Quintin Jardine - Stay of Execution

‘Mr Rossi called,’ the sergeant replied, ‘to say the information you requested will be with you first thing tomorrow. DI McIlhenney phoned. He says he needs to see you tonight; he asked me to call him back to confirm as soon as your plane touched down. DCS Pringle rang as well. He said that Stevie Steele’s got an investigation under way that might need your personal involvement, some time soon.’

‘That’s all I need, Jack.’ He groaned. ‘Did he say what he wanted?’

‘No, sir; he said it was essential, that’s all.’

‘If he said that, it is. Is there a car waiting for me outside the airport?’

‘There better be. I ordered it.’

‘Okay. Tell Neil six o’clock.’

He ended the call then dialled Aileen de Marco’s number. ‘Hello,’ she exclaimed breezily. ‘You are calling to tell me you’re going to make it this time, aren’t you?’

‘Yes, it’s okay. I’ll pick you up at seven fifteen as arranged, yes?’

‘No, just go straight to the club. I’ll be ready to leave in half an hour so I’ll take a taxi, and wait for you there, away from the phones.’

‘Fine. See you there.’

Two constables and a Traffic car were waiting outside as he walked through the main door into the cold November evening. They came to something approaching attention as they saw him. He waved them into the car and slid into the back seat, then checked the time: five thirty-five. ‘Blue-light it if you have to,’ he said. ‘I must be in my office before six.’

He made it to Fettes with ten minutes to spare, and was in his chair, looking out of the window, as Neil McIlhenney’s car rolled up the driveway. His eyebrows rose slightly when he saw that there was a man in the passenger seat.

He was waiting in the corridor when McIlhenney led the crew-cut stranger upstairs; as he ushered them into his room, he asked the inspector, quietly, ‘Do we need anyone else?’

‘Absolutely not,’ his friend replied.

Leaving his visitors for a moment, Skinner went along to his assistant’s office and told him that he could go home. When he returned to his office McIlhenney and the other man were standing in front of his desk.

‘Boss,’ the DI began, ‘this is Lieutenant Eli Huggins, from NYPD Internal Affairs Bureau. He’s got a story that nobody else needs to hear.’

The DCC looked at him; he seemed wound up tight. He smiled at him then reached out and shook his hand. ‘You can tell it sitting down, then, Eli. How long have you been in Scotland?’

‘Since eight thirty, sir.’

‘And in all that time has anyone offered you a beer?’

‘No, sir, they have not.’

‘Bloody disgraceful,’ Skinner muttered. He stepped round to his fridge and took out a bottle of Becks and two Cokes, all uncapped. ‘I’m driving, so I won’t. Neil used to be a fat bastard, so he won’t. But you get outside that, and tell me all about it.’

Huggins’s bottle was empty half-way through his story: the DCC stopped him and fetched him another, then listened until he was finished.

‘Let me be clear on this,’ he asked. ‘Your police commissioner wants me to close down this inquiry to avoid opening a can of worms and having them crawl all over his office. Is that it?’

‘I’m not allowed to ask you to do that, sir. My instruction is to explain the situation to you, to try to make you see how much damage might be done to the reputation of NYPD, and then to ask how far your discretion extends.’

Skinner looked at him. ‘I can see the problem,’ he said. ‘If all our skeletons came out the cupboard we’d all be fucked. However, my problem is that a murder has been committed on my patch, and I am legally bound to pursue it to a conclusion. I’m also under media scrutiny, and that is something which, clearly, you understand.’

Huggins nodded, grim-faced; he looked ready to empty Skinner’s fridge.

‘So this is what I’ll do. You’ve given me information that tells me who Colin Mawhinney’s murderers may have been. Do you have recent photographs of these people?’

‘I have them with me, sir.’

‘Then please let Neil have them. The game is easier if we’re looking for a hired Land Rover; there are damn few of them around. We will show these photographs around the rental companies and the airports. If we can identify Salvona and Falcone, and show definitely that they were here, and had such a vehicle, then even if we never discover where Mawhinney was killed, we’ll have a basis for prosecution.’

Skinner smiled. ‘What we won’t have are Salvona and Falcone locked up. Extradition of a non-US citizen from the States to this country is pretty easy. Extradition of a US citizen is not. So if we get to that point, to save our public purse the cost of long-drawn out hearings. . which would be reported and which might prove prejudicial to an eventual Scottish trial. . just to get them over here, I’d be prepared to recommend to our prosecutors that they turn the evidence over to you. In other words, Eli, if those circumstances arose, I’d be prepared to pass the buck. There would be one proviso: if your DA did pluck up the courage to put them on trial, there could be no death sentence. We couldn’t have that. Does that sound like a deal?’

A smile of pure relief spread over the lieutenant’s face. ‘It does, sir.’

‘That’s good,’ said Skinner. ‘I want to help, but it’s as far as I could go.’ He laughed as he rose to his feet. ‘Of course, if it turns out that Bonnie and fucking Clyde were in Florida after all, you will let us know, won’t you?’

‘That’s a deal also, sir.’

The DCC walked them to the door and, as it closed behind them, glanced at his watch. It showed five minutes to seven. He ran his hand over his stubbled chin, then, decision made, went through to his bathroom. Twenty minutes later, showered, shaved, and dressed in the last of the supply of fresh clothes that he always kept in the office, he headed downstairs to his car.

The worst of the evening traffic was over; there were no hold-ups on his way to the West End, and when he had made the complicated turn past the Caledonian Hotel, he found a parking space without difficulty. He was standing in the hallway of the Scottish Arts Club, an unostentatious terraced house on the north side of the quiet, leafy Rutland Square, when he realised that he had not called Sarah since the night before. He was reaching into his pocket, when Aileen de Marco, blonde hair immaculate, her white blouse looking as fresh as his shirt, came through a doorway to his left. He withdrew his hand and shook hers instead.

‘Almost right on time, Bob,’ she said, with a smile. ‘Only twenty-four hours late.’

As she led him into the club’s sitting room, he felt a strange flutter; he paused for a few moments, wondering if his pacemaker was kicking into action, but it passed and he followed her to a table near the window, with armchairs on either side, and a bottle of white wine in an ice bucket sitting on it. Two long-stemmed glasses stood beside it; one was half-full.

As he sat, she picked the bottle up and filled the second glass. ‘Chardonnay,’ she said. ‘Call me a prole if you want, but I like it.’

‘Me too,’ he confessed. ‘But I’d better keep an eye on it. I have a car outside. So,’ he asked, ‘how are you finding your new job?’

‘Much like my old one as deputy minister; but the salary’s better, the car’s a bit flashier and. .’ She flashed him a quick twinkling smile. ‘. . I get access to all the secrets. Imagine!’

‘That’s good. It means you’ve passed your vetting.’

She looked surprised. ‘I was never vetted for the job.’

Skinner laughed. ‘You don’t know all the secrets, then.’

The minister whistled quietly. ‘Me too? I’m beginning to get an idea, though.’