Quintin Jardine - Stay of Execution

‘Boss, it’s Neil. I’m on my mobile, and there are people here, so I can’t talk, but I need you down here straight away. Albert Dock, Leith.’

Interviewing Belgians was not the way that Jack McGurk would normally have chosen to kick off the working week, but the opportunities to escape the office were few and far between. He felt that he had turned an invisible corner with Bob Skinner over the previous few days, but he still welcomed the trip to Haddington with Ray Wilding.

Their interviewees had been waiting for them in the Town House, a public building at the fork of Market Street and High Street. There had been thirty-five of them listed, twenty-two bandsmen, twelve musketeers and the bus driver who had driven them from Brussels. Dan Pringle had also recruited two interpreters, secretaries from the staff of the French Institute in Edinburgh, thanking his stars that he had not needed to find a Flemish translator.

The one name missing from the list was that of Colonel Malou. The head of CID had told the two sergeants that if he needed to be re-interviewed, he would do it himself.

McGurk and Wilding both felt that the interviews were a formality, but neither of them was about to argue with the DCC or the chief super, so they began, splitting the group into two and taking a desk and an interpreter each.

There’s something about them , McGurk thought, as he surveyed the group of men before him. They were all dressed casually, but some wore expensive leisure clothes while others were clad in shirts and jeans that could have come from any Sunday stall-holders’ market in Europe. They sat three or four to a row on the stacking chairs, waiting for their turn to be called to the interview table. But it was the look in their eyes that caught the sergeant’s attention. He had never seen anything quite like it before; he guessed it was the expression he had seen, descriptive of men in warfare, and how they looked after their closest comrade had been blown away at their side, shocked, but with an undisguised element of relief.

He called the first one forward. ‘ Parlez-vous anglais? ’ the interpreter asked. The man shook his head.

‘Did you know Monsieur Lebeau well?’ McGurk asked him, then waited for the translation. The Belgian shrugged, then muttered a reply.

‘Not much,’ his aide translated. ‘He’s been in the band for fifteen years and he was there when he arrived, but they never got close.’

‘Did you all go shopping in Newcastle last Friday?’

‘No. He certainly didn’t. There was little time, he says.’

‘Did you speak to Monsieur Lebeau that day at all?’

‘Only once when he missed a beat. . he was a. .’ The interpreter blushed, then paused. ‘He was not a very good drummer,’ she concluded.

McGurk noted the man’s name and moved on to the next. The result was the same, as was the next, and the next. ‘A waste of bloody time,’ he murmured to his helper, as the fifth man approached. This one spoke English, and gave his name as Bernard Simenon. ‘Same as the writer,’ he grunted.

‘Can you tell me anything about Monsieur Lebeau?’ the sergeant asked him.

‘Barty? There is little to tell. He had his own group within the band, his own friends, but I was not one. He and his lot were ex-military, old bandsmen; I’m an engineer who likes to play the trombone.’

‘That’s funny. Someone said that he wasn’t a very good drummer.’

‘I never noticed, not behind the noise I make. He couldn’t have been that bad, though, or Auguste would have kicked him out.’

‘You don’t call him “Colonel”, then.’

‘I told you, I’m not a soldier.’

‘I don’t suppose you went shopping with Monsieur Lebeau, did you?’

‘When?’

‘On Friday, in Newcastle. We know that’s where he bought the toothpaste that killed him.’

‘I don’t know when he managed to do that. We played at a school in Sunderland in the morning, and then in a big shopping mall in the afternoon. . the Metro Centre, damn big place. What time’s Barty supposed to have bought this stuff?’

‘Just after four thirty.’

‘Impossible, he was still banging his drum at quarter past. We didn’t get to the city till almost five, and then we went to the British Legion club, because Auguste had said it was okay to have just a couple of beers. How sure are you of the time?’

‘It came from the till in the shop; every transaction’s recorded.’

‘Then its clock must be wrong.’

McGurk frowned, and made a note on his pad. ‘It’s possible,’ he conceded. ‘I’ll have it checked.’ He glanced up at the trombonist. ‘Your beer’s on the ration, is it, Monsieur Simenon?’

‘It is for this trip. Our little colonel wants us marching in straight lines before the Holy Father: but he’s not alone, for we all want that. I cannot tell you how great an honour this is for us, or how great a surprise it was when we were invited. It’s a mystery almost worthy of my namesake. I asked Auguste if he knew the reason, but all he did was shrug his shoulders and tell me I should take it as a gift from God.’ The Belgian frowned. ‘But if it is, then since He gave it to us He’s clearly had second thoughts.’

‘I wouldn’t blame Monsieur Lebeau’s death on God,’ said McGurk, quietly.

‘You say that,’ Simenon exclaimed, ‘but coming on top of poor Philippe. .’

‘Who’s Philippe?’

The man stared at him across the table. ‘Philippe Hanno. Who else?’

‘I’m sorry, that name means nothing to me.’

The Belgian’s face took on an agitated expression. ‘It means everything to us,’ he shouted. ‘I cannot believe you can say that.’

‘But why?’

‘Because Philippe Hanno was knocked down and killed in England, in Hull, by a drunk driver. They still haven’t found him.’

It was Jack McGurk’s turn to stare. ‘You’re not kidding me, are you?’

‘Why would I do that?’ Simenon protested.

The sergeant shoved his chair violently back from the heavy table. ‘Ray!’ he bellowed across the hall.

A security guard tried to stop Skinner’s BMW as it swept through the entrance to the Leith docks complex. He flashed his warrant card at the man and drove on, barely slowing his road speed. He had no idea where the Albert Dock was, but he followed signs until, on taking a left turn, he saw a temporary screen by the waterside, and knew that he had reached his destination.

He swung off the roadway and pulled up alongside Neil McIlhenney’s car, which was parked between a patrol vehicle and an ambulance. Its rear doors were open and its paramedic crew sat inside, their life-saving skills clearly not needed.

The DCC stepped out on to the dock, glad of his heavy jacket in the November cold, and walked behind the big green screen, past the two uniformed constables who stood guard, bracing himself for what he would see. He hated moments like these, but did his best to keep that to himself.

The first person he saw was not McIlhenney, but Mario McGuire. The big superintendent’s back was turned to the thing on the ground, beneath the tarpaulin, but the look on his face told Skinner everything he needed to know and confirmed the conclusion to which he had leaped following the guarded call that had brought him there.

‘Fuck,’ he whispered to himself, as he approached.

McIlhenney heard his footstep and turned. ‘Boss,’ he began.

‘It’s the American, yes?’ the DCC asked brusquely.

His colleague nodded. ‘I’m afraid so.’

‘What happened?’

It was Mario McGuire who answered. ‘He’s drowned himself,’ he told him, in an anguished voice.

‘Easy, big fella,’ Skinner murmured, stepping up and taking the superintendent by the elbow. ‘You’ve been close to Inspector Mawhinney for the last couple of weeks, maybe too close to be here.’