Head Shot

'I wondered how long it would take you to get to a loose end. Bob.' ACC

Willie Haggerty laughed. 'Are you worried that Edinburgh's descending into lawlessness, with the Chief on holiday this week and you in the States?'

'I have no doubt,' Skinner replied, his voice echoing on the satellite link, 'that my city is safe in your hoary hands. But I just thought I'd give you a call to say hello, see how you're doing.'

'I'm doing fine, big fella, just fine. How's it with you? How's Sarah coping?'

'Simply "coping" is not a term you apply to my wife. She deals with life with a capability that's just… well, fucking awesome, as they say over here. We're more or less set for the funeral on Friday, the cleaners have done their bit here at the house, and now she's taking me out to find a caterer for a reception afterwards.'

'How about the investigation?'

'It seems to have run into a series of brick walls, from what I gather

… not, mind you, that the police need to tell me anything. I'm just a civilian, you understand.'

'Aye, and so was Attila the Hun,' Haggerty barked. 'But stil, if they're stalled and it's over a week, we know what that usual y means.'

'We do, Willie, we do; it means they're stuffed. So how's it going over there anyway? Have I missed any action?'

The DCC heard a loud booming laugh in his ear. 'Have you ever… and I'm loving it! Pringle's taken over from Andy, and found himself in the middle of a right pile of shite. First, Mario McGuire's uncle gets his head blown off in his own living room. Next, Maggie Rose discovers that a parish priest from Lanarkshire who's on the missing persons list was actual y certified dead of a heart attack in Edinburgh, under another man's name, and turned into ashes at Seafield last weekend. Then the man who's no' dead after al turns out to have been a tenant of Beppe Viareggio, who's well and truly fucking dead.'

"The faked death,' Skinner interrupted. 'An insurance scam?'

'A big one; there were four policies, adding up to a million, so Pringle just told me. They were written on the basis of an outstanding medical report by a GP, the same doctor who certified the phoney death. They've al been paid out and the money's been moved.'

The DCC's mind raced as he took in and analysed everything that Haggerty had told him. 'Have we gone public on al of this?' he asked.

'Only on Viareggio's murder.'

'Good; that's a help. Where's this doctor now?'

'Found this morning; up the Lammermuirs with a big hole in his chest.'

'Fucking hell! But what about Beppe Viareggio?' Skinner asked himself, aloud. 'He was just a harmless clown with a Marion Brando fixation. Who'd want to kill him?'

'His daughter Paula,' Haggerty answered, 'or so Pringle's telling me; Greg Jay took a statement this morning from her ex-boyfriend, a DI no less, who said that he once stopped her from sticking a steak knife in her old man in the middle of a restaurant.'

'Who's the DI?'

'Steele.'

'Sound lad; not prone to exaggeration.'

'So I'm told. But this is where it gets nasty. I've just had Pringle in to see me… and not before time either. The couple in the insurance fraud had false identities, built around two birth certificates of long-dead people, obtained from Register House. Paula Viareggio's just been fingered as the person who obtained them.

'As it happens, Greg Jay's had her under observation since last weekend, in case whoever killed her old man had it in for her as wel. His people reported that Mario McGuire's been seen with her twice since the murder; once on Saturday, then again last night. He arrived at her place about ten and stayed till after midnight.

'Now, Pringle tells me, Jay wants to lift McGuire for questioning as a suspected accomplice in the conspiracy, and maybe as the brains behind the whole thing.'

'What!!!' Willie Haggerty had the foresight to hold the telephone receiver away from his ear just before the explosion sounded across the transatlantic link.

'You tell him from me,' Skinner roared, 'that if he does, he'd better get his lawnmower sharpened, because he'll be spending a fucking long time in his garden from now on! And you can tell Pringle the same, while you're at it.'

'Relax, Bob, I have done already. Jay's been told to wind his neck in.

I've asked Mario to come up to see me personally this afternoon; he's on his way now.'

The DCC's rage abated. 'Good for you. If the late-night visit means that Mario's having it off with his cousin… well, I'd be disappointed in him, but until it affects his work it's his business. Unlikely as that is, it's far more credible than the notion that the pair of them are involved in a conspiracy. I know Paula Viareggio, and I know about her sauna businesses too; Mario told me a long while back. She's a classic case, that one; her granny reborn. She didn't kil anybody, least of al her father.

'Tell me, Willie. Do you think it's occurred to Detective Superintendent Jay that if someone's going to acquire a couple of copy birth certificates for an il egal purpose, they'd be major league stupid to use their own name when they're doing it?'

'I don't know,' said Haggerty evenly, 'but I'm going to find out. It certainly hasn't occurred to him that if the money's gone, then so are the couple behind the fraud.'

'Yes indeed; so you'd suppose. Willie,' Skinner continued, after a moment, 'this con-man, how did he come to be Beppe's tenant?'

'It looks as if he and his partner set up a fake wine-importing company to show the insurance companies, so that they could take out key executive policies on his life. The names they used were Magnus Essary and Ella Frances.'

'Who's met them?'

'According to Pringle, Beppe signed the lease personally; he's the only one who actual y saw the man who cal ed himself Essary.'

"Then that's why he was killed; so that he couldn't identify him. But if the bloke and his partner are long gone with the money…'

'Why bother about that?' Haggerty exclaimed. 'I see what you mean, Bob.'

'Right. As an entity, Magnus Essary's dead and gone, no one's left to identify him, and the money's in the bank. Therefore this man and his lady accomplice can go back to being who they were before. If we haven't publicised the fact that we've identified the body, they'll be sitting there thinking they've committed the perfect crime.'

There was a silence. 'Or maybe, just maybe before he heads off to the sunshine with his woman and his mil ion… he's got something else to do.'

66

'This is getting crazy,' Maggie murmured, almost to herself. 'What else did Haggerty tell you?'

'That was about it,' her husband answered. 'After your man at GRO came up with Paula's name, and you told Pringle, he went haring into Leith to see Jay. The two of them pul ed the watchers' notes and saw that I've been to her place twice since the murder, and Gregjust went crazy.

'I must real y have upset him; he was for sending a couple of senior officers down to Gala to bring me up to Edinburgh for questioning. Old Dan was sensible enough to tell him to hold his bloody horses, while he went to see Willie Haggerty. The ACC ordered him to calm Jay down, and said that he would talk to me personally, which he duly did.'

Mario sensed her bristling, and saw her sit stiffly upright in her dining chair; that was as close as her icy control would allow her to come to ful -blooded, exploding anger. 'The nerve of that man Jay,' she exclaimed.

'Just as wel that Dan was there, or he might actually have done it. I tel you, love, if he had done that, it would have been him or me. I'd have gone to the DCC and told him that.'

'You wouldn't have had to. First of al, I'd have beaten you to it, and second the Big Man wouldn't have needed any threats from us. The ACC told me he had a cal from him this afternoon. They discussed the case; Haggerty said that he sends us his condolences about Beppe. He also said that they've come to a conclusion about Essary.'