it was I so obviously knew. Was the visit the result of some office politics of which he was unaware? Or was this a genuine Glen Savage moment? Could I help? Or was I about to land him in a world of trouble?

  He decided to play for time. ‘And just what kind of situation do you think this is, Mr Savage?’

  I gave him my concerned expression, the one the social workers use just before they sell you down the river. ‘I don’t think, inspector, I know. I know there’s a child’s body at the top of that hill. I know he disappeared some time ago. I know he was the victim of a brutal attack. And, more importantly, I know you have a big problem.’

  I kept my voice reasonable, but the words were a challenge. Whether Chief Inspector Hastings believed the Glen Savage myth didn’t really matter. What mattered was that he now knew that I knew about as much as he did. The question eating him had to be: how much more does he know? Suspicious eyes attempted to read my mind, or at least my face. The sergeant at his back lacked his boss’s subtlety. He growled something about giving him five minutes with me, but Hastings made a calming motion and he backed off. I watched the calculations run through his brain. By now it was obvious I wasn’t here officially, because I would have oiled my way with a letter, or mentioned the name of some senior officer. So he had a maverick mystic on his hands, offering to help investigate a killing he probably already wished he’d never been landed with. He had to balance the fact that I seemed remarkably well informed against the fact that I had no right to be here. I recognised the moment he made his decision.

  ‘Escort Mr Savage back to his car, sergeant.’ He turned away, shaking his head at the folly he’d almost committed, and the sergeant stepped forward to take my arm.

  ‘What’s missing, chief inspector?’ I asked. ‘Where is it now? And why was it taken?’ Hastings froze and the sergeant’s grip on my elbow weakened. ‘Maybe I can help you answer those questions, maybe I can’t. But can you take that chance?’

  CHAPTER 11

  While we climbed through the bushes that led up to the castle ruins, Hastings supplied me with grudging snatches of basic information.

  ‘He walked out of the family home more than a month ago. But that was nothing new. Shoaz Ahmad, fifteen years old, youngest son of a Moslem family of Pakistani origin. His father runs a small electrical business; mother stays home. Shoaz was the apple of her eye, but he didn’t get on with the father.’ I was beginning to see more parallels between Shoaz Ahmed and Gurya Ali, but I didn’t think he needed to know that yet. ‘He would hang out with other Asian kids, doss down in flats or maybe in a hostel. No known enemies.’

  ‘A race thing?’ I gasped the words, knowing they were the last thing he wanted to hear. In 2004, a young white boy had been snatched off the street not far from where Shoaz disappeared and murdered by a gang of Asian thugs. The killing turned the South Side of Glasgow into a racial powder keg with a short fuse.

  He half-turned to stare down at me. ‘At this stage, Mr Savage, we are ruling nothing in and nothing out. But if you have any reason to believe race is a motive in this case, I hope you’ll pass it on without delay.’

  ‘No reason,’ I assured him. ‘Just raising the possibility.’

  He stepped back to my level. I had very little room to spare on the narrow path and we were so close I could see the tiny scars of an old wound at the corner of his right eye. ‘Let me get this straight, Savage’ – I noticed there was no mister now and the tension had ratcheted up a few notches – ‘I don’t need to hear about possibilities, or thoughts, or theories. I don’t like you being here, and I don’t want you here. The reason you are is because you seem to have an insight into the death of Shoaz Ahmad that I don’t fully understand, and there is a remote possibility that you might be able to provide me with information I don’t currently have, such as why or how Shoaz Ahmad ended up here. If I find out this is some kind of scam, you will go to prison for a very long time. Is that clear?’

  I’ve been threatened by professionals – Hastings wasn’t even in the top ten – but there was no mileage in getting into a fight with him. I n
odded. ‘If that’s the way you want to play it.’ I wondered what he’d do when he found out Gurya Ali had been missing for a fortnight and I was working for her father.

  Roxburgh Castle is a giant lozenge-shaped earthwork that fills most of the space between the Tweed and the Teviot and once protected the broad grassland in a noose composed by the two rivers. The only standing remains are a few pieces of crumbling wall. Someone walking their dog had found Shoaz Ahmad’s body in the shadow of one of the wall fragments and now a small blue tent flapping gently in the light breeze marked the spot. Around it the forensics officers, anonymous and sexless in their white overalls, picked their way methodically through the grass and nettles on hands and knees, tagging and bagging anything that looked remotely like evidence. Hastings was just about to open the tent when a shout came from behind us and I winced as I recognised the voice.

  ‘What in the name of all that’s holy is that man doing on my crime scene?’ Superintendent David Dorward’s roar echoed round the hilltop. Inspector Hastings darted a worried glance at me and scurried off to talk to his boss who stood staring at me with his arms folded and a look of disgust on his face.

  When Hastings was done, Dorward approached the tent with a bitter half-smile on his face.

  ‘So you think you can help, Savage? Well, why don’t we find out?’

  He tugged at the strings holding the tent flaps and motioned me forward. The fact that Dorward was allowing me to wander across his crime scene in my size elevens indicated that they’d already checked the area for shoe prints, but I found this new-found spirit of co-operation worrying.

  ‘Take a look.’ He pulled back the flap and I stepped forward.

  The tent was empty.

  ‘We removed the body this morning. You seemed unaware of that, Mr Savage. It doesn’t say much for your so-called talents.’