19 - Fatal Last Words

by Quintin Jardine

  ‘Yessir. I’m sorry.’

  The Scot relented. ‘Ah, me too. I shouldn’t have yelled at you. I’m a lousy traveller at the best of times, and I had to pass up the Proclaimers live at the Sydney Opera House to come down here. Where have you taken him?’

  ‘The deceased has been taken to the city mortuary.’ There was still a certain stiffness about Giarratano’s tone as they stepped out of the tent that covered the spot where Henry Mount had fallen. ‘It’s not far away, just across the Yarra River, down in Southbank.’

  ‘And where’s the Yarra River?’

  ‘Federation Square, where we are now, backs on to it.’ He pointed to a large, baroque building on the other side of the street. ‘And that over there, that’s Flinders Street station. It looks pretty good in the daylight.’

  ‘I’ll check it out, if I’m still here when the sun rises.’

  The Australian led the way across the square, to a waiting police vehicle. ‘They’re not doing the post-mortem till tomorrow morning,’ he told McGuire as it moved off. ‘Our pathologist takes the view that they won’t be any less dead after a few hours, or any more.’

  ‘I’m not so sure about the “any more” part,’ the DCS grunted. ‘Check him out after a couple of weeks and see how bloody dead he’ll look then.’

  As the inspector had promised, the mortuary was no more than a couple of minutes away. Their driver used the ambulance entrance and parked in a yard. Giarratano was familiar with the layout; he went straight to an unmarked door and rapped on it, then spoke briefly to the attendant who opened it. He looked over his shoulder. ‘OK, sir,’ he called. ‘Come this way and they’ll bring him out of the fridge for us.’

  Just as well we know when he died, McGuire thought. Refrigeration wouldn’t help determine a time if they needed to.

  The two men were shown into a room. If he had been blindfolded, the Scot would still have known that they were in the autopsy theatre, from the overpowering disinfectant odour. Behind them a double door crashed open, as Henry Mount’s body, on a trolley, was wheeled in.

  The attendant pulled off the covering sheet and they could see that the corpse was still clothed, in jeans, a casual shirt emblazoned with a crest that McGuire recognised as that of Archerfield Golf Club, and a light jacket of smooth black leather. He frowned. ‘Wouldn’t he have been cold in that gear?’

  ‘He’d only just stepped outside,’ Giarratano told him. ‘But it was quite warm for August, this afternoon. He’d just done a panel discussion. The Festival director told me that once they’re finished on stage, the writers go outside to sign books. The desk was set up in the sun, so he’d have been OK.’

  The big Scot leaned forward, examining the dead author’s big head, shaved close by clippers. Bereft of life, the skin of Mount’s face was like parchment, emphasising a faint stubble along the jawline, and it was unmarked, save for an old scar on the chin, a relic of a childhood fall, perhaps. ‘Where’s the wound?’ he asked.

  Giarratano nodded to the attendant, who stepped forward and turned the body on to its side, so that McGuire could see the back of the head. At the base of the skull, the remaining hair had been darkest and there, just at the point where it met the spinal column, was a dark mass of blood, flecked with white chips of bone.

  ‘Indeed,’ he said.

  ‘Quite a shot,’ the Australian murmured, professionally dispassionate, as if he was admiring a display of sporting skill. ‘We don’t have a witness who saw it fired, or who saw the moment of impact, but we think we’ve worked out the spot from where the shot was fired. Our ballistics people reckon the victim must have been bending forward at the time. They reckon it’s a small-calibre bullet, maybe soft-nosed, since it’s still in there. A heavier calibre would have taken half his face off.’

  ‘I can’t fault that thinking,’ the DCS murmured. He raised Mount’s right hand, examined it, nodded, and laid it down again. ‘Tell me, what was he doing when he was killed?’

  ‘According to his publicist, and his Book Festival minder . . . I didn’t get much sense out of either of them, they were both so shocked . . . he’d just signed a book for the last lady in his queue.’

  ‘Yes, but what was he doing?’

  ‘His publicist . . . she’s from Sydney . . . had just handed him a bottle of beer, James Squire’s Pilsner. You should try it while you’re here; bloody good. And he was smoking a cigar.’

  ‘What happened immediately after he went down?’

  ‘The guy from the Book Festival leaned over him, and saw pretty quickly that there was plenty wrong. He ran off inside and found a doctor in no time at all. She felt for a pulse, didn’t find one and started to give him CPR. When she went to tilt his head back to try mouth-to-mouth, she felt the blood at the back, took a look and figured out that he hadn’t done that when he fell. She was pretty good; she took charge until we arrived, and had all the people moved back.’

  ‘There were people gathered around him after he went down?’

  ‘Yes, naturally.’

  ‘Sure, but after you arrived and your crime scene team, what happened?’

  ‘Standard procedures. We roped off the area, covered the body, took photographs from all angles, and began to interview witnesses.’

  ‘Did you do a ground search?’

  ‘Of course. We were looking for a shell casing, until the ballistics guys worked out that any casing must be on the roof of Flinders Street station. By that time it was too dark to search up there; we do that tomorrow morning, first light, before the commuters start to arrive.’

  ‘You’ll be wasting your time,’ McGuire told him. ‘You won’t find any shell casing up there.’

  ‘What makes you say that?’ asked Giarratano, clearly resenting the dismissal of his pet theory.

  ‘My partner, the lovely Paula . . . she has an Italian name too, Viareggio. She’s my guiding light. Your people bagged up everything they found at the scene, yes?’

  ‘Sure they did, sir. It’s all gone to the lab.’

  ‘Do you remember if they found a cigar stub, the one that Mr Mount was smoking when he was shot?’

  The inspector shook his head. ‘I remember that they didn’t. I asked them about it specifically. It must have been blown away by the wind, or carried off on some bystander’s shoe.’

  ‘Neither of those. It wasn’t there.’

  ‘Eh?’

  McGuire sighed. ‘I’ll explain . . . it’s Michael, isn’t it?’ The Australian nodded. ‘But first and foremost, Michael, I’m fucking starving, and if you’ve been working all night you must be too. I’ve got a room in the Grand Hyatt. Let’s go there to check me in, find a place to eat, and then I’ll tell you what happened to Henry Mount.’

  Fifty-eight

  Chief Constable Bob Skinner leaned back in his familiar chair and stared at a less familiar ceiling. ‘Well,’ he whispered, ‘there’s no going back now, young man.’

  He thought back to his recent conversation with Brian Mackie; he was no longer in doubt as to the most momentous day of his career. It had arrived. The call had come at ten past twelve, an invitation to join the Police Board meeting, at Edinburgh’s city council headquarters. When he had entered the room, the first thing that he had noticed was the smile on the face of the chair, Councillor Terence Secombe; that was the only sign he needed. There had been no last-minute upheaval.

  ‘Mr Skinner,’ the councillor had begun, as soon as he had taken his seat, ‘given that you are the only suitable applicant, and that you have qualifying service outside this force within the meaning of the regulations, the Board has decided, unanimously, to offer you the position of chief constable for a period of seven years. As you know, we are required to seek approval of the Scottish Government; that has been given, by the Justice Minister, the matter having been delegated, on personal grounds, by the First Minister. Do you accept the post?’

  He had taken a deep breath, and looked slowly round the table, before replying, ‘Yes, sir, I do.’

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nbsp; And that had been all there was to it. He had lunched with the Board members, and with his predecessor (he could not recall having seen Jimmy look so relieved, or so relaxed), seated next to the chairman. The discussion had been light, mostly about the relative fortunes of Heart of Midlothian and Motherwell football clubs, but at one point Councillor Secombe had leaned close. ‘One thing, Bob,’ he had said softly. ‘During our discussion of your appointment, the only reservation that was raised, by one of the SNP members, concerned your relationship with the First Minister. I don’t need to tell you about the regulation prohibiting serving officers from getting actively involved in politics; all I will say is, watch your back in that respect. Say and do nothing that might compromise you, and make sure that Aileen doesn’t either. When’s the wedding, by the way? It hasn’t gone unnoticed that she’s been wearing a ring.’

  ‘Soon, Terry, soon,’ he had replied. ‘But nobody outside our circle will know about it until after it’s happened.’

  ‘Wise man.’

  Oh, but am I? he thought, making a mental note to change the ugly light fittings in his new office. If I was a target before, through Aileen, what am I now?

  Sir James had stayed with the Board members, but he had declined coffee and had returned to Fettes. The first thing he had done was to tell Brian Mackie, Gerry Crossley and Ruth Pye what had happened. The second was to wheel his chair across the corridor and put the outgoing chief’s big black rocker in its place. The third was to transfer the contents of his safe, his personal records and files, and his computer to their new home.

  He was still contemplating the future when there was a knock on the door and Alan Royston, the force’s media relations manager, was shown in, offering congratulations. Skinner sensed that he was a shade nervous, as relations between them had not always been cordial. He decided to clear the decks. ‘Thanks, Alan,’ he said. ‘I’m looking forward to working with you in the future. What’s first?’

  ‘You should see this release, sir. It’s being issued any time now by the Board, through the city council press office, announcing your appointment, with immediate effect. We’ll have the media on our backs, and I’d recommend getting that over within one hit, by holding a general press conference at four o’clock.’

  ‘Set it up. I’ll wear the deputy’s uniform. The new one won’t be ready for a few days.’

  ‘Do you want Sir James to be there?’

  ‘That will be his decision. But I don’t want the Board chairman, even if he asks to be there. He’s warned me to steer clear of politics; he’s going to find that I’m taking his advice from the off.’

  Fifty-nine

  The restaurant was called Cento Venti. ‘I thought Italian was appropriate,’ said Inspector Giarratano as he led the way into the square dining room, not huge, but crammed with tables, of which half were occupied, ‘and this is the best. Is your hotel room OK?’

  ‘It’s fine, thanks, Michael. I’m sorry I kept you waiting, but I had to check in with Paula. She’s taking this interruption pretty well, and I want to keep it that way. I told her I still plan to be on a plane back to Sydney tomorrow.’

  ‘What about your other investigation in Edinburgh? How’s that going?’

  ‘No arrest, and not even the sniff of one, that’s all I know.’

  The head waiter appeared before them and showed them to a window table. ‘Would you like a drink?’ Giarratano asked, as the man handed them menus.

  ‘I’ll try some of that Squire’s Pilsner, if they have it.’ He glanced at the list. ‘As for food, I’ll have spaghetti the way a whore would make it.’ The Australian’s eyes widened; the waiter smiled. ‘Ah,’ said McGuire, ‘so the name’s just for show. You don’t speak the language.’

  ‘Prego and grazie; that’s my limit,’ the other man admitted. ‘I’ve never been to the northern hemisphere, never mind Italy.’

  ‘Spaghetti alla puttanesca,’ the Scot explained, ‘or any other sort of pasta for that matter. What I just said is what the name of the sauce means, literally. It originated in Naples, and there are a few theories about why it’s called that. One is that it’s a cheap meal that prostitutes could make quickly, between punters, so to speak. Did you know, by the way, that in Italy, brothels were once state owned, which made the hookers civil servants? This place isn’t too precious to have it on the menu. Some are, or if they do they choose to call it “Pasta alla buona donna”, that’s “Good woman’s pasta” in English, but there’s a lot of irony in that name.’

  ‘I better have it too,’ Giarratano decided. ‘It’ll give me bragging rights in the office tomorrow.’

  The head waiter left, reappearing almost instantly with McGuire’s beer, and with a Victoria Bitter for Giarratano, and explaining that since the sauce was freshly prepared, it would take a few minutes.

  ‘That’s fine,’ the big DCS told him. ‘That’s the way it should be.’ He took a mouthful of his lager. ‘You weren’t kidding me,’ he declared. ‘This is damn good.’

  ‘We’re proud of it,’ the inspector replied. ‘Bet you don’t get that in Edinburgh.’

  ‘No, mostly it’s Fosters.’ He smiled at the reaction. ‘I’m serious. We do; that and four X.’

  ‘Edinburgh’s pretty cosmopolitan, is it?’

  ‘Very. I’m a walking example; the half of me that isn’t Italian is Irish.’

  ‘But which are you, mostly?’

  ‘Actually, I’m entirely Scottish. I was born there and brought up there. My parents were both second generation. My Italian grandmother’s still alive; Nana Viareggio, a fearsome old lady.’

  ‘Didn’t you say your partner’s name was Viareggio?’

  ‘It is. We’re cousins; her dad . . . he’s dead now . . . was my mum’s brother. Paula says she carried a torch for me all her life, and that a couple of years ago it finally set fire to my shirt tail.’

  ‘And you?’

  ‘I was married for a few years, to another police officer. It didn’t work out. Finally, I figured out why, and Paulie and I got together.’

  ‘Funny,’ the inspector murmured. ‘I’m married to a cop, and we’re fine. The job didn’t have anything to do with your problems, did it?’

  ‘Not at all. Mags outranked me for most of the time we were together, but that was no big deal. We’re both chief superintendents now, but I suspect she may get ahead of me again, when she goes back to work . . . she’s just had a daughter, by another detective.’

  ‘So that marriage worked; that’s a relief.’

  McGuire’s face darkened. ‘That marriage was perfect, but he was killed on duty.’

  ‘Oh no. I’m sorry.’

  ‘Me too.’ He realised that his beer was finished and signalled the waiter for another. It arrived with the food.

  The two men ate in virtual silence, broken occasionally by questions from the Australian about the visitor’s first impressions of his country.

  ‘I’m told you have a saying,’ McGuire responded, ‘that Sydney’s like your tarty sister and Melbourne’s like your mum. I can see what they mean about Sydney. There’s something else we have to do before I go, so maybe if I’m here long enough tomorrow, I’ll get to see how this place feels.’

  Giarratano waited until they were both finished before going on. ‘So what is it?’ he asked, as the Scot wiped the last traces of the puttanesca sauce from his mouth. ‘This thing we have to do.’

  ‘We need to have a look at the late Mr Mount’s hotel room. Do you know where he was staying?’

  ‘The Festival puts its guests up in the Sofitel, just along the road. Mount’s room’s been sealed, so hopefully no housekeepers will have been in there, touching anything. Are we looking for anything specific?’

  ‘Yes, and this is where I come back to my clever partner. Paula and I are both great readers of crime fiction. The guy who was murdered back home, Ainsley Glover, he was a big favourite of mine. Paulie, she’s read the entire Henry Mount catalogue, and she’s got it filed away in her big brain
.’

  ‘And?’

  ‘I’ll get there, but let me stay with Glover for now. When he was found dead, the first thought was “heart attack”; and that’s what it seemed like until the pathologist took another look and found exactly what had happened to him. But the odd coincidence was that in one of his books, there was a storyline which might have described his death exactly, and it was a murder. He’d been drugged and injected with a fatal dose of glucose, not insulin. He was diabetic,’ McGuire explained. ‘Moreover, after his death, someone broke into his house and stole his computer, with all his work on it.’

  Giarratano’s eyes narrowed; he leaned across the table. ‘Go on,’ he whispered.

  ‘Right. So early this evening I have a call from my mate, my deputy, telling me that Mount is dead in Melbourne and asking me to get down here and report. A scenario of two top Scottish crime writers being bumped off within three days of each other, with no connection between them, strikes us both as highly unlikely. Paula was with me at the time, and when she heard what had happened, she dug into her Mastermind-sized Henry Mount database and remembered something from a book called Havana Death. Before I tell you what it was, I should also tell you that the guy didn’t make it up. He borrowed the idea from things that actually happened, in Vietnam, and other places. In it, there’s this guy, chairman of the US Federal Reserve, who upsets the Mafia. But he’s powerful, and he’s well-protected so they can’t get to him. Then, one night, he’s at home, in his study, behind bullet-proof glass; his wife goes in and he’s dead, shot. Turns out the guy was a cigar smoker, and that he always bought his supply, the same brand, all the time, from the same store. When they examine him, and the forensic people go to work, they discover that one of his cigars was rigged. There was a cartridge inside it, bullet pointing inwards, and when the cigar burned down to a certain point . . . bang!’ He slapped the table and Giarratano jumped.

  ‘Michael, when the pathologist does the post-mortem tomorrow, he’s not going to find a bullet inside the cranium, because what we saw tonight was an exit wound, not entry. On the other hand, he will find traces of burnt tobacco inside the man’s mouth, and in the wound itself. Trust me, these devices exist and they work. The Vietcong used them in cigarettes, thirty years ago, to take out American soldiers. So did the Khmer Rouge, in Cambodia. Simple, nasty, deadly. Your people didn’t find Mount’s cigar butt, because it disintegrated. But if they’d looked, as I did in the morgue, they’d have seen that the first two fingers of his right hand were scorched on the inside from the flash when the detonator was triggered.’