Sarah met them in the hall; she had a document pouch in her hand, and looked in surprise at the torch Bob held in his. 'We'll be back in a minute, love,' he told her. 'We're just going up to the Shearers' place.'
He led Mcllhenney out into the bright night, down his long driveway and into Hill Road. Halfway up the steeply-rising street he stopped at a gateway; it led to a big bungalow, modern, like his own, in contrast to the great stone houses which climbed the hillside and which were silhouetted all around against the shining blue sky… until the glare of a security light obliterated everything else.
Diddler's outer door was locked, and the house was in darkness. The door was solid, with no glass panels. Skinner pushed the letter-box open and shone his torch through it. 'Fuck,' he swore quietly. 'There are newspapers all over the place; and one of them's the Sunday Times. Nobody's been here since the weekend.
'I don't like this. The Diddler might be a fucking wee sweetie-wife at times, but he's a good bloke and I am worried about him.'
'Where else could he be?' his assistant asked.
'He and Edith have a place in the south of France; conceivably they could be there. But what isn't conceivable is that none of us knew about it. The Diddler has never missed a Thursday night without letting Benny Crossley, or Davie McPhail, or me know in advance… and I mean never.
'We'd better have a look at that report.'
They ran back down the hill to Skinner's house. This time, Sarah was waiting in the kitchen, making a pot of coffee, simply to have something to do. The Floater file was lying on the work surface; Bob picked it up and took out the report. 'Does this mention old scars and other distinguishing marks?' he asked.
'Yes. Right there on the first page. The body had an appendectomy scar, and that's it, apart from a fairly unusual blood type.'
'Any sign of a healed fracture of the right big toe, about seven years old?'
'The right big toe was missing. Severed. Look, you two, what is this? You've just been to Shearer's place. You don't think that man could be the Diddler, do you?'
Mcllhenney took a folded newspaper from his back pocket and handed it to her. She stared at the image on the front page; slowly her eyes seemed to widen. 'My God,' she whispered. 'I see what you mean. And I helped prepare this picture, too. Yet it never occurred to me.'
'Where's the body now?' Bob asked.
'It'll still be in the mortuary at the Royal Infirmary, I imagine. But Bob, you will not be able to identify it; take a look at the photographs in there if you don't believe me.'
He did as she suggested, taking the big colour prints from the pouch, and wincing as he looked through them. 'I believe you,' he muttered, at last. 'We'll need DNA testing, Neil. The trouble is we'll need something from the Diddler to make the comparison. That means we'll need to get into the house, to look for hairs off pillows and the like.'
'And Edith's in St. Tropez with Victoria, their daughter,' said Sarah. 'I met her in the village last week and she told me they were going, now that the Highers are over.'
'Shit. We'll need her approval to get into the house: last thing I want is to scare the woman before we're certain that the wee bugger isn't shacked up somewhere, up to his old tricks.'
He took the coffee which Sarah handed him. 'Look, we're not going to catch any killers tonight. You get back to the kids, Neil, I'll phone Dan Pringle and tell him to meet me in his office at eight sharp tomorrow.'
Mcllhenney grinned. 'That should be an interesting phone call. Where we have the football on a Thursday night, Superintendent Pringle has the Masons: and Superintendent Pringle likes a drink.'
37
Karen Neville drove quietly along the narrow street. She took a deep breath as she saw the red MGF parked in the driveway. It was after midnight; she had thought it over several times, indeed she was still thinking it over, but she was there.
To hell with what he might have to tell her, or ask her. There were things that she needed to say to him, and she couldn't hold them inside over another long, lonely weekend.
Things like the way he had misread her, and how it wasn't his fault since she had misread herself. Things about stability and the need to stop being a human mayfly, before June came along and there were few options left, and even less future. Things about this bloody office situation and how untenable it was becoming for her, calling him 'Sir', or 'Boss', or 'Mr Martin' in front of other people. Christ, it was a wonder she had never said 'Thank you, sir,' as he had come inside her, 'Thank you for the part of yourself you've given me, the only part you ever give.'
That was at the heart of it: most of all she had to tell him outright that theirs was a taking relationship on both sides, with little or no giving at all, and that she could not go on that way. She couldn't go on being his safe house away from the demons, even if that meant that he could no longer provide the self-same comfort for her.
She didn't know what she was going to say to him after that, other than 'I quit: everything, as of now. Goodbye.'
Or maybe she would simply speak the truth and say, 'I'm sorry, Andy, but I love you.'
She took another deep breath as she parked in front of his car, blocking his driveway. The house was in darkness, but she knew that his bedroom and living room were on the far side. She pressed the door buzzer, hearing it sound inside. She waited; and she waited. She rang again, longer this time, in case he was asleep, although she knew he never slept all that deeply. Still she waited until the picture began to form in her head.
Why was his car in the driveway and not in the garage? Was there another car in there?
Andy, not asleep. Andy, not alone. Andy, with this week's blonde. Or maybe Ruth McConnell… or maybe Alex. Was he really over her? Would he ever be?
Yes, she got the picture.
Her nerve failed her. She walked away from his front door, climbed back into her car, turned on the engine and then, as quietly as she could, Karen Neville drove away.
38
He tried, but he couldn't; he couldn't think about his life. Only about his death, only about that bloody great gun and the cold, thin man who had been pointing it at him all night. It looked pretty old, a Webley service revolver maybe, or an American Colt, the sort of wartime souvenir that had been handed in by the thousands at firearms amnesties over the last fifty years.
It may have been a museum piece, but Martin was in no doubt that it was in working order. Lawrence Scotland knew his firearms; he'd had plenty of practice during his years as a consultant to the Irish Loyalists and to the late and infrequently lamented Tony Manson. A heavy calibre job; point four five, probably. For a second too long he found himself imagining what one of those would do to his head, how much of it would be left.
He had seen a murder victim once, years back, where a heavy weapon like that one had been pressed to the victim's temple. Contact wound; explosive, hardly anything left in the cranium. He thought of JFK and the apparent mystery of what had happened to his brain, when his body had arrived at the Dallas hospital. Where was the mystery? It was all over Jackie!
I wonder who '11 identify me. Bob maybe, poor bugger. Not my dad though, please not him. Altogether too old for that; it would kill him. He pictured a funeral; solemn people in black suits. His parents supported by his younger brother,
David, and his wife Caitlin. Bob, Jim Elder, Proud Jimmy in uniform… Don't wear uniform, Bob, not for me. I know how much you hate it… Sarah, and Alex, near the front. Karen, a row further back with Sammy and Neil. Mario and Maggie…
Stop it, Martin, he shouted at himself, inside his head. This man only has your body captive. Let him take your mind and you really are dead. If he does what you think he's going to do, you have some sort of a chance. He's your enemy, he's the other team, and what do you do to them? That's right: you smash them into the fucking ground, ruck the bastards till they howl for their mothers. You 're going to get this guy with whatever you have and you 're going to hear his last pathetic gasp.