‘Very. We always have been. Wilkie and I were both still at primary school when our mum died, but our father . . . he filled both roles, I suppose.’
‘Did he have anyone else in his life?’
‘You mean women? He had lady friends, but he didn’t have a partner, if that’s what you mean. There was Sandy Rankin, the Herald writer; they had dinner from time to time, but she couldn’t be seen chumming him to book things because she’s a reviewer and didn’t want to be accused of bias. There was Karla Hiaasen, from the university; they were friendly. And of course there was June.’
‘From the university?’ the sergeant noted. ‘Wasn’t your father a full-time writer?’
‘More or less, but he still lectured on some of the postgraduate courses in the accountancy school . . . so he could keep calling himself “Professor” mainly.’ She smiled, faintly. ‘He was very proud of that title, because my grandfather was one too . . . plus I reckon he was a bit of a closet academic snob. But back to the ladies; yes, he was closest to June Connelly, his agent. He used to stay with her when he went down to London, and she stayed at his place when she came up here. You don’t ask your dad about his sleeping arrangements, but I suppose . . .’ Her hand went to her mouth. ‘Oh God, she’s due here today. She’ll be on the train. Dad said he was meeting her at Waverley at two thirty; she travels by train because she can work better on it than on aircraft,’ she explained. ‘She won’t know about this.’
‘Maybe Mr Collins could meet her.’
‘He doesn’t know June. Besides, he has to go to Tynecastle. No, it’ll have to be me.’
‘Don’t worry,’ Wilding assured her, ‘we’ll attend to that. But let’s get through this first. How has your father’s demeanour been recently?’
‘He’s been fine.’
‘Has he mentioned any disagreements with anyone? Rows with his publisher, for example?’
‘No, they love him; they make lots of money out of him, and he’s happy with them.’
‘How about the university? Any problems there?’
‘No, he’s a fixture there. He hasn’t been Head of School for a few years, so he hasn’t had any management role. There’s been nothing to cause him problems.’
‘Dissatisfied students?’
‘No. I told you, his people were all postgrads. They finish the course, they get their Masters; that’s it.’
‘So there was nothing troubling him, and he had no enemies that you knew of?’
‘No.’>
‘Did he ever mention Dr Bruce Anderson?’ Wilding asked.
Carol Glover nodded. ‘That he did. I know that Anderson didn’t like him, and I know why, but Dad didn’t take him seriously. He called him a shallow bully of a man. He didn’t regard him as an enemy, though; he didn’t regard him as anything, really. For fun, I asked him if he’d get me tickets for his event at the Book Festival so I could go along and heckle, but he took me seriously, and said he wouldn’t do it. But why do you ask about Anderson? Is he a suspect?’
‘He and your father had an . . . encounter . . . last night. But it was in a room full of people.’
‘That doesn’t answer my question.’
The sergeant met her gaze. ‘It’s as much of an answer as you’re going to get, at this stage of the investigation at any rate. Let’s change tack. Do you know who’ll benefit from your father’s estate?’
‘We will. Wilkie and me. Dad told us about his will. He said there’s money in trust for us already, there’s a private pension fund that comes to us in the event of his death before its maturity, and then there’s the house and everything else. It’s split down the middle.’ She paused, her hands trembling in her lap. ‘Does that make us prime suspects?’ she asked.
‘Not unless you were hanging about the Book Festival at midnight last night.’
‘We were hanging across the bar in Deacon Brodie’s at midnight,’ she retorted ‘Wilkie, me, and a few hundred others, to judge from the noise in the place.’
‘What about Mr Collins?’
‘He was at a late-night Festival show, just along the road in the Bedlam Theatre; he joined us about quarter past.’
‘Then you’re all in the clear, no worries. So, to sum up, your father’s been acting perfectly normally of late, and unconcerned about anything.’
Her brow creased. ‘Not quite normally.’
‘So what’s been unusual about him?’
‘He’s been using my email, and using this place as a correspondence address.’
‘What do you mean?’ asked Cowan.
‘What I’ve just said. For the last few months, mail’s been arriving here for him, marked care of me.’
‘Why?’
‘It was to do with his website, he said. He gets . . . got . . . feedback from readers and sometimes they want to send him things. He didn’t want them to have his own address, so he asked if once or twice he could use mine.’
‘So instead they know where you live, and if he gets an obsessive . . .’ the DC began, frowning.
‘I’ll be moving out of here in a few months, when Ed and I get married. We’re buying a waterside flat in Leith.’
‘Was there much of this mail?’
‘Some, but not loads. A lot of it had foreign stamps.’
‘What about the email?’
‘He set up his own screen name on my AOL subscription, for the same reason . . . “Annie Wilkes watch” he called it. That’s the name of the nutter in that Stephen King novel. He called himself fatallyg, as in Fat Ally G. Get it?’ Cowan nodded. ‘Ally was his nickname,’ Carol went on, ‘not generally used, though, only by his real friends, people like June, Fred Mount and Henry Noble, his author chums, and maybe Denzel Chandler . . . his partner’s the new Book Festival director.’
‘We know,’ Wilding told her. ‘She found your father’s body.’
‘Poor soul.’ She looked up at him. ‘Sergeant, you said earlier that Dad was found when they unlocked the author tent. If he had been found earlier . . .’
‘Would he have survived? From what Professor Hutchinson, the pathologist, told us, he’d have been affected very quickly, beyond recovery.’
‘Didn’t he have that palm pilot thing of his? Wouldn’t he have been able to phone?’
‘He did use it. He sent Dr Mosley an email, but she didn’t get it until this morning. That’s what made her go to the yurt. I know,’ the DS said, ‘you’re asking yourself, “Why didn’t he phone her? Why email?” We’re advised that he’d have been in a very confused state, not thinking normally. Plus there would have been a very small window before he lost consciousness.’
‘I see.’ Her eyes moistened. ‘Poor old Dad,’ she whispered. ‘It’s just horrible; I’ve got an image in my head that I don’t think I’ll ever lose.’
As she spoke they heard the front door open, and muffled male voices.
‘Thanks,’ said Alice Cowan softly. ‘Unless there’s anything else you can think of that might help, that’ll do for now.’ The dead man’s daughter shook her head. ‘In that case, maybe you could help Mr Collins cut up the pizzas, and ask your brother to join us for a couple of minutes.’
Twenty-two
Alex stepped past the smokers and through the doorway that led to Edinburgh Airport’s arrivals gateway. During the day, even at weekends, the concourse area was always busy, a sign of the growing volume of traffic that was flowing into Scotland’s capital. She looked for her father at the gate, but saw no sign of him. She frowned, wondering whether she had missed him, whether Aileen had given her the wrong time. Equally, and probably more likely, it was not unknown for flights to arrive early, and the capital city’s baggage handlers were known for their efficiency. Her decision to come to the airport had been spur of the moment, and she had not called him; he had no reason to wait for her. She knew what had made her anxious to see him and her young half-siblings; her encounter with Andy had thrown her completely off balance, and she needed the equilibrium that they always gave h
er.
She was angry, too, angry with herself, at her weakness; for she had set herself up for the inevitable fall. She and he had split in shouts of anger, but that had been a sham on her part. In truth, it had torn her in two, and for all the active social life she had pursued since then, for all the sexual partners she had known, not legions, but more than she could tick off on the fingers of one hand, the torch that she carried for him still burned her, whenever she let it. Griff Montell had come closest to supplanting him, but he had fallen short too.
So she had set up their meeting, in spite of all the instincts that told her not to. Her play for him in the kitchen had been unplanned, but once it had begun it had been unstoppable, neither of them thinking of what would come after. But as soon as he had gone, and the air around her had cooled to its normal even temperature, she had known within herself that nothing would come after. She could read him too well to believe that he would ever allow his betrayal of Karen to be more than a one-off. And so his call an hour earlier, his voice, metallic through his car’s small speaker, telling her, apologetically, remorsefully, that it could never happen again, had come as no surprise. Yet still that torch burned, scorching her emotionally, and at that moment she could think of nothing, nobody who could ever put it out. To make it worse, the hurt would always be hers alone. She had never confided her deepest secrets to anyone but her father, and this one had to be kept, even from him.
She winced, and realised that she had been staring into space; for how long, she had no idea. She was on the point of turning on her heel and leaving when she heard a ringtone in her ear and remembered that she was still wearing her hands-free device. ‘Yes,’ she said, answering by voice command.
‘Stand where you are, and look slowly to your right.’ She did as she was instructed, and saw him, sitting at a table beside the coffee kiosk, phone held to his ear, the other hand waving. ‘Come on over,’ he said. ‘The flight’s delayed twenty minutes.’
‘OK. I’ll get myself a coffee.’
‘Get me another one as well; filter, touch of milk, and since you’re buying, I’ll have a bun of some sort.’
She laughed as she walked towards him. ‘I’ve always assumed I’d have to look after you in your old age,’ she said, ‘but I didn’t realise it had started now.’
She went to the bar, waited while her order was made up, paid the inevitably Polish server, and carried a tray across to the table. When she arrived he was speaking on his mobile once again. ‘Sorry,’ he said. ‘I was just letting Aileen know we’ll be later than planned, and catching up with developments.’
‘Yours or hers?’
‘Both. We’ve had a sudden death this morning that’s turned into a homicide. It’ll also turn into a Holyrood by-election.’
‘Ah! I heard something about that on the radio news as I was driving here, but I didn’t really catch it.’
He updated her, explaining how Glover had been found and how the story had unfolded. ‘Aileen’s taken a double hit. She liked Glover, but on top of that, his death could have serious consequences for her politically.’
‘She’ll just have to win the seat.’
‘How?’
‘By putting up a candidate of her own who’ll catch the anti-Trident vote as effectively as Ainsley Glover did.’
Bob smiled. ‘Since when did you take an interest in politics?’
‘Shortly after you started going out with the First Minister, or Justice Minister, as she was then. Plus it was on my university course as a fill-in subject, remember.’
‘Then you should realise that Aileen’s party’s official line is pro-nuclear. ’
‘Doesn’t matter,’ Alex pointed out. ‘Defence is a reserved power; it has nothing to do with the party in Scotland. She can put her own runner in there, throw up her hands in mock horror when he or she disowns Trident, then carry on, giving them full support against Anderson.’
‘Anderson?’
‘That’s something I did pick up from the radio. I didn’t understand the context but now I do. Bruce Anderson was on, saying that if the Labour Party doesn’t select him this time, he’ll fight the by-election as an independent candidate.’
‘Bastard. It didn’t take him long, but that doesn’t surprise me.’ He scowled. ‘Maybe we’ll have put a spoke in his wheel before then. Maybe we’ll have charged him with murder.’
‘Really?’
‘I wish. Neil’s interviewing him this afternoon, but more as a witness than a suspect.’ He looked at her. ‘Do you have anyone in mind for Aileen as a candidate?’
‘That’s her field, not mine. I’m sure she’ll come up with someone.’
‘How about you?’
Alex gasped. ‘Me? That’s the best laugh I’ve had all day; the first, for that matter.’
‘Who’s joking?’
‘You’d better be.’
‘Why should I be?’ he challenged her. ‘You’re articulate, attractive, very clever, a fine analytical thinker, and you don’t back off from anyone in debate. Plus you’re anti-Trident yourself.’
‘Dad, how do you know that I’m even a member of Aileen’s party?’
He chuckled. ‘I don’t, but whether you are or not, that’s a mere detail. You vote for her; you told me.’
‘Because of her, mostly. Dad, stop it. What’s put this crazy idea in your head?’
‘I’m not sure. Just lately I’ve been a bit concerned about you.’
‘In what way?’ she asked cautiously.
‘Like I say, I’m not sure. How can I put this? Looking at you, I’m not sure that your life is completely fulfilled. You say that you’re totally focused on your career, and I believe you, but I find myself wondering whether these ambitions of yours, to be the world’s youngest partner and so on, come from the heart, or from the drawing board. I want you to be all you can be, love, and I know you do too. I just wonder, your career . . . whether that’s it.’
‘So you want me to stand for Holyrood, to fulfil my subconscious desires, is that it?’ There was a hard edge to her voice.
‘No, no,’ he protested, backing off hurriedly. ‘That was just an idle suggestion, so don’t take it seriously. But it must have dawned on you by now that I think you’re the most talented person on the surface of the planet and that you could achieve anything you set your mind to achieving.’
As she looked at him, he thought for a moment or two that her eyes were a little blurred, but decided that the artificial light in the hall was patchy, and could be playing tricks.
‘A real wee Wonderwoman, eh?’ she murmured. ‘Dad, let me just stick to my career, for I know where I’m going there, and, to be honest, blinded by love as you are, you just can’t see that I’m fuck all good at anything else.’
He gazed back at her, trying to read her, realising that he may have stirred up something that might have been better left alone. ‘Do you want to tell me about it?’ he ventured.
‘No,’ she replied, but realised to her great surprise that she was lying. She really did want to pour everything out so that, as he always did, he could make it better.
‘OK,’ he said. ‘When you do . . . You’re my blind spot, Alex. I’ve built a career out of finding things that people try to hide from me, and I can be a holy terror at it. It doesn’t work with you, though.’
For a moment, she came to the very edge of proving him wrong. And then a voice sounded on the other side of the arrivals hall.
‘Dad! Sis!’
She and her father both turned, and saw running towards them the tanned, sturdy form of James Andrew Skinner, maybe an inch or so taller than when he had left for America six weeks before. They stood and went to meet him, and Alex was reminded of something that perhaps she had forgotten in his absence, that there was someone else who made her life worth living.
Twenty-three
‘What’s this guy’s background?’ asked Sammy Pye.
Neil McIlhenney looked up at the grey stone facade of the Georgian building in
Darnaway Street, the short terrace that links Moray Place to Heriot Row. ‘He’s a doctor from Glasgow.’
‘Even so, this is top end of the market. The man must be minted.’
‘Not necessarily; there are always people buying property like this on huge mortgages and living on baked beans, because they think it’s a good long-term bet. Then the interest rates go up and they have to start counting the beans.’
‘Rather them than me,’ the inspector confessed. ‘I’ll stick to my suburban semi, thanks, and the prospect of actually paying off my mortgage some day.’ He followed his colleague up to the secure front door, and watched as he found the button labelled ‘Anderson’ and pressed it.
‘Yes?’ The answering voice was young, a child’s, and female.
‘Is Dr Anderson at home? This is Detective Superintendent McIlhenney, with Detective Inspector Pye. We’d like a word with him.’
‘Can you wait for a minute, please?’ the girl asked. ‘Daddy,’ the detectives heard her call out.
A few seconds later, a man’s voice replaced hers. ‘I’ve been expecting you people,’ it said sharply. ‘Come up. First floor.’
A soft buzz sounded close to them. Pye pushed the door open and led the way into a tiled hall, lit by narrow glass panels on either side of the entrance and by a cupola above. An unsupported stone stairway, one of those little-regarded engineering masterpieces that are commonplace in New Town buildings, led upwards.
The one-time Secretary of State for Scotland was waiting for them at the entrance to the flat. He was of medium height, but stocky, and his body language shouted impatience at them. The superintendent remembered him from his days in office, and noted that his hair had gone completely grey in the time since then.
‘Come in, come in,’ he said, leading them into a drawing room that would have been elegant with period furniture but in which a modern L-shaped sofa arrangement looked completely incongruous. A slim, auburn-haired, thirty-something woman stood beside the window, with a girl, an eleven-year-old female version of her father, at her side, both of them frowning at the officers as they entered. ‘My partner, Anthea Walters,’ he grunted, ‘and my daughter Tanya. Leave us, please, girls; sit in the study if you’d like.’
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