Alex Gray - Shadows of Sounds

‘No. That’s it. Cause of death: strangulation involving a ligature,’ Rosie’s words brought him back suddenly. ‘No signs of any other trauma. No evidence of sexual assault.’

‘Any idea yet where the killing took place?’

‘We’re still working on that one. It’ll keep the SOCOs busy for a while. It wasn’t done in the plant room, that’s for sure. The trap door was only opened when we arrived. The maintenance boys’ idea to give us more light on our subject. Did more than that, though didn’t it?’ she caught his eye and grinned.

‘The body was directly under the trap door in a position commensurate with having been dropped through from just that height,’ Rosie said.

Lorimer nodded. Whoever had killed Karen Quentin-Jones must have had some nerve. Someone had shoved her body through that space in the stage. He tried to visualise the darkened auditorium and the stage set out with music stands for a concert that was certain to be cancelled, now. The vision of the abandoned stage made something flicker in his brain as if someone had struck a match, but whatever it was guttered and died as suddenly as it had appeared. He gave a shudder that had nothing to do with the cadaver lying a few feet away. All at once he needed to be somewhere else, finding out answers to more questions than the ones Rosie was asking.

‘OK,’ Lorimer raised a hand. ‘I’m off. Send me a copy of the report whenever you’ve finished, will you?’ He fished in his pockets for the car keys, his thoughts already elsewhere.

Rosie smiled briefly then turned her attention to the body on the slab. The Police would have their paperwork, but first she had to complete the examination as thoroughly and tenderly as she could. It was something the living owed to the dead, Rosie always told herself; especially to those whose ending had been particularly violent.

The rain on his windscreen closed Lorimer off from the outside world as he sat next to the City Mortuary. Karen Quentin-Jones’ face came back to him as he’d first seen her. A woman with a fine opinion of herself, he remembered.

Not the least sign of apprehension had shown in that cat-like smile. No, she’d had nothing to fear, of that Lorimer was certain. So why had she been the second victim? Had she known something about George’s killer? Perhaps. But her violin was missing too, he remembered. People had been killed for less than a sixty-five grand violin, Lorimer knew.

Lorimer switched on the ignition and instantly the rain was swept away showing the different shades of grey on the city street. He turned the Lexus towards Glasgow Cross, reflecting on the history at the heart of the old town. Here wealthy merchants had amassed their fortunes trading with the Virginia tobacco plantations. Here too, was the site of all the public hangings that had taken place, the Gallowgate. Lorimer gave a thin-lipped smile thinking how apt it was that the city’s mortuary and the High Court were situated in this part of Glasgow. Justice was still being meted out in some form, at any rate. His smile creased into a frown as thoughts of the dead woman returned. Had that been somebody’s warped idea of justice?

Lorimer hardly noticed the swinging bells and dancing angels being erected on each side of George Square. His mind was taking him on a walk through the depths of the Royal Concert Hall to the stage elevator pit. Every set of lights along Saint Vincent Street changed to red as the big car approached but for once Lorimer didn’t curse them. Who had access to that trap door? And what would have happened to Karen’s body if the dungeon hadn’t been flooded? Lorimer shuddered at the memory of that dark, enclosed space beneath the stage and the twin steel pillars that rose and fell to raise sections of staging.

Had the killer thought that her body would be crushed under the weight of the hydraulics? or would the mechanism have failed because of the corpse lying in the sunken area below the stage?

It seemed no time at all until he was across town and into the City of Glasgow Orchestra’s private car park.

Brendan Phillips was sitting at a desk leafing through a pile of paperwork when Lorimer walked into the room.

‘Oh! Oh! It’s you!’ The Orchestra Manager was half out of his seat, his face turned towards the Chief Inspector.

Lorimer’s eyes narrowed. In that split second when he’d been disturbed, Brendan Phillips had visibly jumped from fear. While one part of his brain told Lorimer that it was entirely natural given all the poor man had been through, another part was asking questions.

‘You all right?’

‘Yes, of course,’ Phillips began, then, sinking back into his seat. ‘Well, no. No. I’m not all right. How could I be?’ A querulous note entered his voice. Lorimer shrugged. Of course the man wasn’t all right. He was a bundle of nerves.

‘I came to ask you some more questions,’ Lorimer told him gently, taking a seat beside Brendan Phillips’s desk.

‘There’s nothing else I can tell you,’ Brendan began, his eyes pleading with Lorimer to leave him alone. ‘I really don’t know what’s been going on any more than you do.’

‘OK. I’m sure that’s how it seems. But the normal day-to-day things that might not mean a lot to you could have huge significance when we put them into a different context. You follow?’

Brendan Phillips closed his eyes and drew his fingers back and forth across his brow as if something pained him. Lorimer waited. He recalled Karen Quentin-Jones’s derision when she had referred to the Orchestra Manager as ‘Brenda’. The man was certainly living up to her sneer. Lorimer had seen more backbone in a young child. Still, he was in a world where artistic temperaments abounded and sensitive souls were probably the norm.

‘Take me through the last rehearsal. Just tell me everything that took place.’

Brendan sighed. ‘It was just a routine rehearsal for the Christmas Classics concert, nothing that was too taxing. There was nothing really very new. It’s for the older audience. You know? “White Christmas”, “Sleigh Ride”, “Lara’s theme” from Doctor Zhivago; that sort of stuff.’

‘And you were using a harpist?’

‘Of course,’ Phillips’s eyebrows were raised in surprise. ‘Christmas. Angel harps. Trumpets. It’s all very traditional music.’

‘And you were using Chloe Redpath again, weren’t you?’

‘Yes, as a matter of fact. Our usual girl was sick. Having a bad time with her pregnancy, actually.’

‘So Chloe’s been your main harpist all the time since October 22nd?’

‘Not all the time. Just occasionally.’

‘When we questioned her that night,’ Lorimer began slowly, ‘she was adamant that she had never removed any of her music. Yet when she went on stage for the concert it had gone.’ Somebody had created a series of jobs for Brendan Phillips that night, Lorimer guessed. Unless, of course they had been deliberately manufactured by the Orchestra Manager himself?

‘Really?’ the Orchestra Manager’s eyebrows lifted. ‘She didn’t pass that information on to me,’ he added querulously.

‘Well, events did rather overtake everyone that night,’ Lorimer answered dryly.

‘But, to get back to that other night. The night of Karen’s death,’ he began, ignoring Brendan Phillips’s sudden flinch, ‘nothing out of the ordinary happened at the rehearsal?’

‘No. The musicians turned up. They rehearsed. They went home.’

Lorimer chewed his lip. That was what it was meant to look like, certainly, but not everybody had gone home. Someone had stayed behind with the Second Violin to make sure she would never go home again. ‘Who was on duty from the administrative side of the Orchestra that night?’

‘I was. They don’t need anybody else on a rehearsal night. The sound technicians and the lighting people are all employees of the Hall. There’s a security man downstairs, and some staff in front of house earlier on, in the gift shop and at the box office. By the time we’re ready to leave it’s pretty quiet.’