Quintin Jardine - Stay of Execution

‘Certainly not. They are private; available only to the Belgian military.’

‘What? A colonel, a sergeant and a corporal who were, according to you, clerks and scene-shifters for the bulk of their careers? They’re state secrets?’ His expression as he looked at the Belgian was pure derision. ‘I’ll tell you, chum, you’re another square peg in a round hole. For a spook you’re not very good at it. You’ve had orders to pat me on the head and send me away with a smile on my face. You’ve failed, big-time. I came here with suspicions, and you’ve turned them into certainties.’

He turned to Arrow. ‘Can we get out of here, or is he going to try to detain me until I promise to stop making waves?’

‘Come, come,’ said Winters, trying to recover some dignity and a degree of control. ‘Of course you can leave. Your car is still at your disposal. It will take you to the airport.’

‘For the first time in my life,’ said Skinner bitterly, ‘I find myself looking forward to seeing that place.’

Normally, visits by the chief constable to the outposts of his empire were announced in advance. Sir James Proud did not believe in dropping in casually to divisional headquarters, or to any of the outstations. To some that would imply that he was trying to catch them off guard, and might damage their trust in him. Trust, given and received, was the foundation of his office, and it had seen him through a successful career that was now approaching its conclusion.

Thus, when he swept through the entrance of the Queen Charlotte Street police office, it came as no surprise to the young constable behind the public counter, or to Chief Superintendent Stockton Day waiting in front of it in his pristine uniform, or to Detective Superintendent Mario McGuire, standing beside him, jacketless, a pen clipped into the pocket of his white shirt. They had been alerted in a phone call from his secretary, as he had left Fettes.

Two men followed him into the building; one was in NYPD uniform, while the other, slightly younger, wore a grey tailored suit and a grim expression.

‘Good morning, gentlemen,’ the chief exclaimed. ‘We didn’t need the welcoming committee but thank you anyway.’

As he spoke McGuire and Nolan Donegan nodded to each other, reached across and shook hands. ‘You know each other?’ Sir James asked.

The superintendent nodded. ‘Yes, sir. Colin Mawhinney introduced us when he took me on a tour of some of the precinct offices. Sorry it’s like this, Nolan.’

‘Me too, Mario, me too.’

The chief constable introduced the two Americans to Chief Superintendent Day. ‘I thought it right,’ he said, ‘that they should come straight to the heart of the investigation. Is DI McIlhenney in?’

‘Yes, sir,’ McGuire replied. ‘He’s in the office he’s using. I told him I’d bring you through when you arrived.’

‘Shall I organise refreshments, Chief?’ asked Day.

‘I’d appreciate that.’ He turned to the Americans. ‘How about you, gentlemen?’

Donegan nodded. ‘To be truthful, I’m flagging after that flight. I’d welcome some coffee.’ He turned to his colleague. ‘Eli?’

The crew-cut lieutenant seemed to stand even more stiffly than before. ‘No, thank you. I should check in on the investigation right away.’

As Donegan and the chief were led away by the divisional commander, McGuire showed Huggins through to the CID suite. ‘Good trip?’ he asked casually.

‘No,’ the American replied curtly.

McIlhenney saw them coming through the glass panel in the door of the cubicle that McGuire had described as his office; he rose from behind his desk and opened it for them, then introduced himself to the visitor. ‘Eli Huggins, Lieutenant, Internal Affairs Bureau, NYPD,’ the man replied shortly.

Name, rank and serial number , thought McGuire. He sees us as the fucking enemy .

‘Who’s the senior investigating officer?’ asked Huggins.

‘I am.’ McIlhenney was always amiable; but on occasion it was a little forced.

‘You are? Maybe I misunderstand your ranking structure here, but isn’t a superintendent superior to an inspector in your force?’ He turned to McGuire. ‘And are you, sir, not the divisional detective commander here?’

‘Well done, you’re right both times.’

‘In that case, sir, I have to tell you that I do not believe that my chief of detectives would approve of command of this investigation being delegated to a junior officer.’

‘Nor would he approve of me walking into his office and telling him how to do his job. You’re not going to be a fucking seagull, are you, Eli?’

‘What’s a seagull?’

‘It’s a name the managers of American-owned companies in Scotland sometimes give to the guys from head office. It means that they fly in from far away, make a lot of noise, shit all over you and then fly away again. The story is that the man at the top of our chain of command has decided that it would not be appropriate for me to command this one. Colin and I became good friends in the time we knew each other. .’

‘You mean your objectivity is in doubt?’

‘I mean I’m a potential witness to his state of mind.’

‘There is another reason,’ said McIlhenney quietly. ‘When these people are apprehended, we do not want to have them carried into court by paramedics.’

‘It’s my Italian blood,’ McGuire added. ‘Makes me excitable; that and my Irish blood.’

Huggins showed his first sign of loosening up. ‘Don’t you have Scots blood to calm you down?’

‘Nope. Fifty per cent Wop, fifty per cent Mick, that’s me.’

‘With breeding like that you’d be Commissioner of Police in New York.’

‘I doubt that, very much. I’d probably be at war with myself over control of a labour union.’ He reached out to open the door. ‘I’m going to leave you guys alone, now. By the way, Lieutenant, Neil isn’t on my staff, so I haven’t delegated anything to him. He’s Special Branch.’

‘Is that something like me?’

‘If you mean that you’re both secret policemen, I suppose he is. But that’s as far as it goes.’ He left the room with a smile.

‘Take the weight off your feet,’ said McIlhenney, as the door closed, ‘and tell me why you came in here like a man with a thistle up his arse.’

‘I’m sorry,’ said Huggins, as he accepted the first invitation. ‘Before I left I had an interview with my boss and his boss. They both explained to me what the personal consequences would be if any of the information I’m carrying got into the public domain.’

‘That’s good man management.’ The big inspector chuckled.

‘Maybe, but I can understand why.’

‘Are you telling me that your man Mawhinney was bent?’

‘Absolutely not. There was no straighter officer on our force.’

‘What’s the story, then?’

‘I’ll get to that,’ said the New Yorker, ‘but maybe you could bring me up to speed on your investigation.’

‘Sure.’ McIlhenney ran him through everything they had, detailing all of Mawhinney’s movements since he and McGuire had arrived for the second leg of the exchange visit, and ending with Spoons’s statement, and the search for a single Land Rover among over a hundred thousand vehicles.

‘He wasn’t forced into the automobile?’

‘Not according to the witness statement,’ the inspector repeated. ‘He stopped, there was a period of communication with the people inside, then Colin got in himself, and the vehicle drove off. Next morning he was found in the dock.’

‘Do you think he was meant to be found?’

‘It is only an opinion, you understand, but I don’t. If he was, why bother taking him there? Why not just dump him in the river, or in one of the lochs in Holyrood Park? He was weighted down and dropped in deep water. It was a pure accident that the chain snagged and he didn’t go to the bottom. He wouldn’t have stayed there for ever, but I reckon the thinking was that he’d be down there long enough to fuck up the forensics.’ He looked up. ‘So what have you got?’