Detective Sergeant Robertson sat on the edge of someone’s desk, making notes on her clipboard as a Spacehopper-round PC with a Donald Trump tan talked to someone else on the phone. The reconstruction of DI Bell’s face sat in the middle of his monitor.
PC Spacehopper nodded. ‘Uh-huh. … Uh-huh. … OK. … OK, yeah. Hold on…’ He put his hand over the mouthpiece and turned to Robertson. ‘It’s a match. Definite. Manager says he checked in last Monday.’
She punched the air. ‘Yes! Tell them we’ll be right over.’
‘Hello? Mr Murdoch? Don’t touch anything, we’re on our way.’
Robertson hopped down from the desk and took out her mobile phone. Froze as she saw Logan standing right there in front of her. Then pulled on an uncomfortable-looking smile. ‘Inspector McRae.’
‘George. You promised me some staff to chase stuff up. Where are they?’
‘Ah. Yes.’ Getting quicker with every word. ‘Well, we thought … that is, DCI Hardie thought, that as yours is a historical cold case investigation and we’re hunting an active murderer, we would maybe release someone when there was more time?’ Another go with the smile. ‘Sir.’
Rotten bunch of…
Logan stared at her.
A shrug. ‘Sorry?’
He turned and marched away.
Water gurgled in the downpipes around the back of Divisional Headquarters. Presumably run-off from the mortuary roof, because it had actually stopped raining for once.
A chunk of sunlight snuck through a gap in the clouds to turn this bit of tarmac and granite into a tiny grey suntrap. And, as was traditional in Aberdeen, someone was out enjoying it before it disappeared.
Sheila Dalrymple leaned against the mortuary wall, one long thin leg bent at the knee – its white welly resting against the blockwork, the other smeared with something dark-red-and-brown. She was dressed in her full Anatomical Pathology Technician get-up: blue scrubs, green plastic apron, and fetching grey hairnet. A steaming mug of something in one long-fingered hand, at the end of her long pale arm. Wide flat face turned to the sun.
Logan wandered over. ‘Sheila.’
She didn’t move, just stood there with her eyes closed. Sunning herself. ‘If it’s about that sponsorship money, I’m skint.’
‘DI Bell’s remains.’
A tiny snort. The words hard and bitter: ‘Ah, the duplicitous Detective Inspector Bell. And are we here about the body you exhumed from his grave, or the one you pulled from his crashed car?’
‘Are you feeling all right?’
‘Because if you’re here about that rotting pile of meat and bones, you’re crap out of luck.’
‘You don’t sound all right.’
She cradled the mug against her chest. ‘There are two hundred and six bones in an adult human body, not counting the thirty-two teeth. You know what we got out of that grave? One hundred and fifty-two. As the great man said: “The shotgun is an unforgiving mistress when it practises its art upon the human cranium.”’
Sod.
Logan leaned against the wall next to her. ‘Any luck with DNA?’
‘You’re kidding, right? When you take a body, blow its head off, burn everything, post-mortem what’s left, then bury it in an eco-friendly grave for two years, what you end up with isn’t exactly DNA viable. The smell, on the other hand…’
‘Wonderful.’
She toasted him with her mug. ‘Welcome to my world. If we had the teeth, then maybe we could have drilled something out of the tooth pulp cavity, assuming they weren’t cooked too much. But guess what?’
‘No teeth.’
‘Once again, “the shotgun makes its mischief felt”.’ She pushed off the wall and squinted at him. ‘And for future reference, see next year? When someone asks what to get me for my birthday? Assuming anyone sodding remembers. Tell them gudding about in rotting corpse bits isn’t as much fun as they think!’
‘Oh…’ He pulled on a smile. ‘Happy birthday.’
‘Yeah, now you remember.’ She stalked off, shaking her head. ‘They’re all the bloody same…’
14
Somewhere, off in the gloom, a radio belted out a cheery ‘modern’ song. Which, let’s be honest, was a euphemism for ‘crap’.
‘Pfff…’ He scuffed a foot along the concrete floor. ‘Getting old, Logan.’
Yeah, but it was crap.
A large sign sat on the metal grille that separated the small reception area from the expanse of shelving, boxes, and crates: ‘OFF-SITE EVIDENCE STORAGE FACILITY’. It lurked above a small whiteboard with ‘THIS FACILITY HAS WORKED FOR 3 DAYS WITHOUT A LOST TIME ACCIDENT’ on it.
They’d probably do better on that front if they fixed the lighting: no windows in here, so there was nothing but the striplights overhead and about a third of those were dead. Half of those still alive buzzed, blinked, and flickered into darkness – only to judder on again ten or fifteen seconds later. As if someone had tried setting up a Santa’s grotto in hell.
Logan took a deep breath and made a loudhailer from his hands. ‘COME ON, ELLEN, SOME OF US STILL HAVE CAREERS TO GET ON WITH!’
‘Cheeky sod.’ She came limping out from the depths of the storeroom. Small, but solid. The kind of person whose pint you really wouldn’t want to spill. Dust greyed the front and arms of her Police Scotland T-shirt. Probably from the large cardboard box she was carrying. ‘You’re in luck.’ Ellen shouldered open the gate and kicked it closed behind her. ‘Normally suicide stuff gets cleared out after a couple of years.’
She thumped the box onto the productions desk and raised her eyebrows. ‘Teeth?’
‘Teeth.’
Ellen went digging in the box, laying evidence bags out in front of him. ‘Teeth, teeth, teeth, teeth…’ More bags. Then a couple of small cardboard boxes. Then some big bags. ‘Let’s see: we’ve got burned clothes, burned shoes, a burned shotgun, and a petrol container. Also burned. No teeth.’
‘Please tell me they didn’t leave them at the scene.’
‘OK: “they didn’t leave them at the scene”.’
‘Oh for God’s sake…’ He paced away to the other side of the reception area and back again. ‘I’ve got a body lying in the mortuary and no idea who it belongs to. How am I supposed to find out, if there’s no bloody evidence?’
She held up a finger. ‘There’s evidence, there’s just no teeth.’
‘Urgh…’ Logan slumped forward, thunking his forehead gently against the grille.
The rustling of paperwork sounded behind him, then: ‘That’s odd. Looks like they did find some teeth, but they’re not in the box. Did you try the mortuary? Might have sent them over there for analysis.’
‘They swear blind they’ve never seen them.’
More rustling. ‘According to this, the IB recovered Ding-Dong’s prints off the shotgun and the shells inside it. His prints were on the caravan table’s metal frame and the petrol containers and the caravan door handle too. No one else’s prints were found.’
‘That’s sod-all use to me. I know DI Bell was there – he had to be, he set all this up. What I need to know is whose head he blew off!’ The grille rattled as Logan boinged his head against it again. ‘How could we bury the wrong bloody person?’
‘To be fair, Ding-Dong left two suicide notes. The body was wearing his watch, wedding ring, signet ring, and a stainless-steel bracelet with his initials on it. It was all returned to his widow, by the way, in case you think we’ve lost them too. She also ID’d what was left of his clothes, his shoes, and the wallet they found on the passenger seat of his car. I mean, look at it.’
Logan turned.
Ellen held up a photograph. The skeletal remains of a caravan sagged over the blackened carcass of its contents – everything burned to small unrecognisable lumps. Everything except for the torso-sized chunk of charcoal caught on the metalwork that used to support the floor and the twisted chunks of arms and legs scorched all the way down to the bone in places. A Volkswagen Passat sat in
the background, the paintwork on its bonnet blistered from the heat, front-left tyre flattened.
She shook her head. ‘Not surprising they believed it was him, is it? I mean, no way you’re getting DNA out of something burned that badly, right? And with all the documentation…’
Why did everything have to turn into a disaster?
Logan sighed and held out his hand. ‘Let’s see the wallet.’
She scribbled something onto a clipboard, spun it around on the desk so it was the right way up for him. ‘Sign there. You need gloves?’
He scribbled his signature on the line and nodded. Snapped on the proffered gloves and opened the evidence bag: one black leather wallet, with pictures of Bell’s children proudly displayed in two matching photo insets.
Logan laid the contents out in a line. Two credit cards and one debit. A bunch of slips of paper that had filled one segment of the wallet – receipts probably, their thermal ink all faded away by the heat. A condom lurked in its wrapper at the back of the wallet. And last but not least: three filthy five-pound notes. He added them to the line.
Ellen whistled. ‘Fifteen quid and a condom? Naughty old Ding-Dong.’
‘Better give me the suicide notes too.’
The off-site storage facility loomed over the pool car in all its miserable glory. A bland industrial building in a bland industrial business park, sealed behind bland industrial chain-link fencing. Topped with exciting razor wire. Or at least, anyone trying to clamber over it would find it exciting – a DIY vasectomy courtesy of Police Scotland.
Above, the sky had taken on a disturbing burnt-toast look, spattering down fistfuls of rain that clattered against the car roof, fighting with the roar of the blowers.
Logan opened the big brown envelope and pulled out two A4 sheets in individual plastic wallets. Rested them against the pool car’s steering wheel.
DI Bell’s suicide notes. One to his children, one to his wife. Both handwritten in red biro on what was probably photocopier paper.
‘If I Only Had a Brain’ warbled up from Logan’s mobile phone and he answered it, not even needing to check the caller ID. ‘Simon?’
Rennie’s voice bounded out like a Labrador. ‘I have news, my liege!’
‘Did you know it was Sheila Dalrymple’s birthday today?’
‘Creepy Sheila? We should all chip in and get her a broomstick.’ A pause. ‘I know, I know. We’re not allowed to say things like that in Professional Standards.’
‘No we’re not.’
‘Not even a little bit?’
‘No.’ Logan skimmed the letter to DI Bell’s kids. ‘Got my hands on Bell’s suicide notes. He wants his children to know how proud he is of everything they’ve achieved and everything they’re going to achieve. No mention of why he’s allegedly topping himself.’ Suicide note number two: ‘“My dearest Barbara, I’m sorry, but I’m so tired. I can’t do this any more. I know I’ve not been the best husband for the last few months and I’m truly, truly sorry for that. You were always my soulmate and I want you to be happy, but all I do is make you miserable.”’
‘That’s cheery. You want my exciting news?’
‘“I really do love you, Barbara, I always have. Please don’t hate me for doing this. Give my guitar to Bob and my AFC collection to Gavin. I love you.” Signed, “Duncan”. Again, no reason why.’
‘Jerry the Mole, AKA: Jerry Whyte with a “Y”. She’s real and I’ve got an address.’
Logan slipped note number two back into the envelope. ‘Criminal record?’
‘Not even in the system: clean as a pornstar’s bumhole. Found her through a friend of a friend of a backdoor burglary specialist. And no, that’s not a euphemism.’
‘Address?’
‘Ooh, do I get to come too?’
The wee sod was probably just trying to get out of doing some actual work for a change.
‘Have you done your report for the Procurator Fiscal?’
‘Done, spell-checked, and submitted. For I am the very model of a modern major SIO.’ His voice took on a saccharine child-asking-for-a-toy-and-or-sweetie tone. ‘So can I? Please? I promise I’ll be ever so good!’
Logan glanced at the suicide note to Bell’s kids again. Then shrugged. ‘What’s the worst that can happen?’
The man behind the reception desk gave them the benefit of a perfect white smile. ‘Give me a second and I’ll see if Jerry’s free.’ He stood. Had to be at least six two, maybe even six four. Mid-fifties in a Breton top, jeans, designer stubble, and glasses, with a grey shark-fin haircut perched on the top.
It was a fairly plush reception room, with leather couches and prints by local artists on the walls. A fancy coffee machine and a water dispenser.
Mr Sharksfin opened the door behind his desk and poked his head through.
A woman’s voice boomed out from the room. ‘That sounds great, Lee. I think all we need to do now is…’ Then fell silent as Mr Sharksfin waved at her.
‘Sorry to bother you, Jerry, but the police would like a word.’
‘Have to call you later, Lee. Some people here I need to speak to. OK. Yeah. … Bye.’
Mr Sharksfin turned and beckoned to Logan and Rennie. ‘She’ll see you now.’
Logan stepped into a large office, overlooking the car park with its cordon of yet more chain link and the dreich day beyond. For some reason they’d clad the room in pine, like a sauna, then added huge rubber plants, a display cabinet full of awards and booze, rap-star furniture and a row of fancy wooden filing cabinets.
The company logo filled one entire wall – a cheery Westie in a red collar and the words ‘WHYTEDUG FACILITATION SERVICES LTD. ~ YOU NAME IT, WE CAN HELP.’
That booming voice again: ‘Gentlemen.’ It belonged to the woman lounging on one of the matching white sofas that dominated the middle of the room, her bare feet on the coffee table. A crisp dress shirt with rolled-up sleeves, a bold red tie, and grey suit trousers. Stylish pixie cut, bleached the colour of bone. As if she was trying out for a Eurythmics tribute band. Moles peppered her face and arms – dozens and dozens of them. She placed a mobile phone facedown on the sofa beside her.
Mr Sharksfin wafted Logan and Rennie towards the other couch. ‘Now, would anyone like a tea or coffee?’
Rennie opened his mouth, but Logan got in first: ‘We’re fine, thank you.’
Jerry Whyte stretched her arms out along the back of her sofa. ‘Harvey: give Stevie Zee a bell, make sure that marquee’s up and ready to go Wednesday for the run-through, yeah? Don’t let him fob you off with “It’ll all be up by Thursday.” Wednesday.’
‘Will do.’ Mr Sharksfin strutted from the room, closing the door behind him.
A smile from the woman opposite. ‘So, what can I do you for?’
That logo wasn’t the only Westie in the room. The other one was a wheezy old thing, fur stained to a smoker’s-yellow, snuffling and grunting its way around the coffee table. It made a beeline for Logan’s trousers and gave them a damn good sniffing.
He reached down to scratch the dog’s head, the fur slightly sticky against his fingertips. ‘What exactly do you do here, Mrs Whyte?’
A smile. ‘It’s Miss. And I help people accomplish things. I facilitate.’ She pointed at the closed door. ‘That marquee’s for the Aberdeen Examiner. They’re doing a world record bid – biggest ever stovies-eating competition – and we’re pulling it all together for them. MC, catering, advertising, social media, the works.’
‘So you’re an event coordinator.’
She shrugged. ‘Events, recruitment, mediation, logistics, PR, project management… You name it, we facilitate it.’
Of course she did.
Logan nudged Rennie with his foot.
And for once, the silly sod did what he’d been told. ‘Did you do any facilitation for Fred Marshall?’
‘Let’s find out, shall we?’ She stood and padded her bare feet over to the filing cabinets. Rummaged through one. ‘Fred Marsh?’
; Rennie shook his head. ‘Marshall.’
‘Marshall, Marshall, Marshall… Here we go.’ She pulled out a file and opened it, flicking through the contents. ‘Yup, placed him as a doorman at the Secret Service Gentlemen’s Club for three months. Six-month stint as a security guard at Langstracht Business Park. Some more security work at maybe a dozen concerts? Couple of gigs as a courier during Oil Week.’ She held a sheet of headed notepaper up, reading from it. ‘“Fred Marshall is a conscientious worker who gets on well with his fellow employees and isn’t afraid of hard work. Would hire again.”’
‘I’m confused, ma’am.’ Rennie scooted forward, giving her that idiotic Columbo look of his. ‘You had him working as a security guard?’
The wee dog stopped sniffing Logan’s trousers and lumbered over to Rennie. Squared up to him and barked. Twice. Then let loose a wee wheezy growl.
‘You have to forgive Haggis, he’s a devil when he’s riled.’ Whyte popped the file back in her cabinet. ‘And if you’re asking about Fred Marshall’s criminal record: yes. We were fully aware of it when we placed him, as were all of his employers. Not everyone is prejudiced against people who’ve been through the criminal justice system, Inspector…?’
Chin up. ‘Detective Sergeant Rennie.’
The smile turned more than a little condescending. ‘I believe in rehabilitation, DS Rennie. We’ve got a number of ex-offenders on our books, ex-police-officers too, and serving ones. At W.F.S. we don’t discriminate, we facilitate.’
‘Frank Marshall was a thug for hire and you’re the one who—’
Logan stamped on Rennie’s foot.
‘Ow!’
At that, Haggis stopped growling, turned his bum on Rennie, and scuffed his back feet through the carpet a couple of times. Then waddled over to the other couch and scrambled up onto it.
Rennie stared at Logan. ‘What was that—’
Logan thumped him. ‘When did you last hear from Fred Marshall, Miss Whyte?’
‘Oh.’ She dug her file out again and checked. ‘According to this, he wanted to try a job in catering … two and a bit years ago? We didn’t have anything at the time, but when something came along we tried to get in touch. No answer.’ A shrug. ‘Sorry.’
The Blood Road Page 13