Easy Kill

by Lin Anderson

  The sequence of photographs Janice indicated had definitely been taken in the Necropolis. John Knox must be turning in his grave at the fornication going on in full view of his monument.

  ‘I want Forbes and Irvine back in. See what they have to say.’

  Magnus had predicted that the killer worked alone, but there were always sick-minded disciples lurking in the shadows of killers they admired. If Forbes and Irvine were hanging about the same playground, maybe they knew more than they’d said.

  When his mobile rang Bill thought it was McNab with an update from the culvert, but it was Daniel Bradley, sounding flustered.

  ‘I’m sorry. I don’t seem to have contact details for Mr Gordon. As far as I recall he was a member of the yachting club. You could try the commodore. He might be able to help.’

  Bill thanked him and rang off. He knew McNab and Rhona had visited the Rhu yard and requested a membership list from the commodore. Bill tried McNab’s mobile again. This time he answered.

  ‘We’re out of the culvert. Water level’s too high to check any further.’

  Bill heard the disappointment in McNab’s voice. They’d obviously found nothing. Bill told him the latest news on Mark Gordon. ‘He should be on the membership list the commodore emailed through.’

  McNab perked up. ‘I’ll be with you in five minutes.’

  ‘There’s no Mark Gordon on this.’ McNab threw the hard copy on his desk and went back to the screen. He made sure the list was in alphabetical order and checked again. ‘Bastard!’

  ‘He’s on to us,’ Bill said.

  ‘Maybe he got a whiff of our visit to the marina. Or saw us there.’

  Bradley had seemed nervous during Bill’s phone call. He’d put it down to a natural fear of the police.

  ‘I’ll go down. Check this out,’ McNab offered.

  ‘Take the mug shot of Williams. See if Bradley recognises him.’

  ‘I can feel him. We’re close. So close.’

  ‘If he thinks we’re near, he could run.’

  ‘Leave the country?’

  McNab was right. If Williams, Henderson and Gordon were the same man, he might even now be on his way across the Atlantic on his American passport.

  ‘Take Rhona with you. Get her to look at the yacht Bradley mentioned. If we can match the flake found in the grave …’

  ‘I’ll pick her up on my way.’

  Bill took a look at Williams’s photograph. The quality was so poor he could have been any middle-aged man. Stopping people at airports wasn’t as simple as it sounded. Williams could be travelling on one of three different passports. And he didn’t necessarily look like this in any of them. He only needed to have his hair cut differently, or change the way he dressed. Passport photographs were notoriously unreliable. They could be ten years out of date for a start, hence the move to a biometric version.

  Bill stared at the photograph. Just like McNab, his sense of being near the killer was strong. The puzzle was coming together. The myriad of tiny threads weaving the web with which they’d catch him. And Father Duffy was one thread.

  The priest was in an interview room, a full mug of tea cooling in front of him. His face shone with perspiration.

  ‘When can I go?’ He licked cracked lips.

  ‘Just a few more questions.’

  Bill produced the whisky and a glass. Drying out the priest wasn’t his job. A sudden absence of alcohol could kill an alcoholic. Bill didn’t want Duffy collapsing while in custody. He handed him the glass. The priest looked at it and shook his head.

  ‘You’ll need help to dry out.’

  ‘I’ve managed in the past. God will help.’

  ‘Maybe you weren’t as bad those times.’

  Relenting, Father Duffy took the glass, observed the whisky for a moment, then swallowed it as though it were poison. Bill waited for it to hit the bloodstream.

  ‘This guy from the past you recognised?’

  ‘It’s him in the photo.’

  ‘You’re sure?’

  ‘I’m sure.’

  ‘Tell me about him.’

  The priest held out the glass for a refill, resistance melting like snow off a dyke.

  ‘I met him in Bradford about five years ago. He came to confession. Told me he knew what I needed and wanted and he could make it easier for me.’

  ‘How did he know?’

  ‘I was taking chances.’ Father Duffy paused. ‘When I came to Glasgow, I thought I’d seen the back of him.’

  ‘But he turned up?’

  ‘July last year. I didn’t recognise him at first. Then he asked for confession. And it began again.’

  ‘How?’

  ‘He brought women to the chapel house. I paid. Sometimes he watched. Sometimes he took photos.’ He looked sickened by what he was saying. ‘I told him I didn’t want to do it any more. He threatened to send the photos to the bishop. Every day I prayed to God he would leave me alone. And then he disappeared.’

  ‘When was that exactly?’

  ‘September or October.’

  ‘And he reappeared when?’

  ‘Only once, last Sunday evening.’ Father Duffy looked as though he wanted Bill to tell him it was all a bad dream. ‘He must have seen me bring Leanne to the chapel house on Saturday night. On Sunday, I gave him her number.’ Father Duffy avoided meeting Bill’s eye. ‘I’m sorry. I’ve put Leanne in danger, haven’t I?’

  Bill tried to remember that the priest had helped Leanne pay off Minty. That he’d come here of his own accord, knowing when he spoke out it would be the end of his priesthood. Duffy wasn’t an evil man. Just a bad priest.

  59

  MCNAB TRIED RHONA’S mobile on his way to the car and got no reply. When he rang the lab Chrissy answered.

  ‘I thought she was with you, strolling down the Molendinar.’

  ‘I left there over an hour ago. She’s not been in touch?’

  ‘Nope.’

  The uncomfortable thought that she might have gone back into the culvert crossed McNab’s mind. Surely even headstrong Rhona MacLeod wouldn’t be that stupid … but then, it wouldn’t be the first time her curiosity had put her in danger. For now, he had to assume she’d let common sense prevail.

  ‘I’m headed for Rhu Marina. Looks like we found the yacht. Bill wants Rhona to take a look.’

  ‘I could come …?’ Chrissy sounded cautious.

  ‘Okay,’ McNab answered with equal wariness. ‘I’ll pick you up.’

  McNab had never known Chrissy so quiet. He’d expected the usual acerbic wit known to shrivel a cock at a hundred yards. Even the look she’d given him as he drew up outside the lab, hadn’t included the usual daggers. Ever since he’d become obsessed with Rhona – McNab had finally admitted it to himself – Chrissy had been his number one enemy. This new mellow Chrissy, sitting next to him, was something else. He was wondering what sea-change had occurred, when Chrissy broke the silence.

  ‘I’m pregnant.’

  Chrissy’s blunt announcement took McNab’s mind off the road, generating a horn blast from the Audi behind.

  ‘And I’d like to stay alive long enough to have my baby.’

  McNab gave the finger to the guy in the Audi, who’d just realised to his consternation that he’d honked his horn at a police car.

  ‘Sorry, but it was a bit of a surprise.’

  ‘That’s what fucking does, makes babies. Men like to forget that.’

  McNab held his tongue on that one, and tried to work out who the father might be. Chrissy had been seeing that bloke, Sam Haruna, during the Nigerian case. McNab did a quick calculation and decided it had to be Sam.

  ‘You’re keeping it, then?’ He made his voice neutral.

  ‘It’s not a dress I brought home to try on.’

  McNab suddenly remembered the scene in the Necropolis when he’d suggested Chrissy was putting on weight. How Rhona had changed the subject and removed him from the scene.

  ‘Who else knows?’

 
; ‘I figured once I told you, everyone.’

  ‘I won’t mention it, if you don’t want me to.’

  ‘I don’t give a fuck what you do.’

  McNab decided Chrissy was either very brave or very foolish. Haruna was on the run from the law and the entire Suleiman tribe. Hardly a stay-at-home, financially supportive father. Chrissy was about to enter the world of the one-parent family. The single mothers’ society the Daily Mail liked to blame for the world’s ills.

  ‘My mum had me on her own.’ McNab surprised himself by saying it. It wasn’t something he normally broadcast.

  ‘And look how you turned out.’ Her tone was sharp, but the look Chrissy gave him was conciliatory.

  Daniel Bradley was one nervous man, but McNab was used to honest citizens taking fright when faced with an enquiry from the law. Bradley had brought up the database on the screen and was doing a search with trembling hands.

  ‘Look. He’s not there. He should be under the “G”s.’

  There was no ‘Gordon’.

  ‘Who put him on the system?’

  ‘I did it myself, when he booked yard space to work on his boat.’

  ‘Could Gordon have had access to the database himself?’

  Bradley looked suitably affronted. ‘The office is strictly off limits to anyone except staff.’

  McNab brought out the Atlantic City photograph.

  ‘Is this Gordon?’

  Mr Bradley took a quick glance and shook his head.

  ‘It’s not him?’

  Bradley avoided looking again. ‘No, that’s not him.’ A nerve twitched at the corner of his mouth.

  McNab decided to go for the jugular.

  ‘Mr Gordon is wanted in connection with the Necropolis murders.’

  All the blood drained from Bradley’s face. If he hadn’t been sitting, he’d have fallen down.

  ‘Murder. I thought …’

  ‘You thought what?’

  Bradley chewed on his lip.

  ‘This is very serious. I shouldn’t have to remind you …’

  ‘He gave me photographs,’ Bradley mumbled, ‘and some DVDs.’

  ‘Porn?’

  Bradley nodded.

  ‘You wiped his name from the system?’

  ‘I thought it was about the photographs. I didn’t want to get involved.’

  McNab indicated the picture again. ‘Take a good look. Is that Mark Gordon?’

  This time Bradley did look. ‘It might be.’

  ‘What do you mean, might be?’ McNab’s tone was icy.

  ‘I told you, I don’t want to get involved. I’ve got a wife and two kids.’

  ‘And pornographic material from a murder suspect.’

  Bradley’s face went white.

  McNab was getting pissed off. ‘Protecting the identity of a murder suspect …’

  ‘Okay. Okay. The photo could be Gordon, but he looks different now.’

  ‘How different?’

  ‘He’s smarter dressed and his hair’s shorter.’

  McNab went in search of Chrissy and found her suited figure at the hull of a wooden yacht.

  ‘This the one?’

  She lowered her mask. ‘It is.’

  McNab admired the sleek lines.

  ‘Got what you need?’

  Chrissy nodded. ‘Enough to be going on with. How about you?’

  ‘The photo is Mark Gordon, even if he has changed his hair style.’

  ‘So where is he?’

  ‘Bradley wiped his file, or thought he did. Seems Gordon was supplying him with porn and Bradley took fright at our interest. I’m taking the computer to Tech. Let’s hope Gordon gave a valid contact address when he joined the yacht club.’

  ‘And if he didn’t?’

  ‘We’re no nearer picking him up.’

  60

  ‘NO LUCK IN locating either Irvine or Forbes,’ said Janice. ‘Lothian and Borders are watching Forbes’ work and home. Apparently he hasn’t been seen in either place for the last couple of days.’

  ‘And Irvine?’ Bill asked.

  ‘According to a neighbour, he’s gone on holiday. At least that’s what he told her.’

  ‘Where?’

  ‘Somewhere hot and sunny, away from the rain.’

  ‘They know we’re on to them.’

  ‘Looks like it, sir.’

  The leads were shutting down as quickly as they opened up. McNab had already called in from Rhu Marina with the Bradley story. He was on his way back with the confiscated computer from the repair yard, and the one holding the yacht club members’ list. The CCU would have no problem recovering Gordon’s deleted details, but there was no guarantee he’d given a true address and phone number anyway. Chrissy had taken some samples from the yacht and a team would descend on it tomorrow. McNab had voiced his concern about Rhona’s whereabouts during the call.

  ‘Chrissy checked with the lab,’ McNab had told Bill. ‘Rhona’s not there and her mobile’s switching to voicemail.’

  It was after six. Rhona might have gone home or to the Jazz Club. Bill decided to check both places before he panicked. There was no answer from her flat, so he rang the club. The barman answered and immediately handed Bill over to Sean.

  ‘What’s wrong?’

  ‘Nothing, so far. I wanted to check up on Rhona. Is she with you?’

  ‘I haven’t seen her since she left for work this morning.’

  ‘Okay, I’ll put a call out for her car. She was at the cathedral with DS McNab earlier on, but no one’s spoken to her since.’

  ‘She showed me the photo on her mobile. If that bastard Magnus harms her …’

  Bill cut him off. ‘We have no reason to believe she’s in any danger. And certainly not from Magnus.’

  ‘That’s what she said last night. I didn’t believe her then and I don’t believe you now.’

  Superintendent Sutherland was incandescent with rage.

  ‘Why wasn’t I shown this before?’

  ‘Rhona received it by phone late last night. I haven’t been able to get hold of you until now.’

  ‘The girl’s alive in this.’

  ‘Yes, but it could have been taken up to twenty-four hours ago. CCU believe that’s an underground stream in the background. McNab and Rhona were checking the Molendinar culvert this afternoon, but eventually had to abandon because of high water levels. The council is identifying points of access, but according to them, there could be buried manholes under a number of buildings, predominantly north of the Necropolis.’ Bill didn’t add that it was like potholing without a map during a flood.

  ‘You checked the phone’s location?’

  ‘It was definitely Magnus’s phone, and came from the Glasgow Green area. The mobile hasn’t been used since.’

  ‘Who else knows about it?’

  ‘Myself, McNab and Rhona.’ Bill decided not to mention Sean.

  ‘Keep it like that until we find Professor Pirie and hear his explanation.’

  Bill didn’t believe for a moment that Sutherland thought finding Magnus was a forgone conclusion. The Super had ordered Magnus not to involve himself with the online auction, but Magnus had chosen to ignore the command and made contact with the killer, with some stupid notion he could play him at his own game. Bill didn’t like to have his theories on involving Magnus proved right. But textbook psychology wasn’t real life – you couldn’t understand a killer’s mind just because you’d read the right books. Solid policing was the only way to catch him. Solid policing, forensics and luck.

  Bill outlined the developments on Mark Gordon. The prospect of a suspect went some way to mollifying Sutherland. The Super would have questions to answer on this one, just like Bill.

  ‘He’s the one?’

  ‘Looks like it.’

  Sutherland allowed himself a nod of approbation.

  An hour later, the report came in that Rhona’s car had been located in Duke Street, not far from where Cathy’s body had been discovered. There had been no s
ign of Rhona.

  ‘A CSO came into the main culvert from the east, close to where we found Cathy,’ McNab said.

  ‘A CSO?’

  ‘Combined sewer outlet. Where the sewer overflows into the burn, if its capacity is reached. Rhona took a look but it was encrusted and impossible to search. She thought the injuries on Cathy’s body might have been caused by the encrustation.’

  ‘Rhona wouldn’t have gone back in alone?’

  ‘I wouldn’t have thought so. Not without proper equipment.’

  McNab’s expression didn’t mirror his words. Rhona’s car had been found near the culvert. If she wasn’t planning another look, why would she go back there?

  Bill went to the wall map. The route of the underground burn had been highlighted in blue, running from west to east, north of Alexandra Parade. Culvert 5A was tucked in the triangle between Millbank Street and the Parade. Then a big gap before manhole 6, where the Parade met Wishart Street. The council hadn’t been able to locate any manholes between 5A and 6 and thought they were probably buried under buildings or covered by tar.

  After 6 the burn ran southwards under Wishart Street, west of the Necropolis, the line of manholes down the centre of the road. Then the manhole McNab and Rhona had used, near the boundary of the Necropolis. That was believed to be the last one before the burn emerged above ground. But was it?

  Minty had said he left Cathy standing outside the Great Eastern. They had forensic evidence to show she’d been in Cardross, but her killer had brought her back to Glasgow. They’d searched the Great Eastern and found nothing. Rhona had been concerned about the CSO coming from the east, the direction of the old hotel. What if they had missed something in the building, like an opening on the culvert? The hotel had been an old cotton mill in the time when the burn was used to supply a variety of works. It would be logical to assume it had some access to the water. Maybe Rhona went in there to take a look for herself?

  ‘Okay. We hit the Great Eastern again,’ Bill told McNab. ‘This time we make sure there’s no access to the culvert from the basement.’

  61

  HE’D TOLD HER she would be dead soon, but she wasn’t dead yet.

  Rhona dragged herself into a sitting position, feeling the ground wet beneath her and knowing it was blood from the sharp, metallic smell. She felt the chilly weight of manacles and followed their chains to the wall. Someone had already died in this place. Trussed up and tortured.