Ian Rankin: Even Dogs in the Wild

Maxtone glared at him. ‘Frankly, Malcolm, I’m not expecting to welcome a single one of them. But we need desks and chairs for half a dozen.’

‘And computers and phones?’

‘They’re bringing their own. They do, however, request …’ Maxtone produced a sheet of paper from his pocket and made show of consulting it, ‘“ancillary support, subject to vetting”.’

‘And this came from on high?’

‘The Chief Constable himself.’ Maxtone crumpled the paper and tossed it in the general direction of a bin. ‘They’re arriving in about an hour.’

‘Should I do a bit of dusting?’

‘Might as well — it’s not as if there’s going to be anywhere for you to sit.’

‘I’m losing my chair?’

‘And your desk.’ Maxtone inhaled and exhaled noisily. ‘So if there’s anything in the drawers you’d rather not share…’ He managed a grim smile. ‘Bet you’re wishing you’d stayed in bed, eh?’

‘Worse than that, sir — I’m beginning to wish I’d stayed in Dundee.’

Siobhan Clarke had parked on a yellow line on St Bernard’s Crescent. It was about as grand a street as could be found in Edinburgh’s New Town, all pillared facades and floor-to-ceiling windows. Two bow-shaped Georgian terraces facing one another across a small private garden containing trees and benches. Raeburn Place, with its emporia and eateries, was a two-minute walk away, as was the Water of Leith. She’d brought Malcolm to the Saturday food market a couple of times, and joked that he should trade in his bungalow for one of Stockbridge’s colony flats.

Her phone buzzed: speak of the devil. She answered the call.

‘You off up north again?’

‘Not at the moment,’ he said. ‘Big shake-up happening here, though.’

‘I’ve got news too — I’ve been seconded to the Minton enquiry.’

‘Since when?’

‘First thing this morning. I was going to tell you at lunchtime. James has been put in charge and he wanted me.’

‘Makes sense.’

She locked her car and walked towards a gloss-black front door boasting a gleaming brass knocker and letter box. A uniformed officer stood guard; she gave a half-bow of recognition, which Clarke rewarded with a smile.

‘Any room for a little one?’ Fox was asking, trying to make it sound like a joke, though she could tell he was serious.

‘I’ve got to go, Malcolm. Talk to you later.’ Clarke ended the call and waited for the officer to unlock the door. There were no media — they’d been and gone. A couple of small posies had been left at the front step, probably by neighbours. There was an old-style bell pull by the pillar to the right of the door, and above it a nameplate bearing the single capitalised word MINTON.

As the door swung open, Clarke thanked the officer and went inside. There was some mail on the parquet floor. She scooped it up and saw that more was sitting on an occasional table. The letters on the table had been opened and checked — presumably by the major incident team. There were the usual flyers too, including one for a curry house she knew on the south side of the city. She didn’t see Lord Minton as the takeaway type, but you never could tell. The scene of crime unit had been through the hall, dusting for prints. Lord Minton — David Menzies Minton, to give him his full name — had been killed two evenings back. No one in the vicinity had heard the break-in or the attack. Whoever had done it had scaled a couple of back walls in the darkness to reach the small window of the garden-level laundry room, adjacent to the locked and bolted rear door. They had broken the window and climbed in. Minton had been in his study on the ground floor. According to the post-mortem examination, he had been beaten around the head, then throttled, after which his lifeless body had been beaten some more.

Clarke stood in the still, silent hall, getting her bearings. Then she lifted a file from her shoulder bag and began to reread its contents. Victim had been seventy-eight years old, never married, resident at this address for thirty-five years. Educated at George Heriot’s School and the universities of St Andrews and Edinburgh. Rising through the city’s teeming ranks of lawyers until he reached the position of Lord Advocate, prosecuting some of Scotland’s most high-profile criminal trials. Enemies? He would have had plenty in his heyday, but for the past decade he had lived out of the limelight. Occasional trips to London to sit in the House of Lords. Visited his club on Princes Street most days to read the newspapers and do as many crosswords as he could find.

‘Housebreaking gone wrong,’ Clarke’s boss, DCI James Page, had stated. ‘Perpetrator doesn’t expect anyone home. Panics. Game over.’

‘But why strangle him, then start beating him again once the victim’s deceased?’

‘Like I say: panic. Explains why the attacker fled without taking anything. Probably high on something and needing money for more. Looking for the usual — phones and iPads, easily sold on. But not the sort of thing someone like the noble lord would have in his possession. Maybe that annoyed our man and he took out his frustration then and there.’

‘Sounds reasonable.’

‘But you’d like to see for yourself?’ Page had nodded slowly. ‘Off you go then.’

Living room, formal dining room and kitchen on the ground floor, unused servants’ quarters and laundry room below. The window frame of the laundry room had been boarded up, the window panel itself removed, along with all the shards of glass, to be taken away and examined by forensics. Clarke unlocked the back door and studied the small, well-tended private garden. Lord Minton employed a gardener, but he only visited one day each month in winter. He had been interviewed and had expressed his sadness, along with his concern that he hadn’t been paid for the previous month.

Climbing the noiseless stone staircase to the ground floor, Clarke realised that, apart from a toilet, there was only one further room to check. The study was dark, its thick red velvet curtains closed. From the photographs in her file, she could see that Lord Minton’s body had been found in front of his desk, on a Persian rug that had now also been taken away to be tested. Hair, saliva, fibres — everyone left traces of some kind. The thinking was: the victim was seated at his desk, writing out cheques to pay his gas and electricity bills. Hears a noise and gets up to investigate. Hasn’t got far when the attacker bursts in and smacks him on the head with a tool of some kind — no weapon recovered yet; the pathologist’s best guess, a hammer.

The chequebook lay open on the antique desk next to an expensive-looking pen. There were family photos — black and white, the victim’s parents, maybe — in silver frames. Small enough to be slipped into a thief ’s pocket, yet untouched. She knew that Lord Minton’s wallet had been found in a jacket over the back of the chair, cash and credit cards intact. The gold watch on his wrist had been left too.

‘You weren’t that desperate, were you?’ Clarke muttered.

A woman called Jean Marischal came in twice a week to clean. She had her own key and had found the body the following morning. In her statement she said the place didn’t really need that much attention; she just thought ‘his lordship’ liked a bit of company.

Upstairs there were too many rooms. A drawing room and sitting room that looked as though they’d never seen a visitor; four bedrooms, where only one was needed. Mrs Marischal could not recall a single overnight guest, or a dinner party, or any other kind of gathering, come to that. The bathroom didn’t detain Clarke, so she headed downstairs to the hall again and stood there with arms folded. No fingerprints had been found other than those belonging to the victim and his cleaner. No reports of prowlers or out-of-place visitors.