Quintin Jardine: Death's Door

‘You’ll be doing seven soon.’

‘What do you mean?’

‘That wee boy through there, mate. He’ll be your height before you know it.’

‘Jesus, man, don’t wish his childhood away.’

‘Sorry. I’m not, really; as a caring godparent, if I could keep him in a time warp of innocence I bloody well would. But life ain’t like that.’ Mario’s face grew dark. ‘I saw an angel today, pal; cut off in her prime.’

‘That’s the job.’

‘Sure. But she had a father too, just like wee Louis.’ He shook his heavy shoulders. ‘Don’t mind me,’ he said. ‘You know it always affects me like this when I visit a murder scene.’

‘Good. I’ll start to worry about you the day it doesn’t.’

‘Yeah. Be sure to tell me, too.’

‘In a loud voice.’ Neil peered into the grill once more. ‘Not long now.’ He opened the microwave and used a glove to lift out the baked yams on the revolving glass tray. ‘The dishes are warming in the oven. Do you want to get them out?’ he asked rhetorically, as he carried them across to a work surface.

‘Sure.’

When the plates were laid out, Neil laid a baked potato on each, slit it open and dropped in a spoonful of mustard mayonnaise, then returned to the grill and waited for the steaks to cook to his satisfaction.

‘Did you brief the big man?’ he murmured casually.

‘Bob Skinner? Of course I did,’ McGuire replied. ‘I’m not daft. I looked in on him before I went back to Edinburgh.’

‘How did he react?’

‘He thanked me, and wished us well with the investigation.’

‘Does he expect daily reports?’

‘No. He never asked.’

‘Jesus!’ McIlhenney gasped. ‘How is he?’

‘Haven’t you seen him?’

‘Not since February. That’s the last time he was at our Thursday-night football; I had to go straight home afterwards, so we didn’t have time to talk. He visited Lou in the maternity, of course, the day after the baby was born; brought him a very generous present. But I was in the office so I missed him. How’s he looking?’

McGuire’s eyebrows rose. ‘Fit as hell. To be honest, I haven’t seen him looking better in years.’

‘Did he say what he’s been up to?’

‘He said, and I quote, that he’d been farting about on some study projects he’s been putting off for years. He was in Toronto during the Easter holidays while the kids were with their mother in Connecticut; he didn’t go into detail, but I got the impression that it might have been job-related. I think he’s been writing too.’

‘So the marriage break-up with Sarah isn’t getting to him?’

‘Why do you ask? You’re closer to him than I am.’

‘Not so close that he pours out his soul to me.’

‘As far as I can see, he’s over it. Who knows? Maybe he’s well out of it. Maybe they both are. Besides, he’s involved elsewhere, isn’t he? The story’s all over town.’

Neil turned off the grill. ‘How do I put this? He’s involved discreetly? No, that isn’t the word: the deputy chief constable doesn’t do discreet very well. Yes, he is, but he’s trying his best to keep it low-key; that just about sums it up. I heard that one tabloid was going to run a feature on him and his new lady, until he phoned the editor and squashed it. Whether it was by threat or blackmail, I don’t know, but neither would surprise me.’

He carried the steaks across and laid one on each plate. ‘Graham Leggatt’s going to have to be careful, I guess. Interviewing some of those Muirfield members will call for a bit of diplomacy.’

‘Not from him. Stevie Steele’s fronting the investigation.’

‘Mmm.’ No more than a whisper. ‘I’ll take the girls’ steaks through to the dining room. You bring the salad.’

‘That’s all right.’ Louise’s voice came from the doorway: she was smiling as she stood there with the big glass bowl in her hands. ‘I’ve got it. And what did I say about talking shop? It’s like telling the sun not to set.’

‘Most times it’s obvious, isn’t it?’ said Detective Sergeant Ray Wilding. His face was pale in the neon light of Edinburgh city mortuary’s observation gallery.

‘What?’

‘Cause of death.’

‘So?’ Stevie Steele challenged.

‘So it doesn’t make any difference. They still go through the whole rigmarole, and it still takes a hell of a long time. I had a victim once; he was brought in here with a knife stuck in his chest, wedged right in his sternum like the sword in the fucking stone, and yet it was four hours before they were done with him. Look at this poor lass. .’

‘The pathologist’s name wasn’t Arthur, was it? Arthur King?’

Wilding stared at the inspector. ‘No, it was Sarah Grace, the DCC’s ex-wife. There isn’t one called Arthur King, is. .’ He broke off, as the point struck home. ‘Very funny. Anyway, as I was saying, look at this lass. She’s got a bullet hole in her head, but you can bet they’ll open her up, take all her bits out. .’

‘Enough, for Christ’s sake!’ Steele protested. ‘I don’t need a commentary. However clear-cut it looks, it’s all necessary. What if they go in there and find the bullet lodged in bone? What if it didn’t kill her, and she died of something else? I read of a politician in Ireland, years ago, who was shot five times in the head and survived.’

‘His brain must have been so small they couldn’t hit it,’ the sergeant growled. ‘What odds are you offering against this girl having died of a gunshot wound?’

‘That’s not the point. The autopsy report goes beyond immediate cause of death because that’s how the procurator fiscal wants it. The Crown has to build a complete case: by the time the thing comes to court there just can’t be any questions that it can’t answer. Look at it another way: it’s an important part of our own investigation; a full examination can throw up all sorts of things that might help us.’

‘Like what? She had sand under her fingernails?’

‘A hell of a lot more than that, Ray, and you know it. Okay, her clothing was undisturbed and there was no sign of sexual assault when she was found, but the likelihood is her killer was known to her; that’s true of most homicides. Maybe they had consensual sex, and maybe he left his DNA inside her.’

‘I hope he did.’ Wilding sighed. ‘We’ve got no clue to her identity so far. She doesn’t match any missing-persons’ reports, and there’ve been no alarms raised in and around Gullane since the news broke.’

‘Early days yet, Sergeant. What’s got into you, anyway? It’s not like you to be so bloody negative.’

‘Don’t mind me, gaffer. Autopsies always get to me.’

On the other side of the glass screen a door opened. Dr Aidan Brown and a similarly gowned colleague stepped into the examination room, where the body of Mario McGuire’s angel lay naked on a steel table.

Steele felt his forehead tighten. ‘And me, Ray. And me.’

Louise McIlhenney looked at Paula Viareggio across the dinner table. Only a few crumbs of cheese remained on the board, and the coffee jug was almost empty. The level of the second bottle of Valpolicella was below the top of the label. ‘I’ve got to hand it to these guys,’ she said. ‘They can do it when they have to.’

Neil jerked his thumb in Mario’s direction. ‘What the hell did he do?’

‘I brought the cheese!’ McGuire protested.

‘You were always at your best with takeaways.’

‘That’s what the bachelor life does for you.’

‘Bachelor?’ Neil laughed. ‘Who are you two kidding?’

‘Most of Edinburgh?’ Paula ventured.

‘You’re not even kidding most of your respective streets. Either your car’s parked at his place overnight or his is at yours.’