Quintin Jardine - Thursday legends

'Now who the hell's she, I wonder?' the Sergeant whispered, under his breath.

'Bit on the side? Lucky him if she is.'

'He doesn't fancy it today, then; even from this far away, he does not look like a happy man.'

Their target stood stiffly, facing the girl. His voice was raised as he spoke to her, for fragments of incomprehensible sound seemed to drifted across on the light breeze. She was in no way intimidated; instead she stared at him, eyes bright, lips moving in a retort. All at once, Luke Heard seemed to slump down into himself. He reached into his pocket, took out the packet which he had brought from the car, and shoved it roughly down the front of her overalls. Then he turned on his heel and walked away, back down the rise. McGurk and Wilding watched him, all the way back to the car park.

'What the fuck d'you think that was about?' the Constable exclaimed as they watched him slide back into the Jaguar. i don't know, Ray,' McGurk answered. 'But I think we should find out.'

'Will we brace the girl?'

'Not without checking with Dan Pringle; we don't want to blow our surveillance of Heard just yet. She works here. We can find out who she is, and talk to her any time we like.'

'I've just remembered who she is, Jack,' said Wilding, quietly. 'I recognise her from this distance, even if you don't; you and I took a statement from her the Saturday before last. She's the girl who spotted Howard Shearer in the Water of Leith.'

Skinner put down the telephone and stared out of the conservatory, across the wide Firth of Forth. There was something unsettling about Lennie Plenderleith; even when he spoke to the man by telephone, as he just had for the first time in his life.

Big Lennie, when he was Tony Manson's first lieutenant, had maimed or murdered God knew how many people; later, after his mentor's death he had taken revenge in savage and terminal fashion. He had even tried to kill Skinner himself.

And yet, in spite of it all, against all logic, he found himself liking the giant in Shotts Prison. 'Why?' he asked himself, yet inwardly he knew the answer. In his own way, Lennie understood the meaning of loyalty and obligation as well as anyone he knew and had practised them, even though it had led to his imprisonment for life.

Those were the virtues which Bob Skinner valued above all others and if, in Plenderleith's case, these were accompanied by awesome, pitiless violence when he perceived it to be necessary… the DCC knew that the same streak ran through him. They came from different backgrounds, they had taken different paths through life, yet as Skinner sat in his comfortable home, he wondered whether, had their circumstances been reversed, it might have been him who had ended up in a cell.

Forcing himself to shove the thought to one side, he picked up the phone again, dialled the Torphichen Place police office and asked for Detective Superintendent Pringle.

'Afternoon, sir,' said the veteran as he came on line. 'Did you get anything?'

'Yes, Dan, but nothing that's going to take you forward. I had the Governor bring Lennie to the phone and I asked him about his meetings with Luke Heard. He assured me that the two of them only ever talk business. Heard gives him a quarterly report detailing the performance of every investment in the trust portfolio; Lennie looks at it and makes a few off-the-cuff comments. Later, once he's had a chance to study it at leisure, he writes to him with more detailed instructions.

'There's never any small talk. The big fella told me that he doesn't like Heard; he thinks he's a nasty piece of goods. He only does business with him because the Diddler turned him down.'

'So Lennie had something against Shearer himself,' Pringle commented.

'Don't clutch at straws, Daniel. He understood Diddler's position and he still respects it.'

Pringle could not restrain himself. 'Do you believe all that, though? I mean, the man's a fuckin' murderer.'

Skinner chuckled. 'As someone once said, it doesn't make you a bad person. Seriously though; Lennie has never once told me a lie. Fact is, I doubt if he's ever told a lie in his life. Take it from me, he did not do Heard any favours, or drop him any hints, accidentally or otherwise.'

'Aye okay, sir,' the Superintendent conceded, wearily at first, until his voice changed. 'I suppose one bit of luck's all I can hope for in a day.'

'What d' you mean?'

'I just had a call from the diving team. They've found the Did- Mr Shearer's organiser thing in the river, just downstream from the house. No sign of the watch yet, though.'

'Bugger the watch! You give that lap-top to our technical people; with a bit of luck, there'll be retrievable data on it.'

'It's already on the way to them. I'll give you a call if we get a result.'

'Do that, but keep Andy informed first; everything goes through him.'

As he hung up, he glanced across at Martin, who was seated opposite. 'Did you get that?'

'Diddler's diary?'

'Possibly, unless it's goosed.'

'Our day for the high-tech, isn't it?'

'Seems to be. Go and get Maggie and Mario for me, will you? You understand why I didn't want them in the room while I spoke to Lennie? It would have been a breach of confidence, in a way, to have them listening in.'

'Sure.' Martin paused. 'Tell me something. Do you ever regret not just standing aside that night and letting him walk out of there?'

Bob shook his head. 'Never. Not for a second. Sod the guys that he did in; they were crooks and murderers. But he killed his wife, Andy; he cut her throat, and he had to pay for that.'

The Head of CID left the conservatory, returning quickly with Rose and McGuire at his heels. The Inspector was carrying Alec Smith's computer, while his wife held the strongbox full of photographs.

'Hi, folks,' said the DCC, pushing himself halfway up from his chair as they entered. 'Sorry to keep you waiting; I had something to take care of. We can get on with it now, though, in peace and quiet too; Mark's at school, and Sarah's up at Edith Shearer's with the other two.

'So what's the big mystery? What's this that Andy and I both have to see?'

'Dynamite, Boss,' McGuire, the junior officer in the room, answered. 'Sheer bloody dynamite. As DCI Rose told you on the phone, the late Mrs Smith's Co-op number paid off. We got into the safe, and we found this lot. Once we got into it, we realised that you had to see it.'

'Okay,' said Skinner, 'let's have it then. How's the battery?'

'Fully charged. I switched it on as we were coming through.' He handed the lap-top over, raising the screen as he did so.

The DCC looked at the small keyboard. 'Fiddly thing this. Our Mark's the boy for these.'

'You wouldn't want him to see what's on there.'

'Let's have a look then.'

He looked at the listed folders and clicked open the one marked, 'John'. He hit on the first name at once. 'Barnfather. The old judge?' he asked, glancing up at McGuire, who nodded. As he glanced down the list of names, one jumped out at him. 'Topham? Is that Marcia Topham, the Police Committee woman?'

'The same' Rose murmured.

He opened the first file, and read his way through it. As he finished, the DCI handed him the first envelope of photographs; he hissed with distaste as he looked through them, then handed them to Martin and opened the next file. Slowly, carefully, and silently, he read his way through all twenty-seven numbered files and examined all twenty-seven envelopes.

The twenty-eighth file was headed, 'Report'. Skinner clicked it open and gasped. 'Bloody hell! This is addressed to the Lord President.' The document which showed on the computer screen was headed:

Private and Confidential.

Lord Murray of Overstoun, Lord President of the Court of Session.