Alex Gray - Shadows of Sounds

‘Right, you, over here,’ Raincoat directed Flynn to a corner in the Bar area where there were little round tables and plastic chairs arranged in groups as if people had been sitting having a drink sometime earlier. Flynn suddenly felt like a drink himself.

‘Any chancy a cuppa tea?’ he asked with a nervous lick of his lips.

‘Aye, why not. Milk and sugar?’ Now that he’d got him in here, Raincoat had obviously decided to be his pal. Flynn wasn’t sure if he preferred this to the previous hard-faced version.

‘Aye,’ he replied, watching Raincoat’s every move as the man spoke to a wee lassie behind the counter.

It was only a couple of steps away and Flynn thought about doing a runner. But by the time he’d considered it, Raincoat was back, sitting opposite and looking at him with some interest. Was this about Seaton, after all? Flynn glanced at the lines of people edging towards a table where there were uniformed Busies taking down notes. No, he decided, this wasn’t about him and Allan Seaton. This was something a lot bigger.

‘Use this pitch often, son?’ the Busy enquired, passing a teacup over to Flynn.

‘Aye. An’ they lot in here know me as well so you can jist ask them if you like,’ Flynn answered. He took a slurp of the hot tea, one eye on Raincoat.

‘I will,’ he said, then seemed to lose interest in Flynn, letting his gaze wander over the folk lined up beyond the tea bar. Flynn followed his gaze. Raincoat knew what was up, all right, but what had it to do with him?

‘Has the band cancelled, then? Is that it?’ Flynn asked, drawing Raincoat’s eyes back to his own.

‘Something a bit more serious than that,’ Raincoat answered. ‘Someone got hurt tonight,’ he paused for effect, staring at Flynn as if trying to see how he’d react to this titbit of information. ‘We’re here to find out how it happened.’

Flynn shivered, despite the heat from the cup clutched in both his hands. There was a tone of menace in the Busy’s voice that he didn’t like at all.

The detective took out a notebook and pen from his coat pocket.

‘Right. Let’s make a start. Name.’

Flynn sighed. How often he’d been through this rigmarole. The mischief-maker in him wanted to say ‘Mickey Mouse’ or something daft. Down the Nick it could raise a laugh but here it would just sound stupid. ‘Flynn. Joseph Alexander Flynn. No fixed abode,’ he delivered the words in a monotone.

‘OK, Joseph Alexander-’

‘Flynn. Just Flynn. All right?’

Raincoat looked up, surprised by the vehemence in the lad’s voice. ‘Sure. I’m Detective Sergeant Wilson. Sergeant to you.’

Flynn regarded the man warily. Was he trying to wind him up or butter him up?

The dregs of Flynn’s second cup of tea were cold by the time Wilson had finished with him. He’d asked him the same questions more than once. Who’d passed by the steps that evening? Had he seen anyone emerge from the Buchanan Street entrance? It was obvious to Flynn that they were on the lookout for a villain. Someone who’d had a go at one of the performers, he guessed; maybe it had been a famous bloke. That was what all the fuss was about. If his guess were correct, then he’d be one of the first to see it shouted from the news stands in the morning.

Brendan Phillips was still downstairs. Lorimer hoped he was in a fit state to be questioned but he’d have to wait his turn. Somewhere in this labyrinth the Chief Executive of Glasgow Concert Orchestra was fending off the Press. It was part of Phillips’s job but his boss had relieved him of that under the circumstances.

Slowly the detective walked back towards Morar. The black duster had been removed from the CCTV camera in the corridor, he noticed.

‘Hello again,’ he put his head around the door tentatively. The SOCOs were hard at work gathering fibres from various parts of the room. George Millar’s remains had disappeared into a dark zipped body bag. Already the dressing room had assumed an air of quiet industry. It was as if violent death itself had been swept away by the officers’ zeal. Jim and Rosie turned at the sound of his voice.

‘Anything on that black cloth?’

‘Something sticky this way comes,’ Rosie quipped, holding up the duster in its plastic envelope. ‘We’ll know for certain once it’s back in the lab but it looks like the stuff you get from double-sided sticky tape.’

‘Thanks,’ Lorimer replied briefly, marvelling as always at the pathologist’s capacity for levity in the face of brutality. It wasn’t that she was inured to it; it was merely her way of dealing with the daily business of death in all its horrid forms.

The faint sound of music coming through the wall from the next room reminded Lorimer that Victor Poliakovski was still in Lomond. It had been judged that the Conductor could stay there safely until he’d been interviewed. Then, and only then, would he be free to return to his hotel for the night.

‘I’ll leave you to it,’ Lorimer said. ‘Call me in the morning, will you, Rosie?’

‘Sure will,’ she gave a small wave of her hand before turning back to discuss some technical detail with Jim.

Lorimer stood outside in the corridor. The door to Lomond was closed but he could make out the sound of a piano playing within. As he pushed open the door, he recognised the Rachmaninov concerto at once, its runs descending in a tinkling waterfall of sound. Lorimer expected the sound to falter into silence but it continued even when he walked from the dressing area into the reception room where he saw Victor Poliakovski seated behind the grand piano.

Lorimer quickly realised that the Russian wasn’t ignoring him, but he seemed so totally absorbed in his rendition of the concerto that he simply could not see anyone in the room despite the mirrored wall in front of him. Lorimer raised his eyebrows. Some witness this one was going to make!

As he listened, he tried to put himself into the position of the Conductor on the podium, his back to the audience, his eyes on the performers.

‘What is it you want?’ Poliakovski’s voice broke into Lorimer’s reverie. The music had stopped abruptly and the Russian was rising from his position behind the grand piano.

‘Chief Inspector Lorimer, sir,’ Lorimer was beside him in two strides, his hand outstretched. Poliakovski shook it, a brisk up and down then gestured for Lorimer to sit on one of the easy chairs that were placed around the sitting room. It was, Lorimer mused, a very civilised way to begin a discussion about murder.

‘I’m very sorry that you’ve been so inconvenienced tonight, sir, but under the circumstances…’ Lorimer shrugged and smiled to let the man know that he wasn’t sorry at all and that he was merely being polite. He was a policeman doing his job. Poliakovski was a man who had been stopped halfway through his own evening’s work. Being a famous conductor didn’t come into it, for Lorimer.

‘So. They tell me the First Violin is killed. Here, in the room that is next to mine. And you wish to know if I had a hand in it, eh?’

Lorimer sat up. Was he joking? The Russian’s bearded face was inclined towards him, the eyes beneath the bristling brows devoid of any sign of humour.

‘I’d certainly wish to know that. If you did,’ added Lorimer, his eyes meeting those of the Russian. For some seconds they stared at each other in uncomfortable silence. Poliakovski looked away first then sank back into the armchair. It gave a leathery creak that failed to mask his theatrical sigh. Lorimer still searched the man’s face with his blue gaze.

‘No. Chief Inspector. I cannot give you such a simple solution to your search for a murderer. I did not even know of the matter until the interval.’

Lorimer listened intently to the man’s every word, delivered in near perfect English. There were overtones of an American accent and only a trace of the sort of voices he’d come to associate with John Le Carre’s characters. But then he wasn’t big on Eastern Europeans of any sort. What he heard told him that this was a clever and sophisticated man. It remained to be seen if he was also a suspect.