Quintin Jardine - Lethal Intent

'What happened?'

'The doctor's still in there, but his provisional view, and mine when I saw the body, is that his neck's broken.'

Rose looked up at the towering grey castle. 'Does that mean that he climbed up there and fell?'

'Trying to scale the heights, you mean? It looks like it; a daft boy's trick. He'd have been game for it, that's for sure.' Steele shivered: the December morning was grey and cold, and he found himself wishing that he had brought his own overcoat. 'The body's virtually unmarked. There's some facial bruising, that looks like it was sustained when he hit the ground, but nothing more than that.'

'But it was night-time when it happened, wasn't it?'

'It's Christmastime, Mags. With all the decorations and stuff, this whole area's lit up like a football field.'

'I suppose so. Has George been here yet?'

Steele winced. 'No, not yet; Mary's bringing him… and I wish I didn't have to be here when he arrives.'

'Not his wife, though?'

'God forbid.'

'He may not have the authority to do that. If it was my son…' She broke off. 'Who found him?' she asked.

'He was spotted by somebody in Saltire Court,' said Steele. He pointed at the elegant office block that dominated the far side of Castle Terrace. 'The body can't be seen from the path at all, or from the roadway, but a sharp-eyed worker on the top floor spotted it, took a closer look through a pair of binoculars, and raised the alarm.'

The sound of another approaching vehicle made them look towards the road. 'Oh dear,' Rose whispered. 'Jen is here after all.' The dead boy's mother sat in the back seat of Detective Superintendent Mary Chambers's car. As the two officers moved towards her, they saw on her face the same expression of disbelief that Singh had worn earlier.

The inspector felt a fluttering in his stomach as Detective Sergeant George Regan stepped out on to the hard, rough road. The two friends met, and shook hands formally. 'Jen will stay in the car,' said the bereaved father. 'She wanted to come to the scene, and we didn't try to dissuade her.'

'I'll sit with her,' said Rose, as Mary Chambers came round to join them, her plain square face ashen white.

'Thank you, ma'am,' Regan replied. He drew himself up to his full height, gathering his dignity around him like a protective cloak. 'Let us suit up, Stevie, and then let me see him.'

Steele waved to a crime-scene technician, who brought over two fresh white tunics. He waited in silence while Regan and Chambers put them on, then led the way up the steep slope.

Like most people, Bob Skinner tolerated flying, regarding it as a twenty-first century necessity; he believed firmly that those who said they actually enjoyed being in a heavier-than-air machine thirty-five thousand feet above the ground were either liars or idiots.

The part of the whole process that he disliked most was the pre-boarding wait in the departure lounge. The small airport that served Key West, where Sarah had dropped him fifteen minutes before, was reasonably comfortable, and the monitor screens told him that his aircraft was on the ground and was scheduled to leave on time, but still he fretted.

He tried to read a book, a private-detective yarn called Alarm Call that he had brought with him from Scotland, but found that he could not give it the concentration it deserved. The small cafeteria was open: he bought himself coffee, and a bagel with cream cheese, but even as he chewed he found himself reaching unconsciously inside his jacket for the cell-phone which, on a whim, he had left at home, so that he could be truly out of contact to all except Neil McIlhenney, Trish, the children's nanny, and Aileen de Marco.

He had given her his contact number because, he had told himself and her, he had promised to be there for her whenever she needed advice, but in truth, he wondered if his motive had been more personal. Whatever was in his head, and his heart, he felt an urgent need to speak to her, to make sure that she had kept the promise she had made to him the evening before.

He gave in. He drained the coffee but left half of the bagel, then walked over to a payphone against the wall, and used a credit card to activate it. He punched in her number and waited. Lena McElhone answered. 'Justice Minister's office.'

'Lena, it's Bob Skinner here. Can I speak to Aileen, or is she at lunch?'

'She's in her office, Mr Skinner. Hold on.' He waited for a minute, watching the cost of the call tick higher and higher. 'I'm sorry,' said the private secretary, when finally she came back on line, 'Aileen's very busy and can't be disturbed.'

He grunted in frustration. 'Okay. Tell her I'll call her from Miami once I get there.'

'She expects to be busy all day, sir.'

'She's not clearing her desk, is she?'

'Pardon?'

'Obviously not. Just give her a message, please: tell her I'm glad she's done the right thing, and that I'll be back in Scotland tomorrow morning. I'll call her then, and if her lunch-hour's free maybe she can keep it that way.'

'I'll pass that on, sir. Goodbye.'

Skinner pulled down the cradle, released it again, and dialled the secure Special Branch number. 'Neil,' he said, as his friend picked up the call. 'What's happening? How are the papers handling the terrorists?'

'As you expected,' he replied. 'They're kicking the crap out of the PM and Murtagh. The Nats and the Tories are having a field day.'

'It won't help the terrorists, though. They'll be touching down pretty soon not all that far from where I am right now. I don't fancy their chances of ever leaving.'

'Are you bothered?'

'About what happens to them? In truth, no, I'm not. But I assured Aileen de Marco that they'd be tried in Scotland. I was wrong, and she's been dropped in it. That's what annoys me.'

'You'll both get over it.'

'You sound harassed, Chief Inspector. What's been happening?'

'Plenty, but I can't talk about much of it over the phone. I can tell you one thing, though. Bandit Mackenzie and Andy Martin were playing cowboys last night.'

'Andy was involved?' Then, 'Tayside must be as boring as I told him it would be. Did they get a result?'

'Big time. Bandit's been like a dog with two cocks all morning. He should enjoy it while he can, poor lad: he's about to be given a high-level vasectomy.' The DCC heard McIlhenney pause, as if someone had come into his office. 'Boss, I have to go. See you tomorrow morning.'

The tent was still in place, although the body of George Regan junior, aged thirteen, had been removed to the mortuary in the High Street. The King's Stables Road entrance to Princes Street Gardens had been reopened, and a mobile investigation headquarters caravan, white and imposing, now stood where the cars and ambulances had been parked earlier.

George Regan senior and his wife had gone, with the same composure and grace of bearing they had brought with them, to the unspoken relief of their colleagues. The sergeant had understood how difficult their task would be. The violent death of a stranger child always had a profound effect on those who had to investigate it; when the victim was known to them, inevitably it was even worse. George had realised also that he could not be a member of the team, and had made no such embarrassing request.

'You never know what's in a person till you see them in a crisis,' Detective Superintendent Chambers said quietly, facing Stevie Steele across the small table in the mobile HQ. They had been joined there by Detective Chief Superintendent Dan Pringle, the ageing head of CID, and by Alan Royston, the force media-relations manager. There was a fifth person in the command van: Sir James Proud, the Chief Constable, had come to the scene; he sat next to Pringle, silent and solemn.