by Ken McClure
‘I was brought up watching films where strong circumstantial evidence was nearly always proved wrong in the end. Circumstantial was a dirty word.’
‘Maybe in films,’ said Karen. ‘But in life it’s different. If it looks like a rat and it smells like a rat, it almost invariably turns out to be, a rat.’
Dewar called Malloy, only to be told that Malloy had run the same checks on Hannan that he had on Kelly and again drawn a blank. There was no obvious link between Hannan and the institute either. A final call to Barron confirmed that there had been no change in the position with the Iraqis. Abbas and Siddiqui were still there and they were still just waiting.
‘Just like us,’ Dewar whispered to himself as he put down the phone and crossed to the window. ‘For that damned vaccine to come.’
There was a red glow in the sky to the west. He thought at first it was down to street lighting — the ‘light pollution’ from cities that astronomers complained so much about but then he decided its source was more sinister. He went downstairs and asked the Scottish Office people in the communications room.
‘They’re rioting in Muirhouse,’ said the one liasing with the police operations room at Fettes Headquarters. ‘Situation’s getting out of hand. Three major fires and they won’t let the fire brigade get near them.’
Dewar listened in to the radio traffic for a few minutes before deciding to drive up to police headquarters to see if Grant were there. He found him in his office, eating cheese and pickle sandwiches and monitoring the situation on police radio. His feet were up on his desk. He waved a welcome with his sandwich and indicated to a chair.
‘What d’you think?’ asked Dewar.
‘The commancheros are coming,’ replied Grant between mouthfuls. ‘See the glow in the sky? That’s Tulloch’s career going up in flames. Live by the book, die by the book.’
‘You don’t think he’ll contain it?’
‘Not a chance now the yobs have scented power. He thought he could out-manoeuvre them, show them who’s boss but they know what they’re doing. Look here.’ He got up out of his chair and approached the map on his office wall. They started fires here, here and here. Grant used his forefinger, leaving three greasy prints on the plastic. They set fire to cars in the middle of the road, stopping police access, then they set fire to this building.’ Another greasy print. ‘The building was empty but they were making a point. The fire brigade couldn’t get near because of the blazing cars in the road and the fact that their officers were stoned when they tried to pull them out of the way.’
‘You said they were making a point?’ said Dewar.
‘They were showing Tulloch who was really in control,’ replied Grant. ‘They’ve taken over this whole area now and it won’t be easy to get them out.’
‘But why?’ asked Dewar.
‘God, they don’t need a reason. Their natural loathing for any kind of authority is enough. When you combine that with instinctive animal cunning and a situation like they’ve got down there, it’s a recipe for disaster. Evil rules OK.’
‘But the ordinary people living in this area,’ said Dewar. ‘What about them?’
‘They’ve just had a change of government,’ said Grant. ‘Fear is now the ruling currency. They’ll do what the yobs tell them or they’ll be taking flying lessons from the balconies in the flats.’
‘What a mess,’ said Dewar.
‘I think it was always going to be that,’ said Grant.
DAY SEVEN
The army was called in at 3am to take over manning the barriers so that more police officers would be available to patrol the streets. The soldiers — infantry from Redford Barracks on the south west side of the city, had been on full alert since the decision to go for physical containment had been taken. Their officers, now familiar with street lay-out of the area after several days studying maps supplied by the local authorities, had impressed upon their men the delicacy of the operation. Their role was to maintain the integrity of the line, nothing more. Their presence was to be kept as low-key as possible.
They moved quietly and efficiently into position when called upon and took over manning of the barriers with a minimum of fuss. One police officer was retained at each barrier site to liaise between civilians and the military should this prove necessary. In the event, the barriers were not challenged to any significant degree during the night.
In the estate itself, sporadic outbursts of violence continued into the small hours with stolen cars being set alight and police vehicles attacked with bottles and stones. Windows were broken, street lighting damaged and an electricity sub-station put out of action so that two tower blocks were plunged into darkness with no prospect of repair until order had been restored. Two policemen were injured by flying glass and four youths taken into custody. It should have been many more but police confidence had taken a pounding.
Things quietened down around six in the morning when the first streaks of daylight in the eastern sky signalled an end to the night and called a natural halt to the proceedings. As with so many things in life, a new day heralded a new beginning.
Tulloch looked as if he had aged ten years overnight when he arrived at the Scottish Office. There were dark circles under his eyes and such an air of weariness about him that Dewar thought he might well be ill or injured. Pride made him insist he was just tired but his eyes showed signs of defeat. He had badly misjudged the situation. His earlier success had encouraged him to think that he’d established a natural respect for law and order and he could come down hard on any troublemakers. Zero tolerance had been the wrong option to go for. The yobs hadn’t read the same text book he had. They’d just been waiting for night to fall.
The team was joined this morning by Major Tim Hardy, the officer commanding the troops from Redford Barracks. Although it had been left to the team to decide when troops should be called in, they had been briefed at the outset of the outbreak and their ‘terms of engagement’ decided by Scottish Office ministers. Hardy reported that his orders were to hold the line using minimum force at all times. His men were to remain strictly outside the affected area, leaving matters of civilian law and order to the police. He looked towards Tulloch who avoided his gaze.
‘What exactly is the position this morning?’ Finlay asked Tulloch, who was now gratefully nursing a mug of black coffee, using it to warm his hands as well as his insides.
‘We’ve had to concede control of about one third of the containment area.’
There was a stunned silence in the room. Tulloch continued, ‘There came a point when I though it best, in the interests of keeping casualties to a minimum, that my men retreat and set up lines of containment outside the epicentre of the trouble..’
Finlay asked, ‘Are you saying that we now have a containment area within the containment area?’
‘If you want to put it that way.’
‘You’re saying we now have a no-go area within Muirhouse?’ said Dewar.
Tulloch nodded. ‘You’d think the bastards had been planning this for years,’ he said bitterly.
Mary Martin looked puzzled. She seemed to have difficulty formulating her question. ‘Am I being stupid or are you saying that with things as they are, none of us can reach the population inside this area?’ she asked, making a sweeping gesture over part of the map on the table.
‘I’m saying that my officers cannot guarantee the safety of anyone entering this part of the estate. In fact we’d have to advise strongly against it.’
‘So the yobs are running the show,’ stated Mary.
Tulloch looked down at the table.
‘And the contacts? How do my people reach them? And the social service teams? And the vaccine when it arrives. How do we set up vaccination centres in an area controlled by a mob? What exactly do we do now, Superintendent?’
Tulloch took a deep breath. ‘I fully understand your concern but regaining control of the area would mean a full frontal assault involving hundreds of officers in full riot gear.
Flushing out the opposition on home ground would almost certainly be very costly in terms of police and possibly innocent civilian casualties.’
‘It has to be done,’ said Wright. ‘The people in there must be vaccinated as soon as it becomes available.’
‘Perhaps the army?’ suggested Mary Martin tentatively.’
‘Only as a last resort,’ said Finlay. ‘The Scottish Office wasn’t that keen on bringing troops in to man the barriers this morning but the situation was such that we just had to. But I think that’s as far as it goes unless something really awful happens.’
‘Couldn’t you send in snatch squads to arrest the ring-leaders?’ George Finlay asked Tulloch. ‘If you know who they are, that is?’
‘Oh yes,’ replied Tulloch. ‘They’re known all right. The same trash are running things just like they seem to run everything else in that God-forsaken place from drug dealing to money lending but proving it is always quite another matter. Asking people to stand up in court and testify against them is like asking the tide to go out on Royston beach. As for sending in a snatch squad, we’re talking about the heart of drug-land here. Steel-reinforced doors and blocked stairways, broken lifts and prams suddenly appearing across your path, teenage mothers yelping about police brutality. Pieces of concrete falling from the flats and more knives than you’d find in the Swiss Army.’
‘My God, as if we didn’t have enough to contend with,’ said Finlay. ‘A riot on top of an epidemic.’
‘The vaccine’s not here yet,’ said Dewar. ‘So we’ve probably got another day to wait. I suggest we leave the police, the politicians and the military to work on the problem of regaining control. When the vaccine finally comes — probably this evening we can decide then what we do next.’
There were no dissenting voices.
‘By the way, Major, are your men armed?’
‘Plastic bullets and only then as a last resort.’
As they rose from the table, George Finlay came over to Dewar and said, ‘I almost forgot, Sharon Hannan was asking for you. She seemed agitated about something. Maybe you could come over to the hospital? Have a word with her?’
‘Of course,’ replied Dewar, suddenly excited at the prospect of hearing something useful from her. Maybe this was the break he’d been hoping for. Maybe she’d remembered something important. ‘How is she?’
‘The rash appeared this morning; she definitely has smallpox; she’s putting on a brave face but she’s really quite ill.’
Dewar drove over to the Western General, slowing down at the Crew Toll roundabout just to the north of the hospital to look at a gaggle of military vehicles and police panda cars parked across the main road on the eastern perimeter of Muirhouse. There was something sinister about seeing soldiers with automatic weapons hanging from their shoulders on the streets of the city. Something inside him said their weapons should be up on their shoulders and they should be in dress uniform, marching behind a band on their way to some ceremonial duty at the palace or up on the castle esplanade, entertaining tourists. That’s what soldiers did in the city. Seeing them stand beside a striped lifting bar, spanning the width of the road looked like old newsreel footage from Northern Ireland.
Beyond the barrier, the road was absolutely empty of people or traffic, a dark ribbon of tarmac leading to the concrete skyline of Muirhouse with a pall of smoke still hanging over it from last night.
Dewar turned away and drove up to the hospital where he found parking a lot easier than last time. All clinic and day patients, whether surgical and medical had had their appointments cancelled. Any patient who could possibly go home had been discharged. All non essential surgery had been re-scheduled for some unstated time in the future. Plastic hips and knees would have to wait. Benign cysts would stay where they were for the moment. The hospital was purely for emergencies only
Dewar changed quickly; he was anxious to hear what Sharon had to say. The room was in semi-darkness when he entered. One of the nurses had told him this was because Sharon’s eyes were hurting. He shuddered as he remembered Michael Kelly’s eyes when he’d first seen him.
‘Hello Sharon, I hear you’re not so well,’ said Dewar gently as he sat down at her bedside.
Sharon had been facing the wall; the rash was clearly visible on her cheek. She turned her head, smiling slightly at the voice she recognised but the smile faded when she saw Dewar’s visor. She seemed to recoil slightly and stare at it as if its use were some kind of betrayal. But it was what the nurses wore, thought Dewar. All the same, he didn’t want anything alarming or alienating her. He needed to keep her trust if she were to tell him anything. He took his visor off and said, ‘This damned thing is far too hot. How are you feeling?’
There was no denying the rise in his pulse rate once the visor had gone. He felt exposed and vulnerable. Once again he was trusting his life to a vaccination. The thought made the site on his arm itch slightly, but maybe that was imagination, the power of suggestion as Harry Hill might have put it, he thought stupidly. He wasn’t big on bravado but he felt it was necessary in this case. He hoped he looked calm because it didn’t feel like that on the inside.
‘I feel like I’ve been run over by a bus,’ complained Sharon weakly. ‘I hurt all over.’
‘You’ve got to hang in there,’ Dewar encouraged. ‘Think of nice things. What you’re going to do when you get out of here. Sunshine, beaches, swimming pools, Pina Coladas.’
‘I drink Bacardi,’ replied Sharon.
‘All right, Bacardi,’ smiled Dewar. He reached out his hand and smoothed the hair on Sharon’s forehead and felt a warm dampness there. The hairs rose on the back of his neck. ‘Dr Finlay said you wanted to speak to me?’
‘There was no one else I could tell,’ said Sharon. ‘You said I could call on you if there was anything … ‘
‘Of course, Sharon.’
‘It’s Puss.’
‘Did you say, Puss?’
‘My cat. It’s in the flat. It’s not been fed for days. There was no one else I could ask. Could you possibly go along and feed it, maybe? I’d be ever so grateful. I don’t think I’m going to get better for a few days yet.’
Feed the cat? That’s what she wanted to see him about? She wasn’t going to provide the missing link? Jesus, Mary and Joseph, he couldn’t believe it. He’d really been up for this. He’d really believed that Sharon had remembered something important, something that might enable him to identify the source of the outbreak and all she’d wanted was someone to feed her cat!’ He took a few moments to compose himself then he swallowed his disappointment and said, ‘Of course, Sharon. Where will I find a key?’
‘The nurses have my clothes. You’ll find my key in the leather jacket, left hand pocket.’
‘I’ll see to it,’ he assured her.
‘Thanks very much,’ said Sharon. ‘I’m really obliged. Will you come back and see me?’
Dewar suddenly saw the fear in her eyes. There was no mistaking it. She was behaving bravely but of all human emotions perhaps fear was the most naked and exposed when it appeared in someone’s eyes. His sense of frustration evaporated.
‘Of course I will,’ he said softly. ‘I’ll tell come back and tell you how Puss is getting on.
Dewar went through the disinfecting procedure with a heavy heart then went in search of a nurse who could help him with Sharon’s key. He found two nurses sitting together in the duty room having a cup of tea. They looked exhausted. Dewar said so.
‘We’ve been working twelve hour shifts since the outbreak started said the elder of the two.
‘And no day off,’ added the other.
‘I guess that’s what angels do,’ smiled Dewar, tongue in cheek. ‘Florence has a lot to answer for.’
‘Florence, my bottom,’ said the older nurse. ‘In my case, the building society insists. What can we do for you?’
Dewar told them about the key.
‘Sharon’s clothes were sent off for disinfection but the contents of her
pockets would remain here.’ She got up and went over to a wall cupboard. She swung it open to reveal a number of plastic boxes each with a shallow lair of red fluid in them and a label on the front. She brought down one and said, ‘Here we are.’
Dewar looked into the box and saw some change and a key ring with two keys on it lying in the fluid.
‘Everything gets disinfected,’ said the nurse. She removed the keys and held them under a tap in the sink for a few seconds before drying them in a paper towel and handing them to Dewar.
‘The cat needs feeding,’ explained Dewar.
‘And he called us angels,’ said the younger of the nurses.
Two buzzers went off at the same time sending the two nurses scurrying into action.
Half way to Leith, Dewar started wondering whether there would be cat food in the Hannans’ flat. He decided to play safe and take some with him. Half a mile further on, he stopped at an Asian-owned corner shop that seemed to be a cross between a mini supermarket and Aladdin’s cave and bought four tins of assorted cat food and some dry biscuits. He felt sure if he’d wanted a gas boiler he would simply have been asked, ‘What colour?’
Dewar paid and the proprietor, a plump Indian man with an engaging smile, who offered him a sweet from his own bag he kept by the till. Dewar accepted and popped the striped candy into his mouth. ‘Thanks.’ For some reason the simple kindness made him feel a whole lot better about life.
TWENTY
Jutland Place did not look any better in daylight than it had done in the darkness of his last visit. There was an air of quiet decay about the street that suggested the tenements had outlived their time. Like the sprawling docks nearby, they were an anachronism, a reminder of the time when families were traditionally large, cramped conditions were the norm and unskilled jobs were plentiful. The bulldozers of progress were lurking just to the west, inching ever nearer, just waiting for the chance to clear the way for luxury apartments, waterside bistros and chic galleries, many of which would ironically chronicle in painting what had just been knocked down.