Стюарт Макбрайд - 22 Dead Little Bodies and Other Stories

If anything, Steel had got louder.

On the other end of the phone, Detective Constable Stone picked up. ‘Guv? You forcing bagpipes up a cat’s bum in there?’

Logan put a finger in his other ear. ‘Stoney: where are we with Chris Browning?’

‘Give us a chance, shift hasn’t even started yet. Still waiting for the computer to boot up.’

‘Soon as it does, get onto uniform — I want an update on my desk by five past ten. Then we’re doing the briefing. And tell Wheezy Doug he’s on teas.’

‘Guv.’

Steel got to the big finale, and finished with her arms outstretched and head thrown back, as if she’d just finished running a marathon. Making hissing noises to mimic the crowd’s applause. ‘Thank you, Aberdeen, I love you.’ Then let her arms fall at her side. Pursed her lips. And had a scratch. ‘Pffff... What do you think, landslide?’

Logan clicked the handset back into its cradle. ‘Don’t you have a murder or something to solve?’

‘Did it yesterday, while you were off. Had a cake to celebrate and everything.’ She creaked the chair left, then right again. ‘Bit quiet today, to be honest. I’ve got a Major Investigation Team with nothing major to investigate. Going to have to drag something out of the cold-case file if we’re not careful.’

‘Then go do something about that guy from Edinburgh who got the crap beaten out of him.’

‘Not major enough.’ She waved a hand. ‘And the scumbag was a drug dealer. Probably deserved it. If they’d killed him, it’d be a different matter. But as it is? Pfff...’

‘So find something else.’ Logan pulled the top four sheets out of the folder and laid them side-by-side on the desk. The first one was the latest missing person poster: a photo of Chris Browning sat beneath the headline, ‘MISSING PERSON ~ APPEAL FOR INFORMATION’. He wasn’t exactly a Hollywood heartthrob — a middle-aged man with pasty skin and a receding hairline, little round glasses and sunken eyes.

Steel clapped her hands together, then rubbed them. ‘Of course, being referendum day , there’s bound to be frayed tempers and a bit of a barney, right? Might get ourselves a one-punch-murder or two.’

A knock, and Rennie was back. ‘Sorry, Guv. BBC coverage starts at ten: we’re sending Guthrie out for pizza. You two want anything?’

She pointed at him. ‘Did you vote like I told you?’

‘Guv.’

‘Good boy.’ The finger came round to point at Logan. ‘What about you?’

‘None of your business.’ The next sheet was a list of the most credible sightings from the last week. Which wasn’t saying much. ‘Now if you don’t mind, I’ve got a missing person to find.’

‘Pfff. No’ really a person, is he? A lawyer, a pervert, a wannabe politician, and a No campaigner? The more of them goes missing the better.’

‘Yes, because dehumanizing people who don’t agree with you always turns out well.’

‘Don’t care. Sick of his smug, dumpy wee face. Banging away on the telly and the radio and the sodding papers,’ she put on a posh Aberdonian accent, ‘“Scotland’s going to fall apart under independence.”, “We’re not clever enough to run our own affairs without Westminster.”, “You’re all chip-eating, whisky-swigging, heart-attack-having, ginger-haired, tartan-faced, teuchter thickies, and you should be glad the posh boys in London are prepared to look after you.”’ She sniffed. ‘Tosser.’

‘You made that last one up.’ Sheet number three held a photocopied article from the Aberdeen Examiner . ‘MISSING CAMPAIGNER “PAID FOR SEX”, CLAIM’. The journalist had got statements from a pair of working girls down on Regent Quay. Logan pulled out a pen, wrote the word ‘NAMES?’ and underlined it twice.

‘And who cares what Chris Sodding Browning thinks anyway? Only reason the slimy git’s getting airtime is because he was on that reality TV bollocks. Silver City my sharny arse. You want to make decent telly? Follow police officers about, no’ some ambulance-chasing unionist turdbadger.’

‘You finished?’ The last sheet was a photocopy of Browning’s diary for the day he went missing. Every appointment checked, everyone he’d met with interviewed. And still no idea where he was or what had happened to him. ‘Chris Browning’s perfectly entitled to support whatever side he wants. That’s democracy.’

‘Oh — my — God.’ Steel took her feet off the windowsill and turned to face him. ‘You’re one of them, aren’t you?’

‘Eh?’ Rennie frowned at Logan. ‘Thought you liked girls, Guv? Not that there’s anything wrong with it, but— Ow!’

Steel hit him again. ‘No’ one of them , you idiot, one of them: a Better Togetherer.’ She shuddered. ‘And to think I let you get my wife up the stick!’

Logan closed his eyes and folded forward, wrapped his hands around his face. ‘Will you both, please bugger off?’

Rennie didn’t. Instead he sat down in the other visitor’s chair. ‘Was great though, wasn’t it? You know, that feeling of coming out of the polling station and thinking, “This is it. We could actually do this.” Right? Wasn’t it great?’

There was silence.

‘Guv?’

Logan peeled one eye open.

Steel was sitting bolt upright in her seat, mouth hanging open. Then both eyebrows raised like drawbridges. ‘What time is it?’

Rennie checked. ‘Quarter to ten.’

She scrabbled to her feet. ‘Get a car, now !’

The pool car roared its way up Schoolhill — past the closed shops — lights flashing, siren wailing like a hundred angry pigs. It still managed to sound better than Steel’s rendition of ‘Flower of Scotland’, though.

She sat in the passenger seat, hanging onto the grab handle above the door as Rennie floored it.

Logan had to make do with his seatbelt, clutching it in both hands as the car flashed across the junction outside the Cowdray Hall, its granite lion watching with a silent snarl and a traffic cone on its head. The streetlight gilded it with a pale-yellow glow. Logan raised his voice over the wailing skirl. ‘HOW COULD YOU FORGET TO VOTE?’

‘IT’S NO’ MY FAULT!’

‘REALLY?’

‘SHUT UP.’

His mobile buzzed in his pocket, the ringtone drowned out by the siren. He pulled the phone out and hit the button. ‘McRae.’

‘Guv?’ Stoney sounded as if he was standing at the bottom of a well. ‘Hello? Guv? You there?’

He leaned forward and poked Rennie in the shoulder. ‘TURN THAT BLOODY THING OFF!’

But when Rennie reached for the controls, Steel slapped his hand away. ‘DON’T YOU DARE!’

His Majesty’s Theatre streaked by on the right — a chunk of green glass, followed by fancy granite, light blazing from its windows — then a church that looked like a bank, then the library. Granite. Granite. Granite.

‘Guv? Hello?’

‘I’LL CALL YOU BACK.’ He hung up as the pool car jinked around the corner onto Skene Street, leaving a squeal of tyres behind. The headlights caught two pensioners, frozen on the central reservation, clutching each other as the car flashed by, dentures bared, eyes wide.

When Logan looked back, they’d recovered enough to make obscene gestures. ‘STILL DON’T SEE WHY I NEED TO BE HERE.’

Steel waved a hand. ‘IN CASE I NEED SOMEONE ARRESTED.’

Naked granite gave way to a shield of trees, their leaves dark and glistening in the streetlights.

Rennie pouted. ‘I CAN ARREST PEOPLE!’

‘COURSE YOU CAN. YOU’RE VERY SPECIAL. YES YOU ARE.’ She turned in her seat and mugged at Logan. ‘ISN’T IT SWEET WHEN THEY THINK THEY’RE REAL POLICE OFFICERS?’