“Aggravated?” Donoghue flicked his gold-plated cigarette lighter and played the flame over the bowl of his pipe.
“Aye, sir. Three youths, waded into an elderly couple’s house with an imitation pistol. It looked real to the victims, who are now in a state of shock. We’ve got good witness statements, no prints, though, they wore gloves...”
“Television teaches them something then?”
“Indeed, sir, but Richard thinks the operation has all the hallmarks of a ned that’s known to him, so we’ll be pulling him for a quizzing.”
“All right, you’ll be getting on with that, I take it?”
“Yes, sir, but I really want to draw your attention to this.” Montgomerie handed Donoghue a file. “It’s a code forty-one.”
“Oh. Murder most foul.”
“Indeed, sir. The victim is a young man by the name of Cunningham...”
“Tell me about it.”
So Montgomerie told him about it.
“I see.” Donoghue pulled lovingly on his pipe. “That does take precedence over the aggravated burglary. What are you going to do, do you think?”
“Well, sir, I’ve chatted to Richard King, we both felt that we should look at the deceased’s living circumstances. He still lived with his mother, but he would have had a room of his own. Might be something there. His murder seems to be more than just a brawl that got out of hand.”
“What do you know about his fiancée?”
Montgomerie shook his head. “Not a thing as yet, sir.”
“As you say, a chartered accountant doesn’t get involved in street brawls, especially if he’s soon to be married. Speak to his lady friend, she might be able to tell you of enemies without number. His place of work also might be harbouring a knifeman who had a score to settle.”
Montgomerie stood. “I’ll get onto it immediately, sir. The rest of the night shift was small beer by comparison.” He glanced out of Donoghue’s office window, along the length of Sauchiehall Street, the mixtured buildings, the old, the new, the vehicles, the pedestrians, windows glinting in the sun. “Dr. Reynolds’s report may be expected at eleven or thereabouts.”
“Very good. Leave the other files too, please, I’ll read them now.”
Montgomerie and Constable Wanless called on Mrs. Cunningham, mother of the deceased. She had returned to her sandstone tenement in Mount Florida, and was being comforted by relatives. No, she had no idea who would want to murder her son, no, she had no objection to the police looking in her son’s bedroom, second on the left.
Jack Cunningham’s room was neatly kept, almost to the point of fastidiousness. It was decorated with gentle pastel shades, which contrasted effectively with the solid, sensible furniture. On Jack Cunningham’s desk was a photograph of a young woman, fetching in open-neck shirt and jeans, on which was written “To Jack with all my love, Sally.”
“His lady friend?” asked Wanless.
“They were to be married, or so Mrs. Cunningham told Hamilton in the night after she identified his body. She lives in Partick, I’ve a note of her address. I’m a bit surprised she’s not here; you would have thought she’d have come round.”
“You’d’ve thought so, if they were that close. Hang about, what’s this?” Wanless picked up Cunningham’s desk diary. “Look at the entry for yesterday.”
Montgomerie did so. It read “S.S. at the Bear and Billet, 9:00 P.M.”
“The Bear and Billet?” Wanless asked.
“It’s a pub. In Bearsden. Right, I think we take a wee wander out to the Bear and Billet, see if anybody, like the landlord, remembers Mr. Cunningham speaking with somebody there about two or three hours before he was murdered. We need a photograph of the deceased.”
“This’ll do, I think.” Wanless took a second framed photograph from the desk. It showed Jack Cunningham in happier times, arms around a girl who was clearly Sally.
“It’ll do. We’ll ask if we can take it with us.”
Montgomerie took the wheel and drove the unmarked police car out of the sandstone tenements of Mount Florida, over the Kingston Bridge, through central Glasgow, and out to suburban Bearsden. As they drove along Great Western Road, they were called on the radio. Wanless reached forward and pressed the Send button. “Receiving.”
“Control to Papa Sierra November, message from DI Donoghue reference Cunningham murder. Hair under the fingernail of the deceased believed to come from the perpetrator has been identified as being a beard hair, red in colour. For your information. Control Out.”
Wanless replaced the microphone. “So the perpetrator is a red-haired, bearded guy.”
“Looks that way.” Montgomerie turned up Bearsden Road at the Anniesland junction.
“They can tell a beard hair from a scalp hair? Didn’t know that.”
“Simple,” said Montgomerie as he overtook a blue and yellow Kelvin Scottish double-decker. “Beard hair is triangular in cross section, scalp hair is circular, pubic hair is oval. They’re very easy to tell apart under a microscope. So our perp has a red beard. Narrows the field nicely.”
Montgomerie turned into the forecourt of the Bear and Billet. Only one other car, a yellow Nissan, stood in the car park. He and Wanless left their car and walked towards the low-roofed, long and thin building that was the Bear and Billet, licensed to sell alcohol since 1642, according to a blue plaque on the wall by the wooden door. Inside, a woman in overalls vacuumed the carpet; flecks of dust floated in the air, caught in the shafts of sunlight which streamed in through the windows.
“Not open yet,” she said, almost shouting, as Montgomerie and Wanless entered. Then, noticing Wanless’s uniform, she said, “Oh.” Then she turned and yelled, “Mr. Pike,” into the gloom.
“What now?” came the answering yell.
“Polis,” yelled the cleaning lady. Then she recommenced the cleaning.
Montgomerie and Wanless heard a shuffling of furniture above the din of the vacuum cleaner and a well-built man, casually dressed, walked out of the gloom. He looked questioningly at Montgomerie and Wanless. “Aye?” he said apprehensively.
Montgomerie showed his ID and said it was nothing to worry about, he said they were looking for information. Pike immediately relaxed; so obvious was Pike’s apprehension and relaxation that Montgomerie could only wonder what the man had on his conscience. But he asked if Pike was serving last night.
“Aye.” Pike nodded. “But there was nay bother, I don’t get bother in here, not like in my last pub. People who drink here are professional types, mostly.”
“Busy?”
“Busy enough. But it was Tuesday, always the quietest night of the week.”
“I wonder.” Montgomerie took the photograph of Jack Cunningham with Sally from his jacket pocket and showed it to Pike. “Could you tell us if the man in this photograph was in the pub last night?”
Pike studied the photograph. “Nice-looking lassie,” he said.
“The guy, Mr. Pike. It’s the guy we’re interested in.”
“Och aye... aye... the guy... aye, aye, he was in.” Pike nodded. “See, I mind him because he was so different from his mate... Sat at that table there. I couldn’t see what they saw in each other, so I thought they must be talking business. They talked, what’s the word, intense, that’s it, real intense talk they had. See, him, small neat guy, didn’t drink too much, but his mate, great bear of a man with red hair and a beard, Jeso, talk about Red Fergus of Glen Orchy, drank like a sailor.”
“Red beard?”
“Aye. She’s a bonnie lassie, though, eh?”
“Seen him before?”
“The guy... no, no I haven’t, not the wee guy, but Red Fergus comes in from time to time, not often enough to be called a regular. But you notice him, red hair and cold blue eyes.”
“Did they leave together?”