Alex Gray - Pitch Black

‘Aye, so there is, but that doesn’t mean there wasn’t someone waiting out in the car park for Norman Cartwright. Someone who might have followed him home,’ he added darkly. ‘We know that the weapon used was a sawn-off shotgun. That’s easy enough for anyone to hide under a jacket. Sometimes they tie a bit of rope to the butt stock, loop it over their shoulder, then, bingo! No need to bring out the gun at all, just let it pivot around your hand, aim, fire, then simply let it fall and it disappears back under the jacket. If he’s cool enough, he just strolls on by as if nothing has happened.’

Cameron raised his eyebrows. It sounded far too easy, the way Lorimer described it.

‘The gunman could have fired the shot from a car parked by Cartwright’s driveway, though, couldn’t he?’ he asked thoughtfully.

‘True,’ Lorimer replied with an approving nod in the DC’s direction. Cameron was evidently using his imagination, trying to make a visual reconstruction of the scene in his head. That was good. The young man from Lewis had the makings of an excellent detective, Lorimer told himself. ‘So far there’s nothing to show if he was on foot or not. Hopefully that’ll change. It also makes sense to see who else lived in the same neighbourhood as the victim,’ Lorimer went on. ‘We’ll see if there’s any link there. And if the house-to-house eventually turns up a witness …’ He left the rest of the sentence hanging in the air.

Niall Cameron nodded his head. A whole lot of legwork had to be done before any tangible results might be found. They were heading back for a meeting with other members of the investigation team before Lorimer set out other lines of inquiry for them to follow. Cartwright’s workplace, his family and friends — all of these would be subject to police scrutiny. The detective constable stifled a yawn. It was only Monday but it felt as though he’d done a week’s work already.

Lorimer looked carefully at the report to the Fiscal. It wasn’t mandatory by law for him to have this document in his hand, but Rosie usually made sure he had sight of her reports in cases of murder, anyway. As he skimmed past the bits about issuing a death certificate he mentally blessed the blonde pathologist for her cooperation.

Norman Cartwright had died as a result of a shotgun wound to his skull: fragments of bone and shotgun pellet had penetrated the soft tissues resulting in trauma to the brain. In other words, Lorimer thought, instant death. Rosie’s report included detailed descriptions of the entry wound and the pieces of shotgun pellet that had been removed from the victim’s head. As she had already suggested at the scene of crime, the assailant had been only a few feet away, probably right on the pavement of Willow Grove. Lorimer read on. The angle of entry suggested that the gun had either been fired from a parked car or the gunman had crouched down, military style, to shoot his target. Pity none of Cartwright’s neighbours remembered seeing a gunman flee the scene, he thought wryly, but one or two had mentioned cars passing along the street after the shot had been fired. That meant nothing, though, without a more definite link to the incident.

Meantime, the team was scouring the Glasgow streets for any information that could be gleaned. Previous shootings of this type would be examined but it was never going to be easy to identify a specific gunman: shotguns were licensed to so many folk around the country and they would have to concentrate their search on those in the immediate area.

Something would turn up eventually, he told himself, in an attempt to bolster his confidence. It usually did.

Netta Cartwright sat clutching her handkerchief tightly, rocking back and forwards, a soft moan coming from somewhere deep inside her throat. Beside her the woman in black watched helplessly, her own face creased in pain. Having to identify Norm’s body had been horrible but having to come here to tell Mum … Well, someone had to do it and of course it would be her, Joan Redmond thought. It was always her. On the few occasions that her brother had visited the nursing home, Mum had shown wee signs of recognising him, but on her own daily visits there was nothing. Until today. After she’d broken the news the old woman had turned to her and put up her hands in disbelief saying, ‘Oh, Joan! Oh, no!’ Then she’d lapsed into this quiet keening.

The police had been nice to Joan; that big tall man especially, the one who was in charge. There had been cups of tea and these trips back and from the mortuary in a big car. Yes, that had been nice of them, she thought. Pity they couldn’t have been here to tell Mum … Her eyes filled with tears that she dashed away with the back of her hand. This was only self-pity, wasn’t it? Or was she crying, like Mum, for the football-mad wee boy they could both remember?

Norman Cartwright had been an exemplary employee, according to the human resources manager. No record of poor timekeeping, few days lost through ill health and his work records always up to date. His nine-to-five existence in this government department belied the man who had scampered up and down the length and breadth of Scottish football pitches every weekend. ‘A real stickler,’ one of his fellow Scottish Football Association officials had told the officer who had called to ask about Norman Cartwright. ‘Didn’t stand any nonsense,’ he’d added. That certainly tied in with the man’s last match, one that would go down in the annals of football history for several reasons.

Lorimer looked at the sheets of paper before him. ‘Good to his mum,’ was how his sister, Mrs Redmond, had described him. So, if they were to look anywhere for a reason why Norman Cartwright had been murdered it would seem that they had to concentrate on that game in Kelvin Park after all.

Glancing at his watch, Lorimer saw that it was after nine o’clock. Maggie would have eaten long since, he supposed, feeling the hollow sensation in his empty stomach. And it wasn’t fair to abandon her for hours like this. With a sigh that became a yawn, he decided to leave work for the night. Maybe tomorrow would throw something new into the mass of paperwork that lay on his desk, something that gave a clue into the killing of a football referee.

It was still light when Jason staggered into the doorway of the club. ‘Out!’ The huge figure of Tam Baillie made to lunge at him but then stopped. ‘Oh, it’s you. Aw right then. Sorry.’ And Tam, the bouncer, stepped aside to allow the footballer past.

The bouncer regarded Jason thoughtfully as he pushed his way into the brighter lights and music within. White hadn’t learned his lesson, then? Tam’s bushy eyebrows expressed a modicum of surprise. Some folk never learned, though, did they? With a shrug he turned back to regard the city street. Wasn’t any of his business, but after Saturday’s game and the referee’s shooting you’d have thought even Jason White would have been keeping a low profile. Tam took out his mobile and tapped out the number he’d been given.

‘Aye, he’s here. Just like you said. I’ll keep an eye on him. Okay?’ The bouncer pocketed the phone and turned back to the street. Couldn’t blame his gaffer for wanting to check up on him, could he?

The footballer blinked as he moved on to the dance floor. It was the second club he’d been in tonight. The first one had provided enough drink to get him going but none of the women had taken his fancy so he’d decided to move on. For once, Jason White was on his own. Normally he’d be accompanied by one or other of his mates, hangers-on who revelled in the glamour the footballer seemed to trail around him. But tonight Denis had cried off with the excuse that he had bad toothache and Jerry was down south on some business of his own. Were they deliberately avoiding him after last week’s fracas? For a moment he thought about it. Maybe his mates hadn’t liked seeing him being carted off in a police car. Or maybe they’d been spoken to by someone from the club. So what? Kennedy’s tirade had fallen off him like water off a duck’s back. Mentally he gave two fingers to the Kelvin chairman. It would piss him off if he knew he was here. What if he did frequent the clubs a bit more than the average player? He wasn’t like them, anyway. He had star quality. That’s what all the sports journalists were fond of writing, after all.