Quintin Jardine: Skinner's rules

From that moment on, their relationship, new though it was, had fitted around them like a well-worn pair of good leather gloves, and soon it had seemed as if it had always been. As it had developed, they had discovered the bonuses. They both loved movies, and shared a secret enjoyment of TV soap operas. Their tastes in music were wide and complementary. They played squash well together, and Sarah’s golf was competent enough for them to reach the quarter-finals of the Golf Club mixed four-somes. But best of all the plusses for Sarah had been the friendship she had developed with Alex. There was nothing step-parental in tone about it. Alex was a mature lady for her years, and they had become solid, steadfast adult friends.

Marriage was not discussed. Sarah, having been engaged once, painfully, had no desire to rush back into that state. And in any event, it had hardly seemed necessary.

Their relationship, as they had agreed early on, was never discussed at work. But equally they had agreed that they would make no elaborate attempts to hide it. Her years in New York City had taught Sarah the value of privacy, but she realised that Edinburgh was a village by comparison, where secrets guarded too jealously rarely kept safe for long. And Andy Martin was too good a detective and too close to Bob not to have happened early upon the truth.

He had soon begun to notice his boss disappear more often at lunchtime than was natural for him, and had noticed too the new air of relaxation which he wore at work. However, when he had stumbled on the secret it had been by accident, calling in at Gullane one Sunday morning, with his wind-surfer strapped to the roof of his car. It was 11.00 a.m. The boss never, ever, slept late.

‘Hello, Andy,’ the big tousled figure in the blue silk dressing gown had said as he opened the door. ‘You’ll have had your breakfast, then?’

And he had called into the kitchen. ‘Come on out, love, it’s the polis!

So Andy had been admitted into the secret circle, and when the two had disappeared together in July heading for L’Escala on the Costa Brava, where Bob had a small apartment, he had said not one word to encourage the one or two who remarked on the coincidence of the Big Man and the Young Doctor being on holiday at the same time.

July was a fond memory, and on that dark November morning it was still summer for Skinner and Sarah Grace, even as they drove into Edinburgh on their grim business.

On the road, Skinner repeated Andy’s message, to prepare her for what she would see. He could sense her shudder in the passenger seat beside him. Nevertheless when they arrived at the scene of the murder, she was all professionalism. She approached the black thing huddled in the doorway, despite a combination of nauseating smells of squalor, abuse, decay and destruction.

She gave Skinner a running commentary as she worked. ‘Almost total immolation by fire of the front part of the body. It’s definitely male, but God knows what the age might be. It’s hard to tell, because of the reaction to fire, but the hands look as if they were heavily arthritic. If that’s the case, it would have been difficult, if not impossible, for this poor lump to strike a match.’

Martin broke in, ‘In any event, look at this.’

Skinner followed his pointing finger and saw a five-litre Duckham’s oil can which stood against the damp wall of the close. It was still possible to see where the fire had been started and to follow its course to the corpse, across the scorched flagstones.

‘No doubt about it, is there? Who found it?’

‘Young couple in a passing car. She saw the flames. The bloke had a fire extinguisher in the car. He put it out, but the poor bugger was a cinder by then. No reported sightings, but there were fewer people about than usual on a Saturday morning. The punters must be saving up early for Christmas.’

Skinner nodded in agreement. ‘We’ve got no reason to believe that there’s a connection between this and the Mortimer affair, but two murders in two closes in the same week is a Hell of a big coincidence In any case I don’t want us to be accused of trying less hard for a wino than for an advocate, so let’s repeat everything we’ve done so far in the first one.

‘Let’s go up to the High Street office. Come on, Doctor, I’ll treat you to breakfast.’ He handed Martin a five-pound note. ‘Here, Andy, you’re a detective. See it you can detect some bacon rolls and coffee on a Saturday morning.’

The Edinburgh media were less equipped to handle a murder story on a weekend morning. Nevertheless, Skinner knew that the tip-off machine would make it necessary for him to issue a short-notice statement. The journalists who turned out to High Street at 9.30 a.m. were a mixture of freelances and evening and Sunday paper writers. There was no sign of television, but the diligent Radio Forth was present.

Roger Quick of the Evening News asked the only question after Skinner’s brief factual statement. It seemed that no one, certainly not the Scottish weekend public cared too much about an incinerated wino. ‘When do you expect an identification, Mr Skinner?’

‘Quite frankly, Roger, I don’t know. Some of these poor people can’t remember their own names, far less those of the people around them in the hostels.’

And that was how it turned out. The body was too badly burned to be identifiable, and without a photograph, or any distinguishing feature, it was impossible to conduct a productive enquiry among the city’s alcoholic drop-outs. The hostel wardens agreed to check on absentees from their usual list of guests, but none were hopeful.

Thousands of questions were asked, but no leads uncovered. The charred corpse remained stubbornly anonymous over the weekend.

On Monday morning, Skinner anticipated press requests and called a news conference to report no progress in either case, and to renew his request for assistance from the general public.

Douglas Jackson of Radio Forth asked for an interview. ‘Chief Superintendent, do you believe that there is any connection between last week’s two Royal Mile killings?’

‘There is no proof of that at all. But I’ve been a policeman for a long time, and I have learned to mistrust coincidences.’

A few minutes later, Skinner sat at his borrowed desk in the old High Street office, studying once more the papers in the two cases. Professor Hutchison had worked hard over the weekend to complete his examinations of both bodies. His notes were extensive. ‘Yes,’ they read, ‘it is possible that the bayonet found at the scene of the crime could have inflicted Mr Mortimer’s injuries, if wielded by someone of sufficient strength and expertise. However there is no physical evidence to confirm this, no blood, bone, or tissue adhering to the blade.

‘In the second case, this unfortunate man died from shock as a result of immolation. However his physical condition was so low that the least exertion might have killed him. Had the man been compos mentis at the time it is possible that he could have beaten out the flames. I should have thought it impossible to categorise the crime from the circumstances. One cannot rule out the possibility that this was a youthful prank which went terribly wrong.’

‘Bollocks!’ Skinner shouted to the empty room. ‘The poor bastard was doused in high performance lead-free and set alight. Not much bloody room for error there.’

He looked at the two files. Where to go from here? One man on the threshold of an outstanding professional career, the other in the poorest state to which it was possible to decline in society. Each killed, savagely, in the same week, not three hundred yards apart. That was a link, if nothing else, and experience was shouting at him that there had to be others.