Prayer for the Dead

by James Oswald

  And there was always that natural inquisitiveness, of course. He couldn’t deny that. McLean rolled off the elastic band that had been holding the folder closed, leaned back in his seat and started to read.

  37

  He comes out of the coma slowly, exactly as it should be. It helps that he’s connected up to all the machinery; means I can monitor him waking as the poisons are filtered out of his blood. I imagine he’ll have the mother of all headaches right now, but that’s a small price to pay for what awaits him on the other side.

  ‘Wh … wha … where?’ The question is barely a whisper, almost drowned out by the hum of the life-support systems. I hover out of sight, observing as he slowly comes to terms with his situation. The muscles around his eyes twitch, but they don’t immediately open. As if the eyelids are stuck together with glue, the eyeballs dry inside. There is sweat on his skin, tiny beads forming around his temples and slicking his thin hair.

  ‘Is … is anyone there?’ And now he tries to move his head. He can’t, of course. The bed is designed for epileptics, the restraints soft but very secure. His arms and legs are strapped down, too. In a minute or so he will realise just how helpless he is. As he should be when meeting his maker.

  ‘You are blessed, Jim. You have a certainty about you few possess.’

  I can almost see his ears twitching as he tries to pinpoint my voice. He opens his eyes now, but all he can see is the ceiling high overhead.

  ‘Ben? Is that you?’

  ‘Ben has gone on before you.’ I reach out, stroke the side of his cheek with the back of my finger. ‘Ben is already in heaven.’

  ‘What’s going on? Where am I? Why can’t I move?’ His voice is growing stronger, even as the panic rises. The machines tell me this, but I can read him without them. The same way I can see the readiness of his soul, free of the stains of life.

  ‘I envy you. That’s my downfall, you understand. You have found such a state of grace I can never hope to achieve. I can only pray that when it is my time to be judged He will look upon these works of mine favourably.’

  ‘I … I don’t understand. What are you—’

  ‘Shhh.’ I place my finger over his lips, silencing him. His eyes lock on to my face now, and I can feel the tremors that shake through his body, smell the fear rising from him. God is near, ready to take this perfect soul to his bosom. But this can’t be a swift and violent end. Not like the journalist. I could feel him slipping back into sinful doubt almost from the moment he reached apotheosis. His end was always going to be quick or risk the loss of such a perfect prize. I knew that the moment I first met him, confirmed it over the weeks I fed his obsession, led him to the secret knowledge he so craved.

  This one is different. He is scared, but he is also ever hopeful. I can taste it on him, see the colours of it playing in his aura. This one put his faith in medicine, science, technology. Only fitting then that his beloved machines hasten him toward his salvation.

  ‘Go now, Jim. Do your great works. Heal the sick like our Lord Jesus healed them.’

  He’s ready, has been ready for hours now. Still, I want to savour this, feel the presence of the Lord when he comes to collect this soul. I reach over to the machine, flick the switch. The motors whirr and the ceremony begins.

  ‘What’s happening? What are you doing? Ben?’

  ‘Don’t panic. It will all be over soon.’ I pick a careful path through the tubes and wires as the precious fluid drains slowly from his body. The litany is silent, the words flowing through my mind as I take up my perch on the stool by the door and watch.

  38

  ‘You got a minute, Spence?’

  The detective inspector was holding court in the middle of his incident room, his thin, pointy head rising up over the gaggle of junior detectives surrounding him. McLean couldn’t help noticing that there were more uniforms and admin in the incident room for the Maureen Shenks murder than he had working on the Ben Stevenson case. Indeed quite a few of the officers who were meant to be working with him seemed to have been poached. Some things never changed.

  ‘Not got enough to do, you have to come sticking your nose in here, McLean?’ Spence ambled across with all the urgency of a sloth. The look he gave McLean was one of a headmaster wearily dealing with an awkward boy, which given he was only two years McLean’s senior seemed a bit much. Nothing he wasn’t used to, though, and if Brooks got the promotion to detective superintendent that everyone expected, the chances were good that Spence would have his DCI job. That would be fun.

  ‘Just thought you might have been looking for this.’ McLean held up the PM report. ‘Someone stuck it on my desk by mistake.’

  ‘What is it?’ Spence made no move to take the folder.

  ‘Missing piece of your puzzle, if that board’s anything to go by.’ McLean gestured over to the whiteboard on the far side of the room. Several questions had been written on it in teacher’s handwriting, but there were few answers as yet. How long had it been since Spence had taken over?

  ‘What the hell are you doing here?’ McLean turned in the doorway to see DCI Brooks lumbering up the corridor. Just once in a while, he thought, it would be nice if people could be civil.

  ‘Afternoon, sir. I was just dropping off the PM report on Maureen Shenks. It got shoved in with my filing by mistake.’

  ‘Maureen …?’ For an instant Brooks looked like he was going to ask who, but he rallied with a noncommittal ‘Oh’.

  ‘You might want to read it sir. There’s some alarming similarities in the method used on the nurse and on Ben Stevenson.’

  That got McLean the full angry grimace, and at the same time he felt the folder being tugged from his grasp.

  ‘You’ve read it?’ DI Spence held the report at arm’s length, as if it had been sullied. Either that or he needed his reading glasses.

  ‘Of course I’ve read it. I attended the post-mortem, remember. Before you were assigned the case.’

  ‘So you have nothing better to do than stick your nose in? Ben Stevenson’s killer behind bars, is he?’ DCI Brooks pushed past on his way into the incident room in a manner best described as brusque. The busy hum of activity that had filled the air when McLean arrived had dropped into a tense silence now.

  ‘It’s not a pissing contest, sir. I’m not trying to take over your investigation or steal your glory or whatever you think’s going on. I’m just pointing out that there are similarities between two Cat A murders currently under investigation. If nothing else, it’s a line of enquiry worth pursuing, don’t you think?’

  ‘I’ll be the judge of that, McLean.’ Brooks pulled the report from DI Spence’s weak grasp, flipped it open and went straight to the back.

  ‘Take your time,’ McLean said. He fought back the urge to make a sarcastic comment, knowing full well how counterproductive it would be. ‘You know where to find me if you need me.’

  ‘Brooks tells me you’ve been sticking your nose into his investigation.’

  As conversational openers went, it was much to be expected from Duguid. McLean was surprised at just how quickly the complaint had been made though, and how petty it was. It threw him, too. This wasn’t the reason he’d come to see the chief superintendent.

  ‘I was just giving them their PM report. Someone filed it in my office by mistake.’

  ‘Oh, I know all that.’ Duguid waved away the excuse as if it were a particularly annoying fly that wouldn’t leave him alone. ‘You didn’t have to read it.’

  ‘No, I didn’t. True enough. I bet you’re glad I did though.’

  Duguid stopped swatting the fly, arched a fading ginger eyebrow at him. ‘Glad?’

  ‘You know as well as I do neither of these investigations is getting anywhere, sir. Forensics have found bugger all at either scene, background checks are coming up with nothing. There’s no obvious motive for either killing. Category A murders are rare as rocking horse shit. Makes sense to compare notes, at the very least.’

  Duguid slumped back
in his chair like a man defeated. ‘Christ but I hate the complicated ones.’

  ‘Couldn’t agree more, sir.’

  That got him a frown in return. ‘Could’ve fooled me, McLean. What did you want to see me about anyway? I assume it wasn’t to complain about Brooks telling you to piss off.’

  ‘No, sir. It wasn’t. I wanted to have a word with you about DC MacBride actually.’

  ‘MacBride?’ Duguid furrowed his brow in a fine impression of a man confused. ‘What’s Harry Potter moaning about now?’

  Don’t rise to the bait. Count to ten. ‘Do you think that sets a good example, sir? Calling him names behind his back?’

  ‘Thought it was quite clever, really. What with that scar of his. Wish I’d come up with it myself.’

  ‘Really? You enjoy being called Dagwood behind your back do you, sir?’

  Duguid’s face reddened, a muscle ticking at his temple. ‘It’s just a name.’

  ‘No, it’s not. It’s a sign of disrespect. It’s officers thinking they know better than you and can go do what they please.’

  ‘They do that anyway. Names never hurt anyone, McLean. Surely you learned that in the playground of your posh private school.’

  And then some.

  ‘You’re missing the point, sir. It’s not just name-calling. MacBride’s being systematically bullied by a small faction in this station. Under your command. He’s trying to man up, as you might put it, trying to ignore them, but they’re persistent buggers. It’s affecting his work and if it doesn’t stop soon I’m worried he’ll quit. He’s too good an officer to lose.’

  Duguid stared up at McLean from his chair, mouth slightly agape at the outburst. All the redness had drained out of his skin, leaving him deathly pale.

  ‘For God’s sake, man. He’s a detective. Dealing with nasty shit is almost his entire job description. If he can’t take a little good-natured ribbing, maybe he’d be better off in a different job.’

  McLean said nothing. He wasn’t really sure there was anything he could say that wouldn’t get him in even deeper shit than he usually was. He’d tried. Sometimes that was the best you could do.

  39

  The Good Lord moves in mysterious ways, His wonders to perform.

  I’ve long since given up trying to second-guess my sight. His gift to me. Not everyone’s soul is visible on the outside, and even fewer are close to pure. What is purity, anyway? A strict adherence to the teachings of a discredited church? I don’t think so. Neither is it as simple as just being good. We all want to be good, after all. It’s just that we almost always fall too far short. Some, and they are precious few, strive for one thing above all else. They approach purity simply because they let all the normal distractions fall away, the wants and needs, the lusts and the thousand thousand petty desires. They have found a focus, and in that focus lies their redemption.

  But I don’t know when I will see them, or where. Sometimes months go by, years before one crosses my path. And sometimes they appear in quick succession. Almost as if they are being sent my way. Which, of course, they are. For is this not the Lord’s work that I do?

  Which is why I shouldn’t be surprised. But it’s been a long time since my sight brought to my attention someone I already know.

  I have watched him, of course. Studied him as he speaks and when he prays. Seen the people he associates with. They are lost causes, their souls dark almost to be invisible. I had thought him the same, but now I can see I was wrong. Or maybe he has changed, found that purity of purpose so few ever find. It doesn’t really matter. The sight has shown me; who am I to question it?

  He has faith, this one. It has been tested, but he still clings to it. Despite all he has seen, all he has read about, he still holds to those discredited old teachings. He is searching for a higher truth though, and he is certain, so certain, that he is close to it. That is his focus, I see it now. That will be his undoing.

  And his deliverance.

  40

  ‘Is that Detective Inspector McLean?’

  Late evening, and he really should have gone home a long time ago. McLean had been wading his way through a particularly badly written report, not helped by a complete inability to stop his mind from wandering. The telephone was a welcome distraction.

  ‘It is. Who’s speaking?’

  ‘Oh, yes. You won’t remember me. I’m from the forensic services. Amanda Parsons. Dr Cairns said I should call you.’

  McLean raised an eyebrow even though there was no one about to see it. ‘She did? Why?’

  ‘I’ve been running the DNA analysis on that … um … sample of yours. Not yours yours, obviously, but—’

  ‘Sample?’ McLean interrupted before the caller went off at a complete tangent. He couldn’t recall sending any samples off for DNA analysis, but his brain was full of too many other things.

  ‘The … the stool sample? Human excrement? From the bushes outside your house?’ The voice on the other end of the phone sounded young, no doubt a junior technician given the task no one else wanted. At least McLean remembered now. The man in the bushes at the end of his drive. Of course. And the young forensic scientist who had come in the wee small hours to collect it.

  ‘You’ve got a match?’ he asked, knowing it was never as easy as that.

  ‘Umm … no. Nothing on the database at all. A couple of close ones, but they didn’t work out when I ran the full analysis.’

  McLean stared sightlessly at the opposite wall of his office. It wasn’t very far away. ‘And you felt the need to call at this hour to let me know? Couldn’t it have gone in an email?’

  The technician didn’t reply immediately, the static silence on the phone making McLean feel bad for his outburst. If it had been an outburst.

  ‘Sorry, it’s been a long day,’ he said. ‘I take it there’s more?’

  ‘Yes, there is. See, there’s no match on the database, but, well, I get given a lot of … that’s to say—’

  ‘You get all the shit jobs, is that it?’ McLean couldn’t help but smile as he said it.

  ‘Exactly so. Shit, mucus, skin samples, semen. Christ, you wouldn’t believe what people leave behind at a crime scene.’

  ‘Trust me, Amanda. I would.’

  ‘I … Yes, I suppose you would. Sorry. I get a little distracted sometimes. But your sample. It wasn’t on the database, like I said. Would have written it up and emailed you the results, but something bothered me about it and I couldn’t work out what.’

  ‘I take it you did work it out though, eventually?’

  ‘Oh yes. Quite pleased with myself, really. You see, it wasn’t on the database, but I recognised the profile. Ran a couple of close matches, no joy. But then I remembered we’d had another shit sample in recently. Hadn’t got a match on that one either, and it hadn’t made it on to the database either. Ran the two side by side and bingo. A perfect match. Well, as close to perfect as you’ll get in this game. Whoever shat in your bushes did this one as well.’

  McLean found he had leaned forward, hunched over his desk with the phone clamped to his ear, interest finally piqued. ‘So where did this other sample come from, then?’

  ‘Nasty one, that. It was shoved through a letterbox down Leith Walk about a month back.’

  The drive home was quick, traffic light at what was really a very late hour to be still at work. McLean wondered what the young forensic scientist was doing at her lab, but it was always possible they had shifts to cope with the endless demands put on them. He’d have to thank Jemima Cairns the next time he saw her at a crime scene. Thank Amanda Parsons too.

  He hadn’t needed to ask any more details about the earlier sample. Leith Walk might be a mile long, but he couldn’t imagine that many letterboxes along its length having excrement shoved through them in the past month. He should probably have brought it up as part of the fire investigation, but that had barely started, and if he was being honest with himself he’d forgotten. With the Stevenson case at an advanced stage of g
oing nowhere, it was nice to have something he could get his teeth stuck into. A puzzle it might actually be possible to solve.

  A couple of cats scurried off the drive and into the bushes as he arrived home. Light spilled out from the kitchen window, and as he pushed his way in through the back door he could smell something spicy cooking.

  ‘I thought you were never coming home. It’s not healthy, you know. Working such long hours.’

  Madame Rose was back to her normal self. Face immaculately made up, hair arranged on top of her head in a greying bun, she had found an apron somewhere and was leaning over the Aga stirring a pot of something that bubbled and steamed. A couple of her cats were curled up at her feet, basking in the heat from the oven even though it wasn’t exactly cold outside. Mrs McCutcheon’s cat was nowhere to be seen.

  ‘I find it easier to get stuff done at night. Not so many people distracting me. I can actually get some thinking done.’

  ‘Well park your seat in a chair and get some eating done.’ Madame Rose pulled a plate out of the warming oven. It was already heaped with rice, and she ladled a hefty portion of something that looked suspiciously like chilli con carne on top before sliding the heavy load on to the table. ‘There’s grated cheese in the bowl, sour cream in that wee jug.’

  McLean noticed the two sitting in the middle of the scrubbed kitchen table, where Mrs McCutcheon’s cat usually slept during the day.

  ‘You don’t need to do this for me,’ he said, as the medium pushed the plate towards a place already laid out with cutlery.