‘How long have you been in existence?’
‘As Woodburn Hill and White? Since 1969, but the Woodburn part was founded in 1931. As for Hill and White, that firm goes back to the nineteenth century, 1880, if I can remember my local history. You’ll know what it’s like with the older law firms; the names on the door mean nothing at all. Those three gentlemen are long dead.’ She looked at him as he took the seat she offered, and the sharpness was back in her eyes. ‘So, Sir James, what’s brought you off your patch?’
‘I’m trying to trace someone; a person who’s been missing for a long time.’
‘Someone from Wishaw?’
‘No, but the trail’s led me here. It’s all got to do with a man called Claude Bothwell, a teacher of modern languages. He was once married to a lady from these parts; coincidentally, she has the same name as you.’
The solicitor stared at him, unable to hide her surprise. ‘It’s no coincidence,’ she told him. ‘That’s my aunt Ethel you’re talking about, the heiress, as my grandfather calls her.’
‘Your grandfather?’
‘Yes, Herbert Ward, Bert to his friends. He was a partner in the firm till he retired, but he’s still pretty well known around here so we keep his name on our notepaper as a consultant.’
Proud was confused. ‘But Herbert Ward was Ethel Ward’s father.’
‘Different Herbert: the one you’re talking about was my grandfather’s uncle. He and Aunt Ethel. . she’s not really my aunt, but that’s how she’s always been referred to. . were cousins. Sir James, you’d be much better talking to him. He’s got all the family history, and scandals, in his head. Aunt Ethel very definitely falls into the latter category. Hold on a minute.’ She picked up her phone, dialled and waited. ‘Grandpa,’ she said, when an answer came, ‘you’re in, good. I’m sending someone down to see you. His name’s Sir James Proud. . Yes, the same one. He’ll explain when he gets there.’ She hung up. ‘That’s settled; he’s expecting you. He lives in a place called Thorny Grove.’
‘But that’s where. .’
‘Where Aunt Ethel lived? Yes, I know, but it’s different now: it’s been turned into a retirement community. The big house has been converted into flats and there are some cottages in the grounds. Grandpa has one of those; it’s number three. To get there,’ she pointed, ‘turn right at the end of Church Road, go across the Main Street, then down the hill until you come to a cul-de-sac sign. Thorny Grove’s in there.’
Fifty-one
Wilding glared up at the clock: it was almost fifteen minutes past midday, Big Ming was late and he was annoyed. After his most recent run-in with his new boss he was in no mood to be pissed about by a witness, especially one as gob-smackingly weird as Mr James Smith.
He retrieved his contact details from the file and dialled the number that he had been given. It rang out a dozen times before he hung up. He returned to his summary of the interview with Kitty Philips, checking for a third time to make sure that he had included all the relevant details, although in truth there had been damn few. Apart from provoking another fight with Mackenzie, the visit had added nothing to the sum total of the investigators’ knowledge.
Mackenzie: there was no doubt that the man had a track record. He had proved himself in almost record time in the Drugs Squad, and before that he had been credited with some impressive arrests in Glasgow. . among them, legend had it, his own brother. Wilding reckoned that somewhere along the line someone had told him that the end justifies the method, a dangerous principle in criminal investigation. The sergeant was a disciplined officer; he had served with Dan Pringle, Maggie Rose, Stevie Steele and other good people and had learned from them the importance of staying focused. And here he was, working for a boss who had introduced a drugs investigation slap-bang into the middle of a homicide inquiry without calling for any specialist help, a guy who went off at irrelevant tangents during interviews yet who bollocked subordinates for showing any sort of initiative. He found himself hoping to be in the room the first time he tried that with DI Steele.
He looked at the clock again. ‘Bugger,’ he swore. ‘Enough of this.’ He walked out of the CID suite and through to the front office. ‘I need a car and a driver, Mac,’ he told the desk sergeant. ‘I need to go up to Millend to roust out a witness.’
‘You’ll need a big driver, then. Mike,’ the sergeant called out to a massive constable who had just walked through the front door, ‘stop there, turn round and drive DS Wilding up to the Wild West.’
PC Drake sighed; clearly there were destinations to which he would rather have been ordered. The Millend scheme had earned its tag and its reputation the hard way, and guarded both proudly, prepared to defend its status as Edinburgh’s hardest neighbourhood against all comers.
Wilding followed him outside to his patrol car, where his partner, PC ‘Never’ Wright, waited behind the wheel. He had worn the nickname so long that most people had forgotten that his given name was Johnstone. ‘One of you’ll be enough. We’re just going to pick a bloke up.’
Mike Drake shook his head. ‘No, Sarge. He may not want to be picked up; that could lead to all sorts of problems. You got the address?’
‘Seventy-seven three Pound Driveway.’
‘Smashin’! Maybe we should take an armed-response team too.’
Wright drove quickly and smoothly away from the station heading westward along the Waterfront. Eventually he took a left turn off a roundabout, into a street that bore no resemblance to those they had passed before. The buildings were grey concrete, ugly structures that looked more like giant pigeon-holes than homes. Give someone a house in a place like this, and you’re giving him a message. Wilding kept his thoughts to himself. He was new to the Leith office, and Drake and Wright looked as if they might be the sort of old-fashioned coppers who believed that the inhabitants of places like the Wild West were born trying to head-butt the midwife.
Pound Driveway was in the heart of the scheme, a three-storey, flat-roofed block, its walls grimy and weather-stained. Wright parked the car in front of a stairway entrance with the number 77 displayed on a wooden sign. ‘Lucky,’ he said. ‘Most of the numbers have been ripped off to confuse the enemy, namely us.’ He climbed out of the driver’s seat and leaned against the vehicle. ‘I’ll wait by the motor, Mike. It goes best with four wheels.’
Wilding looked around; he could not see a living soul, but he knew that did not mean there was nobody there.
Big Ming’s flat was on the top floor. Drake led the way up the graffiti-lined stairway, past solid, unglazed doors. ‘Dealer,’ he said, pointing to one on the second floor. ‘It’s steel, with an extra big letterbox.’
‘Dealing what?’
‘Grass mostly. There’s a lot grown around here; if we raided every house in schemes like this in Scotland we’d need to build a new jail for the folk with rooms filled with plants and sodium lights.’
Smith’s door was wooden like the rest. There was no sign of extra security, only a Yale lock and a handle. Drake thumped it with his gloved fist. From somewhere down below they heard the sound of a toilet being flushed. The PC grinned. ‘The dealer probably thought we’d come for him. That’ll be him sending the evidence down the toilet.’ He turned to Wilding. ‘You sure the guy’s in, Sarge?’
‘He told me he’d nowhere else to go.’
Drake battered the door again, so hard that it swung open. ‘What the hell? The Yale must have sprung.’
‘He invited us in, didn’t he, Mike?’ said Wilding.
‘Absolutely.’
The detective stepped inside; a door faced him at the end of a corridor. It was ajar and the sound of daytime television drifted out. ‘Ming,’ he called, stepping forward.
He saw the feet before he reached the doorway. They were encased in filthy carpet slippers and the toes were pointing up. ‘Bloody hell!’ Wilding exclaimed, as he threw the door open and stepped into the room. Big Ming was staring at the ceiling; in the middle of his forehead, there was a third, red eye, from which a thin trickle of blood ran down to the carpet.