Quintin Jardine: Skinner's ghosts

You must be thanking your luckiest star that it's a straight, idealistic, career copper like me holding this gun, and not someone like my mate Adam Arrow, who'd kil you in an instant.

'Nod once if I'm right.'

Slowly, the man in the gun-sight nodded.

Behind the carbine, Bob Skinner's face took on a cold, terrible expression as the memory of Leona McGrath's abused, battered, throttled corpse appeared in his mind's eye. 'Wrong, Peter,' he whispered. 'Sometimes life hands you a luxury you can afford.' The red dot swept upwards to the centre of Heuer's forehead.

'Say hel o to Ross for me.' He squeezed the trigger.

Martin and the two children were waiting at the foot of the hil south of the Gully as Skinner reappeared over its crest, after pressing Heuer's pistol into his hand, and squeezing off one shot into the wall beside the window just as Arrow had told him to do.

Mark came running towards him. 'Uncle Bob! Uncle Bob!' he cried out. 'I told Tanya that it'd be al right. I told her that you'd come to get us.'

Skinner swept him up in his arms, and carried him off back down the hil towards Andy and the white-faced, shocked little girl. 'And you were right, weren't you? Just like you always are.'

'Tanya's awful frightened. Uncle Bob.'

' She's had every right to be. So have you, although I don't suppose you were.'

'Well…' Mark began. 'What about the man, Mr Gilbert?' he asked. 'He won't come back, wil he?'

'No, son. Mr Gilbert's dead. I told him not to do anything sil y, but he did and I had to shoot him.'

'You mean he went back into the kitchen for his gun?' Skinner winced inwardly as he was reminded of the child's astonishing memory for detail.

'Yes, that's just the way it was.'

'What'l happen now?'

'Some Army people will come up to take him away.' In fact, he had begun the clean-up process with a phone cal to Adam Arrow, from the cottage.

And then Mark asked the inevitable question, the one which his remarkable young mind had al owed him to block out until then.

'Uncle Bob…' he began. 'What it said on the radio about my mummy. That wasn't true, was it?'

Skinner hugged the boy to him. 'Let's sit down over here, Wee Man,' he said, 'and let's have a chat.'

'Mitch, does your firm handle property sales?'

'No,' said Laidlaw. 'But I can recommend good people. Why?'

'I'm selling the Gullane cottage,' said Skinner.

'You hardly need do that, Bob,' the portly lawyer beamed, 'since the Secretary of State has said that his office would fund your defence costs. He was pretty magnanimous in his statement exonerating you, after the line he took at the start.'

'He was told to be,' said Skinner.

The lawyer shot him a curious look. 'Fine by me,' he said. 'It means I can now add your daughter's time to the fee note with a clear conscience.'

The policeman laughed.

'I was surprised by what he said in the rest of the statement,'

Laidlaw went on, 'that the al egations had proved to be spurious and that there would be no further enquiries.'

'He was told to say that too,' said Skinner, in a way which invited no further discussion of the matter.

'Stil, Mitch,' he went on, quickly, 'despite the outcome, it was pretty hairy while it lasted. Al your input and support was much appreciated, and I thank you for it.'

'Don't mention it. It's good to see you looking so relaxed after it all, and after yesterday's events. You've had no reaction to…' The rest of the question was unnecessary.

Skinner glanced at him. 'To having to shoot Heuer?' He shook his head. 'No. It's a part of the job. Not an everyday part, thank goodness, but part nonetheless. Heuer made his choice when he killed Leona.

Up the crematorium chimney's the best place for him.'

'Was he killed outright?' asked the solicitor, slightly awed by a side of his friend that he had never seen.

'Oh yes. When your brains are al over the wal behind you, everything else tends to stop working.'

Laidlaw shuddered. 'How were the children, afterwards?' he asked.

The policeman grimaced. 'WeeTanya's completely withdrawn. It'll take her a long time to recover I think, if she ever does. I don't envy Bruce Anderson his job as a father. I think he may even resign his office to look after her.

'As for Mark, he's a remarkable and resilient wee boy. But he's still only that: a wee boy, orphaned by violence.'

'What'l happen to him?'

'He's with his grandparents just now, but they're retired. He'll need a different long-term solution. Still, I'm sure that one will be found.'

Laidlaw nodded. 'Let's hope so. Anyway, back to your house: you're serious?'

'Yes. I just fancy a change, somewhere I can build a new set of memories. I plan to sell the Edinburgh house too, and buy another place in Gul ane.'.,,.,

'Ah so we won't be losing you from the Thursday night footbal club.' '

'Shit no. That's my religion.'

'That's good. But after yesterday, I won't be kicking you again, that's for sure.'

Skinner laughed as he rose to his feet. 'Is my daughter available, by the way?' he asked.

Laidlaw shook his head. 'No, she cal ed in and asked for the day off. She said that you and she and Andy had had a stressful time last night, unwinding. I told her I quite understood, and that I'd see her on Monday.

'She did ask me to give you a message, though. She said that a delivery service had been trying to reach you, about a package that's en route to you. She's told them you'll receive it at Fairyhouse Avenue at midday.'

Skinner frowned as he headed for the door of the lawyer's office.

'Delivery service?' he mused, aloud. 'Wonder what the hell that's about? The way my luck's been going lately, this one really will be a bomb.'

The package was explosive in its own way, but it was no bomb. It had arrived before he reached the bungalow.

He smelled fresh coffee in the kitchen as he stepped through the back door. He caught the fragrance of a familiar perfume as he stepped into the hall. He heard the rustle of movement as he turned into the living room.

'Sarah.'

He said her name quietly and calmly, as nervousness, relief and uncertainty struggled for mastery within him.

'Bob.' She replied cool y and cautiously, with no hostility, but with no hint of emotion.

'What…?' he began. 'What do you want? Why have you come back?'

'I've come back for a fight,' she said, her jaw set defiantly, holding her head proud and high, light glinting on her auburn hair.

Within him, uncertainty triumphed over relief. 'Oh my love,' he cried out, sadly. 'I don't want to fight with you. I never did, and I never should have, only I was too big a fool to know.'

She stepped towards him, skirt swinging, stepped right up against him, tal in her high heels, with her hands on her hips. 'I didn't say I was going to fight with you, honey.' She paused, stil without a smile.

'After you called me, to tell me about you and the other woman, and to warn me about the Spotlight stuff, and I gave you that three-month ultimatum; after al that I sat down and I said to myself, "Hold on here a minute, Doctor. Have you ever stopped loving this man, since the day you met him? Would your life ever be the same if you lost him? Are you prepared to let some other lady enjoy your happy ever after?"

'The answers were "No", "No", and "Hell, no!". Right there and then I decided that you were not getting rid of me that easily, with just one phone cal three months down the road.

'I'm here to fight for you, Bob, my love. That's if I have to.' At last, a tentative smile came to her lips, and into her wonderful eyes.

He shook his head as if to clear it, picked her up and pressed her to him. 'Oh but you don't,' he said, hugging her tight as relief, with an overwhelming counter-surge, swept everything else aside. 'My darling, you don't.