Stuart MacBride - A Dark So Deadly

He pointed through the window at a florist’s, wedged between a domestic appliances shop and a Co-op funeral director’s. A lumpy green van sat out front, the side door slid back so a young woman in trousers, shirt, and tie could load big floral arrangements inside. The number plate matched the one on Voodoo’s printout.

‘... over live to Oldcastle Division Headquarters.’

The sound of a general hubbub died down, punctuated by the occasional clack-whine of a camera going off. Then the Chief Superintendent’s voice boomed out, amplified loud enough to cause a squeal of feedback. ‘Ladies and gentlemen, I’m pleased to announce that O Division officers have successfully concluded the recent spate of mummification murders...’

Callum undid his seatbelt, but McAdams stayed where he was, clutching his stomach and grimacing. ‘Do you want me to call an ambulance?’

A shake of the head. Teeth gritted. ‘It’ll be fine. I just... need to sit here for a minute. Make sure... the press conference goes OK.’

‘... tireless work by the officers under my command, preventing further deaths at the hands of a deeply troubled individual...’

‘Honk the horn if you change your mind. I can stick the flashers on and we’ll be at CHI in ten, fifteen minutes tops.’

‘I told you, I’m fine . Now... sod off, you’re talking... all over the Chief Superintendent.’

He climbed out. Closed the door. Stood there for a moment, as McAdams grimaced and rubbed at his stomach.

Yeah, definitely not looking well.

Callum turned and marched over to the horrible green van. ‘You Mrs Reid?’

The woman gave a little start and yelp. ‘Argh, frightened the life out of me.’

‘This your van?’

She stuck the last arrangement into the back and slid the side door shut. ‘Course it’s not my van. It’s Mrs Reid’s van. How could I afford a van?’

Up close she was a lot younger than she’d looked from the car.

‘Are you the driver of this vehicle, then?’

Her mouth slammed shut, then she turned and hurried out of the rain, huddling under the overhang outside the funeral director’s. ‘You’re the police, aren’t you? Sodding hell.’ She bit at her fingernails — already jagged and rough. ‘If this is about that bitch’s Porsche, I swear those dents were there before I parked next to her.’

He pulled out his notebook. ‘Were you driving this van on Wednesday evening?’

‘No.’

‘You sure?’

Another fingernail disappeared. ‘ Please don’t tell Mrs Reid, OK? I’m not meant to take the van home, but I was out on a late delivery and my boyfriend had his parents’ house to himself and we...’ Colour rushed up her cheeks. ‘Please don’t tell Mrs Reid. I’m on my last warning as it is and I need this job.’

He clamped a pen between his thumb and the dirty fibreglass cast. ‘I’m going to need his name, his address, and his number.’

A grey-haired woman emerged from the florist’s next door, wiping her hands on a stripy apron. ‘Is something wrong, Andrea?’

She slapped on a smile. ‘No, Mrs Reid. This gentleman was just asking if we do funeral wreaths. I was giving him our number.’

‘Well don’t be long, that wedding’s at three and I want those pedestals all set up by two at the latest.’ She pursed her lips then nodded at Callum. ‘I’m sorry for your loss.’ Before disappearing back inside.

Callum produced his photographs again. No joy.

Two vans down, one to go...

‘Are you sure this is it?’

Callum checked Voodoo’s printout again. ‘Postcode is right.’

The registered address for Van Number Three, the grey Peugeot Bipper, wasn’t so much a house as a fire-blackened hulk slumped at the end of a track nearly halfway between Oldcastle and Auchterowan. Bordered on all sides by fields with a clump of woods in the middle distance. Its garden was a riot of weeds and grass, that looked as if it hadn’t seen a lawnmower for at least a decade. No neighbours.

The damp undergrowth seeped cold moisture through Callum’s trousers. ‘Who’s going to buy a second-hand van and register it here?’

McAdams howched, then spat a glob of yellowy-green into the rosebay willowherb. ‘Oldest trick in the book: clone someone’s number plates, or register your dodgy vehicle to someone else. Doesn’t matter if you’re speeding, or parking on double yellows, the police go after the registered keeper, not you.’

Callum called control on his Airwave, ‘Brucie? Can I get a PNC check on a Paul Terence Jeffries, the Cloisters, by Auchterowan, OC25 8TX.’

‘Hud oan.’

McAdams sniffed and leaned on the roof of the car. ‘At least it’s stopped raining.’

Overhead, the sky was a looming mass of grey, darkening from dove to charcoal at the horizon.

‘Right, Paul Terence Jeffries: did a six-stretch in the eighties for raping a mother of two, with three other offences taken into consideration. Couple of speeding tickets, then nothing since the early nineties... Oh, and his house burned down.’

Callum stood, looking at the soot-stained walls, blown-out windows, and partially collapsed roof. ‘You don’t say?’

‘I do say. And there’s no need to sound so sarcastic; it only happened Wednesday.’

The same day Ashlee and Abby Gossard were abducted. No way that was a coincidence.

‘Thanks, Brucie.’ He hung up and put his phone away as McAdams fought through the weeds to the front door.

Well, where the front door should have been — it was just a yawning black chasm now.

McAdams disappeared inside.

Silly sod.

Callum followed him as far as the threshold. Stuck his head in. ‘Is that safe?’

A smile. ‘I’m dying of bowel cancer. What’s the worst that can happen: the walls fall in and spare me six more weeks of chemo and a slow lingering death? I’ll take my chances.’ He wandered down the hall, stepped into another room and was gone.

Just because he had nothing to lose, it didn’t mean Callum had to join him.

It wasn’t safe. Half the roof was still up there, sagging and fire-blackened, ready to come crashing down at any moment. Bang! Crash! Squish! No more police officers.

Callum groaned. Sighed. Then stepped over the threshold and into the burned-out house.

It reeked of smoke — the sweet scent of charred wood mingling with the acrid tang of fried plastics and fabric.

Every floorboard he stood on creaked...

Urgh.

McAdams reappeared at the end of the hallway, sauntering across and in through another door, hands in his pockets, whistling.

Three more doors led off the hall, one hanging open, revealing what looked like a corridor, one through into a grubby bathroom, and one leading down into the depths of the earth.

Callum peered into the partial gloom.

Stone steps, littered with bits of charcoal.

No chance.

What if the ground floor collapsed while he was down there?

McAdams appeared at his shoulder. ‘What have you found here? A dark stairway to Heaven? Or one down to Hell?’

Deep breath.

He took the first step, then the second, then the third.

The floor above didn’t fall on his head. ‘You know, you can’t just chop a sentence into chunks and call it a haiku.’

‘Yes I can.’

‘That’s not poetry, it’s bad punctuation.’ Callum eased himself off the last stone step and onto a hard-packed dirt floor. ‘There’s a weird smell down here. Sort of sweet and tangy? Kind of herbal?’

McAdams limped his way down the stairs. Did a slow catwalk turn. ‘Definitely what estate agents would call a “fixer-upper”.’