Tooth for a Tooth (Di Gilchrist 3)

by Muir, T. F.

  ‘Names mean nothing to me now.’

  ‘Do you remember anything about them? Anything at all?’

  ‘That’s too far back for me to remember,’ Donnie said. ‘But I suppose I could check my records.’

  ‘Records?’

  ‘I used to keep the names and home addresses of every student who rented the place. It started out as a bit of fun,’ he added. ‘But I stopped about ten years ago. I felt like a dirty old man asking all these young students to sign my book.’ He gave out a chuckle that shuffled his shoulders. ‘But I always insisted on their phone numbers.’

  ‘Can I see it?’

  ‘If I can find it. It should be somewhere at home.’

  ‘Where’s that?’

  ‘Glasgow.’

  Gilchrist had hoped Donnie lived locally, but Glasgow was seventy miles south-west of St Andrews. He would have to wait for Donnie to mail it to him.

  ‘How long are you here for?’ he asked Donnie.

  ‘We’re up for a couple of days. My wife, Kathy, drives. Long drives are too much for me now. Besides,’ he said, eyes twinkling with a hint of mischief, ‘it’s nice to have a designated driver on hand. I don’t have to worry about reaching my limit.’ His shoulders shuffled again, and his grin revealed the even teeth of a dental plate.

  ‘Do you have anything planned for this evening?’ Gilchrist asked.

  ‘Drinking. Napping. Not necessarily in that order.’

  ‘Listen, Donnie, it might shed nothing on the investigation, but I’d like to have a look through these records of yours tonight, if possible.’

  Donnie frowned. ‘Tonight?’ he puzzled. ‘They’re in the attic somewhere. It’ll take me a day or two just to find them.’

  ‘If it’s not too much to ask,’ Gilchrist said, ‘I could have someone drive you home, get you started. If you’re lucky you could be back in St Andrews in time for me to buy you a couple in the Central. If I’m out and about, leave them at the office in North Street.’

  ‘Well,’ said Donnie, as if trying to warm to the idea. ‘I’ll see what I can do, but I’ll have to talk to Kathy, of course.’

  ‘Of course,’ said Gilchrist, ‘but before you do, can you show me the back bedroom?’

  ‘Follow me.’

  Gilchrist traipsed after Donnie, out of the living room, down a step, across a short hallway, up another step and through a low doorway that opened on to a room that had memories rampaging back at him.

  Little had changed. The room was small, rectangular in shape, with a large sash window that overlooked the back garden. He had stood by that opened window when Jack had lit that first cigarette for him. Tired curtains hung either side of venetian blinds half-opened in disarray. A single bed lined one wall, but not where Jack used to have it. A white wardrobe stood lopsided on the slanted floor. The wooden flooring, which had been covered by a threadbare oriental rug years earlier, now lay hidden beneath a footworn carpet that stretched from skirting board to skirting board.

  Gilchrist felt his hopes soar. ‘How long has this carpet been down?’

  Donnie frowned. ‘Now you’re asking. Ten, fifteen years, maybe. We don’t spend much on upkeep any more. Used to. But every year’s the same. Place wrecked and needing repainted from top to bottom.’ He shook his head. ‘My father would have skinned me alive if I’d done half of what these youngsters get up to nowadays.’

  Gilchrist eased the wardrobe door open to reveal blouses on hangers, folded sweaters, pressed jeans, scuffed boots on shelves. ‘Someone’s staying here?’

  ‘They’re away for the weekend.’

  ‘Perfect,’ said Gilchrist. ‘I’ll arrange for the SOCOs to complete their investigation before they return.’

  Doubt flickered behind the old man’s eyes.

  ‘That’s not a problem, is it?’ Gilchrist asked.

  ‘SOCOs?’

  ‘Scenes of Crime Officers. Forensic investigators. We’re investigating a suspected murder.’

  ‘Murder? Here? In this room?’

  Gilchrist did not want to tell Donnie that if nothing was found in this bedroom the team would extend their search to other rooms, take over the entire house if they had to, until they found evidence of Kelly’s murder, or not. ‘Now, about that guest book of yours . . .’

  ‘The less Kathy knows about this, the better,’ Donnie said. ‘I’ll talk to her later.’

  ‘Won’t she worry about where you’ll be?’

  ‘She’ll think I’m having a couple of drams,’ said Donnie, and wiped an arthritic hand over his mouth. ‘After what you’ve just told me, I could do with a double right now.’

  ‘How about later?’ Gilchrist said.

  Donnie glanced at his watch, as if to figure out how to pace himself.

  ‘And they’re on me,’ Gilchrist added. ‘All right?’

  That seemed to make up Donnie’s mind. ‘Let’s get on with it, then,’ he said, and trundled down the stairs as Gilchrist followed.

  Fifteen minutes later, Donnie was on his way to Glasgow, courtesy of Stan, and the SOCOs had the bedroom stripped of furniture, the carpet and underfelt rolled up and all of it carted through to the living room.

  Even after thirty-five years, the shadow of where the oriental rug used to lay still showed on the floorboards as a fresher stain. The floor had been varnished at some time in its past, not long before the rug had been placed, Gilchrist thought, but the flooring beneath the rug had retained some of its polished sheen.

  The SOCOs hung a thick sheet over the window. The room fell into darkness. They sprayed the floor with Luminol, a chemical that reacts with iron found in blood haemoglobin. It would not matter how old the blood was. If any blood was present, Luminol would glow in the dark.

  Gilchrist watched them work around the area of the invisible rug, all the while toying with the thought that they were looking in the wrong place. When the black light clicked on, nothing showed up.

  ‘Would it help if someone told you where the bed used to be?’ Gilchrist asked.

  Colin, the lead SOCO, looked at him. ‘You’ve been in this room?’

  ‘My brother used to rent it.’

  Colin seemed to liven. ‘Can you tell me where the bed was, exactly?’

  ‘Over there. By that wall.’ Which was closer to the door, and an image of Rita’s boyfriend bursting into the room and vomiting all over it burst into Gilchrist’s mind. Why else would the sheets be stripped? As he stared at where the bed once lay, an image of the murder weapon shimmered into view; Jack’s bedside lamp, an ugly metal thing that stood erect like a ship’s decanter, its base wide and round and blunt, perfect for crushing skulls—

  ‘And you think that whatever happened took place on the bed?’

  ‘That’s my first thought,’ he agreed.

  Silent, Gilchrist watched the SOCOs continue their search, spraying the floorboards where the bed used to sit, extending their investigation from one end of the room to the other.

  Again, the black light. Again, nothing.

  The room was spotless . . . like she’d scrubbed it clean.

  Back in the late sixties, forensic science was still in its relative infancy. Whoever tried to destroy evidence could never have known of the advances that would be made in the coming years. Or could they? Geoffrey Pennycuick with his knowledge of medicine jumped to the forefront.

  ‘Here’s something, sir.’

  Gilchrist kneeled on the floor. Colin pointed a gloved finger at a few smudged spots, glowing luminescent green on the wooden flooring.

  ‘It’s not a lot, sir.’

  ‘What do you think?’ Gilchrist tried.

  Colin shook his head. ‘Could have come from a cut foot. Maybe a nosebleed. How did you say she was killed?’

  ‘A blow to the side of the head, powerful enough to crush her skull.’

  ‘That would suggest more bleeding than this.’

  Gilchrist stood. He felt helpless, disappointed, so let down by his instincts that he wondered why he had e
ven thought of performing such an investigation.

  ‘Could it be the same bed, sir?’

  ‘Excuse me?’

  ‘I’m thinking of the mattress we moved. Could it be the same one?’

  Gilchrist felt a surge of annoyance. He had not asked Donnie. Was it possible, after all these years, that this was the same bed Jack and Kelly had slept in? Despite being a single bed, students made do with what they were given.

  ‘I shouldn’t think so,’ was all he could say.

  ‘We’ve nothing to lose, so let’s try it, shall we?’

  Rather than hang another sheet over the large window in the living room, the SOCOs carried the mattress back through to the darkness of the bedroom and rested it against the wall. When they sprayed Luminol over it, the black light picked up a mass of spots and stains. But Gilchrist could tell from their location that most were due to menstruation leaks, or breaking maidenheads. Nothing showed up at either end of the mattress, where he would have expected to find Kelly’s blood. Again, doubts seared his mind like shame.

  ‘Right,’ said Colin, ‘let’s try the other side.’ With a combined heave, they flipped the mattress over. Again, the middle of the mattress was an overwhelming mass of stains, but with none that would suggest anything more than a menstruation accident.

  Gilchrist felt deflated.

  As he watched the SOCOs manhandle the mattress and photograph the stains, he felt a lump swell in his throat. Had this old house, this bedroom, been the place where Kelly’s life had been taken, ended by a blow that had crushed her skull and spilled her lifeblood? Why had she been killed? What had happened? But more troubling was the question that kept resurfacing in his mind.

  Where had Jack been when Kelly was battered to death?

  At that question, a shiver as cold as an Arctic wind ran the length of his spine. The thought was almost inconceivable. But Gilchrist knew anything was possible. The cigarette lighter, Kelly’s disappearance, Jack’s emotional crash, his out-of-character mood swings and vocal ragings in the weeks before his hit-and-run accident – were all of these connected, somehow? Gilchrist had always believed that Jack had been pining for his lost American girlfriend. Now more crippling thoughts wormed to the fore. Had Jack killed Kelly? If he had, could he have lived with the burden of what he had done? Had Jack committed suicide by stepping in front of a speeding—

  ‘Sir?’

  ‘Yes?’

  ‘I was asking if you remembered which way the bed faced.’

  Gilchrist pointed to the wall opposite the door. If anyone rushed through that door and projectile-vomited, the bed would be the unlucky recipient. ‘This way,’ he said.

  ‘So the pillows would be at this end? About here?’

  Gilchrist nodded. ‘Give or take. Does it matter?’

  ‘Just a thought, sir. But if the mattress was turned this way, and her head was on the pillows, then the bloodiest stain would be closest to the wall.’ He kneeled on the floor and fingered the wallpaper where it overlapped the skirting board. ‘See here, sir?’

  Gilchrist kneeled beside him.

  ‘Several layers of wallpaper. See? No one does a proper wallpapering job any more. My old man used to strip the walls back to the plaster before papering. Then he’d rub them down and fill the cracks before sizing the walls. Nowadays, they just plaster new paper over old, which got me thinking, just how many layers could have been put up in thirty-five years?’

  He gripped the edge of the paper between thumb and forefinger, eased it from the skirting board, pulled it back to reveal a white layer underneath. He continued to scrape until he loosened another layer. Then he grunted. ‘Looks like there’s three layers. Could be one more. Maybe multiple coats of emulsion in between, depending on the damage left by the students. What do you think?’

  Gilchrist nodded. ‘It’s worth a try.’ He stepped back as the other two SOCOs brought the bed frame back into the room, laid the mattress on top and adjusted it as if readying to make the bed.

  Colin removed a pencil from his pocket and drew a rectangle on the wall, from just beyond the head of the bed to about three feet along its length, and four feet above the level of the mattress. Then he manhandled the bed away from the wall, pushing it into the middle of the room.

  ‘Right, Joe,’ he ordered. ‘Set it up.’

  One of the SOCOs spent the next two minutes setting up the camera on a tripod, and once done, pressed the shutter. The room flashed.

  ‘OK, here we go.’ Colin sprayed Luminol within the rectangle on the wall.

  Gilchrist counted a full minute before Colin clicked on the black light.

  Nothing.

  ‘Keep going,’ Colin said.

  The other SOCO stepped up to the wall with a pail of warm water, and painted over the rectangle with a pasting brush. Another minute passed before he looked at Colin for his nod of approval, ran the sharp edge of the scraper along the pencilled lines and eased the wallpaper back.

  ‘One layer at a time,’ Colin said.

  Gilchrist watched the top layer peel back to reveal white woodchip. Strips of the first layer remained, half-peeled slivers as drab as pith.

  ‘Joe?’

  The camera flashed once, twice.

  Colin pointed his arm to the wall and sprayed the woodchip with Luminol.

  After another minute, the black light revealed nothing.

  Silent, Gilchrist watched them peel back two more layers, until a series of luminescent spots glowed.

  ‘Well, well, well,’ Colin said, peering closer. ‘What have we here?’

  The room flashed as the camera clicked, then Joe unscrewed it from the tripod and moved closer, capturing the spatter pattern on the wall. In his mind’s eye, Gilchrist watched Kelly lying in bed facing the wall, defenceless, as the killer struck down at her, crushing the right side of her skull, spattering blood and brain matter on to the wall. And no matter how he tried, in his mind’s eye flickered an image of Jack in a rage.

  ‘Let’s try for some DNA,’ Colin said.

  ‘We should cut the lot out,’ Joe said, ‘and take it back to the lab.’

  ‘Let’s do that. But first shoot off some more, Joe. Make sure we’ve got it covered from all angles.’

  Gilchrist slipped from the room.

  In College Street, the air felt cold and damp, the wind fresh and lively. He breathed it in, felt its chill bring life back into his lungs. He walked towards Market Street and turned right. He had no destination in mind, no idea where he was walking to, knowing only that he was walking away from something, some terrible event in the past.

  Perhaps the scene of his brother’s murderous crime.

  CHAPTER 16

  Gilchrist was nearing the arches of the West Port when his fingers found Nance’s note.

  He unfolded it. At the top, in her neat printing, was MGB, and beneath, John Betson, followed by an address in Edinburgh, a phone number and a note that John Betson was the last recorded owner of the MGB GT that Fairclough had once owned.

  The call to Betson put Gilchrist through on the first ring. Without introducing himself, he said, ‘I understand you own an MGB GT.’ Betson paused long enough to make Gilchrist think he had lost the call. ‘Do you still have it?’ he tried.

  ‘You are joking, right?’

  Gilchrist frowned. ‘What’s so funny?’

  ‘Some other punter called me first thing this morning and asked if I still had the GT. I mean, I’ve had it for over twenty years, and in the same day I get two calls about it. Is that crazy, or what?’

  Excitement surged through Gilchrist. Had his surprise visit to Fairclough flushed him out? Was he now too late? ‘Have you sold it?’ he asked.

  ‘No. And that’s another funny thing,’ Betson said. ‘We talked money, but he sounded disinterested. Like he didn’t want to buy.’

  ‘Did you get his name?’

  ‘He hung up before I could ask.’

  It had to have been Fairclough, and for a moment he thought of telling
Betson that he was with Fife Constabulary. But Betson seemed so loose and ready with his words that he worried that doing so might clamp him up. Instead, he said, ‘Has anyone come round to have a look at it?’

  ‘I wouldn’t know. I’ve just got back.’

  A thought hit him. ‘Is it still there? The car, I mean. It’s not been stolen—’

  ‘Not a chance,’ Betson said. ‘It’s under six feet of rubbish in the garage. Tell you what, though, I could do with selling it at the moment. It’s up on blocks, and the engine’s filled with oil, so it should be spotless. Are you interested?’

  It occurred to Gilchrist that Fairclough might already be on his way over with a tow truck and a pile of cash that Betson could not resist. That could be Fairclough’s style. Which also meant that, after all these years, time might now be running out. ‘I might be,’ Gilchrist said. ‘Can I see it?’

  ‘Sure. But it’s buried in my garage.’

  Which should keep it safe and secure for a while longer. ‘Did the man who called earlier say anything that seemed odd? Did he say how he knew you had the car?’

  ‘No.’

  ‘Did he just ask if you had it, then hang up?’

  ‘He asked if it was roadworthy, and I told him it was in my garage.’

  ‘Then he hung up?’

  Betson paused, then said, ‘You know, come to think of it, he did ask one question I thought was odd.’

  Gilchrist pressed the phone hard against his ear.

  ‘He asked if I’d stripped the front end or changed the headlights.’

  The headlights? ‘Both of them?’

  ‘I assume that’s what he meant, yes.’

  Gilchrist stared off to the distance, to a bank of clouds as dark as his mood. An image of a body being thrown over a car like a stringless marionette hit his mind, the same image he had dreamed ever since entered brother’s death – always the same – Jack’s body tumbling and hitting the ground, to be left bleeding and dying.

  And the only damage to the car, a broken headlight. Or was it?

  ‘And had you?’ he asked.

  ‘No. There’s nothing wrong with the headlights. I’ve done nothing to the car since I bought it, except keep it clean and in storage. And when I told him that, he swore, which I thought was odd.’