Val McDermid - The Distant Echo

But that would change. Soon enough, the anger would come.

Weird glared at Maclennan, skinny arms folded across his narrow chest. ‘I want a smoke,’ he said. The acid he’d taken earlier had worn off, leaving him jittery and fractious. He didn’t want to be here, and he was determined to get out as quickly as he could. But that didn’t mean he was going to give an inch.

Maclennan shook his head. ‘Sorry, son. I don’t use them.’

Weird turned his head and stared at the door. ‘You’re not supposed to use torture, you know.’

Maclennan refused to rise to the bait. ‘We need to ask you some questions about what happened tonight.’

‘Not without a lawyer, you don’t.’ Weird gave a small, inward smile.

‘Why would you need a lawyer if you’ve got nothing to hide?’

‘Because you’re the Man. And you’ve got a dead lassie on your hands that you need to blame somebody for. And I’m not signing any false confessions, no matter how long you keep me here.’

Maclennan sighed. It depressed him that the dubious antics of a few gave smart-arsed boys like this a stick to beat all cops with. He’d bet a week’s wages that this self-righteous adolescent had a poster of Che Guevara on his bedroom wall. And that he thought he had first dibs on the role of working-class hero. None of which meant he couldn’t have killed Rosie Duff. ‘You’ve got a very funny notion of the way we do things round here.’

‘Tell that to the Birmingham Six and the Guildford Four,’ Weird said, as if it were a trump card.

‘If you don’t want to end up where they are, son, I suggest you start co-operating. Now, we can do this the easy way, where I ask a few questions and you answer them, or we can lock you away for a few hours till we can find a lawyer who’s that desperate for work.’

‘Are you denying me the right to legal representation?’ There was a note of pomposity in Weird’s voice that would have made the hearts of his friends sink if they’d heard it.

But Maclennan reckoned he was more than a match for some student on his high horse. ‘Please yourself.’ He pushed back from the table.

‘I will,’ Weird said stubbornly. ‘I’ve got nothing to say to you without a lawyer present.’ Maclennan made for the door, Burnside on his tail. ‘So you get someone here, right?’

Maclennan turned at the open doorway. ‘That’s not my job, son. You want a lawyer, you make the phone call.’

Weird calculated. He didn’t know any lawyers. Hell, he couldn’t afford a lawyer, even if he’d known one. He could imagine what his dad would say if he phoned home and asked for help with the situation. And it wasn’t an appealing thought. Besides, he’d have to tell a lawyer the whole story, and any lawyer paid for by his father would be bound to make a full report back. There were, he thought, far worse things than being nicked for stealing a Land Rover. ‘I tell you what,’ he said grudgingly. ‘You ask your questions. If they’re as harmless as you seem to think, I’ll answer them. But any hint you’re trying to stitch me up, and I’m saying nothing.’

Maclennan closed the door and sat down again. He gave Weird a long, hard stare, taking in the intelligent eyes, the sharp beaky nose and the incongruously full lips. He didn’t think Rosie Duff would have seen him as a desirable catch. She’d probably have laughed at him if he’d ever propositioned her. That sort of reaction could breed festering resentment. Resentment that might have spilled over into murder. ‘How well did you know Rosie Duff?’ he asked.

Weird cocked his head to one side. ‘Not well enough to know what her second name was.’

‘Did you ever ask her out?’

Weird snorted. ‘You’ve got to be joking. I’m a wee bit more ambitious than that. Small-town lassies with small-time dreams; that’s not my scene.’

‘What about your friends?’

‘Shouldnae think so. We’re here precisely because we’ve got bigger ideas than that.’

Maclennan raised his eyebrows. ‘What? You’ve come all the way from Kirkcaldy to St Andrews to broaden your horizons? My, the world must be holding its breath. Listen, son, Rosie Duff has been murdered. Whatever dreams she had have died with her. So think twice before you sit here and patronize her.’

Weird held Maclennan’s stare. ‘All I meant was that our lives had nothing in common with hers. If it hadn’t been for the fact that we stumbled across her body, you wouldn’t even have heard our names in connection with this investigation. And frankly, if we’re the best you can do in the way of suspects, you don’t deserve to be called detectives.’

The air between the two of them was electric with tension. Normally, Maclennan welcomed the raising of the stakes in an interrogation. It was a useful lever to get people to say more than they meant to. And he had a gut feeling that this young man was covering something with his apparent arrogance. It might be nothing of significance, but it might be everything that mattered. Even if all he’d gain by pushing him would be a sinus headache, Maclennan still couldn’t resist. Just on the off chance. ‘Tell me about the party,’ he said.

Weird cast his eyes upwards. ‘Right enough, I don’t suppose you get invited to many. Here’s how it goes. Males and females congregate in a house or a flat, they have a few bevvies, they dance to the music. Sometimes they get off with each other. Sometimes they even get laid. And then everybody goes home. That’s how it was tonight.’

‘And sometimes they get stoned,’ Maclennan said mildly, refusing to let the boy’s sarcasm rile him further.

‘Not when you’re there, I bet.’ Weird’s smile was scornful.

‘Did you get stoned tonight?’

‘See? There you go. Trying to fit me up.’

‘Who were you with?’

Weird considered. ‘You know, I don’t really remember. I arrived with the boys, I left with the boys. In between? I can’t say I recall. But if you’re trying to suggest I slipped away to commit murder, you’re barking up the wrong tree. Ask me where I was and I can give you an answer. I was in the living room all night except for when I went upstairs for a piss.’

‘What about the rest of your friends? Where were they?’

‘I haven’t a clue. I am not my brothers’ keeper.’

Maclennan immediately noticed the echo of Sigmund Malkiewicz’s words. ‘But you look out for each other, don’t you?’

‘No reason why you’d know that that’s what friends do,’ Weird sneered.

‘So you’d lie for each other?’

‘Ah, the trick question. “When did you stop beating your wife?” There’s no call for us to lie for each other where Rosie Duff is concerned. Because we didn’t do anything that needs lying about.’ Weird rubbed his temples. He wanted his bed so badly it was like a deep itch in his bones. ‘We just got unlucky, that’s all.’

‘Tell me how it happened.’

‘Alex and me, we were mucking about. Pushing each other in the snow. He kind of lost his balance and carried on up the hill. Like the snow was making him excited. Then he tripped and fell and the next thing was, he was shouting us to come up quick.’ For a moment, Weird’s cockiness slipped and he looked younger than he was. ‘And we found her. Ziggy tried … but there was nothing he could do to save her.’ He flicked a smudge of dirt off his trouser leg. ‘Can I go now?’

‘You didn’t see anybody else up there? Or on the way there?’

Weird shook his head. ‘No. The crazed axe-murderer must have gone another way.’ His defences were back in place, and Maclennan could see that any further attempts to extract information would likely be fruitless. But there would be another day. And he suspected there would be another way under Tom Mackie’s defences. He just had to figure out what that might be.