Stuart MacBride - Broken Skin

‘ DI Insch isn’t. You’ve had Alpha Thirteen wasting time all day checking on an address in Danestone — aFrank Garvie — ring any bells? ’ Logan admitted that it did. ‘Right ,’ said Mitchell, ‘we’ve got reports of a disturbance at that address .’

Logan didn’t see what that had to do with him. ‘And?’

‘ And Insch says you’ve got to go- ’

‘But-’ Rachael was making ‘cup of coffee’ motions at him.

‘ Hey, if you want to tell Insch to sod off, you’re on your own. I’m staying well out of it .’

Logan screwed up his eyes and wished a painful and embarrassing death on Detective Inspector Bloody Insch. ‘OK, OK, I’ll need a car.’

‘ Fine, Oscar Foxtrot Two’s going that way. You can cadge a lift .’

He hung up. ‘Sorry-’

‘You’ve got to go, haven’t you?’ she said, as the taxi pulled up behind her.

‘Yes. You know what DI Insch’s like these days.’

‘I’ve heard.’ She opened the taxi door. ‘Come on, I’ll give you a lift to the station.’

Logan lurched out onto the rain-swept forecourt of FHQ, hoping he didn’t look like a drag queen, clarted in lipstick. He hurried through into the reception area as the taxi drove off into the night. Oscar Foxtrot Two — a small, grubby van with wire mesh over the rear windows — was sitting out back, waiting for him with the engine running, the sound of opera seeping out into the downpour. Logan jumped into the passenger seat, and immediately started coughing and spluttering. The whole thing stank of wet dog.

‘You’ll get used tae it in a bit,’ said the woman sitting behind the steering wheel. ‘Gonnae give them a bath when we get hame, aren’t we, babies?’ Logan turned to see a pair of enormous Alsatians with their damp liquorice noses pressed up against the grille separating the back of the tiny van from the driver and passenger seats. The bigger of the two began to snarl and the dog handler laughed, telling the dog, ‘It’s OK, baby he’ll no’ hurt you.’ Then patted Logan on the knee. ‘Dinna make eye-contact, for God’s sake.’

Logan faced the front. Quickly.

She drove him out to Garvie’s flat in Danestone, keeping up a three-way conversation with Logan and her dogs about the documentary she’d seen last night on BBC2 about Bonny Prince Charlie sharing his bed with two Italian courtesans and a bloke from Ireland when he was over for the Jacobite rebellion. ‘Of course,’ she said, as she turned into Garvie’s cul-de-sac, ‘I’ve got a cousin who’s gay and he loves Drambuie. But he’s from Elgin.’

The lights of Alpha Thirteen swept bars of blue through the rain, making it sparkle, as if it’d been electrified. Logan thanked the dog handler and scrambled out of the van and over to the patrol car. ‘What’s the story?’

The PC pointed up at Garvie’s building. ‘Neighbour called in about half an hour ago complaining about the noise. They’ve been on the bloody phone every five minutes since, wanting to know why we’ve not done anything about it.’

‘When did Garvie get home?’

The constable shrugged and Logan cursed. ‘You were supposed to be keeping an eye on the place!’

‘Don’t look at me — I only came on at ten.’

‘Oh for God’s sake …’ Logan turned his collar up and dashed through the rain, up the short path, and in through the building’s front door. Angry voices echoed down from the floors above, shouting over a continuous loop of blaring music. He climbed the stairs, the noise getting louder with every step.

BOOM! BOOM! BOOM! ‘TURN THAT FUCKING THING DOWN!’ A man’s voice.

‘SIR, I’M NOT GOING TO ASK YOU AGAIN-’

‘YOU SEE WHAT WE HAVE TO LIVE WITH?’ A high-pitched woman.

‘OPEN UP, YOU PERVERT BASTARD!’ The man again.

They were on the second floor: five angry residents and an annoyed-looking policewoman. The noise from Garvie’s flat was deafening, whooshing and booming and roaring, violins and keyboards building to a teeth-rattling crescendo. Then silence. Then round it went once more, in an infinite loop. No wonder the neighbours were spitting nails; an hour of this and the Pope would have been rampaging down Union Street with a baseball bat.

Garvie’s front door had been given another paint-job, obscenities covering the woodwork, spreading out over the walls like an angry infection. Logan tapped the constable on the shoulder. ‘Anything?’

‘WHAT?’

‘I SAID: HAVE YOU GOT ANYTHING?’

She looked confused for a moment, then shouted back, ‘NO. IT’S BEEN LIKE THIS SINCE WE GOT HERE. HOUSEHOLDER’S NOT ANSWERING-’

‘OK.’ Logan stepped up to the front door and squatted down, nose wrinkling at the smell of human urine. He pulled on a single latex glove and prised open the letterbox. The hallway lay in darkness, just a ripple of light seeping through from the lounge where that God-awful, repetitive racket was coming from.

‘I’VE TRIED THAT!’ the constable shouted. ‘NO SIGN OF HIM.’

Logan motioned for her to join him downstairs. As soon as they were out of sight the neighbours started hammering on the door again. ‘It’s their own fault,’ said Logan. ‘They’ve been terrorizing the poor sod: graffiti, piss through the letterbox, dog shit in a burning paper bag. He’s probably got the most annoying bit of music he has, put it on a short loop, cranked up the volume and sodded off to a hotel for the night. Getting his own back.’

The constable nodded. ‘So what we going to do?’

Logan stared back up the stairs as another cycle began. ‘We’re going to have to break in. If we don’t they’ll lynch him when he gets back. You-’

‘WHY THE HELL AREN’T YOU DOING ANYTHING?’ A balding, middle-aged man stormed down from the floor above, bright scarlet with apoplectic rage.

‘Do you know anything about the vandalism to Mr Garvie’s flat, sir?’

The man stopped. Going pale, then bright red again. ‘Are you accusing me of something?’

‘Thought so.’ Logan turned to the policewoman. ‘Did you get this gentleman’s name and address, Constable?’

‘Yes, sir.’

‘Good.’ They stood and stared at the man as he backed away up the stairs. He disappeared from sight as the loop started again. ‘Come on then,’ said Logan, ‘if I listen to that any longer, I’m going to end up thumping someone.’

The constable asked to be excused for a minute, hurrying out into the rainy night and the lazy blue sweep of the patrol car’s lights. She came back, shaking the water off her police waterproofs, grinning, holding up what looked like a little gun. ‘Got it off the internet,’ she explained as they climbed the stairs into the deafening noise. ‘Been dying for a chance to try it out.’

‘Hold on,’ said Logan as they got to the first-floor landing, digging out his mobile phone and calling Control, telling them he was concerned for the safety of the householder and that they were going to force entry. There was no sign of the angry mob on the second-floor landing — Mr Middle-Aged had probably warned them the police were more interested in persecuting them for vandalism than doing something about Frank Garvie’s serenade of eternal damnation. ‘KICK IT IN.’

‘NO NEED.’ The PC swaggered up to the door and slid the pointy end of her ‘gun’ into the keyhole, twisting it slightly and pulling the trigger. If anything happened it was inaudible beneath the racket. ‘HA-HA! LOOK AT THAT!’

The door swung open and the noise got even worse. Logan slapped his hands over his ears and picked his way into the flat. The welcome mat stank of piss so he stuck to the wall, not wanting to tread in anything as he picked his way down to the end of the short hallway. The home cinema system in the lounge was pumping out an incredible amount of sound, making the floorboards thrum beneath his feet as the loop built to yet another crescendo. Logan stepped into the living room just as everything went quiet.