Ken McClure - Eye of the raven

The food when it came was lukewarm and soggy but when the waitress returned to ask in her automated way if ‘everything was alright’ for him, he simply nodded and said, ‘Fine.’ The truth was that he hadn’t expected any better — although he did wonder what excuse the UK tourist boards would offer this year for falling numbers. He didn’t think that lousy food and bad service would even make it to the starting line.

Grantown-on-Spey struck Steven as one of these places where it was always Sunday. There were very few people about and it seemed almost as if a respectful silence was being observed. It had the kind of ambience that obliged people to speak in whispers. Yet when he looked more closely, shops and businesses did after all seem to be open. He asked at the post office for directions to Ptarmigan Cottage and was given clear instructions from a friendly woman who thought at first that he might be the Lees’ son. She seemed disappointed when he said that he was just a friend.

Steven spent much of the two miles on the forest-track road leading to Ptarmigan Cottage hoping that nothing was coming the other way. There were so many twists and blind turns in it as it led up through dense pinewoods that the seeds for disaster seemed to be sown at every corner. He completed the journey without incident however, and found himself admiring the cottage and its environs when he finally got out the car. It was painted white and perched on the edge of a steep cliff with magnificent views down the River Spey in both directions. He could understand the attraction the place must have had for Lee when he’d moved there; the idea of living among so much natural beauty after spending such a large part of his professional life with ugliness and decay must have proved irresistible.

He supposed that the cottage itself had probably started out as a home for estate workers but, like so many, it had been modernised and prettified — although not to an unacceptable degree — and sold off to incomers. Through the large picture window of the lounge, Steven saw a woman get out of her chair and come to the door.

‘ Can I help you?’ she asked in a well-educated voice but in a tone that questioned his being there.

‘ Mrs Lee? My name is Dunbar. I hate to intrude like this but I wonder if I might have a word with your husband?’ Steven showed her his ID.

‘ The Sci-Med Inspectorate,’ she read aloud. The formal smile faded from her face and suspicion took its place. ‘May I ask what this is about?’

‘ I’m looking into some aspects of an old case your husband was involved in, Mrs Lee. There are a few things I must ask him.’

‘ Ronnie retired more than eight years ago. That part of his life is over. There’s nothing he can tell you. All that stuff was in the past.’

‘ Stuff?’ asked Steven.

Mrs Lee waved her hands in the air and said, ‘Pathology, dead bodies, police evidence, being called out at all hours, all that… unpleasantness.’

‘ Mrs Lee, I really would like to speak to your husband,’ said Steven plainly. ‘It is important.’

‘ My husband is not a well man, Dr Dunbar and I will not have him being upset. If there’s one thing guaranteed to upset him, it’s any allusion to his former career. He’s still very bitter about the way he was treated by these… bureaucratic pygmies.’

Steven saw the steely resolve in her eyes but he said, ‘I need to ask him some things about the forensic evidence in the Julie Summers murder nine years ago.’

Mary Lee closed her eyes and remained silent for a long moment. When she opened them Steven saw the anger there. ‘The Julie Summers murder is the last thing on earth he needs to be reminded of,’ she hissed. ‘These bastards destroyed my husband’s distinguished career over that ridiculous Mulvey woman and her idiot son. They completely ignored the fact that Ronnie positively identified the murderer and secured a conviction for them.’

Well, well, thought Steven. It wasn’t the first time he’d seen middle-class charm disappear like snow off a dyke to be replaced by fascist rant but he still found it fascinating. He didn’t see any point in reminding the woman that it had been drink that had destroyed her husband’s ‘distinguished career’ and that it apparently had been on the skids for some time before the Summers case so he simply said, ‘My questions have nothing to do with the Mulveys, Mrs Lee.’

‘ Then what?’ Mary Lee demanded.

‘ I’m trying to find some missing lab reports connected with the case. I thought your husband might still have them in among his personal papers. If by any chance you yourself could lay your hands on them for me there would be no need for me to disturb your husband at all.’

‘ Ronnie didn’t keep anything of his old life,’ said Mary Lee. ‘He put it all behind him when we left Edinburgh… Actually, I remember now, we had a bonfire. Any old papers probably went on top of that.’ The sweet smile returned.

‘ I see,’ said Steven. ‘In that case I really will have to speak to him.’

Mary Lee’s smile vanished again. ‘And I’ve already told you; he’s ill.’

‘ Mrs Lee, I do have the authority to insist,’ said Steven. ‘I’m sure neither of us wants the involvement of the local police in this but that’s exactly what will happen if you continue to obstruct me.’

‘ You people make me sick,’ said Mary Lee, turning on her heel and going back inside the house. As she’d left the door open, Steven assumed that should follow and did.

‘ Wait here,’ said Mary Lee without turning when they’d reached the living room. Steven stood there while she disappeared for a few moments. When she returned she said, ‘Through here. You’ve got five minutes. Any longer and I’m going to call the press about harassment of a desperately sick man.’

Steven found Lee in bed. A slight figure with white hair and round shoulders, he was wearing pyjamas, buttoned up to the neck and was propped up on pillows, watching a small television, which sat on a table at the foot of the bed. It was currently showing a cooking programme involving teams of competing celebrities playing to the camera. Their animated laughter and show business smiles contrasted sharply with Lee’s pinched, angry expression. The yellowness of his complexion spoke volumes to Steven about liver damage but a vague smell of whisky in the air said that it was still a factor in Lee’s life.

‘ What the hell do you want?’ snapped Lee; although the effort involved in being aggressive made him cough. ‘You’ve upset my wife.’

‘ I need to ask you some things about the Julie Summers case.

‘ Julie Summers, Julie Summers,’ intoned Lee. ‘Always Julie bloody Summers. We nailed the bastard who did it. What more do you want? More crap about the blessed Mulveys? That was just so much shit from a gutter press who’d nothing better to do with their time than to destroy a few good careers. Rodents!’

‘ I’m not concerned with the Mulveys,’ said Steven. ‘It’s the forensic evidence in the Summers case I need to talk to you about. I already know that the samples taken at the scene of the crime were lost.’

‘ These things happen,’ said Lee. ‘It was an accident, just one of these things. Someone in the lab put them in the wrong rack. We’re all human.’

Steven was taken aback at Lee’s shifting of blame away from himself and apparent dismissal of such a serious mistake but resisted the urge to point this out. Instead he said, ‘I understand that the samples were analysed before they were lost?’

‘ Exactly, so it was no big deal.’

‘ But to all intents and purposes the evidence was rendered useless because the Procurator Fiscal couldn’t use it in case of a Defence challenge?’ countered Steven.