Peter Robinson - A Necessary End

"It could have been any of them, couldn't it? Zoe said as much."

"Yes, but she might have said that to get herself and her mates off the hook. I'm thinking of one of them in particular."

"Who?"

"Boyd."

Banks sighed. "I was afraid you'd say that."

"I'll bet you bloody were." Burgess leaned forward so suddenly that the glasses rattled on the table. Banks could smell the Guinness and cigar smoke on his breath. "If we play it your way, there's no getting around the facts. Boyd was missing all afternoon, unaccounted for. We only have his word that he was walking on the moors. I shouldn't think anybody saw him. It would have been easy for him to get in by the side gate and visit Seth while everyone in the house was wrapped up in their own little games. Nothing odd about that. He helped Seth a lot, and the shed would be full of his fingerprints anyway. They talk, and he kills Seth-pushes his head forward to knock him out on the vice, then slits his ankles." Burgess leaned back again, satisfied, and folded his arms.

"All right," Banks said. "I agree. It fits. But why? Why would Boyd kill Seth Cotton?"

Burgess shrugged. "Because he knew something to link Boyd to Gill's murder. It makes sense, Banks, you know it does. Why you're defending that obnoxious little prick is beyond me."

"Why was Cotton so miserable when Boyd was in jail," Banks asked, "and so happy when he came out?"

Burgess lit another Tom Thumb. "Loyalty, perhaps? He knew something and was worried he might be called on to give evidence. He wasn't sure he could carry on with his lies and evasions under pressure. Boyd gets out, so Cotton feels immediate elation. They talk. Cotton tells Boyd what he knows and how glad he is he won't have to testify under oath, so Boyd gets worried and kills him. Remember, Boyd knew he wasn't quite off the hook, whatever Cotton might have made of his release. And you know how terrified the kid is of enclosed spaces. He'd do anything to avoid a life sentence."

"And the note?"

"Let's say you're right about that. Boyd typed it to clear himself, put the blame on someone who isn't able to defend himself. It's a cowardly kind of act typical of someone like him. That explains the pressure on the keys and the literacy level. Boyd wasn't very well educated. He was spending most of his time on the streets by the time he was thirteen. And he couldn't explain anything about Cotton's motives because he killed Gill himself. So," Burgess went on, "even if we see it your way, I still come out right. Personally, I don't give a damn whether it was Boyd or Cotton. Either way, we've cracked it. Which way do you want to go? Toss a coin."

"I'm still not convinced."

"That's because you don't want to be."

"What do you mean by that?"

"You know damn well what I mean. You've argued yourself into a corner. It was your idea to let Boyd out and see what happened. Well, now you've seen what's happened. No sooner is he out than there's another death. That makes you responsible."

Banks took a deep breath. There was too much truth for comfort in what Burgess was saying. He shook his head. "Somebody killed Seth," he said, "but I don't think it was Boyd. For all the kid's problems, I believe he genuinely cared. The people at Maggie's Farm are the only ones who have ever done anything for him, gone out on a limb."

"Come off it! That sentimental bullshit doesn't work on me. The kid's a survivor, an opportunist. He's nothing more than a street punk."

"And Cotton?"

Burgess sat back and reached for his glass. The chair creaked. "Good actor, accomplice, innocent bystander, conscience-stricken idealist? I don't bloody know. But it doesn't matter now, does it? He's dead. It's all over."

But Banks felt that it did matter. Somehow, after what had happened that afternoon, it seemed to matter more now than it ever had before.

"Is it?" he said. Then he stubbed out his cigarette and drained his glass. "Come on, let's go."

Eastvale General Infirmary stood on King Street, about half a mile west of the police station, not far from the comprehensive school. Because the day was warming up nicely, Banks decided to walk. As he left the station, he turned on his Walkman and listened to Muddy Waters sing "Louisiana Blues" as he made his way through the warren of narrow streets with their cracked stone walls, gift shops and overpriced pubs.

The hospital itself was an austere Victorian brick building. About its high draughty corridors hung an air of fatalistic gloom. Not quite the hospital I'd choose if I were ill, Banks thought, fiddling with the Walkman's off-switch in his overcoat pocket.

The mortuary was in the basement, which, like the police station's cell area, was the most modern part of the building. The autopsy room had white-tiled walls and a central metal table with guttering around its edges to channel off the blood. A long lab bench, complete with Bunsen burners and microscopes, stretched along one wall, with shelving above it for jars of organs, tissue samples and prepared chemical solutions.

Fortunately, the table was empty when Banks entered. A lab assistant was in the process of scrubbing it down, while Glendenning stood at the bench, a cigarette dangling from his mouth. Everyone smoked in the mortuary; they did it to keep the stench of death at bay.

The lab assistant dropped a surgical instrument into a metal kidney bowl. Banks winced at the sound.

"Let's go into the office," Glendenning said. "I can see you're a bit pink around the gills."

Glendenning's office was small and cluttered, hardly befitting a man of his stature and status, Banks thought. But this wasn't America; health care was hardly big business, despite private insurance plans. Glendenning took his white lab coat off, smoothed his shirt and sat down. Banks shifted some old medical journals from the only remaining chair and placed himself opposite the doctor.

"Coffee?"

Banks nodded. "Yes, please."

Glendenning picked up his phone and pressed a button. "Molly, dear, do you think you could scrape up two cups of coffee?" He covered the mouthpiece and asked Banks how he liked his. "One black no sugar, and the usual for me. Yes, three sugars, that's right. What diet? And don't bring that vile muck they drink at reception. What? Yes. I know you'd run out yesterday, but that's no excuse. I haven't paid my coffee money for three weeks? What is this, woman, the bloody Inquisition?" He hung up roughly, ran a hand through his white hair and sighed.

"Good help is hard to find these days. Now, Mr Banks, let's see what we have here." He riffled through the stack of papers on his desk.

He probably knew it all off by heart, Banks thought, but needed the security of his files and sheets of paper in front of him just as Richmond always liked to read from his notebook what he knew perfectly well in the first place.

"Seth Cotton, aye, poor chappie." Glendenning took a pair of half-moon reading glasses from his top pocket and held the report at arm's length as he peered down his nose at it. Having done with that, he put it aside, took off his glasses and sat back in his chair with his large but delicate hands folded on his lap. The coffee arrived, and Molly, giving her boss a disapproving glance on the way, departed.

"Last meal about three hours before death," Glendenning said. "And a good one, too, if I may say so. Roast beef, Yorkshire pudding. What better meal could a condemned man wish for?"

"Haggis?"

Glendenning wagged his finger. "Dinna extract the urine, Mr Banks."

Banks sipped some coffee. It was piping hot and tasted good. Clearly it wasn't the "vile muck" from reception.

"No evidence of poisoning, or indeed of any other wounds bar the external. Mr Cotton was in perfectly good health until the blood drained out of his body."