‘News for you, Dan. You’re third in the pecking order. The new chief constable might have told the press that I’m SIO on this one, but make no mistake, he is. This man Skinner is miles different from Toni Field in most ways, but in one they’re very much alike. She was on the way to creating a force in her own image, flashy, high-tech.’
‘Don’t I know it,’ Provan grumbled. ‘Fuckin’ hand-held devices in all the patrol cars. She’d have had us all wearing GPS ankle bracelets before she was done, so she could tell where every one of us was all the time.’
Lottie smiled; she had a soft spot for her sergeant that she never showed to anyone else. While it was a little short of the truth to say that he was her only mentor. . Max Allan had been that also, if anyone ever was. . he had always been her strongest supporter, even though he had known from their earliest days as colleagues that he had plateaued, while she was on the rise.
‘I wouldn’t go quite that far,’ she said, ‘but aye, that’s along the lines I meant. Skinner, if he sticks around, he’ll change us too, but it’ll be far different from the Field model. And I’ll tell you something else, when it comes to CID, it will always go back to him. So, Danny my man, don’t you be under any illusions about who’s really heading this investigation, ’cos I’m not.’
‘Okay,’ he replied. ‘That’s ma card marked. So if Ah want to know what’s on that video Ah go an’ ask Skinner. That’s what ye’re saying, is it?’
‘Jesus!’ the DI exploded. ‘You’re as persistent as my wee Jakey. I never said I wouldn’t tell you. The recording shows four people being shot. Three of them are dead, and Barry Auger could be left in a wheelchair.’ She described it in detail, as she had done to her husband a few hours earlier. ‘Don’t feel left out because you haven’t seen it, Danny. I wish I hadn’t. Poor Barry and Sandy, they never had a chance.’
‘So much for body armour,’ the sergeant muttered.
‘It’s no’ going to stop a bullet at close range,’ Mann replied. ‘Anyway, Sandy was shot in the head, twice. He was a goner before he hit the ground. The guy Smit was getting ready to finish Barry when Skinner and the other bloke arrived.’
‘Aye, the other bloke. What about him?’
‘Not one of ours. Youngish bloke, maybe mixed race, looked military.’
‘You’re kidding,’ the DS exclaimed. ‘When I was coming in, there was a bloke just like that at reception, and I heard him ask for the chief constable’s office. Light brown skin, dark hair, creases in his trousers, shiny shoes; a fuckin’ soldier for sure. Who is he? What is he?’
‘Skinner hasn’t said outright, but you can bet he’s MI5. I know they’ve got a regional presence in Glasgow but I’ve never heard of them being involved with us before.’
‘So how come they were this time?’
‘The chief had an investigation going in Edinburgh, and this man got pulled in.’
‘Linked to this one?’ Provan asked.
‘Aye. They’ve got a man in custody, the arms supplier.’ She held up a hand. ‘Before you get excited, he knows nothing that’s going to help us. I just had a call from an ACC in Edinburgh. He told me he just finished interrogating him and he’s satisfied he’s not holding anything back.’
‘So the only possible line of investigation we’ve got are the uniforms they wore.’
‘Right enough; and the fact that they were ours, not fakes,’ she confirmed. ‘But that’s not going to be general knowledge either, Danny. If Smit and Botha did indeed have an inside contact, we know one thing, he’ll be on his guard. We have to be careful.’
‘Agreed, but can Ah ask, how certain are we they’re frae inside?’
‘Every single item that we found was what an officer would wear or carry, yet they came from a range of suppliers. If they got them anywhere else they’d have had to know who every one of those is, and some of that stuff isn’t public knowledge, not even under Freedom of Information rules. But it’s the CS spray that’s the clincher; that stuff’s military, and each canister has a serial number. We know that the two we found came from our store, because the numbers are in sequence and they were missing from the stock.’
‘Right. How do we handle it?’
‘Quietly,’ Mann declared. ‘All police equipment’s held in a secure store in Paisley. Operationally, ACC Thomas has oversight of all supplies. He checked on the numbers for me personally. . he let me know it was a big favour, mind. . and he’s agreed that we can interview the civilian manager, as long as we’re discreet. We’re off to Paisley, first up tomorrow morning.’
‘Just the two of us?’
‘Absolutely,’ the DI replied. ‘Discreet is the word.’
Provan nodded. ‘Fair enough. Now, there’s one other thing that Ah’ve been wondering, a question I haven’t heard anyone raise since last night.’
‘What’s that?’
‘How did these two fellas get there, and how were they plannin’ tae get away? This was a well-planned operation, so I doubt they were going down tae the Central Station to catch the London train.’
Lottie Mann’s eyes widened. ‘You know, Dan, life’s really not fair. You should be the DI, not me. Smit and Botha had nothing on them, nothing at all. No ID of any sort, no wallets, no car keys, nothing.’
‘In that case, Lottie,’ the DS chuckled, ‘maybe Ah should be chief constable, for if the new guy really is runnin’ this investigation like you say, then he’s missed it as well.’
Fifteen
Clyde Houseman’s face grew even more pink, but with embarrassment.
‘Come on,’ Skinner snapped. ‘Out with it.’
‘I’m sorry, sir,’ the man replied, ‘but it’s like this. I’m a Security Service officer, and what we were involved in yesterday. . well, I felt at the time it was one of our operations, and not police, and when I was sent to see you yesterday, by my boss, it was on the basis of bringing you inside, not deferring to you.’
‘And you kept thinking that way even though three of our people had been shot?’ the chief constable countered.
‘Even though. I’d just taken someone down myself, and in those circumstances it was my duty to protect the interests of my service: standard practice. So I did what I did. I meant to report to my deputy director straight away, but I was caught up in the situation and couldn’t. I tried to call her this morning, but so far I haven’t been able to raise her, and I don’t want to go anywhere else. She’s my immediate boss.’
‘Even Amanda Dennis has to turn her phone off some time,’ Skinner said. ‘Clyde,’ he continued, ‘I understand what you’re saying, but I’m not buying it. Like it or not, this was a very public crime and the investigation has to be seen to be thorough. I can’t have you withholding evidence. So come on, man, and remember this: I’ve already protected the interests of your service. Only one police officer has seen that tape of you and me taking care of the South Africans, and that’s how it’s going to stay. She’s assuming that I’ve given it to the procurator fiscal, the prosecutor’s office, because I let her believe that, but in fact it’s still in my desk. The deputy fiscal in charge of the investigation knows about it, because I’ve told him; he understands the sensitivity and he’s prepared to forget that it ever existed.’
‘Where is it now?’
‘Locked in my desk, for now, till somebody comes up with the combination of the bloody safe that Toni Field left behind.’
‘Thank you for that,’ Houseman murmured. ‘But do you trust your people? Leaks can happen, and the last thing that either of us wants is for that video to wind up on YouTube.’
‘At the moment, I trust them more than I trust you,’ Skinner pointed out, ‘and I will until you cough up what you took from Smit’s body. Look, I don’t want to, but I will bypass Amanda and go to your director if I have to, even though he is a buffoon.’