‘When did he bring it back?’ the DCI asked.
‘Dinna ken. It was there next mornin’, and the keys were on the kitchen table.’
‘So you remember that?’
‘Oh aye, Ah mind,’ he replied firmly.
‘Why so vividly, if it was just another Saturday morning?’
‘Dinnae ken.’
Haddock leaned forward. ‘Was it because you went outside and saw the dent in the front offside wing?’
Francey looked away. ‘What dent?’ he muttered.
‘Wrong answer, Chic; the correct answer is “Yes, Sergeant”. We know that on the evening of December twenty-seventh, your van knocked down and killed Hector Mackail in Station Road. We can match the scrape that you never bothered to have repaired to paint on the wall where he was crushed. We can match fibres that were still embedded in that mark when our scientists examined it to the coat that Mr Mackail was wearing when he was killed. We can place your son at the scene from DNA traces left on cigarette ends found there. We can’t place you there, but if you carry on denying knowledge of the damage to your van, we might be inclined to think you knew what it had been used for.’
‘Ah never!’ Francey protested. ‘Aye okay, Ah saw the dent. Who wouldnae? Ah asked Dino how it got there, and he said he skidded on the road intae Aberlady. It’s easy done there in the winter, ask anybody.’ He paused, and resumed his study of the table, and the scratches left on it by previous visitors. ‘Anyway,’ he muttered, ‘what does it matter? Dino’s deid, and the other fella’s no’ comin’ back, so . . .’
‘It matters,’ Pye told him, ‘because it wasn’t an accident. Your son used your van to kill Mr Mackail, quite deliberately. We believe he was paid to do so, just as we believe he was paid to abduct the dead child Zena Gates, and keep her for a couple of weeks in a rented cottage. We need to know who paid him.’
‘Well, don’t look at me! This is all fuckin’ news tae me! Why would anybody want tae do all that?’
‘We’re still working on why. There may be no connection between the two crimes; that’s still conceivable. Dean may have had his own reasons for killing Mr Mackail. Did they have any sort of relationship, any contact that you know of?’
‘No,’ Francey replied. ‘Dean didnae even know the man.’
‘How can you be so sure?’
‘The time the lassie and the boy Maxwell came for the lobster and he gie’d her the crab, he said tae her when she was leaving, “Tell your faither if he wants a part-time job he can come out on the boat wi’ us.” The lassie just laughed. I asked Dino what that was a’ aboot, and he said her faither had been in the Navy. Then Ah asked him, “Have ye met him, like?” and he said, “Naw never, but Hazel telt me.” That’s how Ah can be sure, pal.’
‘We can check that with Mrs Mackail and her daughter,’ Haddock warned.
‘Check all yis fuckin’ like. It’s the truth Ah’m tellin’ yis.’ He pushed his chair back. ‘Can Ah go now? Ah’ve had enough of this shite.’
‘Sure,’ the DS replied. ‘You can go. You’ve always been here voluntarily.’
‘And can Ah get ma van back?’
‘That’s different. Your van has a special status; it’s a murder weapon in an open investigation, and we’ll need to keep it until it’s closed.’
‘What am Ah going tae do for ma work?’ Francey protested.
Pye shrugged. ‘The same as you’d do if it broke down: buy or hire another. This interview is over,’ he said, switching off the recorder and the video.
‘Bastards,’ the fisherman muttered.
‘That may be,’ the DCI retorted, ‘but it has nothing to do with us holding on to your van.’
‘And ma boy? When dae Ah get him back?’
‘I’m afraid that’s up to the fiscal’s office, not us. But it won’t be before we’ve arrested the person who shot him.’
‘Then get a fuckin’ move on.’ He looked at the DCI, and the faintest of grins touched the corner of his mouth. ‘Dae ye think Ah’ll get a discount on the cremation?’
Fifty-Two
‘What a nice man,’ Haddock said, as he and Pye watched Francey walk down the driveway of the police office, from their vantage point in the CID suite.
‘A gem,’ Pye agreed. ‘When all this is over, we must set the Trading Standards people on him. I’m sure they’ll be interested in him selling frozen fish as fresh.’
‘When all this is over we might be working for Trading Standards. I hate to point this out, boss, but we’ve just made a rod for our own backs. We were under pressure already to close one major inquiry, and now we’ve gone and opened another.’
‘Do you take pleasure in ruining my day, Sauce? Have we got any positives?’ He moved across to Dickson, who was working at his desk. ‘What about Dino’s stash of cash, Walter? Have forensics come up with anything on that?’
‘No, sir,’ the DC replied, mournfully. ‘As you’d expect from old banknotes, they’re a whole database of fingerprints in themselves. They found Dean Francey’s prints on the notes on the outside, but nothing else they can match to anybody. There were prints overlaying prints, making it virtually impossible to come up with anything for comparison with the central register.’
‘Great,’ Pye moaned.
‘There was one oddity though,’ Dickson continued. ‘You got excited by the Clydesdale Bank connection, I know, but when the bundle was opened up, they found that there was only a hundred quid in those notes, together on top. The rest were all Bank of England; a mix of tens and twenties. You were right about the total though; five thousand.’
‘Where’s the oddity?’ Haddock asked.
‘This is Scotland, Sarge. If you draw a large amount of currency from a bank here, even if you ask for it in used notes, you’re likely to get predominantly Scottish issue. So doesn’t that indicate that the bulk of that money came from south of the border?’
The DS nodded. ‘Probably it does. But does that take us one step forward, Walter? No, it doesn’t.’
‘However,’ Pye began, then stopped.
His team gazed at him, waiting.
‘However what?’ Haddock said
‘Quiet, I’m thinking.’ He walked back towards the window, then turned, retracing his steps, beckoning the sergeant to follow him into his office. ‘We live in the age of money-laundering, right?’
‘And then some,’ his colleague agreed. ‘So?’
‘So, if you were putting together a pile of cash for illicit purposes, as in to pay a hit man, would you go to the bank for it? And suppose you did, would you ask specifically for old cash?’
‘Probably not, gaffer.’
‘No, Sauce, certainly not. But here we have the best part of five grand in old notes, almost exclusively with the Queen’s head on the front, not Sir Walter Scott or some other figure from Scottish history like we have on our money. That’s suggesting two things to me: one, that the cash Dino was paid with wasn’t exactly legitimate and two, that as the other Walter suggested, it was obtained in England.’
Haddock walked to each of the four corners of the small room, peering into each with his hand shading his eyes.
‘What the hell are you doing?’ Pye asked.
‘I’m looking for a straw you haven’t clutched at yet.’
‘Fuck!’ the DCI shouted as he slumped into his chair. ‘If you weren’t my mate, I’d have you on points duty.’
‘Sorry, Sammy,’ the DS said, ‘but that’s what it sounded like. The money’s not going to take us anywhere, other than in ever-decreasing circles, until we disappear up our own arses.’
‘I know,’ Pye sighed. ‘But what have we got? All I can see is the end of the tunnel, and the only light’s an oncoming train.’
‘That may well be, but there’s still one line of inquiry that we haven’t explored, one strand that links our two crimes. We’ve got two victims, the Gates family and now the Mackails; and in each one the father was, or is, in the Navy. Do they connect, and if so, how?’
The DCI pulled himself up in his chair. ‘You’re right, of course,’ he said. ‘I’m tired and I’m under pressure. Thanks, Sauce, I needed that kick up the arse.’ He paused, frowning. ‘We should check Mackail’s Navy background, but let’s not get too excited. The two families were connected professionally; if the two men did know each other in the Navy and kept in touch afterwards, yes, I can see where that could have led Grete to work for Hector, but the likelihood is that the link extends no further than that.’