She noted it down and hung up, then looked across her desk at the shabby, grey-haired, fifty-something figure who sat facing her. ‘It’s a fuckin’ cop, innit?’ he murmured.
‘Yes, it is. And not any old fucking cop either. Did you ever work with Bandit Mackenzie?’
Dan Provan’s eyes widened to the point of incredulity. ‘It’s him?’ He blew out his cheeks. ‘I’ve had that displeasure, although not that close. We were both in the same division when he was a DS, but we were never on the same investigation. I always thought he was unstable, but not that he’d go off his rocker. They’re certain, are they?’
‘Not certain, but from what Wilding told me, they think it’s a bit more than likely.’
She pushed herself to her feet, suddenly, drawing herself up to her full, and not inconsiderable, height. Provan assumed she was ready to leave for Troon, until he saw that her eyes were on the door. He looked over his shoulder, then started out of his own chair.
‘Sit down, the pair of you,’ Bob Skinner said. ‘I assume you’ve been in touch with Ray Wilding by now.’
‘Yes, sir,’ Lottie Mann confirmed. ‘I’m just off the phone with him, and he’s brought us up to speed. We’re still taking it in.’
‘Me too. Mackenzie and I have some shared history, so I’m taking this personally. I thought I’d drop down here to let you know that.’
‘No pressure, eh?’ Provan chuckled.
‘Shut up, you insubordinate wee bastard,’ Skinner retorted, but with a hint of a smile.
‘Do you have any insight that would be useful to us, sir?’ the DI asked.
‘You mean did I ever see him as a wife murderer, Lottie? Hardly, not even as a wife-beater. I’m not sure I do yet, for the evidence they have isn’t conclusive. The day that I’d even suspected as much, he’d have been on suspension and undergoing counselling. The day I’d been able to prove it, he’d have been in the dock.
‘But. . the fact is, the more intelligent someone is, the harder it is to see what’s inside their head. Now you, Dan, I can read you like a fucking book, but Mackenzie, no I couldn’t. For example, I never thought that he would bottle it on an armed operation, but he did.’
His eyes narrowed. ‘The dangerous thing may be,’ he continued, ‘that he never thought so either. I’ve just had a conversation with a friend of mine, a consultant psychologist, one with a special insight, you might say. His view is that when someone as smart and ambitious as David Mackenzie finds that he isn’t the person he believed he was, the consequences can be dramatic.’
‘In which case,’ Provan observed, ‘if he’s as smart as a’ that, Christ, even if he’s only as smart as me, and he has done something bad to his wife, he might not be at any ferry terminal yet.’
The chief nodded. ‘I was wondering about that too, Dan. Why do you think so?’
‘Drugs,’ the dishevelled DS declared. ‘These days, at any ferry terminal you’re likely to find a dog or two, trained to sniff out all sorts of contraband, fags, drugs, even humans. Worst case, if he has done her in, as they’re fearing in Edinburgh, turn up at one of these places wi’ her in the boot of your car and you are seriously pushing your luck.’
‘Absolutely,’ Skinner agreed. ‘And that ties in with something my psychologist said. If the Bandit has killed poor Cheryl, no way was it premeditated. He will have no getaway planned, he’ll be in a panic. In that situation, my consultant says, people in a panic don’t run away; either they sit tight and wait for the inevitable, or they go somewhere they know. We’ve all got a hidey-hole mapped out in our minds, people. We need to find out where Mackenzie’s is, just in case he’s heading for it.’
Twenty-Seven
‘Did you find out anything interesting about the man Holmes?’ Haddock asked as he slid into the passenger seat of his DI’s car. ‘The way the ACC described him made him sound like Al Capone.’
‘Plenty,’ Pye replied. ‘There’s a file on him on our intranet. From what I’ve read so far he was a lot smarter than Mr Capone. Scarface went to jail eventually, but Perry Holmes never did. I found Tommy Partridge’s book too; it isn’t on Kindle, as it happens, so I’ve ordered a copy from the library.’
‘Have you ever met the man Partridge?’
‘No,’ Pye admitted, ‘he was a bit before my time. He’ll be pushing eighty now. .’
‘If he’s still alive.’
‘Oh, he is. I subscribe to an online magazine called Scottish Review. He’s a regular contributor, like a wise old owl perched on a branch somewhere. He also has letters in the Saltire on occasion. He never has any trouble getting them published; the editor’s his daughter.’
‘He sounds like a crank,’ the DS observed.
‘Don’t ever say that if Bob Skinner’s around. Partridge was one of his mentors, and if big Bob has a fault, it’s that he’s too loyal to his friends sometimes.’
‘I’ll bear it in mind. . not that I expect to be seeing a lot of the big man from now on.’
‘Where are we going, then?’
‘Close by Wester Hailes; a street called Beeswaxbank Road, number fifty-three.’
‘I know it,’ Pye said. ‘I had a few calls there when I was stationed in West Edinburgh as a young plod, before I got moved out to East Lothian. By the way, Karen Neville was there too around that time; in East Lothian, that is.’
Haddock glanced sideways, a cheeky grin on his face. ‘Oh aye? And were you and she …’
‘Wind it in, Sauce,’ the DI growled. ‘No we weren’t; just friends, that’s all. She and Andy Martin weren’t either, not then. He was our divisional commander for a short while.’
Their conversation lapsed as Pye drove out of Leith, heading for the bypass rather than taking the straighter route through the ever-chaotic city centre. Initially his satnav protested his choice, insisting that he turn around as soon as convenient, but he solved the problem by switching it off.
Beeswaxbank Road was made up entirely of apartment blocks; fifty-year-old tenements that looked well overdue for refurbishment. On one side of the street, satellite dishes adorned their walls like acne on a teenager.
‘Fifty-three,’ Pye said as he parked in a bay opposite their target. ‘We know that Mr Booth is on benefit. Let’s see if he’s in, or away job-seeking.’
Their destination was accessed via an open stairway, leading to flats above; as they moved towards the steps, Haddock pushed a toddler’s plastic tricycle to one side. ‘Quite tidy,’ Pye remarked. ‘Things have improved since I was here last. For a start, that wee bike would have been gone in thirty seconds.’
There were four doorways on each landing. The one that had a card with the names ‘P. Booth’ and ‘V. Riley’ in a doorframe holder was on the second floor. There was no bell push to be seen in the door, only an eye-level letterbox. Unusually, it had two mortise locks.
The detectives glanced at each other. ‘Oh yes?’ Haddock murmured. He tapped the door lightly with his knuckles. ‘It’s steel,’ he said, ‘and folk with steel doors always have something to hide. If they were a bit smarter they’d work out we’re going to get in anyway, and not bother with all this.’
He pushed the letterbox ajar, and shouted, ‘Police, open up!’ into the space. ‘Now listen,’ he whispered, as Pye smiled. They heard the sound of rushing feet from within, then the sound of taps being run and a toilet being flushed. More than a minute later bolts creaked as they were drawn back, a lock clicked, and the door opened.
A young woman stood behind it, peering through the gap that a chain allowed. ‘Good morning, Victoria,’ Pye said.
‘It’s Vicky. Whitjiswant?’ she demanded, aggressively.
‘We want to talk to Patrick,’ he told her.
‘He’s no’ in.’
‘We’d like to see that for ourselves.’
‘Well, ye cannae.’
Pye shrugged and smiled down at her. ‘Fine, Vicky. We’ll just go, then, and leave you to explain to your man why you put his stock down the drain. We’ll need to warn them down at Seafield that they’ve got another sort of shit coming their way. If they stand too close to that they could get high.’