Кит Мори - Deathly Wind

While Ralph pulled the sheet back Torquil gestured for McArdle to follow him. ‘I think we should go up to the station and have a talk, Mr McArdle. There are a number of questions that you will want to ask and also a whole lot that I need to ask you.’

‘You’re bloody well right there! And I’m going to have someone’s head for this!’

Torquil eyed the new laird dispassionately. ‘As I said, we’ll have a talk. But just so long as you know, Mr McArdle, this is police business now. We will deal with this and there will be no head-taking of any sort on my island.’

Jock McArdle pulled out his car keys and stomped down the corridor. ‘We’ll see, Inspector. I’ll meet you at your station.’

Ralph McLelland came out of the mortuary suite, bundling up his green gown. He deposited it in the wicker basket outside and reached for his jacket which was hanging on the peg above. ‘I’m just away for a spot of breakfast, Torquil, and then I’ll get on with the post-mortem. Is that OK?’

Torquil nodded assent. ‘You must have a cast-iron stomach, Ralph.’

‘Aye,’ was the police surgeon’s only reply.

‘What do you mean, girlie?’ Jock McArdle demanded of Morag. ‘There are no ferries?’

Torquil heard the question as he came in the Kyleshiffin police station front door, in time to see Jock McArdle slam a fist down on the counter.

‘I have just told you, Mr McArdle,’ Morag returned, looking completely unflustered. ‘All ferries to and from the island have been cancelled until further notice. The island has been sealed off pending investigations.’

‘But I need to get some of my boys up here from Glasgow.’

Torquil intervened. ‘As my sergeant just told you, Mr McArdle, there will be no comings and goings until our investigations have been completed. And remember what I said at the hospital: this is a police matter, not a personal one.’

‘Whoever killed my boys made it personal.’

‘And we will find whoever did it,’ Torquil said, and lifting the counter flap he held it open. ‘We’ll continue this in my office, I think.’

Ralph McLelland had gone straight to Fingal’s Cave, the café on Harbour Street that boasted the fastest, biggest and cheapest breakfast in town. He was in a hurry and felt in need of a good fry-up before he began his forensic work. He was sitting down enjoying a mug of sweet tea when the tinkly bell at the back of the café door heralded another customer.

‘Ah, Dr McLelland,’ said Calum Steele, picking up a menu. ‘Mind if I join you?’

‘Ah, Calum,’ Ralph returned with a long suffering smile. ‘Of course not. Grab a seat.’

Morag glanced at her watch and rubbed her eyes. She could hardly believe that it was still only eight o’clock. So much had happened since she received the call from Torquil and there had been so much to do. Before Torquil had put a call through to Dunshiffin Castle they had taken a few minutes in the Incident Room to add a new box with the name Danny Reid, followed by a question mark. The other information that Morag had obtained from her questioning of Megan Munro had been added and they had agreed that they needed to follow up about Nial Urquart’s involvement in the animal rights movement, and about Jock McArdle’s interests in a company that supplied animals to laboratories involved in research. Now that Torquil was busy interviewing Jock McArdle, she switched on her computer and logged onto the internet.

After half an hour she had printed out several sheets of paper. Then rising she went through to make tea. A few minutes later, as she sat down to read the printed sheets, her eyes opened wider as she read through them.

‘Torquil will certainly be interested in these,’ she mused.

Torquil eyed the laird of Dunshiffin with interest. The man was rattled, he could see that. He seemed genuinely shocked and upset, but anger lurked close to the surface.

‘How long will this post-mortem be?’ Jock McArdle demanded.

Torquil shrugged his shoulders. ‘An hour maybe and then there will be all the other tests. I would be hoping for a preliminary result some time this morning.’

‘What is it with this place, McKinnon? My two dogs and my two boys. All dead. All murdered. What are you doing about it?’

‘I am interviewing you for a start, Mr McArdle,’ Torquil replied evenly. ‘For one thing, we are not sure if Danny Reid was murdered. His death is just suspicious.’

‘Suspicious!’ McArdle snapped, showing his temper for the first time in the interview. ‘You saw the frazzled state he was in. Of course he was murdered.’

‘What was he doing at the Wee Kingdom last night?’ Torquil persisted.

‘How should I know?’

‘He is your employee – I mean he was your employee. I would have thought you might have known, especially after your other employee’s death.’

Jock McArdle sucked air noisily through his lips. ‘My boys are not in my employ twenty-four hours a day. I don’t know what he was doing last night. I expect he’d been for a few drinks. My boys liked a drink. And they were very close. I expect he went up there because he wanted to investigate Liam’s death.’ He leaned forward and clasped his hands together on the desk in front of him. ‘You lot don’t seem to have got very far. And that’s why I take grave exception to this cock-eyed ban on the ferries. I want some of my boys to come over here.’

‘The ban is necessary, Mr McArdle. We are investigating a murder, possibly two. There will be no movement on or off the island, neither by sea nor air. And there will be no exceptions.’

‘I don’t like your tone, lad! I’ve had whipper-snappers like you for breakfast.’

Torquil stared him hard in the eye. ‘You would find me most indigestible, Mr McArdle. Now tell me, what were you doing last night?’

McArdle’s cheek muscles twitched. ‘I was at home, in my castle, working on papers. Ask my butler Jesmond.’

‘I will be doing so, of course. But do you think it is possible that he could have been trying to start a fire in the croft cottage and been overcome by the flames and the smoke?’ He paused and rested his chin on his fist. ‘Perhaps he had been drinking as you suggested, and maybe drank too much?’

‘Naw!’ Jock McArdle replied emphatically. ‘My boys could both handle their drink. And there is no way that Danny would have played with fire.’

‘But that isn’t so, is it, Mr McArdle?’ said Torquil, reaching into a wire basket beside his left elbow. ‘We ran a check on your employees.’ He smoothed the paper in front of him. ‘They both had records. Liam Sartori for burglary and possession of drugs and Danny Reid for … arson!’

Jock McArdle leaned back and shrugged. ‘So what!’

‘So it is suggestive, isn’t it? A man with a criminal record for arson is found dead in a burning building.’

‘Don’t be an idiot, McKinnon. Danny wouldn’t have torched my property.’

‘That’s Inspector McKinnon, by the way,’ he corrected calmly. ‘In that case, do you have any idea why anyone would want to set fire to your property? Especially with one of your employees in it?’

The new owner of Dunshiffin Castle clenched his teeth. ‘I am a businessman. A bloody successful businessman. I have had enemies in the past and I seem to have enemies now.’

‘Why is that, Mr McArdle? Could it be because of the way that you do business?’

‘Now you are beginning to get my goat. I am a successful businessman. Say anything else and I’ll have your guts for garters – I’ll sue you and your tuppence ha’penny police outfit for defamation.’

Torquil stared back with his best poker face. ‘There is no defamation in my questioning, Mr McArdle. But since you are so sensitive, let me rephrase the question. You have a robust way of conducting your affairs. People on West Uist have called it bullying. Take those wind towers of yours, for example.’