Стюарт Макбрайд - All That’s Dead

‘I’m doing my best.’ He hung up, stuffed his phone away. Shook his head.

Oh, it was easy shouting the odds and making demands from the safety of Divisional Headquarters, wasn’t it? Didn’t see any of them out here trying to actually make a bloody difference.

The duty undertakers emerged from the cottage, carrying a silver-grey plastic coffin. Looked heavy.

What the hell did everyone expect him to do: magic a result out of thin air? ‘Izzy Wizzy, Let’s Get Busy!’ wasn’t going to cut it this time.

Sodding DI Sodding Frank Sodding King. Why did he have to go make everything worse ?

The duty undertakers levered the coffin into their van and clunked the doors shut. Goodbye Haiden Lochhead.

Come on, Logan. Finger out. Let’s go find DI King.

And kick his backside for him.

Hard .

Steel leaned back and draped her elbows over the metal handrail, face turned to the setting sun. Basking in all her wrinkly glory. E-cigarette poking out the side of her mouth, making thin plumes of fruity fog. Pineapple, going by the smell.

Logan scowled down at the river below, where it disappeared under the bridge, its summer-drought level augmented by the high tide. ‘They still there?’

‘Hud oan, I’ll check.’ She tutted a couple of times. ‘So far we’ve got about two dozen journos, five camera crews, and five outside broadcast vans too.’ Another puff of pineapple vapour. ‘I stand corrected — six , outside broadcast vans. That’s Sky News turned up.’

‘Great.’ Logan banged his hand on the railing, setting it ringing like a miserable bell. ‘How could he just disappear?’

Steel shifted, turning so she was next to him, facing the coast. ‘Longest day of the year, today.’

‘Bloody feels like it.’

‘Oh, no, wait, that was yesterday . It’s Friday today?’

Logan straightened up. Risked a glance across the river at the Kilmarnock Arms Hotel, with its besieging horde of the nation’s press. ‘If he’s lying dead in a ditch somewhere...’

A pineapple-scented sigh. ‘Look, there’s bugger-all we can do the now, right? Till we find Kingy, or your car, we might as well go grab a bite to eat. I’m starving, are you starving? I’m starving.’ She pushed away from the railings and wandered off, in the opposite direction to the cameras. ‘Starving, starving, starving.’

How could she even think about food right now?

What if they couldn’t find King? What if Mhari had him? What if—

‘HOY, LAZ: FINGER OUT, EH?’

Logan scrunched up his face. Nodded. Then followed her.

The sky deepened overhead, fading to a heady purple at the horizon. Stars twinkling away out to sea. No sign of the sun, from here — it was hidden behind the old-fashioned Scottish houses that lined the easternmost edge of Boddam — but its light still painted that side of the heavens with pale blue and gold.

‘Come on, Laz, eat up.’ Steel stuffed a chunk of battered haddock in her gob and worried at it. ‘Had to pull strings to get you that. Chippy was meant to be shut.’

She’d parked her MX-5 next to a sandstone shed thing that had a slate roof, a Scottish Water Authority sign, and a view out over the wee bridge to a cheery red-and-white salt-shaker of a lighthouse, gilded and glowing in the setting sun.

Logan picked at a pale-yellow chip. ‘Not really hungry.’

‘Fish supper, pickled onions, tin of Irn-Bru, and a Mars Bar for dessert — all of which I’m claiming on expenses, by the way.’ She popped a chip of her own, chewing with her mouth open. ‘Besides, it’s a beautiful evening. What’s no’ to love?’

‘How about the fact that our colleague might be dead?’

A sigh. ‘You’ve got to compartmentalise, Laz. If you’re full-on, weight-of-the-world, bleeding-heart, troubled-cop-tastic the whole time, all you’re gonna get is ulcers, depression, and an early slot at the crematorium. There’s nothing we can do right now.’ Another chunk of fish disappeared. ‘Might as well keep your strength up.’

‘Not the point.’ He scowled down at his congealing fish. ‘And you can’t claim this on expenses — I paid for it.’

‘Kingy will be fine . Stop wetting yourself: he’s a big boy. He was in the People’s Army for Scottish Liberation, wasn’t he?’

‘Yeah, but—’

‘There you go, then. Mhari Powell’s no’ going to hurt one of her own, is she?’

Logan stared at Steel as she gnawed lumps out of a pickled onion. ‘Mhari Powell literally stabbed her brother in the back.’

Steel frowned. ‘Ah. There is that.’ A shrug. ‘Now shut up. You’re putting me off my chips.’

Steel stamped on the brakes and hauled her MX-5 off the main road and into a potholed car park. It wasn’t huge: only a dozen spaces, each one marked out by logs. A lone patrol car sat sideways across the far corner, blocking the track that led away across the landscape to Slains Castle.

The ruins were visible in the distance, lurking at the end of the world, where the land fell into the North Sea. Broken walls sticking up like jagged teeth. Other than that, the countryside was a lumpy plain. Fields of wheat and grass. A flock of sheep nibbling away in one littered with big round straw bales.

The sun had finally given up on the day, leaving it to the pale-blue glow of twilight as night took hold. Quarter past ten, so they’d have about an hour to search for DI Vanishing Bastard King before they’d have to break out the torches.

Steel killed the engine and scrambled out, Logan following close behind.

A uniformed officer appeared from the patrol car, pulling his peaked cap on. One of Stubby’s Thugs — Greeny, wasn’t it? Mid-twenties, with a hint of quarter-past-ten-o’clock shadow, his hair all floppy on top and buzz-cut at the sides. He nodded at Logan. ‘Inspector.’ Then led the way, down the track, towards the castle. ‘A wee wifie called it in. White Audi, abandoned on a side road about midway between here and Dracula’s house.’

Steel grimaced. ‘That’s at least half a mile. I’m no’ walking all the way over there!’

‘Nah, only about a quarter. Be there in no time.’

Logan caught up with him. ‘When was this?’

‘About fifteen minutes ago? Glen’s gone down the castle to check it out. I stayed here to block stuff: vehicles and that, you know?’

‘Can we no’ drive down instead?’

‘Need the patrol car for a roadblock.’ Greeny pointed over his shoulder. ‘Sergeant Stubbs is on her way. Think we should cordon off all the access points before she gets here?’

Logan nodded. ‘Couldn’t hurt.’

‘Oh aye, because that won’t tip the press off, will it? You’re a pair of morons.’

‘She’s got a point, Guv.’

‘Course I do.’ Steel pulled out her e-cigarette and puffed up a cloud. ‘Let’s see what we’ve got first, eh? Might be nothing. Just cos it’s an Audi, doesn’t mean it’s Laz’s, right? Could be anyone’s.’

They tromped down the track, then up a small hill.

From here, Slains Castle looked more like a ruined country house. A massive tumbledown one, but the big windows and thin walls didn’t have that air of solid, dingy... castliness that Dunottar, Fyvie, and Crathes had.

Logan kept going... Then stopped.

A small lane snaked away off the track to the right, partially hidden by a frozen explosion of brambles. And there, abandoned a hundred yards along it, was Logan’s Audi.

He scuffed his feet down the lane, staring at what was left of his poor car.

All those years wanting a nice car of his own. A proper one. A new one. One where bits of it weren’t held on with duct tape and prayer. And now look at it.