Payne had been working on the chief constable’s forward engagement diary. He closed it and crossed swiftly to the door. ‘Where are we going?’ he asked, then reacted with surprise as he saw Houseman for the first time.
Skinner did the introductions on his way to the lift. ‘Clyde’s come in with some new information,’ he added. ‘He’s found the vehicle Smit and Botha were using yesterday. Well, that’s to say, we know where it might be.’
‘Should we call Lottie?’ the DCI asked.
‘Yes, we should, but we won’t until we’ve got something to tell her.’
They rode the lift down to the sub-level that accessed the police headquarters park, then took Payne’s car, which he had left in the space allocated to the deputy chief. The journey along Sauchiehall Street and Renfrew Street to the Buchanan Street bus station took only two minutes, five less than it might have on a weekday. Skinner smiled as they passed the McLellan Galleries, his mind going back thirty years to a visit to an art exhibition, in a foursome with Louise Bankier and a couple of their fellow students, when he had spotted, on the other side of the big room, Myra, his fiancée, with a spotty guy he had never seen before. They were heading for the exit, hand in hand, with eyes only for each other. He never had found out who the bloke was, but it had never occurred to him to ask. He had been too wrapped up in his own guilt over Louise; indeed the close encounter had been the beginning of the end of that relationship.
He was still dwelling on the past as they approached their destination. In case his daydream had been noticed, he took out the Drivall car key and made a show of peering at the number written on the fob, until he gave up and handed it to Houseman, and his younger eyes.
‘We’re looking for a Peugeot,’ he announced, after the briefest study, ‘registration LX12 PMP. Doesn’t say what colour it is.’
Payne ignored the official entry point and drove to the office instead. The way was blocked by a barrier. A staff member, in a Day-Glo jacket, came out to meet them. The DCI showed his warrant card, and the parking ticket that Skinner had handed to him. ‘That one of yours?’ he asked.
The attendant studied it. ‘Aye,’ he confirmed. ‘It’s dated yesterday afternoon. Left overnight, eh, and no’ picked up yet. Stolen car? There’s nae TV in here so we get them.’
‘Not necessarily, but we need to find it. Is the park busy?’
‘Jam packed, but go on in.’ He pushed a button at the side of the barrier, and it rose.
‘Okay. Two ways of doing this,’ the chief declared. ‘We either drive through very slowly, and hope we get lucky, or we do the sensible thing and split it. Lowell, drop me on level two, Clyde on four and you go to the top and park. We work our way down till we find it. You’ve both got my work mobile number, and I’ve got yours; either of you find the car, you call me and I’ll alert the other.’
Payne did as he was instructed. As each of them reached his starting point, he realised that the multi-storey was spilt into sub-levels, making it bigger than it had looked from the outside. They searched their separate areas as quickly as they could but nonetheless almost fifteen minutes had passed before Skinner’s mobile rang. By that time he was at ground level.
His screen told him that it was Houseman who had made the discovery. ‘I’m on level five,’ the spook said. ‘At the side, overlooking the street.’
‘Good spot. Be with you in a minute; I’ll tell Lowell.’
‘There’s no need. The way this place is built he can see me from where he is.’
Skinner took the stairs, two at a time. As he stepped out on to level five he saw Payne, on his left, coming towards him down a ramp.
The Peugeot was a big saloon model, in a dark blue colour. Skinner took the key from his pocket and worked out by trial and error which button unlocked it. Houseman was in the act of reaching for the driver’s door handle when Payne called out to him.
‘No, not without gloves.’ He smiled. ‘Sorry,’ he said. ‘It’s a CID reflex.’
‘Understood,’ the MI5 man conceded. He took a handkerchief from his pocket and used it to open the door.
Skinner stepped up behind him and looked inside, then slotted the key in to light up the dashboard. ‘Satnav,’ he said.
‘So?’ Houseman murmured.
‘With a bit of luck they’ll have used it. With even more, they won’t have deleted previous entries. When did they collect the uniforms and equipment? Where? That may give us a clue.’
‘Mmm.’
‘And if they did pick up the gear from an inside source, he may have left us a print, or a DNA trace.’
‘That’s if he’s on the database,’ Payne pointed out. ‘If he is inside, how likely is that?’
‘Come on, Lowell,’ Skinner chided. ‘Think positive.’ He glanced into the back of the car, saw it was empty, then withdrew the key and closed the driver’s door, leaning on it with an elbow. Moving round to the back of the vehicle, which had been left perilously close to the wall of the building, he pushed a third button on the remote. There was a muffled sound and the boot lid sprang open.
‘Jesus Christ!’ the DCI yelled, jumping backwards in alarm and astonishment.
His companions stood their ground, gazing into the luggage compartment.
‘Surprisingly capacious, these things,’ the chief constable murmured, ‘aren’t they, Clyde? You’d get at least two sets of golf clubs in there, no problem. Maybe two trolleys as well.’
‘Beyond a doubt.’
Two medium-sized blue suitcases lay on their sides, at the front of the boot, but there had still been more than enough room for the rest of the load to be jammed in behind them: the body of a man, knees drawn up and his arms wrapped around them. The eyes were open, staring, and there was a cluster of three holes in the centre of his chest.
‘So, chum,’ Skinner wondered. ‘Who the hell were you, and why did you wind up here?’
Sixteen
‘That’s Bazza Brown,’ DS Dan Provan announced.
Lottie Mann frowned. ‘Are you sure?’
‘Trust me. Real name Basil, but nobody ever called him that, unless they wanted a sore face. The first time Ah lifted him he was sixteen, sellin’ what he claimed were LSD tabs on squares from a school jotter. They wis just melted sugar, but nobody ever complained; he wis a hard kid even then, and he had a gang.’
‘When was that?’ Skinner asked. He had never met the wizened little detective before but he found himself taking an instant liking to him, and to his irreverence.
‘Goin’ on twenty-five years ago, sir. He moved on frae there, though. The next time I picked him up he’d just turned twenty-one and he was sellin’ hash. He got three years for that, in the University of Barlinnie, and that, you might say, completed his formal education. He’s never done a day’s time since, even though he’s reckoned . . . sorry, he was reckoned . . . to be one of the big three in drugs in Glasgow.’
‘So how come he wound up in a car boot sale?’
‘Ah can’t tell you that, sir. But Ah know you’re going to want us to find out.’
The chief grinned. ‘That is indeed the name of the game, Sergeant.’
He and Payne had called in Mann and her squad at once. They had left the car untouched. Indeed the only change in the scenery since they had made their discovery lay in the absence of Clyde Houseman. Skinner had decided that it would be best if he made himself scarce.
He had expected Lottie Mann to be blunt when she arrived, and had been ready for her challenge.
‘Can I ask what the fuck you’re doing here, sir? I’ve got people out showing pictures of Smit and Botha to every car park attendant in Glasgow, and what do I find? You and DCI Payne, with their bloody car key!’
‘Inspector!’ Lowell Payne had intervened, but his new chief had calmed his protest with a wave of his hand.
‘It’s okay. DI Mann is well entitled to sound off. I was given some information, Lottie, and I decided to evaluate it myself, and to bring you in if I reckoned it was w
orth it. Get used to me: it’s the way I am.’
‘Oh, I know that already, sir,’ she retorted. ‘Just like I know there’s no point me asking who your source was.’
‘That’s right, but now the result is all yours.’
She had given one of her hard-earned smiles, then gone into action.
The photographer and video cameraman were finishing their work as Provan announced the identity of the victim and he and Skinner had their exchange. They had been hampered slightly by a silver Toyota parked in the bay on the right, but the two to the left were clear.
As they packed their equipment, the elevator door opened, beside the stairway exit, and a woman stepped out, pushing a child in a collapsible pram with John Lewis bags hung on the back. She frowned as she moved towards them. ‘What’s going . . .’ she began.
Payne moved quickly across to intercept her, holding up his warrant card. ‘Police, ma’am. Is that your Toyota?’
‘Yes, but what . . . It’s not damaged, is it? I can move it, can’t I?’
‘It’s fine, but please don’t come any closer. If you give me your car key I’ll bring it out for you.’
‘It’s not a bomb, is it?’ The young mother was terrified; Payne smiled to reassure her.
‘No, no, not at all. If it was I wouldn’t be within a mile of it myself. It’s just a suspicious vehicle, that’s all. We’re checking out the contents. You just give me your keys and don’t you worry.’
He reversed the Toyota out of its bay and drove it a little way down the exit ramp, then helped her load her bags and her child, who had slept through the exchange.
‘Did she see anything?’ Mann asked the DCI as he returned.
‘No, or you’d have heard the screams. But we need to get a screen round this, now we’ve got the room.’
‘It’s on the way, with the forensic people. We’d better not touch anything till they get here. That peppery wee bastard Dorward’s on weekend duty and he’ll never let me forget it if I compromise “his” crime scene.’
‘It’s well compromised already, Lottie,’ Skinner pointed out. ‘Anyone got a pair of gloves?’ he asked. ‘I want a look at these suitcases. I’ll handle Arthur’s flak. I’ve been doing it for long enough.’
Provan handed him a pair of latex gloves. He slipped them on and lifted one of the blue cases from the boot, laid it on the ground and tried the catches, hoping they were unlocked and smiling when they clicked open.
‘Clothing,’ he announced as he studied the contents, and sifted through them. ‘It looks like two changes: trousers, shirt, underwear, just the one jacket, though, and one pair of shoes. Everything’s brand new, Marks and Spencer labels still on them. Summer wear. Mmm,’ he mused. ‘What’s the weather like in South Africa in July?’
There was a zipped pocket set in the lid of the case, which also sported a Marks and Spencer label on its lining. He unfastened it, felt inside and found a padded envelope. It was unsealed; the contents slid into his hand.
‘Wallet,’ he said. ‘Looks like at least three hundred quid. One Visa debit card in the name of Bryan Lightbody. A passport, New Zealand, in the same name, but with Gerry Botha’s photo inside. Flight tickets and itinerary, Singapore Air, Heathrow to Auckland through Singapore, business class, departure tomorrow evening.’
He lifted the second case from the car and checked its contents. ‘An Australian passport,’ he announced when he was finished. ‘It and the bank card are in the name of Richie Mallett, and the flight ticket’s Quantas to Sydney, again Heathrow tomorrow night. So that was the game plan. Drive to London, fly away home and leave us scratching our arses as we try to find them on flights out of Scotland.’
‘Well planned,’ Lottie Mann observed.
‘Yes, but that’s not what these guys did. The man Cohen was the planner. He made all the arrangements, bought the air tickets, hired the car.’
‘The car,’ she repeated, then turned to Provan. ‘Get . . .’
‘Ah’m on it already,’ he retorted, waving the car key with his left hand while holding his mobile to his ear. ‘Yes,’ he said, ‘that’s right, Strathclyde CID. I’m standing over one o’ your cars just now, and Ah need to know whose name is on the rental contract.’ He paused, listening.
‘Because there’s something wrong wi’ it, that’s why.’ He waited again.
‘Maybe there wasn’t when it left you, Jimmy, but there is now. There’s a fuckin’ body in the boot. Or dae all your vehicles come with that accessory? No, Ah won’t hold on. The registration’s LX12 PMP; you get me the information Ah want and get back to me through the force main switchboard. They’ll transfer your call to my mobile. Pronto, please, this is very important.’
As Provan finished, Skinner tapped him on the shoulder. ‘Have you ever done a course,’ he asked, ‘on communication with the public?’
The sergeant pursed his lips, wrinkling his two-tone moustache in the process, and looked up at him. ‘No, sir, I can’t say that Ah have.’
‘Then I will make it my business, Detective Sergeant,’ the chief told him, without the suggestion of a smile, ‘to see that you never do.’
‘Thanks, gaffer,’ the little DS replied, ‘but even if you did send me on one, at my age I wake up sometimes wi’ this terrible hacking cough. Knocks me right off for the day, it does.’
Skinner laughed out loud. ‘I could get to like it here,’ he exclaimed. Then he turned serious. ‘Now prove to me that you’re a detective, not some fucking hobbit who’s tolerated because he’s been around for ever. There’s a begged question in this scenario. I’m not wondering about the guy in the boot. You knew who he was, and I know what he was. No, it’s something else, unrelated. What is it?’
As Dan Provan looked up at his new boss, two thoughts entered his mind. The first of them was financial. He had over thirty years in the job, and his pension was secure as long as he didn’t punch the chief constable in the mouth, and since that struck him as being a seriously stupid overreaction, it wasn’t going to happen. So the ‘daft laddie’ option was open to him, without risk.
But the second was professional, and pride was involved. He had survived as long as he had because he was, in fact, a damn good detective, and as such he was expert in analysing every scenario and in identifying all the possible lines of inquiry that it offered.
A third consideration followed. Skinner hadn’t asked him the question to embarrass him, but because he expected him to know the answer.
He frowned and bent his mind to recalling as much as he could of what had been said in the previous half hour. He played the mental tape, piece by piece, then ran through it again.
‘It’s the flights,’ he said, when he was sure. ‘The two dead guys had plane tickets out of Heathrow. Yes?’
‘Yes.’
‘Right. Now if everything had gone to plan, the two hit men, Smit and Botha, or Lightbody and Mallett, or Randall and fuckin’ Hopkirk deceased, whoever they were, if it had all gone to plan, they’d have driven straight out of this car park, almost before the alarm had been raised, headed straight down to London, dumping our friend Bazza in some lay-by along the way, and got on a fuckin’ plane. Right, boss?’
Skinner nodded. ‘You’re on a roll, Sergeant, carry on.’
‘Thank you, gaffer. In that case, even as we’re stood here, they could have been sipping fuckin’ cocktails in business class. Except . . . their flights were booked for Monday, for tomorrow. So what were they supposed to be doin’ in those spare twenty-four hours?’
The chief constable smiled. ‘Absolutely. Top question. You got an answer for that one?’
Provan shrugged, ‘No idea, sir.’ He nodded towards the boot of the Peugeot. ‘But if we find out what they were doing with poor old Bazza Brown there, maybe that’ll give us a clue.’
Seventeen
‘He’s a marginally insubordinate little joker, but I do like him,’ Bob chuckled. ‘He and that DI, Lottie, they’re some team.’
Sarah smiled across
the table, on which the last of their dinner plates lay, empty save for the skeletons of two lemon sole. She raised her coffee cup. ‘Could it be that Glasgow isn’t the cultural wasteland you thought it was?’
‘Hey, come on,’ he protested. ‘I never said that, or even thought it. I’m from Motherwell, remember; I’m not quite a Weegie myself, but close. I have a Glasgow degree; I spent a good chunk of my teens in that fair city. West of Scotland culture is in my blood. Why do you think I like country music and bad stand-up comedians?’
‘So part of you is glad to be back there,’ she suggested.
‘Sure, the nostalgic part.’
‘Then why did you ever leave?’ she asked in her light American drawl. ‘Myra was from Motherwell as well and yet the two of you upped sticks and moved through to Gullane in your early twenties.’
‘You know why; I’ve told you often enough. I liked Edinburgh, and I liked the seaside. I wanted to work in one and live by the other. I’ve never regretted that decision either, not once.’
‘But what made you choose it over Glasgow? I can see you, man, and your pleasure now at being back there. There must have been an underlying reason.’
He leaned back in his chair and gazed at her. ‘Very well,’ he conceded. ‘There was. I didn’t like being asked what school I went to.’
‘Uh?’ she grunted. ‘Come again? What’s that got to do with anything?’
His laugh was gentle, amused. ‘You’ve lived in Scotland for how long? Twelve years on and off, and you don’t know that one? It’s code, and what it actually means is, “Are you Protestant or are you Catholic?” Where I grew up that was a key question, just as much as in Belfast, and for all Aileen and her kind might try to deny it, I’m sure it still is in some places and to some people. The answer could determine many things, not least your employment prospects.
‘Why the school question? Because through there, education was organised along religious lines; there were Roman Catholic schools and non-denominational, the latter being in name only. They were where the Protestants went. So, your school defined you, and it could mean that some doors were just slammed in your face.’
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